GIs face death penalty AMERICAN GIs who refused to serve in the Gulf war continue to face repression, and in some cases, the death penalty. Eighteen of the war resisters are now incarcerated in US military prisons for up to two years.
But corporal Tahan Jones - one of the most prominent in the campaign against the warhas now been threatened with the death penalty. After turning himself in on May 15 lones was charged with 'desertion in time of war' without warning.
Jones is one of three faced with this threat - gut of an estimated 2,500 Gls who resisted participation in Operation Desert Storm. It is now quite clear that those singled out for the heaviest repression are those that were most vocal in their opposition to the US war-drive. The penalties are entirely unrelated to the gravity' of the offence.
Anti-war activists in the USA have been mobilising a campaign in defence of the resisters, in an attempt to counter the persistent denial of the Gl's rights by the military authorities. Recent protests have included a letter signed by 33 catholic bishops, supporting not only 'religious conscientious objectors, but all those opposed to 'unjust' wars.
June 22, 1991 No. 4 by Slavyna and Adam Novak POLICE recently attacked a demonstration against the General Exhibition in Czechoslovakia, and arrested two young anarchists after an argument. Many of the demonstrators jured.
The police were called to the scene by the organisers of the exhibition, get rid troublesome demonstrators'.
The demonstrators saw the exhibition as an expensive shop-window display of the new Czechoslovakia - but the emperor has no clothes.
This demonstration of around a hundred school students and workers was called by Prague anarchist groups. Thev reiect propaganda in favour of the restoration of capitalism, as well as current, pathetic attempt to attract foreign capital. A further demonstration, protesting against police violence as well as the Exhibition, was called a young week later. The protestors were in- also demanded withdrawal of all charges against those arrested week earlier. keen to The vast majority had of these respected the organisers' advice: don't come armed, don t eive tne cops any excuses! But any hope of a peaceful rally disappeared after a few minutes: 150 skinheads armed with beer bottles and batons charged at the demonstrators in what was clearly ganised assault. They disyoung numbers were injured. The police, normally always in evidence on anarthe chist demonstrations, were late in turning out this time. When they did, they aimed straight for the anarchists, arresting quite a number. Even Jiri iri Exner, deputy mayor of Prague, said 'ÎfI'd seen such a thing two years the ago, l'a have concluded that the skinheads were paid by the policé. This rolé of the police confirms a tendency that has become increasingly clear over the last few months. This involves ignoring racist, anti-gay and anti-left attacks by skinheads, while victimising anarchist groups. Allowing the skinheads an or- to attack these largely inexperienced young people is intended to give a clear any such group going beyond small díscussion meetings will be stopped.
The young skinheads were wearing fascist insignia and military uniforms, and carried the German flag with the slogan 'Deutschland über alles' They speak of 'cleaning' the streets of Prague of 'all this vermin' - travellers, the unemployed, the left, lesbians and gay men, apparatchniks.
The young anarchists need to draw the conclusions from these attacks and adopt a policy of self-defence.
But the left also needs to defend the anarchists' right, and by extension their own right, to demonstrate their views in the face of a rise in the far right and police brutality.
Kurdistan"
The Kurdish national struggle has achieved considerable prominence in recent months. But as the refugee crisis gradually fades from the public eye, the Kurds remain a dispossessed people. Patrick Baker of Socialist Outlook asked SEYFI CENGIZ of the Kurdistan Communist Movement how the struggle for national liberation could be resolved.
Patrick Baker: Imperialism allowed Saddam's regime to beat back the Kurdish uprising. though the peshmergas still control some of that area. What effect has this had on the Kurdish struggle in Iraq?
Seyfi Cengiz: Let me explain imperialism's attitude towards the Kurdish question and the latest uprising. In the past it tried to use the Kurds against Iraq, a country that was friendly with the Soviet Union, unlike the Shah's Iran or Turkey.
They only supported the Kurds with the aim of weakening Saddam, and bringing him closer to the West. Neither Turkey nor Syria want any kind of 'Kurdish solution' - whether a federation or autonomy - be cause they're frightened it would be an example to the Kurds in their country.
During the war, the US tried to use the Kurds as a threat, to get the Ba'ath regime and the army to oust Saddam. wanted a movement from above, notbelow. But the Kurds took Bush at his word. then let them be defeated -when no military coup. curred, they preferred Saddam to the Kurds.
PB: So Saddam has tabilised his regime. Are the Kurds more or less confident after the rising?
SC: The Iraqi Kurds have gained nothing from this defeat. Their level of organisation has not improved, their morale is low. The situation is now completely under western imperialist control. The fate of the Kurds is in their hands.
Both the KDP and the PUK, the main components of the Iraqi Kurdish Front, are bourgeois parties; they do not rely on the masses of Kurdistan or the surrounding area. They always try to use one government International News against another - whether it's Iran against Iraq or the US against Saddam. This is why they supported the West in the Gulf war.
PB: So what is the sig still does! The only point of discluded in the autoromous I'he talks will not lead to any a relatively weak position. promises of autonomy betore -PB: What effect did the defeat gle in Turkey, after Ozal's reforms and the recent struggles against his regime?
SC: An uprising began sponbefore the beginning of the civil independently of else. This rising continued and The effect was considerable. area ceased - small businesses autonomy since 1970 - and he Kurds forced to guard their mountain territory But the rising died away when and was put down by Turkish troops. The last town to fall to April 4. The Kurds in Turkey back and allowed Saddam to PB: How do the Kurds go forward from here? Do the reforms SC: The problem is that the perspective of both the PUK and the KDP is always limited Thus Talebani appealed to Ozal Iraq, while Ozal was suppressing the Kurdish uprising in But this method - always aptions - gets nowhere. Each state PHOTO: David Stewart-Smith (Insight)
The only possibility of a soluunification, and this requires a throughout the region. whole of the nation, though it is Wecame out of a split in 1990 of the nationalist organisation The Struggle, which waged the the Turkish state in the early workers party throughout KurFor more information about the KCM contact: Seyfi Cengiz, Stoke Newington Common, Lon-