The WORKERS AID TO BOSNIA convoy. is now in Slovenia. Aid has already been distributed to refugee camps in Croatia, as the convoy fights to get to Tuzla, a key centre of the Bosnian working class. The worsening military situation means getting into Bosnia cannot be guaranteed. But whether or not the CONVOY convoy gets into Bosnia now, or whether its food, clothing and medical equipment go to refugees or into Bosnia at a later date, the convoy is already a success. Socialist Outlook editorial board member ALAN THORNETT reports from the convoy. AT THE TIME of writing the Workers Aid convoy is in Zagreb campaigning for UN troops (UNPROFOR) to provide protection through the front lines into Bosnia and on to Tuzla. Workers Aid to Bosnia NATIONAL CONFERENCE Saturday 30 October 11am Manchester Town Hall All supporters of the campaign are welcome to attend: £5 waged/ £3 concessions A campaign has been mounted throughout Europe -supported by British MPs, Euro-MPs, trade unions, and trade union federations in both France and Italy to urge UNPROFOR to give the convoy the • necessary protection.
The convoy represents an important working class response to the plight of the Bosnian people and to genocide and 'ethnic cleansing' in the ex-YugoslaV12.
Refugee camps
Four lorry loads of aid have already been taken to three Bosnian refugee camps in Croatia and an orphanage for refugee children.
The response to the convoy in Britain is already known to readers of Socialist Outlook -more material aid was collected from Dundee to Dover than could be packed into the ten lorries which crossed the Channel. The response throughout Europe was similar.
In Paris the convoy was supported by the Mayor of Montrueil, a member of the French Comunist Party, who provided facilities and accommodation.
Important sections of the CGT union federation supported the convoy, and a stall was provided at the French CP's Humanité fete.
From Paris the convoy split into three to conduct extra meetings and campaigning. Between them they covered Nancy, Lille, Besancon, Strasbourg and Thionville in France; to Antwerp, Coutria, Charleroi and Liege in Belgium; Berlin, Oberhausen, Hanover, Hamburg and Munich in Germany, Vienna and Graz in Austria; Geneva and Basel in Switzerland and Brescia in Italy.
Publicity for the convoy in most countries was much better than we were able to achieve in Britain. In Belgium, for example, the progress of the convoy appeared on each hourly news broadcast.
By the time the convoy reached the ex-Yugoslavia it had almost doubled in size. Two heavy lorries joined from Sweden, two lorries from Belgium, two from Italy, one from Hungary and a mini-bus from Denmark.
Big sums of money had also been raised in the campaigns in the various countries; £4,000 in Italy, £11,000 in Sweden and €10,000 in Denmark - much of this from the labour movement. Fourth International In Europe sections and supporters of the Fourth International have been a key force for the convoy's campaign:The sections involved were the LCR in France, the Socialist Party in Sweden (working together with the Syndicalist Union, which has 15,000 members and provided the bulk of the aid, the Workers Socialist Party in Belgium, the Socialist Workers Party in Denmark, and the Bandiera Rossa current inside the Refoundation Communists in Italy. In Germany support was also organised through supporters of the FI.
The first base in ex-Yugoslavia was established in Jesenice in Slovenia by International Workers Aid. It could not have been better placed. Jesenice is a small town with a big steel plant (threatened with closure), a strong trade union movement and an 80 per cent Bosnian population.
The local unions could hardly have given the convoy more support, providing an office, phone and a fax and a warehouse for the surplus aid.
The president of the steel union addressed the convoy and many of the steel workers came to meet us. The local media gave the convoy wide coverage.
Contact was made in Zagreb with the biggest independent trade union in Croatia - the Union of Autotomous Trade Unions of Croatia - with 900,000 members covering a range of industries including coal mining.
A delegation from the convoy met Jasna Petrovic, the coordinator of the union's International Department, and others from the union's leadership.
Backing Bosnia Remarkably (even though the majority of their delegation were Serbs) the union supports the Bosnian people, even to the extent of calling the lifting of the arms embargo.
They run a programme getting aid to refugees on a multi-ethnic basis. They are fighting the Croatian government over the introduction of anti-union laws.
As with the unions in Jesenice, they gave the convoy maximum support. Among other things, they got the convoy access to a meeting with both the Croatian and Bosnian authorities at foreign ministry level to discuss safe passage through the war-zones to Tuzla.
At the same time a delegation from the convoy then went to tic coast, and partly isolated by military action. There we met an Italian convoy of 86 vehicles which has been held up for six months trying to get through to Its problems were different to ours because the drivers are Bosnian - a major additional reason why they were not being.. let through.
The drivers are trapped in a car park they are unable to leave, sitting under a notice saying "The World Forgot Us'. We were able to tell them that we had arranged for their plight to be raised at our meeting with the Bosnian and Croatian authorities.
With no progress in the fight to make UNPROFOR guard the convoy, a protest meeting and a press conference were held last Friday outside the UN HQ in Zagreb.
If this is not successful in persuading the authorities to escort the convoy, there are important decisions to make.
Positive options
Even if the military situation still makes a journey to Tuzla impossible there are several other positive options. More aid could be taken to Bosnian refugee camps in Croatia which desperately need it; or aid could be taken to Bosnian towns in Croatian-occupied Bosnia, which are a desperate situation; or it could be put in the warehouses of the Tuzla Centre in Zagreb and taken in as soon as there is an opening.
These options, although they would fall short of the original objective, fully reflect the objectives of the campaign which is to take aid to Bosnian victims of the war, as an act of political solidarity with the Bosnian people from the working class of Europe.
This has already been achieved in a way far more successful than could have been envisaged. In particular the convoy has made much stronger links with the unions in the ex-Yugoslavia than anyone could have expected.
The challenge now is to consolidate this campaign into an ongoing solidarity campaign on a European level, with the working class of Bosnia and the workers' organisations throughout ex-Yugoslavia.
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No. 50, October 9 1993, Page 3