AROUND THE WORLD
Kurdistan Kurds demonstrate in Syria THE KURDISH people suffers every form of oppression - national, cultural, social and economic - at the hands of the four Middle Eastern states that occupy parts of its land, Kurdistan.
The governments of Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria - four dictatorships, as it happens - have employed every means of repression in the attempt to suppress the demands of the Kurdish people for independence and liberty. Despite this, the liberation movement in Kurdistan keeps raising its head in the various parts of the Kurdish land.
Today, it is in Syria that the Kurdish national struggle, severely repressed in the other three coun tries, has just manifested itself in a spectacular way.
On March 21, on the occasion of the national day of the Kurdish people, "Neroz" [the New Year of Iranic civilization, which coincides with the beginning of spring], clashes occurred between the Syrian repressive forces and the Kurdish masses in the Kurdish regions of Syria and in Damascus itself, where there is a large Kurdish community, made up mainly of workers and students.
In the localities of Qamichly and Derik, the police repressed mass gatherings and made about 20 arrests. This repression sparked new demonstrations. In Kobanie, Afrine, Rajo, Jenderis, and other places, new clashes occurred between demonstrators and police. A young girl was killed and four men were wounded. Four police, including an officer, were also wounded.
It was in Damascus itself that the biggest challenge was thrown in the face of the Baathist dictatorship. Kurdish workers and students, as well as left-wing Arab activists, organized a demonstration that headed toward the presidential palace of Hafez al-Assad.
Police, riot troops and agents of the intelligence services blocked the route. A clash followed, in which a young worker, Suleiman Amine, was killed and eight other demonstrators were wounded.
The demonstration then swelled and set off for downtown Damascus. The regime turned to the Kurdish reformist parties and the Syrian Communist Party to get them to try 26 to calm the demonstrators.
Wissal Farhe, a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, of Kurdish origin, addressed the crowd, calling on it to avoid any action that might "harm the reputation of the national government." Only the Communist Action Party of Syria joined the demonstrators.
This is the first time that the Kurdish masses of Syria have shouted slogans such as "Long live Kurdistan! Down with the exploiters!" It will not be the last. Belgium Miners begin all-out strike ON MONDAY, April 21, 18,000 coal-miners from the pits in Limbourg, Flanders, began an indefinite all-out strike in response to the refusal of the Martens government to give assurances of no pit closures or job - losses.
In the context of a massive austerity drive being waged by the government against the working class, the recent discussions of the national budget have centred on slashing public subsidies - an attack that will undoubtedly mean massive job losses and closures in the five remaining coal-mines in Belgium.
The striking miners are demanding no closures, no redundancies and no job losses from natural wastage.
The union leaderships were forced to call the strike after workers at two pits took unofficial spontaneous strike action to fight for their jobs. The Limbourg district, which contains all five pits, already has 60,000 workers on the dole.
National and local solidarity committees have sprung up in support of the strikers. Indicative of the support for the miners' demands was a 20,000-strong demonstration held on April 12 - two weeks before the strike began.
The Parti Ouvrier Socialiste/Socialistische Arbeiders Partij (Socialist Workers Party, Belgian section of the Fourth International) has begun a national campaign to build support for the strike and is fully involved in the solidarity committees.
International solidarity will be crucial. Readers of IV can contact the local Winterslag pit strike committee for information and to send messages of support at the following address: Comite de Greve Winterslag, Turksa Zereniging, Herenstraat 16, 3600 Genk.
France Defend Martine Toulotte A RECENT CASE in Grenoble, France, shows how the current wave of anti-terrorist hysteria can be used to attack the left. On February 19, Martine Thibaud Toulotte - a member of the LCR (Ligue Communiste Revolutionnaire, French section of the Fourth International) was arrested and imprisoned on the instruction of a magistrate and charged with "harbouring wanted men"
Martine has now been in prison for two months without trial. Usually in cases of this kind the accused would automatically be released on bail. Her crime is that she put up presumed members of the Lebanese group, FARL (Lebanese Revolutionary Armed Faction) and in particular one of its leading members, George Ibrahim Abdallah, in her home. At the time she is supposed to have lodged these presumed members of FARL, they were not even suspects! About one year ago Martine was questioned by police on the same charges and released.
Martine is a well-known activist in the Grenoble area, where she lives with her three children. In the last twenty years she has participated in various committees in solidarity with struggles in the Third World including in the Middle East. She is known nationally in the CGT (one of the three major trade-union federations in France) and before her arrest was active in the anti-racist movement. She stood as an LCR candidate in the French general elections. Of course Martine has no connection with terrorist organizations and shares the position of the LCR on terrorism.
International Viewpoint 5 May 1986
Her arrest and imprisonment have brought protests from wide sections of the labour movement locally, including the Communist Party, the Socialist Party, the CFDT (the Socialist Party-dominated trade-union federation), the CGT, Lutte Ouvriere and local anti-imperialist, ecologist and women's organizations.
It is important that voices of protest begin to make themselves heard internationally against this detention without trial and for Mar tine's immediate release.
A national campaign has been launched to demand Martine's release. For more information write to Collectif de defense de Martine Toulotte, Maison des Associations 2 rue Berthe-de-Boissieux, Boite 309, rue 38, 000 Grenoble.
Send letters of protest to: Procureur de la Republique de Paris, 4 boulevard du Palais, 75004 Paris.
To show Martine that she is getting international support, write to her yourself or get your organization or trade union to write to: Martine Toulotte, numero d'ecrou 16 891K, Maison d'arret de Fleury-Merogis, 91 700 Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois, France.
Errata
A translating error slipped into the introduction of the document by
"Politikus," which was part of our feature on debates in the East European peace movement in International Viewpoint, No. 95, March 24, page 21. In the first line of the introduction, it shouid have said that it was "Politikus' " article that was written from a clearly pro-
Western point of view, and not the Prague Appeal.
Chile Students shot GENERAL PINOCHET's troops and police are stepping up their repression of dissidents. On Tuesday, April 22 riot police opened fire on students demonstrating against the dictator's visit to Tumuco, an agricultural city in soutern Chile.
At least five demonstrators were wounded and over 60 arrests were made.
A week earlier, in Santiago, the police and the army occupied the capital's universities for four days attacking students who were demonstrating for a democratic university system and against the expulsion of professors victimized by the dictatorship.
Both the Association of Professors and the Council of University Deans gave their support to the students. More than 600 arrests were made, with hundreds detained in prison.
70ь. 22
George Breitman GEORGE BREITMAN, the main survivor of the founding generation of Trotskyist leaders in the United States, died of a heart attack on April 19 in New York. He had long been suffering from acute degenerative arthritis, which left him completely incapacitated in the last months of his life.
Breitman joined the Trotskyist movement in 1935. In 1939, he was elected to the National Committee of the newly formed Socialist Workers Party. From 1941 to 1943, he was editor in chief of the SWP's newspaper, The Militant. He served in the army in Europe from 1944 to 1946.
While in Europe, Breitman participated in the political life of the European Trotskyist movement and in the Fourth International. At the first postwar conference of the world movement in 1946, he was one of the three participants from the United States.
From 1949 to 1954, he resumed his work in editing The Militant. In his later life, his outstanding accomplishments were his studies of the Black movement and his editing of the complete political writings of Trotsky in 14 volumes.
Breitman was expelled from the SWP at the end of 1983, in the context of a large number of expulsions. The 1985 World Congress of the Fourth International condemned his expulsion, as well as the others. (See "SWP (USA) rejects the organizational demands of the Twelfth World Congress," in IV, No. reles the organiz, on. He do of thed to till for Cis prisples in the framework of the Fourth Internationalist Tendency.
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