Posted on 01/16/2004 6:36:28 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
MUMBAI: Coming down heavily on US military campaign in Iraq and globalisation, the World Social Forum (WSF) began here on Friday night with a pledge to launch campaign for a new international order ensuring social justice at all levels.
Speakers from different countries urged the US and its allies to stop their show of power in various parts of the world and hand over Iraq to Iraqis while Indian anti-globalisation leaders criticised growing fundamentalism in the country in the context of post-Godhra riots in Gujarat.
Captain Laxmi Sehgal, the INA veteran, said globalisation was a danger and should be fought with full force to stop those trying it to impose it on the public.
Former prime minister V P Singh, in his message read out at the forum, said "another world" was a necessity and not merely a dream.
"There could be only one choice and that is of another world," he said, adding the exploitation, social indifference and communalism should be routed out and the time had come for doing it.
The fourth annual meeting of WSF, being held in Asia for the first time, has brought together thousands of people from 130 countries.
Social activist from Brazil Chico Whitaker, who is also the founder of WSF, said the forum had to challenge the political culture that was deepening in destroying the society. "We should continue with the common struggle for creating better world," he said.
Social activist and Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy said the "new imperialism" had emerged and a single empire, uni-polar economic and military hegemony was being imposed by the United States.
She raised the issue of attack on minority in Gujarat state and said "it was new racism and genocide that was being facilitated."
On the US' growing interference in the various parts of the world, Roy suggested that in the new resistance era its office spread over should be identified and forced to shut down.
Iraqi Democratic Front leader said that the US war against Iraq was nothing but a political weapon and a "new hegemonic method."
Time was running out, he said, adding the WSF should form a International crisis committee for Iraq and launch a counter attack on the US intentions.
British Labour Party leader Germie Coben said there was a need for change in mentality to form a world of social justice.
He said that the decision of US and UK on war against Iraq was cynical. "Imperialism and war have shown its brutality and it is time to get together for launching a struggle," Coben said.
Nobel laurate Shirin Ebadi of Iran appealed to the women community to oppose the male-dominated society and fight for an equal place. She asked the UN to send its delegation to the Palestine for giving political freedom to the citizens.
Abadi alleged the US was not allowing the Iraqi and Afghan citizens to exercise their fundamental rights.
Mustafa Bargoudi, Secretary of Democratic Palestine Civil Society, called for rescuing Palestine citizens from the suffering they are going through.
The fourth World Social Forum opened here on Friday with a call to end the "American occupation of Iraq" and restore that country's control to its people.
Arundhati Roy set the tone for the evening, stressing that it was not enough to express solidarity with Iraqi people. Calling for direct action against the US, which had entered Iraq for its imperialist interests, she said: "Let's us decide here in Mumbai to identify at least two American corporations which have benefited from Iraq's destruction, and force them to shut down operations."
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Communist activities in Mumbai peaking
By: Binoo Nair
January 16, 2004
These are important days for the communist trackers of Mumbai police.
In a week of socialist protest that starts today at Goregaon, the World Social Forum (WSF), the Mumbai Resistance (MR) 2004 and the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Red Flag, three parties who swear by red in different shades, will be conducting anti-globalisation seminars in the city.
Consequently, after a dormant 15 years following the assassination of trade union leader Datta Samant in 1997 and the death of textile mill unionism by the early 1990s, communist activities in the city are now peaking.
Police officers are once again poring over old files and manuscripts to track the communist elements. Helping the police are a group of ‘watchers’ — undercover cops who spy on communists and Naxalites, from places stretching from Bihar to Andhra Pradesh. Some of these watchers operate so secretly that they remain unidentified even to Mumbai police, say sources.
According to the investigations, many of the stalwarts of the WSF are from non-governmental organisations that were active during the textile mill unionism of the mid-1980s.
Those who have come under the police’s microscope are functionaries of the outlawed People’s War Group, the People’s War and certain fundamentalist groups masquerading as social organisations after the government crackdown on the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI).
“We aren’t expecting violence but some elements spread across all three camps could be problematic. They’re a strange mix of religious social groups and hard core Naxalites, and tracking them has been an arduous task. A huge number of officers have been diverted to the task,” confirms a senior police official.
With heightened communist activities and many prominent leaders participating in the WSF, security has become problematic.
“If keeping an eye on VIPs is not enough, we have to keep our ears up for speeches that will be made at the World Youth Forum (a part of WSF),” says a senior police official.
The conferences at Goregaon will go on till January 21 and will conclude with a peaceful sit-in demonstration against imperialism and globalisation at Azad Maidan.
Police expect about 70,000 people to attend the WSF event while MR 2004 is expected to attract another 10,000.
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This communist war brought to you by Ford Foundation, Oxfam
AMITA SHAH
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 14, 2004 05:20:53 AM ]
NEW DELHI: With war against globalisation on their mind, top Indian left leaders are reaching Mumbai this week for the World Social Forum which ironically is associated with champions of globalisation such as the Ford Foundation and Oxfam.
CPI(M) and CPI leaders, including party chiefs Harkishen Singh Surjeet and A B Bardhan, as well as polit bureau members Prakash Karat and Sitaram Yechury and Marxist economist Prabhat Patnaik are attending the six-day meet which is to focus on “Another World is Possible”. Over 70 representatives of foreign communist parties, including those from China, Vietnam and Italy, have confirmed their participation.
Normally members of mainline communist parties have stayed away from such meets if they sensed that their organisers’ were in any way linked with ‘capitalist’ organisations for fear of being ‘co-opted’ by the canny enemy.
In this case, it appears their guard has slipped, inviting comments from several Left watchers here.
Asked to comment, Yechury said WSF was an open space for all to speak against globalisation and the money went only to certain organisations.
He said the left shared platform with these bodies only to argue against them by joining the ideological debate.
The CPI(M) had participated in a big way in the Asian Social Forum in Hyderabad last year.
Among those speaking on socialism and imperialism are Nguyen Thi Binh, veteran of the Vietnamese struggle against the US, Sourto Bertonitt, Italian leader of the Party of Communists Refoundation and Former Algerian President and leader of its revolution Ben Bella.
Around a dozen communists each from China and Cuba are expected to participate besides representatives of communist parties from the western world including United States, France, Canada, Spain, Portuguese and Brazil.
Left leaders from neighbouring countries like Nepal and Bangladesh are also attending the meet which expects a participation of around 75,000 people.
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The Fifth International? - "Noam Chomsky, attended this year's World Social Forum, and concluded that the conference holds "at least the seeds of the first "authentic" international, the dream of the left and labor movements since their modern origins." That is, the World Social Forum has the potential to replace the last two centuries' communist Internationals - the First, founded by Marx, the Second, founded by Engels, the Third by Lenin and the Fourth by Trotsky. The Fifth International! This dream of a Neo-Communist international left is a nightmare for America."
What socialists try to do is to return to the egalitarian ethic of the small hunting group. They are atavistic in their efforts and try to replace general market forces with reason. For the reasons you outlined this always impossible. In spite of their claims to being rational and making rational decisions their underlying motive is atavistic and to return to an egalitarian ideal that is impossible in a modern economy. Indeed, whenever they are successful economic deprivation and chaos results.
The INA, the Indian National Army, was a fifth column in India during WW2 sponsored by the Japanese and the Indian Communist Party to undermine the Raj. The British caught and hanged a number of them, but obviously not enough.
Also, this last little nugget from the Nobel Peace Prize winner, no doubt.. "Abadi alleged the US was not allowing the Iraqi and Afghan citizens to exercise their fundamental rights."
kinda gives ya shivers just reading that ..bbbrrrr
While Barghouti chose to stress upon the "terrible state" of Palestinians, Iranian Nobel Peace laureate Shirin Ebadi highlighted how human rights and along with it human dignity had become key issues for the world to tackle.
"I am here to announce our commitment to human rights. The human suffering from war and poverty has no dignity," said Ebadi, speaking in Arabic.
"I hope in the next meeting of the forum we universally observe a better and equal world.
"The Palestinian struggle is no different from the Indian, Algerian, Vietnamese and South African freedom struggles," he told nearly 2,700 journalists from across the world. "The time has come to stop the injustice."
Jeremy Corbyn, a British parliamentarian, felt the Mumbai chapter of the forum should be a unity between the Third World countries against the World Trade Organisation, International Monetary Fund and US aggressions.
Both he and Barghouti chose to christen the WSF as the world's second superpower.
"While one superpower (read US) has the weapons of mass destruction and unrestricted access to technology, the other superpower (WSF) has the will of the people," said Corbyn. - SOURCE
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British MP Jeremy Corbyn, who said he was honoured to be the only European on stage, claimed Iraq was now "on sale to global interests".
"We have anti-terror laws in the US , the UK , India , everywhere. How can the US unleash terror against countries like Afghanistan and Iraq ?" - SOURCE
I'm still looking through news to find out if International cANSWER, Global Exchange, Code Pink(o), National Lawyers Guild, Muslim American Society, CAIR and other lefty groups have representatives there lobbying for overthrow of US government world peace...
Unfortunately, you are wrong. People do not crave liberty; they crave money and the lifestyle that it can buy. As for central planning, most are ambivalent to it. They will accept and support it if they are promised something for nothing.
If individual liberty and abhorrence of central planning were easy sells, our culture and form of government would be thriving in many countries around the globe, but they are not. There are very few Americas out there.
Individual liberty is a difficult sell, even in our own country. We have been slowly losing our freedom, slice by slice, for decades, and there is no turning point in sight. The bureaucracies engaged in central planning grow more powerful each day.
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‘‘We may not have stopped the war in Iraq,’’ says Jeremy Corbyn, British member of parliament and anti-war thorn in Tony Blair’s side. ‘‘But maybe we’ve stopped the next one. We’ve made it much harder for them to pull off another war against the ‘Axis of Evil’.’’
For Corbyn, the war was about democracy, but not Iraq’s: ‘‘Bush thought he needed a war to win votes. But it’s also about the US achieving global security after 9/11 and oil supplies.’’
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‘‘Iraq is a very special country,’’ says a grim-faced Amir Al-Rekaby, the leader of the Iraqi National Democratic Opposition. Al-Rekaby is an Iraqi, and it sounds as if he is about to eulogise the beauty of his motherland. But his next sentence is heavy with cynicism: ‘‘It’s position is very strategic and it has oil.’’
His explanation of why the war took place is equally stark: ‘‘The US invaded Iraq because it wants hegemony over the world,’’ he says. ‘‘We progressives can fight them, but we need to give ourselves the tools to do it.’’ Corbyn and he are hoping the WSF is the place those tools can be forged. - SOURCE
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