Another Step to Consolidate and Strengthen the Europe of the Monopolies

Workers' Daily Internet Edition : Article Index :

Launch of the Euro:
Another Step to Consolidate and Strengthen the Europe of the Monopolies

Letters to the Editor:
Demonstration against Corrupt Muslim Rulers
Milton Keynes Vigil against the Bombing of Afghanistan
Condemn the Bombing of Afghanistan!

New Year's Message of FARC-EP

The Minister for Europe, Peter Hain, has hailed the launch of the new euro currency as "an historic event".

On 1 January 2002, euro notes and coins became legal tender throughout 12 of the 15 countries of the EU, the so-called eurozone. The euro will also be legal tender in some other European states, and in French overseas territories, such as Martinique and Guadeloupe in the Caribbean. It is reported that some retailers in Britain will also accept the new currency, even though the British government, along with the governments of Denmark and Sweden, has so far not adopted the euro. In Britain’s case the government has promised a referendum before the euro is adopted, but has stated that adoption will not be recommended unless the Chancellors’ five economic conditions have been met.

The introduction of the euro currency is being presented by government ministers and by some sections of the media as in the interests of the citizens of the EU, including those of Britain. In the last few years the government has launched its own campaigns to familiarise British businesses with the new currency, and Peter Hain is widely seen as the government minister charged with whipping up enthusiasm in Britain for the euro. To counter those who argue that Britain’s sovereignty is being eroded, in the past few months leading government ministers have delivered a series of speeches extolling the virtues of what they refer to as "pooled sovereignty". Thus all the conditions are being created for Britain’s adoption of the currency in the near future, despite the government’s propaganda about the need for a referendum where the people can allegedly make their views known.

Far from being in the interests of the people of Europe, the new currency is a further step being taken to consolidate the EU as an organisation of and for the big monopolies and the financial oligarchy. The consolidation is being pushed through to satisfy their need for a "common market" and to develop Europe as a major military, political and economic power bloc in rivalry with other big power blocs, in particular US imperialism. In this respect the EU has the aim of contending for domination of the global market. In doing so, it is seeking to bring about a multipolar world in opposition to the aim of the US to impose its hegemony in a unipolar world. Both strivings are especially dangerous in the conditions of the intensifying global crisis, as well as being directed against the sovereignty of nations and peoples and against their aspirations for a new society. The protestation of Tony Blair and others that Britain does not need to choose between Europe and America is totally self-serving, as well as embodying the retrogressive conception that countries should relinquish charting their own path. His statements, as in his New Year message, that, "We are stronger in Europe because of our closeness to the US. We are stronger with the US because of our growing strength in Europe," are anachronistic illusion-mongering, if they are not declarations that Britain is acting as the agent of US imperialism within the EU.

Thus the peoples of Europe must in no way reconcile themselves to the consolidation and strengthening of the EU of the monopolies through the introduction of the euro. The British working class must get organised on the basis of its own vision for Britain’s future, a future which demands the dismantling of the reactionary EU and an end to all such military, political and economic blocs. This is not a matter of defence of some mythical superiority of Britain and its institutions, but is a question of principle, which has the strategic aim of the working class in Britain constituting itself the nation, in unity with the workers of all countries in Europe and throughout the world.

On Saturday, December 22, 2001, a March and rally was held, organised exclusively by an Islamic organisation called Hizb ut-Tahrir - Britain.

About 600 people took part. The march began from Hyde Park Corner (Marble Arch Station) at 11.30 am, past the Pakistan Embassy, the original destination, and to the Turkish Embassy in Belgrave Square, where a rally was held at about 12:30 pm.

In front of the Turkish Embassy, two speakers gave resounding call for five minutes each, one in Urdu and the other in English, condemning all the rulers of Muslim countries as "corrupt without exception". Those mentioned included Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt, Jordan and Pakistan.

Reference was also made to the necessity for Khilafah as the only solution for the Islamic Ummah. Both speakers condemned President Musharraf for allowing the US its air bases and air space to carry out mass murder of the Afghan Muslims. The rally ended peacefully at around 1.00 pm despite a large police presence, who in the main waited in police vans.

Participant in Demonstration

From mid-day to 1pm on Monday, December 31, 2001, a vigil was held outside Milton Keynes Library to oppose the continued bombing of Afghanistan. Eight people turned up to take part despite a change of time at short notice. The vigil was organised by Open Discussion. A white banner with the slogan ‘NO WAR IN OUR NAME !’ in red was displayed and over one hundred of two different leaflets were given out in the bright sunshine of an otherwise frosty day. One leaflet was the Open Discussion statement and the other an article by Seamus Milne, The innocent dead in a coward's war, which exposes that estimates suggest US bombs have killed at least 3,767 civilians.

Several people stopped to talk and said they totally supported the vigil and wanted to be kept informed of future events or supplied with information that becomes available. They expressed a number of concerns and views on the situation including the following:

• The way events are being portrayed in the media are manipulated to get us to go along with the bombing.
• They call it a war against terrorism but the US and Britain are the aggressors.
• Bush’s presidency was sponsored by oil companies who may well be after access to oil deposits in the area. America wants to rule the world.
• Tony Blair is ridiculous running around the world saying he’s going to sort everything out when it’s none of our business.
• Young people may be worrying that nuclear weapons could be used in their lifetime, they have already been used twice in Japan. Now, with what’s happening between India and Pakistan, things are just getting worse, and Tony Blair went there but of course he will say it had nothing to do with him.
• We need to come back to the democratic process because we haven’t given Tony Blair a mandate to murder children in Afghanistan. Really we are too complacent, we need to fight this sort of thing more.

The vigil has been held every Monday from October 8, 2001. Open Discussion has also held a series of six meetings around the city of Milton Keynes entitled "The Tragic Events in the US and the Danger of World War". More meetings are planned. The Open Discussion meetings have served as a forum to bring together and empower a broad range of local people to discuss a host of political issues which they are concerned about, share information, and plan actions.

Open Discussion, e-mail: Opendiscuk@yahoo.co.uk

Condemn the Bombing of Afghanistan!

Statement by: OPEN DISCUSSION

We are here because we think that it is unacceptable to bomb Afghanistan.

There has been no recourse to international law to bring to justice whoever was responsible for the events of September 11. We, people from Milton Keynes, wish to mark our opposition to this crime that is being committed against Afghanistan by our government and the US. We call on everyone to join us in condemning this action.

These are the brave words of Phyllis and Orlando Rodriguez, New York:

" Our son Greg is among the many missing from the World Trade Center attack. We see our hurt and anger reflected among everybody we meet. We cannot pay attention to the daily flow of news about the disaster. But we read enough of the news to sense that our government is heading in the direction of violent revenge, with the prospect of sons, daughters, parents, friends in distant lands dying, suffering, and nursing further grievances against us. It is not the way to go. It will not avenge our son’s death. Not in our son’s name. "

The Central General Staff of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia - People's Army (FARC-EP) released the following New Year message.

We greet the Colombian people in the midst of the paralysis of the Dialogue and Negotiation Process caused by the conditions imposed by the President in his October 7th statement on the occasion of the extension of the demilitarised zone, two days after the signing of the San Francisco de la Sombra Accord.

The results produced after three years of joint efforts are not what the immense majority of Colombians hoped for, fundamentally due to the regime’s lack of political will to undertake the structural changes Colombia requires for solution of the social and armed conflict. On the contrary, through the information media the enemies of peace are mounting a morbid campaign, the aim of which is to disparage the FARC-EP making use of the drama of a sick child whose father would have returned home if the government had accepted our proposal of a humanitarian exchange for the guerrilla prisoner Ignacio Gonzalez Perdomo, who suffers from a painful illness. On the other hand they say nothing about the situation of state abandonment of 300,000 Colombian children suffering grave illnesses.

Paramilitarism, the expression of state terrorism against the people, continues dominating cities and areas of the countryside, leaving in its wake a toll of cadavers, hundreds of thousands of displaced persons and the economic ruin of the regions, in the midst of total impunity. Meanwhile, the intellectual, material and financial authors of this form of dirty war are in power and in the bases of the armed forces of the state.

The economic crisis is sharpening due to the impositions of the International Monetary Fund, which are keeping the country in its most severe recession of recent decades. As a consequence of this, three and one half million Colombians do not have work; five and one half million more subsist on the informal economy and gleaning; we, the poor of Colombia, now number twenty five million. Of these, eight million live in absolute poverty. The circumstances in Ecuador, Peru, Mexico, Bolivia and Brazil present a similar panorama, countries that do not have guerrilla movements to be blamed for every evil in order to hide the real causes of the crisis generated by the economic system. Argentina is the most recent example where the people have now risen up in rebellion against their rulers, causing the fall of President Fernando de la Rua.

Due to the imposition of US interests, the Colombian state is carrying on a chemical and biological war against the planting of coca and opium poppies, ignoring the socio-economic problems of the campesino cultivators. A real agrarian reform that involves manual eradication together with social investment, in agreement with the communities and not via repression, is the path to the solution of the problem of the illegal crops, as was stated in the Accord of Los Pozos signed by President Pastrana and Commandant Marulanda. The so-called "Plan Colombia" is the military instrument of the imperialist economic annexation scheme known as the FTAA (Free Trade Area of the Americas).

Our attention is drawn by the silence of the presidential candidates who, in the face of the large and profound economic, social and political problems affecting Colombians, present themselves bereft of proposals and programmes that go to the root causes of this grave situation. Likewise, the electoral campaign is proceeding without guarantees of rights for the democratic opposition and alternative movements.

Before the Colombian people the FARC-EP affirm their will to continue contributing initiatives to free the Dialogues of obstacles. The proposed meeting next January 15 with the presidents of the three powers of state and other representatives of the establishment so they explain what it is they are ready to negotiate in favour of peace with social justice and sovereignty, is such an initiative. On the occasion of the New Year, we call upon the Colombian people to organise and fight in co-ordination to win decent conditions of life and work and achieve the objective of a Government of National Reconciliation and Reconstruction that would implement the Ten Point Programme of Government contained in the Political Platform of the FARC-EP.

Mountains of Colombia, December 27, 2001