National News
Fascists kept out of the Square
by New Worker correspondent
ANTI-FASCISTS rallied in Trafalgar Square last Saturday afternoon to prevent the English Volunteer Force — a hard-line neo-Nazi splinter group with connections in the north of Ireland — from holding a planned rally in the Square.
Around 60 to 70 fascists from the EVF, United British Patriots and the South-East Alliance led by Paul Pitt gathered in various pubs along Whitehall from where police collected them to assemble outside the Lord of the Moon pub.
Pitt tried to march them into Trafalgar Square but police barred them because of the anti-fascist presence there, mainly young students — and Unite Against Fascism.
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Reigate Pensioners’ Council launched
by Eric Trevett
THE INAUGURAL meeting of Reigate and District Pensioners’ Council proved to be a lively affair, even though the attendance was small. The speaker from the Greater London Pensioners’ Association, made a fiery speech which contained a wealth of experience and it helped greatly in ensuring the council got off to a sound start.
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Remembering Fukushima
SCORES of peace activists marched through Westminster last Saturday to mark the third anniversary of the Fukushima disaster in Japan.
The marchers assembled at Hyde Park Corner before marching past the Japanese Embassy and one of the buildings housing the Tokyo Electric Company and ending near the Houses of Parliament in Westminster.
The organisers aimed to send a message to people warning of the dangers of nuclear power as well as remembering the victims of the Fukushima disaster on 11th March 2011.
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Dirty tricks from Cambridge police
ANTI-FASCIST activists in Cambridge claim that Cambridgeshire police tried to turn them into police informers — and threatened them with prosecution if they revealed the under-cover police approach to them.
One young activist gave up her campaigning work because she felt intimidated by the police after an under-cover officer tried to recruit her as a spy.
The 23-year-old said the officer, working for a secretive police unit, threatened to prosecute her if she told anyone about the attempt to enlist her as an informer.
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Karl Marx and other heroes
by New Worker correspondent
THE FIRST act of this year’s annual commemoration of Karl Marx at his tomb in Highgate this year was a one-minute silence to mark the deaths of two giants of the working class movement in Britain: Bob Crow and Tony Benn — and of course to remember Marx himself.
Daphne Liddle from the Central Committee of the New Communist Party joined around 60 people to remember the life and times of Marx, who together with Frederick Engels, laid the foundations of modern scientific socialism.
Diplomats from China, Cuba and Vietnam along with comrades from all over the world stood in the warm spring sunshine, the air filled with birdsong, in front of the massive granite monument to Karl Marx, and saluted our heroes.
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35 years of the RCPB (ML)
by New Worker correspondent
Around 60 members and supporters of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist) gathered in Central London on Sunday for a seminar marking 35 years since the party came into being, and paying tribute to the life and work of party founder John Buckle, who died in a mysterious traffic accident in 1983.
Chaired by Leslie Larkum the seminar was opened by Michael Chant, the RCPB (ML)general secretary who paid tribute to Buckle, and characterised the RCPB (ML) as “a party of modern communism which can address itself to the problems of the 21st century”. Contributions were made by Graham Buckle, John Buckle’s brother, Chris Coleman and RCPB(ML) members from various parts of the country.
The DPR Korea ambassador, Hyon Hak Bong, and Mun Myong Sin of the DPRK ‘s London embassy, delivered a friendship message from the central committee of the Workers Party of Korea, and Theo Russell from the New Communist Party also delivered greetings on behalf of the party, in which he expressed the hope that the friendly relations between the two parties, which date back to 1994, would continue for many more years to come.
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International News
Syrian troops drive rebels out
by our Arab Affairs correspondent
The flag of the Syrian Arab Republic flies over the town of Yabroud which was liberated by Syrian troops last weekend. Syrian troops, supported by volunteers from the Lebanese Hezbollah resistance movement, drove the rebels out of their last stronghold on the Lebanese frontier on Sunday ending a reign of terror that had lasted for over two years.
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Venezuela: working for the people’s welfare
by Juan Leandro
Venezuelan authorities on Monday took over Altamira Square in the eastern Caracas district of Chacao from violent protesters.
Following a special operation involving some 600 security agents, Interior Minister Miguel Rodriguez Torres said the area, which protesters had turned into a stronghold, has now been declared violence-free.
The minister added that several people linked to vandalism were arrested and that many confessed they had received payments of up to 5,000 bolivars ($793) per week to generate violence in the area.
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Dalai Lama’s agenda is bane to West, too
by Chen Shilei
Last Friday marked the sixth anniversary of the deadly Lhasa riot masterminded by the Dalai Lama and his secessionist followers.
The more western countries come to understand the Dalai Lama’s real agenda, the more they will see him as a negative political asset.
The prevailing myth in the West about the Dalai Lama as a peace-loving monk and spiritual leader is set to unravel as facts have revealed that he planned the Lhasa riot that killed 18 innocent people.
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Democracy, a Referendum, Russia and the West
by Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey
In a stunn ing display of arrogance, sheer hypocrisy and total disrespect for a democratic vote, the European Union and its puppet-master across the sea shun the free and fair referendum in Crimea, in which a turnout of 85 per cent voted to join Russia by 96.9 per cent. How much clearer could the message be and why can’t the West accept a democratic vote?
The foreign policy pursued by the West is impossible to understand in terms of logic, coherence, credibility and ethics but very easy to comprehend if we approach it from a viewpoint that it is owned and controlled by the lobbies which pull the strings of its political class. These lobbies hold a vice around the testicles of the US Congress, its President and each and every one of the many echelons of “jobs for the boys” in the European Union (Google up “EU agencies and organisms” and multiply these by exponential figures taking into account drivers, advisors and the like).
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RUC Museum cannot fund ‘sanitised’ history
An Phoblacht
THE Relatives for Justice campaign group is writing to Justice Minister David Ford and the Justice Committee over a £500,000 grant to the Royal Ulster Constabulary Museum. Previously, the RUC Museum received £5.5million of public money directly from the British Treasury.
Speaking after the news that the RUC Museum was to get another half a million pounds from public funds, Relatives for Justice said: “The RUC are perfectly entitled to commemorate and host within a museum the record of their past from formation until it was replaced as a key part of securing peace.
“However, the use of public finances for this purpose by the Minister for Justice places certain conditions that must therefore include the excesses and human rights violations that also formed part of that history. This is particularly the case for those families bereaved and people seriously injured by RUC actions.
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Features
Cuba’s Antonio Maceo: A revolutionary legacy
by Henry Hagins
The Cuban Revolution took place on 1st January 1959, led by Fidel Castro’s rebel army, which victoriously entered the capital city of Havana on that date. An excellent way to more fully understand the monumental success of the Revolution is to examine carefully the life of Antonio Maceo. Maceo, who was born in 1845, was one of Cuba’s most celebrated generals in its liberation war against Spain.
The countless heroic examples — generously offered by Maceo — have not only helped to inspire the success of the Revolution against both Spanish and Yankee imperialism, but have also allowed Cuba to play such a central role in the liberation of Angola, Namibia and South Africa, leading to the freeing of Nelson Mandela in 1990.
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The Bourgeois State and Feminism
by Adrian Chan-Wyles
BOURGEOIS capitalist society is premised upon inequality. This is to state clearly and unambiguously that such a system exists because of the inequality that has created it. Bourgeois capitalist society cannot exist without its inherent inequality. If the reality of inequality were to be removed, then bourgeois society would cease to exist.
The contemporary drive toward “equality”, although very important for everyone involved, is nevertheless based upon the misconception that a fundamentally unequal society can lose its “‘unequalness” simply through pressure group action and legislation. It is true that through such actions the bourgeois state sometimes begrudgingly grants a small concession here or a token reform there, but never actually addresses the true issue at hand. The bourgeois system is shot through with an inequality that facilitates exploitation of every living person within its society.
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