Documents

Call from the National Front against the Coup d'Etat in Honduras to the worldwide working class 

August 3, 2009 -- Tegucigalpa -- June 28 of the this year when the Honduran population was preparing to participate in a popular opinion poll on ... whether or not to convoke a Constitutional Assembly, thousands of soldiers kidnapped the constitutional president of the republic, Manuel Zelaya Rosales, and they expelled him to the neighbouring country of Costa Rica; they occupied the Presidential House; they violently closed all of the independent radio and television stations; they persecuted all the functionaries of the government and they implanted a state of siege in the whole country.

Vancouver Socialist Forum

Vancouver Socialist Forum was founded in 2007 to promote the ideas of socialism and facilitate the political activity of its members. It organises educational discussions and regular public forums.

Socialism or barbarism

The economic crisis that engulfed the planet in 2008 once again illustrates the destructive and irrational nature of capitalism. To prevent worsening social and economic misery for the world’s population, capitalism must be replaced by an entirely new economic and social order, socialism.

The goal of socialism is to create societies that offer full participation to each member and are environmentally sustainable. Human needs will be fulfilled through public and democratic ownership of the means of producing social wealth.

Declaration of the Congress of South African Trade Unions International Solidarity Conference, Johannesburg, June 24-26, 2009.

COSATU -- Gathered at this historic International Solidarity Conference of COSATU are workers, activists and internationalists committed to a new and just world order, free from poverty, hunger and injustice. We have concluded two days of intensive engagements, critical reflections and dedicated work to assess and ascertain the revolutionary mood of workers and the poor masses of the world, the ebbs and flows of the global class struggle and the state of readiness by working-class forces and their organisations to wage a decisive battle for the new and just global economic system.

Compiled and introduced by Felipe Stuart Cournoyer

July 10, 2009 -- Most of the coverage of the military coup in Honduras from bourgeois and liberal circles, and from many Western foreign ministers, has focused on what various governments are doing to influence or force an outcome to this struggle.

Statements from Honduras' President Manuel Zelaya, his foreign minister Patricia Rodas, and from leaders of other ALBA countries (especially Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega, Ecuador's Rafael Correa and Bolivia's Evo Morales) have emphasised the role of the mass movement in Honduras. So have the most astute analysts of the rapidly moving events unleashed by the coup.

By Socialist Resistance (Britain)

Joint statement by the Sudanese Communist Party and the Tudeh Party of Iran

Recently, representatives of the central committees of the Tudeh Party of Iran and the Sudanese Communist Party exchanged views and consulted on the political situation unfolding in Iran, in light of the rigged elections of June 12 and the mass protests that quickly took place and began to gain momentum shortly thereafter. The two parties discussed the political situation in their respective countries and the conditions in which the struggle for peace, human rights, democracy and social justice is taking place. Based on their discussion and deliberations the leaderships of the two fraternal parties hereby issue the following statement:

The existing electoral process in Iran is a mockery of democracy, designed to disenfranchise the Iranian electorate. Its entire se- up is not related to the pursuit and furthering of democracy or any concept of progress within Iranian society but to keep the reins of power firmly in the hands of the despotic theocratic regime regardless of the wishes and aspirations of the Iranian people. Despite using every method to orientate the electoral process in their favour, the ruling guard of the theocracy still sought fit to directly rig the outcome of the ballots cast on the day of the election.

Solidarity protest in Sydney, Australia, July 1, 2009. Photos by Peter Boyle.

Below are just some of the statements released by solidarity groups, left parties and governments, and international organisations demanding the return to power of Honduras' elected presidet Manuel Zelaya. They have been compiled by Australia's Green Left Weekly.To view the complete list, click HERE.

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Statement by the Australia-Venezuela Solidarity Network (AVSN)

June 26, 2009 (amended June 30) -- Socialist Alliance stands in solidarity with the millions of Iranians who are bravely demanding their rights in the streets despite huge state-sanctioned repression. These are the biggest protests in Iran since the 1979 protests in which the US-backed Shah was deposed.

Millions of people, old and young, ethnic and religious minorities, have taken to the streets, day in and day out since the disputed election on June 12. They have bravely defied the repressive regime of Mahmoud Ahmedinejad to demand the most basic of rights: the right to freely and transparently elect their representatives.

Some 27 people, including a young woman Neda Agha-Soltan whose death was captured on video, have been killed in the crackdown on protests. Several hundred have been injured, and a leading student activist is in a coma. Government officials on June 24 announced that there had been a total of 645 arrests in Tehran since June 13, 2009. Activists say that several hundred more, including journalists, editors, students, professors, party officials and unionists have also disappeared.

Statement by the Nouveau Parti Anticapitaliste (NPA, New Anti-Capitalist Party of France), translated by Carmel McGlinchey, Luke Weyland and Annolies Truman for Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal

Since June 13, the day after the rigged presidential election, millions of Iranians have gone into the streets with cries of "Down with the dictatorship!". The ferocious repression has already caused tens if not hundreds of deaths. Young people, women and the residents of the poorer areas who comprise the majority of the demonstrators have now been joined by the trade union movement.

The union of bus workers declared its solidarity, in asserting: "As long as the principle of free organisation and elections is not applied, all talk of social liberation and the rights of the workers is only a joke". The workers of Iran Khodro, the first car manufacturer in the country (with 60,000 employees), engaged in a strike while adding their demands for salary increases and the right to strike to the demands raised in the streets. 

Puno, Peru – May 27-28, 2009 – We, indigenous women gathered in the sacred lands of Lake Titicaca, after two days of discussions and deliberation raise our voices in these times when Abya Yala’s[1] womb is once more with chi

Democratic Socialist Perspective (Australia) statement in response to the United Nations Human Rights Council resolution on Sri Lanka