textfiles/politics/SPUNK/sp000922.txt

        Workers Solidarity Winter 94/95
          Issue 44 Electonic addition
                     Part 1

    paper of the Irish anarchist
    Workers Solidarity Movement

          That's capitalism

Africa's annual debt repayments - mostly to US and 
European banks - amount to $10 billion.  This money, 
according to UNICEF, would be more than enough to 
provide primary healthcare, education and sanitation 
services for every single person in  Africa.

*****
A major report presented to the Eastern Health & 
Social Services Board on January 10th confirmed that 
the six counties are suffering growing inequality 
and social disadvantage.  Despite being "an integral 
part of the UK" the North consistently has the 
highest unemployment rates and the lowest average 
household incomes.  The richest 20% of the 
population have almost eleven times as much wealth 
as the poorest 20%.

*****
Union activists in Indonesia have long suffered 
repression.  Last year repression turned to murder 
as worker militancy increased.  Marsinah, a 23 year 
old textile worker, was murdered after leading a 
strike in East Java last May.  Police were directly 
implicated in the murder of 26 year old organiser, 
Rusli, from Medan in Sumatra.  Police were also 
involved in the death of Titi Sugiarti, a West 
Javanese textile worker.  This case has been taken 
up by Indonesia's Legal Aid Foundation.  Titi was on 
strike to improve pay and   conditions but was later 
found drowned in a one metre deep pond.  Police 
claimed she had "slipped" in, but later 
investigation indicated she had been bound and 
tortured prior to death.

Pity Ireland's rich.  Always moaning about"high 
levels of taxation", they  can buy a yuppie type 
apartment and rent it out.  They don't have to pay 
income tax on the rent because they can write off 
the building costs.  This means that an apartment 
priced at #55,000 will only cost them #8,000 in real 
money.     

General Electric is one of the largest corporations 
in the world.  Last year it sacked eleven workers at 
its plant at Ciudad Juarez in Mexico.  This followed 
an attempt by workers to organise across the 
US/Mexico border and join the United Electrical, 
Radio and Machine Workers of America.  Following 
adverse publicity, GE offered financial compensation 
to six workers.  None, however,has been re-instated.

Britain's "water" industry is one of the best 
examples of capitalism there is.  Since 
privatisation the average household bill has gone up 
by 69%.  Meanwhile average retail prices have risen 
by only 25%.  What about share dividends to the new 
owners?  These have risen by 40% since 1990 alone.

***************
               For starters

THE GROWING interest in anarchism has seen the 
appearance of a new magazine, Red & Black 
Revolution.  There are only so many pages in Workers 
Solidarity so we decided to publish a journal that 
would have room for longer articles.  Issue one 
looks at why the 'left' collapsed, the anarchist 
alternative, the Mexican EZLN rebels, the origins of 
the differences between Anarchism and Marxism, the  
syndicalist revival, the story of the TUUAP campaign 
in the unions, and more.

[available in electronic format from Spunk press, 
access methods listed at bottom of this message]

            Find out more

The world's wealth is produced by us - the working 
class.  We ought to enjoy the benefits.

The Workers Solidarity Movement is an anarchist 
organisation that fights for a 32 county Workers' 
Republic.

We stand for a socialism that is based on freedom 
and real democracy, a society based on workplace and 
community councils.

This kind of socialism has nothing to do with the 
state capitalism that was practiced in Russia, and 
still is in China, Cuba and other police states.

We oppose coercive authority, and hold that the 
only limit on freedom of the individual should be 
that they don't  encroach on the freedom of others.

As part of our fight for anarchism we are involved 
in the struggles for higher wages, for trade union 
democracy, for womens rights, for jobs.  

We oppose all divisions in the working class.  We 
fight against all attempts to set Protestant against 
Catholic, men against women, skilled against 
unskilled, old against young,  hetrosexual against 
homosexual.

We are opposed to the British state's presence and 
to partition.  We defend peoples' right to fight 
back.  But we are not nationalists, we do not merely 
want to get rid of the border.  We want to unite our 
class and create a totally new  Ireland.

**************

                     Contents 

(In following parts to be posted over the next week)

Part 2 Shorts on Ireland

  Democratic left's disposable radicalism
  Competition or con
  Anti-Traveller thuggary on increase
  Lies, damned lies and statistics
  Trusting the politicians
  No room at the refuge
  Disconnection threats defeated in Dublin
  Wexford strike declared illegal
  

Part 3 Features
  What's happening in the 6 counties
  A new loyalist party?
..Time to stop beating the Orange drum
  Child molesters & Churchmen

Part 4 World anarchist news
  This is not SIPTU
  Into the 21st Century
  Interview: International organisation
  Nigeria: Raids on anarchist meetings
  Moldova: Anarchists allowed to leave
  UN report
  Asian unions check out anarchism
  "Anarchism" in Russian and Arabic
  The need for an anarchist organisation
  Solidarity with young and unemployed

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The Workers Solidarity Movement can be contacted at 
     PO Box 1528, Dublin 8, Ireland

or by anonymous e-mail to an64739@anon.penet.fi

Some of our material is available via the Spunk press electronic archive

             by FTP to etext.archive.umich.edu or 141.211.164.18
              or by gopher ("gopher etext.archive.umich.edu")
or WWW at http://www.cwi.nl/cwi/people/Jack.Jansen/spunk/Spunk_Home.html

in the directory /pub/Politics/Spunk/texts/groups/WSM

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