REVOLUTION statement on exclusions from StWC

international | anti-war / imperialism | other press Friday October 26, 2007 00:37 by Cogsy (M-L) offensieftegenracisme at yahoo dot co dot uk

Statement from REVOLUTION National Council on the exclusion of HOPI
and Communist Students from affiliation to Stop the War Coalition
21/10/07

We note that Hands Off the People of Iran and Communist Students have
been excluded from affiliating to the StWC Coalition. Whilst we have
our political differences with HOPI, we see this exclusion as
bureaucratic and hypocritical, especially seeing as HOPI and
Communist Students have consistently opposed the War on Terror. At
the same time the StWC leadership has seemed more than happy in
recent months to invite Liberal Democrats and even a Tory MP, Michael
Ancram onto its platforms, allowing individuals within these parties
to pose as anti-war when nothing could be further from the truth.

Since the invasion of Iraq by the US, hundreds of thousands of people
have lost their lives and life continues to deteriorate for those
left behind. Multi-billion dollar contracts have been handed out to
infrastructure companies such as Halliburton and effectively
mercenary `security' armies such Blackwater, all companies based in
or with close links to the occupying nations, working to pillage Iraq
of its valuable energy resources.

In heroic opposition, the Iraqi people have taken up arms against the
imperialists. Involving many hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, militia
organisations have driven US and UK forces out of whole areas of the
country and back to their bases.

With the threats from the imperialists against Iran increasing daily,
many thousands, even millions of Iranians will instinctively arm
themselves against the aggression and fight back in the event of
invasion. Many will very likely join militia organisations, and many
of these will be of a religious persuasion. Many will queue up to
join the Iranian army despite its reactionary policies towards women
and homosexuals and authoritarian lack of democracy to fight back
against the occupying forces.

REVOLUTION supports the right of all to resist imperialist
oppression, whether it is as part of a trade union, the Iranian army,
or an Islamic militia. Socialists must fight alongside these forces
in order to win these fighters to revolutionary communism – a fight
not only against imperialist war, but the system responsible for it–
capitalism.

It is here that we differ from our comrades in HOPI and Communist
Students, yet this should not and must not be used a reason for their
non-affiliation. The diversity of opinion in StWC is what has allowed
it to mobilise so many thousands, even millions in the past. However,
Andrew Murray suggests that it is HOPI and Communist Students'
criticism of StWC that is the reason for their exclusion.

REVOLUTION would like to make clear that in such
movement, disagreement over the politics of the coalition is
inevitable and therefore the need for democratic debate over the
issues is essential in choosing the right path forward to stop the
brutal war on terror.

To this effect we are fully against the exclusion which sets a
dangerous trend within StWC and represents an attack on democracy and
diversity. We will be making this point absolutely clear at the StWC
AGM on Saturday, 27th October.

RNC