Re elect Jean Lambert

June 4th is the date of the European election. Latest opinion polls conducted by Eurobarometer show that there is likely to be a low turnout - they predict 22%. This could be enough to let the BNP into the European Parliament. It is essential that as many people as possible, and that includes all EU citizens in London, vote for Jean Lambert on that day. Today I encouraged a Greek woman working in my office to register and on Tuesday spoke with a Hungarian guy who is going to get all his Hungarian friends in London to vote. The spectre of Fascism hangs over Europe and it is quite possible that these parties will gain many seats in the new European Parliament.

The Green Group in the Parliament have stood up for migrant rights, the LGBT community and workers rights, including a fairer work/life balance and the end of the long hours culture. Nobody has done more for these campaigns than Jean Lambert, London's Green MEP. It is essential that Jean holds her seat and continues the good work which she has been doing for Londoners over the last ten years.

Information on Jean's work can be found here http://www.jeanlambertmep.org.uk/

You can also follow Jean's campaign at http://re-electjean.blogspot.com or on Facebook at http://www.tinyurl.com/jeanlambert - and then when you are sufficiently inspired, you can volunteer to help by emailing reelectjean@hotmail.co.uk

You can also listen to Jean's views in her own words at YouTube via videos like the one below....

It's no wonder that Mark Thomas has endorsed the Green Party http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhIR8MIxzh8

Vote for Jean and the Greens on June 4th in London.

Police brutality at G20 documentary

Watch Newswipe at http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00jwcb3/Newswipe_Episode_4


And for more info on what happened at the G20 protests watch this episode of Newswipe which includes some shocking images. It appears that the police have been let off the leash by this government and we are moving towards criminalising dissent. As Churchill said: "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance."

Protest against police brutality today

With mounting concern over policy brutality I hope that this protest is well supported. New Labour has presided over a situation where we are rapidly becoming a police state.


PROTEST: STOP POLICE BRUTALITY

DEFEND THE RIGHT TO PROTEST
THURSDAY 16 APRIL 5.00PM
NEW SCOTLAND YARD
10 BROADWAY, LONDON SW1
Called by Stop the War, CND, Palestine Solidarity Campaign and
British Muslim Initiative.

More video evidence has emerged of the unrestrained brutality
of the policing on the G20 demonstrations. Stop the War has
experienced the same kind of policing on the Gaza
demonstrations in January this year and also at the George
Bush demonstration in June last year.

In one incident on the 3rd January march, police attacked
marchers in the Hyde Park underpass, creating a situation
which could have led to serious injury and death. Many
complaints were made to the IPCC [Independent Police
Complaints Commission] but that body chose not to proceed with
an investigation. The IPPC is now discredited and must be
replaced.

It is clear that there is now a co-ordinated attempt by the
police to criminalise peaceful protest in this country. This
is a conspiracy against our democracy which requires serious
investigation. We will be protesting outside Scotland Yard on
Thursday 16 April to make this point.

The Legacy of Iraq

It was supposed to be the war to bring democracy and human rights to Iraq. Yeah, tell that to the Iraqis. Clearly one of the groups whose situation has actually worsened since the fall of Sadam is the LGBT community in Iraq. Here is an article from today's Independent by Hasan, a young gay Iraqi refugee in the UK. It is simply unbelievable that the UK government is still contemplating returning LGBT refugees to Iraq. The Green Party's new migration policy passed at our conference in Blackpool recently and a full part of our European election manifesto promises to give full rights to LGBT refugees who come to this country.

As a gay man and a candidate for the European Parliament in London I am proud to support it and call upon New Labour, the architects of the disastrous war in Iraq to stop sending LGBT refugees back to Iraq and other countries where their lives are endangered. This should be put to the Labour LGBT Group the next time they start spouting about the wonderful improvements for the LGBT community under Labour.

Dozens of young men and boys killed by death squads in Baghdad
By Nigel Morris, Deputy Political Editor
Monday, 13 April 2009

Hasan: Our optimism after the fall of Saddam has turned to despair
Comment
My boyfriend was killed by the police because of his sexuality. Policemen came to his house, 10 minutes away from mine, put him in a police car, arrested and killed him. They told his parents it was because of his job. He was working for Iraqi LGBT (Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender). For six months I didn't go out, I didn't do anything – just grieved for him. He was killed because of who he is.
After the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, we – the gay community – were very optimistic. We thought that we would live in a democracy and felt safe with US troops around. So we started to print leaflets that promoted freedom for gay and lesbian people.
But members of our group started being arrested for it. The leaflets weren't political, they were just spreading gay rights.
We have the right to exist and be who we are, but this offended the government. The leaflets had our email addresses and telephone numbers, so the government and the militias came to find out who was distributing the leaflets.
In 2004, the situation got much worse. People began to be killed in the streets, burnt alive and mutilated for being gay. We were a target for the government and militias. I fled to the UK; I feel very safe here but get emails every day about more killings in Iraq. And the problem is that the UK Government doesn't allow us to stay with refugee status even though Iraq is one of the most dangerous places on earth for homosexuals and a war is being waged by the parts of the Iraqi government on gay people. In the UK, I can't work or study because I've been denied the right to asylum, but my only option is to go back to Iraq, face my family and my community and be killed.
Four members of our organisation have already been deported. I am fighting for my right to stay by re-applying for asylum with the help of Iraqi LGBT. Otherwise, I have no future. On Thursday, we will protest outside the Home Office to highlight the homophobic killings. I wish someone would listen and help us; this has been going on in Iraq for years and no one cares.

Hasan, 26, is gay. He moved to the UK nine months ago from his home in Babel province, south of Baghdad, after receiving death threats. His boyfriend was killed because of his sexuality.

Visteon Occupation Statement by Green Left

Green Left has issued the following statement on the occupation of the Visteon factory by workers in north London which I fully endorse.


"Green Left pledges its support and solidarity with the Visteon workers who have taken occupation of their factory to mark their defiance against losing their jobs at short notice, without wages owed or compensation. Green Left also rejects any attempts by the parent company to use the economic crisis as an excuse to impose reduced conditions upon the workers in order to protect the interests of their shareholders.

In a week that has revealed figures indicating the biggest drop in UK industrial production in four decades - including a 12.5% drop in output on the previous year in February alone, the biggest loss since records began - it is clear that it is the workers who are bearing the brunt of this crisis.

Instead of redundancy and a sense of alienation, we need our skilled workforce to help build a sustainable alternative to the current mode of production, not throw them onto the scrapheap. Their vital skills can be used to produce socially and environmentaly useful components, and to build the public transport and renewable energy infrastructure that is essential to achieving this sustainable alternative. In the same spirit that inspired the Lucas Aerospace workers in 1976 to democratically organise and plan to convert production from military equipment to socially useful products, Green Left strongly supports any move by the Visteon workers to organise to develop their own strategy, and to use their skills to produce for the benefit of people and planet, and not be dictated to by the drive to produce profits.

Green Left supports the Visteon workers in their struggle, and other workers who take a similar action to defend their jobs against the self-interest of those who exploit them for profit.

Workers for the world unite."

Andy Hewett
Green Left Steering Group

An Unhappy 60th Birthday Celebration for NATO

I am just recovering from the events of last weekend, which included being teargassed (although I was not at the epicentre of that) and spending 17 hours on a coach trying to reach a besieged city. But it has made very obvious to me and to those who were in Strasbourg for the protests over the 60th anniversary NATO Summit the level of militarisation which Europe is now undergoing and a brief introduction for the citizens of one French city of what occupation feels like.

I left London with a group of anti-war activists from all over England and Scotland on last Friday at 6am. Firstly, we were photographed by the Met before we even left and our licence plates were radioed through by the police to some distant authority either here or in France to warn them that we were en route. All was plain sailing, literally in the case of crossing the Channel, until we reached the outskirts of Strasbourg. All routes to the city had been blocked by the French authorities and it took us over two hours to reach our destination, trying a variety of various side roads. I finally got to where I was staying at 1am, having spent 17 hours travelling. I found my hotel full of police and the whole city centre closed off to all. 25,000 police had been drafted in for the summit. We later found out that the rail lines from Germany had been cut and that the Schengen Agreement had been suspended to disallow democratic protest at the wars which NATO is planning and the billions of pounds, Euros and dollars being spent from our public purse to continue hegemonic policies. There are some indications of the fortification of the city here from this French site and the views of the people living therehttp://www.dailymotion.com/related/x8vnfb/video/x8v010_20090401-strasbourg-ville-fortifie_news

The following morning we discovered that all the streets leading out of the city and towards the Rhine were being blocked by the CRS, the feared French riot police. Only residents living in the zone who had passes were allowed through and then only on foot or by bicycle. Together with a group of French trade unionists, an Irish peace activist living in Geneva and a German living in Switzerland, we tried to get through the various cordons. All routes seemed blocked off. To add to this surreal lock down of an entire city, a huge military convoy trundled through the city, with soldiers perched arrogantly on the top of the trucks and massive military helicopters (I counted five) hovered directly over the houses. Some of those I was with who had been at the European Social Forum meetings in Genoa etc, had said they never had witnessed anything on this scale. The French trade unionists has also never seen this level of police power and command of an entire city. One of them asked the police "Is this the Sarkozy democracy?"

Finally, as we managed to be mistaken for tourists, who were allowed into the tourist zone, we were able to make our way across the city to the demonstration which was in the harbour area. The original idea had been for the demonstration to meet on the Europa Bridge which links France and Germany but the Germans had shut down all rail links into Strasbourg. One person who had asked at the railway station about trains to Germany was told that all trains were cancelled.

The first thing we saw was large numbers of anarchists, called 'the Black Block' gathered near the Europa bridge. They were amassing paving stones and many were wearing masks and scarves. A large fire was burning on the bridge and German police with armoured cars and water cannon were on the other side of the bridge blocking access to Germany. Large numbers of police patrol boats were also in the Rhine. The Black Block had already set fire to a former customs post on the French side and plumes of smoke were rising. This was to become the leitmotif of the protests and the images which the media flashed around the world, totally ignoring the 30,000 demonstrators who marched for an end to war and NATO. The Black Block would later set fire to and destroy a hotel and several petrol stations, bus shelters and phone boxes in the area of the demonstration.

Back at the rally we heard various speakers including Bianca Jagger and Oliver Besancenot of the Left Party in France. Then the German person announcing the speakers told us that two groups using non violent direct action had managed to block the Summit for several hours that morning. Of course, none of this was reported in the media. I also saw French Greens there with Green pennants flying and spoke to them briefly. As the speakers continued we could see rising plumes of smoke from nearby and police firing tear gas from helicopters at the anarchists. The acrid smell of tear gas pervaded the area. The demonstration finally moved off and I was carrying a banner with Kate Hudson, Chair of CND, Andrew Murray, Chair of Stop the War Coalition and others. As we approached one of the bridges we could see that a ring of steel was drawn up with police vehicles with armoured fronts, it was similar to scenes from Northern Ireland riots. We turned into a narrow street over a goods railway line, which was surrounded by factories. By this time we could see that the Black Block had set fire to a hotel ahead and it was burning furiously. We allowed the fire engines to go through the demonstration.

The march came to a halt in this narrow street as the police had closed off the road ahead. I thought that this would be a perfect ambush site and this was indeed what happened. The police were now firing tear gas across the bridge behind us and we sat in the street hoping to move forward. The Black Block then moved several goods wagons across the line, effectively blocking the street and the police were coming from that direction. We could hear explosions ahead as tear gas was being fired. With the aid of several experienced international activists I made my way back along the rail line towards the river. This was because we could see that the Black Block were leading the rest of the demonstrators into a situation where they would be used as a shield and this is exactly what happened. Shortly afterwards the police tear gassed and attacked the demonstration. Panic then ensued and people tried to escape whatever way they could. I saw an unconscious woman being helped into a fire engine and several wounded journalists.

On our way back we found all routes back into the city closed off. Even the rail lines were being patrolled by the CRS. Finally at one check point we showed our papers to the CRS and were allowed through into the city. Passing through an area of social housing, with mainly ethnic minority inhabitants, we asked ourselves why none of these people had protested. The problem, which was discussed by many the following day at the conference, is that the French anti-war movement has not included the Muslim or ethnic minority groups at all and thus is much hampered. Indeed it was clear, when we could see their faces at all, that all of the Black Block were white.

There are some images of the demo here from a French site http://www.dailymotion.com/related/x8va4v/video/x8vnfb_la-recit-de-la-manifestation_news?ajax_function=get_video_list&ajax_arg%5B0%5D=%2Frelated%2Fx8va4v%2F1&ajax_arg%5B1%5D=x8va4v_affrontements-a-la-ganzau_news&ajax_rnd=1239093472981 As you will see the actions of the Black Block jeopardised considerably the other demonstrators and left them open to the considerable police brutality which was on display.

The following day at the conference we heard speeches from the US and Japanese peace movements, both of whom, especially the Japanese sent a considerably sized delegation. We also heard from the those opposing NATO membership of their respective countries in Ukraine and Georgia and I also made contact with one of the Russian speakers from a group based in St Petersburg. John Rees from Stop the War Coalition was announced as "representing the largest anti-war movement in Europe" which is probably the case. Rees in his speech attacked the militarisation of Strasbourg by the authorities but also criticised the Black Block for their actions. He added that the anti-war movement needed to take these alienated youth on board as otherwise their political frustration and aggression would be directed elsewhere. He also made the very strong point that Obama had only succeeded in getting a few thousand troops for the war in Afghanistan, whereas it had taken the French and German governments to send more than 35,000 police and security forces to pen down the anti-war movement in Strasbourg. The anti-war movement had to continue to be the internal resistance in Europe to NATO's wars in Iraq and Afpak (Afghanistan and Pakistan).

Kate Hudson made a strong speech from the floor attacking the "political cowardice" of the Black Block in using others as a human shield and then disrobing and melting into the general demonstration. She also asked what was the political point of smashing up bus shelters in a working class part of the city which were used by poor people to access public transport. This was applauded loudly by many present.

Some Irish speakers invited people to attend a major peace protest there in September and assured us that it would be impossible to block access over the borders as Ireland was an island. When some of these same speakers protested over the use of tear gas and violence by the police, some of the Greek contingent replied that they were being tear gassed all the time and that it was part of confronting the state in many of these continental countries. But it is clear that the NATO states are prepared to militarise their own societies and put their own cities under occupation in order to drive through the war agenda.

After leaving the conference and going back to the peace camp where many of the activists were staying, we discovered that the roads to the camp had been blockaded by the CRS and those leaving the camp were having their baggage searched along with their persons. The police were confiscating anything described as "propaganda". This included papers from the conference and banners in English, many of which they could not understand anyway. One our party had a camera and managed to take photos of this. I promised to raise this with our MEPs on my return to London as I am certain that it is a breach of the European Convention on Human Rights. Outside the cordon sanitaire, many locals waved goodbye to our coach which had a police escort to the motorway. Indeed one of the things which impressed me the most was the number of peace flags, stating 'No to NATO' which were hanging from balconies throughout the city.

A long journey to London lay ahead, which was incident free, but I was glad that I was present for this historic protest, which I hope will not mark the beginning of a new era of NATO led wars. 60 years is enough. It is time for NATO to collect its pension.

No to War! No to NATO!

I have just returned from the international protests to mark the 60th anniversary NATO Summit in Strasbourg and the counter summit held on the following day. I will report on these events later. But for the moment here is the statement from the International Coordinating Committee of No to NATO issued on April 5th . This includes Stop the War Coalition and CND. I support it completely and went to Strasbourg to support those opposing war and aggression.

60 Years are more than enough: No to NATO. No to War!

Our actions against aggressive NATO military policy during its 60th birthday from April 1st to 5th 2009, and at the end of the worldwide week of action of the World Social Forum in Belem, have been a great success despite massive obstructions. Our goal is to dissolve and dismantle NATO.

Along the lines of 'No to NATO - No to War!' thousands of people protested and participated in the international demonstration, the international conference, actions of civil and pacifist disobedience and the camp.

People from peace movements from all NATO countries were united to democratise and demilitarise the relationships between the people and to search for new forms of peaceful cooperation.

The German and French governments fear of their own citizens was obvious. It's the only explanation for the massive obstruction for the people living in this region, the police brutality, the many chicanes, the partial closing of the borders and the invalidation of the Schengen Treaty. Basic democratic rights were trampled on. Violence comes from the poweful and ruling. We want the end of the militarisation of the interior. We are defending Democracy.

The old NATO of confrontation of the two blocks with arms races, nuclear missiles, nuclear war plans lost its function at the end of the cold war. The new "global NATO" threatens with worldwide, unlawful military policy of intervention - hundreds of thousands of people and the environment, prevents the civilising of international politics, and blocks solutions to global challenges. With the adoption of the preemptive strike strategy from the Bush era the danger of new wars, even with nuclear weapons, threatens.

Because of this we demonstrated on April 4th 2009 for a political and peaceful answer to international conflicts, for the withdrawal of all troops - and an end to the war - in Afghanistan, disarmament, countering poverty, the protection of the environment, social justice and the realisation of human rights. We are against the militarisation of the European Union and against the Lisbon Treaty because it imposes a role for NATO on the EU. We want all foreign military bases, and all military structures used for wars, to be closed. We want the military budgets to decrease noticeably and the transfer of the resources to counter the rising global social problems, all the more in the biggest crisis for 80 years. The way out of the global crisis is not the martial rearrangement under the dictate of capital.

Our goal is a peace - spreading Europe in a world of solidarity. This is what we are going to work for.

Our participation in the 'birthday celebration' of NATO and other actions on April 4th in US, Turkey, Cyprus etc, were the start of numerous further actions against NATO in 2009 and in the following years. We stood up for freedom, we will resume our resistance against war and authoritarian states. We will continue our international cooperation 'No to NATO. No to War!'

60 years after the founding 20 years since the end of the confrontation of the blocks we No to NATO as a requirement for a world without war, for peace, justice, solidarity and democracy.