DEMOCRACY FOR CHINA/FREEDOM FOR TIBET-FAX No.77
Newsletter on the campaigns of the Radical Party for the democracy on China and the freedom of Tibet.
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Issue 77, 24 August 1999 (Year IV)
Editors office: Massimo Lensi
Layout & Distribution: Alberto Novi
7H252 - Rue Wiertz 60 - 1047 Brussels (Belgium)
Tel: +32-2-230.41.21 - Fax +32-2-230.36.70
Email: tibet.fax@agora.stm.it - Web: http://www.radicalparty.org - Telnet: agora.stm.it
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"I truly believe that individuals can make a difference in society. Since periods of great change such as the present one come so rarely in human history, it is up to each of us to make the best use of our time to help create a happier world".
Tenzin GYATSO, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama, 1992
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Published in English, Spanish, French, Italian
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FOR MAKING NORTH KOREA AN INTERNATIONAL TRUSTEESHIP
FOR PARDONING RAJIV GANDHI'S KILLERS
In this issue of " China -Tibet fax ", we publish two appeals : the first calls for a trusteeship of the cruellest and most demented Stalinist national dictatorship - the North Korean dictatorship, which is still surviving on the eve of the year 2000, and is condemning entire regions to starvation, while arming to the teeth and preparing to launch a new type of more powerful ballistic missile pointed towards Japan and the United States. According to some sources, 2 out of 10,000 inhabitants starve to death every day - which would give a figure of four million victims between 1995 and 1998. Other sources go as far as to contend there are as many as 6.5 million such victims in North Korea (1). The second appeal concerns the killers of Rajiv Gandhi who were sentenced to death in India. This is an important appeal that calls not only for the pardoning of the four persons on death row, but also for the introduction of a moratorium on capital punishment in India. A decisive sign for maintaining the world's lar
gest democracy and for the universal abolition of the death penalty. These are two appeals addressed to countries under radically different regimes, both of which must nonetheless confront - from different points of view - the Chinese obsession of the leadership of Asia, now out in the open. Whereas North Korea does not hide its preposterous wish to destabilise the region, the crisis between Taipei and Beijing has reached an alarming level in a context that shows signs of greater restrictions of freedom within the so-called "modernisation process" of the People's Republic of China. This crisis obviously calls to question the foreign policy of the United States, if we consider the inconclusive outcome, from the economic point of view at least, of the Hong Kong episode. Nor should we forget that on December 20th of this year, the same fate will be reserved for Macao.
As to the policy of the European Union in particular, it is very simply lamentable, for no such policy exists. There are many factors that force us, in an increasingly alarming manner, to take decisions and initiatives in reply to Asian policies and the forms of expression they adopt: blackmail by the military, embargoes, diplomatic pressure. Hopes for a favourable outcome are now fading perhaps because of the "globalisation," a concept that is cited often, but only when it can prove useful, and also because of a mercenary attitude on the part of international business circles which dare not speak its name. One of these factors is gaining capital importance recently. A crackdown on the Fa Lun Gong religious minority has been under way for several days, which for many brings to mind the massacres "announced" before the tragedy of 4 June 1989. Hundreds of arrests, hundreds of thousands of books burnt, international arrest warrants issued against the head of Fa Lun Gong. This is a sign of weakness on the p
art of regime. It is also a sign of the internal struggle waged in Beijing, but also of the quest for renewed hegemony for the guiding role of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). A new decline in democracy or internal settlement of accounts? However that may be, all these facts must be taken seriously and must lead to a search for new forms of anti-violent mobilisation. In these struggles, the democratic representatives of the international community, the international institutions and our national parliaments and governments must get directly involved.
Time is short and as numerous observers as well as some cadres of the CCP have written, there is a stench of war in the air again. We therefore ask you to support our two joint efforts by signing, as indicated, the two appeals, and circulating them in your respective organisations.
Time for all to get down to work ! (ml)
(1) Kim Hanbyol, » Mourir de faim au nom de Kim Il Sung (LiMes, 1/1999, 20 p.200-201)
M. Sitbon, » Que se passe-t-il en Corée du Nord ? (Maintenant, La Lettre, 20/1997, pp.12 and 19.
P. Biberson, interview in Libération, France, May 98.
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PARDON FOR THE ASSASSINS OF RAJIV GANDHI
After the four defendants in the trial for the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi were sentenced to death, the PRT launched an appeal to the Heads of State and of Government of the European Union, to ask Indian President Narayanan to pardon the four convicted persons. A first step towards the introduction of a moratorium in India on the 20 executions.
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INTERNATIONAL APPEAL TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE INDIAN UNION K.R. NARAYANAN
Mr President,
Of the sentences handed down by the court of first instance in regard to the persons charged with the assassination of the Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, only four were upheld by Indian Supreme Court on 11 May 1999. Our intention in launching this appeal is not to question the justification of the sentence handed down by the Supreme Court. We simply wish to underscore that this ruling comes in a more general context, that of the constantly declining number of capital punishments pronounced and executed year by year in your country and a constant growing of the opposition to the death penalty by politicians and public opinion alike in India. Concurrently, on the international scale, the number of countries that have abolished the death penalty de facto or de jure or have pronounced a moratorium on executions continues to grow. A new and extremely positive situation entails the opposition to the death penalty by majority of the more than 100 UN Member States and makes it henceforth possible for the UN G
eneral Assembly to adopt a universal moratorium on the execution of the death penalty. In this context, we are profoundly convinced that every advancement towards the abolition of the death penalty in your country, which is the world's largest democracy, is no doubt of very great significance for the international community as a whole. We are certain that the pardon granted to the four persons sentenced to death for the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi would constitute one of these advancements and could be a prelude to the introduction of a moratorium on the execution of the death penalty in India, itself the penultimate step to the complete abolition of the death penalty. It is with confidence that we turn to you, Mr President, so that under your prerogatives, you will use your powers to pardon the four persons sentenced to death, Messrs Nalini, T. T. Suthenthiraja, Srih
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Surname - Name - Email address - Organisation
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The appeal can be signed by completing the form on one of the Web sites of the PRT: www.radicalparty.org or by sanding an e-mail to the following address: pr.bruxelles@agora.it.
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CHINA TIBET TELEX CHINA/TIBET/WORLD BANK 3 June (Agence Europe)
Euro MP Olivier DUPUIS deplores the attitude of the management of the World Bank which could decide, on June 8th, to grant China a loan of US $ 334 million for the » China Western Poverty Reduction Project . The project provides for the transfer of some additional 60,000 Chinese settlers in Tibet. According to Mr Dupuis, with this action, the World Bank becomes an accomplice and co-author of the policy to colonise Tibet and to destroy a millennial people and culture.
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CHINA/TIEN AN MEN ANNIVERSARY June 4th
On June 4th, the tenth anniversary of the Tien An Men Square massacre, the Radical Party has organised protests in dozens of cities in remembrance of the victims of this tragedy and of all victims in China, Tibet, Mongolia and Turkestan, which have cast a tragic shadow over more than half a century of Communist dictatorship. In the many cities where these events were held, radical delegations laid flowers before monuments dedicated to resistance fighters and war victims. Every wreath bore the wording: "Like the victims of Nazism and fascism, like the victims of wars and the absence of policy."
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TAIWAN/KOSOVO June 8th.
Following the decision of the Taiwan government to grant US $ 300 million for the reconstruction of Kosovo, the Secretary of the PRT, Olivier Dupuis, Euro MP, issued the following statement: "Once again, the Republic of Taiwan has proven that it is capable of assuming its responsibilities on the international stage, but also, and unlike the communist regime in Beijing, of making a distinction between aggressors and aggressed. That is why we must thank them. For the same reason, the international community, or its democratic component, at least, should take due note and commit itself to achieving the full integration of Taiwan in all international organisations."
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CHINA/DEATH PENALTY June 25th
The association "Hands Off Cain," associated with the Radical Party, has mobilised to ask Italy not to extradite SONG Zhicai, a Chinese citizen accused of fraud, to China. In China, Song may face the death penalty. At a press conference in Rome, the secretary of the Sergio d'Elia association and the senator from the Pannella list, Pietro MILIO commented on the request made to the Italian senate. China is the country where 80% of all death penalties are carried out.
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CHINA/EUROPEAN COMMISSION June 28th
China has paradoxically vetoed the appointment of Chris Patten to the European Commission. Olivier DUPUIS, Secretary of the PRT, had this to say on the matter: » It is unquestionable that the formation of the new Commission has hitherto been characterised by a serious lack of transparency and consideration in regard to the resolution adopted by the European Parliament last January, which called that the commissioners be selected from among European elected officials or personalities of international scope. We should therefore thank the authorities of the People's Republic of China for having, volens nolens, contributed to the opening of the discussion on the appointment of commissioners, by coming out clearly and unequivocally against the nomination of a personality on the international stage such as Chris Patten. In doing so, they made this candidacy even more indisputable, provided it is still possible... We hope that the Chinese authorities will be able to take advantage, in turn, of the electoral proc
edures of the European Parliament, by turning the current House of Communist Lords, into a House of Commons, i.e. a real parliament.
< PAGE TWO >
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TO PRESERVE THE FREEDOM OF 22 MILLION NORTH KOREANS THREATENED WITH STARVATION WHO ARE VICTIMS OF THE MOST SAVAGE DICTATORSHIP IN THE WORLD BY TURNING NORTH KOREA IMMEDIATELY INTO A TRUSTEESHIP
To the Secretary General and members of the UN Security Council
Some 3 million persons have stared to death in North Korea in the last four years. Today, the 22 million inhabitants of that country are threatened by the worst famine imaginable, and have to resort, in certain regions of the country, even to cannibalism; millions of persons are deprived of everything and are totally isolated from the rest of the world, without any rights, at the complete mercy of a national communist regime. Kidnapping, torture, concentration camps, forced repatriation and death sentences are the norm for those who dare criticise the regime. And North Korea poses a constant threat to its neighbouring countries. North Korea is the will to military and terrorist power of international scope, allocating vast means and resources to building up an arsenal of increasingly more powerful weapons of mass destruction. Twenty-two million civilians have been taken hostage in North Korea, are threatened with death, and must be saved. Now! The survival of the regime in North Korea depends on the tacit
support of its big neighbour, Communist China, and on the knowing silence of the international community. Everyone must mobilise, in the name of the right/duty of humanitarian and political interference, to stop this spiralling criminal folly of the Pyongyang regime, which goes hand in hand with the indifference of the international community. The United Nations must assume their political and civil responsibilities by putting under international trusteeship, under their trusteeship and direct protection, this country and the 22 million men and women struggling for survival, the sacrificial victims of the Pyongyang regime. To create in North Korea the conditions for the advent of democracy, the rule of law, and freedom
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Surname - Name - Email address - Organisation
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The appeal can be signed by completing the form on one of the Web sites of the PRT: www.radicalparty.org or by sanding an e-mail to the following address: pr.bruxelles@agora.it.
