ABSTRACT: The reasons for holding the 35th Congress of the Radical Party in Zagreb

(Radical News N. 122 of 15 June 1988)

So as not to forget the other Europe

In this difficult year of experimentation, of transnational attempt, the Radical Party means to hold its next congress in Yugoslavia.

There are all the logistic possibilities to do this, as we have ascertained these days; but there are even more and even better political reasons to justify this choice.

Yugoslavia has been, is, and will be increasingly in the coming months the theatre of three acute crises, bound to explode dramatically, and which could have positive outlets and solutions only in the framework of a European democratic federalism and of the United States of Europe.

From Slovenia to Kosovo, from Croatia to Macedonia, an ethnic crisis is exploding - full of social and cultural implications - which cannot be solved, and could on the contrary rot (as all present and latent ethnic and identity crises in our continent) in the pattern and in the boundaries of the old "national state".

The economic crisis is so bad that the Yugoslav Prime Minister hypothesized the political possibility of operating a radical change in the system, in the sense of a full reinstatement of the free market, "both economic and political and in terms of political parties".

The authoritarian turnabouts carried out these days in Slovenia, with a wave of indiscriminate arrests, have caused indignation in the public opinion, to the point of becoming a popular protest for human and civil rights which can hardly be contained.

For such reasons, Yugoslavia assumes an objective importance which it would be foolish to ignore and underestimate. Thus, the Radical Party, thanks first of all to Sandro Ottoni and the over 50 members who operate in Yugoslavia, now plays a leading role in promoting the timely, intelligent, solid proposal of making Yugoslavia join the EEC, the natural expression of which is the popular petition to the government of Belgrade, for which the radicals are collecting signatures.

However, the decisive reason to hold the congress in that country is another one. Apart from its interests, Yugoslavia today is a crucial trial for the hopes of a politically unified Europe.

1989 and 1992 - with the election of the European Parliament and the drive toward the creation of a single market - represent as many steps of a process which is determined by the force of things, which the Radical Party wants to underline with its project for the enhancement - or more correctly, the creation - of real institutions and real European powers. Nonetheless, if the following five years will be the years of the construction of Europe and of the equilibrium of power inside it, the worst mistake each democrat and each federalist could make is that of forgetting the other Europe, the Europeans beyond the "iron curtain", victims like us of the ruthless logic of Yalta but potential co-authors (no more and no less than we are) of that project of a European Union which is essential for a policy of peace and democracy. The first interlocutor of this "other Europe", the most attentive and willing one, is Yugoslavia, a real trial for Europe, for its (our) capacity to breathe and to take political initiative

s. For all these reasons, I believe it necessary to meet in Zagreb or Ljubljana (or in any case in Yugoslavia) from 4 to 8 January for the congress of the transnational radical party.

The initiative is no doubt expensive and difficult from the point of view of the organization and also from a political point of view, but it must be faced now. In order to hold the congress in Yugoslavia, the dialogue with the government of Belgrade is open, and for our part will surely be respectful of the laws and the autonomy of that country, as well as of our civil and democratic rights.