------------------------- Via Workers World News Service Reprinted from the Dec. 5, 2002 issue of Workers World newspaper -------------------------
EUROPEANS PROTEST NATO'S EASTWARD MARCH By Bill Cecil Prague, Czech Republic "The frontier of freedom has expanded." That's what U.S. President George W. Bush told 50 heads of government assembled here for the Nov. 20-22 summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. The meeting expanded the U.S.- dominated military bloc to include Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia. This brings NATO deep into Eastern Europe and onto the soil of the former Soviet Union. The Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland joined two years ago. At Bush's bidding the gathering formally changed NATO's "mission" from "combating Communism" to acting as an appendage to Washington's "war on terror"--which can be better described as Bush's scheme to pump up oil company profits with mass murder in the Middle East. The U.S. president failed to mention the decades when the people of East Europe lived in terror of obliteration by NATO nuclear missiles aimed at Prague, Bratislava, Warsaw, Budapest, Bucharest, Sofia, Riga, Vilnius, Tallinn and other cities of the region. To partake in Bush's war, the NATO leaders voted to set up a European Rapid Reaction Force. For the recently impoverished East European countries, joining NATO will mean arms purchases from such U.S. firms as Boeing and Northrup Grumman, both financial sponsors of the Prague meeting. Unemployment in the Czech Republic is officially 18.8 percent. Homeless people now live on the streets in once prosperous Prague. Yet the NATO big shots were wined and dined on endangered species of fish in luxury hotels behind walls of police. WHAT 'FREEDOM'? Bush's remarks notwithstanding, this 1,100-year-old city of castles and cobblestones did not feel particularly free last week. It was more like a city under occupation. The Czech government had ceded responsibility for the country's security to the Pentagon for the duration of the summit. U.S. Air Force F16s circled over the city while Czech Army helicopters hovered above and armies of police patrolled its streets. Whole areas of Prague were declared off limits to its people. Police snipers were visible on rooftops. A Kazakh civilian jetliner was forced to land by the U.S. Air Force. These measures were ostensibly taken to "prevent terrorist attacks," but many felt they were meant to stifle political protest. Many Europeans, east and west, don't feel that NATO's growth will bring any kind of freedom. Dozens of political activists were detained at the Czech border to prevent their participating in anti-NATO rallies. The "Czech" media, now mostly owned by U.S. and German companies, created an atmosphere of fear with constant reports that anti-NATO protesters were planning violence. In spite of state and media intimidation, chants of "NATO, no pasaran" and "Drop Bush, not bombs" rang through Prague's streets Nov. 20. Some 2,000 workers, students and retirees took part in a protest rally and marches called by the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia (KSCM). The day before 150 delegates from around Europe had attended an anti- NATO counter-summit the KSCM organized. Also on Nov. 19, over 1,000 mostly young people joined an anti-NATO march called by the Czechoslovak Federation of Anarchists, the Feminist Organization of March 8 and the Organization of Revolutionary Anarchists. At a Nov. 20 news conference, Russian activists pelted NATO Secretary General Lord Robertson with eggs, shouting, "NATO is worse than Gestapo." 'FREE MILOSEVIC, DON'T ATTACK IRAQ' Most of the marchers on Nov. 20 were Czech. But activists came from Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Germany, Belgium, Slovakia and Poland. Marchers carried portraits of Yugoslav children murdered by NATO bombs and signs demanding the liberation of kidnapped and imprisoned Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. Other signs denounced U.S. plans to attack Iraq, a major topic at the "North Atlantic" meeting. A banner called NATO the "North Atlantic Terrorist Organization." Peter Shuster, a student, came from the Czech city of Brno to march against NATO. "We are free people," he said, "and we don't want to be cannon fodder for the U.S. power elite that wants to take over the world." Edo Bango, an 18-year-old Roma man, came to the protest from Slovakia. He wore a shirt with a picture of Che Guevara. His brother, Mario Bango, is in prison for defending himself against a racist attack in which the attacker died. There has been an epidemic of violence against Roma people in Eastern Europe since capitalism was restored there. Edo Bango scoffed at the idea that NATO is bringing freedom. "Capitalism has made everything worse, especially for the Roma people." Marcin Adam, a student from Poland, did not take part in the demonstrations. He and a group of friends were detained at the border and did not get to Prague until after the protests. He said: "NATO is a pact to unite all the richest countries so they can control the world resources. We know the U.S. and Great Britain have more weapons of mass destruction than any other country, and they used chemical weapons against Vietnam and Iraq." Adam said the return of capitalism to Poland is a "success story only for the capitalists, but most workers think it was a catastrophe. Now we have a really high unemployment rate in Poland, and most workers and peasants live in appalling conditions." KSCM General Secretary Miroslav Grebenicek opened the rally. He said, "Prague has become a meeting place for people who are responsible for war crimes and crimes against peace." He denounced NATO's expansion as part of Washington's drive to conquer the "heartland of Eurasia" with its vast energy resources, as outlined in former U.S. National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski's book "The Grand Chessboard." He said, "Our citizens must have housing, schools and hospitals, not tanks, warplanes and cannons." Communist Youth Union leader Zdenek Stefek denounced NATO as the "world's largest terrorist organization, which it proved with its aggression against Yugoslavia and now by its preparations to attack Iraq." He said that "reforming NATO is not possible" and called for the pact to be abolished and its leaders put on trial. The rally and the Nov. 19 counter-summit were also addressed by leaders of Communist and workers' parties from Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Britain, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Germany, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Moldova, Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Slovakia, Sweden, Turkey and Yugoslavia as well as the European Peace Forum and the World Federation of Democratic Youth. Workers Party of Belgium General Secretary Nadine Rosso Rosso called for solidarity with Colombian, Filipino and Palestinian freedom fighters. She reported that the Belgian port of Antwerp was now under U.S. military occupation but that Belgian activists would try to block arms for the attack on Iraq from being shipped through the city. The counter-summit adopted a declaration called the Prague Appeal that denounced the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, the Anglo-U.S. attack on Afghanistan and the U.S. war against Iraq. It called the Bush regime's planned invasion of Iraq an "attempt to solve U.S. economic problems at the expense of other nations" and called on people of the world to mobilize against war. - END - (Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but changing it is not allowed. For more information contact Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe [EMAIL PROTECTED] Support the voice of resistance http://www.workers.org/orders/donate.php) ------------------ This message is sent to you by Workers World News Service. To subscribe, E-mail to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To unsubscribe, E-mail to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To switch to the DIGEST mode, E-mail to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Send administrative queries to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>