5) Behind the Spy-Plane Incident
by [EMAIL PROTECTED]
6) Cop Shooting Sparks Rebellion in Ohio
by [EMAIL PROTECTED]
7) A Message from the Editor
by [EMAIL PROTECTED]
8) Racial Profiling Sparks Mall Boycott
by [EMAIL PROTECTED]
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: torstai 12. huhtikuu 2001 13:03
Subject: [WW] Behind the Spy-Plane Incident
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the April 19, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
U.S.-CHINA RELATIONS: WHAT THE SPY-PLANE INCIDENT
SHOWED
By Fred Goldstein
The agreement whereby China has said it will release the 24
U.S. spies who caused the death of a Chinese pilot has left
mixed feelings.
On the one hand, it is deeply satisfying to see the
imperialist bullies in the White House and the Pentagon
having to back off their arrogant, blustering, unconditional
demand for the immediate release of their spies and spy
plane. Those who are used to giving orders and commanding
obedience were forced to say they were "very sorry" to the
Chinese government and people.
On the other hand, there is anger that the Bush
administration did not comply with China's entirely
justified demands that it take full responsibility for this
flagrant violation of China's sovereignty and territorial
integrity and that the Pentagon has said nothing about
ending its menacing and illegal spy flights.
But whatever the next phase of this ongoing struggle, the
Bush administration and all U.S. personnel in China are
fully aware that the seething anger there against Washington
will not be easily put aside by any settlement and that this
anger played a major role in pushing Bush back.
The New York Times put it bluntly on April 10 when it
revealed that "President Bush's senior advisers have
concluded that the most severe acts of retaliation they
could threaten in the spy-plane stand off with China-selling
advanced arms to Taiwan, restricting trade, derailing
Beijing's bid for the Olympics-would not speed the release
of the 24 American crew members and could harm longer-term
interests in Asia."
In the same edition an article from China reported, "Zhang
Yin, an elderly newsstand owner, recalled a song from the
Korean War to explain his feelings about the current crisis
with the United States: 'When friends come, we have good
wine to entertain them; but if jackals and wolves come,
we'll use hunting rifles to shoot them,' he sang, adding, 'I
have good feelings for the American people, but China should
have shot the plane down!'"
"The streets of Beijing," the article continued, "are filled
with Mr. Zhangs," which explained why the negotiations with
the Chinese to free the 24 crew members were "going so
slowly."
And it is not just the older generation that is aroused. "In
one opinion poll on the Chinese Internet," wrote the Times,
"13,000 of 15,000 net surfers said the collision was the
result of a 'deliberate provocation.' "
The U.S. government and the Pentagon have tried to pass off
their spy mission as being in "international territory."
But an article in the People's Daily of April 10 reprinted
from the People's Liberation Army publication explained that
the U.S. plane had been in China's "exclusive economic
zone." It showed that an "exclusive economic zone" was
defined in the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea as
neither "territorial waters" nor "the high seas." It has its
own legal status, which makes "freedom of overflight"
conditional upon respecting the rights, laws and security of
the coastal countries.
The army daily pointed out that "as early as 1950, for its
national defense security, the United States set up a so-
called anti-aircraft identification zone outside its
territorial airspace which extended several hundred nautical
miles toward the Atlantic and Pacific oceans." Washington
demanded that other countries, before sending their aircraft
into the zones, "must inform the United States of the type
and destination for purposes of identification, positioning
and control.
"As the Chinese saying goes, 'The magistrates are free to
burn down houses, while the common people are forbidden even
to light lamps at night.' That is the 'juridical logic' of
the United States."
Whatever the legality, the spy-plane incident is the result
of a U.S. government provocation. The PRC has protested
repeatedly about these incursions. According to Minxin Pei
of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, speaking
on PBS's "Newshour" on April 10, the U.S. flies over 200
such flights a year against China.
BUSH'S ANTI-CHINA MANEUVERS
This unexpected incident has caught Washington by surprise
in the midst of preparing to execute a coordinated series of
hostile maneuvers aimed at the PRC. The Bush administration
is preparing to give Taiwan new generations of modern
weapons, including Patriot missiles, anti-submarine aircraft
and submarines. And it is threatening to also give Taiwan
the Aegis radar and battle-command system.
It is planning to sponsor an anti-China so-called "human
rights" resolution at the UN Human Rights Commission in
Geneva on April 18. It has also just permitted the Dalai
Lama, the "god-king spiritual leader" of the former serf-
owning clan aristocracy of Tibet, to travel to Taiwan to
meet with the leaders of the Democratic Progressive Party.
Their discussions would be about "independence" from China
for Tibet and Taiwan.
The Dalai Lama does not speak for the Tibetan masses. He and
his entourage of feudal monks were ousted from Tibet by the
People's Liberation Army in 1950. The meeting in Taiwan is
part of Washington's threat to dismember China.
PLAYING THE JAPAN CARD
But most importantly, the Bush administration is moving to
play the Japan card against China. Bush has let it be known,
both during his presidential campaign and in office, that
his administration is going to upgrade its relations with
Japanese imperialism and downgrade its relations with China.
To be sure, the Clinton administration began this shift in
1999 when it signed the so-called defense cooperation
guidelines to include Japanese support for U.S. military
operations in the region.
As part of its strategic review of U.S. military policy and
weaponry, the Bush administration has leaked plans to
elevate its military relations with Japan, directed against
China.
For several years there has been a debate within the U.S.
ruling class over relations with Japan. During the 1980s and
1990s Washington directed most of its efforts to forcing
Japan to open its markets for U.S. investment, autos,
agricultural products, financial services, and so on. This
relentless economic struggle against the Japanese capitalist
class worked against military cooperation.
As China began to develop industrially, sections of the
Pentagon became more and more critical, charging that
Washington was subordinating its military preparations
against China, and against any revolutionary development in
Asia, to trade considerations.
Bush has given signals that he intends to move in the
direction of an imperialist military alliance with Japan.
According to Business Week of April 16, "Bush's military
planners believe that U.S. defense strategy should focus
primarily on Asia rather than Europe as the next potential
Battle Theater. That means the White House wants Japan to
shoulder more responsibility for regional defense." This
means lifting the ban on expanding the Japanese military,
joint training exercises and sharing of facilities.
Of course Washington will not go too far, for fear of
strengthening Japanese imperialism too much. The Japanese
monopolies have their own designs on Asia. The right-wing
militarists in Japan are growing stronger.
Japanese imperialism is the former colonizer of China. It
committed unspeakable atrocities against the Chinese masses,
as well as the rest of the countries of Asia, during the
1930s and up until 1945. In fact, the Chinese government
recently denounced a decision by the Japanese government
that approved a right-wing military version of history in
junior high school textbooks. The textbooks made no mention
of the infamous Nanking Massacre of 1937 in which 200,000
Chinese were killed. The books described the Japanese
invasion of China as a form of liberation from Europe and
the U.S.
The fact that the Japanese government approved these
textbooks is a measure of the political progress that the
militarist and expansionist factions of the Japanese ruling
class have made in the recent period.
TWO VERY DIFFERENT APOLOGIES
It was not lost on the Chinese government that after the
incident in which Japanese nationals were drowned when a
Japanese fishing vessel was sunk by the U.S. submarine
Greeneville this February, the U.S. government and the U.S.
military profusely apologized to their imperialist allies in
Tokyo and to the families of the dead.
This is in sharp contrast to Washington's stubborn refusal
to apologize for the loss of the Chinese pilot and the
destruction of a Chinese aircraft in the course of an
illegal military intrusion.
It is only natural to view the present provocations as
continuous with the bombing of the Chinese Embassy in
Belgrade. In fact, the destruction of the independent
Yugoslav government and the takeover by imperialist-
supported candidates can be regarded as the final stage in
the counter-revolution in Europe, which now frees the U.S.
imperialists to turn their attention fully to the East. The
bombing of China's embassy can be viewed as the first shot
fired across the bow by the Pentagon.
Russia may have nuclear weapons, but it is wallowing in
bourgeois corruption and decadence and in a state of
decline. Its military is in a shambles. Its fleet is
corroded. It has to take a millionaire on its space launch
to earn a measly $20 million. It is in a state of financial
dependency.
While the Pentagon will certainly not ignore Russia, the
counter-revolution there is already accomplished. It has
become a semi-colony. The imperialist strategists see their
fundamental task now as fostering counter-revolution and
recolonization in China.
ROLE OF ECONOMIC RELATIONS
One immediate reason the Bush administration modified its
aggressive posture towards the PRC after the spy plane
incident is that many of the Fortune 500 corporations have
contracts in China and are in the midst of expanding
projects and sales there. This crisis comes at a moment of
economic downturn in the capitalist world in general--a
downturn being led by the U.S. It is a most inopportune
moment for the corporations to interrupt their economic
relations with China.
Business Week of April 16, gives a good feel for these
trepidations: " 'My one criticism of Bush so far is his
inflexibility,' sighs one outside presidential adviser with
strong business ties. 'Ultimately, the aim of policy is to
let our stuff into China. Bush could apologize [for the
death of the Chinese pilot], say this was no one's fault,
and get on with it.' A no-fault exit from the crisis would
obviously please U.S. multinationals."
Furthermore, negotiations with China for entry into the
World Trade Organization are supposed to wrap up by the end
of this month. And the multinationals, including
agribusiness, are waiting to sweep in as Chinese tariffs are
lowered and regulations dismantled. But these negotiations
are dragging on and on. China is resisting many of the
excessive U.S. demands. An escalation of the crisis could
have led to a great setback for the U.S. multinationals had
the WTO agreement collapsed.
But there is a much deeper reason for Bush to proceed with
caution. Reaction in China to the Belgrade embassy bombing
revealed the intense and widespread anti-imperialist
sentiment that lies right under the surface among the
masses. To be sure, they were encouraged to demonstrate by
the government. But no government can produce the kind of
anti-colonial rage that burst forth in 20 cities after the
bombing. It was 150 years of foreign rule that gave the
energy to those demonstrations. In the present crisis, this
sentiment has resurfaced.
The Chinese leadership has pursued normal relations with the
U.S. government in order to secure trade and technology for
the purposes of national development. They have every right
to do so. However, it was thought that trade and economic
"interdependence" would neutralize or stay Washington's
hostilities.
The present crisis and the anti-China military and political
atmosphere surrounding it shows that no amount of trade, no
economic ties can overcome the fundamental class antagonism
between socialist China and the imperialist U.S. ruling
class and its government.
China's market reforms have severely eroded the socialist
foundation, created unemployment and a high degree of
inequality. There is a growing bourgeoisie and economic
penetration by the multinationals.
Nevertheless, the core of the socialist state, consisting of
the Communist Party and the People's Liberation Army as well
as significant state enterprises, remains in place.
Furthermore, the Chinese revolution and its traditions are
easily revived among the masses. In the present crisis there
are reports of a popular yearning for a leader like Mao
Zedong. The possibility is there for a regeneration of the
anti-imperialist struggle and the revival of the
revolutionary class struggle along with a thorough-going
reassessment of relations with the U.S. imperialists and the
market reforms.
- 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:
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From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: torstai 12. huhtikuu 2001 13:03
Subject: [WW] Cop Shooting Sparks Rebellion in Ohio
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the April 19, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
FOUR BLCK MEN KILLED IN FIVE MONTHS: COP SHOOTING
SPARKS REBELLION IN OHIO
Angry Crowds Defy Tear Gas, Stun Guns
By Gery Armsby
A rebellion against police brutality and murder has broken
out in Cincinnati reminiscent of the anti-racist uprisings
of the 1960s.
Timothy Thomas, 19 years old and unarmed, was shot and
killed early in the morning of April 7 by a white, off-duty
Cincinnati police officer. This was the fourth time in only
five months that local cops had killed an African American.
It became the last straw.
Cincinnati WLWT Channel 5 news reported that officer Steven
Roach had been looking for Thomas because of outstanding
warrants for his arrest. All were for misdemeanors or
traffic violations. Roach pursued Thomas on foot and fired
the fatal shot at the corner of 13th and Republic streets.
Thomas died on the way to University Hospital.
Outraged by the police killing of yet another Black youth,
protesters began to gather in the streets on Monday morning,
April 9, to put pressure on Cincinnati police to break a two-
day silence over the shooting.
Some demonstrators were members of the Cincinnati Black
United Front, which had planned peaceful protests. The BUF
had accused the police department of illegal harassment and
profiling of Black people over a 30-year period in a lawsuit
filed only last month.
Later Monday, during a public city council meeting, angry
local residents carrying signs and banners chanted and
voiced their outrage. Eventually they were able to get
Thomas' mother, Angela Leisure, to the podium to demand an
explanation from city officials about her son's death.
By the end of the day a multinational crowd of over 800
protesters, mainly youths, was in the streets in front of
police headquarters.
At midnight, riot police began to encircle the crowd that
remained. They repeatedly fired beanbag stun guns and
sprayed pepper gas in attempts to disperse the
demonstration.
Protesters fought back by lobbing bottles and bricks at the
cops. Bricks were also aimed at city buildings.
Police eventually charged the crowd and made at least 10
arrests. Dozens were injured in the clash with cops, mainly
by police stun guns. Local hospitals reported admitting 25
people injured in the police riot.
The next afternoon--Tuesday, April 10--protesters were back
in the streets demanding justice for Timothy Thomas and an
end to racial profiling. Hundreds of Black, Latino, Asian
and white youths broke up into smaller groups that patrolled
the streets with the message "stop racist killer cops" as
they tried to evade arrest by police. Many people came out
of their homes to signal support as they passed by.
Police corralled a large group at Race and Green streets and
launched a furious offensive of gas and plastic bullets.
Numerous arrests followed. Most of the anti-racist
demonstrators who were arrested face charges of criminal
rioting and are being blamed for vandalism of city property.
As Workers World goes to press, reports of angry protests
and rebellion throughout the city continue to mount. Several
schools were closed on Wednesday. The toll of arrests is up
to 76, and dozens are reported injured.
>From the local press to CNN and ABC, the commercial media
have played up Thomas' arrest warrants to justify another
police killing of a young Black man. Only lip service has
been paid to the nationwide epidemic of racial profiling.
In Cincinnati, police have been accused many times of using
unnecessary force to pursue suspects. Of the four people
killed in recent months, three were shot by police and a
fourth was choked to death while in police custody. No white
suspects have been killed by Cincinnati police during this
period.
Now the Cincinnati authorities are reaping the anger they
have sowed.
- 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:
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From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: torstai 12. huhtikuu 2001 13:03
Subject: [WW] A Message from the Editor
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the April 19, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
A MESSAGE FROM THE EDITOR
Dear Reader:
These are serious times. The Bush government is trying to
dismantle what remains of social protection--just as
economic crisis looms..
These are hopeful times. The struggle is growing against
racism, sexism and gender oppression--the reactionary forces
that attempt to divide the people's movement. There is widespread
anger against a government that steals elections and takes its
orders directly from big business.
Workers World for over 40 years has analyzed, mobilized and
educated on every issue of importance to progressive
activists. Our writers go wherever there is news to report that you
can't get anywhere else.
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hole in the official lies and censorship.
What's happening here in the struggle against racism? For
Mumia Abu-Jamal and Leonard Peltier? For immigrant workers? On
the labor front? For lesbian, gay, bi and trans rights? For a
woman's right to choose?
Every week, Workers World gives you the highlights of these
movements.
And we analyze how it all fits into the bigger picture--the
historic struggle against capitalist domination of the
world, the struggle for the socialist future.
This is a plea for money. The green stuff without which
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We need money badly.
So we've launched a special Spring Fund Drive.
Rents and prices keep going up, but our class has been
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Do you want this paper to keep bringing the class truth to
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Thanks for helping fill the void created by the corporate
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Deirdre Griswold
Editor, Workers World
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(Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to
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From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: torstai 12. huhtikuu 2001 13:03
Subject: [WW] Racial Profiling Sparks Mall Boycott
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the April 19, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
RACIAL PROFILING SPARKS MALL BOYCOTT
By Leslie Feinberg
Cheektowaga, N.Y.
A group of some 60 people--predominantly Black and ranging
from very young to elders--stood on the soggy lawn at the
Walden Avenue entrance to the Galleria Mall here on April 7.
The messages on their hand-lettered signs varied, but they
all arrived at the same point: Boycott!
As drivers and passengers on the crowded highway passed the
protest, many slowed to demonstrate which side they were on.
They shouted in assent, waved, flashed victory signs, honked
and clenched fists of solidarity.
The crowd calling for a boycott of the mall waved back. Many
in the group were encouraged by how many white drivers
blared their car horns and waved in agreement with their
cause.
It was hard to hear the Rev. Darius Pridgen over the din of
horns honking. Pridgen told Workers World that this struggle
"will change the whole area. It will bring people together."
CALL FOR PUBLIC HEARING
He explained, "This protest is against blatant racism and
discrimination at the mall and in the town of Cheektowaga by
the police department and some of those sitting on the
judicial bench. We are asking for very small things," he
said.
"Number one, we don't claim to be the voice for every
citizen who has been harmed. So we are asking the town to
hold a public hearing." That way, more accounts can be added
to the record.
On Feb. 26, Black area residents had packed a Cheektowaga
Town Board meeting to demonstrate their anger at a pattern
of Jim Crow racist incidents in this virtually apartheid
suburb of Buffalo. Of the 100,000 residents here, only some
5 percent are people of color. The Town Board, town
supervisor, both judges and the police chief are all white.
So is the entire 133-member police department.
The day of the Town Board meeting, the coalition set up two
phone lines for residents to lodge complaints about racist
abuse in Cheektowaga. By the next afternoon, more than 120
people had called with personal accounts--about half of
which occurred at Walden Galleria mall. Hundreds more have
called since.
The coalition held an April 3 news conference to call on
people of all nationalities to boycott every business in
Cheektowaga in which racist mistreatment has taken place. At
that media conference, Buffalo lawyer Roland Cercone told
the media that the coalition had amassed enough data about
racist discrimination and harassment to warrant a class-
action suit against the town.
THREE MORE DEMANDS
The fact that the entire 133-member police department is
white, Pridgen said, "allows the police department to
operate with no checks or balances in regard to race
relations." So the coalition is calling for adding Black
police officers to the force.
"We're not just concerned about the past, but about the
future," he stressed. "So we're asking for the town to set
up a Human Rights Division to investigate racism,
discrimination and harassment."
"The final thing," Pridgen explained, is that town officials
"have to send out a clear message that racism or
discrimination will not be tolerated in the town of
Cheektowaga. They have not done that to this point. So now
we wait for the meeting with the town. Then we begin to sit
down at the table to bring about justice in this town."
That meeting is set for April 18.
"We'll be here again next Saturday," Pridgen concluded.
Saturdays are the busiest shopping days at the mall.
This Saturday morning a small group of about a dozen
protesters had met in a church parking lot on the East Side
of Buffalo in a cold downpour. Because of racist profiling
of motorists by Cheektowaga police, everyone rode out
together in a van.
The group in the morning shift stood by the Walden entrance
to the mall in the cold rain, holding signs aloft for
passing motorists to read. The moment they appeared, honks
of support began.
By afternoon, when the location of the protest was broadcast
on radio, 60 men, women and children filled the area waving
to the many motorists--Black and white--who slowed down to
demonstrate solidarity with the boycott.
Mama B., an older Black woman, told Workers World she has
been followed in the mall while she shops. "And it's a very
hurtful thing. I love to shop, I love my plastic and I pay
my bills on time."
That's why she braved the cold vigil outside the mall to
stand up for the boycott. "I am a flexible person. But I
will not bend against my standard," she explained. She
pointed toward the sprawling retail and entertainment
complex. "It's not who built the mall that's the problem,
it's who runs the mall. It's not about the workers in here.
It's at the top. Hit the top."
Al-Nisa Banks, editor and publisher of the weekly newspaper
The Challenger, said this protest was "certainly long
overdue. Ever since the tragic death of Cynthia Wiggins,
this community has been waiting."
In December 1995, Cynthia Wiggins--a young Black mother--was
a passenger on a city bus coming from the African American
community in Buffalo. It wasn't allowed to stop on mall
property. She was killed trying to cross seven lanes of
traffic on Walden Avenue to get to her job at the mall.
Lawyers for her estate argued that the bus was barred from
stopping at the mall to discourage inner-city residents from
shopping there. Mall owner Pyramid Corp. settled the suit
for $2.55 million in November 1999.
Banks concluded, "We're going to have to take it to the next
level of activism and organization. Some of us have to be
willing to go to jail. To be truly effective, we have to go
to those sixties' tactics that got us where we are today. "
- 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] For subscription info send message to:
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