Workers around the world
By Andy McInerney
SOUTH
KOREA
Unions strike for 40-hour week; pilots win
Tens of thousands of workers walked off the job on May
30 to push their demand for a 40-hour workweek. The workers
are members of the Korean Confederation of Trade
Unions.
The workweek in south Korea is 44 hours, generally eight
hours daily Monday through Friday and half a day on
Saturday.
The government agreed to submit a bill as long as bosses
okayed the measure--which they have been unwilling to
consider. "We can't trust the government's continuing lip
service," said KCTU spokesperson Sohn Nak-koo. "We need to
show our strength."
The KCTU estimated that 70,000 responded to the strike
call on the first day. On May 31, 10,000 workers
demonstrated in Seoul to support the shorter workweek.
Other slogans targeted the government's plans to allow the
sale of Daewoo Motor Co. to foreign corporations.
Following the 1998 financial crisis in south Korea, the
government imposed a series of anti-labor laws. These laws,
dictated by the International Monetary Fund, included
opening the country wide to penetration by U.S. and
Japanese capital.
At the same time that the KCTU flexed its muscles in the
street May 30, pilots celebrated a win. About 1,300 Korean
Air pilots had threatened to strike with the KCTU on May 30
if their demands for union recognition were not met. On the
eve of the strike, the government recognized the pilots'
union.
INDONESIA
Students demand Suharto prosecution
The dictator Suharto, who ruled Indonesia with U.S.
support for over 30 years, no longer sits in power in
Jakarta. But he is still a lightning rod for democratic
opposition in the country.
On May 30, hundreds of students rallied near Suharto's
home. They demanded that Suharto go to trial for corruption
during his regime.
Suharto has been under house arrest since April. However
this provision ends on June 11 and no trial date is
set.
The week earlier, on May 25 and 26, student
demonstrations turned into pitched battles against riot
police. On May 25, riot police blocked a march to Suharto's
home on Cendana Street in a wealthy Jakarta neighborhood.
Police opened up on the crowd with batons and tear gas.
Chants erupted from the students: "Burn Cendana right
now!"
The next day, students retaliated by torching military
vehicles. Jakarta police spokesperson Lt. Col. Zainuri
Lubis warned of "anarchy."
The fall of Suharto in 1998 on the heels of student
democracy protests and economic crisis strengthened the
massive archipelago's working-class movement. But pro-U.S.
forces have retained state power despite Suharto's
departure.
Ominously, a wave of anti-communist rallies have been
organized by the "Work for National Care" (KPB). This
organization is dominated by members of Suharto's old
government and military figures. President Abdurrahman
Wahid has called for an end to the ban on communist parties
and literature--a move that the KPB opposes.
PERU
Dictator Fujimori holds on—for now
Peruvian dictator Alberto Fujimori claimed victory in
national elections May 28. But the iron vise with which he
has ruled the country since 1992 is beginning to crack.
Fujimori was first elected in 1990. In 1992 he stage a
"self-coup," disbanding the Congress and seizing
dictatorial powers with the security apparatus to fight the
country's two revolutionary insurgencies, the Peruvian
Communist Party and the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement
(MRTA).
Peru's traditional ruling class parties lined up behind
him to fight the PCP and the MRTA. But after the threat
posed by these groups lessened in 1998, Fujimori's
big-business opponents began to clamor for their old
posts.
These forces coalesced behind Alejandro Toledo, a
Stanford-educated former World Bank official who challenged
Fujimori in the elections. He withdrew from the runoff
elections, charging that Fujimori would rig the elections.
Most independent election observers noted massive
fraud.
Despite the obvious fraud, the United States government
backed off any threats against Fujimori's government. While
the U.S. maintained a friendly posture toward Toledo, it
has provided massive military support to Fujimori's
dictatorship, first to fight the PCP and MRTA and recently
to build support for intervention in neighboring
Colombia.
The struggles within Peru's ruling class have opened a
window for the Peruvian masses to struggle. Mass
demonstrations under the slogan "No to dictatorship" have
erupted into street battles between workers and riot
police.
Toledo has called for mass demonstrations during
Fujimori's swearing in ceremonies. "I can assure you that
we are not going to allow him to be sworn in," he said on
June 1.
Following the elections, United States officials urged
Toledo to moderate his protests. But the torrent of
anti-Fujimori protest may prove to be a Pandora's box for
the Peruvian ruling class and their U.S. backers.
ARGENTINA
Mass protests hit IMF measures
A wave of protest is facing Argentinian President
Fernando de la Rua's attempts to impose an Interna tional
Monetary Fund-backed austerity program. The IMF is trying
to push a 12 percent pay cut for civil servants, a $1.4
billion budget cut and a tax increase of up to 22 percent
on personal taxes.
Argentina's unions drew over 100,000 people into the
streets of Buenos Aires on May 31. That was one day after
an IMF team arrived in the capital to inspect the
government's economic measures.
The unions announced plans for a one-day general strike
on June 9. "Nothing will move in Argentina, not even the
leaves on the trees," warned Hugo Montoya of the General
Workers Federation (CGT).
All the main union federations in Argentina backed the
strike call. Even the normally conservative Catholic Church
in Argentina is backing the protest wave.
"We are preparing a coordinating front against the
adjustments," warned United Left leader Patricio
Echegaray.
COLOMBIA
Police attack hospital workers
Police brutally attacked a demonstration of hospital
workers in Santa Fe de Bogotá, near the capital of
Colombia, on May 26. The workers were protesting cuts in
state financing, which has caused several hospitals to
close. The workers met police guns and tear gas with rocks
and bottles.
Wave of death squad killings widens
Dozens of people have been killed in recent weeks as
death squads terrorize wide areas of Colombia. In the
department of Guajira, the death squads killed nine people
on June 3, according to an RCN report. The massacre brings
the total number killed by death squads that week in the
department to 12.
The night before, eight peasants were murdered in two
separate attacks by members of the United Self-defense
Forces of Colombia (AUC). The AUC is a network of
paramilitary death squads headed by Carlos Castaño
which works closely with the Colombian Armed Forces.
These murders are part of the terror campaign against
the Colombian population. They are aimed at decimating the
support for the revolutionary movements in Colombia.
In another example, Colombian Com munist Party leader
Pedro Nel Hernan dez was murdered with his two sons in the
department of Northern Santander on May 31. Days earlier,
Communist Youth leader Marlys de la Ossa was gunned down in
the department of Cordoba.
ECUADOR
Uprising leader freed; jailed again
Col. Lucio Gutierrez, one of the leaders of the January
popular uprising in Ecuador, was released from prison on
June 3. His release followed a blanket amnesty issued by
the congress for all those arrested for their roles in the
uprising.
But within days, Gutierrez was jailed again by the
military high command. The popular leader was charged with
giving interviews to the press, against the wishes of the
military.
The January uprising culminated in the brief seizure of
power on Jan. 21 by popular forces led by Antonio Vargas of
the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador,
Gutierrez, and former Supreme Court Justice Carlos
Solorzano. The uprising was betrayed by maneuvers on the
part of the military high command.
Many organizations had been planning a welcome march
upon Gutierrez's release. The military high command avoided
this by releasing him in the middle of the night.
In the days prior to his release, Gutierrez gave an
interview to IPS in which he stated that "the function of
the army is not to repress." He also criticized his
government for turning over the Manta Base in eastern
Ecuador to the U.S. Armed Forces as part of the campaign
against the Colombian revolution.
"If Ecuador involves itself in the Plan Colombia [the
U.S.-Colombian governments' answer to the insurgencies], it
will be converted into a new Vietnam and would be obeying
extra-national interests."
This article is copyright under a Creative
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