CCR-BRAZIL SECTION OF RCIT HAS THE SAME POSITION IN WELLCOME MIGRANTS COMING FROM LATIN AMERICA AND HAITIANS AND THE SAME ON REFUGEES AND ECONOMIC MIGRANTS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD
Throw Open the Gates of Europe to Refugees!
Long live International Solidarity of the
Workers and Poor! Down with the Imperialist Fortress EU! Advance the Arab
Revolution to Build Workers and Peasant Republics!
Statement of the Revolutionary Communist
International Tendency (RCIT), 15.9.2015, www.thecommunists.net
1. Currently thousands of refugees – many from
Syria – are trying to reach the European Union. In recent week tens of
thousands have crossed the border. Against the determined campaign of the
ruling classes in the EU, this migration has provoked a spontaneous wave of
solidarity among huge sectors of the European working class and youth,
particularly among many migrants already residing in the EU. This display of
solidarity has in turn forced the governments of the EU and much of the media
to temporarily change their approach, allowing many refugees to enter the EU.
True socialists should, of course, welcome this spontaneous working class
solidarity. However, on 13 September the German and Austrian government
abruptly made a 180-degree turn and closed the borders. The central task now is
not only to help these refugees, but also to create an organized movement based
on the working class, the migrant communities, and the refugees in order to
strengthen the solidarity against the inevitable backlash of the ruling class.
2. For a long time the EU has done everything in
its power to block refugees – fleeing war and devastation in their homelands –
from entering Europe. They have adopted various measures to strengthen the EU
fortress including, setting up internal border controls, increasing the number
of border guards, building a wall at the Hungarian-Serbian border, expanding
the FRONTEX forces to stop refugees crossing the Mediterranean Sea, and
adopting plans which include military operations in Libyan territorial waters
and even the deployment of ground forces along the Libyan coast.
3. However,
the obvious plight of millions of refugees, the so blatantly visible tragedy
they have suffered, all this has provoked a spontaneous wave of working class
solidarity with them. To give just a few examples: In Austria and Germany
hundreds of people go every day to the main train stations, as well as to
refugee camps, in order to help the incoming refugees. When the reactionary
Orban government in Hungary tried to block the arrival of refugees there, a convoy
of 200 cars was formed which drove to Hungary in order to help the refugees
reach Austria. Numerous organizations of Muslim migrant communities are
organizing huge amounts of material support for refugees. In Iceland the
right-wing government provoked a storm of enragement when it announced that the
country could take only 50 (!) Syrian refugees. In response, Icelandic people
organized a campaign in which 10,000 (!) people publicly pledged to take a
Syrian family into their homes! And this in a country with a population of only
330,000 people! On 31 August 20,000 people in Vienna participated in a
spontaneous demonstration in solidarity with the refugees. On 12 September
similar mass demonstrations took place in additional European cities, including
90,000 in London. What an impressive show of international solidarity which
demolishes all myths about the “egotistical nature” of human beings! This is a
spontaneous mass movement which formed against the will of all EU governments,
against the long-standing campaigns of virtually all bourgeois mass media, and
without the support of the “progressive” parties and trade unions.
4. As a result of this public display of human
solidarity, the European governments have been forced to temporarily give in
and allow the refugees enter the fortress. Similarly, various bourgeois media
have changed the tone of their coverage. However, there should be no illusions:
the ruling classes in Europe will do everything in their power to stop
thousands of refugees coming to Europe and to quell this solidarity movement.
As we have seen, on 13 September the German government closed its borders and
the Austrian government quickly followed suite. The Polish and the Slovak
governments have announced that they will only take Christian refugees from
Syria – a country where nearly all people are Muslims! Fascist forces in
eastern Germany are attacking the homes of asylum seeker. No doubt, we can soon
expect to be exposed to media stories about “IS terrorists who are hiding among
the refugees” in order to bring “death and horror to Europe.” We have already
witnessed in recent years a huge racist media campaign – directed in particular
against Muslim migrants. These incitements have resulted not only in daily
attacks on Muslim migrants but also in the formation of racist mass movements
like PEGIDA in Germany; such campaigns have also given rise to the passing of
laws directed against Muslims, for example: the outlawing of specific forms of
female Muslim dress; the prohibition of pro-Palestinian demonstrations in
France during the last Gaza war; a law recently passed by the government of
Austrian which discriminates against Muslims relative to other religious
communities, etc. We have every reason to expect that the ruling class and the
right-wing racists will intensify such campaigns in the near future.
5. Furthermore, the ruling classes in the EU will
use the refugee crisis as a pretext to intensify their wars in the Middle East.
The US, Britain and France have launched a military campaign against Islamist
rebels in Syria and Iraq. They claim that the Syrian refugee crisis is mainly
due to the terror of Daesh (the so-called “Islamic State”). However, while
Daesh is indeed a blood-thirsty, reactionary Salafi-Takfiri outfit, there is no
doubt that most of the deaths and the creation of refugees in Syria have been
caused by the horrendous and indiscriminate massacres and aerial bombings of
Bashar al-Assad’s army! Millions of Syrians were forced to flee their country
long before Daesh was even founded in 2013! In fact, it looks like the Western
imperialists will also use the present migration crisis as a pretext to come to
terms with the brutal regime of Bashar al-Assad, after a few years of having
mostly criticized it. This cynical shift yet further emphasizes how the Western
imperialists are in fact an arch-enemy of the Arab and Muslim people!
6. What is the reason for the current upsurge in
refugees now coming to Europe? It is simply that the ongoing wars, oppression
by dictatorial regimes, and social misery in the Middle East and Africa have
continued for years and years without an end in sight. Hundreds of thousands of
Syrians have been slaughtered during the past four years – most of them by the
forces of the Assad regime, a close ally of imperialist Russia which has also
collaborated many times with US imperialism (e.g., Syria’s participation in the
war against Iraq in 1991; its collusion in the CIA torture program, etc.). The
people of Egypt are daily living in horror in face of the brutal military
dictatorship of General Sisi – a close friend both of the Western as well as
the Eastern great powers. The devastating war of the pro-Western gulf
monarchies (with the support of General Sisi) in Yemen has already created 1.5
million refugees. Increasing economic misery, the direct result of the
lengthening world-wide crisis of capitalism, the insatiable “land grabbing” by
foreign corporations in Third-World nations, and the barbarous austerity
programs imposed by the IMF on many Arab and African countries are all taking
their toll, forcing more and more people to flee their native lands.
7. Until
now, most refugees have remained in countries adjacent to the nation they fled.
Turkey, a country of 77 million people, is home to 800,000 refugees. In Iran, a
country of 78 million people, there are one million refugees. Lebanon, a
country of only 4.4 million people is home to 1.1 million refugees. But these
relatively poor countries can’t take any more refugees. This is why, from now
on, many more refugees will try to reach Europe.
8. Socialists
in Europe must actively participate in the spontaneous solidarity movement with
refugees which we having been witnessing in recent weeks, but must also try to
transform it into an organized mass movement of workers, youth, migrants, and
refugees. Against the lies that “Europe cannot absorb the refugees” socialists
should explain that the imperialist powers are primarily responsible for the
misery in these countries. This distress has been created by the European (and
other imperialist) corporations, their banks, their financial institutions,
their wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and by the brutality of their local allies
and puppets in these countries!
9. Similarly, socialists in Europe should
combine their support for the refugees with active solidarity for the
liberation struggles of the workers and poor in the Maghreb and Mashreq. They
should organize practical solidarity with the popular struggles in Syria against
the blood-thirsty, dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad, in Egypt against the brutal
military regime of General al-Sisi, in Libya against the pro-Western puppet
“government” of General Haftar, and in Yemen against the foreign aggression of
the al-Saud Gang. Such practical solidarity should come together with a
socialist perspective of advancing the Arab Revolution to expropriate the
imperialist and domestic monopolies, overthrow the local corrupt elites, and
create workers’ and fallahin republics.
10. Furthermore,
socialists should clearly expose the sham that Europe – with a population of
more than 500 million persons – can only host 1.6 million refugees, despite its
being far richer than countries like Turkey, Lebanon or Iran. As a matter of fact,
today there are more than 11 million empty residences in Europe. This is enough
to provide a place to live for all the homeless in Europe and still leave over
enough empty flats to accommodate at least 7 million refugees! But the
capitalist governments will not open the borders of Europe, because their
system is for the rich, not the poor. There is no shortage of wealth in Europe.
Just remember that the world’s richest 80 persons – amongst them 16 Western
Europeans – hold the same amount of wealth as the world’s 3.6 billion poorest
people. How many people could live in safety if we would expropriate this
little group of super-rich parasites! Against the social-imperialist opposition
of the labor bureaucracy and various reformists and centrists, socialists
should raise the slogan “Open the Borders to Refugees!”
11. The
alleged problems of finding accommodation for the refugees demonstrate once
more the bankruptcy of the capitalist system. This cannot be otherwise in a
system in which enterprises are the private property of a few oligarchs and
production does not serve the needs of the people but the profits of a small,
privileged minority. This demonstrates yet again the urgent need for a working
class revolution in order to transfer the economy from the control of the
capitalists to that of the society as a whole and to plan production according
to the needs of the entire population.
12. The
most crucial task for socialists in Europe, beyond simply helping refugees
enter the EU and staying there, is to create an organized movement based on the
working class, the migrant communities, and the refugees. Socialists should
pressure the organizations of the workers’ movement, in particular the trade
unions, to mobilize support for the refugees. The workers’ movement should call
for a program of increased taxes and the expropriation of the super-rich
parasites in order to finance massive public works programs. There should also
be established committees of action in workplaces, neighborhoods and schools to
organize support for refugees and to oppose the inevitable backlash of the
capitalist governments and the fascists. Likewise, the need to build a united
front between the workers’ movement, the migrant communities, and refugees is
urgent.
13. The
Austrian section of the RCIT has participated in practical solidarity actions
with the refugees from the very beginning of the current wave. In its campaign
for the incoming municipal elections in Vienna (the Austrian section is running
candidates in the biggest working class district where about half of the
population are migrants), the comrades are raising, among other slogans, the
call to “Open the Borders for Refugees and Migrants!” Our comrades form links
of cooperation with many people who spontaneously participate in practical
support or who give us clothes, toys, etc. for refugees in order to help. The
RCIT is convinced that the present mass solidarity movement is a huge
opportunity for the workers’ movement in Europe to overcome the deep-seated
prejudices of the labor aristocracy against people from poor countries of the
South and to build links between the native and migrant popular masses.
Supporting this movement and advancing the political consciousness of its
activist is therefore an important step for our goal to build a revolutionary
world party of the workers and oppressed.
* For mass solidarity with the refugees!
* Open Europe’s Borders to Refugees!
* For the rights of refugees and the immediate
legalization of all migrants and asylum seekers! For the right of asylum for
all those fleeing war, oppression, and poverty in their countries!
* For full citizenship rights and the abolition
of all discriminatory laws against migrants – regardless of nationality, race,
or religion! Equal pay for equal work!
* No to the EU anti-refugee plans! Down with
the EU naval forces in the Mediterranean Sea! Defend Libya against any foreign
intervention!
* For committees of action in workplaces,
neighborhoods and schools to organize support for refugees and to oppose the
backlash of the capitalist governments and the fascists!
* Build a united front between the workers’
movement, the migrant communities and refugees!
* Fight against discrimination of refugees
(equal access to housing and the labor market, etc.)! Defend refugees against
the state apparatus! Come to the aid of refugees in hiding who are threatened
with deportation! Build armed self-defense units to fight against police
brutality and racist thugs!
* For a revolutionary migrants movement as part
of a new World Party of Socialist Revolution – the Fifth Workers International!
International Secretariat of the RCIT
(*) Fallahin is the Arab plural noun for
peasants.
For our analyses on the refugee crisis, we
refer readers to:
RCIT: Europe / North Africa: Storm the Gates of
Rome! Open Borders for Refugees! Stop the Imperialist EU-War against Refugees!
No to the Preparations for an Imperialist Aggression against Libya! 22.5.2015, http://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/europe/eu-war-against-refugees/
See photos of a solidarity action of the
Austrian section of the RCIT here: http://www.rkob.net/wien-wahl-2015/fluechtlingen-helfen/
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