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Many further such trials must be opposed.

The bureaucracy argues that all their opponents must favour capitalist restoration. But the events of 1956 in Hungary proved that as workers in the deformed workers states enter all-out struggle against the Stalinist bureaucracy they seek not the return of capitalism but the reconstruction of the organisations of working class rulethe workers' councils, or soviets-that were instrumental in the Russian Revolution itself.

Ended privileges

In Hungary workers councils set up joint militias of workers, students and soldiers.

They destroyed the secret police and ended bureaucratic privileges.

The full might of the Russian army was needed to crush the rising.

And only recently food riots and strikes in. Poland have shown that the same forces remain as a threat to the bureaucracy.

The Workers Socialist League fights for the reconstruction of the Fourth. International to provide conscious leadership for the forward movement of the working class both in the capitalist states in the struggle to end capitalist exploitation and for révolutionary parties in the deformed workers states to overthrow the parasitic Stalinist bureaucracy.

As part of this we demand the rehabilitation of all the victims of the 1930 frame-up Moscow Trials, through which Stalin liquidated many of the Old Bolsheviks that had led the October Revolution.

But our fight has nothing in common with the hypocrisy of capitalist politicians or the position of the "Eurocommunist" Parties.

Even while these CP leaders criticise the trials they themselves are lining up with capitalist parties in Popular Front formationsin Italy even supporting the Tory Christian Democrats in office.

Meeting with And in their criticisms they line up with the imperialists themselves. Mrs. Shcharansky went from a French CP demonstration straight to a meeting with

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ALIST PRESS, Wednesday 19 July, 1978 David Whitfield traces the history of the struggle of the Eritrean people for self-determination against both the imperialist powers and a succession of repressive regimes in Ethiopia, the latest of which is now backed up by military support from Cuba and the USSR.

Asmara, the capital city. banned.

eration'. been subordinated to It would be naive to expect that the Stalinist bureaucracy would act with any less self-interhostility to revolution, in the case of Eritrea than in any other area of the globe.

Although the Soviet delegate to the UN proclaimed in 1950 that the USSR had 'consistently supported the proposal that Eritrea should be granted independence' this was a blatant lie.

In earlier negotiations, Soviet representatives had proposed at different times a trusteeship' (i.e. colonial rule masked by a legal fiction) of US, British. or Italian imperialism, or finally a collective international trusteeship.

Twists and turns

Proletarian internationalism was not the principle that directed the Stalinists' twists and turns.

Alarmed by the arrogant international disregard for their demands, the Moslem League and the Liberal Progressive Party united with six smaller organisations to form the Independence Bloc in 1949.

• The Bloc could claim represent the aspirations the majority of Eritreans.

At the United Nations. its leader, Ibrahim Sultan, declared that Eritreans refuse and reject any form of annexation, dismemberment or a return to the hated colonialism no matter what type it would be, whatever form it takes or from which direction it comes.

But in the General Assembly debate of 1950, motions from the USSR and Poland, proposing Eritrean independence, were defeated.

The imperialist powers sank their differences and rallied behind a motion proposing that Eritrea become 'an autonomous state federated with Ethiopia under the sovereignty of the Ethiopian Crown' In 1951, the UN sent its Commissioner to For 19 months he laboured in Eritred with the British colonial administration.

Their aim was first to 'pacify' the country and break all resistance to 'fedAutonomy Elections were held Assembly in 1952.

The Unionists won 32 of the 68 seats. The short-lived Independence Bloc had split by this time, with the majority forming themselves into the Democratic Bloc, which gained 18 seats.

The Moslem League, once again standing independently, won 15 seats. It was an alliance of the Moslem League and the Unionists which approved the draft constitution.

This provided on paper for Eritrean autonomy and considerable restrictions on the power of Haile Selassie. It was a constitution that the Ethiopian emperor had no intention of observing, that the imperialist powers never intended to enforce.

The "federation' began its official existence on 15 SepPART FOUR tember 1952, and the ations and independent British troops and admin- newspapers had been istration withdrew.

On 22 May 1953, a . This direct repression Mutual Defence Pact was went alongside mounting signed between the US and Ethiopian abuse of the Ethiopian governments. Eritrean constitution.

Under this agreement, the US established what was (until its closure in 1977) its largest military base in Ethiopian authority. Three Africa-at Kagnew, in years later the Chief Execconstructed a naval base at Decamere, again in Eritrea, and the Zionist state was allowed facilities on the British colonial period. Eritrean coast for its international spying network.

But this military exploitation by the imperialist powers reveals only one resentative. aspect of the oppression of the Eritrean masses. ly replaced!

Unionisation Many elements of thé elders. This meant supposed constitution were simply never implemented.

Those that were, all met the same fate over the next ten Ethiopian oppression. years.

Through the last years of British rule, the urban proletariat had entered into a process of unionisation. In December 1952, the General Union of Labour Syndicates was formed.

The General Union was banned by the Ethiopian state in the next month. Its leaders were physically attacked and all mass meetings of workers The suppression of Eritrea was enforced by economic as well as political and military means.

As a result of the decades of Italian rule, Eritrea was far more industrially developed than Ethiopia.

Its new rulers continued the British moves to dismantle the Economy systematically. Plant was transferred to Ethiopia, the port of Massawa run down as a new Ethiopian outlet was created at Assab, and permission refused for the development of new wages Those employers allowed to continue production (mostly US, Israeli and Italian capitalists) were able to exploit labour at barbarically low wages; since trade unions and strikes were both banned.

The Eritrean masses were to be starved and beaten into submission. As unemployment increased, People's militia thousands of workers werę forced to emigrate to Ethiopia, the Sudan, the Middle East and Europe.

Battered by these attacks the workers continued to organise themselves in the General Union of Labour In 1953 the Eritrean Syndicates-now operating courts and legal system had underground and growing steadily.

Workers joined with students in a stream of utive, representing demonstrations against Ethiopian interests, in Eritrea, moved to suspend Ethiopian domination. the electoral laws and revive General strike the procedures of the This movement came to The Supreme Court ruled a head in the national that any assembly formed general strike of March by these methods would be 1958. For four days the unconstitutional and unrep- towns and cities were brought to a standstill.

The judges were prompt- Then a demonstration of thousands marched through The deputies to the new Asmara, condemning Assembly were elected in Ethiopian oppression of theory by the community Eritrea and demanding independence. practice, an Assembly that The colonial rulers would offer not the slightest reacted with furious resistance to the advance of 88 Eritreans were killed in Asmara alone, with hundreds more injured and thousands imprisoned throughout the country.

As the Ethiopian regime pressed on in its determination to subjugate Eritrea entirely, so the momentum of the liberation struggle fast gathered pace.

Amharic (the language of the dominant nationality in Ethiopia) was imposed as the official language of the education system, while all books in Tigrinya and Arabie were burned.

power of the Assembly was reduced even further and it became demoted to the status of an 'Administration' After the crushing of the general strike, there was no mass resistance to these blows for some ten years.

Students staged demonstrations with increasing frequency, but the major development was to emerge beyond the towns.

On 14 November 1962, the 'federation' was ended by imperial decree. Jets flew over the towns to intimidate any protests while troops moved into the session of the Assembly.

14th province The Ethiopian , government proclaimed this 'unanimous decision' that Eritrea should become the '14th province of the Ethiopian Empire'.

But by this stage the Eritrean masses had no illusions in the good inten.

tions, let alone the power of the Assembly. The armed struggle had already begun.

The Eritrean Liberation Front had been formed on 1 September 1961-a group of 13 fighters led by Hamid Idris Awate and equipped only with old British rifles.

By 1963, the ELF numbered 250. Its tactics were those of guerrillaismattacks on government buildings and officials, raids on small military and police outposts. Arms were captured in these incidents and brought along by deserters from the police.

Violent In the next year, the ELF engaged directly with Ethiopian regular sol diers for the first time. The Ethiopian troops were heavily: defeated at Togoruba.

As the scale of the guerrilla war. rapidly expanded, it became more than every necessary for the

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INTERNATIONAL- liberation

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