Collapse of Fake Chile 'boycott

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The "boycott" of Chilean goods called. in December by the US union federation the AFL-CIO and by ORIT (the Latin American branch of the anti-Communist International Confederation of Free ent reactionary farce which we predicted it would be.

So far not so much as a single onion has been blacked under the AFL-CIO "boycott".

On January 8 the committee charged with organising the boycott could agree on no action at all and it now looks as if the proposal has been shelved.

This is in no way surprising since the pro-imperialist leaders who called it in the first place are divided between those who wanted to use the "boycott" to put purely verbal pressure on Pinochet to restore rights to some of Chile's yellow unions, and those who (like US dockers' leader Thomas. Gleason) think that even talk of boycott can only "help the Communists"

Both groups remain firmly on the side of capitalism and imperialism in Chile and will be opponents of any serious move in the labour . • movement for concrete solidarity action with the authentic trade unions.

• The record of the AFL-CIO and ORIT is one of conspiracy with the CIA and with capitalist groups in Chile to destroy the traditional unions of the Chilean workers (which were politically linked to the Communist and Socialist Parties) and replace them with yellow unions linked to the Christian Democrats.

Their aim now is to gently persuade Pinochet to release the legal straightjacket on trade unionism in Chile to selectively benefit the Christian Democrat "group of 10" unions and discriminate against any authentically working class unions.

Last Pinochet's junta tried to sabotage this by going ahead with rigidly corporatist plans for state-' run "unions" and total prohibition of even formal rights to strike and organise.

Huffing and puffing Since the AFL-CIO's huffing and puffing about Pinochet has changed his "boycott", however, plans, replaced his Labour minister and made some cosmetic concessions on labour legislation.

The AFL-CIO's client pro-capitalist unions still call this insufficient and want to negotiate a better But it is probably a move in a diplomatic game at the end of which the AFL-CIO leaders and ORIT will declare the Pinochet regime "clean" on the questions of labour rights.

If that seems far-fetched, then it is worth noting who has been negotiating with the dictatorship on behalf of the AFL-CIO.

He is President of the American Institute of Free Labour Development, the AFL-CIO's Latin American arm.

His name: Peter Grace. His occupation?

He is a big-time capitalist and a director of multinational corporations, especially those with interests in mining in Peru and Chile.

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Agordat Massawa YEM Sobderos, ARA [Borentu Asmaros REPUI

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Trade Unions) is turning out to be the transpar-