[nternmen The Italian: government has just introduced new…]

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nternmen The Italian: government has just introduced new, even more draconian, "antiterrorism"' laws.

Up to now it has been possible to hold suspects for four years before. they were brought to trial.

The new law, voted for in the Chamber of Deputies by 446 votes to 79, extends these powers-giving the state the right to hold suspects for 12 years!

This is of course a form internment.

"Scoundrels"

The Italian Communist Party -in the forefront of the so-called "Eurocommunist" parties voted in favour of the change.

Indeed: when the Radical Party tried to filibuster the legislation, • Parliamentary deputies chanted "scoundrels, scoundrels" at them.

This same Communist Party only recently condemned the Soviet Union's treatment of dissident Andrei Sakharov, arguing that they are defending "human rights"

Such condemnation of the Stalinist repression against Sakharov has nothing to do with the criticisms made by Trotsky-. ists.

The Italian CP has become more and more an echo of imperialism at home and abroad.

CP leader Berlinguer The treachery of the Italian CP creates the kind of political conditions in which fascism can develop. This is because they allow a capitalist party, like the Radical Party, to appear as the defenders of democratic rights at the same time as the CP themselves support the introduction of internment-a measure which at a later point will be used against their own members.

These confusionist, class collaborationist policies of the CP-echoing the disastrous Stalinist policies of the 1930s Popular Front, which brought the defeat of the Spanish working class-offer no independent policy to the Italian working class, but perpetuate the existing bourgeois coalition government, while sowing frustrațion and demoralisation in the labour movement.