[As the final ultimatum arrives from the 'Red…]

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As the final ultimatum arrives from the 'Red Brigades' stipulating the conditions for the release of Christian Democratic Party President Aldo Moro, the Italian police and Interior Ministry have taken the kidnapping as the occasion for a vast round-up of the Italian left.

Hundreds of militants have been arrested and questioned; a large number have been detained for "belonging to a subversive organisation' Documents and papers have also been confiscated.

The extent of this wave of repression can be judged from the fact that even the Communist Party, which has been in the vanguard of the move to strengthen the repressive state apparatus, has been forced to protest against what it describes as 'indiscriminate police intervention' But the CP deliberately blames the police and exonerates the Christian Democratic which it keeps in office. And it fails to mention that the wave of anti-left arrests has been facilitated by the special The metal workers' strike has been one of the longest in postwar Germany. By creating lay-offs it has been one of the most financially damaging to capitalism.

But its importance is not simply a question of quantity. Following the dockers' and printworkers' strikes, it has displayed the militancy of German workers and given a lead to other sections.

Already miners and workers in the public sector have come into conflict with private and government employers over their wage claims, and other groups are lining up behind them.

During these confrontations, union bureaucrats and social democratic politicians in Schmidt's coalition government will find it increasingly necessary to try to end the formal 'neutrality of the state in labour relations and establish some form of 'social contract' such as their fellowtraitors have developed in Britain and internationally.

RAN THE WAVE OF anti-Shah demonstrations in Iran two weeks ago was much greater than originally reported.

The demonstrations came 40 days after the massacre at Tabriz on February 18 when the Shah's police shot dead dozens of demonstrators who were themselves protesting against a previous massacre 40 days earlier.

According • to the Committee for Human Rights in Iran, a Paris-based organisation, the toll of these demonstrations was: Ispahan 50 dead, many wounded;

Meched, state of emergency;

Kashan, many wounded, 4,000 workers on strike;

Qom, a student killed, 300 arrests; Jahrom, six dead:

Jaar (Teheran , several hundred prisoner on hunger

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Jimmy Carter is the first ruling President ever to visit black Africa.

He went because, unlike Previous presidents, he needed to.

He was on a rescue mission Stirred by the events in Angola, Mengistu saw the alliance with Havana and Moscow as the only way in which he could preserve in power his left-talking military clique, which was now under attack from both right wing