The brutal Baathist capitalist regime for more than 22 years has continued to crush, destroy and kill individuals, groups and our sons always in order to stabilize its dark authority. In a very barbaric way it attacked the revolutionary people of this country.
No day went by without the regime arresting hundreds and thousands of workers, exploited and revolutionary people who then disappeared. Also it attacked and destroyed most of the proud and revolutionary areas that opposed the regime. Under the regime in this critical and desperate era, constant starvation, unemployment and high prices had pushed most people into this forlornly unhappy situation.
The capitalist orientated parasitical minority have got all the methods, most of the institutions and everything else in their hands while we, the majority have been denied every human right.
This decadent capitalistic regime with its naked brutal dictatorship, has made us the workers and exploited, into cannon fodder for two big destructive wars (Iran v Iraq and the US/Alliance in Kuwait). Up to now we and our sons have been eaten by the desert vultures in both wars. Many of us disappeared or we live very precariously. The hatred of this always disadvantaged people everywhere exploited in the cities and small towns has destroyed the regime's institutions though their own force alone. So much so that they nearly sounded the death knell for the regime which even until now has not been able to put itself back together again. It was the realisation af tbe oppressed's own power; independent, relying only on themselves, and in no way dependent on the might of Imperialism and the bourgeois nationalists of the Kurdistan Front. In Kurdistan, the KF were trying to control the power of the people and nowhere, not just in Iraq, are the interests of World Imperialism, particularly America, served by revoutionary people. Today it's always trying to crush the uprising of the workers and exploited people in any part of the world and replace it with rulers and/or capitalist states which serve their interests. Just look at how we saw the shame of the beaten Iraqi army and how, with its power broken, it was then encouraged by the Imperialists to crush the uprising. They gave up on the destruction of the regime because they needed this defeated army for another time.
It was due to both the philosophical attitude of the bourgeois nationalists which didn't enjoy the backing of Imperialism as well as the lack of a workers' Communist Party representing the vanguard of different sectors of the workers' movement that the uprising couldn't continue and which stopped us in our tracks (This was the weakest point af the revolutionary workers' movement at the time of the uprising (That's what they think - Translator's note). The Kurdish people became the victims, migrating and starving in their thousands in the cold where they contacted diseases and many died. But even despite these adversities, in this period of bourgeois nationalist negotiations with the regime, the workers and exploited have continued with their uprising and are ever ready to confrant the forces of fear and trickery.
The bourgeois nationalists after justifying the migration of revolutionary Kurdish people because of the Imperialists' betrayal are now themselves in negotiations with the regime seeking a solution to the Kurdish problem in this way. But the workers and exploited revolutionary people continuing with their uprising in Sulliemania are proving that they will never accept the negotiating conditions. And in Hawlir, on the Tuesday before AED (a Muslim religious festival) the workers and exploited through their sympathy actions proved their solidarity with the people of the south and the rest of Iraq. It won't let the colours of their own struggle fade!
The workers and exploited assent to negotiations for one reasan only - that the reuniting power of the people obliged the regime to come to the negotiating table clearing the way towards the destruction of the regime and the Kurdish people should have all the power in their hands.
The people of Kurdistan only assent to the negotiations in order to stipulate that there must be democracy and political freedom now in Kurdistan and all Iraq. That no one should be tortured and one should be free to choose any politics or beliefs.
Moreover, tbe workers and exploited only condone the negotiations so that, on the one hand, a framework can be recognised so that there shouldn't be anybody above them speaking on their behalf. On the other hand, we, the millions of workers standing in line do not sanction the negotiations as a means of consolidating authority (everyday the regime strengthens the institutions and the army, - barricades, soldiers patrolling the streets, armoured vehicles etc have increased and there is no corner in Kurdistan without their presence).
We also cannot sanction these negotiations while democracy and free expression is forbidden and the workers' and exploited cannot be free in their homes to discuss their demands and needs. What's the ground for negotiations and what do they mean if the regime continues with the same policy?
And what do negotiations mean if or when the Kurdistan Front starts openly attacking the voice of freedom and democracy setting about the shora workers' councils and their committees or anyone outside the Kurdistan Front? We, the workers and exploited, have as an immediate task to organise our general meetings and asseemblies, to discuss our differences and to put forward our demands asking for an explanation for the on-going negotiations and to put pressure on both sides not to keep us waiting. ln short, to rise up for our demands. Firstly, all the invader's army and powers should be ousted completely from Kurdistan. Secondly, complete freedom for all political prisoners and freedom for the Anfal and Barzani area prisoners. Thirdly, unconditional political freedom. Fourthly, a vote on whether to agree/ disagree with the negotiations. All this is to be established by the workers and people themselves.
VICTORY TO THE POPULAR WORKER'S UPRISING.
DOWN WITH CAPITALISM. LONG LIVE SOCIALISM.
COMMITTEE FOR WORKERS IN SMALL FACTORIES IN SULLIEMANIA
June 23rd, 1991
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