East Timor and Kosovo

Mr P.A. Van Heusden pvanheus at hgmp.mrc.ac.uk
Wed Sep 8 02:02:08 PDT 1999


On Tue, 7 Sep 1999, Chris Burford wrote:


> but John's call goes on
>
>
> >> Call the White House comment line at 202-456-1414. Urge President
> >>Clinton to immediately suspend all further military and financial aid to
> >>Indonesia until the military and paramilitary violence is stopped. The
> >>U.S. must show strong support for East Timor's democratic decision to
> >>break away from Indonesia.
>
>
> This calls on US and other citizens to campaign not just against military
> aid but against financial aid. To campaign against financial aid means the
> politics of bankrupting Indonesia's foreign exchanges. It logically means
> not just using all of US hegemonic influence to delay the next conditional
> tranche IMF aid, whenever that is due, but to recall all outstanding IMF
> and other loans immediately.
>
> This demand has the the capacity to smash the economy of Indonesia, which
> has already been severely battered by the 1998 crisis. Although it sounds
> neutral and reasonable in the face of what is frankly now a war against the
> civilian population of East Timor, in the most abstract form it coldly
> asserts the power of US led global capital over the millions of people of
> the Indonesian archipelago. It has the capacity to cause as many deaths as
> that of the Indonesian armed forces in their campaign against the East
> Timorese.

Chris, what was your position on sanctions against South Africa?

Peter -- Peter van Heusden : pvanheus at hgmp.mrc.ac.uk : PGP key available 'The demand to give up illusions about the existing state of affairs is the demand to give up a state of affairs which needs illusions.' - Karl Marx



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list