Archive for the Category 'Czech Republic'
Nearly 50,000 people protested in the trade union demonstration against government reforms
On Saturday, May 21th, Prague hosted a big trade union demonstration against the forthcoming reforms of the current neo-liberal right-wing coalition. The various government proposals would come to the Parliament in June, so that in most cases they could be implemented in 2012. That is why the end of May was an ideal time to show the government that its proposals will encounter a strong resistance. »»»»
read comments (0)
Open discussion meetings in Berlin and Prague about the struggles of women in the Arab world
In the last few months, millions of people in the Arab world have gone out onto the streets. Again and again, it was women in the front line of the protests. While discussions about Arab women tend to revolve around catchwords like “the veil” and “forced marriage”, the struggles of women in Tunisia, Egypt and other countries present a very different picture. »»»»
The League for the FIfth International attempts to expel RIO members from the New Anticapitalist Left (NAL) of the Czech Republic
The Prague group of the Revolutionary Internationalist Organization (RIO) formulated an open letter which named the current problems of the New Anticapitalist Left (NAL) in the Czech Republic. Our aim was to start a constructive debate about the future direction of the NAL and the work of all left-wing groups (RIO and also the League for the Fifth International, LFI) in this organization. »»»»
Open Letter to the League for the FIfth International
Dear comrades,
for many years, the Czech members of the League for the Fifth International (LFI) and the Czech members of the Revolutionary Internationalist Organization (RIO) have worked side by side in different campaigns (such as the No Bases Initiative and Students Against Racism). In addition to our friendly personal relations, we have always had similar political positions, since we are the only two left Trotskyist groups in the Czech Republic. »»»»
Report from the second conference of the NAL on October 30-31
In the summer of 2009, the idea was born for the creation of a united radical left organization in the Czech Republic to break the isolation of the revolutionary forces. After a series of discussions, a conference in November 2009 founded the New Anticapitalist Left (NAL). On the weekend of October 30-31, 2010, after exactly one year of work, a second conference was held. But this NAL conference was attended by only a third as many people as the founding conference one year earlier. This illustrates the bad situation the NAL is in right now. »»»»
In response to social cuts and worsening working conditions, 40,000 trade unionists and opponents of the government went onto the streets of Prague on September 22. Workers in the Czech Republic are rightly worried about attacks on their rights: The government plans to reduce the budget for salaries in the civil service by 10%, which means wage cuts for all workers and also layoffs. The firefighters and the police lost their patience first, but also doctors, teachers, government employees, cultural workers and even military staff joined these protests. »»»»
In the Czech parliamentary elections at the end of May, all the traditional parties lost
On May 28 and 29, parliamentary elections were held in the Czech Republic. The last elections four years ago ended with a draw (the right-wing and the left-wing parties got exactly 100 seats each) but thanks to corruption two social democrats supported the election of a right-wing government. »»»»
RIO, the Revolutionary Internationalist Organization, was present at May Day demonstrations in Berlin, Prague, Zurch and St. Gallen this year. The following are reports from these actions. »»»»
Revolutionary perspectives in times of crisis
As in previous years, for the youth organization REVOLUTION the first week of August was filled up by REVOCAMP, an internationalist summer camp for young revolutionaries in Liberec (Czech Republic). This year’s camp was organized jointly by the independent youth organization REVOLUTION and the Revolutionary Socialist Organization (RSO). About 50 participants from the Czech Republic, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Great Britain and the USA made this camp slightly bigger than last year’s; also, more comrades from groups such as Socialist Workers’ Voice (SAS), Permanent Revolution, and the Left Party youth organization “Linksjugend [‘solid]” were present and a lively political exchange was possible. »»»»
Lack of information and unprepared schools forced school students to protest
On Friday, June 19, students went out into the streets of Prague to express their opinions about plans to establish centralized state-wide final exams. Their demonstration was coordinated vie popular social networks, i.e. Facebook. The demonstration started at 12:00 pm on Palacky square. 20 minutes before the beginning of the action the square was really full of students equipped with banners, flutes or ratchets. Those who stood near the statue were able to hear speeches from the organizers. The megaphones on hand were too weak to reach everyone in the crowd, so the others began spontaneously chanting slogans against the state finals. »»»»
On April 27, 2009, in the Czech city of Brno there was a brutal attack against several members of the Union of Young Communists of Czechoslovakia (SMKČ), the successor organization of the Communist Youth Union (KSM), which was banned by the Czech government for their goal of replacing capitalism with socialism. Even if our ideas of socialism differ significantly from the “socialism” of the SMKČ, we see the legal dissolution of the KSM, accompanied by police harassment of its leaders, as an attack on the entire radical left because, of course, the goal of overcoming capitalism is shared by other groups and organizations. »»»»