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-4- the last vestiges of Neutrality and of playing the poor European relation.) [Incidentally, both Ireland and India allowed refuelling of us planes on their way to the Gulf war, at Shannon and Bombay. The Chandra Shekar and Haughey governments came under a lot of political flak for this pro-imperialist departure from traditional neutrality. After Congress (I) protests (Chandra Shekar needed their support to stay in office - when it was withdrawn he fell precipitating the present general election) the refuelling was stopped and switched to Sri Lanka. But despite Rajiv's role in this he is bitterly criticised by CPI(M) as Congress (I) still voted with the government when a no-confidence motion was tabled by the left and V.P. Singh forces arising from this issue. I think CPI(M) would love it if GA mentioned this - but on balance I would tend to see it as an inadvisable intrusion into Indian internal affairs in the midst of a general election whose outcome is by no means certain.] - Finally, of course, both the Indian and Irish communities face British racism and discrimination and should unite in the struggle for their social, National and Cultural rights. (As a footnote, the 'Irish Post' lived in Southall for its first 21 years!)

Defend Socialist Kovea against the 'New world order' By Keith Bennett Artide written for the next Lalkar. The collapse of socialism in eastern Europe and its abandonment by the Gorbachov clique in the Soviet Union, together with the defeat of Iraq in the brutal Gulf War, are the / key foundations of what US President George Bush calls the "new world order". In reality, of course, there is nothing particularly new about it. Rather it & represents an attempt to retur return to unfettered imperialist hegemony as in the pre-1971917 era. This is the reality behind John Major's recent proposal that the build-up of the military capacity of any country should be subject to international monitoring and control. You can bet your life that he does not have the imperialist countries in mind! Not surprisingly, there are some countries that are not at all anxious to be part of Bush and Major's "New World Order". & Whilst the imperialists refuse to lift the sanctions on Iraq, despite the threat of famine and epidemic, they con and continue with their attempts to partition and dismember the country, Their hand can also be seen in the continuing turmoil in ex Albania, Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union. Flushed with victory in the Gulf, the imperialists are now seeking to undermine or topple the remaining socialist countries - and even any Third World countries that seek to uphold independence. Cuba, China, Algeria and Libya are amongst the countries currently being singled out for destabilisation or worse. The March 14 edition of the Calcutta Telegraph reported that India, too, was on the US hit list on account of its nuclear potential. But probably the But it is probably the Democratic People's Republic of (north) Korea that is most under threat of a US-initiated war. In early April, the annual report of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff said that the Korean peninsula is the region fraught with the greatest danger of the outbreak of a local war after the Gulf and openly declared that in the event of a war breaking out in Korea, fierce battles of at least 120 days were inevitable and that the United States would commit another 200,000 troops over and above the 40,000 plus that it keeps in permanent occupation of south Korea. A key role in creating a pretext for a possible war against Korea is played by propaganda on the nuclear question. A high ranking US officer in south Korea recently stated that north Korea would be taken as a target of attack on account of its alleged nuclear capability - adding that one of the important reasons why the United States went to war with Iraq was to destroy that country's atomic reactor facilities.

Capital, his country's -2- Needless to say, in a world where the imperialists have the capacity to commit nuclear and non-nuclear genocide countless times over, socialist and anti- imperialist countries have the absolute right to develop nuclear or any other weapons for their national defence. But the fact is that whatever nuclear industry exists in Kaxx north Korea is for purely peaceful purposes. Since at least 1980/the a Korean party and government has consistently called for the creation of a nuclear free peace zone on the peninsula. This was reiterated by Korea's leader, President Kim Il Sung, as recently as April 29. In his opening speech to the 85th Conference of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, held in Pyongyang, and attended by delegations from and delegates from 86 countries and 10 international organisations, including four Conservative and four Labour MPs from Britain, he said: "Disarmament and the abolition of nuclear weapons and other types of mass destruction weapons is now the most pressing task in ensuring peace. The large stockpile of nuclear weapons now on the earth is a menace to the survival of mankind itself. It is imtolerable to use the valuable results of science and technology, created by mankind, and its social wealth, for the production of the means of aggression and war that threaten man's survival, and not for the benefit well being and development of humanity. <t<th The testing and production of nuclear weapons must be banned, the existing nuclear weapons, must be reduced and, further, all nuclear weapons must be completely abolished. " President Kim Il Sung also responded to talk of a new world order by stating: "There "There are large and small countries in the world but there cannot be high and low countries; there are developed developed nations but there cannot be nations destined to dominate other nations or destined to be dominated." In contrast to north Korea's peaceful policy, the US occupation forces in south Korea have placed more than 1,000 nuclear weapons there, including nuclear land mines, cruise missiles and neutron bombs, which were banned from European deployment but which are racistically deployed in Asia. Yet in April the defence minister in the south Korean regime blared that a commando raid might be staged against north Korea's nuclear facilities. Earlier, a south Korean magazine revealed that the United States has just such an operational plan. Predictably, the Gorbachov clique promptly chimed in with its two kopecks' worth with an official accompanying the Soviet leader on his unsuccessful trip begging to Tokyo stating that the Soviets would halt all nuclear collaboration with north Korea. Writing in the New York Times of April 11 under the headline "Pyongyang can outdo Baghdad" (remember how recently Saddam Hussein was supposed to be the greatest danger to humanity?), Leslie H. Gelb, a "journalist" with close ties to the US State Department, wrote:

-3- "What country with 23 million people run by a vicious dictator has missiles, a million men under arms and is likely to possess nuclear weapons in a few years? It is not Iraq anymore. Not Syria, which has not entered the nuclear race, nor any other Middle Eastern country. "The renegade, and perhaps the most dangerous country in the world today, is north Korea. "The world community...has the opportunity to stop it from becoming the next Iraq." The imperialists have north Korea in their sights for a number of reasons. It is a Third World country and a member of the Non-Aligned Movement that jealously guards its own independence. It is also an anti-imperialist country that has selflessly and militantly supported the national liberation and other revolutionary struggles around the world. Above all, it is one of the few countries in the world that proudly holds high the banner of socialism and continues to struggle for socialism and communism. the realisation of Under the brilliant leadership of President Kim Il Sung, and today of Secretary Kim Jong Il as well, the Workers' Party of Korea has avoided the right and 'left' deviations to which other socialist countries have succumbed and has turned a once poor and backward country into one with developed agriculture and industry, flourishing culture and advanced education and health care for all. Socialist construction in Korea has advanced at a speed not seen in the world since the gigantic leap taken by the Soviet Union in the 1930s and many visitors to Korea, particularly from Third World countries, describe it as the "model country of socialism". The working class movement, if it is not to be the slave and handmaiden of imperialism, has the elementary duty to unconditionally defend socialist Korea from the threat of imperialist attack and to firmly support their Korean people's struggle to reunify the country and achieve the complete victory of socialism. And in so doing, we will be helping to build the type of movement necessary for proletarian revolution in Britain, too.

PAPER OF KEITH BENNETT PRESENTED TO THE EUROPEAN REGIONAL SEMINAR ON THE JUCHE IDEA - PARIS APRIL 1987. Esteemed comrades from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Dear Fellow European Students of the Juche idea, Comrades and Friends, It is indeed my great pleasure to participate in this regional seminar convened around the theme, Europe and World Peace illuminated by the Juche idea. We meet at an auspicious time. The people of the DPRK and all the anti-imperialist, peace- and independence- loving peoples of the world are preparing to celebrate in a grand and militant fashion the happy occasion of the 75th anniversary of the birth of the great leader Comrade Kim Il Sung, who created and developed the immortal Juche idea in the crucible of a bitter revolutionary struggle. In gathering at our seminar at this time, therefore, we are joining our modest efforts together with those of our Korean friends and peoples throughout the world. In 1987 we celebrate both the 75th anniversary of the birthday of the great leader and also the 70th anniversary of the triumph of the Great October Socialist Revolution which translated socialism from an ideal into a reality. The great leader Comrade Kim Il Sung therefore began his revolutionary activity in an era of great change and development when the revolution was developing more briskly than hitherto. The dear leader Comrade Kim Jong Il is the distinguished continuator of, and successor to, the Juche cause.

-2- He has incisively explained this question as follows: "Kimilsungism was founded and has been developed in the course of safeguarding and embodying the ideological and theoretical achievements of Marxism-Leninism. The Juche idea itself is an idea discovered in the process of the revolutionary struggle waged under the banner of Marxism-Leninism; it is an idea which has opposed all trends of idealism and metaphysics and strictly adhered to the materialistic and dialectic stand. The revolutionary theory of Kimilsungism is also a theory which was founded and enriched in the course of protecting the revolutionary quintessence of Marxist-Leninist theory from bourgeois and opportunist theories and creatively applying and developing it in line with the requirements of the revolutionary practice of our times." As Comrade Kim Jong Il has said the creation of the Juche idea is the most brilliant of the revolutionary achievements of Comrade Kim Il Sung. It was developed in a new era when the oppressed and humiliated masses of the people were becoming the masters of their own destinies and a new era of human history was approaching. In this era the revolutionary movement makes progress in a broad and diversified way on a worldwide scale. This entails the working class and people of every country solving all problems in accordance with their actual situation. As dear Comrade Kim Jong Il points out: "When the leader embarked on the road of revolution, a

-3- new development was taking place in the struggle of the working class and the popular masses against exploitation and oppression. On the world arena, the influence of socialism, which had won its first victory, grew strong, and the revolutionary struggle of the working class and the liberation struggle of the peoples in colonies and semi-colonies were intensified sharply." Comrade Kim Il Sung emphasised from the earliest days of his political work and on the basis of summing-up positive and negative experiences that it was the duty of revolutionaries to go among the popular masses to educate, organise and inspire them for the struggle. He also emphasised that the revolutionary forces themselves should be trained from among the masses and that all problems arising in the revolutionary struggle should shold likewise be tackled by relying on the wisdom and strength of the masses, the masters of the revolution. T The course of the Korean revolution was most difficult and arduous. More than any other it needed to hew out its own independent path path. As Comrade Kim Jong Il explains: "The leader clarified the truth that a revolution should be carried out not by anyone's approval or instruction but by one's own conviction and on one's own responsibility and that all problems arising in the revolution should be solved in an independent and creative way." But the Korean revolution also had many points in common

-4- with other revolutionary struggles , particularly those in other colonial and semi-colonial Countries. struggles. The theories of the Juche idea are thus universal in their significance. As Comrade Kim Jong Il says: "The Korean revolution has paved an absolutely correct path for national liberation in a colony and opened a short cut to socialism." The Juche idea is thus peculiarly and distinctively Korean. It is also the precious weapon and guiding ideology of all peoples. It encapsulates the teaching of Frederick Engels, the co-founder with Karl Marx of scientific socialism, that everything truly national is also international. We live in an epoch of immense changes. As Comrade Kim Jong Il says: "Capitalism and imperialism, which has grown fat on the blood and sweat of the working masses and lorded it over their destinies for centuries, is precipitating irreversibly into bankruptcy and towards its downfall, deep into the grave of history." Such a situation presents every individual with a choice as to which side they will take in the ongoing struggle. This is the general reason why progressive intellectuals are increasingly receptive to new ideologies and ideas and why, therefore, there is a vast and growing movement to study and apply the great Juche idea. The joining to this trend of academic personalities in Europe is to be welcomed. Vast distances seperate Korea and Europe and the

-5- differences in circumstances are, of course, equally vast. Yet when viewed with an open mind it can be seen that the Juche idea provides answers to European problems just as much as it does to the problems of other parts of the world. Its stress on the human factor, on the development of man's mastery of the world and the consumation of his Chajusong touches profoundly on the problems that concern many European peoples in a fashion that traditional schools of thought on the left - increasingly mired in economism and crude materialistic and mechanical materialistic perceptions - cannot possibly hope to do. The growing success of the Green Party in the Federal Republic of Germany and the development of similar parties and movements in most of the countries of western Europe illustrates this point and should be taken into account by adherents of the Juche idea. National independence is a fundamental prerequisite and starting point of the Juche idea. As Comrade Kim Jong Il says: "There are big and small parties, big and small countries, and economically developed and underdeveloped peoples in the world, but all parties, all countries and peoples are equal and independent." The countries and peoples of Europe also wish to win, maintain, defend and extend their national independence, and the peoples of Europe - like all peoples - wish to realise Chajusong. Followers of the Juche idea need to pay particular attention to the mass peace movement. This movement opposes the subordination of Europe to the United States, which

-6- seeks global hegemony and vainly plots to eliminate socialism from the face of the earth. The peace movements are a powerful national and international political force standing in the way of that design. As Comrade Kim Il Sung has explained we must welcome any country taking the road of independence and if such countries as Japan or Britain refuse to follow the war policies of the United States it will become impossible to unleash a new and catastrophic world war. Adherents of the Juche idea in Britain, defence therefore, welcome the non-nuclear/policy of the Labour Party whilst criticising its limitations in wary both ideology and policy and remaining way/of the attempts of the more reactionary As quarters of the that party to dilute it any further or to overturn it altogether. But Europe is not just the home of imperialist powers like Britain, France and Federal Germany. There are numerous small and medium sized countries a number of which - such as Sweden, Switzerland and Austria - uphold neutrality. Others such as Malta and Cyprus - are active members of the Non- Aligned Movement, which President Kim Il Sung defines as a mighty revolutionary movement of our times. Even some members of the aggressive NATO alliance - notably Greece affairs. - are taking more independent positions in international In all of these countries the state policies bear a often certain - albeit/limited - relationship to the t Juche idea and the peoples of those countries are abey the more consistent force impelling their