World Backlash follows Trinidad coup bid BRIDGETOWN, Barbados—An idio- tic coup attempt which tumed into a hostage-taking drama in the Trinidadian Capital Port of Spain last month under- scored the political and racial divisions persisting in this potentially prosperous Caribbean twin island republic. In a development which sent shock waves through the corridors of the parlia- ments and boardrooms of the 13-member English-speaking island grouping, CARI- COM, a rag tag group of armed Muslims stormed the island’s Parliament and TV Station and occupied them for four days. The more than two dozen commandos who broke through the pitiful security with AK-47s and SLRs blazing, quickly cor- nered some 14 MPs, including Prime Min- ister A.N.R. Robinson and several mini- Sters of his ruling National Alliance for Reconstruction (NAR) administration. Other MPs who were in the late night session debating a bill on corruption of the previous regime belonged to the opposi- tion United National Congress (UNC). Another group of armed men of the Jamaat al Muslimeen (JAM) sect led by its leader Yasmin Abu Bakr, took control of the TV station TTT. Yet another action occurred at the near- by police headquarters where a car bomb exploded, setting the building afire. Un- able to reach it due to sniper fire, firemen watched it burn to the ground. In an emotional statement on a prime time TV broadcast, Abu Bakr said he and his followers had “overthrown” the four- year-old government of Robinson because of its lack of concern for the poor and the continuing corruption and divisions in the former British colony of 1.3 million people. Bakr, in his 40s, said that the straw which broke the camel’s back was the dec- ision of the NAR to spend thousands of dollars on a monument to a former female civil servant, Gene Miles, who died in a mental institution after she testified in the 1960s about the corruption of the previous People’s National Movement (PNM) gov- Norman Faria ernment of Prime Minister Sir Eric Wil- liams and later George Chambers. In a show of bravado which probably they didn’t even feel comfortable with, the Muslim “rebels” demanded an interim ad- ministration be formed which would in- clude opposition members. They also pro- mised free and fair elections would be held within 90 days. From their point of view, their situation was hopeless from day one. For one thing, the group had no mass support. The sect, one of several in the country, is estimated to have an active following of 200 to 500. Indeed, only about six per cent of the population are Muslim. There were no indications that the armed forces and police leadership sup- ported them — unlike the case back in 1970 when elements of the army threw in their lot with widespread mass protests. The army in fact occupied — illegally say the JAM’s attorneys— the sect’s eight acre commune in a Port of Spain suburb in the period leading up to the hostage-taking. Tobe sure, sections of the working class and unemployed sectors of Trinidadian society undoubtedly supported some of JAM’s aspirations. The criticism of the corruption-plagued high places in a coun- try where revenues from oil, even when prices were high, rarely trickled down to the grassroots, the JAM’s beefs struck a responsive chord with sections of the have- nots. The day after the hostages were taken, the looting started. Whole streets of the FROM THE CARIBBEAN retail section of the capital were stripped clean of merchandise. At the police headquarters all that was left of the country’s criminal records were piles of ashes. The Muslims’ appeal for racial and pol- itical unity has been one of the major planks of the island’s trade union move- ment, the left and the opposition UNC. This latter party is led by Basdeo Panday who had been the NAR’s foreign minister before splitting with several other “East Indian” ministers to help form the UNC. They had accused Robinson, among other things, of autocratic leadership. Trinidad and Tobago, which lies about 20 miles off the northeast tip of Venezuela, had seen voting along racial lines since political parties were established in the late 1930s and 1940s. The JAM is made up of both Indo- and Afro-Trinidadians but Afro membership is larger, resulting in a wide- spread media term “Black Muslim group.” Ross Alexander, the acting assistant general secretary of the Waterfront and Seaman’s Workers’ Union, told me last October that the building of racial unity was one of the pressing political tasks in Trinidad today. None of the mainstream political par- ties indicated support for the JAM’s action. Nor did the small left organizations. Regionally, CARICOM government representatives, meeting in Jamaica, con- demned the action and announced plans to deal with itmilitarily if negotiations did not succeed. In English-speaking Guyana where there are 120,000 Muslims, the People’s Progressive Party condemned the attempted coup as did the Maurice Bishop Patriotic Movement (MBPM) in Grenada. In an interview with the Tribune, MBPM Deputy leader Einstein Louison argued the action was not in the interests of the Trin- idadian and Caribbean people. Predictably, the 114 Muslims at the Par- liament and TV station were all arrested and the hostages freed four days after the shooting began. The NAR government promptly tore up the agreement Robinson had signed. He had agreed to step down as Prime Minister and call elections before they are constitutionally due at the end of next year. Bakr and those involved could well face long prison terms as the political direc- torate flexes its muscles in tightening up security. Several of the 23 people who died over the four days appeared to die at the hands of the commandos, including a NAR MP, a police officer and a number of civ- ilians. Robinson was shot in the legs. Ominously, a number of CARICOM governments announced the tightening up of security measures and surveillance of certain religious groups. During the host- age taking, a group of Muslims who had no connection with the JAM were detained by the Grenadian government. Barbados’ Prime Minister Erskine Sandiford told joumalists he would not hesitate to call in “outside” military help to deal with a sim- ilar situation in Barbados. Meantime, as the looting suggests, or- dinary “Trinis” (as they are known in the islands) continue to “catch hell” as the Trinis themselves say. In a speech at a labour day rally last June 19, UDC leader Panday urged unity of the trade union movement. Panday, who is also President General of the All Trinidadian Sugar and General Workers Trade Union, echoed a widely held view among the island’s left forces and democratic movement that the ruling NAR is in bed with big business interests and conglomerates. NATO countries moving towards defence cuts Continued from page 8 in Europe between the Atlantic and the Urals. It is inevitable that any number of these would be struck either deliberately or accidentally by bombs or missiles and would release more radioactive material and’ long-term contamination than a nuclear warhead explosion. Even if only 15 percent of power stations were hit, hundreds of thousands of square miles of territory would be devastated, made uninhabitable for gen- erations. The report points out that the existing . commercial nuclear power plants in Europe contain about the same amounts of stron- tium-90 and cesium-137 as could be pro- duced if the whole nuclear arsenals of the United States and the Soviet Union were exploded. Further, almost as bad a danger exists in the 1,861 chemical plants in the 12-country European Community which process 178 chemicals that are highly toxic, flammable or explosive. The report also argues for the extensive reduction of conventional arms, many of which are almost as destructive as nuclear weapons. Some commentators have declared that “the West has won the cold war.” No one can deny that the grave setbacks suffered by socialism in Eastern Europe and the present problems in the Soviet Union have been at least partly linked with the burdens of cold war policies. But if the West had won the cold war, NATO would be dictating the terms, and that is not the case. In fact, the development of peace, disar- mament, detente, security and co-operation in Europe and similar features of today’s situation have all been aims of the socialist countries and progressive forces interna- tionally. All the initiatives for peace, disar- mament and the elimination of military blocs have come from the Warsaw Treaty countries, while the West has been averse to such proposals. The Warsaw Treaty countries continue to set forth clear proposals for the future, in- cluding dismantling the two military blocs in Europe and developing anew joint system of co-operation. They aim to heal the divisions in Europe through political rather than military means. As it becomes clear that conventional arms are insupportable, for almost the same reasons as nuclear arms, the justification for NATO must collapse further. The end of the cold war may well spell the end, in Europe, of major wars of any kind. GORBACHEV (I), MULRONEY AT OTTAWA MEETING ... East-West contact adding an | to pressure for diminished military role for NATO. Pacific Tribune, September 10, 1990 + 9 ie oi nares