whee hchnal vars pron PPE) | 1 nt | Uda AL ate ha INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE IN SOLIDARITY WITH THE INDEPENDENCE OF y tory of Puerto Rico’s colon- Hition was told, and solidarity de the Struggle of its people was 1} essed by all. f in egates discussed how U.S. Malism related to their own tries, how it intervened in i international affairs, explo- ej €ir people and controlled ‘he; Culture; the impact. of im- M28 world-wide, and the hat hg strength of those forces fight against it; and the im- het, ice of detente in the inter- _ Of world peace. itive’, Opening address was ,- by Juan Marinello, chair- ).,.°! the Cuban Committee for 4 and Sovereignty of the i €. He was followed by Noel 4 ert Martinez, chairman of the : Nokes Rican Peace Council and iltlep 2" for the Puerto Rican enon. The official addresses ook, followed by speeches of ! The people for the delegations. mn canadian delegates were « idgewood, president of akville, Ontario Labor 0 / enllian government whose * we and executive council Sid sen by the United States as a took over. In 1917 it hat p, lded by the Americans ohej, “etto Ricans could “elect” , in ®wn governor. {hh ben tte Puerto Rican people, efit has been derived from Mm “R€rican military, economi¢ thy) Political invasion of their i POverty they experience ft Worse each year as the te Sf American monopolies hy ae While foreign invest- A ate rose from $583,000,- he, Re to- $1,300,000,000 in 4 the p, average weekly wage nf Uerto Rican worker has Mpg, $61.45 to $57.85. lcial “sien has risen to 30% 8ures) and inflation to €conomic growth is hn iuerto Rico the official pov- hugh Per family is $2,000, yi high living expenses are SA, Th oa than those in the PPulatio 970, 35% of the total Rn $2,009 “28 living on less One : a year. 0 jf © most startling, and Cts of life in Puerto k Initic Sterilization of wo- re inthe 1930s, it gram . preadily through a WR} Pecialized clinics so Council and an active member of United Auto Workers Local 707, who represented the Canadian Peace Congress; and Edward Sloan, president of the Conseil Quebecois de la Paix. Bridge- wood was the Canadian spokes- A JIM BRIDGEWOOD Canadian Peace Congress ec 9 that by 1968, 35.5% of women of child-bearing age had been sterilized. This is the highest in- cidence of sterilization in the world! + The Puerto Ricans are not the — contented wards the U.S. gov- ernment would like the world to believe. Their struggle for inde- pendence is as long as their his- | tory of colonization. It began with the Spanish, when Indian inhabitants waged a bloody re- sistance against the invasion, — through slave rebellions, the up- risings of small farmers, the — famous Lares insurrection | against Spanish rule in 1868, re- sistance to the American inva- sion only 20 years later and the nationalist movement during the 1930s which culminated in the insurrection of 1950. Today, inside and outside Puer- to Rico the struggle continues. New, anti - imperialist forces gaining strength in the world give hope to the Puerto Rican people that their fight may soon be won. The independence struggle won support from the United Nations when, in 1973 a resolu- tion was adopted by the com- mittee on decolonization. recog- nizing the right to independence and self-determination for Puer- to Rico. The United States succeeded man. In his speech he compared American economic, political and cultural control of Canada and Puerto Rico, saying that the Canadian people will take up the struggle for Puerto Rican inde- pendence because they can asso- ciate it to their own struggle. ‘I come from Canada,- the closest neighbor to the United States. Also, I am a worker em- ployed by one of the largest American corporations, Ford Motor Company. Canadian work- ers in the trade union movement know first-hand of domination by U.S. monopolies. They virtu- ally have stolen, or been given by a series of Canadian govern- ments, almost all of our major industries. _ “Once the working people of Canada learn about the U.S. sup- pression of Puerto Rico they will orient it to their own anti-mono- ‘poly struggle.’ The general statement passed by the conference noted that: The Yankee fiag first flew over Puerto Rico in 1898. Today the “International solidarity for the independence of Puerto Rico has greatly advanced during the last few years, manifesting itself in concrete facts.” It said further: “,,. All these concrete, broad EDWARD SLOAN Conseil Quebecois de la Paix Island is called a “free associated state” but in reality it is a U.S. colony, important for the economic and military objectives of Washington. in having the final discussion and vote put off until 1976 to try and consolidate their imperialist aims in Puerto Rico. After the resolution came into being an Ad Hoc committee was set up, composed of seven Ame- ricans and seven Puerto Rican “officials to do just that. The committee has submitted a draft of a “Pact of Permanent Union of Puerto Rico with the United States” to U.S. President Ford in which the structures of American colonial domination will not only remain intact, but also be strengthened, opening the way to annexation of the island as an “incorporated terri- tory of the United States.” For this reason in particular, the struggle for Puerto Rico’s © sovereignty and self-determina- tion must become a world-wide campaign to ensure the passage of the United Nations resolution and bury U.S. imperialism in Puerto Rico forever. TER a eT and massive actions have placed world solidarity for the struggle of the Puerto Rican people on a level never before attained. This international solidarity will have greater possibilities of material- izing in successful results in combination with the broad, united participation of all anti- imperialist and anti-colonial for- ces of the Puerto Rican people. “.. . The conference is the beginning of a higher phase of international solidarity with the struggle of the Puerto Rican peo- ple, which is a part of the whole anti-imperialist, anti-colonialist, national and social liberation process for peace, democracy, progress and socialism which is taking place throughout the- whole world.” “. .. The convocation, organiz- ation and development of this meeting, in which representa- tives of progressive, democratic and peace-loving peoples the world over have been broadly re- presented, shows that the just cause of the Puerto Rican people is deeply rooted in the universal conscience. “... The Puerto Rican people’s determination to be free shall not fail, nor will international solidarity, newly affirmed at this conference, slacken. It will be expanded and deepened within the historic reality of a world in which colonialism is totally out of date and not to be tolerated! “Long live a free, independent and sovereign Puerto Rico.” * + * Preparation for the Confer- ence began March 30, 1975 when a preparatory meeting was held in Havana. The original decision to hold such a meeting was an- nounced at the World Peace Council in Bulgaria, in 1974 and ratified later that year at the Council’s Presidential Bureau meeting in Panama. The delegates pledged to hold a second International Confer- ence in Solidarity with the Inde- pendence of Puerto Rico within the next three years and issued a call to strengthen the interna- tional campaign for Puerto Rican independence and precede next year’s meeting of the United Na- tions Decolonization Committee with an intensive world-wide campaign of solidarity. PACIFIC TRIBUNE—OCTOBER 17, 1975—Page 7