Zaire ‘rescue’ cover for NATO intervention

The so-called ‘‘humanitarian”
rescue operation in Zaire’s Shaba
or Katanga province was a cover
for massive NATO intervention in-
to Zaire to prop up the tottering
Mobutu Sese Seko regime.

Coordinated by U.S. NATO com-
mander General Alexander Haig,
Belgium and French troops were
airlifted to Zaire last week to fight
the insurgent Congolese National
Liberation Front (FLNC), on the
pretext of ‘“‘rescuing”’ white per-
Sonnel of multinational corpora-
tions.

The NATO intervention into
Zaire was condemned this week by
the Soviet Union, Cuba and by
Massive. citizen protests’ in
Belgium and France. The foreign
ministry of Cuba said Sunday in
Havana that there are no Cubans in
Zaire and rejected the accusations
of the Mobutu government that
Cuba is ‘interfering in Zaire’s

Cuba said that no relations exist
or have existed on the level of mili-
tary cooperation between Cuba
and the forces fighting Mobutu in
Zaire and that it neither trained,
supplied or participated with those
forces.

The accusations against Cuba
are merely to justify NATO’s in-
tervention, Cuba said.

As refugees from Shaba arrived
in Brussels, Belgium this week it
was learned that the sensationalist
reports of mass atrocities com-
mitted by the Congolese Liberation
forces were largely false. The
reported atrocities — given wide
coverage by the Canadian media —
were actually committed by
regular Zaire Army troops.

Nelly Van Hevel, a Belgium citi-
zen arrived from Kolwezi, told a
press conference at the Brussels
airport that Zaire troops were re-
sponsible for the widely reported

massacre of 34 whites whose
See REPORTS pg. 12

WY Y

> nt /,

LLNS
AFRICA

Ys;
Vj
Z ZAIRE
VW...

S

SHABA

ANGOLA ™

@Kamina

H A BA

SHABA PROVINCE
(KATANGA)

EZ: a KOLWEZI
o1o
@ Mutshatsha @ ?
oS

@ LUBUMBASHI

UPI

internal affairs.”

Demonstrators from the Toronto Association for P’

eace last week brought their demand for a ban on

the neutron bomb to the U.S. consulate where they maintained their vigil from noon to 1 p.m. through
May 26 to mark the opening of the UN Special Session on Disarmament. In Vancouver, the Ad Hoc
Coalition for Disarmament will mark the session with a car cavalcade beginning at 10:30 a.m. May 27 at

the Nat Bailey Stadium.

—Mike Phillips photo

~ Munro reiterates

pledge to UFAWU

Federal labor minister John
Munro last week reiterated his
pledge to amend the labor code.to
give fishermen full bargaining
rights following meetings in Ot-
tawa which United Fishermen and
Allied Workers Union secretary
George Hewison described as “‘the
most positive we’ve had in many
years.”

Hewison and UFAWU president
Jack Nichol were in Ottawa last
Wednesday and Thursday for
meetings with Munro, consumer
and corporate affairs minister
Warren Allmand and _ fisheries
minister Romeo LeBlanc.

CP blasts corporate concentration report —

Last week’s controversial Royal
Commission report on corporate
Concentration was designed to
assist a future Liberal or Con-
Servative government ‘fasten
tighter corporate and U.S. control
Over the economy and the people of
Canada,” the central executive of
the Communist party declared in a
Statement last week.

The CP’s condemnation of the
report was joined with those of

labor spokesmen throughout the
country who branded it a big
business, anti-labor and anti-
people document.

The Royal Commission was ap-
pointed by prime minister Trudeau

in April of 1975 but was delayed by

the loss of its chairman shortly
afterwards for health reasons. The
report was written by the com-
mission’s remaining two mem-
bers, Pierre Nadeau, oil executive

and director of the Royal Bank of
Canada, and ‘Robert Dickenson, a
Vancouver corporate and tax
lawyer.

“The Royal Commission labored
for three years and produced a
total whitewash of U.S. and
Canadian corporations in
Canada,” the CP statement said in
analyzing the report, ‘‘Mergers are
‘a natural phenomenon,’ that is,
not only to be approved of, but to be

Trident protesters occupy base
to support disarmament session

About 4,000 protesters last week-
€nd converged on the Trident
nuclear submarine base at Bangor,
Wash. to demonstrate against the
base and to focus public attention
On the United Nations special
Session on disarmament.

Demonstrators came from Can-
ada and the U.S. to the base Sun-
day, 160 kilometres south of Van-
Couver, for a giant march around
the nuclear base. Several thousand
Stayed for a candlelight vigil

unday evening and camped
Overnight in a field nearby.
Onday morning “about 300

scaled the fence surrounding the
Trident base to occupy the base in
a non-violent protest. While about a
thousand cheered from the outside
of the fence, police rounded up
demonstrators on to buses and took
them to the base gymnasium for

processing. There were no inci- ©

dents and no one was injured.

After questioning, most of the
demonstrators were bussed to Ta-
coma, 55 kilometres away, where
they were released. Five, including
two Canadians, had charges laid
against them.

The occupation of the Trident
base was the second time that
protesters have scaled the base’s
fences to dramatize their op-
position to the ‘‘first strike’
nuclear weapons that will be stored
at the $640 million base.

Last weekend’s occupation was
organized by a coalition of peace,
environment and student groups
including the Pacific Life Com-
munity, Greenpeace, the Quakers,
Crabshell and Clamshell Alliances
and the Simon Fraser Students for
Nuclear Responsibility. ©

encouraged. Taxes on capital gains
should be eliminated. Taxes on
corporate profits should be ended.
There should be an open door
policy with respect to foreign in-
vestments in Canada. These and
other goodies were proposed by the
Royal Commission as being in the
public interest.”

The release of the report was a
“highly political act,’’ the CP
statement warned, timed to come
on the eve of an election to
demonstrate to Corporations that
the Liberals can be counted on
“first, last and always — and the
public be damned.”

The CP predicted ,that either a
Liberal or Tory government would
implement the report, which it
said, ‘tis another good reason why
Canada needs Communists in
Parliament.”

The demand for the rejection of
the Royal Commission report was
also voiced in Vancouver by the
newly elected secretary-treasurer
of the B.C. Federation of Labor,
Dave MacIntyre, who May 16
called the report ‘‘an unbelievable
piece of trash.”

The proposals contained in the
report are ‘“‘totally wrong and
totally out of touch with the reality
of Canadian economics,” Mac-
Intyre said. ““Exempting corporate

pe See REPORT pg. 2

The UFAWU had sought the
meeting to press Munro on his
pledge — voiced to the union’s con-
vention in February — to grant
fishermen full bargaining rights
and also to demand that the con-
sumer and corporate affairs de-
partment intervene to end the
Combines harassment of the
fishermen’s union.

“Munro gave us an unequivocal
commitment that changes would

See ACT pg. 12

INSIDE

NOW ISNT THIS
MUCH BETTER FOR
BEDDY-BYE * TIME
THAN THAT STUFF
WEVE BEEN

e RCMP: The tangled web of
the RCMP’s activities is
unravelled in this article by a
Soviet diplomat. The se-
cond of two parts, page 7.

e FESTIVAL: In only a few
weeks, thousands of youth
from around the world will
converge on the city of
Havana — and among them
will be 240 Canadians, the
largest delegation ever to
the World Youth Festival,
page 11.

j