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GREEK PRISONERS
"APPEAL FOR HELP

= pamune has received a
ae tom the Greek prisoners
that ae which tells the truth

€ ruling Junta is trying

des
oi ately to keep from the

The r

tl i €port deals with the bru-

ieee rture and inhuman condi-
Prison Prevailing in the Averof
sia and the St. Paul’s hospital
Son in Athens.
The letter says:

sonesot® than 200 political pri-
. TS, of left, centre and right
of Bye are held in the Aver-
tins ire in the centre of
erin itself. Following our suf-
Drisone In the underground, in
bine, Sand camps, or the tor-
fered in the Security
nica : of Athens, Piraeus, Sal-
health ee and elsewhere, our
Paired @s been. seriously im-
Drisone Among these political
ftom, a are many who spent
others to 30 years in prison,
age Who are over 60 years of

*a,2nd some disabled . . .
th ne moment of writing,
a ple prison, large rooms
becatige S, looks like a hospital
ee. cryone is down with
eee Very sick prisoners
tal ‘Aoi to the prisoners’ hospi-
even 810s Pavlos’ (St. Paul’s) but,
efforts fre, despite the doctors’
and sv. sonditions are wretched
ence ON is complete indiffer-
the needs of the prison-

ots 4s” far
ey oar i
concéemed as the State is

coo the-sick- prisoners are
from he obtain medical supplies
e ae. homes, at their own
and ¢ aed our administration
ond; Mistry remain unmov-
“Dy Indifferent.
have bee the eight months we
oe €n here, as far as we
9 in epruing has been forth-
this es Tom the Red Cross for
that Coad ... Yet we know
cially the Many countries, espe-
S0cialigt Soviet Union and other
ies of countries, large quanti-
ee supplies sufficient
aVe bee the prisoners’ needs
ing and N sent, as well as cloth-
been j, food. But these have
Biven €pt in the stores and not
€ither to the political

Piso

Prison, : :

llieg » €rs or their ruined fam-
Ther,

Prisone, are no facilities for

tendea ts to have their teeth at-
is eee St. Paul’s prison there
tory ; € overcrowding. “Lava-
Order have long been out of
the War d Cockroaches run about

S .. . mattresses .are

>

dirty and rotted. Dishes and
cups are in such a state that one
feels revulsion at the sight of
them.”

When prisoners complain their
relatives on the outside are pick-
ed up and subjected to threats,
beating and torture.

“They have even reached the
point where well-known and
stigmatized torturers from the
Security enter the prisons and
carry out interrogation. On July
3, the Piraeus Security Police
Chief, Kouvas, visited the Aver-
of prison, and in the Governor’s
office, he interrogated our fellow
prisoner, Triantafyllo Karageo-
riou. Kouvas demanded that
Karageoriou repudiate the report
broadcast by the Voice of Truth
radio and say that he had not
been tortured. He refused,
whereupon Kouvas threatened
to have him taken again to the
cells of the Security police.”

Giannis Lippas, 4 leading
member of the Communist
Party of Greece has courageous-
ly signed a statement from. pri-
son stating: “I, the undersigned,
Giannas Lippas, state that re-

“cently my wife Sophia was call-

ed to the Piraeus Security and
tortured. Torturers of the Kou-
vas type beat her up savagely
and tried to compel her to sign
a statement that the denuncia-
ions made to the Sub-Commis-
sion on Human Rights of the
tortures suffered by my fellow-
detainees, were untrue. She re-
fused to sign such a statement.

“we denounce the fascist
method of threats and torture

“practiced by the Junta against

our relatives. We state that any
signatures extracted by brute
force are of no value. We de-
nounce the torture that has not
ceased in Greece for a single
day. We state yet once again
that we were subjected to most
horrible tortures during the in-
terrogation period. We call on
international public opinion and
international organizations to
intercede for the protection of
our relatives.” :
The prisoners are demanding
that “The International Red
Cross send a delegation to visit
us, or any other international
organization whatsoever, to see
the conditions from the health
point of view, the conditions
under which we are held and to
take the necessary steps to
change this state of affairs
which is incompatible with con-
temporary civilization.”

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YT LL 1 AA eo nec enrreree

Defend democracy in Quebec

Mr. Sam Walsh, leader of the
Communist Party of Quebec, in
giving an analysis of the recent
police strike, the eruption of
violence, and the use of the army
in Montreal, to the Central Exe-
cutive of the Communist Party in
Toronto, made the following
points:

Bertrand has declared publicly
that he called out the provincial
police, and the army and the
RCMP, at the request of the
Drapeau-Saulnier administration,
and that-he made sure to speak
to Saulnier beforehand. Mayor
Drapeau, who was subjected to
much public criticism for his
silence, issued a joint statement
with Saulnier which seemed to

‘call for removing the provincial

police and the army, but Ber-
trand again asserted publicly
that after this statement he had
spoken both to Saulnier and
Drapeau, who reaffirmed their
desire to maintain ‘these forces
in the city of Montreal.

For Bertrand the crisis in Mon-
treal was a real opportunity to
prove that he was serious with
his 10-point police state program,
announced some weeks ago, in-
cluding the provision used now
for the first time that the provin-
cial police could be placed in
command of all police and army
personnel in any emergency.

The following day, 4 provincial
bye-elections took place, uncon-

tested by the Liberal Party or by

the Parti Quebecois. The Union

Third and last instalment of
the interview with Vasil Bilak,

published in the newspaper
Rude Pravo, September 3. (New
Times).

“Comrade Dubcek did indeed
receive a personal letter from
Comrade Brezhnev on June 12 in
which Comrade Brezhnev in
very comradely terms drew his
attention to the fact that not-
withstanding the promises and
conclusions drawn by the May
plenary meeting of our Central
Committee, the situation in our
country ...Wwas.-- worsening.
He suggested meeting .- - Com-
rade Dubcek could say who was
to take part in the meeting. If I

am not mistaken Comrade Brezh- ©

nev wrote then that he was pre-
pared to discuss the mounting
danger together any day and in
any place...

“Comrade Dubcek decided
against going to the meeting...

“ can confirm that Comrades
Brezhnev and Kadar personally
asked us to attend the Warsaw
meeting. The date of the meet-
ing had finally been postoponed
in the hope that we might per-
haps take part in it... the fact
of the matter is that Comrade
Dubcek and some other mem-
bers .. . were opposed to the
idea of the meeting in prin-
ciple .. .”

In response to a question as
to why the Warsaw Pact coun-
tries published their letter pub-
licly, V. Bilak answered:

“T think that was done so that

it could not be passed over in.

silence . . . As for the campaign

Nationale swept all four seats, in-
cluding one formerly held by the
Liberals, electing one new mem-
ber, Mr. Cournoyer, who repre-
sented the government in their
hard-line negotiations with the
teachers.

The Liberals and Rene Leves-
que, leader of the Parti Quebe-
cois, voted for the draconic legis-
lation proposed by the Bert-
rand government — for “law and

order”. Once again Levesque has .

shown that when wage demands
and forms of struggle come into
conflict with the Establishment,
he unhesitatingly takes the side
of the establishment.

Both the Quebec Federation of
Labor and the CNTU were
strangely silent when Bertrand
announced his 10-point police
state program, although one or
two individuals expressed the
forlorne hope that these meas-
ures would not be applied to the
labor movement, strikes, etc., but
only to terrorists.

Bertrand has made it abun-
dantly clear that it is precisely
in enforcing his austerity pro-
gram, as well as in his sell-out
to Anglo-Canadian and US.
monopoly interests, that his 10-
point police state program will
be applied. —

In the current situation, nei-
ther trade union centre has
moved to take action to defend
the democratic rights of the

unleashed subsequently by the
Right opportunist, anti-socialist
and anti-Soviet forces — with
official blessing! — that is com-
mon knowledge. At that time a
wave of false patriotism arose,
there was literally a howl for
national unity against the Soviet
Union . . . Even today, after
some time has passed, we think
of that atmosphere with hor-
Tor: = ;

“The Plenary meeting itself
(July 19, 1968) was subsequently
staged in such a way that it was
attended by almost as many
press, radio and television per-
sonnel as CC members. Various
delegations were organized

‘which called out certain mem-

bers of the CC from the meet-
ing and literally threatened

» them, so that no one should dare

to express a different viewpoint.
The class approach . . . was lost,
and against this amazing back-
ground . . . the Central Commit-
tee endorsed the decision of the
Presidium not to participate in
the Warsaw negotiations ...
“We all made a great mistake:
some voted out of conviction,
some for fear of being expelled,
others—although they personal-
ly wanted us to go to Warsaw—
also, under the circumstances,
unfortunately voted against.
This led to a false unity on the
crest of an anti-Soviet wave.
“Undoubtedly part of the Pre-
sidium and a group of dishonest
men did exert pressure on Com-
rade Dubcek, and took advan-
tage of this. I believe that he
himself will help to find a
deeper explanation of these prob-
lems, he himself will tell of the
different pressures exerted on
him, what advice he was given

~ ~3 {

Cty te

ing Canadians,

workers, or of the people in gen-

eral. The CNTU Regional Council
of Montreal, however, chose this

week to pronounce themselves
for unilingualism — against the:
opposition of a large part of their
membership.

2

The Young Communist League
of Quebec has been in touch with
the two trade union centres, and
is working for convening a broad
conference next week in defence
of democratic rights in Montreal.
Characterisitcally, Raymond Le-
mieux, leader of the unilingual-
ists, had already stated that he
would not favor actions in favor
of democratic rights, so as not
to take away from the main issue
that he wants emphasized —
unilingualism. On the other hand, .
ultra-leftists are» seeking ‘“con-
frontation” only. Nevertheless,
we believe that there is a real
basis for uniting the progressive
forces, including the organized
workers in the first place, in
defence of democratic rights
against the police state legisla-
tion and action of Mr. Bertrand.

We believe that English-speak-
especially the
working people, should be sup-
porting the demand of French-
Canadian nation for self-determi-
nation of equality. This is the
strongest guarantee of welding
solidarity between the working
people of both nations in Canada.

and by whom. au.
“The allied troops éntered
Czechoslovakia not in order to
implant some other ideology, but
to defend the ideology which we
jointly embrace, the ideology of
Marxism-Leninism. They came

-not to set up some other social

system, but to protect the re-
sults of socialism in our coun-
try won in bitter class battles,
to defend the principle, record-
ed in our Constitution that ‘the
Czechoslovak Socialist Republic
is part cf the socialist world
system’...

-“The Bratislava Statement of
August 3, 1968, which bears our
signature, sets forth that ‘sup-
port, defense and consolidation
of these gains, won at the cost
of heroic efforts, the selfless
labor of each of our nations, is
the common _§internationalist
duty of all-socialist countries.’

“The fact that we did not mo-
bilize our own forces to defend
the socialist gain is our mistake,
not the mistake of our allies.

“In the domestic as well as in
the foreign policy of the social-
ist state, the Communist Party,
there must never be any diver-
gence between words and deeds,
between our socialist theory and
our socialist practise.

“It was idealism on our part
to have talked about the strug-
gle with the anti-socialist forces
having been finally completed,
and that we could lead a care-
free existence. The recent incid-
ents, when the Right-wing poli-
tical trend and the anti-socialist
forces joined with criminal anti-
social elements, also show what
might have happened if there
had not been firm party leader-
ship.”

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—OCTOBER 24, 1969—Page 9

SCyT eee ee

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