<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=utf-8">
<META content="MSHTML 6.00.2900.2604" name=GENERATOR></HEAD>
<BODY>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman"><SPAN
class=218290220-02032005><STRONG>The Militant
</STRONG></SPAN><STRONG>Vol. 69/No. 9 <SPAN class=218290220-02032005>
</SPAN><SPAN class=218290220-02032005> </SPAN>March 7,
2005</STRONG> </FONT><FONT face="Times New Roman"
size=3> <BR></DIV><SPAN class=218290220-02032005><FONT face=Arial
size=2></FONT></SPAN></FONT></FONT>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3><SPAN
class=218290220-02032005><FONT face=Arial size=2>from</FONT></SPAN> <SPAN
class=218290220-02032005><FONT face=Arial color=#000000 size=2><A
href="http://www.themiltant.com">www.themiltant.com</A> - if you browse
this site for 'World Youth Festival' you'll get some intersting articles on
the last one in Algeria and the one before that in
Cuba...</FONT></SPAN><BR> <BR></FONT><!-- Main headline --><FONT
size=5><FONT face="Times New Roman"><STRONG>Build the world youth festival in
Venezuela </STRONG></FONT><FONT face="Times New Roman"><SPAN
class=218290220-02032005><STRONG>
</STRONG></SPAN></FONT></FONT></FONT><FONT face=Arial><FONT
size=2>(editorial)<BR></DIV></FONT></FONT><!-- Put text above here -->
<DIV><FONT size=2><FONT face=Arial>We encourage young people to go to Caracas,
Venezuela, on the week of August 7-15 to take part in the 16th World Festival of
Youth and Students. We urge you to work with others in your area over the coming
months to build the biggest and broadest possible delegation from this country
to the international festival. </FONT></DIV>
<P><FONT face=Arial>Like the preceding world youth festivals in Havana in 1997
and Algiers in 2001, this gathering will bring together thousands of students,
workers, and other youth from every continent who are looking for ways to fight
imperialist oppression and exploitation everywhere, from the Mideast to the
Americas. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>The fact that this festival takes place in Venezuela, a
political flashpoint in the world today, provides a special opportunity. It’s a
chance to learn firsthand about the intensifying struggles of workers and
farmers in Venezuela for land, jobs, literacy, and improved living conditions in
face of efforts by Venezuelan capitalists, backed by Washington, to overthrow
the government of President Hugo Chávez and push back the gains and
self-confidence that working people have won. It’s a chance to learn about the
example of internationalist Cuban volunteers working in Venezuela as teachers
and medical workers—a glimpse of what workers and farmers can accomplish when
they make a revolution and take state power as they have done in Cuba.
</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>At a recent meeting of the U.S. National Preparatory
Committee (NPC), which is organizing the U.S. delegation to the festival,
participants heard reports from a dozen newly formed local organizing committees
on their initial efforts to build delegations from their areas. Across the
country there are opportunities right now to work with others to form local
organizing committees in cities where they don’t exist and to expand out from
existing coalitions to other campuses and elsewhere in surrounding regions,
doing so through the national committee. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>Reaching out to involve students, workers, farmers, and
other youth, including a united effort to draw in the broadest range of
organizations interested in building the festival, will maximize the number of
people who can attend the gathering in Caracas. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>In a number of cities, local organizing committees are
holding meetings, giving presentations to student groups, setting up information
tables on campuses, distributing the NPC’s festival brochure and local
literature, and organizing other activities to promote participation in the
world youth festival. These efforts provide opportunities to explain the class
struggle unfolding in Venezuela, report on the internationalist work of Cuban
volunteers there, and mobilize defense of Venezuela and Cuba in face of
Washington’s confrontational course and military build-up in neighboring
Colombia. Some have organized showings and discussions of <I>The Revolution Will
Not be Televised</I>, a documentary that shows the mass working-class
mobilizations in Caracas that were key in defeating the April 2002 U.S.-backed
military coup in Venezuela. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>For young workers and students who are potentially attracted
to the working-class resistance here and abroad, getting involved in such
political work can help draw them closer to an understanding of the class
struggle and the need to join a movement to make a revolution of workers and
farmers in the United States or wherever we may live. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>One of the first questions young people interested in
attending the world youth festival in Venezuela will ask is: how can I get
there? In each city, collective efforts to plan travel, raise funds to cover
costs, and work out other practical arrangements are needed to ensure the
largest possible delegation to the international gathering. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial></FONT> </P>
<P><SPAN class=218290220-02032005><FONT
face=Arial>***********************************************************************</FONT></SPAN></P>
<P><!--StartFragment --><STRONG><FONT face=Arial size=4> <SPAN
class=bigHeadline>Spain plans summit to fight Colombia
terrorism</SPAN><BR></FONT></STRONG><SPAN class=all><FONT face=Arial>By Mark
Mulligan, Andy Webb-Vidal and Raymond Colitt <BR><SPAN
class=218290220-02032005>Financial Times</SPAN>: March 3 2005 </FONT></SPAN></P>
<P><SPAN class=all></SPAN><!--startclickprintexclude--><!--endclickprintexclude--><FONT
face=Arial>José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, the Spanish prime minister, plans to
host a summit of three South American leaders later this month aimed at
fostering closer co-operation in the fight against terrorism and drug
trafficking in Colombia.</FONT></P><!--startclickprintexclude-->
<DIV id=artAd style="DISPLAY: block; VISIBILITY: visible"><FONT face=Arial>The
summit is tentatively scheduled for March 29 and invitations have been sent to
Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, Colombia's Alvaro Uribe and Luíz Inácio Lula da Silva
of Brazil. A venue has yet to be agreed on.</FONT></DIV>
<P><FONT face=Arial>Government officials in Madrid say Mr Zapatero is expected
to hold up the successful Franco-Spanish campaign against Eta, the Basque
separatist group, as proof of the effectiveness of cross-border co-operation
against terrorism.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>Successive Colombian governments have been fighting the
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc), a group considered a terrorist
organisation by the US and Europe, for about 40 years.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>The Spanish government has also been forced to step up its
anti-terrorist operations since last year's train bombings by al-Qaeda cells,
which left nearly 200 dead and about 2,000 injured.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>However, the Zapatero initiative is also partly aimed at
easing tension between Spain and Colombia over Madrid's planned sale of military
equipment to Venezuela. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>Mr Chávez in January agreed to buy four naval vessels and
possibly six C-295 transport aircraft from Spain in a deal worth as much as
$1.2bn (€910m, £630m). That purchase, part of a weapons procurement programme
that has stoked fears in Colombia over an arms race, came at the height of a
dispute between Venezuela and Colombia over the capture of a Colombian insurgent
in Caracas. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>Last year, the Chávez government successfully lobbied Madrid
to cancel a symbolic contract, signed by former prime minister José Mar´a Aznar,
to supply Colombia with about 40 refurbished AMX-30 battle tanks.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>Mr Uribe is likely to use the summit to win backing for his
tough domestic security policies from a European government that has also faced
a domestic terrorist threat.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>Colombia, the third-largest recipient of US military aid,
after Israel and Egypt, is keen to counter the view that it is supported
exclusively by Washington.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>Meanwhile, Mr Chávez wants to cement ties with Mr Zapatero
as a European ally in an effort to offset an increasingly hostile stance from
Washington. </FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>The US is concerned about what it this week described as Mr
Chávez's “suspect relationship” with radical movements across Latin America,
including Colombia's leftwing guerrilla armies. On Wednesday, Roger Noriega, the
assistant secretary of state for western hemisphere affairs, said the US woud
begin to “increase awareness among Venezuela's neighbours of Chávez's
destabilising acts”.</FONT></P>
<P><FONT face=Arial>Mr Zapatero's visit to Colombia could help mend relations
with President George W. Bush, who was angered by the Spanish leader's decision
last year to withdraw the country's troops from Iraq. However, his role of peace
broker may clash with the regional agenda of Mr Lula da Silva. The Brazilian
president held individual meetings with Mr Uribe and Mr Chávez to help resolve
the recent standoff. </FONT></P></FONT></BODY></HTML>
<BR>
<P><FONT SIZE=2>--<BR>
No virus found in this outgoing message.<BR>
Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.<BR>
Version: 7.0.308 / Virus Database: 266.6.0 - Release Date: 02/03/2005<BR>
</FONT> </P>