Asian scholars panel, political prisoners in Philippines and Indonesia

=== [PDF page 1] === DAILY WORLD Where to send protests on Chile Letters to Chilean aod U.S. representatives, inquiring about specific prisoners, can pat pressure on the junta for release. Wire or send your letters to: General Angusto Pinochet Ugarte, Santiago, Chile. Embassy of Chile (Chancellery), 173S Massachusetts Ave., Washington, D.C. Phone:' (202) 785-1746 or direct line from New York 245-1471. And to: United Nations Mission of Chile, 809 UN Plaza, N.Y., N.Y. 10017. Phone (212) MU 7-7547. Protests to U.S. officials can be directed to: Henry A. Kissinger, Department of State, Washington, D.C. 20520, phone (202) 655-4000. Or: Arnold Isaacs, Chile desk, U.S. Department of State, phone (202) 632-2575. UN Commission on Human Rights, United Nations, N.Y. 10017. Boston pickets hit Philippine tyranny Special to the Daily Worid -— BOSTON, April 8—Some fifty persons joined in a picket line April 1 to protest an address that Philippine Ambassador Eduardo Romualdez was scheduled to deliver to the Association of Asian Scholars at its convention at the StatlerHilton here. Organized by the Friends of the Filipino People and the Concerned Asian Scholars, the demonstrators carried placards and chanted slo gans calling for “Hands off the Philippines, No more Vietnams,” and “No U.S. Aid to Marcos, Lon Nol and Thieu.” Romualdez failed to show up at the Convention as scheduled, claiming pressing business in Manila. The moderator of the panel, “Multilateral Diplomacy in S.E. Asia: Ambassadors’ Views,” where Romualdez was to have spoken, permitted Ms. Barbara Cort of Cambridge, Mass., to make a statement for the Friends of the Filipino People and the Concerned Asian Scholars to the audience. Calling attention to the recent massacre of civilians at Jolo by the Marcos government using U.S.supplied weapons, Ms. Cort said: “The future looks ominous for peace and security in the Philip pines and ultimately in all South east Asia. Fighting is still raging in Indochina largely because more than 80 percent of the operating expenses of the Thieu government are paid by the United States gov ernment. “And now the Philippines is following the same path. Marcos is increasingly violent against his own population and reliant on U.S. military aid. U.S. Green Ber et soldiers are on active today in that country. “We feel that peace and secur ity in Asia can never be achieved while U.S. military aid can be used to prop up corrupt and dic tatorial governments.” Ms. Cort’s statement received warmer applause than any made by the Ambassadors who addres sed the panel (those from Indones ia, Malaysia, etc.). A subsequent question from the floor raised the issue of political prisoners in the Philippines and Indonesia. On April 3, the Association of Asian Scholars held a panel on Martial Law in the Philippines at which Benedict Kerkvliet and Robert Stauffer of the University of Hawaii, Raul Manglapus of Cornell, and David Rosenber of Middlebury College all spoke critically of the Philippine dicta torship. mayors assail Nixon anti-city Mayors Coleman Young of De troit and Richard Hatcher of Gary, Ind., predicted that unless money is made available soon, urban problems will be magnified mon strously in the next few years. The public meeting at which the two mayors spoke was part of the fifth annual conference of the Martin Luther King, Jr.. Center for Social Change. Mrs. Coretta Scott King, widow of the slain leader and president of the center, told a Friday press conference; “The center is the organization responsible for building a perman ent living memorial to Dr. King, and for programs and new non violent training techniques to carry forward his movement. “At each year’s conference, the center seeks to provide, through its guest speakers, its officers and its trustees, a per spective on events and issues in the nation and in the nonviolent movement for social change.” “Frontier Issues for Cities in the Seventies” was chosen as the theme of this year’s conference. In addition to Young and Hatch er. the two-day meeting was ad dressed by Mayor Kenneth Gib son of Newark, Mayor Howard By WILLIAM POMEROY LONDON — The new British Labor Government, heeding a strongly-backed motion from its left-wing members, has halted overseas financial aid to Chile and has banned further arms supplies to the junta regime. It is “urgently reviewing” existing arms contracts entered into by the preceding Tory Government. While in opposition, the Labor Party had de nounced the military coup in Chile and the junta’s savage repressive measures, and had pledged to cut off Tory aid programs if returned to office. This was in response to the strong grass-roots sentiment in the British labor movement against the brutal overthrow of the Allende Government. Judith Hart, appointed by Prime Minister Harold Wilson as Minister of Overseas Development in his new cabinet,mas been (me of the most vocal oppon ents of any support for the Chilean junta. It had been expected that she would press for termination of Tory aid programs. Ask recall of ship However, foot-dragging by the new Labor foreign minister, James Callaghan, caused the Labor leftwing MPs to force the issue in Parliament on March 27 with a motion demanding the end of arms aid for the junta. The motion quickly drew the signatures of 130 Labor MPs, with more to come. Callaghan then announced that “we shall not grant new export li censes for arms” and promised the urgent review of a present contract for supplying four warships to the Chilean navy. The lack of a firm commitment on non-delivery of the warships has not fully satisfied the Labor left-wing, which also wants one of the completed warships, a frigate, to be withheld from the junta. Some Labor MPs have demanded the recall of the Britisn ambassador from Chile and the severing of relations with the junta regime. Strong support for the Allende government and its policies had prevailed in the British labor move ment, and the indecent haste with which the recent Tory government had recognized the junta regime had brought mounting protest in Britain. The Brit ish embassy in Santiago had callously closed its Lee of Chapel Hill. N.C., Rep. Andrew Young (D-Ga) and Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass). Mrs. King, in her speech at the Continued on page 10 Nixon aide hits media critics of Indochina war By TOM FOLEY WASHINGTON, April 8 — The Nixon case for U.S. ag gression in Indochina was pleaded here today before an ultra-Right international anti-Communist gathering. Bruce Herschenson, deputy special assistant to the President, launched a bitter attack on media critics of the Vietnam war in a keynote address to the Seventh Confer ence of the World Anti-Communist League meeting at the Statler-Hilton Hotel. He singled out TV commentators and columnists in a manner reminiscent of the attacks made J on the press by former Vice President Spiro Agnew. arms to NEW YORK, April 8 — Some 2,000 people gathered in the Cathedral of St. John the Divine Friday evening to hear Black mayors of two major U.S. cities denounce the stran gulation of the nation’s “inner cities” by federal fund starvation. Britain halts funds, bans Page 3 By PHILLIP BONOSKY and J.J. JOHNSON doors to persecuted Chileans seeking asylum, and the Tory government at home had crudely deported a group of Chilean student refugees asking to stay in Britain, both steps bringing an outcry from many British people. Union resolutions Innumerable British trade unions, at regional, district and local levels, have passed resolutions calling for the withdrawal of diplomatic recognition from the junta regime. Concurring with left-wing demands. Overseas Development Minister Judith Hart announced in the House of Commons on March 27 that aid p»^ grams currently totaling about $700,000 would oe halted, except for support to Chilean students com ing to Britain for study. She responded to Tory com plaints that this would “do great damage to a coun try whose needs are great” by stating that: “There are three main areas of technical assist ance to Chile. First, industrial training, and in in dustry trade unions are suppressed and trade un ionists are imprisoned, persecuted and killed; sec ond, agriculture, where the present military regime has totally reversed the land reform program; and third, education, where most of the educational in stitutions are in the hands of the generals, depart ments are closed and there has been suppression and persecution of people engaged in education.” Concern for prisoners Under pressure from Labor MPs, Foreign Sec retary Callaghan was persuaded to align much of his policy with labor movement sentiment. He de clared that “our policy towards the military junta will be governed by our desire to see democracy restored and human rights put into perspective there” and that “we shall take part in any future representations to be made by the United Nations on human rights in Chile and our ambassador has been instructed to represent strongly to the military junta our concern of the treatment of prisoners.” Reversing Tory policy, Callaghan also said that “the home secretary will consider applications from Chilean refugees sympathetically.” There was praise from progressive people in Britain for all these steps, but it was made clear that demands will continue for the breaking off of all relations with the fascist junta. Tuesday, April 9,1974 Herschenson told the 250 delegates that Americans in Vietnam “fought two wars simultaneously — one was the war against Com munist aggression in Asia, and the other was a war to reject the con stant bombardment of screams and yells from those who are tell ing our military forces that the cause was not worthwhile.” Defends invasions and bombing The Nixon staffer defended Nix on’s 1970 invasion of Cambodia, the Saigon invasion of Laos, Nix on’s mining of the ports of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the December. 1972 Nixon bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong. Herschenson — who in his text released to the delegates men tions genocide but spelling it “genecide” — indicated that he doesn’t have a very clear idea of what the word means. “ ‘Genecide,’ they said,” he shouted. “His (Nixon’s) very san ity was questioned, today we can thank God he had the strength and courage to ignore the battering they (the news media) gave him.” Herschenson argued that “the self-professed, experts were wrong. Today they prophesy other things and they are still wrong.” Those singled out for sharp at tack by Herschenson were the TV newsmen Dan Rather, Eric Sevareid and Harry Reasoner, and New York Times columnists James Reston and Anthony Lewis. Herschenson claimed “that many Americans daring the Viet nam war were shocked because of “one-sided news reporting.” He was especially critical of CBS television and CBS producer John Hart who made a film in the DRV which Herschenson implied was heavily weighted toward the DRV side. “There were films of hospi tals and churches bombed and damaged by Americans,” he said. “There were no films of factories or bridges or railroads or supply Continued an page 10 IINI