Pakistan

We have received this report from Kashmir, detailing the PTUDC's growing relief efforts. Medical camps are now being established and our relief camps are awaiting the goods to arrive with the solidarity caravan.

This article from the English daily DAWN in Pakistan explains that the team of doctors coming with the Indian relief delegation to go along with MP Manzoor Ahmed and the Revolutionary Solidarity Caravan have been denied access to Pakistan. This clearly exposes the rottenness of the Musharraf regime and shows how little the dictatorship is concerned about the victims of the earthquake.

We have received this report from Pakistan containing information from the PTUDC teams on the ground in Kashmir. The comrades have been hard at work establishing Solidarity Relief camps and holding meetings to discuss an action plan for the relief effort on the ground.

On Friday, October 14, Comrade Manzoor Ahmed, Member of Parliament and PTUDC president, held a press conference at the Lahore Press Club announcing the launching of the PTUDC solidarity caravan, called “The Revolutionary Solidarity Caravan”. Manzoor also announced his programme of demands for the aftermath of the earthquake and criticised the Musharraf government's handling of the disaster.

The initial shock of the earthquake in Pakistan and Azad Kashmir is beginning to turn into anger as millions of people are left without shelter in the cold and rain. The PTUDC’s international solidarity campaign has swung into action raising well over £1000 over the last few days. The response to our appeal has been truly amazing, but we need to raise more money to pay for the supplies, convoys, and medicines that we will be sending to the worst affected areas of Kashmir and Pakistan.

We received this flyer from the PTUDC in the United States, which is being distributed to trade unions and workers in the US in order to raise money for the PTUDC's aid campaign. You can download the flyer from the PTUDC website.

We were sent this contribution from Munno Bhai, a very well known left wing journalist and TV director in Pakistan.  The article is on the economic growth rates in Venezuela. It is one of his daily columns published on September 23 in the daily Urdu newspaper, the Jang with a readership of nearly 20 million people.

Upwards of 40,000 people are thought to have died and hundreds of thousands injured in Pakistan, northern India, and Kashmir as a result of the earthquake that hit the region Saturday morning. The devastation caused by the quake has exposed the rottenness of the Musharraf regime and has left millions stranded with no shelter, food or water.

“I Ask the Night” is a translation of selected poems by Javed Shaheen, the famous Pakistani poet, published by Struggle Publications in Lahore. Javed Shaheen witnessed the terrible bloodshed at the time of the partition of India and that marked him for the rest of his life. Ever since then he has sided with the downtrodden and oppressed.

“I Ask the Night” is a translation of selected poems by Javed Shaheen, the famous Pakistani poet, published by Struggle Publications in Lahore. Javed Shaheen witnessed the terrible bloodshed at the time of the partition of India and that marked him for the rest of his life. Ever since then he has sided with the downtrodden and oppressed.

We have just received this urgent appeal from the comrades in Pakistan. The terrible earthquake that has devastated the north of Pakistan and India has had its worst effects in Kashmir. As if the inhabitants of this oppressed land had not suffered enough, nature has now inflicted an appalling calamity that falls heaviest on the poorest sections of society. We are calling on our readers to give as generously as possible to the special appeal that we have launched today.

We have just received this urgent appeal from the comrades in Pakistan. The terrible earthquake that has devastated the north of Pakistan and India has had its worst effects in Kashmir. As if the inhabitants of this oppressed land had not suffered enough, nature has now inflicted an appalling calamity that falls heaviest on the poorest sections of society. We are calling on our readers to give as generously as possible to the special appeal that we have launched today.

The South Asian subcontinent is the least gender sensitive region in the world. It is the only region in the world where men outnumber women. The sex ratio is 105.7 men to every 100 women. In Pakistan, women are not only subjected to financial discrimination, but they are also victims of inhuman customs and laws such as Karo Kari, Hadood ordinance, Qasas and marriage to the Quran and half witnesses according to the state law (whereby in court a female witness is only worth half a male witness).

After the struggle of the PTCL workers in Pakistan came to an end some on the left raised criticisms of the PTUDC comrades, insinuating they played a minor role. Here we present an account of the sterling work done by the PTUDC comrades, written by two PTCL workers active in the struggle, and supporters of the PTUDC. Instead of attacks these comrades deserve every bit of support they can get.

On July 7, a rally of more than 2000 students and youth broke the deep silence of the Jhelum Valley road in Muzaffarabad Azad, Kashmir and its surroundings. The participants of the rally waved huge red flags and banners and chanted revolutionary slogans while riding on the roofs of buses and wagons. The convoy disrupted and even paralyzed the routine life of the valley and every viewer called it a “red storm”.

Pakistan is a country where Lenin’s famous phrase “socialism or barbarism” rings absolutely true. The present situation in Pakistan is characterized by fundamental instability. From this instability flow social and class conflicts, which could move Pakistan to the top of the world political agenda in the coming years. Marie Frederiksen in Denmark takes a look at the history of a country torn apart by divisions.