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Cites F.B.I. “Conspiracy” To Destroy B.P.P.: Appeals Court Orders New Fred Hampton Trial

(Chicago, Ill.) - Citing strong evidence of conspiracies by the FBI and the Cook County State's Attorney's office to destroy the Black Panther Party, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ordered a new trial for 24 law enforcement officials involved in the December 4, 1969, predawn police raid in which Illinois Black Panther Party leaders Fred Hampton and Mark Clark were assassinated.

The April 23 ruling by a three-judge panel of the 7th Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals was hailed as a victory by the families of the two slain BPP members and the seven survivors of the 1969 raid, who are former members of the Illinois Chapter of the BPP. In January, 1976, a $47.7 million lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court by the Hampton and Clark families and the survivors against 28 law enforcement officials, including former Cook County State's Attorney Edward V. Hanrahan, three of his assistants, 15 Chicago police officers and several agents of the Chicago FBI office.

The 18-month trial, the longest in federal court history, ended in June, 1977, when Judge Joseph Sam Perry, in an unprecedented federal court decision, directed that the charges against all 28 defendants be dropped after the jury said it was deadlocked on reaching a verdict.

Following Perry's ruling, the plaintiffs appealed the case. Oral arguments were heard in August, 1978, and the case was then given to the appellate court for a ruling.

Judge Luther Swygert, one of the three members of the 7th Circuit Court panel, wrote in his decision, "It was clear from the record that (plaintiffs) had established an initial case that there were two conspiracies involved in the 1969 incident.

One conspiracy, Swygert said, was intended to destroy the Black Panther Party and the other "was intended to frustrate any redress the plaintiffs might seek, and more importantly, to conceal the true character of the raid and

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the raid activities.."

The main objective of the FBI Counterintelligence Program (COINTELPRO) set up in 1967 was to "destroy, discredit and misdirect" the political movement of Black and poor people in America and "prevent the rise of a Black Messiah" who would lead the movement.

On the 295 COINTELPRO actions carried out between 1967 and 1972 -- when the program allegedly ended -- over 90 per cent were directed against the BPP.

COINTELEPRO documents that the FBI was ordered to produce at the first trial, along with others that have been made public by the Freedom of Information Act, have revealed an elaborate plot by the state's attorney's office, the Chicago Police Department and the Chicago Office of the FBI to eliminate Fred Hampton from leadership of the Illinois BPP Chapter and to destroy the entire chapter.

Testifying at the federal trial in late 1976, Black agent provocateur William O'Neal admitted that he was recruited and paid by the FBI to infiltrate the Illinois BPP Chapter. O'Neal provided Chicago FBI agent Roy Mitchell with a map of Fred's Westside Chicago apartment, with an "X" marking the spot where the dynamic Party leader slept. (Mitchell and O'Neal were both defendants in the first trial.)

An autopsy report made after the assassination of Fred and Mark revealed that Fred had been drugged with a barbiturate. It is widely believed that O'Neal was responsible for the drugging.

Fred, 21, was killed in a barrage of police gunfire as he lay sleeping in his bed.

Mark, 22, was killed when he went to see who was at the apartment door.

Edward Hanrahan, who now has a private law practice, masterminded the 4 a.m. police raid. The right-wing former Cook County state's attorney considered the charismatic Fred Hampton and the BPP to be a serious threat to the political stranglehold that late Mayor Richard Daley's machine had over the Black and poor community in Chicago. Under Harahan's rule, Illinois BPP members were subjected to dozens of false arrests and jailings and were continually harassed by Chicago police officers.

Following the raid, Harnahan staged a series of press conferences and phony simulations of the raid to justify his office's action. He claimed the police started shooting because shots were fired at them from inside the apartment. Ballistics experts who examined the apartment door, however, found that only one of the 82 to 99 rounds shot could have been fired from inside.

The Black police officer who killed Fred, "Gloves" Davis, is still on the Chicago force. Davis has been hated and feared by Chicago's Black community for years.

In its historic decision, the appellate panel ruled that Perry, a White jurist from Alabama who is about 82 years old, was wrong in directing verdicts of acquittal against 24 of the defendants. The judge upheld Perry's directed verdicts of acquittal for four police officers.

Attorney G. Flint Taylor, one of the two lawyers for the plaintiffs, told THE BLACK PANTHER in a telephone interview that the ruling was "a very smashing decision."

Taylor was particularly pleased that the appellate court had orderd that action be taken against the FBI agents involved in the raid. The court cited widespread FBI suppression of documents and other evidence.

Taylor also noted Perry's ruling ordering the plaintiffs to pay court costs was reversed by the higher court, which ordered the defendants to pay the costs, estimated by some to be as high as half a million dollars.

Taylor said that the 24 remaining defendants may appeal the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.

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Retrial of Huey P. Newton Set For July 30

(Oakland, Calif.) - Huey P. Newton is scheduled to go on trial on July 30 for the second time on the false charge that he murdered a Black prostitute in 1974.

Meanwhile, the Committee to Stop the Retrial of Huey P. Newton, which has gathered over 4,500 signatures on a petition demanding that Alameda County District Attorney Lowell Jensen drop the murder charge against the Black Panther Party president, announced an upcoming major development in Huey's case.

"We are about to take an action that will not only help obtain justice for Huey," committee spokesperson JoNina Abron said, "but will obtain justice for countless other Black and poor people in Alameda County who have been victims of the district attorney's office during Jensen's 10-year rule."

The petition now being circulated by committee volunteers notes that courtroom expenditures alone in the first trial cost taxpayers $3,375 per day, totalling $60,750 for the 18-day trial.

"The county court system," the petition states, "is already severely overcrowded with cases. We believe that your (Jensen's) decision to retry Mr. Newton, whose first trial ended in a 10-2 vote for acquittal, is financially irresponsible given the current fiscal crisis in our government.

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"The hundreds of thousands of dollars that would be spent on a second trial could be better used by you and your staff to create methods to reduce the overcrowded court schedules and to make other needed improvements in the county's criminal justice system.

In the first trial for Kathleen Smith's murder, which ended on March 24 of this year, a jury of nine women and three men -- only one juror was Black -- voted 10-2 for Huey's acquittal. Juries in felony cases in California must reach a unanimous verdict, and the jury's "hopeless deadlock" resulted in Superior Court Judge Carl West Anderson declaring a mistrial.

On the last day of the trial, it was learned that on March 21, the day jury deliberations began, one of the three alternate jurors, Mrs. Menees, passed a note to Mrs. Silva, one of the two jurors who held out for Huey's conviction. The note said, "Go hang him (Huey)."

Michael Kennedy, BPP chief defense counsel, demanded that Anderson dismiss Silva and Menees. The Judge refused, claiming that Menees was only an alternate juror and that he didn't believe the note had affected Silva's deliberations.

Menees, in effect, tampered with the jury. In California, jury tampering carries a maximum sentence of five years in state prison. Neither Menees nor Silva has been charged.

The state Court of Appeals overturned Anderson's ruling that Huey spend five days in the county jail for contempt of court. During his three days on the witness stand in the first trial, Huey refused to tell Deputy District Attorney Thomas Orloff who helped leave the U.S. for Cuba, where he fled to political exile in fear of his life in August, 1974.

Anderson cited the Black Panther Party founder for contempt of court. The appellate court, in reversing the ruling, said that Anderson failed to state how Huey's refusal to tell who helped him go to Cuba related to the murder of Kathleen Smith.

The key point in the 18-day trial came when Michelle Jenkins, a prostitute friend of Smith's, recanted her earlier testimony that she saw Huey shoot Smith on an Oakland street corner in the early morning hours of august 6, 1974.

Eleven days after she testified for the prosecution against Huey, Jenkins returned to the stand, this time as a defense witness, and said she had lied in her previous testimony.

Asked by Kennedy why she had lied about Huey's guilt for nearly five years, Jenkins said that because she is a prostitute, the district attorney's office and the Oakland Police Department had threatened to put her in jail if she did not implicate Huey. The young Black woman was only 17 at the time of the 1974 incident.

In a related develoment, an overwhelming majority of Black people recently polled by the weekly Black newspaper, the California Voice, said they do not want Huey to be retried.

"I think it (another trial) would be a waste of time," said 31-year-old Martha Langston.

"The police are really going overboard to nail Newton because he is a militant," said 24-year-old John Bentley.

"You would think that because of Prop. 13 the state would want to save the taxpayers' more money, but getting Huey Newton is something the police want," said 30-year-old Oscar Morrison.

"I think another trial would be unfair…look at the caliber of witnesses they are putting up against Newton. They are dope pushers and whores…" said 33-year-old Leslie Crockett:

"The police are just trying to undermine the Black Panthers and that's why they are trying to put Newton in jail for something he did not do in my view," said 21-year-old Cherry Greene.

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Black Workers Vow To Fight Court Ruling

(San Francisco, Calif.) - A U.S. District Court judge here recently dismissed charges of racial discrimination made against Caterpillar Tractor Company in a lawsuit filed by Black and other minority employees of the multinational corporation.

Attacking the decision made by Judge Spencer Williams, Lorenza Carlisle, co-founder and spokesperson of the Caterpillar Anti-Discrimination Committee, told THE BLACK PANTHER in an interview that Williams' ruling was "racist."

"He told us (Black and minority employees of Caterpillar) that we had wasted the court's time," Carlisle said, "and ordered us to pay the $6,000 in court costs."

Carlisle and a fellow employee organized the Anti-Discrimination Committee at Caterpillar's San Leandro, California, plant in 1973. The committee has pressed several grievances against Caterpillar, the largest producer of tractor parts in the world. The grievances involve racial descrimination against Black and other minority employees in hiring, promotion and job training.

Out of the 2,000 workers at the San Leandro plant, some 400 are Black and minority, Carlisle said.

In 1975, the committee filed a class action suit against Caterpillar with Lorenza and several other Black and minority workers charging that they had been

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denied promotions because of racism by white plant officials. Williams, in his late April ruling on the case, claimed that the plaintiffs did not represent a class.

Carlisle said that Williams deliberately put the case off time after time. "He tried to break our momentum and destroy us," the Black factory worker maintained, 'and put a lot of pressure on us to settle the case out of court.

"We refused to do that," Carlisle continued, "because we were never offered anything adequate to cover minorities for the entire plant, and we definitely wanted to prove discrimination by Caterpillar.

"We were trying to get some relief so that there would be future opportunities for minorities," said Carlisle, who organized the Northern California Coalition to overturn the Weber Case (NCCOWC).

Carlisle said that the suit did "bring about some changes in the plant. A lot of minorities got promoted. But the ones who fight the fight never really get the prize," the Black factory organizer added.

"The minority always fights for the majority, and the objective of the boss man is to punish those that fight and reward those who are not doing anything in order to divide the workers," Carlisle explained.

Despite the judge's ruling, Carlisle said that "it was a victory to get Caterpillar to go to court and have to answer to racism. That's a victory in itself. In the Weber case (which is now before the U.S. Supreme Court), they are trying to eliminate the means by which Black people can say that they are victims of racism."

$12,000

The Caterpillar Anti-Discrimination Committee is now trying to raise $12,000 to hire an attorney to appeal the District Court ruling. Anyone wishing to make a contribution should call (415) 465-6433.

CENTRAL DISTRIBUTION
8501 E. 14TH STREET
OAKLAND, CALIF. 94621

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Editorial: Register To Vote

A recent Oakland Tribune article, lamenting the low East Bay turnout in the April municipal elections, attributed voter apathy in Oakland to the absence of the Black Panther Party from the election campaign.

This year marks the first time since 1973 that the BPP has not been actively involved in Oakland elections. When Party members ran for office in 1973, the city experienced its largest voter turnout in history. The effective voter registration drive organized by the Party in the Black and poor community of the city, along with the fear of the White minority, middle class population that "Panthers" might be elected to office caused a record number of people to go to the polls in 1973.

Again in 1975 and 1977, the Party's organization and leadership of a broad-based community coalition was instrumental in getting large voter turnouts and the election of politicians who claimed to be "liberal" and "progressive."

Lionel Wilson would not be Oakland's mayor today had it not been for the Black Panther Party's city-wide voter registration drive and intensive precinct work. Nevertheless, Wilson has refused to use his position to stop the retrial of Huey P. Newton.

The electoral system in America was never meant to work in the interests of Black and poor people. Big business is the only true "elector" in this country. The giant corporations give money to the politicians they trust to do their bidding in Washington. Consequently, on the national level, our votes have little or no meaning.

On the local level, however, there is more of a chance for us to make our voices heard. By not voting in Oakland's recent election, poor people expressed their anger at the politicians whom we have put in office over the last six years. They have forgotten about us, so we "forgot" to vote.

Poor people by no means have lost the chance to win control of Oakland government. To achieve our goal, we must do certain basic things, including registering to vote. We can no longer afford to limit ourselves to voting in regular elections. The numerous elected officials who continue to ignore us cannot remain in office if we do not want them to. Register to vote today.

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Letters to the Editor

B.P.P. DREAMS LIVE ON

Dear Editor:

To my distinguished brothers and sisters, I would like to show my gratitude with this tribute.

It is honor to know that there were brothers and sisters who were fighting for the physical cause in the '60's and I would like to show my gratitude with this, because we have not forgotten you because your dreams still live.

To the Panthers and friends who gave their lives, I only wish I knew each and every one of you, You had a reason for doing what was necessary, even if it was wrong according to the Constitution, because you knew it was right.

We the people are still fighting for what should be right. Because of the past, we can never forget what happened to our people. They were a part of us, especially the brothers and sisters who were on the Panther Party staff. How could we ever forget you and your struggle? You have left us with accomplishments, and now we will try to acknowledge them to the people and accomplish more.

I want to thank the Panthers for the programs they have established for the people in the Oakland community. They are essential to the struggle and also meaningful and helpful to the people.

I will never forget the Panthers. I don't know where some of us would be today without you. I thank you and also know many others thank you. We're with you all the way, and we will despond to your call.

Sincerely,
Lewis Davis

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COMMENT: Utility Companies Biased Against Blacks

In the excerpts of the following article reprinted from the Los Angeles Times. California Assemblywoman Maxine Waters, representative of the 48th Assembly District, which includes the predominantly Black area of South Central Los Angeles, describes the problems faced by Black and poor people victimized by big business and trigger-happy White racist policemen.

A few days ago. I received a call from a friend who wanted to, talk about the killing of Eulia love by two policemen last January in South-Central Los Angeles. (See article, p. 5)

My friend complained that not only are Los Angeles police officers abusive and violent, but the citizens of our neighborhood also are treated differently by the public utilities.

He complained that policies allowing the disconnection of services for delinquent payments are pursued more aggressively, that goods and services are inferior, and that the general attitude held by too many companies creates an atmosphere of hostility.

In cases of constituent complaints about Southern California Gas Company stopping service, I am always amazed at the amount of money in question -- $20 to $25 past due is the commonly quoted amount.

On several occasions, my office staff has determined that the customer has at least that much money on advance deposit with the utility.

It's all very cruel. People who are poor, unaware and misinformed are the victims of business practices that not only dehumanize but also cause frustration, resentment and hostility.

When you add to all of this a police department whose policy often has guns being drawn when a traffic violation is committed, and when at every other major intersection passersby witness police searching a citizen who is spread-eagled against the wall or an automobile, the conclusion can only be that there will be many more killings.

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Anti-Nuclear Protest Set For May 6 In Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.) - A massive nationwide march and rally to protest nuclear energy hazards will be held here on May 6. The protest, announced at a recent news conference in the nation's capital by well know consumer activist Ralph Nader, and at simultaneous press conferences in other cities, is being organized by the May 6th Coalition and the Mobilization for Survival.

Meanwhile, the Senate subcommittee on health released declassified government documents in mid-April revealing that President Dwight Eisenhower told the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (AFC) in 1953 to keep the public "confused" with its explanations of the radioactive fallout that is now arousing concern over serious cancer problems in southern Utah.

Utah Governor Scott Matheson testified at the Senate hearing that when sheep died in southern Utah during the 1953 testing, the AEC told the public that fallout was not the cause.

THYROID RESEARCH

Matheson also said that the AEC cut off funds for thyroid cancer research before it could be completed and suppressed a 1965 study that showed that leukemia rates in the state were abnormally high.

In light of the recent nuclear "accident" at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania and revelations of the U.S. government's deliberate cover-up of the dangers that nuclear energy poses to human life, THE BLACK PANTHER presents the conclusion of the following speech by Dr. Helen Caldecott.

Geneticists say that we probably won't live to see these effects of genetic disease, because these things are all so carcinogenic or cancer-producing that we'll all probably die of cancer before then. Scientists predict epidemics of cancer and leukemia in young people. We may have to get used to living only twenty or thirty years instead of seventy or eighty years. I'm scared stiff that we probably won't survive to the year 2,000. Some of the greatest brains at Harvard say our chances of surviving to the year 2,000 are less than 50 per cent, because this country has enough weapons to overkill Russia forty times, and Russia has enough weapons to overkill this country twenty times. And if a nuclear war occurred, the whole of the human

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race would not survive. There's no way we could survive a nuclear war. Even if there were a few survivors, the water and air would be so contaminated, they'd get leukemia and cancer later.

Nuclear plants are synonomous with nuclear weapons. Nuclear power plants are becoming unpopular in this country for obvious reasons. People are saying, "I don't want one in my city." But GE and Westinghouse keep making them: you know, if you have a product, you've got to sell it. So they're saying to the Third World countries, "Say, would you like to buy a nice nuclear power plant?" And they say, "Well, we don't have enough money." And the companies say, "We'll lend you the money." The more countries that get nuclear power plants, the greater chance that there will be a limited nuclear war somewhere in the world and that could precipitate a global confrontation.

Now, we all know that the man who had control of the black box several years ago in this country was not completely stable. Brezhnev is apparently being treated with Cortisone, a hormone that can produce acute psychosis. Obviously, he is in charge of the black box in Russia to a degree. We are none of us completely sane and stable all our lives. We're all fallible. We're only human. Yet we're dealing with weapons and industries of such magnitude that human beings can't handle them. And they will be used unless we get rid of them.

I would contend that nuclear power is not medically indicated; neither is nuclear war -- it kills people. I'm here to look after build these things. If you were a psychiatrist sitting on Mars, looking down on Earth, you'd say, "The world is run by lunatics!" - that is, if you were for life and not for death.

What these people seem not to realize is that they won't live either. Most of us, I think, don't like to think about our own death, because it's too scary. We sort of deny that we'll ever die. I think particularly of those politicians who have probably never even seen a person die. They've never seen children, age twelve coming into a hospital, looking slightly pale, with a few bruises, to have a blood picture done, and they're put in an isolated ward all by themselves. And their parents suddenly appear in a gown and mask. Nobody tells them what's the matter. They have some strange drugs which make them feel funny. They live an a state of abject terror and ignorance for two weeks, and suddenly they die from a hemorrhage from their nose or mouth. These politicians have never seen the grief of parents, with their beautiful children dying. Have they ever seen or witnessed anything like that? Because if they had, they wouldn't be doing this.

WON'T SURVIVE

Unless we get rid of all these nuclear weapons, we probably won't survive. We are the curators of life on earth. We hold it in the palm of our hand.

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Mayor Frank Rizzo: “Break Criminals' Heads”: Philly Police Brutality Probed By U.S. Civil Rights Commission

(Philadelphia, Pa.) - "As long as I'm mayor of Philadelphia, nobody, but nobody, will take advantage of a policeman doing his job."

So spoke Frank L. Rizzo recently before the U.S. Civil Rights Commission which is investigating charges of widespread police brutality in the "City of Brotherly Love."

Rizzo, who was the notorious police commissioner of the nation's fourth largest city until becoming mayor in 1971, blamed "militants and anarchists" for reports of abuses by this city's 8,500 member police force.

A bipartisan Pennsylvania House subcommittee on crime and corrections has blamed Rizzo and the city's current police commissioner, Joseph F. O' Neill, for "police lawlessness" that sometimes reaches the point of "homicidal violence," the New York Times reports.

The head of the district attorney's police abuse unit, George Parry, said that the mayor and the police commissioner "have let it be known to one and all that policemen who use deadly force will not be punished."

The Civil Rights Commission, which is probing causes of illegal police violence across the country, chose Philadelphia as one of two hearing sites (the other is Houston) "because of the large volume of complaints from citizens here who said their civil rights were violated by the police."

In Philadelphia, political leadership and the police department are nearly synonymous. Rizzo was a career policeman before he was elected mayor on a strong law-and-order platform in the wake of the urban civil rights disturbances of the late 1960's, the Times reports.

Ever since, Rizzo has fervently supported the police, and vice versa, through one crisis after another. His eight-year tenure, ending this year after voters rejected a city charter amendment that would have permitted him to serve again, has been marked by contention between the police and the Black community and the press.

There have been angry demonstrations against the police, and the department has been the subject of inquiries by special prosecutors, crime commissions and federal investigators.

Since 1970, local newspapers have reported numerous allegations of police brutality -- of people being pulled from cars and beaten unconscious; of unarmed teenagers being shot in the back and killed as they fled police officers; of a man being shot to death while handcuffed; of off-duty officers shooting at motorists, then arresting them, and of White policemen shadowing Black policemen who criticize the actions of their uniformed colleagues.

There have also been charges that Rizzo formed a special police squad to shadow members of the city council; of policemen being found guilty of criminal assault, yet being cleared by the department and remaining on active duty; of a policeman who faced more than a dozen formal brutality complaints going unreprimanded and, in fact, being promoted, while the city paid thousands of dollars in civil damages.

Rizzo has routinely labeled the reports "biased," "prejudiced" or "unfair newspaper stores," and that usually has been the only response from a police department that keeps its policies, procedures, practices and internal actions secret.

District Attorney Edward Rendell says that the department "has an attitude that the police can do no wrong."

The department has refused to cooperate with Rendell's recently formed police brutality unit, going so far as to withhold, as a matter of policy, the statements of the shooting officer when a citizen is killed by a police bullet.

When Rizzo was rising from South Philadelphia through the police ranks to police commissioner, most people seemed to think that he could do no wrong. He was a darling, practically a creation, of news organizations that had a tradition of cozy relations with the police and politicians.

He wore two pistols and he was quotable. He had a swagger and charisma; he was good copy. The press nicknamed him "The Cisco kid" and "The Big Bambino."

Rizzo was a particular favorite of Walter Annenberg, then publisher of the Philadelphia Inquirer, who reportedly, over the years, rode around in Officer Rizzo's cruiser, and allowed editors to screen reporters' inquiring calls to Commissioner Rizzo.

But in 1970, Annenberg sold the Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News to Knight Newspapers Inc., and the chain brought in new editors and reporters. In 1971 Rizzo became mayor and almost immediately he and the Inquirer fell into undeclared war.

In the fall of 1971, the Inquirer began publishing articles about police corruption that led to the formation of a special prosecutor's office. Rizzo's political friends in the state capital eventually starved the office for funds.

By 1977, the Inquirer was reporting extensively on police brutality. It won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished public service for a series disclosing, among other things, that a man had been sent to prison after confessions were beaten from him by police detectives.

From 1971 on, the mayor raged at much of the press, and so did police officers and their wives. The wives picketed the newspaper building and once halted publication when other unions refused to cross the lines.

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Boycott Grows Against Nestle Infant Formula

(Minneapolis, Minn.) - Nestle, the international Swiss-based food giant, is coming under increasing pressure to halt its promotion of infant formula in developing countries, which is creating a serious health epidemic by encouraging mothers to switch from their own breast milk to powdered infant formula.

Unclean water and poverty make the safe preparation of the expensive infant formula virtually impossible, says the Infant Formula Action Coalition (INFACT), an assembly of concerned nutritionists, educators and religious leaders. INFACT estimates that bottle feeding in developing countries leads to 10 millions cases of severe infant disease each year. The result is malnutrition, retardation and death.

Nestle, the world's largest producer of infant formula, disputes these charges and refuses to cease its promotion and marketing practices despite widespread international protests and an on-going boycott of its many products.

"Clip Nestly Quik!" is the slogan for an INFACT campaign which culminated in April with the cross-country trip of a large truck collecting tens of thousands of Nestle discount coupons. INFACT supporters have been clipping the coupons from newspapers and magazines in the past two months. The truck was scheduled to deliver the unredeemed coupons to Neste's U.S. headquarters in White Plains, New York, on April 28.

Dr. Benjamin Spock, the noted pediatrician, joined INFACT organizers in Los Angeles on April 20, for the truck's send-off.

The collection of the Nestle coupons was the focus of rallies

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scheduled in more than a dozen cities, including Denver, Minneapolis, Chicago, Detroit, and Washington, D.C. Additional activities and demonstrations took place in numerous other cities during this 10-day period.

"In some cities," said Douglas Johnson, national chairperson for INFACT, "the coupons are being burned in a public protest, or bundled off to David Guerrant, president of Nestle, USA. But they all represent products Nestle could have sold if they would stop their unethical promotional practices.

The Nestle boycott includes: Nescafe, the world's largest selling brand of instant coffee; Taster's Choice; Nestea; QUIK; and CRUNCH; foods marketed by Nestle's wholly-owned subsidiaries, Stouffer and Libby.

FUND APPEAL

Dr. Spock, 75, in a fund-appeal sent out for INFACT, has charged Nestle with "putting profits first." "We are trying, with the boycott, to compel Nestle to do what they won't do out of decency," said Spock.

Dr. Spock was one of the leading opponents of the Vietnam War. He is also one of the best-selling authors of all time. His Baby and Child Care, first published 33 years ago, has sold 25 million copies.

INFACT was organized in 1977 to stop multinational corporations from promoting infant formula overseas, which the group says has led to a phenomenon United Nations doctors now call "Baby Bottle Disease." This syndrome includes a range of malnutrition and intestinal illnesses and occurs in areas of the world lacking the necessary conditions for safe use of the powdered milk.

To use formula properly, the health authorities say, a mother must have safe water supplies, adequate fuel for sterilization of bottles, and refrigeration of the prepared milk, Improperly prepared the baby bottle is a breeding ground for bacteria that cause acute diarrhea, malnutrition and death.

INFACT has made the following demands of Nestle:

- Stop the use of "milk nurse" sales personnel, in or out of starched white uniforms;

- Stop distributing free supplies of formula to hospitals, clinics, and the homes of newborn babies;

- Stop promoting these formulas to the health professions through health care institutions;

- Stop direct promotion and advertising of artificial baby formula to consumers, as recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Because the Nestle Company, one of the largest food processors in the world, is Swiss-owned, it is not subject to Congressional pressure or stockholder resolutions, as are several American corporations who have altered their policies as a result of INFACT pressure.

"But INFACT's greatest hope for success, says Johnson, "rests with millions of concerned Americans whose participation in the boycott will force Nestle to listen and act."

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Each-One Teach-One Assoc. To Sponsor May 6 Benefit: Community School Childern Display Talents In Spring Festival

(Oakland, Calif.) - The recent nuclear "accident" in Pennsylvania and the gasoline "shortage" were among the topics featured in the recent Oakland Community School (OCS) Spring Festival of the Performing Arts.

The talented children of OCS, ages two and one-half to 11, gave one of their most delightful performances at the April 22 program. The festival began with a stunning presentation by the 17 girls who make up the OCS "Mighty, Mighty Panthers" Drill Team. Following, the primary skills children performed a rousing rhythm band song, during which they played percussion instruments.

Next, a group of the school's older children told the story of "Perdy Peachie," an eight-year-old boy who turned into a peach. In "Sunday Afternoon Newsbreak," featuring "Barbara Dizzy" and "Walter Crazy," the children made timely comments on how the nuclear and oil industries lie to the public in order to make huge profits.

Next followed a skit on "Later Gator Toothpaste," whose users lost all their teeth, and "The Year of the Children," a beautifully moving dance choreographed for the older girls of the school by Evelyn Thomas.

For their finale, the children sang the popular song, "Love Music."

To help continue the quality educational program of Oakland Community School, a fundraising Champagne Sip will be held on Sunday, May 6, at the Oakland Community Learning Center (OCLC), 6118 East 14th Street, from 2 to 4 p. m. The benefit will be sponsored by the Each-One Teach-One Association, a program of Educational Opportunities Corporation, the non-profit, community-based organization that administers the OCS.

The fundraiser will feature the Rebop film on the OCS and the OCLC Teen Program and a dance presentation by OCS students.

Tickets for the Champagne Sip are $5.00 each and may be purchased by calling (415) 562-5261 or coming to 6118 East 14th Street, Oakland. Tax deductible checks should be made payable to Educational Opportunities Corporation.

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D.A.'s Office Rules Murder of Melvin Black “Justified”: Community Support Mounts For Oakland Police Review Board

(Oakland, Calif.) - Outraged at the recent ruling of Alameda County District Attorney Lowell Jensen's office that the murder of a 15-year-old Black youth by three Oakland policemen was "justifiable homicide," the city's Black and poor community has vowed to establish a community-based police review commission to conduct independent investigations of police violence and misconduct.

The Melvin Black Human Rights Committee, the Black Veterans Association (BVA), Seniors Against A Fearful Environment (S. A. F. E.) Club of the Oakland Community Learning Center, American Indian Movement (AIM) School for Survival and the Black Panther Party are among the groups in the broadbased coalition that has been formed to launch a campaign to establish an independent citizens' police review board in Oakland.

The coalition has denounced the April 27 finding of the district attorney's office that no criminal charges will be filed against the three police officers who shot 15-year-old Melvin Black to death in front of his North Oakland home on March 17.

According to the district attorney's office, "the circumstances justify a reasonable belief that deadly force was necessary" against the Black youth. Police claimed that the high school student matched the description of an alleged sniper who was shooting at cars on a nearby freeway.

The D.A.'s report, explained by Deputy District Attorney Donald Whyte, who directed the investigation, said that officers Forrest Ken Thornberry and Glen Tomek approached the Black teenager as he was leaning against a car in front of his home because he matched descriptions of the sniping suspect. The policemen, according to the report, identified themselves and told Black to "freeze" and put his hands on the car he was leaning against.

Then, the D.A.'s report claimed, Black put his left hand on the car and reached into his waistband with the right for a weapon, which was later identified as a pellet gun.

When Black pointed the gun at Thornberry, the report continued, he and Tomek immediately fired all six bullets from their revolvers. According to the report, Thornberry fired the fatal shot, which entered the youth's neck.

Struck with the five bullets, Black, the D.A.'s report continued, ran in a crouch to the rear of the nearby apartment building, where he lived with his mother and sister. Sergeant Joe Thomas and Officer Tom Campbell, who were allegedly searching for another suspect, arrived on the scene in time to see Black aim the gun at Thornberry. They joined in the pursuit of the Black teenager, with Thomas firing one more shot

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"because he thought Thornberry and Tomek had missed."

The youth's family maintains that he was shot 12 times, disputing the coroner's report that he was shot five times.

Whyte said the D.A.'s report was based on reports and interviews with one eyewitness and 17 people who heard the shooting but didn't see it. The eyewitness, who said he was sitting in a car parked across the street, confirmed the police version of the murder, according to Whyte.

Shortly after the March 17 incident, Charla Black, the 18-year-old sister of the dead youth, charged that police had intimidated several of her neighbors who said that the killing was completely unjustified.

Reports of two other investigations of the killing have not yet been concluded. One is being conducted by John Burris, a Black attorney formerly employed by the D.A.'s office. Burris was hired by Oakland Mayor Lionel Wilson and the city council.

Many people in the community are skeptical that Burris will carry out an impartial investigation because of his close ties with the D.A.'s office.

The U.S. attorney's office is also investigating the case at the request of the local branch of the NAACP. A third investigation is being made by the Internal Affairs division of the Oakland Police Department.

The Charles Houston Bar Association, a group of Bay Area Black lawyers, is one of several groups that has demanded the suspension of Thornberry, Tomek and Thomas from the Oakland police force. In a letter to the Association, police chief George Hart refused to take any action against the men until there is a "determination of wrongdoing by police."

Meanwhile, Mayor Wilson recently completed appointments to a blue ribbon panel that will recommend whether there should be an independent board to review Oakland police misconduct. The panel, headed by Vice mayor John Sutter, includes: Margaret Pryor, of Oakland Concerned Citizens for Urban Renewal (OCCUR), Oakland's official citizens lobby group; Oscar Wright, of the local NAACP; Lonnie Dillard, Elmhurst district coordinator of the Community Development district Board; Howard Janssen, a deputy district attorney in Berkeley; Lyman Hubbard, director of public affairs for the Oakland Chamber of Commerce and a former police officer; Rev. J. Alfred Smith, pastor of East Oakland's Allen Temple Baptist Church; Geoffrey Carter, an attorney of the Charles Houston Bar Association, and David Way, manager of community affairs at the Clorox Corporation and chairman of the New Oakland Committee, a group of predominantly White businessmen.

The Melvin Black Human Rights Committee meets every Monday at 7 p.m. at the Oakland Community Learning Center, 6118 East 14the Street, Oakland. The public is invited to attend. For further information. call, (415) 562-5261.

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L.A.P.D. Killing Sparks Demand For Review Board

(Los Angeles, Calif.) - Outraged over the whitewashed investigation into the senseless murder by two police officers of a 39-year-old Black woman, the Black community here is demanding the establishment of a community-based police review board.

The city's rubber-stamp "Civilian" police commission and District Attorney John Van de Kamp, who has refused to indict the officers who shot Eulia Love on January 3 in a dispute over an unpaid $22.09 gas bill, have come under increasing attack for their cover-up of the murder.

According to numerous eyewitness accounts of the incident, Mrs. Love, a widowed mother of three whose husband died last June of sickle cell anemia, leaving the family dependent on meager Social Security payments, allegedly attacked a gas serviceman with a shovel who had come to her home to turn off her gas.

After the serviceman fled and called police, Mrs. Love walked to a nearby grocery store and purchased a $22.09 money order to pay the bill -- the money order was found in her purse after she was killed -- and returned home.

A gas company truck had returned. She tried to pay the serviceman, but he wouldn't accept it.

"I'll pay $20, but I won't pay $80," the serviceman quoted the visibly upset Black woman as saying.

Mrs. Love's bill reportedly had been delinquent for some time, and she owed a total of $80. The $22.09, however, was the minimum payment required to keep

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the service connected.

When patrolmen Edward Hopson and Lloyd O'Callaghan arrived, Mrs. Love was in her front yard, holding a knife she had taken from her kitchen after the dispute with the second serviceman.

Mrs. Love's daughters, Tammy and Sheila, said that after their mother turned her back on the officers and began walking toward her house. O'Callaghan approached her from behind and knocked her down. They said the officers then opened fore on her, shooting 12 times and hitting her with eight bullets.

Contrary to this and several other eyewitness accounts, the two policeman claim that Mrs. Love first threatened them with the knife, and they acted in self-defense.

At the first of a series of hearings by the police commission, which is investigating the case, the NAACP and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), among other groups, called for a community police review board.

Black community leaders charged that the Love shooting is not all that unique, adding that there have been several "questionable" homicides under investigation by the district attorney's office, including:

- James H. Richardson, 19, a burglary suspect, was shot to death on January 14 by an officer who claimed he pulled a shiny object from his pocket. Police later reported that the object, which was thought to be a gun, was "two foiled wrapped packets of angel dust."

- Cornelius Tatum, 42, was shot and seriously wounded by two plainclothes officers as he entered tha cashier's booth of a gas station where he worked. The officers claimed that the service station attendant aimed a shotgun at them.

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U.S. Denies Mexican Activist Political Asylum

(Houston, Tex.) - In a landmark case decided here in mid-April, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) refused to grant political asylum to Mexican activist Hector Marroquin.

The 25-year-old former student activist now faces deportation to Mexico, where he faces jail, torture and possible death.

"Returning to Mexico," Marroquin said at his four-day hearing before INS Judge James Smith, "will be a death sentence."

Six days after Marrouquin's hearing, Smith gave him 30 days to leave the country " voluntarily" or be deported. Smith's ruling is being appealed.

If Marroquin's appeal is successful, he will be the first Mexican granted political asylum in this country -- and an historic precedent will be set for political refugees from right-wing Latin American regimes seeking asylum.

During the hearing, Marroquin's attorney, Margaret Winter, brought several witnesses to the stand who detailed instances of political persecution, including torture and kidnapping. Two of these witnesses included Mexican human rights activist Rosario Ibarra de Piedra and Robert Goldman, dean-designate of the American University Law School and author of a report on repression in Mexico for the prestigious International League for Human Rights (ILHR).

Piedra is the founder of the Committee to Defend Political Prisoners the Politically Persecu "Disappeared," and Exceed an internationally acclained human rights group. Piedra's son, Jesus, a student activist, has "disappeared" since being arrested by Mexican police.

Marroquin became politically active after the Mexican government's massacre of 500 demonstrators on the eve of the 1968 Olympics. In 1974, during a period of student unrest, a librarian was killed at the university where Marroquin was a student. Marroquin and three other student activists were falsely accused of the murder.

Convinced that he could not get a fair trial, Marroquin fled the country.

Two of those accused with Marroquin have been killed by Mexican police; the third has "disappeared" since his arrest.

After entering the U.S., Mexican police accused Marroquin of participating in two robberies in Mexico.

In September, 1977, Marroquin was arrested by "la migra," the INS, after he came back from a

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secret trip to Mexico. He spent three months in jail before the Socialist Workers Party (SWP), of which he is now a member, provided him with lawyers and helped raise his $10,000 bail.

Important documents on the secret role of the FBI in Mexico were introduced at Marroquin's hearing held in April. The documents provide substantial evidence that the FBI, operating illegally in Mexico, was involved in the original frame-up of Marroquin.

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Dellums Charges Plan For Draft Is Racist

(Washington, D.C.) - Bay Area Black Congressman Ronald Dellums recently charged that efforts to revive the draft have "racist implications."

The House Armed Services Committee member said that "peacetime military conscription constitutes involuntary servitude as defined by the 13th Amendment" in the Constitution, which prohibits slavery.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) also has voiced strong opposition to the proposed reinstatement of the draft and has launched an intensive lobbying campaign in Congress against such a move.

Congressman G.V. (Sonny) Montgomery of Mississippi and other lawmakers have introduced legislation that would draft about 200,000 men a year into a special program of six months' active training, followed by nearly six years in the Individual Ready Reserve pool.

Army Chief of Staff Bernard Rogers recently endorsed this proposal before the Senate Armed Services Committee. He has since been named to replace General Alexander Haig as Supreme Allied Commander in Europe. Haig has announced his candidacy for the Presidency.

California Congressman Pete McCloskey has introduced a bill whereby all men and women reaching the age of 18 would be forced to take one of four options: 1) two years of military service; 2) six months of active duty, followed by nearly six years in the military reserves; 3) one year of civilian services; or 4) six years of eligibility in a draft lottery.

McCloskey also proposed that both military and civilian draftees would be paid subsistence wages of only about $200 a month for the first two years of service. This is in contrast to the present military starting pay of $419.40 a month. At present, the pay of most soldiers rises above the starting level during the first two years of service.

A mandatory national service program in which everyone would be drafted -- a plan that goes beyond McCloskey's -- would cost the government $23 billion a year if present military pay scales were extended to both military and civilian draftees, according to Pentagon estimates.

"Some of my colleagues, including so-called liberals, are contending that the military is becoming too Blck and too non-White," Dellums noted in reference to the highly disproportionate number of Black and poor people in the current all-volunteer force.

The high numbers of non-Whites in the military "is due to the fact that most of them are searching for economic and educational opportunities in the military which have previously been denied them in civilian life," Dellums said.

If there had been no peacetime draft during the administrations of President Johnson and President Kennedy, the U.S. might never have been involved in the Vietnam war, he said.

"It is our duty to prevent the warmongers of the present and future from having ready-made, conscripted cannon fodder at their disposal for possible further misadventures," Dellums said.

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People's Perspective

Black Prisoners
To Be Retried

(San Francisco, Calif.) - Two Black prison activists, whose convictions in the death of a White prison guard were reversed by the state Supreme Court, appeared in Superior Court here recently to begin proceedings for their third trial on the charges. Eugene Allen and Ernest Graham are accused of the 1973 stabbing of Jerry Sanders, a Deuel Vocational Institute guard in Tracy, California. In a unanimous decision in February, the state Supreme Court ordered a new trial because the prosecution excluded all Black prospective jurors. Graham and Allen were convicted in 1976 by an all-White jury in the second trial after the first trial ended in a hung jury.

Miranda Rights
Attacked

(Washington, D.C.) - The Supreme Court recently ruled that police need not always obtain written proof that a suspect waived his right to have a lawyer present before they can question him or her. By a 5 to 3 vote, the court said that judges must decide, based on the facts of each case, whether a suspect might have implicitly waived his right to talk to an attorney. This decision seriously curtails the rights of criminal defendants as outlined by the 1966 Miranda v. Arizona decision. In that case the court held that police may not question a suspect until the person is informed of his rights to remain silent and see a lawyer.

Maryland Police
"Gun Crazy"

(Prince Georges County, Md.) - Angered that Terrence Johnson, a 16-year-old Black youth, was not convicted of first degree murder in the shooting of two White policemen (he was convicted of manslaughter and illegal possession of a handgun used during a felony), the Prince Georges County police staged a walkout recently and have vowed to "use their guns more." Johnson, a victim of police brutality, now faces a maximum of 25 years in jail for defending himself and his brother against two policemen, one of whom had tried to break his neck.

China Invests In
Oakland Project

(Hong Kong) - The People's Republic of China has invested in retail space in the Hong Kong-USA project being built in downtown Oakland, California, Hong Kong business sources report. The report has been confirmed by David Davies, managing director of Gammon Properties, Ltd. the Hong Kong-based firm that is marketing the huge development project. Davies also said that the report wasn't "surprising" since the Port of Oakland has been seeking to establish business ties with China and retail outlets in Oakland would enhance the Port's bid for business.

Chavez Blasts
Murder Ruling

(El Central. Calif.) - United Farm Workers (UFW) President Cesar Chavez has bitterly denounced the dismissal of murder charges against three men who killed a striking union member at the peak of a labour walkout in Imperial Valley lettuce fields.

Charges of murder, attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon against the three in the February 10 slaying of 28-year-old Rufino Contreras were recently dropped by the Imperial Valley district attorney. Contreras was killed as he and other striking UFW workers walked into a field where non-union employees were harvesting lettuce.

Chavez said in a statement, "Judge Lenhardt has confirmed what we feared for three months -- that there is no justice for farmworkers in Imperial Valley.

Indians Protest
Uranium Mining

(Grants, New Mexico) - Native Americans in the Southwest were scheduled to gather here in late April to protest uranium mining on sacred Navajo and Pueblo lands in the Grants Mineral Belt. The action will specifically protest uranium exploration and mining on Mt. Taylor, one of the four sacred Navajo mountains which is also spiritually valued by the Pueblos. The Grants Mineral Belt contains over half of the uranium supply in the U.S. and is mostly located on Navajo and Pueblo lands.

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Black Inmates To Be Tried For Pontiac Prison Rebellion

(Chicago, Ill.) - Seventeen Pontiac State Prison inmates recently petitioned a county court to change the location of their upcoming trial, on charges of killing three prison guards, from Livingston County to Cook County in Chicago.

The guards were killed during a July 22, 1978, uprising at Pontiac by over 1,200 predominantly Black and poor inmates who rebelled because of 110 degree heat in the prison cell blocks, severe overcrowding and other inhumane conditions. (See THE BLACK PANTHER, July 15-29, 1978.)

The 17 prisoners insisted they could not receive a fair trial in Livingston County where the prison is located because of racial prejudice.

The petition asked for a change of venue to Cook County "where there is a possibility of their receiving a fair trial since it is the only county (in Illinois) which has a substantial Black population from which to draw an impartial jury…," the Bilalian News reports.

The 17 inmates base their petition on the fact that 98 per cent of Livingston County's population is White and the three guards killed were White. The inmates are all young Black men from Chicago and, the petition continues, "represent an unpopular class in Livingston County."

A substantial number of prison employees are residents of the city of Pontiac and roughly one-half of the town's population has relatives or friends who have been or are presently employed at the prison.

These facts, along with adverse media publicity in the small town surrounding the prison, make a fair trial for the Black prisoners virtual impossibility.

Due to a strong and persistent anti-Black attitude on the part of the White residents of Pontiac against the prisoners, the 17 Black inmates charged in their petition that such hostility "would create great pressure on any juror to convict the alleged killers of prison guards."

The prisoners could each be sentenced to death if found guilty of the five murder counts for which each has been indicted.

The three guards, Lt. William Thomas, Robert Conkle, and Stanley Cole, were stabbed to death during the 1978 summer rebellion which resulted in a

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general prison lock-up that is still in operation.

On the day of the uprising a group of 550 inmates was being returned to their north cellhouse after an outdoor recreational period. A second group of about 600 inmates broke out of an auditorium where they were watching a movie and joined the first group in the prison yard.

Several inmates took four guards as hostages and set fire to bedding in two dormitories where they had built barricades.

Throughout the four-hour uprising, the inmates held over 200 guards and policemen at bay.

After prison authorities used tear gas to regain control, the Pontiac inmates were stripped naked before being returned to their cells.

The prisons' Black warden, Thaddeus T. Pinkney, said of the rebellion, "Everyone in the state of Illinois knows we're overcrowded and understaffed."

Illinois Governor James Thompson noted, "Any spark can touch off men who are locked in cages and that's what prisoners are."

The Pontiac revolt was the second major Illinois prison uprising within a week. On July 19, 1978, inmates at Stateville Correctional Center near Joliet took control of cellblocks during a two-hour protest.

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The Role Of Blacks On Juries

"We want trials by a jury of peers for all persons charged with so-called crimes under the laws of this country." -- Point Number 9, Black Panther Party Program and Platform.

Black and other poor people in America do not receive justice in the courts of this country because they are systematically denied juries made up of people from their communities. The overwhelming majority of Black, Native American, Chicano, and poor White people sentenced to jail or prison are convicted by predominantly White, middle class people.

As a public service to our readers, below, THE BLACK PANTHER presents Part 1 of a pamphlet published by the Greater Watts Justice Center in Los Angeles on the importance of Black participation in the jury system. As the pamphlet states, "A few days of jury service may save someone from years of prison and keep many families together."

A jury is supposed to represent a cross-section of the population, but for a variety of reasons there are fewer Black faces on juries than there should be.

Many studies describe American society as racist. This means non-Whites are discriminated against in the jobs they can get, the quality of schools they can attend and the kind of neighborhood they can live in.

Racism also means that some Whites have a hard time seeing non-Whites as individuals. Some Whites often tend to see all Blacks as "lazy, shiftless and violent."

Also, because they live mainly among other Whites, they tend to be ignorant of common experiences in a Black community. They tend to believe the word of a White person over the word of a Black person.

Black defendants tend to be found guilty more often by juries that are all White than by juries that have Blacks on them. Often this is because White jurors tend to accept the stories of White victims or White policemen over the word of the Black defendant or witness. This is an example of racism.

Black jurors bring an understanding of the problems and behavior of their community to the jury box. If you or a friend of yours were on trial, wouldn't you want Black jurors on a jury? Wouldn't you want jurors who understand where you came from and jurors who wouldn't be influenced in judging guilt or innocence based solely on the fact you or your friends are Black?

Blacks know that police often stop cars driven by Blacks for no apparent reason. A White juror would be more likely to believe a person to be guilty just because he was stopped by the police

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since this is much less likely to happen to a White person.

Someone from the Black community, however, knows being stopped by the police is an everyday occurrence and may have been stopped a few times himself. He can use this experience to help him make a fair decision as a juror.

Whites often mistake one Black for another. The saying of Whites that, "They all look alike" is no joke to a Black defendant on trial. This is because White jurors often do not question the identification of a Black by a White witness.

A Black juror might have a lot of questions knowing how easily Whites get Blacks mixed up.

Many trials of Blacks involve issues of police misconduct where the officer, to cover up his misconduct, often files charges like "disorderly conduct" and "assaulting a police officer."

The officers are almost always White and White jurors tend to accept their stories without question. Black jurors, often knowing how the police operate with Black persons, would be more suspicious of some of these charges -- especially if the defendant went to the hospital and the policemen went home!

Defense testimony is usually discounted by White jurors when the defense witnesses are Black. An alibi defense -- being someplace else when the crime is committed -- is usually disbelieved by White jurors when the alibi witnesses are Black.

TO BE CONTINUED

-- 7 --

Black Judge Exposes Police Racism In New York City

(New York, N.Y.) - The fairness with which Bruce McM. Wright, a Black judge in the city's criminal court system, has treated Black and poor people charged with crimes has caused a new uproar here with his recent decision to release a Black man without bail who has been accused of slashing the throat of a White, undercover decoy policeman.

Releasing Jerome Singleton without bail, Judge Wright charged that "the police have a license to hunt down Blacks and kill them with impunity."

Judge Wright allowed Singleton, 30, to go free on the grounds that he had no record, had not yet been indicted and had ties to the community.

Singleton, a college student who is married and has two children, surrendered to police after he was indicted. Another judge reinstated the $10,000 bail on the indictment, but a relative posted it and Singleton again went free.

Judge Wright's action was attacked by New York City Mayor Edward Koch, who called Wright's bail decision "bizarre."

The head of the predominantly White Patrolmen's Benevolent Association (PBA) called for the Black judge's removal from the bench, claiming Wright's remark about the police "had outdone Hitler."

It is not the first time Judge Wright, 60, has created a furor by releasing a suspect on his own recognizance. His policy of granting low bail or parole led the PBA several years ago to dub him "Turn 'em loose Bruce."

Wright does not back off from such controversy. In a recent guest sermon at a Black church in Brooklyn, he read the names of three Black youth, aged 10, 15, and 22, killed by White police officers in New York City since 1974.

"When I refer to White cops as killers, I've read indictments," Wright declared. Two of the officers involved were tried and acquitted, and the third was found not guilty by reason of insanity.

Wright also chided the NAACP and the National Urban League as "gentle collaborators" for accepting "White money."

-- 16 --

Hundreds of demonstrators chanting, "Bruce Is All Right; Koch Is Bizarre," marched near the Manhattan Criminal Court building where Judge Wright's courtroom is located.

Judge Wright has consistently maintained that bail should be set only to ensure defendant's appearance in court.

Concerning his charge that White policemen are racist, Wright said, "You should never expect Blacks to act the same way as Whites until they're treated that way, and that's a long way off."

-- 8 --

Z.A.N.U. Operates Survival Programs In Liberated Zimbabwe

Justin Nyoka, a prominent exiled Black Zimbabwean (Rhodesian) journalist, spent over three months at the end of last year touring the eastern part of Zimbabwe, which is controlled by the guerrilla forces of ZANLA, the military arm of the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU). The journalist, who spoke at a recent program held at the Oakland Community Learning Center, was forced to flee Zimbabwe last year after threats on his life by the government. Following are excerpts, reprinted from the Zimbabwe News, of Nyoka's account of his experiences in the liberated areas of Zimbabwe.

The reason (White former "Prime Minister" Ian) Smith and his collaborators. (Black puppet leaders Bishop Abel Muzorewa, Rev. Ndabaningi Sithole, and Chief Jeremy Chirau) have lost the war to ZANLA forces is that they have been outdone by ZANLA in mass political mobilization. The political strategy used by ZANLA forces was to win the hearts and minds of the masses well before the liberation forces used the gun against the enemy.

The most important thing has been to make certain that the masses know and understand what the revolution is all about, thanks to the political commissars in particular and to all the ZANLA forces in general.

In the areas I visited with ZANLA forces, I found that the masses had been politicized to the extent that no matter what the fascist Smith's security forces do, the masses are prepared to resist and persevere right up to the end.

For example, the masses have been prepared to accept the fact that "security" forces will bomb indiscriminately whole villages and that people will die in the process, especially as Smith and his traitor-collaborators in the "internal settlement," Muzorewn, Sithole and Chirau, realize that they are in the final stages of losing the war.

Through mass mobilization, ZANLA forces have been able to eliminate enemy agents. The detection of enemy agents is done by the masses through their militia. The masses do all the security patrols, and the movement of people in ZANLA-controlled areas is always carefully scrutinized so that infiltration by enemy agents is totally eliminated.

If an agent is arrested by the masses, he is tried by the people's courts and the appropriate punishment administered.

No one is allowed to enter or leave a ZANLA area without the necessary permission from the local people's committee or the local commander.

I remember an incident in the Sabi area when a group of the representatives of the masses captured two young men who confessed that they had been sent by Sithole to make contact with ZANLA forces and find out about the location of bases so that they could report them to the Rhodesian "security" forces.

The masses were demanding the death sentence. In the end, some form of compromise was found. One of the young men would be punished by the masses while the other would be allowed to go and report what had happened to his masters and their running dogs.

Movement is also controlled regarding people who visit urban areas for whatever reason: for example, those visiting the sick, or people on specific missions to take messages to ZANLA contacts in the cities. Those carrying any such messages could be old people -- men and women -- or young girls, especially in areas where all the young men have gone to join the fighting forces.

I found it remarkable that many girls are now doing work that used to be done by boys, such as patrolling or as runners or guides. I travelled with such girls for six hours and some times 12 at a stretch. This was done in some of the most trying terrain.

I found a tremendous desire among old and young men and girls in the liberated and semiliberated areas to be trained in arms.

Elaborate health and education facilities are in operation in the liberated and semi-liberated zones.

I was vividly struck by the fact that the masses now completely rely on ZANLA forces for their health, with clinics being held every evening or cases being treated as they arise. There are provincial medical officers who treat more serious injuries.

I also found that in many areas ZANLA forces are using the former infrastructure in education and local administration to set up the people's administrative machinery under the guidance of the Party. For example, I found that headmen can be in charge of logistics on the people's committee.

I discovered that ZANLA forces never ordered the closure of schools. What they objected to was that pupils should pay school fees. Also abolished were the taxes which the Smith administration levied on the masses.

In a number of cases, chiefs and headmen who were collaborators of the Smith administration have had to flee their areas to live in the towns under what they believe is the White man's protection. In some cases, I found many chiefs, headmen and kraal heads who work with ZANLA forces. ZANLA has encouraged these former agents of the enemy to become part of the masses.

In Chiduku, a local headman was having problems with a group of people about a certain piece of land which they wanted to cultivate co-operatively. The land was not in their area but under the jurisdiction of this headman and the local committee. The matter was brought to ZANLA for arbitration. It was referred back to the people who debated it and communicated their verdict to the ZANLA forces.

What impressed me here was the fact that ZANLA does not give the local people the idea that it will solve their ordinary problems for them, but that the Party only gives them the guidance and the people discuss the problems and then solve them in a democratic manner.

Commerce is now in the hands of the masses. Again, former structures have been used as a basis for transferring the means of production and supply to the local people.

As the war escalated, the Smith regime closed down shops at business centers in the war zones in a bid to cut off food supplies to the guerrillas. In some cases, owners of businesses were shot and killed and their shops and grinding mills were shut.

I found ZANLA forces now encouraging people to reopen the shops. Ownership of the shops and other businesses is by cooperatives, although individuals can still run them.

The businessmen understand that they are providing a service to the local community and that they must not charge exorbitant prices. The idea of making huge profits at the expense of the masses is discouraged. If people are found charging high prices, the matter is taken up with the businessmen or with the cooperative. If they fail to comply, ZANLA forces are asked to intervene on the side of the people.

I found that in a number of areas, chickens, goats, sheep and cattle are kept on a cooperative basis. Most of the cattle are those the masses have driven from farms owned by unfriendly Whites.

Mobilization meetings begin on the same pattern throughout the country.

The history of the Party is given, usually by the political commissar, with other ZANLA forces joining in where possible. Those among the masses who have any contribution to make are encouraged to participate.

I participated in many of the discussions and found that ZANLA encouraged leadership among the local people.

In many areas I was pleasantly surprised to find that the local population really knew and understood why they had to put up with so much suffering.

One old man told me: "We have gone along way in this war, our cattle were taken by the White man, but our sons (ZANLA) have restored our wealth and where a village had a total of a hundred and fifty head of cattle, we now have more than five hundred."

There was such political awareness that some parents were sending for their sons working in the cities to come home and meet the comrades. Working in Salisbury, I had noticed that those who met with ZANLA forces always came back converted people.

This type of contact, together with the political mobilization which was being carried out by the people's movement in the urban areas, was responsible for Muzorewa's loss of support. Sithole had never made any impact after he deserted the struggle to join the enemy, Smith.

I found that when holding their own meetings, the masses now begin in the standard ZANLA pattern, with party slogans.

ZANLA forces encourage the local population to listen to radio broadcasts from all over the world. They also listen to their own program, the Voice of Zimbabwe.

The masses of Zimbabwe, I discovered, have had so much political teaching that they now discuss among themselves the maneuvers by Britain and America to impose a leadership of their choice on the people. I found during my trip a strong determination that having fought and defeated Smith, the people of Zimbabwe, under the guidance of their vanguard liberation movement, were prepared to fight and defeat any stage imposed by the Western powers.

I should perhaps go back and begin by

-- 9 --
correcting the widely circulated reports that I was abducted from my farm near Enkeldoorn on the night of August 26, 1978. The truth of the matter is that once I made contact with a group of ZANLA forces on the afternoon of that day, and got irrefutable evidence that forces loyal to three members of the "internal regime." Smith, Muzorewa and Sithole, had elaborate plans to kill me, I decided I should leave.

I had two choices: to remain inside the country and die an ignoble death at the hands of people I regarded as traitors to the cause, demands and sentiments of the Black population, or take the risk of walking to Mozambique, and if caught, get shot and die as a "terrorist" recruit, a "terrorist collaborator," or whatever the Rhodesian "security" forces would choose to call me. I took the latter choice.

After discussing the matter with three ZANLA officers, we decided on a possible plan that would completely exonerate my labor force from any possible danger and reprisals when the Rhodesian authorities started investigating my disappearance.

The three members of the "Executive Council," Smith, Muzorewa and Sithole (Chief Chirau was not included), so detested what I reported in newspapers, magazines and broadcast on radio overseas about the "interim government" that they wanted to have me killed.

My trips to the farm were watched and one plan was that I should be killed while on the farm and ZANLA would be blamed for it. ZANLA produced detailed reports of instances I had been roughed up by Muzorewa and Sithole supporters at their offices and at press conferences. Muzorewa and Sithole thugs, I then discovered, were working in close contact with the Selous Scouts.

There was another plan to kidnap me from my office on a day I would be working late into the evening. I would then be driven to an unknown destination and be killed. The Selous Scouts, ZANLA convinced me, also had a plan to involve me in an accident on a night I would be driving from the farm and then use explosives to burn me to death in my car.

I wanted to see as much as possible of ZANLA operations and if the ZANU Central Committee approved, I wished to be allowed to write a book on the last days of the collapse of the Smith, Muzorewa, Sithole and Chirau alliance.

What I wanted to see most were the liberated areas and what happened in these, and most important, what constituted a liberated area. As it turned out, we left Sabi North TTL (Chief Mtekedza's area) on August 31. The next phase of the journey was the most rewarding.

The real tragedy of the Rhodesian situation is that the majority among the White population, because of a docile press and government-controlled radio and television services, simply have no idea how the war has long been lost to the guerrillas of ZANU. My journey took me to the whole area that stretches from the North right down to Gwanda and Nuanetsi, an area that has been lost to ZANLA forces. They have now created liberated and semi-liberated zones in these areas, and are the sole administrators.

In Rhodesia today, one hears very little about the once-so-much-talked-about "battle of the hearts and minds" the "security" forces hoped to win among the Black population in the "Tribal Trust Lands." The reason is that the battle of the hearts and minds has been won by ZANLA forces, through the very carefully worked out programs of political mobilization.

In the Sabi North Tribal Trust (TTL), I was already enjoying my new life with ZANLA forces, what with breaking all curfew regulations and later defying the martial law. In the bush, these laws are meaningless. ZANLA forces regard themselves as "kings of the night" in the areas where they are fighting for territorial control.

This area (Sabi) is a semi-liberated area. There are occasional air strikes, but there have been no ground "security" forces seen in the area for the past year.

We made our southward thrust, into Buhera, The Smith regime has long said that the civil administration in the area has collapsed.

What has not been said is that ZANLA forces have set up an alternative administration, with schools and clinics being run by People's Committees under the direction of ZANLA. I found that the local community was being organized into cooperatives in producing chickens, goats, sheep, cattle, vegetables, etc.

The cattle are mostly those that have been driven from farms of unfriendly, or as the locals put it, reactionary White farmers. I was assured throughout my travels, by both ZANLA forces and the local people that "progressive" White farmers had nothing to fear. Indeed, I met a couple of White farmers who told me they adopted the philosophy of "live and let live" and that they had nothing to fear. One White farmer said he now enjoyed ZANLA protection in the same way that the Blacks did.

Shops that had been closed down by the Rhodesian "security" forces, because the owners had been helping guerrillas, have been, or are being, reopened by cooperatives or by individuals. The striking difference in the running of the shops is that prices are drastically reduced, with no profiteering at all.

In fact, money has a very small role to play in the transactions. Products are being exchanged.

We proceeded to the Fort Victoria district, passing through Mashagashe Purchase Area, heading for Chibi TTL. It was a large unit, 70-strong.

At each base-camp there would be mass mobilization meetings, with the political commissar doing most of the talking, but with members of the audience being allowed to address the meeting or ask questions. Strict precautions are taken to ensure the safety of the masses, with heavily armed guards being placed at strategic positions and the audiences being advised on how to retreat in the event of the "security" forces attacking.

From Chibi we went to Shabani, and in the Rude TTL, met with a new group led by a senior officer, who had just come from a mission in Mozambique.

Battles were going on all the time. Commanders were bringing in captured vehicles, guns and communication equipment.

I celebrated my first month in the bush on September 26 at a camp in the Belingwe area.

The senior officer from Mozambique remained in Belingwe, and I went with a new smaller group of 17 commandos. It was a marathon trek to Gwanda, where they left me in the care of a large unit of 30. This group had been involved in two ambushes between Gwanda and West Nicholson the previous day.

The situation around the area was very tense. Indications were that "security" forces had suffered many losses. Helicopters and a spotter plane were flying around all over the place.

The "security" forces gave up the search, and with a new unit of 23, headed for Nuanetsi.

There was so much guerrilla traffic that sometimes there would be three to five different units, each on a separate mission, in a base with a total of about 170 forces, some of them very heavily armed. I then understood why ZANLA often boasted that Smith's ground forces were scared stiff of contact in such circumstances.

The Rhodesians have lost the guerrilla war. To win, they would have to shoot every tree in the country.

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Intercommunal News: Provisional Government Holds Elections In Uganda

(Kampala, Uganda) - Eight days after the overthrow of President Idi Amin, Ugandans voted in local elections held in late April for the first time in more than eight years.

Thousands of Ugandans turned out to elect regional officials to the provisional national government.

Following Amin's overthrow, the new government of President Yusufu K. Lule pledged to hold presidential elections in two years.

Meanwhile, former Vice President Mustafa Adrisi has been captured and will be put on trial for crimes committed during Amin's eight-year rule. Adrisi is the highest ranking member of the deposed regime to be captured by the new government.

Kenya recently said it would return any fugitives from Uganda who have fled to the neighboring east African country. Kenya is reportedly holding Robert Astles, a British-born Amin henchman who has been accused of involvement in numerous murders.

According to a recent Associated Press report, Amin has fled to Iraq. Reuters, however, has reported that Amin left Iraq after spending two days there and his whereabouts are not known.

In late April, Ugandan troops supported by Tanzanian forces continued an offensive moving toward Amin's homeland in the northwest part of Uganda in a drive to wipe out the last pockets

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of resistance among troops still loyal to the ousted dictator.

In an earlier battle near Jinja, Uganda's second largest city, government troops successfully reopened a strategic highway to the Kenyan border. The road is Uganda's prime route for importing fuel and essential commodities.

In a related develoment, Oregon Magazine went on sale recently with the first half of an article about Uganda written by a former CIA agent containing 16 words which the spy agency unsuccessfully sought to have censored.

Editor Tom Bates refused to identify the 16 words the CIA wanted removed from the article by Jay Mullen.

The first installment deals with Mullen's employment and training as a CIA agent, assignment to Uganda in 1971, and some of his activities there.

DAMAGING

The most damaging information remaining in the article -- parts of which are censored by the CIA -- would appear to be the last 16 words of this sentence: "The CIA provided the government of Uganda with training advisory assistance in exchange for the opportunity to tap the telephones of the country's resident Russians and Chinese…."

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Muzorewa To Lead Black Puppet Regime In Zimbabwe

(Salisbury, Zimbabwe) - Black turncoat leader Bishop Abel Muzorewa will head a Black puppet government in Zimbabwe (Rhodesia) as a result of a bogus "election" staged in late April aimed at undermining the continuing success of the armed liberation struggle.

Black puppet leader Rev. Ndabaningi Sithole, bitter at his defeat as one of three Black candidates for premier, exposed the elections as having been "stage-managed" and riddled with "gross irregularities."

Evidence of the election fraud was revealed when ballots cast in two of the eight provinces exceeded the government's estimate of the number of eligible adults by a total of 17,3000 votes.

The provinces, Mashonaland Central and Mashonaland West, reported exaggerated turnouts of 108.1 per cent and 100.8 per cent respectively, of the official estimated voting populations, while a third province, Mashonaland East, reported a bogus figure of 94.4 per cent.

The first of the international "observers" to report on the elections charged that the voting had been neither fair nor free because of the massive coercion of Blacks to go to the polls despite their unwillingness to participate in the sham election.

This condemnation of the elections was made by Lord Chitnis, a former official of Britain's Liberal Party and director of the Rowntree Trust, which some years ago donated $120,000 to Muzorewa.

Chitnis charged that the private armies of Muzorewa and Sithole and employers forced Blacks to vote, and in the "protected villages" no one had been allowed out until they had filled out a ballot form.

A conservative movement in the Senate now wants the U.S. to lift sanctions against Zimbabwe as a result of the April election.

Saying that the voting in Zimbabwe had constituted "the most free and open election in the history of the continent of Africa," right-wing North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms recently introduced a bill that would require President Carter to end sanctions against Zimbabwe.

Pennsylvania Senator Richard Schweiker earlier introduced a resolution calling on Carter to lift the sanctions within 10 days of the Black puppet government's installation on June 1. Co-sponsored by Arizona Senator Dennis DeConcini, the resolution would not be binding on the President.

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Congressman Stephen Solarz of New York, however, said that it was "impossible to conclude" that the election had offered a genuine opportunity for Blacks in Zimbabwe to "freely and fairly" determine their political future.

"Hundreds of thousands of Blacks were…intimidated" by Zimbabwean authorities, Solarz said. If the U.S. lifted sanctions now, the congressman added, it would enter a "de facto alliance with the White government of South Africa, alienate all the Black leaders of nearby countries and end any chance for a negotiated settlement in either Rhodesia or South West Africa (Namibia)."

DEVELOPMENT

In a related development, the London Observer, in a recent expose on South Africa's growing influence-buying scandal, revealed that some of the White minority regime's "most extravagant secret political investments" were made in Zimbabwe.

The Observer said that South Africa contributed more than a million dollars to Muzorewa's election campaign.

In a recent television interview, Muzorewa said he would like to see a "southern African economic community" based on closer links between South Africa and Zimbabwe.

Meanwhile, warplanes of the White Rhodesian military force bombarded refugee camps in a two-day invasion of neighboring Mozambique at the start of the five-day election.

The White minority regime had launched five similar invasions into Zambia within a week, bringing to 16 the reported number of raids in the neighboring frontline states -- Mozambique, Zambia, Angola, Tanzania and Botswana -- which support the armed liberation struggles in southern Africa.

The two guerrilla groups which make up the Patriotic Front alliance which is leading the armed struggle in Zimbabwe, the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) and the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU). operate refugee camps and military bases in Mozambique and Zambia respectively.

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Radical Leaders Suspended From Chinese Government

(Hong Kong) - Six radical members of the People's Republic of China's ruling Politburo have been suspended because of ideological differences with Vice Premier Deng Xiaoping, according to informed sources here.

According to a Los Angeles Times report in late April, the sixth-ranked Chinese Communist Party (CCP) official and former head of internal security, Wang Dongxing, is among the leaders who have been stripped of all responsibilities and barred from participating in the deliberations of the 30-member Politburo.

Wang, who rose to prominence as the bodyguard to the late Chairman Mao Zedong, reportedly clashed with Deng over the current right-wing leadership's concerted campaign to dismantle socialist programs implemented by Mao and downplay the importance of the teachings of the great revolutionary leader.

To preserve the semblance of stability and unity, all of the suspended officials have been permitted to retain their Politburo memberships, though they no longer exert any real authority, sources said.

Besides Wang, the Politburo members reported to have been purged are former Beijing mayor Wu De, Vice Premier Ji Dengkui, model peasant Chen Yonggui, labor leader Ni Zhifu, and Chen Xilain, commander of the Beijing Military Region.

All leaders of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution inspired by Mao, these six officials have reportedly had longstanding ideological differences with Deng and other intrenched bureaucrats who were purged during the height of the tumultuous Cultural Revolution in the late 1960's.

Deng, who was twice purged as the "Number 2 Party person taking the capitalist road," and other veteran leaders have been restored to power only since Mao's death in 1976.

One source here who travels to Beijing regularly and is reportedly close to the leadership there, including Deng and the elderly head of state, Ye Jianying, said that nearly every effort to revise Mao's economic, diplomatic and educational policies has encountered strong opposition from the suspended radicals.

"The attitude of people like

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Dongzing is always, 'whatever Mao said is good enough for us, so why change?"' the source, a Hong Kong businessman, said.

The official Chinese press has recently belittled this staunch support for Mao's progressive teachings, calling it "whateverism."

Deng, in opposition to Mao's policies, has been spearheading a so-called modernization campaign that has relied heavily on massive amounts of foreign assistance and technology from the United States and other Western powers.

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Third World Challenges Western Sea Monopoly

(New York, N.Y.) - A determined effort will be made by Third World countries to end the monopoly control by industrialized countries of the world's ocean shipping at the upcoming United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in Manila, Philippines.

Developing countries will challenge the Western monopoly in three ways at the fifth UNCTAD conference, which opens on May 7.

First, they will press to have the "40-40-20" cargo sharing arrangement, which UNCTAD has almost succeeded in getting adopted for diversified liner ships, extended to the tanker and other bulk cargo carriers.

It would require 40 per cent of cargo to be carried in ships under the exporting country's flag, 40 per cent under that of the importing country and 20 per cent by others -- "cross carriers."

Second, they will press the developed countries to provide the financing to enable poor countries to buy or build large merchant fleets.

Under the 40-40-20 proposal for sharing cargo, the developing countries, which export the vast majority of the world's bulk raw commodities, would stand to gain by obtaining fleets to carry their own goods to market.

Third, they will step up the struggle against open registry, which permits rich American companies to operate ships under Panamanian, Liberian or other "flags of convenience' at much lower costs than they could operate under their own flags.

The U.S. is strongly opposed to the first and third of these plans and is spearheading Western opposition.

The proposal to phase out open registry and flags of convenience might be postponed at the Manila meeting, according to Philip J. Loree, chairperson of the Federation of American Controlled Shipping (FACS), whose group represents most of the Panamanian and Liberian flag bulk carrier fleets.

Loree told a conference at Bath, England, that the "Group of 77," the 117 poorest countries of the world, voted at a meeting in February to send the issue back to UNCTAD's secretariat at Geneva, Switzerland, for further study.

The Liberian Shipowners Council (LSC) in New York, however, was worried that an attempt might be made at Manila to at least start a phaseout of flags of convenience. It noted that R.A. Ramsey, head of the shipping section of UNCTAD, had declared that flag of convenience operations are "the most outrageous example of the industrialized nations' attempt to dominate world shipping."

Representatives of major oil companies also attended the Bath meeting and voiced strong opposition to the developing countries' proposals.

American-owned ships are about one-third of all the open registry ships in the world, and more than 50 million tons of U.S.-owned ships sail international seas under flags of convenience.

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Africa In Focus

Libya Occupies Chad

(Paris, France) - Libyan troops recently seized territory up to 300 miles inside Chad. Libya had occupied a 50-mile-wide strop of Chad territory for the past six years. Libya said in July, 1977, that it had annexed the Aozou Strip" -- the 27,000-square-mile occupied territory -- which is rich in uranium and iron ore and is the principal source of known natural resources in the land-locked, former French colony.

Guerrillas Battle
Ethiopian Troops

(Nairobi, Kenya) - Ethnic Somali secessionist guerrilla groups fighting against Ethiopian rule said in late April that they had killed some 1,000 Ethiopian soldiers in two recent battles. The Tigre People's Liberation Force (TPLF), fighting for self-rule in the north-eastern Tigre region of Ethiopia, claimed to have killed over 800 Ethiopian troops. The Western Somali Liberation Front (WSLF) said it killed some 200 Ethiopians near the town of Jijiga in the disputed southeastern Ogaden desert region of Ethiopia.

S. African
Scandal Grows

(Durham, North Carolina) - The Christian League of Southern Africa (CLSA), a right-wing group that has publicly opposed the World Council of Churches' support for African liberation movements, has recently been implicated in the growing South African influence buying scandal. According to the Guardian in England, the League received over $300,000 in government funds beginning in 1975. The group had launched a worldwide organization called the International Network of Confessing Christians, and a delegation toured the U.S. last year.

Black Miners
Strike In Namibia

(Beijing, China) - The world's largest diamond mine has been shut down by 5,200 striking Black miners in Namibia, the Chinese daily Xinhua reported in late April. Safety hazards at the mine in Oranjemund were reportedly the cause of the strike.

Mauritania
Leaves Sahara

(Beirut, Lebanon) - In a major victory for the armed liberation struggle being waged by the Polisario Front, Mauritania agreed in mid-April to end its occupation of Western Sahara. Polisario and Mauritanian officials will meet in Libya on May 26 to sign a peace treaty.

Meanwhile, the Front said it killed hundreds of Moroccan troops in April. Morocco joined with Mauritania to annex the former Spanish colony in 1975.

Eritrean Refugees
Mount

(Durham, North Carolina) - According to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, over 8,600 new refugees from the Ethiopian province of Eritrea have crossed into Sudan in the past month. The refugees are said to be fleeing a late March offensive by Ethiopian troops battling Eritrean guerrillas in the western part of the province.

Liberian School
Closed

(Monrovia, Liberia) - Liberian President William R. Tolbert ordered the University of Liberia closed in late April following an uprising in this capital city over high food prices which left 29 protesters dead and over 400 injured. Students at the university went on strike after the rebellion and have called for Tolbert's resignation.

Secret Base
In Zaire

(Bonn, West Germany) - Charges that a secret rocket base has been set up in the heart of Africa recently prompted the government of Zaire to renounce parts of its agreement with a West German company. Zaire said the firm, Otrag, an acronym for Orbital Transport and Raketen-aktiengesell-schaft, was directed to halt its experimental and rocket-launching activities. The company has exercised sovereign control over 39,000 miles of Zairean territory.

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World Scope

Amnesty Plan
In Iran

(Tehran, Iran) - The government of Prime Minister Mehdi Bazargan proposed a limited amnesty for the remaining officials of Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi's deposed regime in late April. Iran's revolutionary leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who must approve the proposal, has thus far resisted persistent attempts by Bazargan to end the trials which have led to the executions of more than 170 men, including former Prime Minister Amir Abbas Hoveyda, since the February Revolution.

Civilians Killed
In Nicaragua

(Managua, Nicaragua) - National Guardsmen killed five youth in a house-to-house search of this capital city in late April for guerrillas of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). In Leon, 55 miles west of Managua, a one-day general strike was carried out to protest the deaths of two doctors and a nurse who were dragged from an operating room in the northern city of Esteli, shot and burned to death by Guardsmen. An estimated 1,500 people died in a week-long battle between the FSLN and government troops in Esteli in mid-April.

Saudi Arabia
Breaks With Egypt

(Washington, D.C.) - Saudi Arabia recently carried out its threat to break diplomatic relations with Egypt to protest President Anwar Sadat's peace treaty with Israel. The Saudis, however, made no immediate move to cut off their estimated $1.5 billion in annual foreign aid to Egypt. The Saudi action left Sadat politically isolated in the Arab world. It came soon after Kuwait broke its economic and diplomatic links with Egypt to comply with resolutions condemning Egypt that were adopted at a meeting of Arab foreign and economic ministers in March. The only Arab countries that have supported the treaty have been Sudan and Oman.

Israel Expands
Settlements

(Tel Aviv, Israel) - The Israeli cabinet recently approved the construction of two new illegal Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank of the Jordan River, an area designated for token Palestinian autonomy under the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty. Jewish settlements in occupied Palestine have been condemned by the United Nations.

Israel Invades
Lebanon

(Beirut, Lebanon) - Israeli forces attacking Palestinian refugee camps ended a four-day invasion of Lebanon in late April. The air, land and sea attack was the biggest since the Israeli invasion and occupation of southern Lebanon in March last year. Israeli ships shelled the coastline around Tyre and land-based artillery fired at inland villages around Nabatiyeh, while fighter planes bombed Palestinian camps north of the Litani River.

Leftists Attacked
In Britain

(London, England) - A force of 7,000 police attacked 500 leftist demonstrators protesting an election campaign meeting of the White racist National Front here in April. Scotland Yard reported 16 supporters of the Anti-Nazi League were arrested outside Newham town hall in London's East End, where 600 Front supporters had gathered. The Front, which advocates the deportation of all non-Whites, is running 301 candidates in the May 3 national elections for the 635-seat House of Commons. Labor Prime Minister James Callaghan dissolved Parliament and called the elections after losing a confidence vote in March. In an earlier incident, police guarding a Front rally in London's predominantly Asian Southall District attacked thousands of leftists and Asian protesters. One protester was killed and more than 70 persons, including 21 police officers, were hospitalized. About 340 demonstrators, mostly Asians, were arrested.

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“China Syndrome”: PA. “Accident” and Silkwood Case Come To Life

The following review of the current hit film China Syndrome, starring Jack Lemmon, Jane Fonda and Micheel Douglas, is reprinted from the Daily World. The recent nuclear crisis at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania and the Karen Silkwood case now being tried in federal court in Oklahoma make China Syndrome not just an adventure film, but a true-to-life story, a frightening story of how the American nuclear industry will stop at nothing to protect its profits - even if it means endangering the lives of innocent men, women and children with radioactive fallout.

THE BLACK PANTHER urges our readers to see China Syndrome, which was made before the Pennsylvania "accident." The events depicted in the movie could happen to any of us.

(Editor's note: Columbia Pictures, producers of the film, have advised Lemmon, Fonda and Douglas not to make any further public statements about China Syndrome.)

A television news crew is doing a documentary on a nuclear power plant in southern California when an "accident" occurs. Acting against instructions from the reporter (Jane Fonda), the cameraman (Michael Douglas) captures on film the efforts of the control room crew to correct the malfunction.

The film is shown to nuclear experts who affirm that the "China Syndrome" was barely averted. It is explained that should the coolant system of a nuclear reactor fail, the reactant core would heat to an incredible temperature, burning its way through the floor of the plant and right through the earth's core to China; hence, the title of the movie.

Syndrome takes some well-aimed swings at big business. First, there is the energy utility, which not only seeks to minimize the significance of the malfunction, but is ready to murder to suppress the truth. The company is portrayed as callous, only interested in profits and so concerned with its public image that it orders the Los Angeles SWAT squad to kill an employee (Jack Lemmon) who is about to pull the covers off the cover-up.

Then, there is the television network, which underplays the "accident" and is a willing partner in the cover-up. How often have we seen instances of the media joining hands with government and the monopolies to deceive the people.

A major factor in precipitating the "accident" is the way in which safety measures in the construction and maintenance of the facility were disregarded. The government -- through the Nuclear Regulatory Commission -- is willing to collude with the company in whitewashing the whole thing.

Lemmon, however, as a conscientious worker concerned about the possibility of the "China Syndrome," conducts his own investigation and discovers that the inspector who gave the facility a clean bill of health had not been so conscientious about his job. When Lemmon attempts to bring this to the attention of his superiors, he is told that it is standard operating procedure to falsify inspection data.

Frustration at every turn, Lemmon seizes the facility in the effort to get national attention for his revelations. This is when SWAT comes in, but even their M-16s can't keep the truth from coming out.

There is an obvious allusion to the Karen Silkwood case in the film. Silkwood was killed in a car crash about four years ago as she was on her way to meet a journalist to expose unsafe conditions at the Kerr-McGee plutonium facility in Cimarron, Oklahoma.

Many have charged that Silkwood was murdered.

In Syndrome, a young man who is carrying photographs documenting the criminally-shoddy safety inspection of the plant is run off the road, and when he is found by the highway patrol, the photos are missing.

Syndrome goes a long way toward dispelling the idea that opponents of nuclear energy are a lunatic fringe of alienated leftovers from the antiwar movement. Their concerns are real; newspapers are daily reporting the closing of nuclear facilities because they are unsafe.