Given by Larisa Scherba, delegate from the International Council and Northstar Compass

On behalf of the International Council for Friendship and Solidarity with Soviet People and its journal Northstar Compass I would like to offer our greetings and solidarity to the International Committee Against Disappearances and, particularly, to the YAKAY-DER organization – Aiding and Solidarity Association with the Families who lost their relatives.

As imperialism and neo-liberalism tightens its grip on the entire world, as corporate dependence on super-profits grows, so does the war on the people of the world. The war on working peoples in all nations grows. The war on the organizations of the working people grows. And, ultimately, it becomes a war against the very existence of humanity, its economic, cultural and ecological basis. All for the sake of profit. Neo-liberal profit becomes the negation of human progress.

This is the final stage of the age-long struggle of the exploiting few against the exploited many. And though the conflict is old, the methods used by neo-liberalism are relatively new. Liberalism bears in it the very name of freedom. Yet, this freedom is marked by selfishness, greed, with the use of any and all psychological means, both subtle and blatant, to convince us of their benefit. And, in an ultimate mockery of humanity, neo-liberalism cynically cloaks itself with the mantle of human rights. Consequently, when the concept of human rights is degraded, ultimately it is actual humans that are degraded. And thus we come to the topic of this conference: the surreptitious detainment and murder of political and social activists for the maintenance of the economic, political and social status quo.

The International Council for Friendship and Solidarity with Soviet People exists to spread information about and develop support for parties and organizations seeking to restore the socialist union of the fraternal peoples, which history united in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. And as an internationalist organization, which coordinates its efforts with many movements and individuals throughout the world, it also participates in the anti-imperialist struggle worldwide. Among its many duties, the International Council disseminates information on political prisoners held, in many cases without trial, in the nations of the former Soviet Union.

Political disappearances per se are not as common in nations such as Russia, Ukraine, Moldova and other former Soviet republics as they are in some other countries. Yet, acts of political detention and repression are quite common. And as in most nations with advanced juridical systems, these detentions are shrouded in legality. Often these prisoners "disappear" within the legal system, as they are held endlessly with the judicial process deliberately stalled. And, as usual, the state uses torture and physical abuse, in some cases resulting in death. With exceptional brutality bourgeois governments of Russia and Ukraine persecute young fighters for liberation of their nations from the capitalist yoke imposed on them in the last 15+ years. The passionate hearts of the members of the Young Communist League (Komsomol), the Vanguard of Communist Youth (AKM) and members of communist parties refuse to put up with the injustice of capitalist existence, with the destruction of their native country, with abject poverty and lawlessness, which fell upon working people. To silence these youth governments and the police of both Russia and Ukraine have been turning to drastic measures. They disregard their own laws in may instances during imprisonment, as in the cases of Larissa Romanova, Nadezhda Raks and Andrey Yakovenko; they put young communists into psychiatric hospitals to cure them from revolutionary ideas, as in the cases of Alexander Birukov, Ilia Romanov, Vyacheslav Lunev and Igor Fedorovich; they torture young revolutionaries with the professionalism of Medieval executioners and with the delight of Nazi invaders, as in the case of Igor Danilov; the servants of the newly founded "democracy" bestially beet and rape the underage, as in the case of the 17 year old Young Communist League member Nina Polskaya; some of these tortures cause death, as in the case of the Young Communist League member Sergei Berdugin who was only 20 years old when he died from liver rupture after being tormented by the butchers of the so called "free" and "democratic" post-Soviet regimes.

The use by the state of means such as kidnapping, abductions, tortures and other extra-legal means of coercion and control are amongst the most hideous means of the neo-liberal and neo-colonial state to maintain its power. The struggle against state use of disappearances is an essential part of the struggle for national and social liberation. The International Council for Friendship and Solidarity with Soviet People wishes success to the conference and offers its solidarity in this struggle.

For there to be a future, it must be red!