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Greeting from KCTU
I should like to greet heartily as comrade to all the fighting labor brothers and sisters gathering to the November 9th National Workers Rally. I am Go Jong-Hwan, President of Seoul Area Local KCTU from South Korea. Tojen (struggle)!
I introduce to you comrade Kim Chang Seob, Vice President of Seoul Area Local and comrade Mun Mun-Ju, Director of Organization of Seoul Area Local.
First of all we thank comrade TANAKA Yasuhiro, President of DORO-CHIBA and comrade union members who invited us. Besides we thank you all present here on behalf of Korean workers.
I am very happy here to make solidarity with workers comrade. Frankly speaking, I do not feel at ease for the situation of the workers in Korea is so severe, with which I confront.
The Korean government and capitals are enforcing repression on the lawful exercise of the fundamental rights of labor, such as right of association and right of collective bargaining, which is guaranteed by the Constitution and the ILO, through civil and criminal measures such as seizure of property/wage for damages, detention etc. They do not keep their promise of abolishing discrimination against irregular workers. On the contrary they are intending to revise law to expand irregular employment.
Labor policy of the Korean government is formulated in the recently published “Roadmap for Industrial Relations Reform”. Its essence lies in binding workers by hands and feet and strengthening counteraction right of employers. Five workers are driven into suicide this year by the enforcement of the governmental policy for our regret. Moreover, a worker is still in danger of life. The tragic deaths of these comrades are cruel products of the neo-liberal policy of expelling workers and ‘murder’ by the Roh Moo-Hyun administration that has been organizing repression on labor movement.
The Roh Moo-Hyun administration has decided to dispatch troops to Iraq under the pressure of the US, neglecting the public opinion of Korean people whose majority is opposed to it. In a word, the Roh Moo-Hyun administration is not satisfied with overall killing of workers at home through failure of its domestic policy and dares to commit to a shameless act of demanding Korean people to massacre Iraqi people in accord with the unrighteous US war of aggression on Iraq.
To cope with this serious situation, the KCTU has decided to wage an all-out general strike with the following demands: to stop seizure of property/wage for damages and repression on labor movement; to abolish discrimination against irregular workers; to arrest employers who committed unfair labor practice; to stop dispatch of troops to Iraq. On November 6, we waged the first general strike with participation of 120 thousand workers and today we are holding 100 thousand Workers Rally. We are determined to continue our struggle through the second general strike on November 12 against neo-liberalist repression of the government in collusion with transnational capitals on labor movement.
Comrades!
There are militant class-oriented activists of Japanese labor movement together here. We sincerely congratulate you all again. We regard the fact itself as very significant that we can be here with you, with all our comrades. “Workers of the whole world, unite!” this internationalism of workers has not been realized for certain period and in one country framework of labor movement. This ideal has been sleeping in the book and has sounded clumsy. But now in the era of globalization of neoliberalism, it must not remain the mere comfortable slogan but must be materialized through our struggle. Without realizing this ideal, we can’t even maintain the historical achievements that our predecessors of labor movement have acquired by their fights with many sacrifices.
Now under the global system of capitalism, Workers internationalism must be the indispensable integral part of workers struggle. It being realized, we can make our struggle one step forward and can protect our right of existence and our fundamental labor rights too.
In this meaning, it is important for us, the Korean, Japanese and American labor movement to fight against the war crisis jointly, which has been brought about meanwhile by the “Nuclear Problem” of North Korea. Military forces of US have now strongholds crossing over the regional boundaries and move from there. So, if we want to cope with this move, we must build up the coordinated movement that covers Japan, Korea and the rest of the East Asia.
We must above all prevent the impending brutal warfare, prepared by both Japanese Militarism, symbolized by the latest Emergency Legislation, and by US-Imperialism. At the same time, it is also necessary that the movement against US-imperialism must be fought inside the US itself, i.e. by the class-oriented labor movement and anti-war movement.
So, it is an urgent task for all of us to make an international solidarity between Korean, American, and Japanese labor movement. We must make further efforts to prevent globalization of neoliberalism. For that purpose, we, the Korean labor movement, make its best for our part. We wish with all our heart that today and this place should be a milestone of the international class solidarity of Korean, American and Japanese labor movement.
Finally, we want to pay our warm respects to all the participating comrades. Thank you very much. |
11.9全国労働者総決起集会に参加した戦闘的な日本の労働兄弟・姉妹たちに、同志的な気持ちを込めて連帯のあいさつを送ります｡私は韓国から来た全国民主労働組合総連盟ソウル地域本部の本部長、コジョンファンです｡トゥジェン（闘争）！
