November 1 - 15, 2006

Condemn US imperialism’s double standards and hostile policy towards North Korea!

North Korea, officially known as the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK) announced on October 9, 2006 that it had successfully conducted a controlled nuclear explosion. This has been immediately followed by a world wide campaign led by US imperialism to impose stringent sanctions on that country.

Under US pressure, the UN Security Council has passed a most unjust and hypocritical resolution, demanding that the DPRK gives up its nuclear and ballistic missile programs “completely, verifiably and irreversibly”. It has imposed very harsh sanctions against the DPRK which include freezing its economic and financial assets and transactions abroad, obstructing its economic, trade, scientific, technical and other foreign relations, as well as a travel ban. It also sanctions the stopping of and inspection of all vessels carrying cargo to and from DPRK under the pretext of preventing the movement of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. These amount to a flagrant and totally unjustifiable assault on North Korea's sovereignty, and has been denounced by the DPRK as an act of war. They are designed to punish the people of North Korea by putting hurdles in the way of their normal intercourse with other countries and peoples.

US imperialism’s bellicose posture against DPR Korea constitutes a grave threat to mankind and increase the possibilities of war in the region. The reaction of the US to the nuclear test by DPR Korea clearly shows its complete hypocrisy and cynicism. American imperialism has stockpiled enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world several times over. It dropped nuclear bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki towards the end of the Second World War. The US is not even a member of the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT), but it arrogates to itself the right to deny other countries possession of nuclear weapons and to insist that they abide by the NPT. Its attitude towards other countries' nuclear programs is dependent on how those countries figure in the US imperialists' overall geopolitical strategy. Thus, the US has all along supported the nuclear weapons program of Israel, a state which has no qualms about launching aggressive wars, and has reconciled itself to the nuclear weapons programs of India and Pakistan, while it raves and rants about North Korea, or even Iran which does not even have a nuclear weapons program. Thus the US policy of selective opposition to nuclear tests carries no moral weight whatsoever. It is just one more stick with which it tries to beat down those countries and states that do not fall in line with its strategy.

US imperialism is responsible for the partition of the Korean peninsula at the end of the Second World War, for occupying and using Japan and South Korea as a military base to target the peoples of Korea, Russia, China and Japan. It is responsible for the militarization of the Korean peninsula, and is recognized by the people of the Korean peninsula as the main roadblock to reunification.

The DPRK nuclear test follows on the failure of the six-party talks being conducted between itself and the US along with China, Russia, Japan and South Korea. The responsibility for the failure of the talks lies at the door of the US. It indulged in provocative acts even while the talks were going on, and let loose a barrage of vicious propaganda against North Korea. The US occupation forces in South Korea have established a massive nuclear arsenal over the years, and to prevent reunification, have encouraged South Korea's military to develop the cruise missile earlier this year. Drawing warranted conclusions from the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, both of which countries possessed no weapons to deter a US attack, the DPRK first withdrew from the NPT which it had earlier voluntarily joined, gave notice of its intention to test a nuclear weapon, and then conducted the test based entirely on its own capabilities.

The stand of the Manmohan Singh government deserves to be roundly denounced. What right does the Indian state, which has conducted its own nuclear tests, have to join in the condemnation of the nuclear weapons test of another sovereign country, which has never harmed India or any other country? Now that India has joined the “nuclear club”, it does not want anyone else to achieve this “privileged” status! This stand too is completely lacking in any principle or any logic other than that of going along with its new-found “ally”, the US. The Indian working class does not in any way support this stand of the UPA government.

The Indian working class and people voice their condemnation of the recent UN Security Council resolution against North Korea, and demand its rescinding in full. The Indian government must not in any way go along with the punitive and vengeful measures taken in the name of the Security Council resolution. In addition, the pressure on and siege of North Korea by the US imperialists and other big powers, that has been going on for decades, must be lifted, and North Korea allowed to have normal intercourse with other countries and peoples like all other countries. The Indian working class and people must also reiterate support for the principle of complete, universal and simultaneous nuclear disarmament, by all countries without exception, as an essential precondition for global peace and security.