photo essay: "Don't attack Iran"

On October 6, 800 people marched through the streets of Toronto to oppose the looming war on Iran, organized by the Toronto Coalition to Stop the War and the Iranian-Canadian Community Council. There were a half dozen events across Canada, organized by the Canadian Peace Alliance and local peace groups, as part of an international day of action. Coinciding with the 11th anniversary of the the war on Afghanistan, a member of Afghans for Peace reminded the crowd in Toronto that the brutality of the Taliban was cynically used as a pretext for NATO's war for oil. Sold as a war for women's liberation, the war has only brought more misery to the people of Afghanistan. Now there's a new movement--combining previous anti-war movements with a new generation--growing against the next war.

As people chanted on the march, "They lied about Afghanistan, they lied about Iraq. They're lying again about Iran, so we say don't attack." In 2003 Stephen Harper supported the war on Iraq based on claims of weapons of mass destruction. But the only WMDs were US sanctions and war, which each killed a million people. The Iraq War was supposed to be a stepping stone to Iran, but the Iraqi resistance and the global anti-war movement stopped the US from advancing. So the US has resorted to proxy wars that Harper has also supported: Israel's attacks on Lebanon in 2006 and Gaza in 2009. The economic crisis has increased inter-imperial rivalry and the Arab Spring has shaken US control of the region, so it might gamble on another proxy war through Israel to reassert its dominance. Threats against Iran are based on a series of myths--like unfounded claims Iran is building a nuclear weapon, and that sanctions and war are necessary to promote peace. But sanctions have bolstered the Iranian regime's domestic control while increasing the suffering of ordinary Iranians--including Iranian-Canadians. Similarly a war would allow the Iranian regime to present itself as the protector of the nation, while undermining resistance movements and killing countless. As the Arab Spring shows, real regime change can only be accomplished by people in the region themselves. The best way people in the West can support them is by stopping our own governments from bombing them, which requires a broad and inclusive anti-war movement.  

Harper's war drive against Iran--supporting sanctions, declaring Iran and "Islamicism" the greatest threats, severing diplomatic relations, and pinkwashing the war--is part of a broader agenda of militarism including spending $490 billion on war instead of jobs, social programs and the environment. The war abroad is part of a war at home--including cutting healthcare for refugees, a campaign against US Iraq War resisters, and attacking a woman's right to chose. Queers for Social Justice mobilized for the Toronto demonstration to expose the pinkwashing and join with others in chanting "Drop Harper, not bombs."

At the start of 2003 Parliament consisted of a majority Liberal government supporting war, the Opposition Tories who supported war, and a small NDP that opposed the war. But people across the country built a mass anti-war movement in the streets, campuses, workplaces and neighbourhoods. Uniting under the simple slogan "Don't attack Iraq," the movement identified US war as the greatest threat, stopping the war as the greatest way to support the Iraqi people against their own regime, and a broad and inclusive movement as the method to do so. The NDP provided a megaphone for the movement, with Jack Layton speaking out against war and calling on people to join the demonstrations. Together, we stopped Canada from officially participating in the Iraq War, and if we remember the lessons of the Iraq anti-war movement we can stop Harper from joining the looming Iran War. For anti-war resources--including fact sheets, petitions, sample letters and resolutions, window signs and stickers, go here.

5 lessons from the Quebec student strike

The historic Quebec student strike has generated a number of lessons we can all take forward in the fight against austerity.

1. We can beat austerity

Premier Charest tried to raise tuition 75% to further the neoliberal assault on education and provoke students—hoping to use the resulting polarization right-wing populism to win another election. Students were subject to media attacks, ridicule from the Premier, police violence, and the draconian Bill 78—revealing the extent to which the 1% will go to impose austerity.

Yet the student movement remained united, mobilized wider support and built a historic movement that played a key role in running Charest out of office, out of his own seat, and securing the promise of the incoming PQ to abolish the tuition hike and revoke Bill 78 (law 12). In the process hundreds of thousands of students were educated in a semester of resistance that will shape struggles to come and have inspired people across Canada and around the world. Who’s laughing now, Mr. Charest?

2. Resistance is a process not an event

Though the Quebec Spring appeared to come out of nowhere for people outside Quebec, it has been a long time coming. Quebec’s history of resistance to national oppression has contributed to making it the site of the largest social movements of the last decade—from the anti-globalization protests of 2001, the anti-war protests of 2003 (which stopped Canada from officially participation), the mass May Day protest of 2004, and the mass student strike of 2005. The last strike, the latest in a history of student strikes in Quebec, trained a generation of student activists and defeated the government’s $103 million cuts to education.

This collective experience in Quebec became intertwined with the 2011 year of revolt triggered by the Arab spring to produce the “printemps érable.” The 2012 strike drew on local and global to build a mass strike from the ground up, department by department and campus by campus—an experience that can’t be spontaneously summoned but must be patiently built if we want to spread the Quebec spring.

3. Politics matter

It was not simply the scale of the attacks—from the 75% tuition hike to Bill 78’s attack on civil liberties—that spontaneously produced mass resistance, or the existence of general assemblies in the abstract. The politics that dominated the assemblies built the movement in a way that was both broad and radical. 

First, the movement was built in an inclusive way so as to mobilize the greatest amount of opposition. While many at the heart of the movement believe in free education, the strike was initiated on the simple demand of “stop the hike”, to mobilize the greatest unity on this primary demand—and the resulting mass participation allowed for people to radicalize. When Charest imposed Bill 78, the movement responded by appealing to all those affected to rally in defense of civil liberties. By doing so the student strike turned the tables on Charest and broadened the resistance—encouraging casserole demonstration by many who had previously not taken part in the protests.

At the same time, a simple basis of unity against tuition hike and Bill 78 were framed in a context against austerity that built alliances with other groups—from the April 22 earth day demonstration that linked the student movement with the environmental movement against Plan Nord, to the solidarity with the locked out workers in Alma. As a result the student movement became a broader social movement.

4. Left parties can amplify movements

The history of social movements in Quebec has given rise to the left alternative Québec solidaire, a “party of the ballot box and the streets”, whose one MNA Amir Khadir was able to be a megaphone for the movement—encouraging resistance Bill 78, and getting arrested while joining the protests. 

            The election was dominated by two opposite but reinforcing currents that squeezed QS: a "radical" abstentionism that counterposes the streets and the ballot box and dismisses the importance of QS—surrendering the electoral terrain to the right—and an “anyone but Charest” argument that bolsters the PQ. But the disillusionment with the PQ and Liberals meant that they both lost support, with a right-wing populism turning with the CAQ.

Despite these dominant currents, QS won two seats (with well known feminist Françoise David joining Amir Khadir), came in second in two others, and increased their percentage of the vote. Combined with the higher voter turnout, this represents an important increase in support for QS—a doubling of the vote from 2008. QS helped build the Quebec spring and was in turn shaped by it, with many students joining its ranks, and is in a stronger position to continue giving voice to the movements in the future.

5. La lutte continue

           This has just been the first chapter of the printemps érable. The support for the PQ is shallow, there is anger at the Liberals and false hope in the CAQ, like the ADQ before it, and all will show their united support for neoliberalism. The movement will need to keep asserting itself in the streets, campuses, neighbourhoods and workplaces, amplified by QS--to ensure the PQ maintains its promise of revoking the hike and the law, and to push the movement forward.

Unfortunately NDP leader Thomas Mulcair told his MPs not to support the student strike and then announced the NDP will run provincially—against QS. But the rapid spread of casserole demonstrations across the country shows the growing solidarity with Quebec and a desire to fight austerity locally. We need to learn the lessons of the Quebec spring by building broad movements from below, and having left parties that amplify and not dampen movements. 

Support the Riveras, stop the deportation of war resisters

The Harper government is trying to deport US Iraq War resister Kimberly Rivera and her family September 20, the start of a renewed campaign against war resisters that undermines international law and Canadian democracy. But there is a campaign to support the Riveras and stop the deportations.

With massive demonstrations against the looming Iraq War in 2003, the Canadian government refused to participate—and Prime Minister Harper  admitted the war was “absolutely an error.” Recently Archbishop Desmond Tutu called for Bush and Blair to be tried for war crimes for a war that "has destabilized and polarized the world to a greater extent than any other conflict in history."

Under international law soldiers have the right to refuse participation in illegal conflicts such as Iraq, and the Nuremburg principles call on soldiers to refuse participation in such wars. During the Vietnam War, Canada welcomed US war resisters—both volunteers and conscripts—and resisters from the Iraq War have been coming to Canada since 2004. US veteran Kimberly Rivera left the Iraq War after experiencing the terrifying impact of the war on children. She came to Canada in 2007—becoming the first female US Iraq War resister—and lives in Toronto with her husband Mario and four children (Christian, Rebecca, Katie and Gabriel).

US Iraq War resisters have the support of the majority of Canadians—including human rights groups, student and labour unions, community and faith groups, environmentalists, authors and artists. This mass support has been reflected in two Parliamentary motions calling on the government to stop the deportations and to let war resisters stay.

Minister of Censorship and Deportation

Despite international law, Canadian tradition and democracy, and Harper's own statements against the Iraq War, the Harper government has deported war resisters to US prison—including Robin Long (who was separated from his family) and Cliff Cornell, who both received harsh jail sentences for speaking out against the war. According to Cliff’s lawyer, “because he spoke out against the Iraq war, Cliff's sentence is harsher than the punishment given to 94 percent of deserters who are not penalized but administratively discharged.” Threatened with a similar fate of being separated from his family and jailed for following his conscience and international law, resister Rodney Watson has been living in sanctuary since 2009.

Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, an early supporter of the Iraq War, has gone out of his way to try to deport war resisters. When the Rivera family was threatened with deportation in 2009, Kenney called war resisters “bogus refugee claimants.” This was not about supporting other refugees, as Kenney's cruel cuts to refugee health have since made clear. As the Canadian Council for Refugees wrote in an open letter: “It is highly inappropriate for you to express your opinions on how you believe IRB (Immigration and Refugee Board) members should make refugee determinations. To do so gives the strong appearance of political interference. Public comments such as yours only make IRB members’ jobs more difficult and threaten claimants’ rights to an unbiased decision…The Canadian Council for Refugees supports all war resisters from any country who refuse to engage in armed conflict that is contrary to international humanitarian law.” 

Kenney dodged responsibility for his campaign against war resisters when questioned in public. Thankfully an emergency stay of removal was granted to the Riveras last time, and since 2008 there have been 10 federal court or federal court of appeal decisions in favour of war resisters.

Kenney has since amplified his intervention against war resisters by issuing Operational Bulletin 202, instructing immigration officials to flag US Iraq War resisters as “criminally inadmissible” (as opposed to criminal Conrad Black). In response, Amnesty International and Peter Showler (former Chair of Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Board) called on Kenney to rescind Operational Bulletin 202 because it “misstates the law and seeks to intrude on the independence of both IRB members and Immigration Officers.” 

Now there is a renewed offensive against war resisters beginning with the Riveras, who—before even receiving the decision on their application to stay on humanitarian and compassionate grounds—were given a deportation date of September 20. 

Support the Riveras, stop the deportation of war resisters

Last night's community meeting in Parkdale, where the Riveras and other war resisters live, spilled out into the streets as people marched to show their support for war resisters. We have two weeks to amplify the campaign to stop the September 20 deportation of Kimberly Rivera and her family, and to reaffirm that she was right--and so were we--to say no to the Iraq War.

*Ask Immigration Minister Jason Kenney to stop the deportation: call 613-954-1064, email minister@cic.gc.ca or send this online letter.

*Contribute to the urgent appeal for funds.

*Friday September 14, 4:30-6pm will be a Canada-wide day of petitioning and leafletting. People in Toronto can meet at three locations: Carrot Common on Danforth ave, Trinity St. Paul Centre (427 Bloor St West, near Spadina), and Queen St. West and Dunn (Parkdale). Information from other cities will soon be available.

* Wednesday September 19, 4:30-6pm, there will be a peaceful demonstration outside the Federal Court Building at 180 Queen St. West, Toronto, to call on Kenney to stop the deportation of the Riveras.

*Follow the campaign for updates: www.resisters.ca

Photo essay: "Healthcare for refugee, stop the cuts now!"

From Inuvik to Vancouver to St. John's, people across Canada rallied today against a looming healthcare catastrophe: cruel and costly cuts to refugee health. In Toronto, more than 500 people took over both sides of the sidewalk outside the immigration office, spilling out into the street and getting solidarity honks from passing drivers.

The National Day of Action to Stop Cuts to Refugee Health Care, organized by Doctors for Refugee Care, mobilized the full range of health providers and other supporters of refugees and health care. There were rallies in more than a dozen cities, while the Opposition Immigration Critic Jinny Sims raised the issue in Parliament.

Since these cuts to the Interim Federal Health Program (IFHP) were announced by Immigration Minister Jason Kenney on April 25, there has been a groundswell of opposition. On May 11, physicians protested across the country, including occupying a Tory office in Toronto. The cuts are based on a number of bogus arguments (thoroughly debunked here)--that they will reduce costs, promote fairness, and protect public health. But the cuts will predictably produce the opposite outcomes, which is why they're being imposed.

On my way to the rally I met a refugee and mother of three who is scared of losing access to her life-saving dialysis treatment. Denying basic medical care to people who have fled war, torture, rape and persecution is both cruel, costly (forcing expensive ER visits with complications of untreated conditions) and dangerous. These cuts will kill.

If the Tories were so concerned about health equity, why not promote health for all? Instead, just a few months ago the Tories announced $21 billion cuts to health care--as part of a prescription for privatization. Austerity requires scapegoats, so the Tories are blaming refugees and the small IFHP program that covers their basic healthcare. As Dr. Mark Tyndall said at the Ottawa press conference today, "the government has used this issue to divide Canadians, pitting those who are dissatisfied with their own health coverage against refugees. Canadians are smarter than this. This is an attack on our entire healthcare system."

That hundreds of healthcare providers rallied on a monday afternoon shows how the government's attempts to whip up anti-immigrant hysteria is backfiring. The cuts are also exposing the government's other priorities--from prisons to fighter jets--which are consuming billions of dollars diverted from healthcare.

As many of the placards said at the Toronto rally, call or email Jason Kenney at 613-992-2235 or jason.kenney@parl.gc.ca--to demand healthcare for refugees, stop the cuts now!

Stop cuts to refugee health

Toronto doctors rally outside Joe Oliver's office

Today doctors across the country took action against proposed cuts to refugee health. There were occupations of Tory offices in Winnipeg and Toronto, a rally in Ottawa and press conferences in other cities.

On April 25, Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney announced drastic cuts to the Interim Federal Health Program. These cuts, which are scheduled to take effect on June 30, are cruel, costly and a threat to public health. According to the Canadian Council for Refugees (CCR), the cuts to the Interim Federal Health Program (IFHP) will have the following impact: 

1. create two-tier system of refugee care in Canada, discriminating between refugee claimants on the basis of their country of origin

2. deny necessary medical care on  arrival in Canada to resettled refugees or accepted refugee claimants with acute health needs

3. institutionalize gender discrimination

4. deny long-term, essential medical coverage to individuals who are living in Canada in limbo

5. offload costs to provinces

As CCR President Wanda Yamamoto summarized, “Thousands of people now receiving medication for everything from epilepsy and childhood respiratory illnesses to cancer and AIDS will no longer have access as of 30 June 2012. Will it take some deaths for the government to change its mind?”

Bogus arguments
The Tories justify the cuts by claiming that they will promote fairness, save money and protect public health. But these arguments are bogus. Denying basic and medically necessary health care for people who have been forced to leave their countries to escape war, rape, torture and persecution is not fair, it is inhumane. Furthermore, as the CCR points out “the government’s own figures show that the per capita cost for refugee claimants under the IFHP is only about 10% of the average per capita cost for Canadians.” Refugees are not a drain on the system, and depriving of them of basic health care needs will not save money. Instead, denying people cost-effective preventive care will force them to suffer complications of untreated conditions, which is costly and a threat to public health. As infectious disease specialist Dr. Mark Tyndall wrote,
"there is not a health economist in the world who would tell you that restricting primary and preventive care is a cost saver. In fact, waiting until people require urgent care before intervening is contrary to everything we know about sound health economics. Does Immigration Minister Jason Kenney really believe that we shouldn’t treat someone’s high blood pressure, diabetes, depression or arthritis or offer pre-natal care to expectant mothers?"

Austerity scapegoat

The real purpose of these cuts are to scapegoat refugees for the austerity agenda. Just a few months ago the Harper government announced $21 billion in cuts to Medicare, part of a prescription for privatization. To distract from that they are blaming the very modest $84 million IFHP. As Dr. Tyndall wrote, “It is reprehensible that Minister Kenney is pitting Canadians who are dissatisfied with their own medical coverage, against refugees, as depicted in a shameless petition posted on his official website.”

Cutting refugee health is the sharp end of the wedge to cutting public health care. According to Michael McBane from the Canadian Health Coalition, “The dismantling of one of the oldest parts of Canada’s public healthcare system –health care for displaced persons who arrived in Canada following W.W. II – is symptomatic of the Harper government’s approach to health care. ‘Cut and run’ is their motto and changing the hearts of Canadians from compassion to contempt is their goal.” This goal is also being pursued by criminalizing refugees with Bill C-4 and Bill C-31.

A broad coalition of groups--migrant justice groups, labour and student groups, health and health care provider groups--will be necessary to stop these harmful cuts to refugee health. 

Photo essay: global day of action in Alma, Quebec

On March 31, 8,000 people—including striking students, workers from across Quebec, and contingents from Toronto to South Africa—converged in Alma, Quebec to support locked-out workers.

On New Year’s Eve, Rio Tinto locked out 800 workers in Alma—a town of 30,000 people, three hours north of Quebec City. The mining giant wants to contract out jobs so it can impose a 50% wage cut. But Alma workers have launched a campaign that has gone global—from California workers who had a successful strike against Rio Tinto, BC workers who have pledged $60,000 of their own wages, and Toronto Steelworkers who in early march took a bus 12 hours to the picket lines (for video footage, go here).

The solidarity for locked out workers is converging with the massive student strike. Alma workers have supported the Quebec student strike, and on March 31, students from Quebec (including the leadership of CLASSE, the group leading the group) joined the day of action in Alma. 

There were also contingents of trade unions from across Quebec, buses of steelworkers from Hamilton and Toronto, and workers from Kentucky, Los Angeles, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Turkey, the Netherlands, and South Africa.

In the Arab Spring, the interaction between students and workers has been crucial: while students and youth groups were often the first in the streets in Tunisia and Egypt, it was mass strikes that finally drove out Ben Ali and Mubarak, and the revolutions have continued on campuses in workplaces with demonstrations, occupations and strikes. As Amir Khadir, one of the leaders of Quebec’s left-wing electoral party Québec solidaire, has explained in this video interview, Quebec’s “printemps érable” (which is translated as “maple spring” but in French sounds like “Arab spring”) includes both students and workers. The mass student strike is giving confidence to broader movements, from Earth Day protests on April 22 to the labour movement. In the last two weeks of March, Aveos workers blockaded a road in Montreal after being laid off, Air Canada workers went on solidarity wildcat strike in Montreal and Quebec City, and then the mass demonstration converged in Alma.

Canada’s 1% rules by dividing, including divisions across Canada and Quebec, but there is growing solidarity. For more information on the campaign, including video footage of the March 31 demonstration, go here. To hear a song one of the locked out workers wrote, go here. So-so-so, solidarité!

photo essay: Toronto IWD march

On March 3, women from across Toronto took to the streets for International Women's Day.

The march included labour and community groups, opposition from inside and outside Parliament/City Council, and people of all ages.

As the organizers explained, the austerity agenda is worsening the lives of women, who already face endemic problems of violence. "Over the past year, the 99% has faced attacks on our rights as workers and the right to decent jobs, while austerity-driven political agendas have moved forward to slash public spending, targeting the very services upon which we rely during times of economic uncertainty.  Women and other marginalized people are disproportionately affected by cuts to public services, which deepen socio-economic marginalization. Our services mitigate socio-economic inequity and are vital to an equitable society." 

This year's theme--"Reclaim our city: good jobs, services, dignity. Together we are stronger"--built on the organizing of the past year.

Women have been at the heart of resistance movements, from the Egyptian revolution to anti-austerity fights in Toronto. Last year, IWD organizers were one of the first to confront Rob Ford over his cuts that threaten women's access to public services. Since then a year of organizing has dented the Ford agenda--stopping some budget cuts, stalling the sell off of social housing, and leading to a rebirth of the public transit debate. Ford is trying to get around the opposition by attacking the jobs on which public services depend, like contracting out cleaners. The march connected the fight for public services with the defence of the jobs that provide them, and included cleaners and library workers at the front of the march--who are campaigning to save jobs and public services.

Slogans also make links were also made to broader issues, like "childcare not warfare". While Harper is wasting billions on fighter jets, battle ships and wars from Afghanistan and Libya to threats against Syria and Iran--he still refuses to fund a national, publicly-funded child care program.

The march passed by City Hall, where people left messages in chalk connecting local with global, from "save transit city", to "status for all", to "free Palestinian female prisoners" (for more information, come to Israeli Apartheid Week)

By uniting women and men from across the city in defence of good jobs, public services and dignity, IWD left a strong message for Ford, Harper and the rest of the 1%: expect resistance.