Repression In Argentina!

URGENT
Brukman Factory Defenders Attacked!
Vicious Repression Against Workers Days Before Argentina's Elections!
Activist Vicente Balvanera Injured By Cops!

Send Messages of Protest to the Embassy and Consulates of Argentina!
Send Messages of Solidarity to the Workers of Brukman!

The Argentina Solidarity Committee denounces the repression of the workers and supporters of the Brukman factory by the police in Argentina. We call on all workers organizations, unions, supporters of workers self-management, women's organizations, and defenders of human rights to act now to denounce the repression against the Brukman factory workers and all workers and activists in struggle against the Argentine government.

We have attached a report from Indymedia.org to provide some background on the cops' vicious attack. Rubber bullets and live ammunition was used on the 7000 defenders of Brukman, wounding 32. During this attack defenders of Brukman were chased into a children's hospital and then tear-gassed. While no one was killed—this time--the scope of the police rampage was wider than the infamous attack on the Pueyrredón bridge last year which resulted in the assassination of two activists which outraged Argentina and the world.

On the eve of the phony elections
Duhalde Must Return Argentina to Capitalist Law and Order

Just six days before the presidential elections in Argentina, the desperate government of Duhalde return "stability" of normal "law and order" to economically ravaged Argentina. All Duhalde has proven to the workers of Argentina is that the state is on the side of the owners of the factories. Duhalde has dedicated his government to these principles: The bosses must have the right to close factories and create unemployment. The bosses must decide how much food and clothing is produced, no matter who is going without clothing. For the state unemployment and hunger and want are acceptable facts of life. Workers cannot take the situation into their own hands. This is what is at stake for Duhalde-- the 55 woman textile workers who managed the Brukman factory themselves challenge the right of the oligarchy to rule and point the way to a new social order.

Duhalde and the oligarchy of Argentina is desperate to establish legitimacy for the phony elections on April 27. They demand, with the force of a police stick and gun, that the population accept the imposition of another of the bosses politicians whose program for Argentina is the same disastrous policy of repayment of the foreign debt. Whether Peronist or Center-Left, the program is the same.

Since the Argentinazo (Argentine Uprising) on December 19-20, 2001, when four presidents in a row were thrown out by the masses, the demand has been the same: "All of Them Must Go!" for no faith the government and any of the politicians. Duhalde's answer has been to save a dying regime which has lost its support among the working class, middle class and urban poor.

This attack is comes during a campaign by Duhalde to evict worker occupied factories and shut down progressive organizations such as Indymedia Argentina, a major activist news and organizing internet site in Argentina. Just over a week ago, the cops moved against several worker occupied plants including the Sasatru food production plant. Sasatru had been closed for 20 years and was recently reopened by its former employees and neighbors to produce cheap food for Argentina's rapidly growing population of poor people.

Vicente Balvanera Injured
Amongst the 32 injured by the bosses cops was Vicente Balvanera, an activist who is known to many in San Francisco and Los Angeles. Balvanera suffered a rubber bullet to the head, but has received treatment and is recovering safely. Vicente Balvanera was associated with many workers' struggles in California, including the Argentina Solidarity Committee, Labor Action Committee to Free Mumia Abu Jamal, the Port Workers Solidarity Committee, the Frente Unidad in Los Angeles, and the Inner City Labor Party Organizing Committee in Los Angeles. Balvanera recently returned to Argentina. His picture is attached below.

Solidarity with Argentina's workers!
Like the union saying goes, "An injury to one is an injury to all!" The fight against capitalist globalization on the streets of Buenos Aires is our fight too.

PLEASE SEND MESSAGES OF SUPPORT TO:
Prensabrukman2 [at] yahoo.com.ar
With copy to: ceprodh [at] hotmail.com (whose lawyers are defending the Brukman workers), and to sf_adam [at] rocketmail.com (Moderator of the Argentina Solidarity Committee)
Argentina Solidarity Committee
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Argentina_Solidarity/

SEND MESSAGES OF PROTEST TO:
Argentina Consulate General New York NY
12 West 56th Street New York, NY 10019 212-603-0400
Argentina Consulate General Atlanta GA
245 Peachtree Center Avenue Suite 2101 Atlanta, GA 30303 404/880-0805
Argentina Consulate General Houston TX
1990 South Post Oak Road Suite 770 Houston, TX 77056 713/871-8935

Argentina Consulate General Los Angeles CA
5055 Wilshire Blvd Suite 210 Los Angeles, CA 90036 213/954-9155
Argentina Consulate General Miami FL
Penthouse 1 800 Brickell Avenue Miami, FL 33131 305/373-7794

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Repression In Brukman Factory

The Infantry division of the Argentine Federal Police showed its true face today in a brutal repression of the 7000 people who had gathered around the Brukman factory to help the workers reclaim what is theirs. After 4 days of waiting in front of the factory and after the Government repeatedly refused any real negotiations the workers attempted to peacefully enter the factory by moving the barricades the police had formed. The workers however where met by a shower of tear gas and rubber bullets, to the point where the whole city block was turned white in tear gas. The people defending themselves as best as they could where chased by the police who continued to shoot at them, in some cases following them over 25 blocks to a children hospital and then shooting tear gas into the hospital itself.

Motorcycles belonging to police roll on the street of Balvanerra neighborhood, persecuting demonstrators who run away from their repression, even inside hospitals and universities. Journalists are also being blocked from visiting and counting the detainees. On Balconies outside the factory and near the Police station, in an act of solidarity people have begun to bang pots and pans to support the demonstrators.
The night ends with over 100 arrested, and 32 wounded one of them by live ammunition; the fact that police forces where < ammunition live with armed>had been previously denounced by the Argentina IMC. The wounded also included 2 IMC journalists injured by the police while in visible possession of their press credentials and equipment. Workers are expected to mobilize tomorrow once again to the factory (es).
There is a call to action tomorrow, April 22nd at 11 in Plaza Miserere.