RALLY FOR HUGO BLANCO IN LONDON
By Charles van Gelderen x
London
A well-attended meeting at the Caxton Hall January 26 Launched a _ campaign in Britain to save Hugo Blanco.- -
Syd Bidwell, a Labour Member of Parliament for Southall, was the principal speaker. He expressed complete solidarity with Hugo Blanco's struggle to organise the oppressed peasants of Peru, protested at the savage sentence passed on him by a military court and added his voice to. the world-wide demand for’an ammesty.
Bill Molloy, M.P. for Ealing North, who had also agreed. to speak at the neeting, was unable to do so because of a last-minute constituency engagement. He sent: a message . of ‘support through Syd Bidwell. :
Frida Laski, widow of the late Harold Laski, gave a moving account of the servile conditions under which the peasants of Peru live and work. She said that their status is little better than. that. of.chattel slaves and she urged that all should be done to. save ‘Hugo Blanco and to give support to the movement he led. *
° Messages were: received from Ernie Roberts, assistant’ general secretary of the. Amalgamated Engineering Union. He conveyed his "personal opposition to the. attempted legal ‘assassination of Hugo Blanco." He called on the British trade-union movement to "voice its opposition to this attempt to kill a man for his opinions. " ; :
Bill Jones of the Transport and General Workers Union also expressed his regret that:.a previous engagement prévented him from being present. "I have no hesitation," he wrote, “in supporting: alt your efforts on behalf of Blanco: and; wish them every success as they deserve tobe.
Speakers from the , International Socialist Group and the Irish Workers ' League also addressed the © ‘meeting «and expressed their solidarity with the campaign.
Kenneth Jordaan, Executive ‘member of the Pan-African Congress of South Africa, drew a parallel between the situation in Peru and South Africa where the peasants are likewise fighting for the most elementary human rights. He pointed out that 85 members of his organisation had already been executed for political activities since 1945 and that nine are now under sentence of death | in Cape Town: ; aa Tt was agreed to send a protest. to the Peruvian embassy - in the name of the neeting. . a
Since an appeal on pehalf of Hugo Blanco appeared in . the Tribune a few weeks ago, numerous letters of protest from individuals and organisations have bee been sent to the embassy: None of them have been acknowledged.
‘The Movement for Colonial Freedom, whose “speaker” was also ‘unable to appear at the last moment, sent a message which read, in part, as follows: "The: ‘MCF -because of its particular interest and participation in the struggle of peoples oppressed and exploited by Colonial and neo-Colonial powers, is naturally also concerned for the struggle against the oppression of the -under-privileged by the privileged within any particular state. it can only have the highest possible regard for the courage and leadership of Hugo
Blanco and for his steadfast efforts to lift his people out of the poverty and humiliation of their present conditions in spite of the brutal injustice of the forces opposing him.... We therefore hope that among all those voices which are raised against this terrible penalty the voice of the Movement for Colonial Freedom will be heard loud and clear demanding that [the prison sentence] shall be immediately revoked and that the struggle of Hugo Blanco for democracy and human liberty in his country shall be recognized for what it is."
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