From 'Militant', June 10th.
The government of Peru has announced the capture of peasant leader Hugo Blanco, an intellectual inepired by the Cuban Revolution, who has been organizing the landless campesinos of his own country. So far news about Blanco's capture is very scanty. Only two brief items have appeared to date in the 0.8.. press. The first, an U.P.I. dispatch of May 30th, datelined Cuzco Pero, stateds "Hugo Blanes, Communist leader and head of a band of guerilla terrorists seaking to set up a Castro type regime in Peru, was captured by the police today... “Blanco, who had slipped through a number of police dragnets during the last year, was seized in the agricultural area of Quallabama. The police gave no details of the capture, but the 29 year old guerilla was said to be ill upon the transfer to the military prison here. "Blanco controlled a total of 8,000 to 10,000 Indians who he lead with the slogan- ‘Land or death’. His headquarters were in the Indian valley of La Convension in Southern Peru". The second item was a special dispatch to the New York Times from Lima on the 31st of May. It says- "Hugo Blanco, a Communist agitator who was captured yesterday after a long search, is being held incommunicado in the Cuzco army barracks The police said he would be tried at Arequipa, for the murder of 5 rural policemen."
Brief though these items are, they contain several ominous notes, First is that Blanco was said to beund irgoing transfer to the military prison. This may mean that he is extremely sick, that he was wounded, or that he has been tortured. That he is being held incommunicado, and that officials are so close mouthed about his capture and imprisonment could also mean topture or refusal of needed medical attention. The Peruvian police and military have a record of torturing political prisoners. This reputation biscame all the more sinister in the past year under the military dictatorship. It conducted mass round ups of leftists guilty of nothing but their opinions. They were shipped to overcrowded jungle concentration camps and left to sicken and die without medical attention, adequate food or facilities.
The brief news items contain a number of inaccuracies. Blanco has always Gpposed the policies of the Communist Party. He was an adherent, whilst a student , of revolutionary socislist movements led by Trotskyists Indeed the May issue of ‘World Marxist NReview' contains an attack on Blanco. Moreover, in an interview carried by the Limnewspaper, Expresso , Blanco denied being 4 guerilla. When the reporters commrad his course to that of Castro, he pointed out: "Cuba's agrarain reform was the product of the bloody war which was conducted from the Sierra Maestra. It was its outcome but here the opposite is true. The campesinos were carrying out their own reform here, but they had not killed the landlords. "We want to kill the system of big estates, Blanco told the reporters, "We don't want to kill gamonales (landlords). We don't feed on blood hut the products of the soil!
Telegrams demandi +fat Blanob not be tortured or held incommunicado, and that he get medical attention, plus the right to choose a lawyer, should be sent to the Peruvian Ambassajers Peruvian Embassy, 52, Sloane St., London S.W.1. (T.N. London HEL 1917) or private residence, 34 Porchester Terrace, London W.2. (T.N. London AMB 5018 L ttece Editorial Note: The campaign against the arrest of Hugo Blanco will be hampered by lack of knowledge of the activities of the movement he leads, Wo will in future issues devote material to this question, especially if his detention is prolonged. In addition there have been several articles in the Militant on the question, Comrades should use this material to write letters te Tribune, Union Voice, Railway Review and other labour movement journals, We mst act quick but with the knowledge that the set up in Peru is such that political prisoners can be liberated by mass pressure, i a ee
"The Indians Were Edgin 1619 Peace News of June 7th reproduced from I.F,. Stones Biweekly the following extracts from hearings before th U.S. House Appropriations Committee. This remarkable testimony throws a completely different light on the charges of Chinese aggression, taken up so readily by such papers as Tribune, and justifies the stand taken by this publication of supporting the Chinese workers state agatnat Nehru's capitalist Indias. "Mr, (Robert L.F semocrat, Florida); Let me talk about Red China ana the Taian operation. Did the Indian: actually start this hilitary operation?
(Maxwell D) Taylor (Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff): They were edging forward in the disputed area; yes, sir. (Diseussion off the record) MM Sikes Is the area of the neutral tone on territory that was formerly claimed by India or claimed by China? Gen. Taylor: In most cases claimed by both. Mir. Sikes: Where is it 7° relation to the generally accepted international boundary? Gen. Taylor This is hard to say because there is no generally accepted international boundary. I am sorry to be vague about this but I can assure you that spent several hours trying to find out where the McMahon line is. Actually you find the maps differ on this. The terrain is so terribly rugged: there has been no accurate mapping and no accurate boundary lines or markers placed. Mr. Sikes: Is the proposed neut al zone generally within territory which was occupied prior to all of this activity by Indian or Chines forces. Gen. Taylor: Most of it was unoccupied by anybody. General Hall are you an expert on this subject Gen. Hall: Yes, sir. I would say in general it was ccceupied by n ither force. , but that the N.E.F.A. (North Bast Frontier Agency) was occupied predomin ntly by Indian forces. One thing I think it is very important to point out is that the Chinese Nationalists, when they were in control of hina, did not recognise this line either. 5 it is not a question of the fact that it is a Chinese Communist vis-a-vis an Indian line. It is an Indian line that has never been recognized by either the Chinese Communists or the Nationalists. Dept, of Defence, 1964, appropriation hearings before House Appropriations Committee, P.T.2, released April 19, pps. 9-1 .
- Forward
south Africa Increases Her Trade With........Ghina The Chinese C.P. talks very left, especially in relation to the Colonial Revolution, and the African revolution in particular., However, the following, which appeared in the -bserver of June 9th, shows. that just as the Russians put diamond trading interests before solidarity with the international Boycott campaign, the Chinese are capahle of similar hypoer: y. "Faced with increasing competition and trade boycotts in the West, South Africa ia turning to the .ar East and to the Communist countries as alternative markets. Exports to Communist China have jumped dramatically. Peking is buying large quantities of maize grown by South Africa's predominantly Government- supported farmers. Now the Langeberg co-operative, which has a decisive influence over the prosperity of perhaps 60% of South Africa's deciduous fruit industry, as well as over a large sector of this countr s exports of canned goods!..."It is an open secret. in the deciduous fruit industry that Langeberg is going to sound out the market possibilities in Communist Chine."