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From The Socialist newspaper, 16 January 2019
Key task to strengthen Tamil Solidarity campaign in 2019
Refugee Rights and Tamil Solidarity on the NHS demonstration 30 June 2018, photo Paul Mattsson, photo Paul Mattsson (Click to enlarge)
Tamil Solidarity campaign had a very successful Annual General Meeting on 13 January.
Reports of various aspects of the campaign were presented by the group of young Tamils who are playing a key role in the organisation.
Tamil Solidarity is a unique campaign within the Tamil community in Britain as it links the Tamil Struggle with the workers' movement in Britain.
Since the campaign was launched ten years ago, we have developed a young leadership which is growing in confidence and putting forward boldly the demand to build a common struggle with the working class, young people, and other oppressed communities, to win rights for all.
This opening session was then followed by a political discussion on South Asia, focusing on the recent political crisis in Sri Lanka.
2019 is going to be an important year for the campaign - it marks the ten-year anniversary of the so-called end of the war in Sri Lanka, where over one hundred thousand Tamil civilians were rounded up and slaughtered by the Sri Lankan government.
As Tamil Solidarity pointed out at the time of the war, as well as since then, the brutal war and its end solved nothing.
Working-class people, young people and oppressed Tamils, have not had any 'peace dividend'. Instead their conditions have deteriorated.
The building and strengthening of the Tamil Solidarity campaign is going to be a key task in the coming year - to win over a new layer of young people to socialist ideas.
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The coronavirus crisis has laid bare the class character of society in numerous ways. It is making clear to many that it is the working class that keeps society running, not the CEOs of major corporations.
The results of austerity have been graphically demonstrated as public services strain to cope with the crisis.
The government has now ripped up its 'austerity' mantra and turned to policies that not long ago were denounced as socialist. But after the corona crisis, it will try to make the working class pay for it, by trying to claw back what has been given.
- The Socialist Party's material is more vital than ever, so we can continue to report from workers who are fighting for better health and safety measures, against layoffs, for adequate staffing levels, etc.
- When the health crisis subsides, we must be ready for the stormy events ahead and the need to arm workers' movements with a socialist programme - one which puts the health and needs of humanity before the profits of a few.
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In The Socialist 16 January 2019:
What we think
May facing Brexit vote catastrophe
Socialist Party news and analysis
After Grenfell, thousands still in high-rise firetrap blocks
Universal Credit: robbing the working class
30% of English secondaries in deficit
Socialist Party reports and campaigns
A key task - strengthen Tamil Solidarity campaign
Council cuts
Glasgow: huge turnout to fight closure of Whitehill pool
Surrey: save our children's centres
Caerphilly: right-wing Islwyn Labour councillors fight to impose cuts
Nothing to declare? Dodgy councillors hide vested interests
North Tyneside: march to save our footbridge
Socialist history
The 1979 'Winter of Discontent'
International socialist news and analysis
USA: federal workers without pay - but immediate mass action can end shutdown
India: biggest general strike ever
France: union-led action and assemblies can defeat Macron
Mexico: police silence on horrific attack on CWI member
Workplace news and analysis
Unions must fight and demand nationalisation to save thousands of car industry jobs
Hundreds join Manc RMT picket line in solidarity after far-right attack
UCU: Vote Yes and Yes in the higher education pay and equality ballot
Opinion
Sorry to Bother You: "Socialist film Botox that made me feel young again"
Brexit: The Uncivil War - an interesting but inaccurate portrayal of EU referendum
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