Left Parties to Protest Against President Obama’s Visit in India

Six Left parties in India – the CPI, CPI(M), CPI(ML)-Liberation, AIFB, SUCI(C) and RSP – have planned to protest against the U.S. President Barack Obama‘s visit in India on the country’s Republic Day, January 26.

In a joint statement, these parties have said that the Narendra Modi government and the BJP have unleashed the forces of Hindutva which threatens the secular and democratic values of the Indian Republic.

It is at such a juncture that the government has invited President Obama to be the Chief Guest at the Republic Day.

The political parties say it is a supreme irony that the day which symbolizes India’s independence and sovereignty is being graced by the head of a country which has done the most to assault and destroy the sovereignty of many countries around the world.

President Obama himself is responsible for the aggression in Libya and for the rerun of bombing and sending troops back to Iraq. The U.S. is doing everything to destroy Syria as a national entity, the parties said in the statement.

The Left parties protest the visit of President Obama because:

1. The United States is targeting and destabilizing governments and countries in West Asia by military interventions like in Iraq, Libya and Syria.

2. The United States is the patron and staunch supporter of Israel which occupies Palestinian land and Arab territories and subjects the Palestinian people to colonial oppression.

3. The United States has shifted a substantial part of its naval and military resources to Asia as part of the pivot of Asia and is creating new military bases and tensions in the Asia-Pacific region.

4. U.S. intervention in Afghanistan and role in Pakistan have nurtured fundamentalist forces, the disastrous consequences of which serve as a warning to India.

5. U.S., which wages wars in the name of defending democracy, is facing massive protests at home against racial murders by its police force. Further the terrible record of torture and Islamophobic profiling by the CIA with the approval of the U.S. government has recently exposed the US as amongst the worst violator of human rights and democracy in the world.

The BJP government is pursuing a pro-U.S. foreign policy which is contrary to an independent non-aligned foreign policy. This is being done in the interests of Indian and foreign monopoly capital.

The Left parties protest:

• The decision to renew the India-US Defence Framework Agreement for another ten years. This is a pact which will yoke India to American military strategy in Asia.
• Seeking to pressurise India to change its foreign policy orientation vis a vis Palestine, Israel, and Iran to suit U.S. interests
• The relentless pressures exercised by the Obama administration on India to open up the financial sector to U.S. capital, as a result of which the Modi government has promulgated an ordinance to allow 49 per cent FDI in the insurance sector.
• The strong pressure of the US to weaken the patents regime in India to benefit the U.S. drug companies, so that they can sell drugs in India at high prices.
• America’s pressures that India to give up its food security programme by undermining public procurement and the public distribution system.
• U.S. pressuring India to weaken laws that protect labour rights and environment, to benefit U.S. corporations.
• The Obama-Modi efforts to dilute the civil nuclear liability law to favour U.S. nuclear companies.

The Left parties call for a Protest Day against the visit of President Obama on January 24.

Photo courtesy: CPI(M)