p The Irish Workers’ Party supported the proposal, when first made, for an International Meeting of the Communist and Workers’ Parties.

p Such a meeting with its aim of strengthening the unity of the international communist movement is of great importance at the present time expressing as it does the identity of interests of the world’s working class and each Party’s adherence to the immortal slogan of "Workers of the World, Unite!”.

p The Irish people have a long and bitter experience of imperialism and we therefore particularly welcome the objective of this conference which sets out the tasks at the present stage of the struggle against imperialism and the need for the unity of action of the Communist and Workers’ Parties and of all antiimperialist forces.

p The Irish working-class and national revolutionary forces were linked with the work of the First International. We therefore attend the 1969 conference in the best internationalist traditions of our forebears.

p We fully appreciate the importance of international unity and solidarity since the first recipient of international help was the Irish revolutionary movement when Marx and Engels organised the First International’s campaign for the release of the “Fenian” prisoners after the Irish rebellion of 1867.

p Our people have grievously suffered at the hands of British imperialism. Ireland was Britain’s first colony. After generations of struggle a degree of political independence was wrested from the British imperialists, who, however, imposed Partition on our small island, thereby creating the first British neocolony—in the South, the Republic of Ireland, and a semi-colony, the state of Northern Ireland.

p In the state in which our Party functions—the Republic of Ireland— monopoly capitalism is more and more undermining what degree of political and economic independence has been won.

p In their sell-out of the national interests of the people the national bourgeoisie are identifying their interests with those of the imperialists, and, therefore, on the basis of our own experience we particularly endorse that part of the Main Document which says:

p “Social differentiation is developing in the newly independent countries. 674 There is a sharpening conflict between the working class, the peasantry and other democratic forces, including patriotic-minded sections of the petty bourgeoisie, on the one hand, and, on the other, imperialism and the forces of domestic reaction, the elements of the national bourgeoisie which are increasingly accepting a deal with imperialism”.

p We consider that the Fianna Fail Government of the Republic of Ireland provides a classic example of the role of such elements.

p In his application of Marxism to the interpretation of Ireland’s national liberation struggle, the great Irish Socialist leader, James Connolly, showed that the working class, the only "incorruptible inheritors of the fight for freedom in Ireland", was the only force that could successfully lead the centuries-long struggle to completion.

p In the case of our own country this Marxist analysis by Connolly has been proved true. Since he was executed by the British imperialists in 1916 there have been two great “sellouts” by the native propertied class in Ireland. The first was the connivance with the imposition of the imperialist so-called solution of the Irish question in the form of the partitioning Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921; and 45 years later this inherent characteristic of the propertied class was again demonstrated even by that section of it which was radical enough to oppose the 1921 Treaty by the force of arms, but who in 1966 capitulated completely to imperialism by signing the Anglo-Irish Free Trade Agreement which opens up our economy to the British monopolies. The Agreement, furthermore, is a preparation for the further submerging of Ireland in the European Common Market.

p Having abandoned the struggle for national independence, the Fianna Fail Government has encouraged, in addition to the British, the penetration of other foreign monopolies such as US, West German, Japanese, etc. Large estates of land are being purchased by wealthy foreigners.

p But our people are fighting back against the surrender!

p Countering the imperialist strategy of "divide and rule", the people in both parts of the island are finding new forms of united struggle. In the Northern Ireland state there has been established the mass Civil Rights Movement which strives to unite the Catholic and Protestant peoples in the fight for democratic rights. There is also the strengthening of the national role of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions which acts as a single trade union centre for the working class of the two Irish states.

p The Republic of Ireland heads the "European League" for man days lost because of strike action. Militant solidarity actions have forced the government to release imprisoned strikers. A firm class reaction has defeated attempts by US firms to deny recognition of any form of trade union organisation in their Irish branches.

p In many parts of the countryside, small farmers and landless men have organised themselves into "Land Leagues"; the form of organisation which so effectively fought British landlordism in the last century. On the very eve of our International Meeting, there were militant actions against the West Germans (many of them former nazis) who with their wealth have “grabbed” the land needed by the small farmers and landless .men. The agitation of the latter has 675 been sufficiently sharp enough to evoke a reaction in the Bonn Parliament.

p The young married couples denied housing accommodation are in a militant mood; occupying empty houses, and at the same time linking their struggle with opposition to the foreign property speculators who buy up sites, demolish habitable houses and build profit-making office blocks for the external monopolies.

p In our State Television Station outstanding producers have recently resigned in protest against the corrupt commercialisation and cosmopolitanism which has accompanied the national sellout,

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p In the fight for peace and international solidarity there is the increasing action of trade union leaders, intellectuals, priests, legal personalities and many, others against the US aggression in Vietnam and in support of the very active antiapartheid campaign.

p The small shopkeepers and traders are actively combining against the foreign monopoly distributive chains.

p Irish exporters’ associations have called for trade and diplomatic relations (which are at present non-existent) with the socialist countries in order to offset some of the economic consequences of our heavy and increasing dependence on the British market.

p The Irish Workers’ Party is playing a leading role in many of these agitations. It plays a unique unifying role in the growing unity in action between the national revolutionary Irish Republican Movement and many sections of the Labour Party (Social Democrats), trade unionists and allied organisations.

p The struggle for national liberation, for socialism and against imperialism in Ireland is accelerating. A great change is coming about in our people’s thinking. This change not only reflects the intensity of the struggles that are being waged, it reflects also the change in the world balance offerees and the influence of the world socialist system.

p Our party regards the world socialist system as the derive force in the antiimperialist struggle. All developments on a world scale are influenced by the world socialist system and in particular by the Soviet Union, the first socialist state, which is now laying the foundations of a communist society and which is a source of great strength and solidarity for every struggle for national and social liberation.

p It is appropriate that the International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties should take place on the eve of the centenary of the birth of V. I. Lenin—founder of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and great leader and teacher of the international revolutionary movement. We are especially pleased with this, because last year we celebrated the 100th anniversary of the birth of James Connolly. Connolly was one of the few who opposed the socialchauvinist betrayal of the leaders of the Second International during the imperialist war of 1914-18. He bequeathed to the Irish working-class movement glorious standards of internationalism and of anti-imperialist struggles which makes our participation in this conference a natural thing.

p Again, we would wish to refer to the significance of the timing of the conference with the Lenin centenary. Lenin’s teachings will be forever our guide in our revolutionary work for an independent, united and socialist Ireland. We 676 shall never forget the great debt due, by the Irish working class and national revolutionary movement, to Lenin for his profound theoretical teachings and great revolutionary practice. We particularly will remember that his name is forever linked with Ireland because of his defence of the Irish Rising of 1916— the greatest date yet in our revolutionary history.

p On behalf of our party we declare our agreement with the general line of the Main Document of this conference:—"Tasks at the Present Stage of the Struggle Against Imperialism and United Action of the Communist and Workers’ Parties and All Anti-Imperialist Forces.”

p We support, and will also sign, the address of the conference on the centenary of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin; the Peace Appeal and the conference statements on the US aggression in Vietnam; the just cause of the Arab peoples, and of solidarity with Communists and democrats subjected to repression.

p As regards the various propositions advanced at the conference we wish to declare our emphatic support for:

p —United actions against imperialism.

p —More frequent bilateral and multilateral meetings of the Communist and Workers’ Parties,

p —The holding of frequent international theoretical conferences.

p —The organisation of a world anti-imperialist conference.

p The application of these decisions will be of tremendous assistance in our common hard and strenuous fight against imperialism.

p We regard the holding, and the proceedings, of this conference as a great victory for the international communist movement.

The delegation of the Irish Workers’ Party wishes to thank the Communist Party of the Soviet Union for the splendid organisation of the conference. It wishes also to record its appreciation of the work of the Hungarian comrades in the preparatory meetings.

(Comrade O’Riordan’s speech was submitted to the Secretariat in written form for inclusion in the Minutes.)