Bushfire crisis in Australia – willful destruction of the foundations of natural life

ICOR note with grave concern the bushfire crisis in Australia. These bushfires are unprecedented in their duration, scope and intensity. To date, 32 lives have been lost, over 2500 homes completely destroyed (together with shearing sheds, dairies and implement sheds), and possibly over a billion animals, including livestock and Australia’s unique wildlife, killed. 10 billion hectares and a number of small rural towns have been burned out.

ICOR recognises that the bushfires, together with other extreme weather events in Australia and around the world, are a product of the capitalist pursuit of profits and of the reluctance of governments to end the operations of fossil fuel corporations. Large-scale, out-of-control fires have increased internationally in recent years. They have occurred in Brazil, USA, Canada, Sweden, Indonesia and Southern Europe, among others. A threatening interaction of all the characteristics of the global environmental crisis is developing.

The Australian government of Prime Minister Scott Morrison has behaved with criminal neglect and irresponsibility over climate change. Both it and the Labor Opposition remain committed to coal production and export. The government hides behind claims that Australian CO2 emissions account for only 1.3% of the world’s total, but it is the third-highest per capita emitter (after Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates)¹. It is the third-largest exporter of fossil fuels (behind Russia and Saudi Arabia)² and the largest exporter of coal³. The government has lied to the Australian people and in international forums about “meeting and beating” its Kyoto 2 emissions reduction target⁴. It lies to protect the giant multinational energy and resources corporations that exercise power in the country.

The bushfire catastrophe that has engulfed Australia over the last five months confirms the basic tenets of the Marxist-Leninist analysis of capitalism’s willful destruction of the unity of humanity and nature as it is argued by numerous ICOR members. The working class must lead the environmental and climate change mass movements in the direction of the only solution to the growing catastrophes of global warming and extreme weather events – socialism and Communism.

The Australian people are mobilising against climate inaction in huge numbers - 80,000 in Sydney on September 20, and over a hundred thousand on a few days' notice around the country already this year. ICOR expresses its solidarity with the Australian people and their fight against imperialism and for socialism. It supports the demands of the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist) for phasing out the export of fossil fuels, for banning coal seam gas mining and all new fossil fuel projects including the Indian monopoly Adani’s Galilee Basin coal mine and the Norwegian company Equinor’s oil exploration in the seawaters of the Great Australian Bight. The Party plays an important role in uniting the people to target the ruling class, and resisting blame games that seek to divide the people

The livelihood of workers currently employed in the coal, gas and oil industries is one of the Australian Party’s priorities. They must be won to the idea of their industries being closed with practical reassurance, including a national register of workers employed in fossil fuel companies to be given income support, retraining and fast-tracking into sustainable industry employment while their fossil fuel employers are closed down and stopped. The big corporations which currently pay little or no tax⁵ must be made to pay for this!

ICOR recognises the importance to humanity of restoring its essential unity with nature, and will continue to work to develop environmental policy that supports the revolutionary struggle for socialism.

Signatories (as of 23 February 2020, further signatories possible):

1. ORC Organisation Révolutionnaire du Congo (Revolutionary Organization of Congo), Democratic Republic of the Congo

2. CPK Communist Party of Kenya, Kenya

3. MMLPL Moroccan Marxist-Leninist Proletarian Line

4. CPSA (ML) Communist Party of South Africa (Marxist-Leninist)

5. PPDS Parti Patriotique Démocratique Socialiste (Patriotic Democratic Socialist Party), Tunisia

6. MLOA Marxist-Leninist Organization of Afghanistan

7. CPB Communist Party of Bangladesh

8. CPI (ML) Red Star Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Red Star

9. Ranjbaran Hezb-e Ranjbaran-e Iran (Proletarian Party of Iran)

10. NCP (Mashal) Nepal Communist Party (Mashal)

11. PPRF Patriotic Peoples Republican Front of Nepal

12. БКП Българска Комунистическа Партия (Bulgarian Communist Party)

13. PR-ByH Partija Rada - ByH (Party of Labor - Bosnia and Herzegovina), Bosnia and Herzegovina

14. MLPD Marxistisch-Leninistische Partei Deutschlands (Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany)

15. UCLyon Unité Communiste Lyon (Communist United Lyon), France

16. UPML Union Prolétarienne Marxiste-Léniniste (Marxist-Leninist Proletarian Union), France

17. BP (NK-T) Bolşevik Parti (Kuzey Kürdistan-Türkiye) (Bolshevik Party (North Kurdistan-Turkey))

18. KOL Kommunistische Organisation Luxemburg (Communist Organization of Luxemburg)

19. RM Rode Morgen (Red Dawn), Netherlands

20. VZDOR VZDOR - strana práce (Resistance - labour party), Slovakia

21. MLKP Marksist Leninist Komünist Parti Türkiye / Kürdistan (Marxist Leninist Communist Party Turkey / Kurdistan)

22. KSRD Koordinazionnyj Sowjet Rabotschewo Dvizhenija (Coordination Council of the Workers Class Movement), Ukraine

23. PCP (independiente) Partido Comunista Paraguayo (independiente) (Paraguayan Communist Party (independent))

24. PPP Partido Proletario del Perú (Proletarian Party of Peru)

25. PC (ML) Partido Comunista (Marxista Leninista) (Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist)), Dominican Republic

26. PS-GdT Plataforma Socialista - Golpe de Timón (Socialist Platform – Change of Course), Venezuela

27. ROL Revolutionary Organization of Labor, USA

28. PCR-U Partido Comunista Revolucionario del Uruguay (Revolutionary Communist Party of Uruguay)

29. CPA/ML Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist)

30. MIKSZ Magyar Ifjúság Közösségi Szervezete (Organisation of Hungarian Youth Community), Hungary

31. MLGS Marxistisch-Leninistische Gruppe Schweiz (Marxist-Leninist Group of Switzerland)

Subsequent signatories:

32. BDP   Bloque Democratico Popular (Popular Democratic Bloc), Peru