December 17, 2004
Quito – Ecuador

Final Declaration of the VIII International Seminar: Problems of the Revolution in Latin America

Latin America: A trench, a river, a volcano

Encouraged by the rise in struggle of the workers and the peoples of Latin America and the world, the organizations which have signed this declaration met in Quito, Ecuador, to share our experience in the impulse of the political action to bring to victory the struggle for the emancipation of the working class and peoples.

We are acting against the current, confronting the offensive that U.S. imperialism has unleashed against the peoples, to affirm itself as a hegemonic power, in contention with other imperialists and imperialist blocs for control of markets and spheres of influence.

Based on the use of military force, the United States and its allies are threatening the peoples and acting against them. Afghanistan and Iraq were the first victims of this new assault, but the list of political-military objectives is greater, and includes countries on all continents. However, the militarism and the interventions struck against the resistance, combativeness and struggle of the peoples. In Iraq a heroic war of national liberation is taking shape, while the United States is promoting an illegal electoral process with which it is trying to legitimize a supposedly democratic regime; in Palestine, the people are fighting heroically for the establishment of a Palestinian State, fighting against Israeli Zionism, spearhead of the Washington government in the Middle East; in Afghanistan too the resistance is advancing. In solidarity with those and other peoples, and in condemnation of Yankee militarism, a powerful protest movement of the masses is developing on an international level.

But the smell of Yankee gunpowder is spreading not only in distant lands; in this hemisphere the interventionist plans are also taking their course. The political and economic efforts to raise Plan Colombia – Patriot Plan to new levels are continuing; the United States has established military bases in various countries and plans to build them in other places; the destabilizing efforts against Cuba and against the government of Hugo Chávez in Venezuela are continuing, but they will collide with the resistance of their peoples and those of all the Americas.

In order to consolidate economic and political control in the region, to face its crisis and to compete in better conditions in the world market, U.S. imperialism, in sharp contention with other imperialist powers, is trying to set up and control a single regional market at the exclusive service of their monopoly enterprises. To this end it has created the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) and the Free Trade Agreement. But its attempts are running up against the actions of the masses, who forced the imperialists and the servile oligarchies to hold off on the implementation of the FTAA until after January 2005, as they had planned.

The workers and peoples are not resigned to oppression and exploitation, to hunger, unemployment, the terrible conditions of life that capitalism and foreign domination have produced. They have moved from cries of dissatisfaction and complaints to open protest, to partial and general mobilizations, to actions demanding their rights, for definitive social changes.

In Latin America there is social turmoil, the consciousness of the peoples and the movement of the masses are developing. The time of ebb has been left behind; today the tendency is for the revival and advance of the struggle. The desire for change is deepening and broad sectors understand that this will only come with effort, with the struggle of the peoples.

Various events confirm this. There is no country that has not felt the mobilization of the masses on its territory. The popular rebellions and uprisings in Ecuador, Argentina and Bolivia, the blocking of highways, the paralyzations on a regional and national level and by economic sector, are nourished by the fighting spirit of the workers, the youth, the indigenous movement, the peasants, the landless, the retired, the women, the small merchants, in short… all who are suffering the effects of the sell-out, anti-popular and neo-liberal policies demanded by the International Monetary Fund. This is taking place even in Chile, the country which has been shown off as a model of "viability" of the neo-liberal policies.

In the search for social change, in some countries such as Venezuela, Ecuador, Brazil and Uruguay, the peoples have brought to victory democratic and progressive electoral plans, although not all of them have been consistent with the program and popular aspirations, and some have even betrayed them. What is important is that the masses saw in them a means of resistance to the oligarchies and to foreign interference, that they were and are popular attempts to obtain sovereignty, independence, freedom and social change. In Venezuela the people were the cause of the failure of the coup directed from the United States, which sought (and is still trying) to put an end to a government that has defended the dignity of the country and people, rejecting head-on the policies of U.S. imperialism. The struggle of the masses, the political action and the fight of the insurgent forces in Colombia against the pro-imperialist government of Uribe are winning victories and the sympathy of the peoples.

In these actions, in these fights we the revolutionary organizations have been present, playing our political role, using our experience for the development of the consciousness, organization and struggle of the workers and peoples. We are making efforts to raise the popular unity to new levels in fronts of action and struggle, in electoral coalitions, in movements of solidarity, in political fronts, with programmatic proposals. Our activity aims at affirming the leading role of the working class, of winning the broad masses for the revolution and orienting them to that purpose, we are working to accumulate revolutionary forces. We are confronting the ruling classes and imperialism using the most varied forms of struggle depending on the needs and political conditions that have been created in each of our countries.

In Latin America there are favorable conditions for the development of the mass struggle, for the action of the revolutionary organizations. Based on the historical experience of the fight of the working class and peoples, we reaffirm the validity of the use of revolutionary violence of the masses for seizing power.

The struggle of the masses in Latin America is one more torrent in the battle that the workers and peoples are waging in Asia, Africa and the Middle East against the imperialist powers. The action of these peoples flows together with the fight of the proletariat and the peoples of the developed capitalist countries. All these columns should unite in a great Anti-Imperialist Front that, more than an organizing expression, involves the common struggle of the peoples, the revolutionaries, the patriots and democrats. Our task is to defeat imperialist domination and the exploitation of the local ruling classes, to put an end to the war plans of U.S. imperialism, as well as its economic plans. To defend our sovereignty, our natural resources and the environment and to preserve the cultural identity of the peoples faced with the ideological offensive, this is our inescapable task. Our struggle is for the victory of the revolution, the conquest of popular power and socialism.

Once again we unite our voices of support and solidarity with all the peoples of the world who are fighting for bread, freedom and the revolution within this America Latina which is a volcano, not only because of what is to come, but because of what is happening now. We revolutionaries in this part of the Earth will fight to rise to the occasion and to fulfill the responsibility that history has imposed on us.

Revolutionary Communist Party of Argentina
Revolutionary Communist Party, Brazil
Communist Party of Chile (Proletarian Action)
Communist Party of Colombia (Marxist-Leninist)
Communist Party of Colombia Maoist
Movement for the Popular Constituent Assembly – Colombia
Communist Party of the Workers of Denmark
Communist Party of Labor of the Dominican Republic
Movement for Independence, Unity and Change, Dominican Republic
Marxist-Leninist Communist Party of Ecuador
Democratic Popular Movement, Ecuador
Revolutionary Youth of Ecuador
Communist Party of the Workers of France
Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany
Communist Party of Mexico Marxist-Leninist
Marxist-Leninist Communist Party of Peru
Communist Organization October of Spain
Marxist-Leninist Communist Party of Turkey and North Kurdistan
Revolutionary Communist Party of Turkey
Ray O. Light Organization of the United States
Revolutionary Communist Party of Upper Volta
Utopia Organization, Venezuela

Click here to return to the Latin America Index