CPA Chairman on the Responsibilities of the Maoists

What follows is an excerpt from an interview with a spokesperson of the Communist Party of Afghanistan which appeared in Haghighat (Truth, organ of the Communist Party of Iran (Marxist-Leninist-Maoist)) March 2002. The interview was given shortly after the US invasion of Afghanistan. -AWTW

Haghighat: Our last question for you is: in the present situation, what are the tasks and responsibilities of the Maoists in Afghanistan and all over the world?

Answer: The situation is extremely tense. If the masses in Afghanistan think that they should either surrender to imperialist invasion or support the “Taliban” or “al-Qaeda” and their supporters, the misery of the people of Afghanistan will continue. The task of the Maoists is to show the true path for the emancipation of the masses of Afghanistan, and to mobilise them to achieve it.

Our Party has declared that it is fiercely determined to resist with maximum effort the imperialist invasion, to mobilise and establish the people’s resistance and to fight under an independent revolutionary banner. We must carry forward the war of resistance against US imperialism and their allies as a stage of people’s war and new-democratic revolution in Afghanistan. Although at this stage the resistance against the imperialist invasion is our principal task, we must also consider the reactionary “pan-Islamism” and “theocracy” that is currently ruling Afghanistan, consisting of either the Taliban or Jihadi, as one of the main targets of the revolutionary struggle, and to carry out this struggle in different forms and ways. In carrying this out, it is essential that the positive and negative experiences of the war of resistance against Soviet social-imperialism should be vigorously evaluated.

The immediate task of the Maoists in Afghanistan is to overcome our weaknesses, urgently and principally, in order to be able to be practically present in the battlefields of Afghanistan. Fulfilling this task is our principal responsibility. The task of Afghanistani Maoists abroad is to join this struggle in Afghanistan; if this is not possible for them then they must support and strengthen the struggle in the many ways that they can.

It is also our task to struggle to establish a broader national-democratic anti-imperialist movement, which not only consists of Maoists but also consists of individuals and national, democratic and revolutionary Afghanistani groups, both in and out of the country. To carry out this task on the basis of our principles, and to do it correctly, is related to our advances and struggles in carrying out our central tasks. This must be in the service of, and subordinate to, the necessities of carrying out our central tasks. It is the duty of the Maoists of Afghanistan to be closely linked with the anti-war movements within the imperialist countries and, together with the Maoists of other countries, to struggle to lead these movements on a revolutionary path.

It is the task of the Maoists around the world to strengthen in every way the struggles of the Maoists in Afghanistan to establish the people’s resistance against the invasion of US imperialism and its allies, to propagate the positions and activities of the Maoists in Afghanistan, to heighten the anti-imperialist struggles, to actively participate in the anti-war movements and to closely and directly co-operate with the Maoists in Afghanistan and their struggles. The struggle and resistance against the invasion campaign of the US imperialists and their allies must be struggle and resistance on a world scale.