Release Djilas and

DJILAS: still jailed

THE re-arrest of Mihajlo • Mihajlov, the Yugoslav professor, and the continued incarceration of Milovan Djilas —one-time vice-president of the Yugoslay Federal Republic-makes nonsense of the recent actions undertaken by Tito against the secret police and the dismissal of Minister of Interior Rankovic.

These actions indicate the depth of the dilemma which confronts Tito better than any policy change might do.

Whatever political faults Dillas may have, he had the unique merit of being the first to protest against the growing power of bureaucracy which was threatening - and still does - the conquests of the Yugoslav revolution.

CRITICISM

In fact his most vehement criticism was aimed against the growing privileges enjoyed by the officers of the army and secret police (a fact which is only now being made public - and how timorously). For these and other dissenting remarks the Tito regime used the penal code against Djilas and he was sent to jail.

During his trial Dillas protested strongly against the covert pan-serbian chauvinism expressed by the Judiciary.

Yet it is only today (12 years after) that any resistance is being put up against pan-Serbianism, represented by Rankovic and his clique.

His first book "The New Class' an analysis of the Yugoslay state system from the standpoint of state capitalism, earned him a sentence of seven years.

After his conditional release in 1961, Djilas wrote another Stalin' for 'Conversations with for the publication of which he was re-arrested, tried and imprisoned, despite the protests of many socialists and communists and despite the knowledge that the trial was a ludicrous judicial farce.

Mihajlov, a liberal and mystic intellectual, has been arrested for trying to found a journal independent of the Yugosiav Communist Party and for having defied Tito in the Italian press.

Whatever disagreements Marxists may have with Mihajlov, it is impossible to condone the actions of the government against these dissidents.

Greek Army threatens life of conscientious objector CHRISTOS KAZANIS, a 22year-old member of a religious sect, known as the 'Martyrs of Jehovah', has been sentenced to death by the Athens military court for refusing on religious grounds to bear weapons.

The verdict was unanimous and is the second occasion on which an objector has been sentenced to death. The first youth had his sentence • commuted to a seven-year jail term.

According to a Jehovah's Witness spokesman, the real culprit is not the army, but the Orthodox Church, which has immense powers in the government. "Huks' renew Phillipines struggle THE 'Hukbalahap' movement in the Phillipines which was driven underground after the defection of its leader Luis Taruc in the fifties has now re-emerged under a new leadership and is presently carrying out an armed struggle against the regime of President Marcos.

Workers' management and administrative de-centralisation cannot be reconciled with either an omnipotent secret police, or an omniscient party.

Proletarian democracy, if it means anything at all, must surely mean the right of all tendencies and parties which accept the Yugoslav constitution to function freely and advocate their policies without any fear of administrative reprisal.

Only the release of Djilas and Mihajlov can show how real the change in Yugoslav government policy is. those who think differently,' Rosa Luxemburg once said. Footnote: Mihajlov's associate Dr. Marijan Batinic days been released (after three detention) with an official document stating that his arrest had been illegal.