Rossana Rossanda, who died on 20 September 2020, played an important role in the Italian communist left, first within the Communist Party - from which she was expelled in 1969 - then as director of the newspaper Il Manifesto until 2012.It is said that for a long time in Il Manifesto, a historical communist newspaper, the following refrain was heard: “Is Valentino there?” Is Luigi writing? What does Rossana say?” This trio consisted of Valentino Parlato, Luigi Pintor and Rossana Rossanda. The last of the three left us yesterday at the age of 96, after a long life in the camp of the left and the communist ideals for which she fought. Always defeated in the end.
Gisèle Halimi: A courageous anti-colonialist and feminist lawyer
17 August, byIt was in 2017, so very late in the day, that I truly discovered the extent of the struggles waged by Gisèle Halimi. Having started to campaign on the eve of May 1968, I have always attached a great deal of interest to the leaders of major social movements. I knew that Gisèle Halimi had defended FLN activists during the Algerian war, nothing more. I had followed with enthusiasm the progress of the Bobigny trials in 1972 where young Marie-Claire, accused of having an abortion, was acquitted and that in Aix in 1978 where three rapists of two young Belgian campers, feminists and lesbians, were sentenced by the Court of Assizes of the Bouches du Rhône. For me, Gisèle Halimi, this beautiful “bon chic, bon genre” woman was an excellent advocate for the cause of women, but she was not one of those remarkable feminist activists who inspired me. But after having immersed myself in the book she wrote with Simone de Beauvoir on the case of Djamila Boupacha and the account of the multiple obstacles that she had had to overcome for two years to ensure her defence, I grasped the determination of this woman to denounce torture alongside other intellectuals, in disregard of her safety and that of her family, and more generally the radical nature of her commitment to the fight against all injustices.
Maurice Rajsfus, the last of the righteous
19 June, byMaurice Rajsfus was born in Aubervilliers (Seine St Denis) on 9 April 1928 and died in Antony (Hauts de Seine) on 13 June 2020. His parents were Polish Jews who had arrived in France in the 1920s. He last saw his parents at the age of 14 when they were arrested in the notorious rafle du Vélodrome d’Hiver.
Remembrance of Kevin Keating
5 June, byKevin Keating was born in Baile à tha Cliath (Dublin) Ireland on 29 January 1949 and died there on 8 May 2020. He joined People’s Democracy (Irish section of the Fourth International) in 1980, and remained a Fourth Internationalist until his death as a member of Socialist Democracy.
Carlos Ferra, Historic Pillar of the Socialist, Anti-capitalist Struggle, Has Died
23 May, byWe are very sad to announce the death on May 19 of our comrade Carlos Rubén Ferra MartÃnez (Hermosillo, Sonora, Mexico, 1942 – Mexico City, 2020), a member of the Revolutionary Socialist Coordinating Group, member organization of the Fourth International.
An Appreciation of Neil Davidson (1957-2020)
11 May, bySocialist Resistance and supporters of the Fourth International were deeply saddened by the recent death of Scottish Marxist writer and activist Neil Davidson from a brain tumour.
Remembering George Shriver
10 May, byGeorge Shriver was born in India in 1936 of missionary parents. He died April 24, 2020 in Tucson, Arizona. Having joined the Socialist Workers’ Party in his 20s, he was a lifelong Fourth Internationalist.
Pierre Granet has left us
9 MayPierre Granet was born on 6 Septembre 1949 in Marseilles and died on 2 May 2020 in Toulouse. He became politically active as a high-school student in Cannes from 1963, notably in soldiarity with the Algerian revolution . He rapidly joined the JCR and the PCI, then French section of the Fourth International, and remained an active militant until the end of his life, as member of the LCR then the NPA. This tribute was written by his comrades from Toulouse.
"It is the Henri Weber who sang the Internationale with Higelin that we mourn, not the one at the service of the political apparatus of the PS"
2 May, byHenri Weber was born in Leninabad (now Khujand), Tajikistan, Soviet Union on 23 June 1944. His Polish-Jewish parents had left Poland at the time of the German-Soviet pact but, refusing to become Soviet citizens, were sent to labour camp where he was born. They returned to Poland after the war but four years later left because of prevailing anti-semitism and moved to France. As a student in Paris Weber was recruited by Alain Krivine and became a leading member of the Jeunesse Communiste Révolutionnaire (JCR) and of the Ligue Communiste (subsequently Ligue Communiste Révolutionnaire LCR), French section of the Fourth International. In the early 1980s he ceased political activity and in 1986 joined the Socialist Party. A member of the leadership of the Socialist Party, he held elected positions as a senator (1995-2004) and then as a member of the European Parliament (2004-2014). He died in Avignon on 26 April 2020 from coronavirus.[IVP]
Luis Sepulveda, revolutionary activist and Chilean writer, has died from Covid-19
23 April, byLuis Sepulveda died on Thursday 16 April in Oviedo (Asturias, in the Spanish state) of Covid-19, which he had contracted at the end of February during a congress of writers in Portugal. Sepulveda was a great writer and his works, translated into more than 60 languages, have enjoyed worldwide success.
Luis Sepulveda was also an activist. Member of the Chilean Communist Party from the age of 12, he quickly moved towards a more revolutionary commitment. In recent years, he had moved away from the debates on the socialist and revolutionary left. Nevertheless he was also very close to us because he had participated, in practice and with arms, in all the debates of the revolutionary movement from the beginning of the 1970s to the mid-1980s.
