Unreservedly we wish all our readers a hapvy Christmas. There are two reasons why we do not need to apologize for doing so. First, our readers, like millions of others, have earned a holiday, and only nigeardly Calvinists would begrudge them their Saturnalia. Second, in a certain sense, when one strips away the commerce, the piety, and the tinsel, it is all dimly in honour of an old revolutionary hero. Few of the parsons will remember what many of our readers will recall, that all this rather silly guff has, buried under it, at its centre, a legend about a notorious political criminal, anti-imperialist, blasphemer and rebel. The celebrations can be relied upon to be secular, convivial, uninterrupted by theological lucubrations. Into the general succession of binges we do not wish to force our way with any kill-joy note of duty: but between them we would like to press certain claims of conscience,
All socialists should take some time at this particular season to think of some present day victims of imperialism, capitalism, repression and fascism, There are thousands whose names we would like to mention: but some can be taken as typical, and we are sure we will not be misunderstood if we choose them as representatives, First, in South Africa, there are Nelson Mandela and his colleagues, Jonathan Sobutwe, and Neville Alexander and his friends. Now they have been joined by Alex Kitson, a member of our own Draughtsmen's Union, and victim of the 'Little Rivonia' trial. We have written at length during the year about all these cases: now we salute brave men whose liberation is our sworn aim, Secondly, in Nigeria, there is Vic Allen and his Nigerian co-phrisoners, viciously rail-roaded into prison by a directionless and hopeless neo-colonialism. Then, in Spain, there are the innumerable victins of Franco. We will be excused if we single out one, the young anarchist Stuart Christie. Carrying an atrocious sentence, Christie is accused of wishing to place bombs under Spanish fascism. The bizarre and disgusting absurdity of such a charge, when levelled by an arch-bomber, assassin of a whole generation of Spanish democrats, partner of Hitler and Mussolini, and architect of Guernica, would only need pointing out in a world whose memory had been abolished. To all these comrades we send our warm fraternal greetings. We hope our readers will write to them, sending messages of encouragement and pledges of assistance, We also hope that the campaigns for their release will be stepped up to a pitch of frenzy in the coming months, and that they will soon be back among us, helping once again in the struggle which has made them its temporary hostages,
Yet not all the fighters on our side are in prison.Through incredible costs of blood and endurance, the new world is carving its emergence. Our salute to the guerillas of Vietnam, of Congo, of Angola, of Guinea, of Venezuela, who are battling to be free! Our warmest greetings to the freedom-fighters of the USA, who in the Mississippi heartland of the past order of things are speaking, and dying, for us} To the socialists and trade unionists of the advanced European countries, our unstinted goodwill! We shall form unbreakable links with all of you, to put a speedy end to the straightening world of capitalism which is bracketed down upon all our backs! And to the workers of the Soviet Union, China, and the other countries of the communist bloc, our fraternal solidarity! In particular, to those who fight for socialist humanism, for the democratic regeneration of socialism, we send our deepest brotherly acclain!}