Common announcement of 16 Communist Youth Organisations after the 19th Meeting of European Communist Youth Organisations
Following the 19th MECYO, the undersigned organisations declare:
UNITED WE STAND AGAINST WAR, POVERTY, OPPRESSION, AND
CAPITALIST EXPLOITATION — TOGETHER WE WILL BUILD A SOCIALIST
EUROPE IN SOLIDARITY WITH THE WORLD’S PEOPLES!
The communist youth organisations participating in the 19th Meeting of European Communist Youth Organisations in London note the decay of the capitalist system subjecting youth and the working classes to war, poverty and oppression across the globe. We stand in solidarity with the youth and peoples of Palestine, with the peoples of Ukraine and Russia, and all those who resist imperialism and capitalist exploitation. We salute the millions of young people who have been mobilising all across Europe against the genocide of the Palestinian people and the complicity of their governments, against imperialist wars, and to defend their rights.
A few days before the 108th anniversary of the October Revolution, which brought the working class to power in the first socialist state in human history, we reiterate that the temporary victory of the counterrevolution is not the end of history. Today, as the irreconcilable contradictions of capitalism threaten to drag the peoples into the abyss of imperialist war, and new waves of class struggle emerge, we call on the youth and workers of Europe to organise and to fight for another future free from the chains of exploitation and profit — socialism.
Barbarism is capitalism’s only offer to workers. The arms race and growing militarism in Europe are a consequence of the growing competition between the bourgeois classes for control of markets and market shares, strategic territories, spheres of influence, trade and supply routes, energy and mineral resources and, ultimately, for supremacy in the international capitalist system.
War is one manifestation of the increasing aggression of imperialism. This barbarism is evidenced, among other things, by the global plans of the USA and NATO, which aim at safeguarding the interests of American and European monopoly capital against their rivals, as well as by the genocide unleashed by the murderous state of Israel on the people of Palestine in Gaza, who would have stood alone if not for the solidarity of peoples around the world.
The fragile ceasefire in the Gaza Strip advances Trump’s plan to convert Gaza into a US-Israeli protectorate and seeks to bury the Palestinians’ right to a truly independent state. The EU seeks to play a role in the ‘day after’ plans, vying for a share of the spoils and for the strengthening of its geopolitical footholds in the wider region. In Ukraine, the conflict of the US-NATO-EU with capitalist Russia, which is rooted in the bourgeois classes’ rivalries over control of Ukraine’s mineral wealth, energy and commodity transport routes, and geopolitical footholds, has led to hundreds of thousands of deaths and 25 million displaced people. To fund the war preparations, alongside militarisation and armament, the bourgeois classes across Europe are demanding sacrifices and deprivation in the name of the ‘war economy’, slashing public spending at the expense of education, housing and healthcare. This is choking the youth and working class whilst lining the pockets of the arms industry.
The war in Ukraine is a consequence of heightened contradictions around the world leading to increased military expenditure on all sides. EU-NATO governments are realising the Lisbon Treaty commitment to coordinate arms production across Europe. The Russian government mirrors these policies by stripping social spending in favour of military budgets and strengthening monopoly capital. Europe’s ‘ReArm EU’ plan agreed an additional €800 billion for military spending at the UK-EU summit in May 2025. This will loosen fiscal rules, ensure the joint procurement of defence projects and enlarge the role of the European Investment Bank in funding militarisation and rearmament. The expansion of NATO membership to include Finland and Sweden, the increase in the required percentage of GDP expenditure for NATO membership, and the expansion of procurement and production of arms are all products of the sharpening antagonisms in the world imperialist system.
Underpinning this are the ‘Russian threat’ to invade European countries on one side, and NATO expansion threatening Russian security on the other, used to justify the war which serves the interests of monopoly capital on all sides. The drive to war is backed by parties across the spectrum of bourgeois politics — conservative, far right, social-democratic and green parties. Efforts by either side to dehumanise peoples through nationalist propaganda or collective vilification must be condemned, as they serve only to deepen division and obscure the class interests driving the conflict.
European governments, including those of the EU and NATO have consistently added fuel to the fire of war. Young communists call on the peoples of all our countries to join the struggle against the involvement of our governments in the war in Ukraine, for the withdrawal of our countries from NATO and all imperialist alliances, for a ceasefire and an end to hostilities between Russia and Ukraine, while knowing that a lasting peace will not be possible without the struggle against imperialism. There is no such thing as imperialist peace. The most devastating consequences of the war are borne by the working class in Ukraine and Russia, whose rights and living conditions are being eroded. We oppose sanctions used as tools of capitalist aggression that primarily harm the working classes across all countries while serving the profit interests of monopoly capital in energy markets and other sectors. We condemn the vulgar plans for the division of Ukraine’s territories and resources in favour of capital, which demonstrate the predatory nature of imperialism. We reiterate that just peace can only be guaranteed by the peoples taking their destinies into their own hands.
We continue to condemn the rehabilitation of fascism and Nazism in Ukraine and other European countries, as well as the current attacks on democratic rights and repression of communists and progressive forces in Ukraine, Russia and elsewhere in Europe. We condemn the organisation in Saint Petersburg, Russia in September 2025 of a world fascist ‘Paladins’ congress in which fascist organisations from all across Europe took part.
We condemn the falsification of history including historical revision of the nature of the victory in the Second World War, the misappropriation of communist history and symbols by the government of the Russian Federation, and the neglect and destruction of anti-fascist memorials across Europe. We reaffirm the true legacy of the Communist movement that has always struggled against fascism as the most reactionary offspring of the capitalist system, and honour the innumerable sacrifices that communists made in common struggle against Nazi-fascism and its barbarism in the Second World War.
At the same time, we will continue to stand with the Palestinian people in their just struggle for freedom and liberation. Britain, France, and other European states have recently recognised a Palestinian state along the 1967 lines. As the atrocities and famine continue in Gaza, this does not begin to address the complicity of European states in the genocide, who continue to supply arms to Israel. Young communists support the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people, their right of return and their right to resistance against occupation. We call on the workers, the people and the youth in all countries to intensify the struggle to stop the genocide, and to end the occupation of Palestine by Israel, to express their firm solidarity with the just struggle of the Palestinians, to the struggle through which the peoples of the Middle East can achieve their right to live in peace. We express solidarity and support to the Palestinian popular resistance which includes youth, workers’ and communist organisations, as well as those in Israel that are facing repression and persecution from their own government, in their struggle to stop the genocidal plans of the State of Israel and for peace, equality and justice. We condemn the repression faced by working youth and students standing in solidarity with Palestine, while those complicit in the genocide walk free. We stand in solidarity with all those who have been wrongfully imprisoned and prosecuted for taking action against imperialism.
Class struggle is the working classes’ only antidote to the barbarism of capitalism, a system based on exploitation that cannot be ‘managed’ in favour of the people. The reality of this system does not change whether we have a liberal, conservative, or social-democratic government. Young and working people will not bow down passively to the destitution, evermore rising costs- of-living, exploitation and oppression imposed upon us by the ruling capitalist class. We, the communist youths of Europe, have been, are, and will be in the forefront of the struggles of youth, students, the working class and its trade unions, for better salaries, rights and conditions in the workplaces, for free and public education and healthcare, for the right to housing, culture, rest, sport, against precarity and insecurity. At the same time, we must be prepared to tackle the ruling class offensive of stoking racism and nationalism to divide the working class of Europe. The fight against these divisions is inseparable from the class struggle because they are a method by which the ruling class maintains the class relations necessary to uphold capitalist exploitation. Our weapon is proletarian internationalism in the common struggle of the peoples against capitalist exploitation.
It is our duty to show the youth of Europe that there is a world beyond capitalism, that the material conditions have matured for workers to take power into their own hands and build a world of peace and social justice, eliminating the exploitation of man by man — where planned development and technical and scientific progress meet the needs of the working class, humanity and the planet, rather than the chaos caused by the pursuit of maximum profit in capitalism.
The united front of the working class and the poor popular strata against imperialism, led by the communist movements of Europe in cooperation with anti-imperialist and peace movements, is needed to fight for a socialist Europe free from imperialism, free from exploitation and oppression.
We must strengthen and develop our joint struggle in internationalism to build the world of peace, solidarity and prosperity of peoples — the world of socialism and communism.
The Organisations signing the statement:
- Communist Youth of Austria (KJÖ)
- Young Communist League (YCL), Britain
- United Democratic Youth Organisation (EDON), Cyprus
- Communist Youth Union (KSM), Czech Republic
- Mouvement Jeunes Communistes de France (MCJF)
- Socialist German Workers’ Youth (SDAJ)
- Communist Youth of Greece (KNE)
- Connolly Youth Movement (CYM), Ireland
- Workers’ Party Youth (WPY), Ireland
- Front of Communist Youth (FGC), Italy
- Communist Youth Movement (CJB), Netherlands
- Union of Socialist Youth (UTS), Romania
- Revolutionary Communist Youth League (Bolsheviks), RKSM(b), Russia
- Collectives of Young Communists (CJC), Spain
- Communist Youth of Sweden (SKU)
- Communist Youth of Turkey (TKG)
