#CP100: a century against imperialism and militarism

As part of the Communist Party’s Centenary Red Wedge meetings Johnnie Hunter discusses the legacy of struggle of Britain’s young communists against imperialism and war and the contemporary fights occurring in South America. This is a transcript a speech delivered online on 1 August 2020.

Liberation: the bedrock of anti-colonial struggles in Britain

Robin Talbot talks about the historic anti-imperialist campaign Liberation (formerly the Movement for Colonial Freedom) – and how YCLers can fulfil their own historic role.

Today, Liberation is a small campaign that runs from an office in the ASLEF trade union building not far from the Marx Memorial Library in London. But Liberation, which was known as the Movement for Colonial Freedom until the seventies, has been the bedrock of anti-imperialist and anti-colonial struggles in Britain since its founding conference in 1954. Even before then, its predecessor COPAI organised ruthlessly against British meddling abroad, including its bribery and intimidation of the founder of modern-day Botswana noted in the 2016 film “A United Kingdom”.