BOLIVIAN TROTSKYIST LEADER
SEIZED BY POLITICAL POLICE
APRIL 29 -- We have just received word that Dr. Hugo Gonz4lez Moscoso, a well-known Trotskyist leader in Bolivia, was arrested by the Bolivian secret police on April 13. The Santa Cruz Diaria del Oriente reported in its April 15 issue that "In a joint operation lasting several days, the police and the DIC ([Direccién Investigaci6n Criminal -- the secret police] arrested Hugo Gonz4lez Moscoso...in the home of Dr. Carlos Arancibia, whom he was visiting. According to the authorities, for several days they were following the trail of an unknown person who was closely linked to guerrillas and Communist elements in our city whom he was directing in their activity in order to create problems for the government."
This sensation~mongering about "plots" is plainly exposed for the witchhunt frame-up it is when they come around to reporting the "evidence" for the arrest: "At the headquarters of the DIC they showed journalists documents taken from the home of Gonz4lez. Most of it was Marxist literature coming from China, the USSR and Cuba. He had a file of unpublished articles.. Dr. Gonz4lez upon being interrogated said that he was in Santa Cruz on account of his health."
The "subversive documents" Dr. Gonz4lez possessed consisted of a number of sociological and political studies including "Cuba and Bolivia: Two revolutions, Two Roads -- a Single Victory." This particular article which was singled out as "proof" by the La Paz newspapers as well as the Santa Cruz press, is a chapter for a book commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the Russian Revolution to be published this fall. The collective work will include contributions from Marxist scholars from a number of countries, including the United States.
The Bolivian press in La Pag reported that the DIC said that another proof of Hugo Gonz4lez Moscoso's relations with the guerrillas is the fact that he was found in the town of Santa Cruz. The least medical examination could prove that he was unable to remain at high altitudes such as La Paz, and had
moved to Santa Cruz for health reasons.
Dr. Gonz&lez is cosecretary, with
Guillermo Lora, of the Partido Obrero
Revolucionario (POR -- Revolutionary Work- .
ers party), the Trotskyist party of Boli-
via. He has been one of the staunchest
opponents of the military dictatorship of
General René Barrientos Ortufio.
Barrientos seized power in a "pre-
ventive coup" in November 1964, after
mass protests, including armed clashes
between the miners and the army, threat-
ened to topple Bolivian capitalism. Bar-
rientos aimed at using the army to re-
press the tin miners and drive down their
standard of living. He made a few savage
thrusts in this direction in the summer
of 1965.
During that brutal suppression,
César Lora, Guillermo Lora's brother, a
leader of the miners and a militant Trot-
skyist, was arrested by the army and shot
without trial on July 29, 1965.
Hugo Gonz&lez Moscoso was also ar-
rested in September, 1965, but a wave of
mass protests forced the government to
release him.
The present full-scale witch—hunt
was opened up after Barrientos made him-
self president through a fraudulent elec-
tion on July 3, 1966.
The American press has spent a
great deal of time and space reporti’ ,
the contradictory claims of the Bolivian
government on the outbreak of guerrilla
warfare there. A studious silence has
been maintained when it comes to report-
ing the brutal witch-hunt that the Bar-
rientos dictatorship has been carrying
out, which has intensified since last
January -- long before any claims of guer-
rilla operations.
Barrientos rounded up all the lead-
ers of leftist parties he could find and
deported them to remote villages where
they face death from starvation and ill-
ness. On April 11, he outlawed the Commu-
nist and Revolutionary Workers parties.
STALIN'S DAUGHTER NOT POLITICAL?