Australian Regime Rejects Bail for Leftist Political Prisoner!
Free Pro-DPRK Socialist Chan Han Choi!

22 October 2019: Last Friday, NSW Supreme Court Judge Lonergan rejected a bail application made by a political prisoner in Australia, Chan Han Choi. Choi has been imprisoned for the last 22 months for his sympathies for the socialistic DPRK, the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (i.e. “North Korea”). For most of that time he has been imprisoned at Long Bay jail – one of the Australian regime’s most notorious prison camps. On 29 December 2015, in the very same section of Long Bay where Choi is imprisoned – the Prison Hospital/remand centre – Aboriginal prisoner, David Dungay, was killed by six members of the prison riot squad. The heavy set guards crushed Dungay with their combined weight while dismissing Dungay’s repeated desperate cries of “I can’t breathe” as the 26 year-old Dunghutti man gasped for breath. Nearly four years on, the family of David Dungay still have not received any justice, with the coroner only handing down his findings next month. The same racist, rich people’s regime in this country that commits such brutal oppression of Aboriginal people and which oversees the exploitation of the working class by the big end of town has trampled on the rights of Chan Han Choi for nearly two years. Their rejection of Choi’s bail bid is just the latest example of this.

Chan Han Choi is awaiting trial, scheduled to take place next year, on charges of trying to broker deals to enable the people of the DPRK to evade crippling United Nations economic sanctions on that country. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges. Moreover, even the police acknowledge that none of the deals actually went through. Indeed, even their own allegations admit that most of the alleged deals were abandoned by Choi himself or by his alleged DPRK suppliers before police arrested Choi. However, even if he did try to broker deals to help the DPRK export its produce in violation of these sanctions, that would be no crime whatsoever from the standpoint of the working class. In fact, this  would make him an even bigger hero. For as Choi himself stated in a courageous message made from prison: “The United Nations economic sanctions that have been imposed on North Korea are both unjust and unfair.” They prohibit more than 90% of North Korea’s exports as well as import of many key items. As a small country whose land is dominated by steep mountains and harsh winters, the DPRK has always needed to export in order to provide enough food for its population. The prohibition of almost all of North Korea’ exports are, thus, causing shortages of food and medicine for her people. Similar sanctions imposed on Iraq caused the deaths of over 500,000 babies in just the first eight years of their implementation from 1990 onwards. Although the DPRK’s socialistic system has enabled her to avert such catastrophic consequences, the sanctions still cause terrible hardship to her people.

Secondly, the idea that the U.S., Australian and other Western imperialists should get the UN to sanction the DPRK under the pretext of opposing its development of a nuclear deterrence is, frankly, obscene. The U.S. has over 6,000 nuclear warheads, France 300 and Britain 200, whereas the DPRK is said to possess just 30 such warheads (see:  https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Nuclearweaponswhohaswhat) and their capability has not been extensively tested at all. Moreover, North Korea has never unleashed nuclear weapons on human beings before. It was the U.S. imperialists who did that, cheered on by their Australian junior partners, when they heinously dropped atomic bombs on the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan. As for the notion pushed by the imperial powers that North Korea is particularly “dangerous” and thus should be especially prevented from acquiring a nuclear capability, one has only to note that it is not North Korea that destroyed Iraq and killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqi people. No, that was the work of the U.S., British and Australian regimes in their two invasions of Iraq, first in 1991 and then from 2003 onwards. Nor was it North Korea who killed tens of thousands of civilians in Afghanistan including through airstrikes on wedding parties, civilian convoys and hospitals. No, those crimes were committed by the U.S., NATO and Australian forces. The latter (as we are finally starting to hear more details of) killed several Afghan children, executed in cold blood many civilians and murdered unarmed prisoners. The U.S. and NATO got together too – with the assistance of the joint U.S.-Australia spy base at Pine Gap – to devastate Serbia in 1999 and then pummel Libya in 2011 – an onslaught that not only killed tens of thousands of Libyan people but which has left that once peaceful country mired in bloodshed and chaos ever since. North Korea had absolutely nothing to do with those calamities. Yet despite all this, the capitalist powers single out North Korea as the supposedly dangerously reckless country whose people must be ground down with sanctions until she disarms.

The real reason that the DPRK is being targeted is that the imperialist powers that instigated the sanctions regime want to bring down a state that dares to defy their colonial diktats. Furthermore, they want to target the DPRK because it is a socialistic state. They know too that by turning the vice on the DPRK they can also squeeze her neighbour and ally, the Peoples Republic of China – the world’s most powerful socialistic state.  Although the workers states in North Korea and China are bureaucratically deformed and in the latter case weakened also by a significant degree of capitalist intrusion – the existence of states created by anti-capitalist revolutions remain an obstacle to the rich capitalist powers exploiting the masses there the way that they super-exploit the peoples of Indonesia, the Philippines, Bangladesh, Mexico and other ex-colonies. Moreover, the Western powers fear that if the workers states in Cuba, China, North Korea, Vietnam and Laos are allowed to thrive then that would encourage the masses in other former colonies – including the ones raped by Australian corporate bigwigs like PNG, Fiji, East Timor and Indonesia – to have their own revolutions to kick out their imperialist overlords and the corrupt local capitalist ruling classes allied with them.  

Put simply, the socialistic rule, in however an imperfect form, which exists in North Korea and China is bad for the interests of the 5 to 10% of the Australian population that make up the capitalist upper class. However, it is very much in the interests of the vast majority of this country’s – and indeed the world’s – population; that is of the working class and all but the most privileged layers of the middle class. The existence of workers states in North Korea, China, Cuba and Co. can only give encouragement to the struggles for justice of the working class and oppressed in capitalist countries like Australia. It gives the masses here the understanding that capitalist rule is not inevitable and does not need to be put up with. The existence of states with economies centred on public ownership shows working class people that it is possible to have a system based not on the ownership of banks, mines, factories, agricultural land and transport and communications infrastructure by a small class of wealthy private individuals but on common socialist ownership of these means of production by all the people. In China, 70 years of a system where state-owned enterprises continue to play the backbone role has seen the country achieve poverty reduction unheard of in all human history. In North Korea, the system of public ownership of all the main means of production is a great conquest for the masses so that when the crippling sanctions are lifted, when the crushing military vice that she is ensnared in is loosened and when her system of socialist ownership is supplemented by workers democracy, it will enable her people to flourish. This is proven by the achievements made in North Korea in the first decades after the U.S., Australian, South Korean and other capitalist militaries heinously incinerated her cities and killed millions of her people during the 1950-53 Korean War. In those decades after the Korean War, when the former USSR provided the DPRK with a military shield against further imperialist attack, the DPRK – despite (like the PRC) not having the benefit of real workers democracy administering the workers state – was able to achieve tremendous advances in health care, literacy, access to cultural facilities, women’s rights and industrial development.

By opposing the UN economic sanctions on North Korea, Chan Han Choi is standing not only by her people but by the working class majority of Australia and the world. In standing by a system where public ownership plays the dominant role, which is necessarily counterposed to the capitalist system of big end of town-ownership, Choi is, in effect, standing by everyone who has suffered from the job losses, rising prices and deterioration in services that came with rampant privatisation in this country. He is standing by the many, many people still stuck for years on Australian public housing waiting lists or who are paying too high rents in the private sector because governments here have sold off so much public housing. He is standing by the many people who don’t have a secure job or, indeed, any job at all because of the relentless capitalist drive for higher profits in this country; that is, Chan Han Choi is standing by the young workers forced to work as casuals or on short term contracts and by the workers laid off by greedy private corporations or by state utilities overseen by the Australian capitalist state, alike. And since the system of capitalism is the root cause of the heightening racism in this country, Choi’s support for a state counterposed to capitalism puts him on the side of the Aboriginal people facing ever more vicious racist oppression and with the Muslim, Chinese, Sudanese and other non-white communities in Australia being stigmatised today. So, we should all in turn stand by socialist political prisoner Chan Han Choi. Let us mobilise in mass actions to demand the dropping of all charges against Chan Han Choi and the lifting of all UN economic sanctions on the socialistic DPRK.

It’s About Economic Sanctions on the People of North Korea and
Not About Weapons of Mass Destruction

An Australian citizen who migrated from South Korea 32 years ago, Choi began volunteering his services as a trade representative for North Korea more than a dozen years ago. He accomplished some pretty big deals that earnt the people of North Korea badly needed hard currency in the years before progressively tightening sanctions on the DPRK restricted legal trade. According to the AFP’s own “Statement of Facts”, two 2008 deals alone, for the export of iron ore and coal from North Korea, brought in $1.3 million. Despite legally bringing in large sums of money for the people of North Korea, Choi himself lived a humble life. The police note that at the time of his arrest he had no property in Australia and only $6,000 in savings. He lived in a modest rented home in Eastwood and worked as a hospital cleaner earning just around $750 a week. His brokering work was done not for any personal gain but out of a humanitarian impulse to help the DPRK’s people and out of political solidarity with the DPRK.

The AFP allege that after the sanctions restricted most of the DPRK’s exports, Choi continued to attempt to broker the sale of DPRK commodities. Most of the charges against him relate to alleged attempts to export coal or iron ore from the DPRK to entities in third countries including Indonesia, Vietnam and South Korea. However, the Australian government have tried to hype up the case as one of a Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) matter by focusing on one of the charges which alleges that Choi tried to broker the sale of North Korean short-range missiles. This charge of “Providing Services for WMD Program” is highly misleading as Choi is not even alleged to have tried to broker the sale of any WMD material – like nuclear, chemical or biological weapons. Moreover, this charge is based on the most tenuous of claims. Even the AFP’s allegations acknowledge that the alleged negotiations to sell the missiles was cancelled due to “machinations internal to the DPRK” – in other words, even the AFP have to accept that the alleged plan was scrapped at Choi’s end. This ending of the alleged plan occurred some three and a half months before Choi was arrested. When Choi was arrested, even if one believes the AFP’s claims, there was no attempt to sell short-range missiles taking place at all.

Yet the Australian government and the AFP have played up this charge related to short-range missiles, which is basically an accusation of a thought crime, in order to distract from the fact that Choi’s imprisonment is really a matter about the cruel economic sanctions on the people of North Korea. The mainstream media have played their part in this diversion. News reports last year stated that Choi was accused of helping to import materials for the DPRK’s WMD program. Yet the AFP do not even allege this. Indeed, all the allegations against Choi relate not to import of material to the DPRK but to export of items from there, with the sole exception of a more recently imposed charge that Choi tried to arrange the import of petroleum products to the DPRK. To try to get WMD’s into the picture the AFP have to do some rather extreme stretching of their “evidence.” For example, they claim that a five minute DPRK propaganda video which Choi E-mailed the link of to an associate was evidence that Choi was advertising the DPRK’s weapons … since the political propaganda video happened to include the firing of missiles!

To be sure, it is not wrong for an embattled workers state – especially when it is facing sanctions so crippling that it threatens to cause the starvation of some of her people – to try and raise some badly needed funds through weapons sales. It should be noted that the AFP’s rather flimsy allegations about Choi attempting to broker weapons sales claim that his brokering activities took place in a period when the sanctions had reached ultra-severe levels and when Donald Trump was threatening the people of North Korea with “fire and fury like the world has never seen.” Moreover, it is the height of hypocrisy for the Australian regime to be repressing others for allegedly selling weapons. The right-wing Coalition has openly proclaimed its intention to make Australia a top ten global arms exporter. Meanwhile, as an exposé by the Guardian revealed, Australian company Electro Optics Systems (EOS) has shipped large quantities of weapons to the militaries of Saudi Arabia and the UAE – the very militaries which have been spearheading the brutal Saudi-led war on Yemen that has killed over 100,000 people, displaced another three million people and brought mass starvation in what is today the world’s worst humanitarian disaster (see: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jul/25/australian-weapons-shipped-to-saudi-and-uae-as-war-rages-in-yemen). Among the weapons that Canberra allows EOS to sell to the murderous Saudi and UAE militaries is the R400s weapons station for remotely operating missile launchers and cannons.

Confused by all the hype surrounding the tenuous claims that Choi tried to broker the sale of North Korean missiles, a couple of Australian Chinese-language community newspapers erroneously headlined that Choi is accused of selling weapons to Taiwan. This is because the individual dealer whom the police alleged Choi negotiated with to arrange the sale to happened to be based in Taiwan. However, this person, one Raymond Chao, has no connection whatsoever with the Taiwanese government and the police themselves allege that “CHAO desired to obtain missiles and missile technology through the offices of the Accused and to produce and sell these missiles around the world” – in other words, not at all to the Taiwanese government. When Choi heard about these incorrect headlines he was upset as they mis-represented his political stance which includes strong sympathy for the Peoples Republic of China. Therefore, Choi asked his supporters to broadcast the following statement:

• That he, Chan Han Choi is a strong supporter of the PRC, which is a longtime friend of the DPRK.
• That he has never had any dealings with the Taiwanese government whatsoever.
• That any discussions he has had about commercial deals between the DPRK and entities in Taiwan have been with non-government individuals who have no connections, whatsoever, to the government of Taiwan.
• That he, Chan Han Choi, strongly believes in one China.
• That he opposes all weapons sales to the Taiwanese regime and has never himself tried to sell to this regime.

What the Police Claim Were Their Reasons for Opposing Bail

To realise how unfair the court’s rejection of Choi’s bail application is, consider this: not only has Choi never had a criminal conviction but there are no victims in the “crimes” that Choi is alleged to have committed. He is not accused of killing anyone, bashing anyone, sexually assaulting anyone, stealing from anyone nor is he even accused of espionage. Thus, he would have been of zero threat to the community had he been released on bail. By contrast, George Pell who was accused – and then convicted – of a heinous sexual assault against a child was granted bail prior to his trial. This despite having access to massive financial backing and powerful friends with the capacity to allow him to flee the jurisdiction. The fact is that the justice system in this country does not at all treat everyone equally and as impartially as it claims. Rather, the justice system is a core part of state machinery that has been brought under the control of the wealthy capitalist class in order to serve its interests against those of the working class masses and their supporters. That is why greedy construction industry bosses in Australia get away with no criminal punishment for neglecting workplace safety to such a degree that on average over 30 construction industry workers are killed on the job every year. Yet representatives from the CFMMEU construction workers union get hit with criminal convictions, fines and potential jail terms just for standing up for workers’ safety and “illegally” inspecting unsafe work sites. We have a legal system where the ABCC “independent” construction industry watchdog slapped 99.2% of its huge $4.25 million in fines last financial year on workers and their union and just 0.08% on the filthy rich and notoriously criminal-infested construction industry bosses! Meanwhile, the state machinery here bent its own rules to enable billionaire James Packer’s Crown Group to set up an exclusive, six-star hotel and casino complex at Sydney’s Barangaroo despite Crown’s links to criminal-connected entities. Yet, in the process of forcibly relocating public housing tenants from the previously thriving working class community in nearby Millers Point in order to make the surroundings of Packer’s luxury resort more “compatible” with his project, state bureaucrats and tribunal judges bullied elderly working class tenants. This is the same state apparatus that is persecuting Chan Han Choi!

We cannot bring you the reasons that the judge gave for rejecting Choi’s bail application, as the judge has placed the details of that decision under a temporary non-publication order. However, we can say that the Prosecution’s main argument for opposing bail is that Choi would be a flight risk. Yet the truth is that Choi does not want to flee, because he wants to fight the charges and in the process expose the cruelty and unfairness of the economic sanctions on the DPRK, reveal all the violation of basic rights that he has endured and more (and that “more” could be politically explosive!). That is why Choi has refused to accept any offers for a plea bargain.

One of the most infuriating aspects of the Crown’s opposition to Choi’s bail application is that it included in good part an argument that Choi has few community ties in Australia because he has had “significantly diminished contact with his immediate family” since his arrest. Yet that “significantly diminished contact” is because of the actions of and decisions enforced by the Australian regime itself! One way they have achieved Choi’s isolation from his own family is by banning Choi – whose English is limited – from speaking in Korean to his wife – whose English is even poorer. At the start of his incarceration, prison guards would listen in on his phone calls and then cut the line if he and his wife inadvertently broke into Korean. Then on 22 February of this year, the regime got even nastier. Two officers from the Corrections Intelligence Group visited Choi and informed him that should he speak in Korean again he would be sent to Goulburn Supermax prison. Choi soon found out that he could not communicate with his wife in any meaningful way now and it was risky too – an inadvertent break into Korean could see him isolated in Goulburn Supermax. So that line of communication became completely cut. Meanwhile, in the classic guilt by association mantra of all repressive regimes, when Choi was arrested his adult son’s house was also raided and his son subjected to a threatening interrogation. Although police did not charge his son they made it clear that any support for, or association with, his father could see him in trouble. They also told him that he would no longer be able to work in any white collar jobs and had him sacked from a highly skilled role at a multinational IT hardware, infrastructure firm. Thus, his son has been effectively barred from communication with Choi. It is this isolation from his only child and the knowledge that his son’s career has been dealt a severe blow by the authorities that is the most painful part of the persecution that political prisoner Chan Han Choi has endured. To highlight the depth of the authorities’ efforts to isolate Choi from his family, the Australian regime also barred Choi’s application to be able to call even his daughter-in-law. And then they have the hide to say that he shouldn’t get bail because he has had “significantly diminished contact with his immediate family”!

The Persecution of Chan Han Choi and
Growing State Repression in Australia

In the Commonwealth DPP’s submission opposing the bail application of Chan Han Choi, they list the reasons for why they argue that the “Applicant’s alleged offending is objectively serious.” Their first point is about the maximum penalties for the alleged offences. However, number two on their list is “the Applicant’s repeated statements that he is a loyal subject of the DPRK.” In other words, because of Chan Han Choi’s open and proud sympathy for the socialistic DPRK his offences should be considered more serious than they otherwise would be! This is blatant political discrimination! Theoretically, according to Australia’s claimed pseudo-“democratic” legal system everyone is equal regardless of their political views. Now, of course, we know that this is not at all the case in real life. But in Choi’s bail hearing, the Australian regime was so brazen as to declare that because someone is a supporter of the DPRK they should have less rights than others. This dovetails with a rapidly intensifying Cold War witch-hunt going on in Australia against those who support socialistic states. The main targets of that witch-hunt have been people sympathetic to the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) or even those in the Chinese community accused of simply being not hostile enough to Red China. Chinese international students who have spoken out in support of the PRC – for example, by expressing opposition to supporters of the right-wing, pro-colonial riots in Hong Kong – have been demonised by the government and mainstream media as having “interfered” in Australian internal affairs. Most sinisterly, a few weeks ago the Australian government announced the creation of a new taskforce to look into “foreign interference” on Australian campuses. The “foreign interference” laws brought in last year are themselves a way to intimidate supporters of socialistic China. As the persecution of Chan Han Choi for his outspoken sympathy for the DPRK shows, the new anti-communist McCarthyite witch-hunt targets not only supporters of the world’s largest socialistic state. Who will be next attacked in Australia? Supporters of socialistic Cuba? People who advocate the policies practiced in the socialistic states like state ownership of the banks and extensive public housing? Sympathisers with the left-wing protest movement currently rocking Chile and Ecuador?

The forces of Cold War repression in Australia seem to also have supporters of Chan Han Choi in their sites. Point 20 of the Crown’s submissions opposing Choi’s bail application states that:

On two occasions when the Applicant’s matter has been before Central Local Court for mention, supporters have attended with one of them wearing a t-shirt bearing the flag of the DPRK above the words “See you in Pyongyang” which was displayed prominently (the first time, in the foyer of the court; the second time, in the body of the court during the mention of the matter) and then covered up. On the first occasion, those supporters also photographed the outside of the court including members of the Prosecution who were walking down the steps and then immediately attending an internet café before splitting up.

The comrades involved in this highly “subversive” act of “wearing a t-shirt bearing the flag of the DPRK” and then “attending an internet cafe” immediately after attending court said that they were in the Internet cafe and then talked together outside for a combined period of over an hour before “splitting up.” That means that the AFP/ASIO officers who stalked them not only tailed them the hundreds of metres from the court to the internet cafe but also carried out surveillance on them for over an hour! And how is this relevant to a bail submission? Not at all! The Crown’s only motive in putting this in a public bail submission would be to send a message to Choi’s supporters that they are being followed. Certainly, intimidation of political opponents is a central part of the modus operandi of the AFP. Just two months before Chan Han Choi was arrested, the AFP intimidated the entire workers movement when they conducted heavy-handed raids on the Sydney and Melbourne offices of the Australian Workers Union over trumped up allegations about union donations to political campaigns more than twelve years ago. Then in June, the AFP launched a threatening raid on the home of Murdoch journalist, Annika Smethhurst, over her story explaining how the government was considering extending the role of the Australian Signals Directorate from spying on foreign entities to targeting Australian citizens. That was followed up the next day by an even more high profile AFP raid. This time the AFP raided ABC headquarters in response to an ABC exposé of some of the war crimes committed by Australian special forces troops in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, it is the same AFP and Commonwealth DPP who are prosecuting Choi who are also prosecuting Witness K, the former Australian intelligence agent who revealed to journalists how the ASIS spy agency had bugged East Timorese government buildings in order to give the Australian government – and the corporations, like Woodside, that it was acting on behalf of – the advantage in maritime boundary and oil resource negotiations with East Timor. Witness K and his lawyer, Bernard Collaery, today face imprisonment for their decent act of revealing to the world this bullying, colonialist outrage. The same forces persecuting Choi, Witness K and Collaery are also prosecuting David McBride, the military lawyer who blew the whistle on war crimes by Australian troops in Afghanistan.

Yet, it is not only the AFP that is engaged in repressing whistleblowers and dissidents. The whole Australian capitalist regime is being unleashed. Three weeks ago, home affairs minister Peter Dutton responded to climate change protests by calling for participants who receive welfare benefits to have their payments cut and for mandatory jail sentences for protesters who disrupt traffic. Of course, the regime here is not against all protests. They never made the kind of attacks that Dutton has fired off against climate change protesters against those who participated in the violent racist, “Reclaim Australia” protests a few years ago. And they are all for the anti-Red China riots in Hong Kong that has seen rich kid rioters vandalise subway stations, smash shops and assault supporters of the PRC. Prominent hard right Liberal MP, Tim Wilson, even went all the way to Hong Kong to join a march of these right-wing rioters. Yet any protest, whistleblowing or action in Australia that in the slightest way undermines the interests of the big end of town and the regime that serves it is facing the threat of growing repression. Just ask the many staunch trade unionists in Australia who are being hauled through the courts at an ever increasing rate!

It is true that the Australian regime’s attacks on our trade unions, their persecution of whistleblowers and journalists and their persecution of people sympathizing with socialistic China and – in the case of Chan Han Choi – with the socialistic DPRK are each different in their own way. Yet, there is a common thread to them and common root causes. One key root cause is that the capitalist system is, on the one hand, increasingly unable to provide secure jobs for most workers – especially young workers – while, on the other, is heading towards another steep economic downturn. The second fundamental factor – which is accentuated by the first – is that the insecure imperialist ruling classes are driven to intensify their Cold War against socialistic China and her DPRK ally. In this context, the nervous capitalist rulers in Australia, like their counterparts abroad, are gradually moving to constrict the political rights of the masses, intimidate dissidents and whistleblowers and suppress the voice of those who uphold an alternative system to capitalism. And they are so hell-bent on this course that even mainstream Murdoch and government-owned media journalists who have themselves done so much to feed the anti-PRC Cold War are themselves sometimes targeted if they occasionally do an investigative report that, in some way, contradicts the narrative that’s being pushed by the ruling class.

Of course, it is hardly a surprise that the Australian and other capitalist states should play this role. After all, that is what they were built up for in the first place! The “democracy” that supposedly exists in this country is only a democracy for the rich. For not only are the state organs tied by thousands of threads to the ultra-rich, the “democratic” and electoral processes are dominated by the capitalist class. It is they who own the media, who are able to sway politicians and bureaucrats with the enticement of future high-paying jobs in the corporations that they own and who have the immense wealth that allows them to disproportionately fund political parties, pay for political advertising and hire lobbyists. And we know too that when the working class masses show signs of rising up, the “democratic” capitalists will not baulk at turning to would-be military dictators or fascist extremists lurking on the edges if that is what it takes to save their class rule – the way they did in Mussolini’s Italy, Hitler’s Germany, Suharto’s Indonesia and Pinochet’s Chile. So when one hears that the AFP/ASIO is, on the one hand, stalking left-wing supporters of Choi and, on the other hand, doing almost nothing to curb violent far-right racists – they did not even have the Australian fascist terrorist who ended up murdering 51 people in the NZ mosque shootings under any sort of surveillance despite him making many violent threatening statements online – one should not be surprised. However, we should not be indifferent to the growing political repression in this country. In the struggle for the improvement in the lives of the working class and oppressed we need to utilise every democratic right that exists – however tenuous those rights may be – especially since many of these rights were won in struggle by the masses. That is why everyone who supports the rights of the working class and downtrodden – regardless of whether they agree with Choi’s politics or not – and everyone who opposes the growing political repression in Australia must stand against the blatantly political persecution of Chan Han Choi. This as part of defending all those targeted by the rising authoritarian wave. We must demand: Drop all charges against Chan Han Choi, David McBride, Witness K and Bernard Collaery!  Stop the Australian regime’s persecution of whistleblowers and investigative journalists! Resist the new Cold War, McCarthyist witch-hunt of supporters of socialistic China and her DPRK ally! 

Mobilise Mass Action to Demand Freedom for Chan Han Choi

When one steps back and looks at the picture of what is happening in Australia – Cold War witch-hunting, union-busting and targeting of whistleblowers and investigative journalists – the real reason why the Commonwealth DPP opposed bail for Choi is apparent. And this has little to do with a genuine fear that he would try to abscond. Rather, it is an attempt to silence Choi so that his opposition to the cruel UN sanctions will not be heard and so that he will not be able to further energise his growing base of supporters. The AFP actually gave this away in their own “Statement of Facts.” In it they state that the “AFP opposes the Accused being granted bail, for the following reasons” and then give as one of the reasons the following:

The Accused has made numerous statements while in custody, which have been posted online to YouTube, through which the Accused apportions blame onto others for his incarceration, and portrays himself as a “political prisoner”:

 i. sanctions against the DPRK are unfair and unjust;

 ii. he has been denied “basic human rights”;

 iii. he has “supporters” (groups and individuals) located in Australia and worldwide;

 iv. other evidence against the DPRK has been “faked”; and

 v. his arrest is a “political matter” instigated by the South Korean Government and perpetrated with the cooperation of the Australian Government;

In other words, the AFP is saying that Choi expressing such political views, including his opposition to the economic sanctions on the DPRK, is a reason to deny him bail!

From the time that then prime minister Malcolm Turnbull commented on Choi’s arrest with the extreme claim that, “North Korea is a dangerous, reckless criminal regime threatening the peace of the region” to the AFP’s opposition to bail being granted to Choi in good part based on his sympathy for the socialistic DPRK and his outspoken opposition to the sanctions against her, the arrest and imprisonment of Chan Han Choi has been a saga of Cold War anti-communist persecution. That is why even within the parameters of unjust laws enforcing the UN sanctions, there is no way that Chan Han Choi can get a fair trial. For one, the statements by the then highest political officer in the country, Malcolm Turnbull, which as good as pronounced Choi guilty and associated his arrest with a rabid rant against the state that Choi is sympathetic to has prejudiced any jury that would sit on Choi’s upcoming trial. Moreover, the ongoing special restrictions on Choi in prison limit his ability to properly prepare and adequately brief his legal team for his trial. For example, recent attempt by his lawyers to mail crucial legal documents to Choi were blocked from getting through. Moreover, since late last year he has not been permitted to even telephone his own lawyers. After being blocked from visiting him for several months, Choi’s lawyers now have clearance to visit him in custody but at the time of writing the Korean interpreters needed to make any legal visit meaningful have not received clearance to accompany his legal representatives. Meanwhile, Choi’s legal team have still not received funding for the Korean interpreters essential to preparing Choi’s defence. This is almost certainly no accident. It bears an eerie resemblance to what is going on in another case of political persecution – that of Witness K. As of late August, Witness K’s counsel angrily announced that his client had received almost no funding from Legal Aid despite having applied for it more than a year previously! Witness K’s counsel, Haydn Carmichael, accused Legal Aid of an “extraordinary unexplained roadblock.”

What has happened throughout Choi’s incarceration gives zero confidence that the authorities are going to change course and allow him to properly prepare for his trial. When Choi was first arrested, following an initial visit from a lawyer soon after his arrest, he went through an approximately 50 day period when he was prevented from having visits from anyone at all – including lawyers, family and friends. His current lawyer was able to visit in mid-September last year soon after she took on the case. However, once it became clear that she was not going to roll over and push Choi into pleading guilty, not only did Choi’s right to call her get taken away but her visits and those of any interpreter faced repeated obstruction. After having been able to have an initial visit to Choi, suddenly she had to apply for a security clearance to visit Choi as did Korean-English interpreters. As a result, in the one year period following their initial visit to Choi in mid-September 2018, Choi’s lawyers were only able to visit him twice in jail and only one of those visits were with an interpreter. For periods, even attempts by Choi’s lawyers to have audio-visual links with him (which are no substitute for visits as they do not allow for the practical joint perusal and discussion of legal documents) were delayed for months on the grounds that even such communication with Choi needed approval by the Commissioner of Prisons. In contrast, in the early-middle part of last year, when Choi had a government appointed lawyer that was pushing him to plead guilty, that lawyer was able to visit with an interpreter without any obstruction and was able to have weekly visits to Choi.

Realising that he cannot get a fair trial, Choi has put in a motion for a Permanent Stay in proceedings. If successful such a motion will mean that, on the grounds that he cannot get due process, his trial will be put on hold indefinitely and he will be released from custody. One additional reason why Choi made this application for Permanent Stay is that it appears that – and he seems to have legal documents to prove this – the AFP have submitted documentary “evidence” with crucial information deleted from the documents without even informing the defence that they – or their source – have made such deletions. When the AFP raided ABC headquarters in June, they did so under a search warrant that allowed them to “add, copy, delete or alter other data … found in the course of a search.” Did their warrant to arrest Choi have similar provisions and are they now putting the “delete” option into practice? Or did they or their source (likely to be from South Korean or perhaps U.S. intelligence) do this anyway? Stay tuned to hear a lot more about this later!

The problem facing Chan Han Choi in his Permanent Stay motion is that the court that will hear this motion is itself part of the biased, capitalist state machinery that makes it impossible for him to get a fair trial in the first place. That is why only mass action on the streets in support of Choi can make the Australian capitalist state pull back from their course to railroad him into a long sentence through an unfair prosecution. The good thing is that support for Choi is building every day. Even now, Chan Han Choi can be proud that through his brave stance in support of the DPRK, his refusal to plead guilty and his outspoken opposition to the economic sanctions imposed on the people of North Korea, new people have been energised in opposition to the sanctions and in defence of the socialistic DPRK. Thus, the last protest action six months ago in support of Choi and in opposition to the economic sanctions on North Korea was not only the first actual street march with a pro-DPRK content in several decades in Australia, it was also the biggest pro-DPRK action in Australia in at least the last four decades … and possibly ever.

The Australian regime are clearly rattled by the support that is building for Choi. Indeed the AFP even note the 13 April  Free Chan Han Choi march in the latest version of their “Statement of Facts”:

The AFP allege the Accused’s “supporters”, including members of the Trotskyist Platform, Aust-DPRK Solidarity, Australia-DPRK Friendship Society, Stalin Society of Australia, the Irish Republican socialist group the James Connolly Association, Young Communists – Western Sydney and the Lebanese Communist Party, held a rally on 13 April 2019 in support of the Accused describing him a “left-wing political prisoner”. This group declares that the Accused, even if guilty, would not be a considered a criminal from that group’s standpoint.

That those persecuting Choi are rattled by the growing support for him should only encourage us to work still harder to build broader and deeper forces to fight for his freedom. The capitalist regime really believe that everyone buys their propaganda. That is why they thought that persecuting Choi would be a piece of cake, a walk in the park that no one would oppose. Yet for militant trade unionists who know that this regime lies when it attacks their unions, why should they then believe what this regime says about the DPRK or about other international questions. Similarly, for public housing tenants being stigmatised and unemployed workers being vilified by the regime as lazy alcoholics and drug addicts, why should they believe what this same regime says in its attacks on North Korea when they know that this regime lies about them? And for Aboriginal people whose family and friends have been killed by state forces in custody, there is no reason to believe what this racist, rich people’s regime says about North Korea or any other question for that matter when this very same regime tries to pass off the killing of their family and friends as “accidents.” That is why the people who have most reason to distrust and oppose the Australian capitalist regime are coming together to support Chan Han Choi. Those committed to opposing the growing repression in Australia, people who understand that public ownership of the economy is the only road to advancement for working class people and opponents of imperialist bullying of the ex-colonies must come together in ever stronger actions to demand freedom for Chan Han Choi and an end to the brutal economic sanctions on the people of North Korea.