After a very successful first day the congress delegates and visitors were in a very excited mood, discussing till late at night the issues raised in the sessions and commissions. Today the comrades gathered for the second day of the congress.

At 10am on Saturday, 10 March, the 31^st Congress of the Pakistani Marxists opened its doors in the impressive Aiwan-i-Iqbal building in Lahore. This year there has been a record participation, exceeding all previous attendance. Over 2,600 people filled the huge hall to full capacity. There were no spare seats upstairs or downstairs and some people had to sit in the passageways.

Preparations for a Historic Congress of Pakistani Marxists are in full swing and a big participation is expected in Aiwan-i-Iqbal on 10, 11 March. Four Draft Documents have been published for this congress and debates are being finalized from branches to regional congress for the four sessions in congress. Documents are also published on our Urdu website www.struggle.com.pk

Fightback and La Riposte supporters converged in Toronto for the May long weekend to attend the annual Fightback national conference. This year, over 40 comrades from Fredericton, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, and Vancouver, with international guests from Britain, were able to attend and discuss the rapid changes occurring around the world. The conference also marked the 10th anniversary of supporters of the ideas of the International Marxist Tendency organizing national meetings in Canada; to begin the conference, a picture from the first conference in 2001 was shown, and comrades could see how far we had come in the past decade.

This year’s national sellers conference of ‘Socialist Appeal’ was held in London on the weekend of April 16th and 17th. Supporters from all over Britain, from Aberdeen to Torbay, came together against the backdrop of a year of class struggle and revolution in Britain and internationally. Without doubt, the conference marked a new period in the development of the Marxist voice.

“There are so few moments of happiness in life. But I have felt happiness in this marvellous congress.” Comment on the congress of The Struggle from Karamat Ali, a veteran from the 1968 revolution.