Next Thursday, September 19th, the trials against 16 unions of the CNT-AIT (IWA) begin as a consequence of the lawsuits brought by the CNT-CIT (ICL), a union with which we formed a single organisation until less than 10 years ago. We will not go into the reasons for this situation, something we already did 3 years ago in a text entitled ‘Against all odds’. Today our intention is to inform and point out some questions about the content and the meaning of the lawsuits.

The lawsuits seek to force us (through the State) to stop using ‘the name National Confederation of Labour, the initials CNT, its distinctive signs [flags and logos] ... and its emblem [Hercules fighting the Lion of Nemea]’, with the argument that ‘they are registered as National Trademarks’ (at the Spanish Patent and Trademark Office) in the name of the CNT-CIT. They accuse us of supplanting an identity that they claim belongs to them and seek to confuse their potential affiliates by using this historical prestige. But the only certainty is that, of the two parties, the CNT-AIT is the only one that has always made it clear who it is and to which international it belongs (the International Workers' Association founded in 1922). About the CNT-CIT, on the other hand, one could almost say that they deliberately hide this as a marketing strategy. Who is creating the confusion? The answer seems obvious to us.

Another point that we think is relevant in the lawsuits is their intention to judicially prevent us from publically saying what happened, about their intolerable behaviour, their political manoeuvres and their corrupt practices. They intend to silence us by making use of the National Court, achieving by the force of the State what their lack of moral legitimacy has been unable to achieve.

As if this were not shameful enough, they are asking for €50,000 from each defendant union (a total of €800,000) for the alleged ‘moral damages’ caused, with the aim of crippling us financially.

The IWA is an international revolutionary workers' association. Founded in Berlin in 1922, for over a century it has been fighting against all odds for workers' self-management and libertarian organization. Currently it has organizations in 21 countries and has expanded to new areas of the globe.

One of the most well-known organizations in our International is the CNT-AIT in Spain. Several years ago, a faction of this organization managed, among other ways by conducting purges, to take defacto control of all the increasingly centralized functions of the organization. It also tried, without success, to disenfranchise the majority of the IWA Sections and, when it failed, tried to “relaunch” the IWA behind closed doors with just two other Sections. Finally, this faction launched the International Confederation of Labor, (in Spanish CIT), consisting of other organizations with other practices than the International Workers' Association, IWA. The CNT-AIT remains the Spanish Section of the IWA, retaining the same principles as the CNT-AIT prior to the attempts to reform the organization on different principles.

One fact that must be stressed is that the Spanish section of CIT, which has a cadre of professional lawyers, claims the exclusive right to the name CNT and all the property that was ever held by the CNT-AIT. This organization has effectively stolen the IWA archives which it keeps in poor conditions in a warehouse outside Toledo, refusing even access to it. It is also suing numerous unions of the CNT-AIT and a libertarian ateneo as well, for enormous amounts of money. This decision to start the suits was made by the lawyers, not by the general membership, showing the authoritarian and vertical direction the union has taken. These suits will be heard in court in September.

Among the things that this Spanish organization is claiming is that the CNT-AIT cannot be called CNT-AIT because the AIT (Spanish acronym for the IWA) does not exist.
This is a really audacious lie told by the Spanish organization of CIT, as it knows absolutely that the IWA exists and has existed for over a century.

On June 29-30, over 60 delegates and observers from the IWA participated in the Plenary which took place in Bogota, Colombia. We were also joined on line by Chinese anarcho-syndicalists who were invited to observe the meeting. We thank ULET, our Section in Colombia, for the tremendous effort in organizing the Plenary and for their very warm hospitality.

Prior to the Plenary there was a public discussion with members of CNT-AIT Spain, ZSP from Poland and ULET from Colombia. The Plenary was also accompanied by a number of cultural events.

The Plenary dealt with many internal matters such as procedures and dealing with good practices but also decided to organize some actions and campaigns. There will be a new, long-term campaign against wage theft, in addition to the Week Against Unpaid Wages that we have held over the past few years. Next year there will be an IWA Week of Action in May where the Sections and Friends can organize a wide variety of activities.