Who is the KPD?

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Kategorie: K P D
Veröffentlicht am Sonntag, 02. Dezember 2012 18:05
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The Communist Party of Germany (Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands - KPD) was founded as an independent party by the constitution of the Spartacus Alliance in the party conference which took place from 30th December 1918 until 1st January 1919. This was the most significant event in the history of German Workers Movement. On this day the cornerstone of a Marxist party based on the model of Lenin’s communist party was laid. It arose under the influence of the Great Socialist October Revolution in Russia and the November Revolution in Germany. To the joint founders of the party belong Karl Liebknecht, Rosa Luxemburg and Wilhelm Pieck. The historical roots of the KPD go back to the middle of the 19th century, to the Alliance of Communists.

The KPD accessed to the wealth of experiences contained in the revolutionary party programmes of the German and International Communist Movement. First of all “The Communist Manifesto” is to mention, elaborated by the founders of scientific communism Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, the programmatic main document of the International Communist Movement.

In the classes’ fights of the 20s and 30s of the 20th century the KPD grew to a mass party of workers and advocated their interests in the most consequent way. In the anti-fascist struggle our party had the most victims. Many of our members were murdered by the fascists, amongst them the chairman of the KPD, comrade Ernst Thälmann. Numerous communists and social democrats were sentenced to exemplary punishments and incarcerated in all kinds of prisons as well as in fascist concentration camps. Many communists participated as members of the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War for the liberation of Spain from the fascist Franco regime.

On the side of the Red Army and other allied armed forces communists took part in the armed fight against the fascist armies, helped to smash the fascism in Germany and put themselves in the vanguard of the anti-fascist democratic build-up.

In the Soviet occupied zone on 20th April 1946 the KPD and SPD (Social-democratic Party of Germany) united and founded the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands - SED). On its side communists in western Germany fought for the establishment of a united party of workers that was prevented by the western occupying powers in alliance with the right-wing leaders of the social democracy. After the foundation of the GDR one began to build up socialism under the leadership of the SED. The party used the experiences of the German and International Workers Movement and amongst others the build-up of socialism in the Soviet Union and the countries of Eastern Europe, Asia and Latin America. By the counter revolution from outside and inside, in a gradual process, the socialist order of the society was destroyed in 1989. It remains as the most precious achievement in the history of the German Workers Movement.

The communists have kept their loyalty to the scientific ideology of Marxism-Leninism. After the destruction of the SED by the counter revolution and the foundation of a new social-democratic party in the GDR the KPD was consequently re-founded in January 1990. The party is the follower of Liebknecht’s, Luxemburg’s, Thaelmann’s and Pieck’s KPD.

The KPD and its policy are guided by the unity and purity of the party and the scientific basics of Marxism-Leninism. It struggles against the imperialist system of exploitation, against opportunism, against the variety of revisionism as well as the social democracy as the considerable cause of the destruction of socialism and against the war policy of the FRG. Since its re-foundation in 1990 in the GRD the KPD insistently pleads for a broad alliance of all left-wing forces as well as an integrated over-all German communist party on the basis of Marxism-Leninism. With regard to its tradition the KPD particularly struggles for the social and political rights of workers and wage-related labourers as well as for all the exploited and discriminated by capitalism. The KPD decidedly turns against persecution and discrimination of communists and other progressive forces in the FRG as well as the campaign of vengeance against former citizens of the GDR.

The KPD maintains, embedded in proletarian internationalism, numerous relationships with communist and workers’ parties in the world. The party advocates for a new international alliance and coordinated action of the World Communist Movement.

The KPD re-founded in 1990 in the GDR does not come under the KPD’s prohibition of 17th August 1956 in the former FRG. Since its re-foundation in 1990 the KPD has been legalised to participate in all elections for the federal parliament (Deutscher Bundestag) and the state parliaments (Landtag).

The KPD publishes the newspaper „The Red Flag“ („Die Rote Fahne“) as its central organ and the “Written Series of the Communist Party of Germany – Articles on Theory and Practise of Marxism-Leninism” („Schriftenreihe der Kommunistischen Partei Deutschlands – Beiträge zur Theorie und Praxis des Marxismus-Leninismus“).

In the 21st Party Conference of the KPD in March 2001 the basic principle document “Socialism / Communism – Future of Humankind” was concluded. The process of the ideological and organisational innovation began in the 24th Party Conference in 2005. This process achieved its preliminary summit with the conclusion of the new party’s programme and the reworked statute in the 25th Party Conference of the KPD in April 2007. In the programme the KPD emphasises its Marxist-Leninist character. Its aim is socialism.