Antiwar fighter seeks to return to US
By Deirdre Graham
A self-exiled man, who claims he destroyed draft files of poor and working class kids and destroyed the computer network of Dow Chemical Corporation during the Vietnam War, is appealing for support to return to the US.
Robert Malecki, who has been living in Sweden since being given humanitarian asylum in the 1970s, is seeking help to avoid being jailed on his return.
Malecki said he was sentenced to 12 years' imprisonment in 1969 after being caught with military files. After 27 months he was released on bail and made it to Sweden.
"I do not intend to crawl back to the US begging for forgiveness. However, I would accept an amnesty or pardon", he said.
"I have children and grandchildren in the United States who I would like to visit. I want the right to return to the US, the country of my birth, and walk the streets as a free man."
An unrepentant Malecki says he will never apologise for his actions against the war in Vietnam where millions of people suffered because of US bombings of napalm made by Dow Corporation.
"Tens of thousands have cancer and children are still being born deformed because of chemicals like Agent Orange", he said. "I still remember the faces of the Vietnamese children running down a highway in Vietnam while napalm was burning holes in their little bodies and I did fight the best way I knew how."
Malecki is committed to highlighting the genocide still being committed by multinational corporations today. With the support of the Australian government, CRA is "financing a dirty war" on Bougainville in order to open up the mine again'.
"One would think that the Australian government would have learned its lesson after the Vietnam fiasco!", he said.
Malecki said the US government had not succeeded in silencing opposition to its criminal activities, although it had found new ways of keeping people in prison. Conspiracy trials are still being used against people whose "crime" is only to speak out against the government's policies.
Malecki is demanding that the US government drop the charges against him and allow him to return to the US. For more information contact Robert Malecki, Bergmstargatan 11B, 915 31 Robertsfors, Sweden.