The 20th Congress of  the KKE was held from the 30th of March until the 2nd of April 2017 at the headquarters of the Central Committee of the Party.

The 20th Congress approved the Theses of the CC which include the report on the party's work and its political tasks until the 21s Congress, taking into account the discussion and their approval by the general assemblies of the Party's Base Organizations (PBOs) and the Conferences. It also approved the report of the CC at the 20th Congress as well as the report of work of the Central Auditing Committee (CAC).

The 20th Congress of the KKE approved the Political Resolution, which determines the tasks of the Party until the 21st Congress, underscoring the need to strengthen the KKE in its activity for the regroupment of the labour movement, the reinforcement of the Social Alliance, the struggle against imperialist war, for workers' power. Specific tasks were set for party building in the working class, amongst productive age groups, the youth, women, for supporting KNE's work, for improving the functioning of the leading organs, for the promotion of new cadres.

The documents of the 20th Congress further equip the KKE in order for it to meet the contemporary demands of the class struggle and decisively deal with the difficulties, confirming its role as the vanguard of the working class, as an all-weather communist party.

Capitalism is permeated by very sharp contradictions. The basic contradiction between capital and labour is sharpening, the trend for the absolute and relative destitution of the working class is being reinforced, the percentage of permanent long-term unemployment is increasing, the rate of exploitation of the working class is intensifying, all the social contradictions are sharpening.

The implacable antagonisms are being expressed between the capitalist states, their military-political and economic-political alliances, antagonisms that have led to imperialist wars and realignments.

The trends that were formed in the previous years are as follows:

•             Most of the older powerful capitalist states-amongst them the still leading capitalist power, the USA-continue to lose ground in the global capitalist market to China mainly.

•             Very few capitalist economies achieved levels of growth greater than those that existed before the synchronized international economic crisis (2008-2009).

•             The trends of protectionism of domestic production and the domestic economy are being strengthened.

•             The cohesion of the Eurozone is developing in a contradictory way. The sharpening of the contradictions in the EU and the Eurozone is reinforcing the secessionist tendencies, which in turn feed into bourgeois "euroscepticism".This is an equally reactionary-antipeople current, which is supported by sections of capital, by far-right and fascist forces and other bourgeois parties.

•             New capitalist international inter-state unions are being formed and old ones are being recomposed (e.g. BRICS, G20 etc.), as well as regional ones (e.g. Shanghai Cooperation Organization, ALBA in Latin America etc.)in the framework of the international imperialist system.

In these conditions, the inter-imperialist contradictions are strengthening. All the capitalist states, with the USA in the first place, are modernizing their military equipment, while the most powerful seek an advantage in terms of the most modern military hardware.

The national arena of the class struggle remains the primary one, at the same time its coordination at a regional and international level is of great importance. The main problem is that no upsurge of the communist movement is observed at an international level, which would constitute a real beacon of hope. On the contrary, many of the parties that define themselves as communist have been co-opted in capitalist management and choose a camp amongst the imperialist alliances.

The 20th Congress of the KKE assessed that the local and regional conflicts will continue as an expression and result of the sharpening of inter-imperialist antagonisms and contradictions, with possible military flash-points in the Middle East, Aegean, the Balkans, North Africa, the Black Sea, Ukraine, the Baltic, the Arctic and the South and East China Sea.

Particularly in our region, the sharpening of the situation between Greece and Turkey with the involvement of other countries as well is possible. The questioning of the borders and sovereign rights of Greece on the part of the Turkish bourgeois class is integrated in the framework of its competitive relations with the Greek bourgeois class in the region.

The Greek bourgeois class actively participates in the imperialist plans, interventions, competition and wars, guided by its aim to strategically enhance its position in the wider region. It bears responsibilities for the possible entanglement of the country in a war.

The Programme of the Party has determined our position concerning the imperialist war and the line of our activity. It is the task of the vanguard of the working class, the KKE, to constantly adjust, specialize, escalate its struggle slogans, without losing sight of the basic aspect which is the character of the war that is imperialist on both sides, regardless of who attacked first. We are projecting this position in the working class and popular strata and on this basis we are struggling today in the following directions:

•             The education of the people about the imperialist character of the war, about the dangers, about who is responsible, about the need for their political denunciation and the struggle to overturn any attempt to change the borders.

•             Highlighting that the political line of the bourgeois government in the case of its involvement in a war is a continuation of its more general policies against the working class and popular strata whether in conditions of capitalist recovery or in conditions of the outbreak of an economic crisis. Highlighting the necessity for the people have no trust in the bourgeois government, that there cannot be-and never could be- "national unity" between the bourgeois class and the working class in any state.

•             The need to oppose every imperialist alliance, to struggle for the closure of all the foreign bases of death in Greece, for disengagement from NATO and the EU, for all the NATO military forces to be removed from the Aegean.

•             Highlighting the need to organize the struggle, the resistance and counterattack of the other popular strata, their Social Alliance, in order to put an end to the changes of borders, against the possible invasion-occupation and also against the participation in wars outside our borders. To intensify the struggle against the governments of the bourgeois class, which prepared the terrain with the bourgeois classes of other states in the framework of NATO and led the children of the people to the slaughter. To coordinate the struggle with the labour-people's movements of other countries, linked with the goal of overthrowing capitalist power in Greece and neighbouring countries, so that their peoples can live peacefully with workers' power.

The developments require the intensification of activity against the imperialist wars and interventions, with broad political work of the party and KNE organizations, as well as of the trade unions, the labour-people's movement more generally, the development of the activity of EEDYE (Greek Committee for International Detente and Peace), especially in areas with military bases and command centres in the service of NATO and the "Common Security and Defense Policy" of the EU.

The Greek people can and must choose themselves- with their will and their activity- to exit the EU, to put this objective at the forefront of their slogans, by organizing their struggle in such a way as to simultaneously fight for the "keys" of the economy, the wealth that they produce, taking the power into their own hands. That constitutes the real alternative to the benefit of the people and is worth every sacrifice.

Capitalist Greece with a "national currency" does not constitute a rupture for the people's benefit. The adoption of a more undervalued currency cannot be a step for the improvement for the life of the working class and the popular strata via any possible impetus that will be given to competitiveness and growth because of the cheaper labor force, as a consequence of the devaluation. Any eventual recovery of  capitalist production, whenever it may occur, will not be accompanied by a substantial recovery of wages, pensions, rights; it will not benefit the people.

The political forces which highlight such an objective as a "solution" or as an intermediate aim for radical changes, objectively, at least, serve the specific needs of sections of the capital and more broadly the different trends in bourgeois politics that exist as a result of the intensification of its contradictions. Besides, policies that attack the  workers’-people’s gains are being implemented both in countries of the eurozone as well as in capitalist countries with national currencies.

If the EU and the bourgeois class choose Greece's departure from the Eurozone and a currency change, the KKE will fight, like it does now, with a specific line, which it will promote within the movement and the Greek people. It will militantly intervene in order to organize a more decisive struggle for the people's survival, for solidarity, so that no popular family, no worker, no unemployed person will be alone in the framework of sharper consequences of a currency changeover (black market, sharp and large increase of inflation), in the clutches of the banks and speculators. The labour-people’s movement must connect this fight with the struggle for actual rupture with the capitalist system.

The labour-popular movement in Greece and across Europe as a whole, with coordinated strikes and a comprehensive counterattack, must utilize any contradictions in the eurozone and the EU that create fissures, in order to strengthen the struggle for the overthrow of the capital's power, the conquest of workers power in every country which will promote and organize social ownership, the central scientific planning of economy and services, the  development of production for the people's benefit.

The 20th Congress of the KKE assessed that during the entire previous period our party fiercely resisted the pressure exerted on it to support or tolerate the political line of bourgeois management, initially implemented by the ND-PASOK government and then afterwards by the SYRIZA-ANEL government. It warned, it exposed the real character of SYRIZA, its relationship with local and foreign capitalists, with various imperialist centres. Life has clearly vindicated the assessments and positions of the KKE, the line of struggle against capital, the imperialist unions, the bourgeois parties, both liberal and social-democratic, old and new. The KKE fought against the entire current of opportunism, against the forces-inside and outside of SYRIZA- that exerted pressure on the party to transform it into a part of the political management of the system. Over the entire 4-year period, the KKE successfully met the challenges of the ideological-political struggle.

The intervention of the party, in confrontation with the various plans to reform the bourgeois political system, must focus on the following issues:

•             To promote the necessity and timeliness of socialism, against historically obsolete views that a transitional government on the terrain of government can pave the way for the revolutionary overthrow, as well as against the illusions that a transitional intermediate form of power, which will stand between capitalism and socialism, intensifying the struggle against the political organizations that express these views. To fight against anti-communism, which is being promoted by various bourgeois forces and mechanisms.

•             There needs to be a stable front against the anti-people strategic goals of the bourgeois class (capitalist recovery, geo-strategic enhancement, promotion of Greece as an energy-trade hub, an active role in the framework of NATO and the EU etc.)The highlighting of the fact that the basic forces of the bourgeois political system converge on these strategic goals. The different views and contradictions that exist over management issues are related to contradictions inside the bourgeois class, to the priorities and methods of the capitalist recovery, priorities in relation to the inter-state alliances of capital.

•             The party must confront the continuing efforts of SYRIZA to appear with a "left" profile and use "ideological differences" with ND in order to mislead and repeatedly deceive the working class and popular strata. There is a particularly dangerous attempt being carried out by the government to hijack in a crude way the history and the struggles of the KKE and the labour-people's movement, to present itself almost as a communist force.

•             There needs to be a stable front against the efforts to revive "new" and "old" social-democracy. This includes SYRIZA's efforts, utilizing its cooperation with European Social-Democracy, as well as the efforts of PASOK and the Democratic Alliance.

•             The party must strengthen the struggle against ND's attempts to utilize the climate of discontent against the government in order to appear as an alternative governmental solution, as the force which, implementing the goals of capital in a stable way, will "lead the country out of the crisis".

•             There needs to be a stable front against "Euroscepticism", especially against opportunist forces that seek to play a role as a new obstacle to the radicalization of the people's consciousness, camouflaging the bourgeois character  of their political proposal with anti-capitalist sloganeering.

•             There needs to be a confrontation against nationalism and racism, as well as against primitive anticommunism, which is being promoted by various forces that are  found in the so-called "right" and "far-right" political space and particular the Nazis of criminal Golden Dawn. To highlight their character as forces that support the system, their suspicious and multifaceted connections with centres inside and outside the country, with sections of capital and the big employers.

•             To confront illusions regarding the reformation of the bourgeois political system, the fear amongst working class-popular forces about the possibility of political instability.

•             To expose the attempts to mislead the people via the hypocritical discussion about dealing with corruption and vested interests that aims to conceal the real causes of the crisis and its consequences for the working class-popular strata and create illusions that the phenomenon of bribery and corruption can be dealt with by "investigation committees", by reinforcing the monitoring mechanisms of the bourgeois state, by alleged changes to the Judiciary. To highlight that corruption is inherent in capitalism. At the same time, the promotion of specific repeated proposals of the KKE- which have been rejected by the government and other opposition parties-as minimum measures to restrict corruption.

There must be a particular front against the attempt to co-opt working class and popular masses through the functioning of institutions and structures of he bourgeois state:

•             The illusions regarding the institutional reforms and revision of the constitution must be confronted, which the SYRIZA-ANEL government is pushing forwards, i.e. they claim that they will transform the bourgeois state into a pro-people one, that these are measures to "extend democracy".To highlight the character of the state today as a mechanism to defend and promote the interests of capital, of the monopolies. This character does not change, cannot be altered in a pro-people pro-worker direction.

•             To highlight the role of Local and Regional government as apparatuses of the bourgeois state for the implementation of the anti-people political line and at the same time to fight against its function to assimilate working class-popular masses in programmes and structures for the management of poverty and unemployment, via EU programmes, NGO structures and volunteering. To promote the example of the 5 municpalities where the communists have the responsibility for the administration (Patras, Haidari, Petroupoli, Kaisariani, Ikaria), which, in the framework of the very restrictive institutions and financial resources, organize the people's mobilization and activity in favour of the downtrodden popular strata in their cities, keeping their pre-election promises they gave to the people of their municipalities that they will maintain a clear oppositional stance towards the central organs of capitalist power.

•             In particular, the party must expose the role of the so-called "Social and Solidarity Economy" to broader working class-popular strata and especially the unemployed. Through the various types of cooperatives and the so-called Social Cooperative Enterprises, the wide use of "volunteers", the generalization of flexible employment relations and the deception of the unemployed is being promoted, while at the same time it facilitates the efforts of the bourgeois state to unburden itself of  its responsibilities in terms of health and welfare policy issues, which results in the downgrading of the provisions and services for the workers. In reality, it functions as an additional tool for the deterioration of labour relations and the increase of the rate of exploitation via voluntary labour, the lengthening of work shifts, low salaries, the reduction of social provisions that previously were free,  as well as an apparatus for manipulation and assimilation.

The 20th Congress of the KKE, on the basis of the programmatic documents as well as the experience from the activity of the party in the previous period, defined the tasks of the party in relation with the work for the regroupment of the labour movement. The basic content of the regrouping of the labour movement is defined as the preparation and development of its abilty to confront decisively and effectively and in alliance with the popular strata of the self-employed and farmers  the single elaborated strategy of capital and capitalist power.

The implementation of this task presupposes the intensification of the ideological-political struggle in the trade union movement. The bourgeois political forces intervene in the trade unions in an organized way, as well as the employers, the various state mechanisms, opportunism. The politicization of the activity of the trade unions in anti-capitalist direction above all is related to their general orientation, in the sense that they do not restrict themselves to a struggle framework of immediate demands. We aim for the trade unions to take positions in favour of the class struggle and the abolition of exploitation, against class collaboration, against the "common national interest", against the submission to the capitalists. The labour movement paid a high price for the illusions that an allegedly "broader" line, which will only or chiefly focus on the specific problem in each workplace, can widen the framework of rallying and facilitate the main goal. Any short-terms results of such a line in other conditions quickly dissipated and led to the disillusionment and demobilization of even consistent forces.

Politicization occurs in the framework of the movement, through the participation of workers and taking into account that not all the members of trade unions have acquired political class consciousness. The work for politicization, to overcome sectional phenomena and attitudes must be developed on a daily basis with the creative concern and care of the communists in order to form the correct relationship between the party and the trade unions, so that the impression is not created unintentionally of transforming trade unions into "party organizations" sometimes, by mechanistically transmitting  overly general positions, slogans and methods of party work.

What is mainly needed is a better specialization and elaboration of demands and the content of each struggle, of the positions and slogans in each trade union, in each sector, in every workplace. This is the only way to overcome over-generalizations, the repetition of non-specific overly general strategic slogans. The communists act openly, do not hide their views, do not retreat from the positions and programme of the party, however their ability to form a framework of struggle and demands that facilitates the mobilization of workers and impedes their easier manipulation and co-option by the system is judged on a daily basis.

We need to acquire a stable orientation but also greater ability to strengthen from below- beginning from the workplace itself, the trade union- the line of struggle which sets in focus the contemporary needs of  the workers’-people's forces. We must acquire the ability to project the fact that the obstacle to the satisfaction of contemporary needs and the demands which express them is capitalist ownership and  capitalist profit. We must also have the capability to convincingly expose- through the ideological confrontation that will be developing in the small or bigger struggles- the mechanisms of exploitation and especially the conditions for their abolition. The party and every communist must have the ability to work on the basis of a plan and with continuity inside working class-popular forces, to promote their organization, mobilization and education, with the aim of radicalizing their consciousness, raising the level of demands and the the combativeness of the activity to satisfy all their contemporary demands.

Despite the fact that today they must be at the focus of the demands, the satisfaction of the contemporary needs is not possible inside capitalism, but presupposes the socialization of the concentrated means of production and their integration into scientific central planning.

The projection of the demands for the recovery of the losses does not idealize the pre-2009 period, but highlights the worsening of the exploitation in relation to the previous generations, in obvious contradiction with the real contemporary needs and capabilities. The false arguments that the reduction of rights today is due to the previous existence of some irrational privileges must be answered.

The regroupment of the labour movement is based on the activity to organize the working class. This effort is expressed with specific goals:

•             The trade unions acquiring mass characteristics. The influx of new workers in their unions  must be a permanent concern and criterion for the regroupment efforts, insisting on the significance of the organized collective struggle and the concentration of forces against the class enemy. Greater focus on organizing women, young people and immigrants.

•             Coverage of all workplaces by sectoral trade unions, with their branches, and also by workplace trade unions, creating new ones where it is considered necessary, on the basis of the criterion of the organization and unity of the workers, irrespective of their employment relations. Development of an integrated network of such trade unions across the country.

•             The stable functioning of the trade unions as a basic criterion of regroupment, safeguarding the functioning of the executive committees, highlighting the importance of and consolidating the General Assemblies of the unions. Continuous updates for the workers by the trade unions, as well as the discovery of new ways and forms of activity that facilitate the participation of the working people (e.g. in the educational, cultural, sports sectors)

•             Systematic monitoring of the process of the elections, the changing of the correlation of forces in favor of the class forces. The utilization of the positive experience related to the more systematic and close control by the party organs, the early preparation, the effort to concentrate new forces, to promote new trade union cadres.

•             Strengthening of the solidarity, the mutual aid and class support for the workers’-people’s familoes and each worker. It must be realized that, essentially, this is not a means to attract workers, but chiefly a means to create a militant orientation, criteria, stance. On that point, the special work with unemployed and immigrants who are permanently settled in our country is of special importance.

The trade unions must be linked to the place of residence, to acquire access in organizational terms to the neighbourhoods, where a large section of  workers not organized in trade unions live and work.

PAME- as the class-oriented rally of the working class in the trade union movement, in whose ranks dozens of federations and labour centres and hundreds of trade unions, struggle committees and trade unionists participate, has a line of mobilization and struggle in an anti-capitalist anti-monopoly direction and this is a great advantage for the movement. The initiative of communists and others who work together with the communists to establish it, as well as its constant activity over all these years serves-as  the work of the communists in the trade unions in general does-the goal of developing militant bonds with the masses in order to mobilize them in the direction of overthrowing the capitalist system.

Its recent nationwide conference contributed, with its preparation and final decisions, to expanding it influence and the rallying of forces around it.

There is detailed reference in the Programme of the KKE to the importance of forming the Social Alliance in order for the working class to play  its leading role in the revolutionary overthrow. The 20th Congress of the KKE, examining the experience from the party's work to form the Social Alliance, noted the following:

Firstly:The working class due to its position in capitalist production is objectively the only revolutionary class, the builder of the socialist-communist society and therefore is the leading force in relation to the other popular forces. Only the labour movement can take on complete revolutionary characteristics and develop into a consistent class revolutionary movement. It is an issue of constant struggle and efforts for the popular sections of the middle strata, as potential allies of the working class and for their respective movements to be drawn to a greater or lesser extent actively into the revolutionary struggle and other sections must at least be rendered neutral. The overthrow of capitalism, which will be led by the working class, is also in the interests of the popular strata, provides solutions to the right to work, to all the social rights of the self-employed, the individual commodity producer, to the prospect of integrating them into direct social labour.

The KKE is in practice responsible for the realization of the Social Alliances, as it is the organized ideological-political vanguard of the working class in Greece. It is realized through the political activity of the KKE concerning the problems of the popular strata, through the corresponding activity of the members of the party, KNE, the friends of the party inside the labour and trade union movement.

Second:The Social Alliance in an anticapitalist-antimonopoly direction is comprised of social forces, which are determined on the basis of their position in relation to the prevailing mode of production, without gender of age discrimination. Women and youth belong to specific social forces, while the social position of  those sections of them that do not participate in production is determined by their family background.

Third:The Social Alliance must not be treated in a schematic way and identified with joint activity of the existing antimonopoly-anticapitalist forms of rallying like PAME, PASEVE, PASY, OGE, MAS. Particular care is needed because OGE, as the radical movement of women of a working class-popular social position or background and MAS as the rally of students cannot be considered as organizations that express distinct social forces. The certain form acquired through the joint struggle framework, which was formed in the previous years, does not remain static. It will develop according to the specific phase of the movement and the correlation of forces. It will emerge in other forms; it will be strengthened; it will be rearranged in movement terms, in relation to the real mobilization of the masses, strengthening and deepening the anticapitalist-antimonopoly goals of the alliance, constantly expanding its influence.

Fourth:In particular, the issue of developing the movement of allies of the working class, i.e. of the popular strata, must be studied. There needs to be a better understanding of our view as to how the work of the Social Alliance is served by our activity in the farmers' movement, PASY and the Nationwide Committee of Farmers' Roadblocks that is a new form of coordination, which was formed in 2014 and has developed into a Nationwide Coordinating Committee of Federations, Associations, Farmers' Committees. The main orientation today is to organize the farmers into Associations, Federations etc. Similarly, we must examine the situation in the Associations of the self-employed, through the anti-monopoly rally of PASEVE.

The radical rallies in an anticapitalist-antimonopoly direction must not be treated statically, but as apart of the dynamic of the class straggle which is not one-sided or linear. The depth of the anticapitalist-antimonopoly content of the struggle is not the same in every phase, something that is reflected in the forms that will be taken by the alliance, which will develop

The 20th Congress of the party decided that the CC should organize a Nationwide Body in order to discuss comprehensively and in detail the issues of the Social Alliance, the updating of the framework of struggle and demands that are related to the farmers' movement (the forms of organization, the alliance, the anticapitalist-antimonopoly rally etc.)

Fifth:The People's Committees as forms of expression of the Social Alliance at a territorial-local level need to more solidly established. We must overcome the phenomena of some of them resembling "citizens' initiatives", where some members of various organizations participate, mainly members and friends of the party, without expressing existing trade unions, struggle committees, people's movement organizations at the level of the city and neighbourhood where the working class-popular forces are mobilized. They must be forms of rallying where the trade unions or their local branches play the leading role, with the participation of forms of organization and mobilization of the self-employed and farmers, the participation of the associations of OGE or MAS, student's committees, school students' committees, at the level of the neighbourhood, the place of residence.

Sixth:The Social Alliance-due to its character as an alliance of social movements-is not a form of cooperation between parties nor a form of cooperation of the KKE with mass organizations. To the extent that other political forces of a petty bourgeois political character are active with their members in the forms of rallying of the Social Alliance, they will meet together with the communists in common struggle at the level of the movement and an ideological-political struggle will be conducted inside the movement. Any common activity and ideological struggle will be expressed within the ranks and the organs of struggle of the Social Alliance, which is rooted in the workplaces, the General Assemblies of the trade unions and associations, in the struggle committees in the neighbourhoods etc.

The KKE- with its activity, both independently as a party and via the activity of its members in the ranks of the organizations of the Social Alliance and the forms of rallying that are created for its more effective advancement-understands its responsibility to act more effectively, with the aim of approaching and mobilizing workers'-people’s masses. In the framework of these efforts, the following question arises: which political line provides a real answer to the problems of the people, the line in favour the monopolies or the one against their domination? The line supporting the power of the monopolies and capital or the line supporting the power of the working people, who are the creators of all of society's wealth?

The rallying of the majority of the working class with the KKE and the attraction of leading sections of the popular strata will pass through various phases. The labour movement, the movements of the urban self-employed and farmers and the form that their alliance takes on with anti-monopoly and anti-capitalist goals, with the vanguard activity of the KKE's forces, in non-revolutionary conditions, constitute the first form for the creation of the revolutionary workers' and people's front in revolutionary conditions.

The working class and popular masses, through the experience of their participation in the organization of the struggle in a direction of confrontation with capital's strategy, will be persuaded of the need for their organization and confrontation to take on the character of a full and multi-faceted confrontation against the economic and political dominance of capital.

The KKE as the vanguard of the working class has the responsibility of guiding the movement, not only in terms of its general programmatic direction or through the content of its statement, but also in organizational terms, i.e. through its leading organs, the Party Base Organizations, the Party groups that work directly in the movement, the comrades elected to trade union bodies.

The leading role of the party is secured through the activity of communists in the ranks of the trade unions, the mass organizations of the self-employed, the farmers, the radical forms of rallying, working to safeguard their anticapitalist-antimonopoly orientation.

The trade union groups, the election lists, and initiatives that exist or are being created cannot have this leading-vanguard role, nor the forms of rallying in the movement, even those that have a clear anticapitalist-antimonopoly line. Their basic role is the concentration of forces, the rallying of trade unions, federations, struggle committees, workers' groups in an anticapitalist-antimonopoly direction, to coordinate their joint activity, to promote the anticapitalist-antimonopoly struggle, strengthening and enriching this direction.

The Communist Party also acts independently inside the movement. It ensures the connection of the daily struggles with the revolutionary overthrow, with the strategic proposal of the party for socialist power and construction. The discussion and ideological struggle inside the movement, the content of the struggle itself must pose the issue and goal of power without becoming detached from the specific, everyday, temporary and immediate demands. The struggle we are waging today must acquire anticapitalist-antimonopoly characteristics and be a struggle for workers' power. And this must permeate the movement as a focus for discussion and ideological struggle.

This is a basic task for the communists, which they must simultaneously work on, understanding the need for persuasion and an escalation of their line of argumentation. It is their task to acquire the ability to pose this issue in a popular, persuasive way, understanding that in non-revolutionary conditions it is a slogan that determines the direction of the struggle and is not an immediate goal for action.

A basic factor that determines the role and effectiveness of the party in the labour movement, in the class struggle,in its work for the regroupment of the labour movement is party building in industry, in strategically important sectors, in new dynamic sectors of the economy,  in combination with the increase of its strength and influence in the great mass of the working class and especially in its younger sections. It is of more general strategic importance.

Consequently, the construction of strong party organizations oriented to the masses in the monopoly groups, the factories, major financial, industrial, retail centres emerges as a basic task. The leading organs and party organizations must focus on this task. We underscore the following basic issues:

•             The deployment of forces and cadres focusing on the workplaces is what lends forward impetus to all party work. There must be no retreat from this. The adjustment requires time, a steady rudder, so that we are not pulled off course by the developments. The mobility in the structuring of the economic sectors as result of centralization, competition between businesses and new technological advances in production must be taken into account so that our intervention can be adjusted correspondingly. The political guidance work must improve; it must assist in the accumulation and generalization of experience, in the development of the ability of the party members, in the formation of young  labour movement cadres.

•             The "buttressing", consolidation and strengthening of the party's intervention in the sectors is a necessary precondition for the reinforcement of our party's vitally important characteristics. The positive steps in the coordination and unified orientation of work between sectoral and area-based party organizations must be utilized. Work in the sectors and places of residence must not be treated as being in confrontation with each other. There must be a common orientation for all organizations:Work in the working class, in the sectors, in the large workplaces. The phenomena of workers that are employed in important economic sectors and businesses remaining organizationally in neighbourhood organizations, i.e. meaning that the orientation towards redeployment is not proceeding, must be overcome.

•             We must focus on the central problem of party building, which is the delay in developing the party in large industries and strategically important sectors, prioritizing the following:Ports and airports (transport as a whole), energy, telecommunications, metal, chemical industry, pharmaceutical industry, food industry, construction-major projects, large retail centres etc.

•             The precondition for steps to be taken in expanding the influence and organizational strength of the party is the formation of a periphery around the party through mass ideological-political work, through the stable and systematic dissemination of its positions and political line, with the dissemination of "Rizospastis" being the main feature. This intervention must be at the epicentre of the activity of every PBO, every communist, as a basic precondition for party building. The methods for educational/propaganda work must be expanded and must not be restricted to short-term campaigning forms of activity. The dissemination and study of "Rizospastis", "Kommounistiki Epitheorisi", the ideological-political, historical and even literary publications of "Synchroni Epohi" must be intensified by each PBO, as well as the wide promotion and discussion of the positions and assessments of the party on the basis of current developments. The goal is to expand the party's influence in every workplace, neighbourhood, sector, to draw in more and more forces into the class struggle.

The major efforts of the previous period brought certain results, which are expressed by the replenishment of certain forces, the building of party organizations, the formation of a periphery and the mainly through the improvement of the social composition of the party. This experience must be utilized in the further improvement of the plans to recruit and build the party in the workplaces by the Party Organizations.

We persist in the goal of achieving a leap forwards in terms of party building and the political strengthening of the KKE in the working class in the run up to the party's 100th anniversary. This task can be summarized by the following codified goals for party building, which must be the object of friendly competition between the party organizations:

•             Improvement of the percentage of industrial workers and the number of PBOs in major businesses of strategic importance.

•             Improvement of the social composition of the party in terms of the percentage of workers.

•             Improvement of the age composition through an increase of recruits from KNE and from the 18-40 age group.

•             An increase of the recruitment of women and improvement of the their overall percentage in the party and in the leading organs.

KNE is the basic source of recruits for the party. For KNE to enter a phase of significantly developing its forces and its ability to carry out communist education is undeniably an integral element for the revolutionary continuity of the KKE and party building and must be treated as such by the party organs. The party organs must treat the specific task as a precondition for the strengthening of the party quantitatively and qualitatively.

Party work amongst younger age groups, before they enter production, in the places of education and training, especially in the technical schools (EPAL, TEI, IEK), the vocational schools, the Merchant Maritime Academy, the junior and senior high schools, the universities is crucial for work in the next generation of the working class.

The content of the work of the party must be stably focused in this direction, with a unified plan and programme of work, from the organs of the party and KNE to the level of the PBOs and BOs, armed with ideological-political resources and communist education to carry out vanguard propaganda work  and activity. This plan must relate well to the sharpening problems, as they are expressed in these specific age groups. There needs to be solid activity in the fields of culture and sports, militantly confronting social problems in an ideological and political way, such as the increase of drug use.

The positive steps that have been taken in the work with younger age groups through the cooperation of the party and KNE must be stabilized and reinforced.

The party is responsible for facilitating KNE in fulfilling the reason for its existence and activity. This plan must have an orientation towards the communication, activity and transmission of the values and revolutionary goals of the party and KNE to school students from working class-popular families, to students in vocational-technical education, to university students with a working class-popular background, to drawing them into the labour movement. In particular, immediate and specific measures must be taken to enhance our work in vocational education in cooperation with the party groups in the federations and sectoral trade unions and with the contribution of our forces amongst the educators in these institutions.

The party undertakes the responsibility for the ideological-political preparation of the members of the KNE, Marxist education, the assimilation of the Programme and elaborations of the party, the conclusions from the study of the history of the communist and labour movement, the transmission of the lived experience of the party, the assistance for active participation in the internal life of KNE, the preparation and support for all the members of KNE so that they can later become party members.

The inequality and discrimination against women at every level, in life, in the family, at work, in the struggle, in the political struggles, have  deep class roots, which means that this problem affects the labour movement. Only the Communist Party can consistently express the identification of the struggle for emancipation and equality with the struggle for the complete liberation of men and women from exploitation. However, this presupposes the leading activity of the party organizations, of communist women workers, employees, trade unionists and intellectuals, who through their activity in the ranks of the women's movement can radicalize it in an antimonopoly, anticapitalist direction.

Confusion concerning the necessity and content of the specialized work amongst women and the activity of communist women in the radical women's movement, under the responsibility of the leading organs, must be overcome. This is issue particularly concerns the women cadres that generalize their own life stance, underestimating the additional objective difficulties which limit the political and social activity of women, even of some that took the step to become members of the party and KNE.

The understanding of the essence of the women's issue is a prerequisite for the realization of the necessity to develop the movement for the equality and emancipation of women of a working class and popular social position and background. In addition, it is necessary for the increase of the ability of the party members-men and women-to approach women workers, employees, unemployed, self-employed or formers, young workers, mothers students, pensioners, we well as women outside the workplace, like housewives.

The goal remains the improvement of the participation of women in the ranks of the party, which today does not correspond to the percentage of women in the general population of the country and the economically active female population. This goal must in particular engage specific Regional Party organizations, particularly in the countryside, whose composition in terms of women members is very low, well below the national average.

The task of strengthening the party is inextricably linked to the enhancement of the work and abilities of the leading organs. The Sectoral Committees (SC) are a particularly important link in the chain that we must focus on. The SCs must acquire characteristics of real fighting bodies. The substantial improvement of the work of these leading organs, from the Central Committee to the Regional Committees, is a precondition for the enhancement of the work of the SCs.

The leading organs must acquire the ability to specialize their work. When we say specialize, we mean assistance from the CC, the Regional Committees to the Sectoral Organs so that:

Firstly:The SCs must acquire the ability to adapt the general directions to the specificities of their area of responsibility, taking into account a number of factors, such as the social composition, the real living standards, the prevailing views etc. I.e. they must not just repeat general directions, as happens usually, ending up in a general discussion or a formalistic control and a sterile recitation of some organizational tasks.

Second:They must proceed to generalize heir own experience, feeding the formation central elaborations, positions and directions with new material, assessments, thoughts,conclusions.

Third:Specialization also means the prioritization of the goals of the SCs based on the central-general goals. I.e how the goal for the regroupment of the labour movement will be expressed in the the area of responsibility of each SC. How the Social Alliance will be advanced in every field. How the ideological and political struggle will be conducted, both independently by the party as well as inside the movement, in the specific field of activity.

The ideological level of the organs is a necessary precondition so that they work and function as real command centres. There needs to be a constant effort of the SCs, all the leading organs, in order to reinforce our capability in the ideological-political struggle that is under way in every area of work.

For the sectoral organs to draw sufficient and useful experience, the PBOs must be encouraged and seek in their area of responsibility to discuss wider issues in an organized way, in combination with the issues that  engage the workers'-people's families on a daily basis.

A goal is the for many cadres from the working class, with a working class-popular background, who will be assisted in order to acquire multifaceted capabilities, specialization in areas of work, a good ideological-political level, the ability to communicate with and lead masses, the ability to orient their work in the direction of regrouping the movement, promoting the regroupment of the movement, the promotion of the Social Alliance, the rallying around the party and the organization of new forces.

In order to implement this important task, there needs to be planning, research, timely and special preparation for KNE's forces. There needs to be particular support for cadres that are deployed in work in the working class, while at the same time there needs to be a systematic utilization of scientists and artists who are party members, who will place their work at the service of the working class and the goals of the socialist prospect. We persist in taking measures to assist cadres who are responsible for politically guiding PBOs and BOs. All the cadres, regardless of their allocation in specific sectors (organizational, mass, ideological), must acquire direct personal experience from discussions and communication with workers inside the movement, the trade unions, the mass organizations, the struggles so that the tasks are specialized in the movement in a specific and lively way, so that they directly engage with demands of the ideological-political struggle.

The improvement of the work of the CC is directly related to the improvement of the performance and contribution of the Sections of the CC. Despite the relatively adequate staffing of certain sections, it still continues to be absolutely necessary to further reinforce and staff all the basic mechanisms of the Sections of the CC with new comrades who will be educated at the side of the older comrades. The new CC must contribute to the elaborations of the Sections of the CC with the collective discussion and to guide the corresponding work at the level of Regional Committees and Sectoral Committees, and the respective organs of KNE.

The conditions of the class struggle will become increasingly complex, increasingly difficult. We must be prepared for this. A basic criterion for the CC as a whole, the cadres, all the leading organs, is the level of readiness to immediately respond to the most difficult tasks, as well as the ability to predict even in terms of issues of daily work and the political developments.

In particular, because today a new cadre force is a emerging with relatively less experience, there needs to be a reinforcement of certain issues concerning the functioning of the leading organs that are not self-evident. The statutory principles governing the parties functioning must be unwaveringly observed, the discussion of different thoughts and opinions, which is something objective and natural, must be open, sincere, must not contribute to unjust suspicion, must not negatively affect the cohesion of the organs, without  criteria based on personal likes and dislikes .The older and more experienced cadres must play a particular role in this direction.

The 20th Congress confirmed that the regroupment and development of the international communist movement is a permanent, consistent task for our a party. It flows from the global character of the class struggle.

The International Communist Movement is in retreat, finds it difficult to react against the offensive of the class enemy, which is taking place not only with repressive measures, but also with ideological-political means, with the impact of opportunism.

The Party of the European Left (PEL), as a centre for the coordination of opportunist forces at the level of Europe, plays a particular role in supporting opportunism inside the International Communist Movement. The CPs that participate in the PEL act as a "battering ram" for  de-communisation, i.e. the further loss of the communist characteristics of other CPs as well.

The 20th Congress of the KKE approved the initiatives taken in the previous period in order to gather together communists forces from all over the world, to develop joint activity and decided to continue to orient our work in this direction:Specifically:

•             In the effort to form condition that will lend impetus to the issue of the common strategy of the Communist Parties through the work of the "International Communist Review", its circulation, and also through other forms in the future.

•             In the intervention that has begun in Europe with the formation of the "European Communist Initiative", as a form of regional cooperation of 29 Communist Parties.

•             There must be a continuation of the Regional Meetings of Communist and Workers Parties. These are the European Communist Meetings, the meetings of the CPs of the Eastern Mediterranean, Red Sea and Persian Gulf and the meetings of the Balkan CPs.

•             In the effort to maintain the communist characteristics of the International Meetings of the 120 Communist and Workers Parties that participate in them.

The process of the revolutionary regroupment is slow, difficult, vulnerable, will be based on the ability of the communist parties to comprehensively strengthen themselves ideologically, politically and organizationally in their countries. Overcoming mistaken positions that dominated in the International Communist Movement in the previous decades and are being reproduced in different forms today. Building solid bases in the working class, in strategic sectors of the economy, reinforcing their intervention in the labour-people's movement.

On this basis, our party still has the goal of forming a Marxist-Leninist pole in the international communist movement. The further specific forms that its formation may take depends on the steps made by other Communist parties as well. Our party will contribute in every way possible at a bilateral and multilateral level to this effort, also developing its independent ideological-political intervention.

The KKE maintains relations, discusses, exchanges views and seeks common activity with dozens of communist and workers parties and will intensify this effort in the next period, irrespective of the level of agreement or disagreement on partial or more all-encompassing issues.

The KKE expresses and will continue to express its solidarity with the just demands and the struggles of all the peoples. In particular, it expresses its solidarity with the people of Palestine that are suffering due to the Israeli occupation and military aggression.

The KKE consistently expresses its solidarity with the Cypriot people against the Turkish invasion-occupation and every kind of dichotomous "solution".Our party fights for a united Cyprus, for one and not two states, with one sovereignty, one citizenship, one international personality, a common homeland for Greek-Cypriots and Turkish-Cypriots, without occupation and other foreign armies, without foreign bases, without guarantors and "protectors", with the Cypriot people masters in their own land.

As a whole, the KKE defends the struggle of every people against the imperialist interventions and wars, for the friendship and solidarity of the peoples. It contributes as best it can in the framework of the international mass movement for the leading activity of the WFTU, WPC, WIDF, WFDY.

The party, emerging from a period when it was compelled to take difficult decisions as regards its finances (e.g. closure of the television and radio station of "902", the ending of the functioning of "Typoekdotiki" print works, the reduction of the spending of the Party Organizations etc.)so that it could cover its basic needs of its propaganda work, its work to project its positions. The real self-sacrifice and heroism of the communists, the members of KNE and the many friends of the party was a decisive factor in all this.

The CC feels real pride concerning the hundreds of thousands of workers all over the country that supported the KKE from their meagre earnings, with smaller amounts than before-both during the fund-raising campaign and also throughout the whole year-as well as concerning the thousands of members and cadres of the party and KNE who struggle daily to help the party financially so that it can respond to its high objectives in service of the interests of the workers and all the popular strata.

We were and continue to be in a particularly difficult period for the working class, the Greek people as a whole. The consequences of the crisis continue to torment the popular families. The  close comradely political relationship of the workers with the party, for 100 years, in even the most difficult moments of the struggle, is also expressed through their financial support, through the further development of the bonds of the party and KNE with their friends and supporters.

The increase of income from fund-raising work and the support of the organizations, the increase of the circulation of "Rizospastis", of "Kommounistiki Epitheorisi", of "Odigitis", of the publications of "Synchroni Epohi", apart from the more general importance they have for the ideological-political intervention, can significantly contribute to reinforcing the party's finances.

In the context of the offensive being escalated by the class enemy and its parties, via its mechanisms and its governments, the party must have greater readiness, competence, financial self-sufficiency for serious political, ideological, publishing activity, so that the political line of the party reaches the Greek people in a mass, more decisive, broad and comprehensive way.

•             Nationwide Conference to monitor the decision regarding the regroupment of the labour and trade union movement, the promotion of the social alliance, the updating of the joint action framework of the rallies in which the party is active inside the social alliance and the labour-people's movement, party building, especially inside the working class and strategically important sectors.

•             Extended Plenum of the CC or Conference to study the issues of the urban self-employed, especially those in the major urban centres and their movement.

•             Extended Plenum of the CC or Conference to study the issue of agriculture, the movement and rallies amongst the small-medium farmers, the development of the farmers' movement and the activity of the party.

•             Completion of the study on the class structure of Greek society.

•             Continuation of broad work to shed light on our proposal for a unified 12-year school, as well as the completion of a number of elaborations related to the position of the party on pre-school education, Vocational and Unified Higher Education.

•             Updating of positions on issues of health-social insurance-welfare.

•             Nationwide Conference for the final approval of the redrafted first volume of the History of the Party, which deals with the period from before the party's establishment up until 1949. To proceed with the completion of the study of the period of the dictatorship. At the same time, there must be a continuation of the efforts to complete the historical research for the writing of the period 1974-1991.

•             The Central Committee should hold an extended plenum for the continuous and systematic monitoring of the course of the events, publications and other cultural and political activities, the final steps for the 100th anniversary of the party in 2018, with the basic task being the approval of the Declaration of the CC on the 100th anniversary. The issue will be discussed at an Extended Plenum of the CC.

•             Suitable staffing of the Sections of the CC so that the study of socialist construction during the 20th century can proceed, as well as the study of the strategy of the International Communist Movement and in particular of the Communist International.

•             Decisive promotion and completion of the schools of Marxist Education at the level of sectoral organizations and mainly the cycle of lessons on the Programme at the level of the PBOs and BOs.

•             Organization of a discussion in the CC on propaganda and its forms, especially on the development of the work and circulation of "Rizospastis", the Internet tools and the enhancement of our intervention in social media networks. Special discussion on the development of the work and circulation of "Rizospastis".

Athens, 30 March-2 April 2017

20th Congress of the KKE