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FREEDOMWAYS
THIRD QUARTER 1972
Prize winners were prominent fighters for the freedom and independence of their country To Hoai, a Vietnamese writer, Mahumd Dervish, a Palestinian poet, and Alex La Guma, a South African novelist. The 1970 Lotus Prize was awarded to Agostino Nato, the Angolian poet and public figure, the Soviet poet Zulfia, and the Indian poet Harivanshrai Bachanu. In 1971 the Lotus Prize went to Semben Usman, a playwright from the Senegal, Sononmin Udaval of Mongolia and Tavfik el Hakim, an Egyptian writer.
The Fourth Conference of Afro-Asian Writers in Delhi (November 12-20, 1970) was held at a time when the international situation had been aggravated by the continued Israeli aggression against Arab countries, the escalation of war by American imperialism throughout the whole of Indochina and Portugal's colonial policy in Africa.
The hosts of the conference, the Indian writers, conducted extensive preparations. They set up a national Preparatory Committee which included over 100 prominent Indian writers. The President of the Indian Academy of Literature, Suniti Kumar Chatterdjee, a scholar of world reknown, was elected chairman of the Committee. This body published a regular bulletin describing preparations for the conference, while the Indian press gave great coverage to the Fourth Conference with items prepared by the members of the Committee. The Committee also published several collections of works by Asian and African writers for the Conference in English and Hindi.
In 1970 individual representatives of leftist-minded quarters in India tried to undermine the conference. All sorts of leaflets and declarations were circulated in the lobbies and an attempt was made to stage a protest demonstration but that failed. The Delhi Conference was held in a business-like manner in an atmosphere of unanimity of all its delegates. 
Delegates from 33 countries of Asia and Africa and observers from seven countries of Europe, Asia, and Australia were present at the Conference. Also invited were representatives  of the World Peace Council and the Arab Organization for the Promotion of Education, Culture and Science. The overwhelming majority of participants in the Delhi Conference were prominent writers, scholars, leaders of writers' organizations and publishers. The Soviet delegation was led by Kamil Yashen, chairmen of the Soviet Committee for liason with Afro-Asian writers. 
The Conference adopted a general Declaration and a Resolution on Indochina and United States aggression against Vietnam, Laos
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AMINOV
and Cambodia. There were also special resolutions on imperialist aggression against the Arab countries, on the liquidation of racialist and colonial regimes in the Portuguese colonies and in South Africa. The Delhi Conference held a special meeting devoted to the Lenin Centenary. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi of India, presented the Lotus Prize to the first group of winners and delivered a speech in which she called for unity among the writers of Asia and Africa. She also wished the writers of the two continents always to be with their peoples, to lead the people in the struggle against poverty, backwardness, past prejudices and reaction. All this created a special atmosphere at the Conference and aroused wide comment throughout India.
The Conference elected the leadership of the Afro-Asian Writer's Association—an Executive Committee and a Permanent Bureau comprising representatives from 30 and 10 countries respectively. It was unanimously voted to hold the Fifth Conference of Afro-Asian Writers in Alma-Ata, the capital of Soviet Kazakhstan in the autumn of 1973.
After the Soviet delegation returned home from Delhi extensive preparatory work was started for the Alma-Ata conference. Here are some of the activities conducted along these lines in the Uzbek Republic.
In 1971 the Union of Writers of Uzbekistan, jointly with the Uzbek Committee for contacts with Afro-Asian writers held a "Poetry Evening" devoted to Soviet-Indian friendship. At this function leading Uzbek writers who had been to India took the floor to share their impressions and poets recited verses devoted to India. The "Fighting Vietnam Week" and the Festival of Syrian Culture in the USSR were held in Uzbekistan with great activity by all the members of the Union of Writers of the republic.
The local papers and magazines have begun publishing items in a special column devoted to the forthcoming conference in Alma-Ata. The Khamid Gulyam Fiction Publishing House in Tashkent put out during the last three years 16 book titles in Uzbek in a total edition of over three million copies. This includes an anthology of poetry by Soviet, African and Asian poets entitled We Live On One Planet, a collection of stories Vietnam in Flames, another collection Voices of South Africa and the novel Death of the Water Carrier by Yusef el-Sibai, a prominent Egyptian writer and chairman of the Afro-Asian Writers' Association. The publishing house is planning to put out another fifty book titles in a total edition of over eleven million copies.
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