People Before Profit blog

Syria and the monarchs: a perfect storm

Thu, 27 Jun 2013 12:53:00 +0000

The Obama administration's decision to directly supply weapons to the Syrian opposition may end up torpedoing the possibility of a political settlement. It will almost certainly accelerate the chaos spreading from the almost three year-old civil war. It will also align the U.S. with one of the most un-democratic alliances on the planet, and one that looks increasingly unstable.

In short, we are headed into a perfect political storm.

While the rationale behind the White House's decision to send light arms and ammunition to the rebels is that it will level the playing field and force the Assad regime to the bargaining table, it is much more likely to do exactly the opposite. The U.S. is now a direct participant in the war to bring down the Damascus regime, thus shedding any possibility that, along with Russia, it could act as a neutral force to bring the parties together.

Of course, the U.S. has hardly been a disinterested bystander in the Syrian civil war. For more than two years it has helped facilitate the flow of arms from Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates across the Jordanian and Turkish borders, and the CIA is training insurgents in Jordan. But the White House has always given lip service to a "diplomatic solution," albeit one whose outcome was preordained: "Assad must go," the president said in August 2011, a precondition that early on turned this into a fight to the death.

As Ramzy Mardini, a former U.S. State Department official for Near Eastern affairs, recently wrote in the New York Times, "What's the point of negotiating a political settlement if the outcome is already predetermined?"

It is hard to tell if the administration's policies around Syria are Machiavellian or just stunningly inept. Take President Obama's famous "red line" speech warning the Assad regime that the use of chemical weapons would trigger U.S. military intervention. Didn't the president realize that his comment was a roadmap for the insurgency: show that chemical weapons were used and in come the Marines? And, as if on cue, the insurgents began claiming poison gas was used on them, a charge the Damascus regime has denied.

Whether there is any truth to the charge is hard to tell since neither the British, French, nor the U.S. have released any findings. "If you are the opposition and you hear" that the White House has drawn a red line on the use of nerve agents, then "you have an interest in giving the impression that some chemical weapons have been used," says Rolf Ekeus, a Swedish scientist who headed up the U.N. weapons inspections in Iraq. Carla Del Ponte, of the U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Syria, says it was the insurgents who used poison gas, not the Syrian government.

The French and British are hardly neutral bystanders, with long and sordid track records in the region. It was Paris and London that secretly carved up the Middle East in the 1916 Sykes-Picot Agreement, and who used divisions between Shites, Sunnis, and Christians to keep their subject populations at one another's throats. Both countries just successfully lobbied the European Union to end its arms embargo on the Syrian combatants and are considering supplying weapons to the insurgents.

Besides the growing butcher bill in Syria-according to the U.N., the death toll is now over 93,000, with a million and a half refugees; the war is going regional, particularly in Iraq and Lebanon, although Turkey and Jordan are also being pulled into the maelstrom.

Fighting between Shites and Saudi-sponsored Sunni extremists in Lebanon's northern city of Tripoli is drawing in the Lebanese Army, which recently issued a warning that sectarian violence was getting out of control. There is fighting between Assad loyalists, Sunni insurgents, and the Shite-based organization Hezbollah on both sides of Lebanon's border with Syria.

In the meantime, Sunni extremist groups, associated with al-Qaeda, are waging a car-bombing offensive against the central government in Iraq. According to the U.N., 1,000 Iraqis were killed in May, and the toll continues to mount. A recent bombing in a Turkish border town killed 51 people and local Turks blamed the insurgents, not the Assad regime.

The war has put economically fragile Jordan on the front lines. Some 8,000 troops from 19 countries just completed war games entitled "Eager Lion" in that country. The 12-day exercise was aimed, according to the Independent (UK), at preparing "for possible fighting in Syria." The U.S. has deployed Patriot missiles, troops, and F-16 fighter-bombers in Jordan.

While the Syrian civil war started over the Assad regime's brutal response to demonstrators, it has morphed into a proxy war between Syria, Iran, Russia, and the government of Prime Minster Nouri al-Maliki in Iraq on one side, and the U.S., France, Britain, Israel, Turkey, and the monarchies of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) on the other. The Council includes Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, and new members Morocco and Jordan.

The GCC is playing banker and arms supplier to the insurgency, much the same role it played in Libya's civil war. Qatar has poured more than $3 billion into the effort to upend Assad, and, along with Saudi Arabia and the US, helped shift Egypt from its initial support for a diplomatic solution to backing a military overthrow of the Damascus regime.

Egypt is in the midst of a major financial crisis, and Qatar has agreed to invest billions in its economy. Such investments come with strings, however, and Qatar is not shy about using its cash to get countries on board its foreign policy goals. Ahram Online said a major reason for the diplomatic shift was "the hope of soliciting desperately need financial and fuel aid" from Saudi Arabia.

According to Ahram, Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi bucked the advice of his top aides to switch positions. The April 6 Democratic Front Movement accused Morsi of caving in to "Washington" and extremist "Salafist Sheikhs."

Egypt is also trying to land a loan from the International Monetary Fund, over which the U.S. wields considerable influence. It is hard to see Egypt's shift as anything but a quid pro quo for a bailout.

The Gulf Council has almost unlimited amounts of cash at its disposal, but how stable are the monarchies that make it up?

Last year Bahrain was forced to use Saudi Arabian troops to quash protests by its Shia majority demanding democratic rights. The United Arab Emirates charged 94 people with conspiracy because they asked for democratic rights. They face 15 years in prison. Qatar recently sentenced a poet to 15 years for writing a "subversive" poem.

The monarchs' bitter opposition to anything that smacks of democracy or representative government suggests that their crowns do not sit all that firmly on their heads.

Saudi Arabia is a case in point. While it is the world's biggest oil exporter, it has a growing population-at 30 million, larger than all the Gulf members of the GCC members put together-and unemployment among Saudis aged 20 to 24 is around 40 percent. The kingdom is also facing a restive Shia population in its eastern provinces.

The Saudi monarchy has dealt with opposition through a combination of stepped up repression and a $130 billion spending program. But as Karen House points out in her book "On Saudi Arabia," the country's "High birthrate, poor education...and deep structural rigidities in the economy, compounded by pervasive corruption, all have led to a decline in living standards...Many of [the] young feel their future is being stolen from them."

The other Gulf monarchies are rich-Jordan is the exception-but lack population and rely on imported workers to meet their labor needs. Because there is essentially no public oversight, the monarchies tend to breed corruption. The Saud family has some 7,000 princes, all of whom have special access to the vast wealth of the country.

A generation ago that corruption could be easily covered up, but the Internet makes that increasingly difficult. Twitter and YouTube have a huge following in Saudi Arabia.

Yet it is with these monarchies-the world's last bastions of feudal power-that the U.S. and its allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) have made common cause.

Reliance on the GCC also means that Washington is essentially part of the Sunni jihad against Shiites in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Iran. However, while the Shiite-Sunni conflict is important and long-standing, the fact that Iran, Syria, and Iraq have very different foreign policies than the GCC has more to do with the Council's hostility to Teheran than religious differences.

It was Jordan's King Abdullah who first warned that a "Shiite Crescent"- Hezbollah, Syria, Iraq, and Iran-was a threat to the Middle East, a "warning" that conveniently fit into the U.S.'s drive to build an alliance against Iran. But elevating sectarian divisions in Islam into an alliance not only helped unleash Sunni extremists-including the al-Qaeda-linked groups in Syria that reportedly worry Washington-it opened a Pandora's Box of ethnic divisions that the US and the Gulf monarchies may yet come to regret.

There is still time to halt this looming train wreck.

United Nations General Secretary Ban Ki-moon said the U.S. move was "not helpful," and reiterated, "There can be no military solution to this conflict, even if the [Syrian] Government and the opposition, and their supporters, think there can be." The Obama administration could use that admonition to call for a ceasefire, hold off sending arms, and instead concentrate-along with Russia-on building a peace conference.

The conference would have to involve all the parties, including the countries currently being destabilized by the ongoing fighting. The U.S. will also have to step back from its "Assad must go" position and, instead, seek a way to integrate Syria's 2014 presidential elections into a formula for peace. But more arms and a tighter embrace of the backward Gulf Council will insure the war will continue to kill Syrians and destabilize the region.

This was reposted from Dispatches from the Edge.

Photo: James Gordon/Flickr (CC)

What will Iran’s new president deliver?

Mon, 24 Jun 2013 15:39:00 +0000

The June 14 election of Hassan Rouhani as president of Iran was welcomed by thousands coming onto the streets of Tehran and other Iranian cities.

To say that the outcome of the presidential election in Iran was unexpected is an understatement. It certainly was not the result predicted by most pundits and the public at large did not anticipate Rouhani's victory. The clerical leadership had played a sophisticated political game. They allowed a range of candidates to stand who were mostly acceptable within the context of their overall strategy, while preventing the pro-reform camp and wider spectrum of progressive opposition from fielding candidates.

Both for those who had refused to participate in the election and those who cast their vote for Hassan Rouhani, the election result represented a clear rejection of the regime's policies. While the euphoria was in part about the election of Rouhani, it had more to do with the desire of many Iranians for reform. Within the very strict limitations of the electoral system in Iran, Rouhani was the only candidate who appeared to promise reform, hence the shift of support his way in the final days of the campaign.

The shift towards Rouhani was impressive enough for him to secure 51 percent of the vote and the presidency on the first ballot. Commentators had predicted that a run-off with the conservative-backed Saeed Jalili, leading to a second round vote, would be the best that could be hoped for. In the event, Jalili trailed in third, the hardline vote was split and Rouhani squeezed through the middle.

Of course, many were reminded of the 2009 election, with reformist candidate Mir Hussein Mousavi being the most likely winner until the regime stepped in to rig the outcome in favour of incumbent hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The outcome of the regime's actions at that time was a mass outpouring onto the streets of Iran and the growth of the Green Movement in response to the stolen election. Given the level of ongoing opposition since 2009, the regime may well have calculated that a similar imposition would not work a second time. The ongoing threat of intervention from the U.S. and popular dissatisfaction with the regime's policies due to sanctions, means that the clergy have been reluctant to gamble on imposing their most preferred candidate again.

Rouhani himself has described his win as follows: "This victory is a victory of wisdom, a victory of moderation, a victory of growth and awareness, and a victory of commitment over extremism and ill-temper."

This clearly aims to fuel the notion that he is a genuine candidate of reform, representing the people against the establishment.

However, little is ever as it appears in the world of Iranian politics. With the economy in free-fall and relationships with the West at an all time low over the issues of the nuclear program and economic sanctions, the clergy look to have decided to cut their losses and go with the popular vote. After all, although the six presidential candidates did display varying signs of difference on policy matters, all had been selected with the approval of the Guardian Council and the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the outcome was always going to be a pro-regime president.

The more hard-line clergy in Iran have also had to accept that the reform movement has made some impact, so the appearance of a limited degree of accommodation may have been regarded as politic. With a directly pro-reform candidate having been forced to stand down in the contest, former presidents Khatemi and Rafsanjani came out in favour of Rouhani during the campaign, even though Khatemi recognised that "Rouhani does not consider himself as belonging to the pro-reform camp." However, for the people of Iran, the opportunity to prevent an even more hard-line candidate succeeding Ahmadinejad was clearly seen as the short-term priority, even if Rouhani promises little else than the more efficient management of the existing regime.

For the regime itself, there can be little doubt that Rouhani is largely considered to be a safe pair of hands. His CV includes having been Khamenei's representative and the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council for 16 years, a position he maintained even after the electoral coup of 2009.

Rouhani has stated that he will lead Iran towards moderation and détente in the international arena as well as proclaiming the need to increase production and employment. With the existing sanctions in place from the West, the two go hand in hand. Given the wider regional considerations, including current action in Syria and the apparent need of the West to demonize Iran, the extent to which Rouhani can engineer any détente will inevitably be limited. However, this is Rouhani's main mandate from the regime. Delivering on the lifting of sanctions, heading off the threat of military intervention and improving relations with Iran's conservative and Arab neighbors is seen by the regime as vital for the long term sustainability of the Islamic Republic in its current form.

Also, the extent to which the ruling clergy will allow any genuine reform is questionable. In any event, there is nothing in either the program or declarations of Rouhani that would suggest that the legalization of free and independent trade unions, the freeing of all political prisoners or greater freedom for women is to be on the agenda any time soon.

The election outcome in Iran may well be read as an unexpected defeat for the more hard-line factions within the establishment. Whether that makes it a vote which will result in genuine reform is much more open to question. There is still time for the voices of the Iranian people to be heard on the streets in coming months. It will be interesting to see if they continue to proclaim Rouhani's victory so loudly.

CODIR - the Committee for the Defence of the Iranian People's Rights - and those campaigning for human and democratic rights inside Iran will watch closely to see if Rouhani is at all responsive to popular demands for change. Campaigning on issues of peace, democracy and human rights will continue, however, until all political prisoners are released, executions are ended and the Islamic Republic allows free and democratic trade union activity in Iran.

Photo: Iran's new president, Hassan Rouhani. Wikimedia Commons

Brazil protests: some background

Mon, 24 Jun 2013 11:19:00 +0000

All last week, major Brazilian cities were the sites of massive youth protests. Although President Dilma Rousseff expressed sympathy with some of the grievances, promised wide ranging reforms, and reaffirmed the right of the Brazilian people to protest, there were also indications of efforts of right-wing activists as well as criminal elements trying to use the protests as cover for their agendas.

The demonstrations started on June 11 in São Paulo, as protests against an increase in bus and train fares. There was a heavy handed police response. Protests quickly spread to Rio de Janeiro and many other cities. Protesters began to raise many other issues, including the large amount of money that is being spent on preparations for the FIFA soccer World Cup, which will be hosted by Brazil next year, corruption, and dissatisfaction with the functioning of many institutions of Brazilian society, including schools and health care.

Although the initial crowds of protesters were mostly middle income and white, and thus not very representative of her own working class and multi-racial political base, President Rousseff of the left wing Workers' Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores) expressed sympathy with the demonstrators, saying that such demonstrations show a healthy level of concern and a desire of ordinary Brazilian citizens to be included in political and societal decisions at all levels. The Brazilian left, including the two communist parties (the Communist Party of Brazil or PC do B, and the Brazilian Communist Party or PCB, both announced support for the movement.

On Friday June 21, there was a meeting in São Paulo of 76 important left wing and labor groupings, including the two communist parties, Rousseff's own Workers' Party, the Central Union of Workers (CUT) which is Brazil's main trade union federation, the National Union of Students, the Brazilian Socialist Party and others. The purpose of the meeting was to come to an agreement on a broad agenda for change to be included in the demands of the demonstrations. The head of the Communist Party of Brazil in São Paulo State, Orlando Silva, said that the left should raise issues of housing, agrarian reform, and call for 10 percent of the GDP of the country to go for improving education.

Rousseff herself is a figure of the left, who spent time in prison and was tortured during the 1970s for participating in a guerilla movement to oust the military dictatorship that had overthrown the leftist president, João Goulart, in 1964. She was elected in 2010, succeeding Luiz Inaciio Lula da Silva, a former union activist from the Workers' Party. Rousseff's major focus has been on reducing extreme poverty in Brazil, through various programs such as the Bolsa Familiar (Family Purse), which makes direct cash transfers to poor families in exchange for their cooperation in keeping their children in school and up to date on immunizations. Under Lula and Rousseff, this program has pulled more than 36 million of Brazil's 200 million people out of extreme poverty, and the president announced an expansion of the program in February of this year. Rousseff has been expected to be easily reelected in 2014.

But there have been difficulties. Growth of the Brazilian economy has been slow for the last two years. President Lula da Silva's Workers' Party had, by itself or in combination with other left parties, no majority in the 513 seat Chamber of Deputies or the 81 seat Senate, and so had to govern through coalition arrangements with shaky partners who did not share the ideology of the president. With Rousseff's election came an expansion of the parliamentary left, but not enough for the president to get progressive legislation passed easily.

The Workers' Party is also a very heterogeneous social-democratic formation, which has had its share of corruption scandals and political splits. Finally, the federal structure of the Brazilian government has meant that many of the state institutions and policies about which the protesters are complaining are not controlled by the federal government but by local politicians from parties not in Rousseff's coalition. An example is Rio de Janeiro, whose mayor is not in sympathy with the president's program.

As the demonstrations continued, with the participation of at least a million people nationwide, some right wing and even fascist tendencies began to show their faces.

Members of left groups who tried to display their banners and placards were attacked in some places. Criminal elements also had infiltrated the crowds and some violence and looting began to occur, notably an attempt to break into the Foreign Ministry building in the capital, Brasilia.

The fare increases in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro were rescinded. President Rousseff spoke to the nation on Friday evening proposing three point program: The hiring of more doctors from overseas to improve the health care system, passage of a bill now in parliament which would dedicate all the state's revenues from oil into the school system, and a general increase of federal government to problems of corruption and inefficiency in the country's institutions. However, she defended the participation of Brazil in the World Cup, saying that the costs would be borne by private companies and that the Brazilian economy would benefit from the activities.

On Sunday, President Rousseff was set to meet with representatives of the "Free Pass" movement, which had initiated the demonstrations against the fare hikes.

Photo: Victor R. Caivano/AP

Germany's Left Party deals with water, fire, air and dirt

Fri, 21 Jun 2013 14:08:00 +0000

BERLIN - Two elements threatened the congress of The Left Party in Dresden over the weekend. One was water; the river Elbe, whose floodwaters reached almost to the terrace just outside the congress hall. As congress co-president Katja Kipping reported: "Two weeks ago we didn't know if we could get to this meeting without rubber dinghies!"

The other menacing element, but only figuratively, was fire. The media, true to form, searched out anything that might spark a conflict among the delegates or cause controversy they could exploit in the national arena. Last year, in this vein, they focused on Oskar Lafontaine, the former Social Democratic leader who became a stalwart of The Left Party, which, although it unites easterners and westerners, traces its lineage back to the Party for Democratic Socialism, which in turn came out of the Socialist Unity Party, the ruling party of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany).

The issue for the media around Lafontaine last year was his call for elimination of the euro, which he saw as an impediment to the healing of Europe's economic crisis. His proposal brought no applause from others in the party, and no media bellows - or bellowing - could turn it into a fire.

This year Oskar, now 69, has lost much of his wonderful charisma and political weight and he did not even address the convention.

But others did! And their speeches had real fire to them!

Two were on TV, and for viewers it was reportedly difficult for viewers to stay seated on their couches. After years of losing ground as one wing of The Left flapped against the other, the party united this time around some strong planks.

There were fifteen hours of debate without the anger, the sharp jibes and the hard battle lines of the past. The 550 delegates, with only a few abstentions and five "no" votes, approved an election program. The campaign for the Sept. 22 elections was launched in earnest with three very notable speeches.

The Left Party speakers all challenged statements by the two other opposition parties, the Social Democrats and the Greens, that they would not accept even limited support by The Left in forming a government; they would rather join Merkel's right-wing Christian Democratic Union (CDU) or the even further-right Free Democrats (FDP).

The Left speakers turned the tables on the Social Democrats and the Greens. They said The Left Party was the one in the position of not being able to join any alliance unless the Social Democrats and the Greens changed some of their positions.

Despite some left-sounding electioneering, the Left party speakers noted, major parts of the programs of the Social Democrats and the Greens are indistinguishable from the program of the Christian Democrats.

The Left Party Congress Co-President Berndt Riexinger, previously a militant West German union leader, started with the day's news: "Evidently a new reason for war in Syria is being dredged up. We saw that ten years ago when alleged chemical weapons were used to justify a war. That gives me every reason to say: Hands off Syria! No military involvement, no intervention! Our message is clear: peace. The federal government must support all initiatives for a multilateral peaceful solution. All participants must sit down at one table. And all of the Patriot rocket launchers must be removed from the region."

Seeks close ties with union members

Riexinger also urged close ties with union members - something not stressed enough by the Left in the past: "As a union man I say that no path can dodge the issue of decreasing employment...It was a blunder for the unions to brush this important project aside. It's an impossible situation when some people work much too hard, get burned out and break under constant stress while others have no work or are pushed into mini-jobs...

"For Angela Merkel things are simple. She has stated very clearly: there should be no tax increases for the wealthy, no, not with her. She has made the decision. Sharp and clear. Her camp is that of the upper ten percent of the population."

Riexinger attacked Merkel's frequent boast that Germany has been able to beat out the economic storm: "For millions that is not the case. They have not nicely weathered the crisis. Ten million people have to work in the low wage sector. More than four million earn less than seven euros an hour before taxes. One and a half million don't even make five euros... Many of these are in the retail field, where employers have annulled all contracts. They want to blackmail the union... The owners of the top discount retail nets, all on the list of the ten wealthiest Germans, want to pauperize their employees. But these - mostly militant women - are fighting back. And our place is on the side of those who walk out to fight such policies. Also those in Madrid, in Athens and especially these days on Taksim Square in Turkey. The Left is the party of international solidarity."

The other co-president, Katja Kipping, comes from Dresden: "I'm glad the congress is here, this is my election district. My daughter's favorite swing is on a playground near here. Dresden is a beautiful city but, admittedly, it has a conservative reputation, the CDU is strong here. I can assure you however that we are working to change that. Things are happening." And she told of the initiative of The Left in a successful referendum campaign to prevent city hospitals from being privatized.

She voiced the sympathy of the congress for the many thousands who have suffered disastrously in recent weeks because of the weather.

"When we speak about the flood, we must of course speak about quick assistance, but also about how such destruction can be prevented in future..."

She, too, took a swipe at Angela Merkel's European economic policy and its implicit blame on allegedly "wasteful" or "spoiled" people in the southern countries.

"The Black-Yellow government (in common political shorthand the color of the CDU is black, that of its partner FDP is yellow) tries to convince us that we are being forced to pay for the debts of the Greeks, the Spanish and the others. But we know that there is no conflict between the different nationalities, the conflict is always between those on top and those down below, and a nurse in Athens, who works under very difficult conditions, gets to see nothing at all from these rescue packages."

She also examined the position of the Green party.

"The Greens were once part of the peace movement. Today they are very eager when it comes to making war. We get constant new surprises. When Foreign Minister Westerwelle acted sensibly during the Libyan conflict, the Greens demanded instead that we join in the battle. With such a switch by this party from green to olive drab green we can really be glad that none of them were foreign minister..."

Kipping also hammered at the wage gap when she discussed the economy.

"The chairman of the board of the Bayer pharmaceutical concern gets paid 91 times as much as a nurse who also is on night shifts. Ninety-one times as much! Can anyone really merit 91 times as much as a nurse? I think not!"

More than just a good speaker

Kipping has a history of much more than just good speech making. Those at the congress were proud that the party co-president, with several Bundestag members, had been in the middle of the recent "Blockupy the banks" parade in Frankfurt and had tried vainly to prevent the very brutal police attacks on the demonstrators. She mentioned the event in her speech.

"Blockupy 2013 is not only a story of police repression but also of solidarity. The police wanted to split up the demonstration but all participants remained united, from the group opposed to air flight noise to the feminists, to those of us from The Left, from members of the Metal Workers Union to the anarchists - we all stuck together. Yes, the Blockupy demonstration showed the mosaic character of the left, its multiplicity in breadth and variety. We too were part of this. And our joy about this togetherness cannot be destroyed by any police attack in the world - not by any pepper spray..."

In the last of this trio of three keynote speeches, Gregor Gysi, leading founder of the party, head of The Left caucus in the Bundestag and a popular speaker well outside the ranks of his party, took a look at some still very controversial questions involving past and future:

"State socialism foundered, but that does not mean that the GDR had no achievements. I need only mention the chances for women to work and to qualify for better jobs, the child care, education, where there were unfortunately political limitations but never any financial ones, the all-round medical polyclinics, the chance to get both a college preparatory diploma and full apprenticeship training. And I find that we should learn at last to point to these with self-confidence and without always creeping away from the matter...

"Why have I remained a socialist? Because capitalism causes wars, it lives from wars, and will continue to do so as long as profits can be made from wars. Economic interests are basic to every war. I oppose this and that is why I want a democratic socialism. And because capitalism does not establish social justice, it always tends instead to concentrate wealth in a few hands and spread poverty. Because capitalism cannot establish ecological sustainability and because, of the 70 million who die on our earth every year, 18 million die of hunger. Even though world agriculture is capable of feeding the population twice over, 18 million die of hunger. Why isn't capitalism even able to feed the world population - I cannot understand this. And that is why we want to transform society and achieve a democratic socialism..."

Turning to election issues, Gysi pointed out how important opposition from The Left had been: "We placed the question of an all-inclusive legal minimum wage on the agenda of the republic. It was we who pushed themes like justice in taxation. We are neither a tax-raising party nor a tax-cutting party. We are a party of tax justice...We put the subjects of controlling rent, of holding down electricity costs, of universal health insurance, of combating old age poverty, of withdrawing troops from Afghanistan - we put all of them on the agenda, and wherever you look, you see how we forced the others into motion and to copy our proposals. We shouldn't complain about that, it was a success if the others were forced to copy from us - and we must now keep pushing, that is our task...

"The stronger The Left becomes the greater chance we have to turn majorities in the thinking of the population into political majorities and then go on to fight for further demands. That holds true for the fight against any military involvement of the armed forces, against poverty in old age, on a minimum wage law, justice in taxation, medical insurance, equal pay and equal pensions for men and women in East and West."

Gysi listed 20 major demands on the election platform and set, as a goal for the September 22 vote, a result in the two-digit range.

Four years ago the ability of The Left to win nearly 12 percent of the vote gave the others political parties a great shock. At present the polls wobble between six and nine percent for The Left.

The politicians of the four established parties (the CDU, the SPD, the FDP and the Greens) will try to keep people from learning about the program of the Left Party and may even resort to that fourth element of Greek tradition - earth or, or in political terms - dirt.

If the three powerful speeches given at The Left Party congress last weekend can be followed by an equally vigorous election campaign, that two-digit goal may actually be reached.

Photo: Gregor Gysi (CC)

Brazil protests continue with 50,000-strong cathedral rally

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 13:59:00 +0000

Tens of thousands of people filled the streets of Sao Paulo again on Tuesday night, furious at high taxes, poor public services, and a government tainted by corruption.

More than 50,000 people massed in front of the metropolitan cathedral in Brazil's largest city. A few clashed with police as they tried to enter city hall. Other protesters formed a human chain to stop them, shouting: "Peace, peace."

Demonstrations have ballooned out of protests over a rise in bus and underground fares in Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and elsewhere. Four cities have already put the brakes on the increase and there are signs that Sao Paulo will do the same. But that is unlikely to quell the anger.

The protests "are acute manifestations of the great stress experienced by a large portion of the population of the largest urban centers in Brazil," said Communist Party (PCdoB) chairman Renato Rabelo. He called on the government to tackle the country's housing crisis and "establish an integrated plan for the development, renewal, and humanization of cities."

The protests were an important part of democracy, Rabello added. "The voice of the people must be carefully listened to and answered."

President Dilma Rousseff, a former Marxist guerilla, hailed the protests today as a sign of the strength of Brazil's democracy. "Brazil has woken up a stronger country," she said. "It is good to see so many young people and adults ... together holding the Brazilian flag, singing our anthem, and fighting for a better country. "Citizens emerged who want more and who are entitled to more. I want to assure you that my government also wants more, and we'll get more for our country and our people."

More mass protests are planned for today and Brazilian expats have rallied in Mexico, Portugal, Spain, and Denmark in solidarity.

As well as complaints of corruption and inefficiency, the £10 billion cost of the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympics has added fuel to the fire.

This article was reposted from Morning Star.

Photo: portalctb.org

Mali agreement signed but root problems remain

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 12:26:00 +0000

On Tuesday June 18, the interim government of Mali and the Tuareg separatists of the National Movement of Azawad (MNLA) signed a tentative peace deal to put an end to a year and a half of intense fighting. However, not everyone is sanguine about the deal and its ability to solve the root problems behind the conflict.

The MNLA has been fighting for the separation of Tuareg majority areas from Mali and neighboring states and the creation of an independent Tuareg state. The Tuaregs are an ethnic group that speaks a language of the Berber family and that has social customs different from those of its neighbors. There have been many Tuareg revolts, but the current one started in January of 2012. The MNLA made a marriage of convenience with militant Sunni Islamist groups, including Ansar Dine, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, and MUJAO (the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa).

This, plus an influx into Mali of Tuareg fighters and armaments from Libya caused by the overthrow of Libyan leader Muammar Gadaffi, gave the rebels the strike force which enabled them to take over the whole Northeastern triangle of Mali including the important towns of Timbuktu, Gao and Kidal. The rebel advance and the failure of the government then in power to stop it was the pretext for a coup d'etat by junior officers of the Malian army in March of 2012. The new military junta, headed by Captain Amadou Sanogo, found that the coup did not stop the rebel advance, and that regional powers were reluctant to send help to a government not established legally.

Time was lost as Sanogo tussled politically with other factions in Malian politics. Meanwhile, the Islamist organizations pushed aside the MNLA forces and established their control over the Northeast.

At the beginning of 2013, the rebels made a sudden push through Mali's narrow waistline, and there was real fear that they might capture the capital, Bamako. At that point the interim president, Diancounda Traore, appealed to the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the African Union and French President Francois Hollande to send military help. Combined Malian, French and other African troops drove back the rebels and recaptured Timbuktu, Gao and other towns, but they have not captured Kidal, which, unlike the other places, is mostly Tuareg.

Earlier this year, reports surfaced that the French were thinking in terms of dividing the rebels by making attractive offers of autonomy to the Tuaregs. This led to some consternation in Bamako. Mali is not alone in Africa in being very wary of separatist tendencies, especially when they are being promoted by the former colonial power. Malians speak more than 60 different languages. Africa is seen as already balkanized enough and to open the door to ethnic separatist movements is perceived as very dangerous. However, the Malian army was not in adequate shape to overcome the rebel forces on its own, without outside and especially French military help.

While there were especially bitter local complaints about the Islamist rebels, there were also complaints about the MNLA. Besides abusive behavior by Tuareg fighters, many Black Malians, especially but not only of the Bella ethnic group, fear that Tuareg aristocrats aim to re-subject them to the slavery that prevailed before the colonial period and persisted in one form or another through colonialism and into the period of independence.

There were many reports in the international media of Bella people being "claimed" by Taureg "owners" during the rebel occupation. In response to these experiences, even innocent Tuaregs and Arabs have been subjected to repression by the returning Malian troops, or have been attacked and driven out by local villagers.

Nevertheless, President Traore's government agreed to sit down with the MNLA and hammer out a peace accord, with various countries, including Algeria and Switzerland (considered a Tuareg ally), playing mediating roles. Tuesday's agreement was signed in Oagadougou, the capital of neighboring Burkina Faso, whose government has spearheaded ECOWAS efforts to resolve the crisis.

The agreement includes acceptance by MNLA that Mali will not be broken up. A mechanism was devised whereby Tuareg rebel troops will withdraw from Kidal to bases outside, and Malian troops and civil administrators will return, with French and allied African help. The cease fire will be supervised by a joint commission composed of representatives from the Malian government, the rebels, the United Nations, the ECOWAS forces, the African Union and (naturally) France. The rebels had asked for an amnesty for all crimes committed by them during their occupation of the Northeast, but this will be a matter, rather, for a joint commission. This interim setup will permit the people of Kidal to participate in Malian presidential elections scheduled for July 28. The new government elected at that time will then pursue a more permanent peace treaty.

But there is much suspicion of this agreement in the rest of Mali. Many fear that it is basically a bit of French chicanery designed to keep Tuareg separatism alive and ultimately allied to French interests. International donors have made reconstruction aid dependent on the deal going through. The main group of the left in Mali, the SADI (African Solidarity for Democracy and Independence) Party, denounced the agreement as a violation of Mali's national sovereignity.

Women's organizations also expressed fear that the agreement would allow the rebels to get away with their abuse of women.

And this agreement does nothing to remedy the basic problems of Mali and its neighbors, which are their extreme poverty and their disadvantageous position in the corporate dominated world economy.

Photo: U.S. Army Capt. Laura Porter with children during a medical capabilities exercise in Senkoro, Mali. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Jeromy K. Cross)

Labor a big part of protests in 77 Turkish cities

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 15:37:00 +0000

Over the past few weeks, Turkey has been rocked by unrest. The protests were sparked by peaceful resistance to the destruction of Istanbul's Gezi Park in Taksim Square, the only green public place in central Istanbul, which was going to be turned into a shopping mall and historical recreation of Ottoman Artillery Barracks.

A harsh response from the state, characterized by extreme police brutality, has ensued in response to what have become the largest demonstrations the country has seen for decades. Protests have now spread to 77 cities in Turkey.

For years, tensions have been growing between women and gay rights groups, environmentalists, secularists-including trade unions-and Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP), which controls the government.

Engin Sedat Kaya, a labor activist in Turkey's textile sector, said:

These protests represent a great accumulation of anger against the government's increasingly repressive policies-bans on abortion, on alcohol and anti-democratic policies against trade unions and workers. It is even a reaction to the extremely arrogant tone in Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan's speeches.

For 20 days, demonstrators have faced excessive beatings with police batons and rifle handles, excessive use of tear and pepper gas, water cannons shooting water laced with chemicals, flash bombs, rubber bullets and allegedly real bullets. So far, five have died and 7,000 have been injured.

On Sunday, a funeral was held for Ethem Sarısülük, a working-class labor and political activist and an Alevi-a religious minority in Turkey-who was killed last week by a police bullet that was recorded on video. Police attacked his funeral attendees with water cannons. Sarısülük's case has been deliberately suppressed from media coverage and his family was not allowed into his autopsy.

The extreme reaction by police to the initial protest in May has sparked a mass movement in civil society against authoritarianism and for democracy. The labor movement has played a prominent role in this movement in recent days by mobilizing its members to action to preserve the rights of citizens in an evolving Turkey.

On June 17, the Confederation of Public Workers' Unions (KESK) and the Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions (DISK), along with three professional organizations of architects, engineers, doctors and dentists, have announced a one-day work stoppage to demand an end to police violence. In Istanbul, police did not allow DISK's march to take place into Taksim Square.

The Council of Global Unions, which brings together 11 global union federations and represents hundreds of millions of workers worldwide, wrote a letter to Prime Minister Erdoğan that cited both the current violence and the bloodshed of this year's May Day celebrations in Istanbul and said, "The global union movement is concerned that your government has turned violent repression into a regular practice....Such brutality is unacceptable."

The Istanbul Gezi Park protests have been coordinated by a broad coalition called "Taksim Solidarity," which is composed of 117 different constituent groups, including trade unions.

This prominent stand has not gone without retaliation. Prime Minister Erdoğan told hundreds of thousands of supporters at a government-organized rally outside Istanbul on Sunday that the protesters were manipulated by "terrorists." Erdoğan also has criticized foreign media and has vowed to "identify one by one those who have terrorized the streets."

The president of the Turkish Medical Association reported that five doctors and three nurses had gone missing on Saturday after treating injured protesters. Amnesty International has launched a campaign against incommunicado detention of protesters. Lawyers were detained en masse last week when they tried to stop the first massive police attack on Taksim Square.

Despite promises from the Turkish government to respect a court decision that stopped the construction of the shopping mall in Gezi Park, police invaded the Taksim Square and Gezi Park en masse. Subsequently, extreme violence has consumed the streets of Istanbul and other cities across the country. Military police, or "jandarma," have joined the civilian police in the attacks.

The DISK and KESK union confederations have played a major role in the demonstrations that have captured the world's attention this May and June. Already, KESK held a one-day strike on June 5, criticizing the government's "terrorist response" to peaceful protests. DISK also struck, and DISK organizers have been at the center of the Gezi Park protests.

For decades, these two union confederations have supported respect for fundamental human and labor rights in Turkey. KESK, in particular, has been a leading voice for equality and respect for Kurdish rights in Turkey. As a result, it has experienced constant government raids in recent years. Both the leadership and rank-and-file members have been and continue to be detained under false charges of promoting "terrorist propaganda."

That is why this protest movement is such an important struggle for Turkey's labor unions. It is not just Gezi Park that is at stake, but also the ability of Turkish civil society to thrive free of government intimidation. Indeed, according to many veterans of the Turkish labor movement, workers' rights in Turkey stand to rise or fall with the fortunes of the Taksim Square protesters.

"Turkey's trade unionists stand in solidarity with the protesters in Taksim Square, because we have stood-down these authoritarian practices, tear gas and rubber bullets so many times ourselves in the past," said Eylem Yildizer, a 10-year veteran of both the labor and political movements in Turkey. "This is a turning point for young people active from the beginning of these protests. We will not stand silent and be victims of these government attacks. These protests give new meaning to the way we form a nation. It is only the beginning of what we can achieve. We want freedom for everyone."

The AFL-CIO supports these Turkish labor federations' call for immediate end to the brutal police crackdown in Turkey. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka sent a letter to Prime Minister Erdoğan supporting the demands of the unions.

AFL-CIO NOW blog

Photo: At a protest rally by labor unions in Ankara, Turkey, June 17. Burhan Ozbilici/AP

Cuba, Vietnam among 38 countries that reduced hunger

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 12:15:00 +0000

The United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) announced last weekend that a total of 38 countries worldwide have already met all or part of the "Millennium Goals" for the reduction of hunger, malnutrition and poverty.

The announcement was made by FAO Director General Jose Graziano da Silva on June 16 in a meeting in Rome.

The original hunger and malnutrition Millennium Goal 1, of halving the proportion in each country between the period from 1990-1992 and 2012-2012 was set in 1996, while the World Food Summit Goal, established in 2000, calls for halving the absolute number of hungry in each country by 2015.

Eighteen countries achieved the second, more difficult goal.

Among these 18, outstanding in Latin America are Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Peru. In the Caribbean area, the goals were met by Guyana and St. Vincent and the Grenadines. The other twelve countries in this category are Armenia, Azerbaijan, Djibouti, Georgia, Ghana, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Samoa, São Tomé and Principe, Thailand, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam.

Twenty countries did not meet the second goal but did meet the Millennium Goal 1. These are Algeria, Angola, Bangladesh, Benin, Brazil, Cambodia, Cameroon, Chile, Dominican Republic, Fiji, Honduras, Indonesia, Jordan, Malawi, Maldives, Niger, Nigeria, Panama, Togo and Uruguay.

In the Rome session, the FAO adopted a new goal of the total eradication of hunger.

The FAO singled out former Cuban President Fidel Castro and current President Raul Castro for praise for their long struggle to wipe out hunger and malnutrition worldwide.

At the Rome session, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Elias Jaua expressed, in the name of the late President Hugo Chavez, the view of his own country and those of the Bolivarian Alliance for Our America (ALBA) that to conquer hunger, the idea of food as a commodity and not as a human right has to be jettisoned. Jaua pointed out that four ALBA countries (Cuba, Nicaragua, St. Vincent and the Grenadines and Venezuela) were among those who met the highest benchmark of hunger elimination and were thus recognized by the FAO.

Venezuela has been distributing large amounts of food to its poorer citizens through government-sponsored programs. This fact is often ignored in the international corporate press reports of scarcities of certain items and problems with inflation. Both Venezuela and Cuba have been working hard to encourage urban residents to take up farming so as to increase overall food production.

Photo: Food and Agriculture Organization Facebook page.

U.S. intervention in Syria is a dangerous move

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 16:05:00 +0000

The Obama administration's announcement last week that it would start direct military aid to Syrian rebels is a dangerous step in the wrong direction.

For over a year now, the U.S. has been helping reactionary Saudi Arabia and Qatar funnel money and weaponry to opposition groups in Syria, even though exactly who has been getting the money and arms is unclear.

Over the same time period, violence and bloodshed has steadily increased in Syria, with the death toll now over 90,000, and refugees flooding neighboring countries. There has been a surge in sectarian violence, much like the horrible militia violence that wracked Iraq during the U.S. occupation.

Inserting the U.S. more directly and adding more weaponry into this toxic mix is a recipe for disaster, in our view and that of many others.

In recent months, major news media have been filled with reports of chaotic divisions among Syria's opposition forces, and the growing role of fanatical al-Qaeda-like Islamist groups. There have been reports of truly barbaric attacks by such elements, including, for example, a video of a rebel leader cutting out a government soldier's heart and putting it in his mouth.

According to virtually every recent news report, the Syrian opposition has no clear leadership and is fractured among contending groups. It is not clear who, if any of them, represents the majority of Syria's people.

In this context, the administration's announcement that it plans to increase the "scale and scope" of its support to the so-called Syrian Opposition Coalition, including "direct support" (as opposed to channeling military aid through other countries like Qatar), is reckless indeed.

White House foreign policy advisor Benjamin Rhodes, who announced the new policy on Thursday, claimed that the administration was comfortable working with the opposition coalition. McClatchy reporter Hannah Allam called that "an odd assessment, given that U.S. officials told McClatchy only two weeks ago that the State Department was so fed up with the coalition's lack of progress that it was considering diverting millions of dollars in U.S. funds earmarked for the group." Another administration official said the coalition has "obviously been a very unstable organization."

The White House claimed that it is ramping up intervention because it has determined that the Syrian government has used chemical weapons, crossing a "red line" that President Obama declared last fall. But experts say that evidence of chemical weapons use - by the government or by the rebels - is still unclear. The number of claimed victims of such chemical weapons is 130 to 150, a tiny number compared to the more than 90,000 dead in the fighting so far.

It appears that the chemical weapons issue is a pretext that the administration is using to escalate its military role. Commentators are pointing to several factors behind the administration's move. These include:

* following recent military successes by the Assad regime, a fear that the Syrian rebellion could collapse. This would deal a blow to the U.S./UK/French desire to oust Assad and put in a moderate, West-friendly government that would be part of an alliance against Iran;

* the fear that collapse of the Syrian rebels would make the U.S. "look weak" on the world scene;

* pressure from conservative and liberal warhawks at home - most recently including Bill Clinton;

* interventionist pressure from Britain and France, former imperial powers in the Middle East. This is expected to be a big topic at this week's G8 meeting in Northern Ireland;

* the "humanitarian intervention" policy that advocates military intervention with a human rights face as a way to advance U.S. geopolitical interests. This approach has gained ground with the appointment of Susan Rice as national security advisor and Samantha Power as ambassador to the United Nations.

The White House announcement did not specify what the ramped up U.S. intervention would consist of. According to Reuters, knowledgeable officials say the U.S. will provide automatic weapons, light mortars and rocket-propelled grenades, but not shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles that could bring down Syrian military planes and helicopters. Also, these officials say, for now, the U.S. is not supporting setting up a "no-fly zone" over Syria, which would involve major U.S. and European military involvement to counter Syria's extensive air defenses. For now?

Just last December President Obama achieved the final withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, after our nine-year military debacle profoundly damaged and destabilized that country. It will take Iraq a long time to recover. Do we really want to unleash the ugly reactionary forces at play in Syria? Next door to Iraq, Syria occupies a central place in the Middle East - geographically, politically, historically, and culturally. For the U.S. to now directly insert itself militarily there, greatly increasing the chances for a disastrous outcome, is a profoundly bad move.

We urge our readers to contact the White House and congressional representatives and call for no military intervention of any kind in Syria. The only solution to the crisis there is through thoughtful diplomacy that places a priority on the wishes and interests of Syria's democratic-minded people.

Photo: As the G8 meeting opened in Northern Ireland, with President Obama in attendance, Monday, June 17, members of Oxfam placed white roses and gravestones on the ground outside Belfast City Hall, symbolizing the bloodshed in Syria. Oxfam called on the G8 leaders to throw their weight behind a political solution to the conflict. (AP/Peter Morrison)

Audit OKs Venezuela election, U.S. response to be seen

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 16:50:00 +0000

On June 11, Tibisay Lucena, chair of the Venezuelan National Election Council (CNE), announced that it had completed its audit of all ballots from the April 14 presidential election. No major discrepancies were found, and the election of socialist and Hugo Chavez ally Nicolas Maduro as the new president is allowed to stand. Predictably, the opposition, led by losing MUD presidential candidate Henrique Capriles Radonski, denounced the audit as fraudulent. A response from the Obama administration is now awaited.

The presidential election was a special one, made necessary by the death of President Chavez on March 5. The initial results were close, with Maduro winning 50.7 percent of the 4.6 million votes cast, to Capriles' 49.1 percent. A routine audit of 54 percent of the vote, which compared paper receipts with computer recordings, was carried out immediately. Capriles then demanded a full audit of the remaining ballots, which is the one just completed. An additional demand to verify the fingerprints of all registered voters was refused by the CNE.

Capriles has announced that he will ask the Venezuelan Supreme Court for a new election, and if, as expected, he fails there, he will go to "international bodies."

The completed audit found a 99.98 percent correspondence between the paper and electronic votes. The .02 percent discrepancy was caused by errors such as the voter destroying the paper ballot rather than putting it in the required receptacle, CNE representatives explained.

It is doubtful that Capriles' efforts to overturn the election will succeed. As of this writing, the United States is the only country refusing to recognize the election results, which may change given the audit. All other countries of the Western Hemisphere, including those with right-wing governments, have long since recognized Maduro as president.

Friction between Venezuela and the United States has continued because of various incidents, including a statement by President Obama to a Spanish-language media outlet that Venezuela should look to countries such as Mexico, Colombia, Peru and Chile as examples of how to improve their country's governance. This was met with incredulity in Caracas and beyond; elections like the one held last year in Mexico have been notoriously corrupt, with evidence of massive vote-buying scandals still unfolding.

However, there some cooling of tempers may be in the offing. Venezuela released and deported, instead of prosecuting, a young American it had arrested after accusing him of links to far-right groups. And on July 6 at the Organization of American States meeting in Antigua, Guatemala, Secretary of State John Kerry met with Venezuelan Foreign Minister Elias Jaua. Evidently the meeting went well; the two agreed to work on restoration of ambassadorial-level relations, broken off since 2009. Kerry thanked Jaua and "President Maduro" and said that both countries want to "find a new way forward, establish a more constructive and positive relationship "

Negotiations on bilateral relations will continue with Venezuela's foreign ministry represented by Calixto Ortega, and the U.S. State Department by Roberta Jacobson. Energy and other issues will also be on the agenda.

Predictably, the right wing in the United States criticized the Jaua-Kerry meeting. Progressive activists are urging that the White House and State Department openly recognize Maduro as president and normalize U.S.-Venezuela relations.

Photo: Secretary of State John Kerry, left, and Venezuelan Foreign Minister Elias Jose Jaua shake hands as they pose for a photo during a meeting of the 43rd General Assembly of the Organization of American States, OAS, in Antigua Guatemala, Guatemala, June 5. Kerry, on his first trip to Latin America since taking office, gauged prospects Wednesday for improving badly strained ties between the United States and Venezuela that have steadily deteriorated over the past decade. (AP/Moises Castillo)

Lawyers assail police response to Turkey protest

Wed, 12 Jun 2013 12:42:00 +0000

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) - Thousands of black-robed Turkish lawyers stormed out of their courthouses Wednesday, shouting about the alleged rough treatment of their colleagues by police amid the country's biggest anti-government protests in years.

The rallies by clapping, chanting jurists added a new twist to the nearly two weeks of protests that started in Istanbul and spread to dozens of other Turkish cities. The protests have shaped up as the biggest test yet in the 10-year rule of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Islamic-rooted government.

The embattled premier hosted talks with a small group of activists Wednesday afternoon in a bid to end the standoff, though critics in the streets said the 11-person delegation wasn't representative of the protesters - and insisted it wouldn't end the showdown.

Meanwhile, police and protesters retrenched after fierce overnight clashes in Istanbul's Taksim Square. The protesters say the prime minister is becoming increasingly authoritarian and is trying to force his deep religious views on all Turks, a charge that Erdogan and his allies strongly deny.

In Ankara and Istanbul, thousands of lawyers railed against the alleged rough treatment of dozens of their colleagues, who police briefly detained in Istanbul on the sidelines of Tuesday's unrest.

Sema Aksoy, the deputy head of the Ankara lawyer's association, said the lawyers were handcuffed and pulled over the ground. She called the police action an affront to Turkey's judicial system.

"Lawyers can't be dragged on the ground!" the demonstrating lawyers shouted in rhythm as they marched out of an Istanbul courthouse. Riot police stood off to the side, shields at the ready.

Turkey's Human Rights Foundation said Istanbul prosecutors had launched an investigation into allegations of excessive use of police force during the protests.

The foundation said 620 people, including a one-year-old baby, were injured during the police crackdown early Wednesday. Police detained around 70 people during the incidents. Prior to this, activists reported that 5,000 people had been injured or seriously affected by the tear gas and four people have died in the protests.

The government, meanwhile, pressed ahead with uncertain efforts to defuse the protests.

President Abdullah Gul, seen by many as a more moderate voice than Erdogan, said the government couldn't tolerate more of the unrest that has disrupted daily life in Istanbul and beyond. He promised, however, that authorities would listen to protesters' grievances.

"I am hopeful that we will surmount this through democratic maturity," Gul told reporters. "If they have objections, we need to hear them, enter into a dialogue. It is our duty to lend them an ear."

The protests erupted May 31 after a violent police crackdown on a peaceful sit-in by activists objecting to a development project replacing Gezi Park with a replica Ottoman-era barracks. They then spread to 78 cities across the country and have attracted tens of thousands of people nearly every night.

Erdogan hosted the 11 activists - including academics, students and artists - in his offices at his Justice and Development Party in Ankara. Some leaders of civil society groups, including Greenpeace, had said they would not participate because of an "environment of violence" in the country.

The activist group Taksim Solidarity, which includes academics and architects who oppose the development plan, said its members hadn't been invited to the meeting with Erdogan and predicted it would yield no results.

"As police violence continues mercilessly ... these meetings will in no way lead to a solution," the group said in a statement. It also reiterated the group's demands, saying Gezi should remain a public park, senior officials behind the police excesses should be fired and all detained protesters should be released.

"We are still here and our demands haven't changed," group member Ongun Yucel said at the park. "People who are in the meeting are not representative of Taksim Solidarity. They are people who have nothing to do with what is going on here."

After Tuesday's violence, traffic returned to Taksim Square with taxis, trucks and pedestrians back on the streets. At one point, some police were seen kicking a soccer ball on the square. Riot police stood to the side, near a new barricade of wrecked cars and construction material that activists put up to impede their ability to fire tear gas on the park.

Hundreds of protesters remained camped out in Gezi Park, clearing up after a night of trying to fend off tear gas. An early morning storm blew down tents and soaked bedding. Donations of food and supplies including tents, sleeping bags and toilet paper continued to arrive.

On Tuesday, riot police firing water cannons and tear gas clashed all day and night with pockets of protesters throwing stones and setting off fireworks. The pitched battles didn't simmer down until just before dawn.

Erdogan has insisted the protests and occupations, which he says are hurting Turkey's image and economy, must end immediately and are being organized by extremists and terrorists.

The protests are drawing expressions of concern from abroad.

Germany's government was "following the news from Turkey with great preoccupation, especially the images of yesterday's police action," Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman Steffen Seibert said Wednesday. "Now de-escalation is needed. Only an open dialogue can contribute to easing the situation."

Photo: Thousands of Turkish lawyers march in support of anti-government protests, in the Turkish capital, Ankara, early Wednesday, June 12, 2013. (AP/Burhan Ozbilici)

Russia adopts law against “gay propaganda”

Wed, 12 Jun 2013 12:15:00 +0000

As police in Moscow kept watch over hundreds of gay activists who were holding a rally, the Russian parliament unanimously passed a law yesterday banning "gay propaganda."

The law passed 436-0, with only one deputy abstaining from voting on the bill, which prohibits the spreading of "propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations" among minors.

The passage of the law comes on the heels of a number of actions that activists say the Russian government has taken in violation of basic human rights.

Earlier this week, a Russian LGBT film festival was fined about $10,000 for acting as a "foreign agent." Organizers of the St. Petersburg Bok o Bok (Side by Side) festival say they were fined in an attempt to squash the group's screenings and discussions relating to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender issues.

On June 1, the government announced a ban on adoption of Russian children by foreign same-sex couples. Vladimir Putin, Russia's president, had said April 1 that a French law allowing same-sex marriage went against traditional Russian values and that Russia would take steps to ensure that gay couples from abroad did not adopt Russian orphans. Russia banned all adoptions by Americans this year in a dispute with the United States over human rights.

Homosexuality was decriminalized in Russia in 1993. Prior to that, it was punishable with jail terms.

Putin has frequently championed socially conservative values and courted the Russian Orthodox Church during the new term he started in March, 2012. A poll by the Levada Centre found that 38 percent of Russians believe gay people needed medical treatment and another 13 percent said they should face prosecution. A March poll found that 85 percent opposed same-sex marriage.

Putin, who has criticized gay people for "not adding to Russia's population," insists that "Russia does not discriminate."

Russian gay activists say Putin's statements, combined with the law passed yesterday, encourage discrimination. The brutal killing of a man who police said told drinking partners he was gay has stoked fear of more anti-gay violence.

The law passed yesterday makes it illegal to equate straight and gay relationships, and to distribute material on gay rights. It provides fines for both Russians and foreigners found guilty of breaking the law.

Immediately after passing the law, the Duma also approved a law allowing jail sentences of up to three years for "offending religious feelings."

"I have sincere contempt for the Duma's deputies, all of them, including the so-called opposition. You have now brought fascism to my country," wrote Yelena Kostychenko, a journalist at the Novaya Gazeta newspaper.

The two new laws are seen as strengthening the hand of the Russian Orthodox Church, an organization repeatedly called upon by Putin to boost his own political standing.

"The government is using homophobia and xenophobia to justify its policies against an independent civil society," said Igor Kochetkov, the president of the LGBT Network, another St. Petersburg group. "They are making enemies out of us - not just LGBT society, but any group that doesn't agree with their current politics."

Photo: Ivan Sekretarev/AP

Britain pays $31 million to Mau Mau victims

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 16:49:00 +0000

LONDON - British Foreign Secretary William Hague stopped short of issuing an apology last week to the elderly Kenyans tortured by British colonial forces during the Mau Mau uprising.

The Mau Mau movement emerged in central Kenya during the 1950s to get back seized land and push for an end to colonial rule. Supporters were detained in camps and thousands were tortured, maimed or executed.

Hague told the House of Commons June 6 that the government had reached a full and final settlement with solicitors of 5,228 claimants totaling $31 million.

The government would also support the construction of a memorial in Kenya's capital Nairobi to the victims of torture and ill-treatment during the colonial era.

But he said the British government continued to deny liability for what happened during the uprising.

Shadow foreign secretary Douglas Alexander said Labour supported the government.

However left Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn said it was strange of the government to offer compensation but to deny any formal responsibility.

"I'm a bit surprised," he said, adding: "This is a very strange result, to offer compensation and a settlement for Leigh Day and at the same time deny liability."

Corbyn pointed out that many MPs in the 1950s raised the issue in Parliament at the time, praising the Kenyans for their "tenacity" in seeking justice.

"When we deny rights and justice, when we deny democracy, when we practice concentration camps, it reduces our ability to criticize anybody else for that fundamental denial of human rights, and I think this is a lesson that needs to be learnt not just in Kenya but in other colonial wars as well where equal brutality was used by British forces," he said.

Hague said there was no inconsistency in recognizing the suffering endured by many of the victims while continuing to deny liability.

Originally posted at Morning Star; currency converted to U.S. dollars.

Photo: Veterans of Kenya's Mau Mau uprising await the press conference announcing a settlement in their legal case against the British government, in Nairobi, Kenya, June 6, 2013. (AP/Ben Curtis)

International labor pushes to free the Cuban Five

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 14:56:00 +0000

Both internationally and within the United States, organized labor is now taking up the struggle to free the Cuban Five, with major unions in Canada, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean organizing projects to educate their members and the public and exert pressure on U.S. authorities.

The "Cuban Five" are Cuban agents who, in the 1990s, had settled into the Miami, Florida area to carry out surveillance of right wing Cuban exile organizations that had organized terrorist attacks in Cuba in which many died.

Cuba, which had on many occasions asked that the U.S to crack down on these terrorist groups, handed over information collected by its agents in Florida to the F.B.I. But instead of arresting the terrorists, the U.S. authorities arrested the five, who were sentenced to long terms in federal prison after a farcical trial in Miami.

Rene Gonzalez, one of the original Five, has since been released after serving his sentence, but the group, which has held together steadfastly, still calls itself "The Cuban Five." The remaining four still imprisoned in the United States are Gerardo Hernandez, Ramon Labaniño, Antonio Guerrero and Fernando Gonzalez.

Since then, a large-scale national and international movement to "Free the Cuban Five" has grown up. In Washington D.C. from May 30 through June 5, supporters of the Cuban Five carried out numerous activities under the rubric of "Five Days for the Cuban Five." The activities, organized by the International Committee for the Freedom of the Cuban 5, included lobbying visits to Congress, panels, press events, cultural events and a protest at the White House. Important presentations were made by civil rights leader and author Angela Davis, Wayne Smith (President Jimmy Carter's ambassador to Cuba), farmworker leader Dolores Huerta, and a host of activists, intellectuals and parliamentarians from more than a dozen countries.

Internationally, major support for the Cuban Five has been organized through the labor union movement, with many national union federations, such as the Congress of South African Trade Unions and Britain's Trades Union Congress, playing a leading role. In the United States too, there are more and more Cuba solidarity activities, and especially activities in support of the Cuban Five, being undertaken by unions including SEIU, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union and the San Francisco Central Labor Council.

On June 3, as part of the "Five Days for the Cuban Five" mobilization, labor activists gathered at the union hall of Local 140 of the American Postal Workers' Union, AFL-CIO, for a discussion with U.S., British and Canadian unionists on the importance of the Cuban Five struggle for U.S. and international labor, and initiatives that labor is taking to achieve the freedom of the prisoners.

Participants were welcomed by Local 140 President Denise Briscoe and by Carl Gentile of the American Federation of Government Employees, both of whom have been involved in organizing union-sponsored trips by elected labor officials to Cuba, with a focus on Maryland and the District of Colombia.

Presentations were given by British, Canadian and U.S. trade unionists.

From Britain came Rob Miller from the British Trades Union Congress (T.U.C.). Miller heads the Cuba Solidarity Committee which operates within the 1.5 million member T.U.C. and counts on major support from UNITE, the very large British industrial and general union which has close relations with unions in the United States including the Steelworkers through their joint "Workers Uniting" partnership. The aim is to create a "jury of millions" to reverse the unfair decisions of a bigoted Miami court which originally convicted the Cuban Five.

Dennis Lemelin, national president of the 50,000 member Canadian Union of Postal Workers, pointed out that as a public union, his union must be aware of international events. In the past, this has meant that it was heavily involved in the struggle to end apartheid in South Africa and other international solidarity campaigns. Its Cuba solidarity work is a continuation of that.

Santos Crespo, president of local 372 of the New York City Board of Education Employees (AFSCME), who had written an eloquent letter to President Obama calling for the freedom of the Five, pointed out the relevance of the issue for U.S. workers, and the new opportunities for raising the Cuban 5 issue within U.S. labor. In the past, the power of right wing Cuban exiles in labor circles has made it difficult to successfully bring up the issue, but this influence is fading.

Speakers at the event made clear that they see that the treatment that has been meted out to the Five falls into the category of "an injury to one is an injury to all" above anything.

All speakers urged the participants in the session to immediately become active on the issue of Cuba and the Cuban five in their own workplaces and union locals, approaching the issue as one of solidarity between working people in the United States and working people in Cuba. They urged a rank and file outreach in which major time is invested in talking to ordinary workers and union members. Social media should also be extensively used.

Richard Grassi contributed to this article.

Creative Commons, Flickr.

Some 1.5 million disappear in Germany

Mon, 10 Jun 2013 15:24:00 +0000

BERLIN - There is almost too much to write about from Berlin! To start off, there's the uncanny disappearance of 1.5 million residents of Germany, missing since the last census over 20 years ago. Instead of 81.7 million people, there are only 80.2 million (of whom 6.2 million, or 7.7 percent, were not German citizens).

You may ask, "who cares?" One answer: hard-hit Berlin, where 400,000 are unaccounted for, and which will now lose millions of euros in subsidies from the European Union and richer German states.

Adding to the funding problems is the high cost of those deadly killing machines, the drones, which President Obama is trying so hard to justify. Germany's Thomas de Maiziere is in a worse bind: his Defense Department wasted $650,000,000 dollars on Northrop Grumman's Global Hawk drone, renaming it the Euro Hawk.

It may soon be called the Euro Vulture, since his project is a cadaver: his drones, lacking an anti-collision system, are officially banned in Europe, and unless Herr Minister can do some skillful maneuvering, Merkel may have to drop him from her cabinet - just a few months before the big election. Of course, Northrup Grumman will continue taking in money in the amount of double-digit billions and Germany will remain the world's third biggest weapons exporter.

There seems to be no end to the continued proposals for whole new areas into which drone technology can be deployed. The use of smaller, unarmed, low-flying drones has also been suggested here in Germany for the war against scofflaw graffiti artists.

Another item may be of interest to both amateur and professional historians. Germany's Social Democratic Party, on the eve of its festive sesquicentennial celebration in Leipzig (150 years), announced a new international "Progressive Alliance" to compete (and perhaps replace) the Socialist International, which was constituted in 1951, largely to "fight the menace of Communism." It once made headlines with leaders like Willy Brandt and Olaf Palme, but also with Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and similar "socialist" members. Although the fifty parties forming the new organization are not officially quitting, the old Socialist International will hardly make many headlines in future.

Founded in Leipzig's historic City Bathhouse, its political temperature could remain lukewarm; it will include the British Labour Party and - just imagine - the fiery Democratic Party of the USA, with Howard Dean a main speaker and Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin in the new leadership. As yet I have heard neither sobs at the collapse of the one nor hurrahs at the birth of the other. But who can tell?

The dominant news in Germany is about the terrible floods filling many urban areas with filthy water and leaving sticky sludge, mud, destruction, and a loss of many millions of euros by those whose homes line the Danube, Elbe, and their other flooded tributaries in the south and east. Many, with no insurance, are ruined by these worst floods in a century, in four centuries in some cases.

The debates continue; is the main culprit human-caused climate change, or over-farming and construction in riverside areas, which once harmlessly drew excess water out of the raging rivers? Or both?

But I must finally turn to my main subject, though it was largely submerged in the press by the floods.

The dozen or so towers and skyscrapers of Frankfurt on the Main are too tall to worry about inundations of a watery kind; owned by banks, they hope for fluidity of a financial nature. Both the locals, like the Deutsche Bank, or foreigners like JP Morgan and Bank of America, are mostly well protected in that connection. But on Saturday, the European Central Bank, one of the very biggest, forty stories high, suddenly feared a siege!

But although this attack was certainly angry enough, it was completely non-violent. It was the newest action of the Blockupy Movement, a European offspring of Occupy Wall Street, and it was protesting the entire austerity policy of the so-called Troika, the new dictators of Europe, forcing millions in Greece, Spain, Cyprus, and Portugal to endure brutal poverty measures, an economic flood which hurts people in all countries while the euros pile up in those big towers. The troika consists of the Commission of the European Union, the International Monetary Fund, and last but not least, Frankfurt's European Central Bank, which was forced to face its foes.

On June 1, up to 20,000 people, many from other countries, marched through the banking district - sort of like Wall Street. They even had court permission to march a definite route - and they kept to the agreement. The police, unfortunately, did not.

The march started at noon but had hardly gone 300 yards in the first twenty minutes when the police stopped it, separating and surrounding the first group of 1000 people, whom they decided was a "black block", although a large number were wearing t-shirts and apparel of all different colors.

"Halt," the police said, "You are violating the law by wearing masks!" What did the "masks" consist of? Sunglasses and umbrellas! They agreed to give them up, but the police insisted on frisking and registering every one of them. Then the police demanded that the rest of the marchers leave the first group and take a different route. But they refused, and the bargaining dragged on for two hours, with those in the first group still surrounded, unable to leave.

Suddenly, the police moved in, heavily armed, under the pretense of an alleged fireworks explosion. They had pepper gas by the gallon, which they used as often as possible. One participant remarked, "They made no distinction, beating young and old alike. I saw a kick with a military boot aimed at me, and could not escape it. It hit me hard on my right thigh through my clothing. I was beaten on my nose and chest.

"The women with me were torn from my side. I had to push my way out of the gas clouds and the orgy of violence to the side of the street. We could not get past the edge of the street, because the demonstration had been cut off so no one could get through. For thousands, it was impossible to get to the transportable toilets or get food or water."

Another attack followed, he recounted, with police making another attack on those seeking in vain to escape. He said one cop threatened to "pound his head to a pulp."

The beatings lasted from 2 until 8 p.m.; not even the intervention of two Bundestag deputies of the Left Party or the credentials of journalists impressed the cops. It was late in the evening before the last demonstrators were permitted to leave - after having their identities registered.

Despite over a hundred casualties, however, the Blockupy people refused to be provoked, or to abandon the first group, which was hit the hardest. Thus, the obvious aim of the police to make it easy for the media to pin the whole event on a radical, violent "black block" of wild anarchists just didn't work this time. There were no provocations at all; perhaps even the usual police provocateurs found it impossible to do the job expected of them.

This Blockupy protest was supported by forty organizations, most actively the anti-banker group Attaq, the Ver-di union, second largest and most militant federation in Germany (city and state employees, hospital, postal, and garbage units, also cultural professional groups like music teachers and writers), and the LINKE (Left) Party. At least two of its Bundestag deputies, including the co-chairperson of the party, Katja Kipping, were in the middle of the event.

In the days that followed, a Frankfurt leader of the right-wing CDU attacked the Greens and the Social Democrats: "Are they part of the black block of the enemies of democracy or with us on the side of a just state?" He even accused the Greens of returning to their old stone-throwing beginnings of the 1970's. But this was just election year play-acting since banners or flags of the SPD or Greens were visible on Saturday. And while later in the week both SPD and Greens loudly demanded an investigation of events, the situation is especially complicated for the Greens since they are partners with the CDU in Frankfurt's city government.

And while criticizing the police brutality, the Green leaders quickly added that what happened need not endanger their coalition.

A dramatic aspect of the Blockupy event was that, at almost the same time, police with similar weapons were violently attacking protesters in Istanbul, Ankara, and many other cities in Turkey. The past year has seen militant actions in Greece, in Portugal, in Spain and Cyprus. Germans, though also hit by the economic crisis, have been far better off than those in the southern countries, and have been less active and less militant. Those in power in Germany, in office like Angela Merkel, or in those skyscrapers like the heads of the big banks, would like to keep it that way - and frighten off any protests like those in Frankfurt. They have shown that they can get as tough as the cops in Istanbul.

Photo: A crowd in Reichstag, Berlin. Lower census figures mean less public funds for Berlin. Flickr (CC)

Chinese officials slam negligence in deadly poultry plant fire

Fri, 07 Jun 2013 15:38:00 +0000

China's top work safety official issued a stinging criticism of company management and government regulatory efforts following Monday's deadly poultry plant fire that killed 120 and injured 77. Yang Dongliang, director of the State Administration of Work Safety, said the fire was caused by negligence on the part of the plant's management as well as supervisory authorities.

The board chairman and general manager of the Jilin Baoyuanfeng Poultry Company have been detained by police, and the firm's assets have been frozen and all of its licenses have been revoked.

Some 350 workers were inside the plant when the early morning fire broke out and rapidly spread through the facility. Workers struggling to get out were blocked by locked or blocked doors - the plant had only one open exit. In addition, those who escaped said the building's narrow hallways made it difficult to reach the exit.

"You had to get the team leader's permission before going to the toilet, and the doors would only be opened then," a former worker named Li told CCTV, China's state television station.

Some reports said the explosion was caused by leakage in one of the plant's liquid ammonia tanks. Ammonia is used as a refrigerant in the food-processing industry. It is highly flammable, as shown in the West, Texas, fertilizer plant explosion in April which killed 14 and injured about 200.

"The company must not shirk its responsibility to maintain safety, nor can the government shirk its management and supervisory responsibilities," said Yang, the Chinese news agency Xinhua reported.

Yang spoke Thursday at an investigative work team meeting in Changchun, capital of Jilin Province in northeast China, where the poultry plant is located.

An initial investigation by the team showed that work safety management at the plant was a "total mess," Yang said.

The company failed to implement an accountability system for workplace safety and thoroughly eliminate work safety hazards, he said.

The company also failed to conduct safety drills and offer safety awareness education to its employees, the investigation team found.

"The company's management of employees was chaotic. No training, no drills. Many people died near the gate," Yang said.

"It's too early to say for certain whether the emergency exits were locked or not. But one thing is for sure: they could not be opened," he said.

A former worker named Li told CCTV, the state television station, "You had to get the team leader's permission before going to the toilet, and the doors would only be opened then."

Yang said the accident also demonstrated that local governments and relevant authorities failed to fulfill their supervisory responsibilities.

Bayanqolu, the governor of Jilin Province and deputy head of the investigation team, said the government's work safety supervision efforts have many loopholes

"The company emphasized production and efficiency but neglected safety and workers' lives, causing irreversible losses," he said. "As governor, I feel deeply guilty."

The Jilin Baoyuanfeng Poultry Company, which opened in 2009, is a major producer of processed chicken and employs about 1,200 people. The area is an agribusiness center, especially for poultry. One of the biggest producers of broiler chickens in China, Jilin Deda Co., is nearby. It is partly owned by Thailand-based conglomerate Charoen Pokphand Group.

Chinese authorities said the 2,000 and more dead chickens at the Jilin Baoyuanfeng plant pose a high risk of causing an epidemic. The local government has mobilized 80 rescue workers to curb any potential outbreak, CCTV reported.

A BBC report notes that the Chinese government has made strides in improving workplace safety in recent years. Workplace accidents have dropped more than 33% in the past five years, according to comments made in January by China's then Vice Premier Zhang Dejiang. The death toll from those accidents has also dropped more than 29%.

However, fire accidents at construction sites and agricultural production factories like the Jilin poultry plant are on the rise, according to the most recent data available from China's Public Security Bureau.

Factory managers failed to obey safety procedures, using heat sources and electricity in unsafe ways, the bureau reported.

Photo: In this photo released by China's Xinhua News Agency, a family member of a worker cries Monday near the fire at the Jilin Baoyuanfeng Poultry Company in northeast China's Jilin Province. (AP/Xinhua, Jin Liwang)

Trade unions join Turkey protests

Thu, 06 Jun 2013 11:26:00 +0000

Turkish trade unionists have piled into anti-government protests, marching into Istanbul's Taksim Square banging drums and waving banners.

Members of more than a dozen unions joined in, calling for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to quit.

"We will show that we will not surrender to fascism with our peaceful democratic reaction in city squares," said a joint statement from two union confederations.

They said the Islamist ruling party was restricting citizens' rights and freedoms "to realise its own dreams of power."

The Turkish Confederation of Public Workers' Unions (Kesk), which represents 240,000 workers, launched a two-day strike on Tuesday.

And today the even bigger Confederation of Revolutionary Trade Unions of Turkey (Disk), which has 420,000 members, joined the strike and demonstration.

Thousands of demonstrators welcomed the trade unionists to the square, yelling defiance at Mr Erdogan, who had earlier dismissed them as "extremists" and "vandals."

"The vandals are here! Where is Tayyip?" shouted the crowd.

On a nearby street during the night some protesters had clashed with police, who used tear gas against them.

There were similar protests against Mr Erdogan's reactionary policies in Kizilay Park in the capital Ankara.

And in the western port city of Izmir police raided 38 addresses and arrested 25 people for "inciting the people to enmity and hate" through Twitter posts.

Police said that they were still after 13 others.

Clashes spread overnight to the eastern province of Tunceli, where police fired tear gas and water cannon at hundreds of protesters who set up barricades and threw stones.

Police also confronted demonstrators in Ankara as well as in Hatay province on the Syrian border, where a 22-year-old man died after being hit in the head at a rally late on Monday.

Two people have been killed and more than 3,000 injured in the six days of protests.

Reposted from Morning Star.

Photo: Protesters near Taksim Square, Istanbul, Turkey, Thursday, June 6, 2013. Kostas Tsironis/AP

Police told to find Neruda murderer

Tue, 04 Jun 2013 11:05:00 +0000

Forty years after the death of Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, a judge ordered police to find the man that prosecutors allege may have been instrumental in poisoning him.

Mr Neruda's death was blamed on prostate cancer but lawyer Eduardo Contreras says that new evidence points the finger at agents of dictator General Augusto Pinochet.

Mr Contreras said that Dr Sergio Draper, who originally testified that he was with Mr Neruda when he died on September 23 1973, is now saying that there was another doctor named Price with the poet.

But Dr Price did not appear in any of the hospital's records as a treating doctor and Dr Draper said that he never saw him again after the day he left him with Mr Neruda.

Moreover Dr Price's description - a blonde, blue-eyed, tall man - matches Michael Townley, the CIA double agent who worked with Chilean secret police under Gen Pinochet.

Mr Townley was whipped off into the US witness protection programme immediately after admitting having killed prominent Pinochet critics in Washington and Buenos Aires.

For Mr Contreras, whoever the man was, "the important fact is that this was the person who ordered the injection" that allegedly killed Mr Neruda.

The poet's former assistant Manuel Araya also said that he believed the poet was poisoned by Pinochet agents.

The Nobel prizewinner's body was exhumed on April 8 and is being analysed by Chilean and international forensic specialists.

Reposted from Morning Star.

Photo: A painting of Pablo Neruda (right) on the side of a building in Santiago, Chile. Rafa Alves/Flickr (CC)

Turkey erupts in anti-government protests

Tue, 04 Jun 2013 10:57:00 +0000

Turkish protesters clashed with riot police in the early hours today as demonstrations entered their fourth day after a night of noisy protests and violence in major cities.

In Izmir, protesters threw fire bombs at the ruling AK Party offices overnight and television footage showed part of the building ablaze.

Bus shelters, paving stones and street signs ripped up by protesters to make barricades littered a major avenue by the Bosphorus in Istanbul where some of the heaviest clashes took place.

Roads around Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's office were sealed off in the early hours as police fired tear gas to push back protesters.

In the main street near Erdogan's office, one demonstrator drove a small mechanical digger towards police lines as other protesters followed behind.

The demonstrations grew out of anger over excessive force against protesters holding a sit-in to prevent the uprooting of trees near Taksim Square.

But they spiraled into Turkey's biggest anti-government disturbances in years, challenging the PM, who demonstrators say has appeared increasingly authoritarian.

Erdogan inflamed tensions further by calling protesters "a bunch of looters."

And he again dismissed the street protests as organized by extremists and angrily rejected comparisons with the Arab Spring.

He claimed the protests were being organized by Turkey's opposition party and extremist groups, plus "internal and external" groups bent on harming Turkey, said that the country's intelligence service was working on identifying them and threatened to hit back at them.

"We shall be discussing these with them and will be following up, in fact we will also settle accounts with them," he said.

By contrast with Erdogan, President Abdullah Gul appealed for calm from all sides and defended citizens' rights to air grievances.

"When we speak of democracy, of course the will of the people is above all," Mr Gul said.

"There can be nothing more natural for the expression of various views, various situations and objections through a variety of ways, besides elections," he said.

He claimed: "The views that are well intentioned have been read, seen and noted and the messages have been received."

Turkey's Public Workers Unions Confederation said that it would hold a "warning strike" tomorrow to protest against the crackdown on anti-government demonstrations over the last four days.

"The state terror implemented against mass protests across the country... has shown once again the enmity to democracy of the AKP government," said a statement from the confederation, which has around 240,000 members in 11 unions.

UK-based LabourStart urges union members and other activists to sign their petition protesting the brutal crackdown. "A coalition of organizations including trade unions has issued demands, which trade unionists everywhere will support.

"These include:

free all those arrested;
drop all charges against them;
hold accountable those responsible for the police violence;
and lift all bans on meetings and demonstrations."

In addition, during the evening hours in Ankara the police attacked the headquarters of the Communist Party of Turkey, throwing tear gas bombs into the building and to the café of a nearby cultural center. They took café patrons into custody.

Originally published in Morning Star.

Photo: Police use tear gas against Turkish demonstrators in Ankara, June 2. (AP/Burhan Ozbilici)

Chilean police told to find Neruda murderer

Mon, 03 Jun 2013 17:05:00 +0000

Forty years after the death of Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, a judge ordered police to find the man that prosecutors allege may have been instrumental in poisoning him.

Mr. Neruda's death was blamed on prostate cancer but lawyer Eduardo Contreras says that new evidence points the finger at agents of dictator General Augusto Pinochet.

Mr. Contreras said that Dr Sergio Draper, who originally testified that he was with Mr. Neruda when he died on September 23 1973, is now saying that there was another doctor named Price with the poet.

But Dr Price did not appear in any of the hospital's records as a treating doctor and Dr Draper said that he never saw him again after the day he left him with Mr. Neruda.

Moreover Dr Price's description - a blonde, blue-eyed, tall man - matches Michael Townley, the CIA double agent who worked with Chilean secret police under Gen Pinochet.

Mr. Townley was whipped off into the U.S. witness protection program immediately after admitting having killed prominent Pinochet critics in Washington and Buenos Aires.

For Mr. Contreras, whoever the man was, "the important fact is that this was the person who ordered the injection" that allegedly killed Mr. Neruda.

The poet's former assistant Manuel Araya also said that he believed the poet was poisoned by Pinochet agents.

The Nobel prizewinner's body was exhumed on April 8 and is being analyzed by Chilean and international forensic specialists.

Morning Star

Photo: This Feb. 14, 1952 file photo shows Chilean poet Pablo Neruda in Capri, Italy. Mario Torrisi/AP