Restraint to Retribution: Modi’s New Normal and Nawaz Sharif’s Challenge

Arvinder Singh Lamba

India’s response by a surgical counter-strike by Special Forces on launch pads against terrorists near the Line of Control (LoC) to infiltrate inside Indian Territory was the beginning of a natural but formidable exhibition of the changing political will and military precision assaults. The resonance of near global synergy and opinion against both - terror and a terror sponsor state - that uses its military machine to endanger peace and stability, should have warned Pakistan of possible responses.

 

India’s strong responses with complete ownership at the highest level signal the first ever reflection of rare strategic convergence between political leadership, the home ministry, the National Security Advisor, and the military.

 

For Pakistan, the message was one of India’s zero tolerance towards terror emanating from home grown groups in Pakistan, as well as terror groups or elements sponsored by Pakistan and operating within India.

 

In keeping with its strategy of denial and disowning terrorist actions from Mumbai to Uri, Pakistan’s military has dismissed the strike as a usual cease fire violation. The chorus of denial this time came from the highest diplomatic levels as office of the high commissioner of Pakistan in India to the political and the military hierarchy in Pakistan.

 

Pakistan's response is unmistakeable despite this denial. Visits of journalists to forward locations to negate the truth of Indian surgical strike have been followed up by intensified firing on border villages inflicting heavier casualties in the rice belt of RS Pura, sensitive Macchal and Gurez sectors, terror strikes in Afghanistan and Balochistan, and mutilations of Indian soldiers. Recent media reports of four posts in Keran sector routed by India’s fire assaults and increased casualties of Pakistan’s soldiers reflect the hardening responses.

 

First, it is imperative to identify the reasons impelling Pakistan’s denial. Foremost, the strike challenged the Pakistan Army’s rhetoric of being the saviours and guardians of the country, especially when viewed in India’s historically reactive and overcautious perspective; caused a paralysis, disabling Pakistan Army’s response to this strike, and more grievously, preventing Pakistan’s response to any further strikes by Indian military.

 

Second, the military’s inability to explain significant casualties to their trained and nurtured terrorists who expect due protection from the military during operations and suicide missions, added a sense of betrayal to their sacrifices.

 

Finally, for an event that has drawn enormous international support for India in its war on terror, what will the Pakistani military have to explain to the nation, and its political leadership, and where does the government go from here? The civilian government, forced to toe the military line, risks its own credibility.

 

The bigger spin off is one of paralysis in the political leadership and the chasm in civil-military relations intensifying with an environment of resentment against Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s money laundering in the Panama Papers leaks and other businesses; clampdown on media; and the military’s pressures for escalating the situation that may compel the government to box this big lie.

 

While Pakistan's military may be working to redress the ramifications, three major outcomes are likely:

 

One, obfuscation of the event will deny the government any grounds for justifying appropriate response or reaction, and such continued inaction will substantiate the perceived paralysis of the leadership and the policy makers.

 

Two, for Pakistan, their doctrine of bleeding India by a thousand cuts has been deeply frustrated, adding to uncertainty regarding the frontline role and space in future operations of jihadis and other terrorists.

 

Finally, the change of Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff (COAS) will draw greater focus in light of accentuated and irrational responses. Whether or not incumbent COAS Gen Raheel Sharif gets an extension, the level of escalation across the LoC and the International Border (IB) may well threaten the civilian government’s aspirations for stability. In fact, the escalation, with a major risk of throwing the spiral out of control, may have already begun.

 

For India, the increased latitude and freedom by the Ministry of Home Affairs to the Border Security Force, and the military to its tactical commanders for dealing with similar situations is a significant departure from the past that will encourage harder responses by India each time.

 

By irrational actions such as ceasefire violations, killings, mutilations on the border, and terror strikes in Balochistan and Afghanistan, Pakistan has more than crossed the threshold of India’s restraint.

 

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent warning of retribution is a unique mark up, threatening to escalate responses to the next level with graver consequences for Pakistan’s military, as much as for Nawaz Sharif - whose political leadership is already under test. The subsequent phone call by Director General of Military Operations to his Indian counterpart raising the white flag to stop increasing casualties is in acknowledgement that responses are beginning to hurt.

 

In the larger perspective, the tectonic shift from strategic restraint to credible military options by Prime Minister Modi not only indicates India’s new political direction, but also emphatically debunks the traditional myth of zero operational space between unabated terror by Pakistan and a nuclear war.

For the international community, India’s dynamic political leadership and professional military have underscored their capacity and resolve to protect national interests, as well as to play a credible role in ensuring stability and security in the region.

University of Brighton International Students’ Scholarships 2017/2018

Application Deadline: There are four application deadlines throughout the year: 31st January, 31st March, 31st May, and 31st July 2017.

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: International countries

To be taken at (country): United Kingdom

Type: Postgraduate taught

Eligibility: To be eligible, candidate must:

• be new, full-time, international fee-status student who holds an offer of admission.
• have applied for the course of your choice at the University of Brighton, and have been offered a place on that course for 2016 entry.
• Students studying graduate diplomas, pre-masters programmes, or equivalent, at University of Brighton partner colleges or those on PG Cert and PG Dip courses (excluding OSPAP, Law CPE PGDip and Accounting PGDip) are not eligible for these scholarships.
• These scholarships are not open to students who are fully sponsored.
• Existing international students are also not eligible unless starting a new postgraduate programme.

Selection Criteria: The criteria for awarding University of Brighton international scholarships are primarily merit-based. Merit does not necessarily have to mean academic merit but could also be interpreted to include outstanding performance in a variety of spheres.

The strongest candidates will be those demonstrating a mixture of academic merit (including English language ability) and other merit or outstanding achievement in a particular field of activity.

Candidate will also need to show that they have sufficient funds to pay the remainder of the fees.

Number of Awardees: Thirty (30)

Value of Scholarship: The scholarship is worth £5,000 off the cost of students’ tuition fees for each year of your course.

Duration of Scholarship:  One (1) year

How to Apply: Visit the scholarship webpage to apply

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: University of Brighton

University of Warwick Commonwealth Shared Scholarship for Masters Students 2017/2018

Application Deadline: 16th March 2017.

Eligible Countries: Commonwealth countries

To be taken at (country): UK

Eligible Fields of Study: The Taught Masters courses offered for the academic year 2017/18 by the University of Warwick in partnership with the Commonwealth Scholarships Commission are the following 10 courses only :

MSc in Healthcare Operational Management – Warwick Manufacturing Group
MSc in Economics and International Financial Economics – Economics
MA in Global and Comparative History – History
LLM in International Development Law and Human Rights – School of Law
MSc in Biotechnology, Bioprocessing and Business Management – School of Life Sciences
MSc in Food Security – School of Life Sciences
MSc in Sustainable Crop Development; Agronomy for the 21st Century – School of Life Sciences
MA in Gender and International Development – Sociology
MA in International Development – Politics and International Studies
MA in International Political Economy – Politics and International Studies

Type: Masters

Eligibility: To apply for these scholarships, candidate must:

• Be a Commonwealth citizen, refugee, or British protected person
• Be permanently resident in a developing Commonwealth country (for a full list of eligible countries, see the terms and conditions in link below)
• Be available to start your academic studies in the UK by the start of the UK academic year in September/October 2017
• By August 2017, hold a first degree of either first or upper second class (2:1) classification, or lower second class (2:2) classification plus a relevant postgraduate qualification (usually a Master’s degree)
• Not have studied or worked for one (academic) year or more in a developed country
• Be unable, either yourself or through your family, to pay to study in the UK

Selection Criteria: Selection criteria include:

• Academic merit of the candidate
• Potential impact of the work on the development of the candidate’s home country.

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Scholarship: The Scholarships cover full tuition fees, offer a generous stipend, provide airfare to the UK and return home and an allowance for warm clothing.

Duration of Scholarship: 1 year

How to Apply: In addition to the University’s own online study application, applicants mustsubmit a funding application via the Commission’s electronic application system by 16th March 2017. No late applications will be considered.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: University of Warwick

New Zealand’s capital caught unprepared for earthquake and flooding

Chris Ross

On 15 November, the day after a powerful 7.8 magnitude earthquake shook the South Island of New Zealand, the capital city Wellington, on the lower North Island, was cut off by heavy rain and strong winds. Widespread flooding, land slips and aftershocks closed both main state highways, caused the suspension of rail and bus services and prompted the evacuation of some residents.

On the South Island, the town of Kaikoura remains devastated and isolated by the earthquake, with State Highway 1 severed in both directions. The government sent military convoys and navy vessels, including the guided missile destroyer USS Samson, to evacuate the township. Billed as a “humanitarian” mission, it is another example of how natural disasters are used to conduct joint military exercises.

In Wellington, the quake and severe weather highlighted the lack of preparedness for a major disaster. Late and inadequate tsunami warnings created confusion. GeoNet advised residents living in low-lying areas to seek high ground without waiting for official warnings. Following widespread criticism, Prime Minister John Key belatedly promised a national disaster warning system capable of sending alerts to every cell phone. He claimed it would cost “tens of millions” of dollars.

In a rush to get business back to “normal,” Wellington’s recently-elected Labour Party mayor Justin Lester declared the central business district (CBD) to be safe, just a day after workers were told to stay home so building inspections could be conducted. Workers and residents were met by cordoned-off areas outside buildings shut down over structural concerns, which were still being discovered days after the event. Lester refused to declare red zones near affected buildings, saying an evacuation of the CBD would be a “logistical nightmare.”

Relatively new buildings, such as the CentrePort-owned Bank of NZ Centre and the government’s Statistics NZ Office, that are built on reclaimed land, were badly damaged. On November 17, a carpark complex in the centre of the city was closed, with 100 residents evacuated from nearby apartments. The building has now been declared at “risk of collapse” and is to be demolished. Other buildings, such as Archives NZ, NZ Post House and Wellington Girls’ College, were also evacuated. The Queensgate mall and Wainuiomata mall in working-class suburbs outside the city remain closed. Some buildings could be shut for months.

Wellington Company director Ian Cassels said most workers returned to work the day after the quake “because their employers want them there.”

Acting Civil Defence Minister Gerry Brownlee initially said he was “a little surprised” at the decision to reopen the city so quickly but later backed off the criticism, complaining only of landlords not sharing building safety information with city authorities.

Mayor Lester told the media it was not his task “to create chaos or fear or hysteria.” Wellington, however, sits astride a major geographical fault and is at high risk of ongoing damage from aftershocks. The council has a list of over 660 buildings that are classified as earthquake risks. They are not among those damaged last week.

GeoNet, which monitors earthquake activity, has forecast aftershocks and smaller earthquakes in the immediate future. Yesterday another quake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.1–6.3 hit the North Island, north of Wellington. It was centred off the coast, almost 140km from Palmerston North, to a depth of 37 metres.

If a major earthquake, of 7.8 or above magnitude, strikes Wellington or the surrounding region, the capital could easily be thrown into chaos, resulting in death, destruction and severing the city from the rest of the country.

The day after the November 15 quake, Wellington was hit by a severe weather system with 140 kmph (87mph) gale force winds and heavy rain. Lester initially dismissed the weather warnings, telling the Herald that the wind was “nothing more than a gentle breeze.”

However, State Highways 1 and 2 out of the city were closed for more than a day by flooding and lands slips. State Highway 58 between Porirua and the Hutt Valley, Paekakariki Hill Road and others were also closed, severing the capital’s land access. Bus services were brought to a standstill. Thousands of motorists waited hours for State Highway 2 to reopen.

Train services were cancelled because of multiple slips, and could not be replaced by buses due to road closures. All train services were suspended after two quake aftershocks of 5.8 and 5.2 magnitude but were subsequently resumed, without thorough track inspections. The longest double-track rail tunnel in the country, near Wellington, had some surface flooding but services continued regardless.

Some residents were trapped in their homes by rising floodwaters. Many river banks in Porirua and the Hutt Valley flooded, threatening nearby houses and prompting evacuation calls. Schools, kindergartens and libraries were closed.

This is not the first time the capital city has been cut off. In May 2015, heavy rain caused floods and slips, resulting in the closure of both state highways and all passenger rail lines. Severe weather has repeatedly exposed the capital’s run-down, outdated infrastructure. Much of it is over 100 years old. Without rational planning and billions being spent on infrastructure, the region’s topography and geographic isolation makes a disaster inevitable.

Immediate responsibility for this state of affairs rests with the Wellington City Council and the Greater Wellington Regional Council (GWRC). Both institutions have been dominated over many years by Labour Party and Greens representatives. Rather than attempting to meet the needs of working people, their overriding concern is to facilitate business operations. The GWRC has recently opened up the rail network to a private operator.

Events such as those of last week expose the complacency and indifference of the entire political establishment to the needs of ordinary citizens. This was starkly revealed in its response to the earthquake that devastated the city of Christchurch in 2011, with the loss of 185 lives.

Five years on, entire suburbs have been abandoned and areas of the central city remain rubble-strewn. Mayor Lianne Dalziel, a former Labour government minister, has worked closely with the National government to protect big business and impose the cost of the rebuild on the working class. The city council has cut staff, increased rates and begun to sell off assets to help fund its “share” of the rebuild.

The Christchurch debacle—in which the government and rapacious insurance companies have wrecked thousands of lives—stands as an indictment of the profit system and all its political representatives.

Sri Lankan president orders arrest of “inciters of racism”

W.A. Sunil 

According to the Colombo-based Daily Mirror, at a meeting of Sri Lanka’s security council on Sunday, President Maithripala Sirisena instructed the police and security forces to “take all who incite racism into custody and produce [them] before courts under the existing law.”

While the immediate reason given for this order is to “curb racism,” it signals that the government is preparing for a broader crackdown on opposition parties and the working class.

As Sirisena reaches the second anniversary of his installation as president, his pro-US government is in deep political crisis. The infighting between the ruling coalition and an opposition group led by ousted former President Mahinda Rajapakse is intensifying.

Sunday’s meeting of the country’s top security body was attended by the inspector general of police, the armed forces chiefs and several leading ministers, including Justice Minister Wijedasa Rajapakshe and Law and Order Minister Sagala Ratnayake.

The Daily Mirror reported that Sirisena inquired about the possibility of enacting new laws to take action against people who promote racism. The justice minister said “steps had already been taken to draft the new law” and pointed out that even under the existing laws, “inciters of racism were liable for one year’s imprisonment.” Last month, the cabinet approved sweeping new anti-terror laws, which a parliamentary committee is now examining.

On November 15, both Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe warned about a “political conspiracy” against the government. The two were speaking at a meeting held to mark the 30th anniversary of Ravaya, a Sinhala-weekly newspaper that helped to bring Sirisena to office.

Sirisena declared there were moves to destabilise the government, and a “well-organised and well-funded political conspiracy to hinder the march toward reconciliation.” Wickremesinghe said “racist groups are trying to take the power.”

Sirisena and Wickremesinghe did not name names but implied that the “conspirators” were in the Rajapakse-led faction of Sirisena’s Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP). This faction opposes Sirisena’s national unity government with Wickremesinghe’s United National Party (UNP).

The government is seeking to exploit provocations by Sinhala chauvinist groups in order to strengthen its hand. Sirisena and Wickremesinghe are not opposed to communalism. Both were leaders in successive governments that waged communal war against the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), which was defeated in 2009. Both have pledged their continued support for the domination of Buddhism and the Sinhala majority.

The chauvinist campaign by Sinhala Buddhist extremists has intensified during recent months. Last week, in Batticaloa in the eastern province, a Buddhist monk, a supporter of the Buddhist Brigade (Bodu Bala Sena or BBS)—a fascistic group of Buddhist monks—threatened an ethnic Tamil government village officer with bodily harm if he continued court cases against Sinhalese people. In another incident, police were compelled to arrest a Sinhala chauvinist last week who made similar threats against Muslims at a public demonstration in Colombo.

On Saturday, the BBS held a Buddhist prayer meeting in Kandy, directed against those “harassing Sinhalese.” The BBS is notorious for anti-Muslim provocations, including a riot in Aluthgama in 2013 that resulted in the killing of four people and the significant destruction of property.

These are not isolated incidents. Many Sinhala chauvinist groups, including the BBS, are backing Rajapakse. The ex-president and his supporters are accusing the government of “betraying” the “war heroes”—the armed forces that waged the ruthless communal war against the LTTE.

Two weeks ago, members of parliament supporting Rajapakse formed a new political party, named the Sri Lanka Podujana Party. Rajapakse, who is campaigning to regain power, indicated that he would take the leadership of the new party at a future date.

As part of its efforts to undermine Rajapakse’s campaign, the government is trying to intimidate media outlets that sympathise with him. In October, the media ministry revoked the broadcasting license of CSN TV, which is closely connected to the Rajapakse family over alleged license violations. The media ministry secretary has also threatened Derena TV, accusing it of distorting a recent speech by Sirisena.

The threat to the media is not limited to these two institutions. The government repeatedly attacks the media for criticising it. Wickremesinghe last week said the government would have to take action against media outlets that did not behave. Yesterday, in a veiled threat, Sirisena said the media did not see any positive actions by the government.

Last week, the head of the Sinhala racist Mahajana Eksath Peramuna, Dinesh Gunawardena—a party supporting Rajapakse—added fuel to the government’s conspiracy claims. “There might be a military coup if the government does not take immediate action to arrest the rapid deterioration of democracy in the country,” Gunawardena warned parliament.

The concern of Gunawardena and Rajapakse is not the “deterioration of democracy.” The former Rajapakse government ruthlessly suppressed the media as part of its assault on democratic rights.

The government condemned Gunawardena’s comments and accused the opposition group of attempting to “disrupt political stability and create fear among the people.”

Both the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe government and the opposition groups allied to Rajapaske are fearful that popular unrest involving workers, students and the rural poor could threaten capitalist rule.

Over the past year, there has been a series of workers’ protests demanding pay increases and better working conditions. In September, tens of thousands of estate workers came onto the streets demanding a pay hike and protesting against workload increases.

The country’s economic crisis is deepening, with falling exports and investment. Export earnings dropped by 5.8 percent during the first six months of this year and foreign investment fell to $US4.5 billion, a staggering 52.5 percent decline on the previous year. The government’s foreign debt has increased to $65 billion, and public debt has risen to 76 percent of gross domestic product.

This month, the government presented a budget that imposed heavy taxes on workers and poor, while cutting expenditure on public education and health to limit the deficit to the target set by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). One week later, the IMF released the second installment of its current loan package. To meet the demands of the financial markets, the government also decided to expedite the restructuring and privatisation of public enterprises. Tens of thousands of workers will lose their jobs. These attacks will provoke social upheavals.

The working people must take a warning. Inciting communalism, against Tamils and Muslims, has been standard operating procedure for every faction of the ruling elite for decades to divide the working class and deepen its repressive rule when it faces sharpening class tensions. The Sirisena-Wickremesinghe government’s measures are not designed to end racism and communalism but are strengthening police-state methods to suppress the working class and poor.

Hundreds killed in US home fires

Steve Filips

Three hundred twenty-six people have been killed in home fires in the United States so far this fall as the heating season is just beginning. Of the 326 people who died, at least 55 are children and another 70 are senior citizens. Twenty-five people died in both Texas and Georgia and 21 in Pennsylvania.

With the weather turning cooler in the US, the heating season has begun. This is the time of year when preventable fatalities increase due to inadequate housing and heating conditions, which are forcing many to utilize space heaters to supplement heating, raising the risk of house fires.

At least 1,869 people have died as a result of fires this year alone. The figure is most likely higher, as there are likely many cases that never get reported in the media.

Statistics compiled from media reports by the United States Fire Administration (USFA) reveal the scale of the crisis. There have been several tragic multiple fatalities in house fires across the US. These largely preventable deaths expose the social inequality and dangerous housing conditions that exist for the working class despite the so-called economic recovery.

On November 21, four children, girls ages 11, 9, 7 and 5, died when the house they were living in caught fire in Carroll County, Indiana. The mother was pulled from the blaze with burns on her hands and face and suffering from smoke inhalation. Two police officers who tried to rescue the children were also hospitalized with smoke inhalation.

In the last week of October, there was a horrific increase in residential fires, in which 67 people were killed. In that week, there were 12 incidents in which 36 people lost their lives. Sixteen of the victims were under 14 years old.

Georgia has had 25 deaths since the beginning of the heating season. Twelve people were killed in fires on the weekend of October 22 and 23 alone.

In Trion, in the northwest corner of Georgia, a mobile home fire took the lives of five family members and one relative visiting in a mobile home that caught fire around 11 p.m. on October 23. The victims were Brad Miron and Demi Jones, 29 and 22, and their three children, Clair, Lola, and Olivia Jones, who were aged 5, 3, and just 3 months old, respectively. A cousin staying overnight, Jada Kendrick, age 5, also perished.

Brad Miron had installed a wood stove in the trailer the day of fire, and it was determined to be the cause of the blaze. A family member told the local press, “Brad was going to make sure those babies were warm, and he had no other option, so he did what he thought was right to keep them warm and it cost them their lives.”

There has been no confirmation that the home contained smoke or carbon monoxide detectors. Mobile homes are notorious death traps, where fire can engulf the entire home is just minutes.

The town of Trion is home to one of the largest textile factories in world for denim, Mount Vernon Mills, which employs 1,700 workers. According to the US Census Bureau, the poverty rate in Trion for children under 18 years of age in 2014 was 29.4 percent, a nearly 8 percent increase over 2012.

Also that weekend, five people were killed in a home fire in Duluth, Georgia. Killed in the blaze were Kimberly Lewis, 45, David Waring, 45, Kelley Tomkinson, 47, Edward Brown, 21, and Danielle Waring, 19.

A mobile home fire in Kaplan, Louisiana, on October 23 killed a mother and two infants. Felicie Cloteaux, 22, was killed as she tried to save her friend’s children, Rory and Arabella Hudson, just 3 and 4 years old.

At the time of the fire, there were six inside the home, with three escaping when they became aware of the fast-moving blaze in the mobile home early in the morning. The victims were believed to have succumbed to smoke inhalation and were found in the back bedroom of the home.

After a preliminary investigation, it is believed that the fire may have started from an electrical malfunction in the living room area. It was reported that there were no smoke or carbon monoxide detectors operational in the home.

In Amarillo, Texas, a fire on November 10 in a recreational vehicle killed a mother and her three children. The family was using the RV as a home because their nearby mobile home was not in fit condition to be occupied. The emergency call came at 5 p.m. from a neighbor who noticed smoke. The neighbors’ attempts at rescue were repelled by thick smoke.

Killed in the blaze were Michelle Stone, 34, and her children Richard, Audrianna, and Keegan Stone, who were 8, 5, and 4, respectively. The victims are survived by Michelle’s husband, Rick Stone, and two older children. The cause of the fire, and whether there were detectors of any kind in the RV, is unknown.

All of these deaths were preventable. With the colder weather and the high price of fuel, many working class and low-income families are forced to rely on unsafe space heaters or wood burners. The high cost of housing is also forcing many families into overcrowded and substandard housing, which are often firetraps. As winter approaches, these tragedies will only increase and claim more victims.

Over 120,000 British children will be homeless this winter

Alice Summers

More than 120,000 children in the UK will be homeless this Christmas, according to a report by the charity Shelter. This is the equivalent of four children at every school in the country.

This figure comprising children living in temporary accommodation, such as emergency bed and breakfasts and hostels, or “couch surfing” involving indefinite stays at the homes of friends and relatives. It represents the highest level of child homelessness seen in the UK for eight years.

According to Shelter’s calculations, the number of families living in temporary accommodation has risen by 15 percent since last year alone, standing at 7,475 families by the end of June 2016.

In their report, Shelter interviewed 25 families who were currently or recently living in temporary accommodation. All of the families lived in grossly inadequate and overcrowded conditions, with every family having only one room to share between an entire family. Over half of the parents reported that they also had to share a bed with their children.

One family stressed how their accommodation fell way short of acceptable standards, explaining, “You know they say a brother and a sister can’t share [a bed] past 11 [years old], but [our daughter] shares with three boys and their mum.”

Another family told Shelter that they were sharing a two-bedroom terrace house with three other families.

The temporary accommodation these families are forced to live in was not only overcrowded, but also violated basic health and safety regulations leading many parents to fear for the safety of their children. Many of the rooms had problems ranging from dirty or broken mattresses to mould, sparking plugs, windows that would not shut and doors without locks. Some families reported vermin, exposure to drug abuse, fighting and strangers sleeping in the corridors.

These conditions had serious effects on the mental wellbeing of children, with 18 out of the 25 families reporting that their children’s emotional and mental health had been negatively impacted upon. Parents described how their children became anxious, socially isolated and had problems sleeping.

Over half of the parents interviewed said that their children’s development had been negatively affected. Shelter reported, “[W]hile children in emergency accommodation might have a roof over their heads, they are clearly without a home. They do not have the space to live their lives—to play, study, or relax. Nor a place of stability and safety where they can grow and develop.”

This growth in child homelessness reflects a general rise in homelessness across the entire population. Another report released at the start of this year by Crisis, a charity for single homeless people, documented a 30 percent rise in homelessness in England over a single year.

Both Crisis and Shelter cite the huge lack of affordable homes, instability and high costs in the private rented sector, and reductions in welfare as the main causes of this surge in homelessness.

Over the past years, relentless cuts to social security payments, such as Job Seekers Allowance and in-work and housing benefits, have removed much of the safety net that many families rely on to avoid homelessness while they look for work or cheaper accommodation.

This month a cap on the amount a household can receive in welfare benefits came into operation. The cap will particularly hit those most in need, including an estimated 42,000 single parents. The total amount of benefits a household can receive has been slashed by a massive £6,000 from £26,000 to £20,000 nationally, with the exception of London. In London, it is reduced from £26,000 to £23,000. The Institute for Fiscal Studies think tank said the benefit cap “almost exclusively affects families with large numbers of children or very high rents or both.”

Assessing the report, charities estimate that 112,000 families, responsible for 320,000 children, will be up to £115 a week worse off. The Children’s Society said more families could be made homeless as a result. “There are already 3.9 million children living in poverty across Britain and the new cap is likely to cause that total to rise. Children’s health, well-being and mental health could all be put at risk,” it stated.

Compounding the problem families face accessing any decent accommodation is discrimination in the private rented section, with landlords frequently refusing to accept families claiming housing benefits even if the household is in work. Under legislation that came into force at the beginning of this year, landlords are also obliged to verify the immigration status of potential tenants, with the possibility of receiving fines for letting out a property to an illegal immigrant leading many private landlords to be unwilling to let to people they perceive to be immigrants.

These stricter laws on renting to migrant workers—nominally to stop rogue landlords taking advantage of vulnerable people—have in fact imposed further restrictions on access to accommodation for migrant workers and the working class more broadly.

According to Shelter, barely half of the 250,000 new homes the country requires in order to keep up with demand are being built. The majority of which are sold at market rates—completely out of the price range of many families. Add this to skyrocketing property prices and the mass privatisation of many social homes under the “Right to Buy” scheme, and the reasons increasing numbers of families have been pushed into the unstable and unaffordable private sector become clear.

A tenant renting a property in the private sector can be asked to move out with just two months’ notice. For many families this is insufficient time to find alternative affordable accommodation, or to raise the large amounts of cash that are needed in advance to pay up-front costs such as letting agent fees, tenancy deposits and initial rents. As a result, many families are forced out of their homes and end up with nowhere to go.

Councils have a legal duty to provide homeless families with children with somewhere to sleep. However, due to the massive housing shortage, these families are often placed in insecure temporary lodgings.

A spokesman for the ruling Conservatives’ Department of Communities and Local Government hailed the provision of such inadequate housing, stating, “Temporary accommodation ensures that no families with children are ever left without roofs over their heads. … Just last week, this Government announced it would be backing [Conservative MP] Bob Blackman’s Homelessness Reduction Bill—which will also provide vital support for many more people.”

The bill, which passed its second reading in Parliament on October 28, will extend the period of time during which a person is considered to be “threatened with homelessness” from 28 to 56 days, giving families an extra four weeks to seek help from their local authority in finding new accommodation. This token measure will do virtually nothing to solve the homelessness crisis. Without greater provision of social or affordable homes, after this extended period many individuals will still be forced into insecure, temporary accommodation or onto the streets.

UK: Chilcot Iraq War inquiry cover-up confirmed

Robert Stevens

New documents made available, as the result of Freedom of Information (FOI) requests, confirm that the Chilcot report into the Iraq War was set up to ensure that those who organised and planned the illegal war would not be held accountable.

The Chilcot Inquiry, chaired by Sir John Chilcot, was established by Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown in 2009. Chilcot’s report was only finally released seven years later, in July. The report provided sometimes devastating confirmation of the criminal role of the British and US officials who organized and led it, but it issued no finding on the legality of the invasion. No one, including then British Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George W. Bush, the architects of the war, was called to account.

This was always going to be the outcome of the inquiry. Brown set it up with the limited remit of establishing the “lessons that can be learned” regarding British involvement in the US-led war. Its terms of reference ensured there would be no assigning of responsibility to any politician, civil servant, diplomat or military figure for their role in the events leading to the war, the military slaughter itself, or its aftermath. Those testifying were assured that no prosecutions or legal proceedings would arise from their appearances. Witnesses were not required to speak under oath and none of those testifying, including Blair and Brown, faced anything remotely near a proper cross-examination.

The papers confirming that this whitewash was the planned outcome were made public after Chris Lamb, an FOI campaigner, won a two-year court battle for the right to access classified memos by government officials relating to the setting up of the Chilcot Inquiry. The memos were all written in a four-week period in May and June 2009.

Labour government officials, including Brown himself, were opposed to any sort of public inquiry. They favoured an investigation by members of the secretive Privy Council—senior politicians who advise the monarch—along the lines of the Franks Inquiry into the 1982 Falklands/Malvinas war. That inquiry, called by the then Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher, has gone down in history as a whitewash and, as one commentator put it, “a classic establishment job.”

Writing to Brown’s Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O’Donnell, Cabinet Office official Ben Lyon said an inquiry could be designed to “focus on lessons and avoid blame.” A parliamentary inquiry, he warned, would lead to a “daily running commentary.”

In response, O’Donnell stated his agreement and told Brown a parliamentary inquiry would “threaten legal liability for individuals” and “take a long time.”

In June 2009, Brown announced that a Privy Council investigation into the war, to be held in secret, was to take place. He faced a public backlash and was forced to relent and authorise a public inquiry.

Even then, parts of the Chilcot Inquiry were still held in private “in the national interest.” Lamb told the Observer, “The inquiry was hobbled before it even started, with tight restrictions on what it could do that were not fully made public.”

That the Chilcot Inquiry was wholly a creature of the government and had no real independence is confirmed in the FOI documents. One of the memos by Lyon states that protocol was that the secretariat of the Chilcot Inquiry should not draw from civil servants and that those selected “should not have been involved in Iraq policy since 2002.” But O’Donnell immediately made Margaret Aldred the secretary of the inquiry, under conditions in which Aldred had chaired the Iraq senior officials group during the period Chilcot was investigating. A previous FOI request by Lamb found that Aldred was directly nominated by O’Donnell, despite the inquiry’s head of communications stating, “Sir John Chilcot had complete freedom to choose whoever he wanted both as Secretary and as head of communications.”

It only gets worse! Other senior Blair government figures involved in the 2003 war, who were enlisted to establish the inquiry, included Sir Jeremy Heywood—Blair’s parliamentary private secretary until 2003—and Sir John Scarlett, the chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) from 2004 to 2009. Scarlett was the nominal author of a draft intelligence dossier produced on September 16, 2002 that contained an executive summary stating that “intelligence” (in fact, a single source) allowed the government to judge Iraq “has military plans for the use of chemical and biological [weapons], some of which could be ready within 45 minutes of an order to use them.”

This was then published by the Blair government, with a foreword by Blair himself that focused on the 45-minute claim to justify war—an assertion that Blair then repeated in Parliament.

In another memo, O’Donnell advised that the Chilcot investigation be organised so that it would be prevented from reaching “any conclusion on questions of law or fact, which create circumstances which expose organizations, departments and/or individuals to criminal or civil proceedings or judicial review.”

Central to this was that there were to be no judges or lawyers among the inquiry appointees. This was critical, wrote O’Donnell, in order to avoid a “legalistic” focus being adopted.

The cherry on the cake in ensuring that the inquiry would be utterly toothless was the appointment of Chilcot, the very safest pair of hands, to lead it. Chilcot became a Privy Counsellor in 2004 and was a member of the Butler Review of the use of intelligence in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Named after its chairman, Robin Butler, Baron Butler of Brockwell—a pillar of the establishment who served as private secretary to five prime ministers, including Thatcher and Blair—the Butler report, published in 2004, refused to hold Blair or anyone else accountable for the lies used to justify the war.

Throughout his career, Chilcot served as a top official in various Labour and Conservative governments in the Home Office, Civil Service Department and the Cabinet Office. He was private secretary to Home Secretaries Roy Jenkins (Labour), Merlyn Rees (Labour) and William Whitelaw (Conservative). Chilcot is now the president of The Police Foundation, a policing think tank.

Earlier this month Chilcot gave evidence at Parliament’s Liaison Committee and told them that Blair went “beyond the facts” in order to justify the war. Translated into plain English, Blair lied, as Chilcot and everyone knows. However, Blair, a widely despised, unindicted war criminal, remains free and is now in the process of establishing an office in London and returning to front-line politics. That this is the case is due to the now proven fact that the ruling elite ensured that none of those responsible for the Iraq war would face justice.

Just a few months after Chilcot’s report was issued, its 2.6 million words, in 13 volumes, are now gathering dust in the House of Commons library. It has served its purpose for the ruling elite, who always intended it as the basis for finally washing their hands of the Iraq War. Following the publication of Chilcot’s report earlier this year, only around 50 MPs, out of 650, even showed up to debate it in Parliament. Their main concern was that, whatever the consequences of Iraq, it would be wrong to use the criticisms to oppose further wars involving Britain’s military.

Merkel to run for fourth term as German chancellor

Ulrich Rippert

Christian Democratic Union (CDU) leader Angela Merkel will run for a fourth term as German chancellor. On Sunday, she announced that she would once again stand for the office of CDU chairperson at the party conference in early December. She told a press conference that, in her opinion, the party chairmanship meant she was automatically the party’s candidate for chancellor and consequently she would stand in next year’s federal election.

Media reports pointed out that Merkel had indicated four years ago that she wanted to use her third chancellorship to prepare a change of leadership in the party and government. However, the growing crisis in Europe has left her little room for manoeuvre. At the press conference on Sunday, Merkel emphasized that she had “thought long and hard” and her decision had not been an easy one.

The fact that she has decided to stand a fourth time is directly related to the Brexit vote and election of Donald Trump as US president. Trump’s nationalist policy of “America first” has rocked European politics to the core.

Trump’s election success was seen in Europe as a vote of no confidence in the ruling elites, represented by Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. Many articles have pointed out that a similar development is taking place in Europe and Germany. Opposition to official policy is growing significantly. Brexit was only the beginning of an intensification of the crisis of the European Union. In the coming period, victories for far-right parties are in the cards in Austria, the Netherlands and France.

While the ruling elite in the US is lining up behind Trump, a similar development is taking place in Germany behind Merkel. All of the establishment parties are converging and seeking to form a kind of political fortress against the population.

A new Merkel chancellorship is an appeal for a continuation of the current “grand coalition” of the “union” parties—the CDU and the Bavarian-based Christian Social Union (CSU)—and the Social Democrats (SPD). It is in addition a call for all parties to close ranks and work together more closely. The recent decision to make Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier of the SPD the joint presidential candidate of the SPD and the CDU/CSU has the same goal.

Many media commentators have described a reelection of Merkel as a “policy of stagnation” and “business as usual.” In fact, the opposite is the case. A Merkel cabinet 4.0 would not be merely a continuation of what has already taken place. Merkel’s decision for a renewed candidacy is linked to a political offensive, prepared long in advance, aimed at tackling foreign and domestic policy changes with energy and aggressiveness.

To those critics who warn that continuing the grand coalition will reinforce political disillusionment and extra-parliamentary protest, Merkel supporters reply: “Bring it on!” Her new candidacy is bound up with preparations to intensify the policies of militarism and the expansion of state powers to combat social opposition that already constitute the foundation of the program of the grand coalition. A review of the record of the current grand coalition shows that Merkel’s renewed candidacy must be understood as a threat.

Following the federal election of 2013, coalition negotiations lasted an exceptionally long time, until it became clear that the governing parties had agreed on a fundamental change in foreign policy in favour of militarism and war. Foreign Minister Steinmeier, Defence Minister von der Leyen, President Gauck and others declared that Germany was “too big and too important” to comment on “world politics from the sidelines.”

For the first time since the end of World War II and the crimes of the Nazi dictatorship, leading German politicians stressed that the period of military restraint was over. In future, Germany would intervene more independently in crisis regions and focal points of world politics—expressly by military means.

There followed a process of intensive military rearmament. In close alliance with the US, the German government organized a coup in Kiev and, using fascist forces, brought a pro-Western regime to power that threw Ukraine into civil war and triggered a confrontation with nuclear-armed Russia.

Next came the deployment of the Bundeswehr in Syria in support of NATO. At the same time, the intervention of the Bundeswehr in Africa was put into motion. German Defence Minister Von der Leyen recently announced additional military expenditures totalling €130 billion, and a new white paper from the Defence Ministry envisages the deployment of the Bundeswehr at home and abroad.

In the European Union, Merkel and her finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble, have intensified the social crisis with their brutal economic policy. The result is 23 million unemployed in Europe. Millions more work in the low-pay sector and in irregular jobs.

In many countries—Portugal, Spain, Italy and Greece—youth unemployment is over 50 percent. Poverty is growing among the unemployed, young people, low-wage workers and pensioners. This social counterrevolution culminated in drastic austerity measures for Greece, devastating the whole country.

In Germany, poverty is increasing rapidly. Over 12 million people are officially registered as poor, and children are particularly affected. Eight million people work in precarious forms of work. In 2030, 50 percent of all pensioners will receive a pension equivalent to minimal Hartz-IV social payments, despite having worked their entire lives. Business associations are already calling for an increase in the retirement age to 73.

At the same time, a small minority lives in the lap of luxury. The government has created conditions in which this minority can enrich itself enormously at the expense of the majority. Income from investment assets and property has risen by more than 30 percent over the past 15 years.

Preparations for a state of emergency and dictatorship are being pushed forward to suppress resistance to these policies. Based on the anti-terrorism laws, a huge monitoring apparatus is being created. Police and intelligence services work closely together, and the Bundeswehr is active inside the country, despite the fact that both practices violate Germany’s Basic Law.

The attack on basic democratic rights is most evident in the vicious campaign against refugees. The right to asylum has been mutilated to the point of non-existence. Desperate people fleeing wars in the Middle East and Africa are being abused, detained in prison camps, intimidated and deported. Hundreds drown every month in the Mediterranean.

The government and the media are stirring up a hate campaign against Muslims that recalls the Nazi pogroms against Jews. It serves the same purpose, to divide the working class, and plays into the hands of the far right Alternative for Germany (AfD).

The election of Trump in the US has made clear where such a policy leads. Resistance to this development is growing among workers and young people, but the government is determined to pursue its course. With her announced intention to stand for a fourth term, Chancellor Merkel has thrown down the gauntlet on the eve of major class battles.

US arms Syrian Islamists with surface-to-air missiles

Bill Van Auken

A US-backed Islamist militia in southern Syria has been armed with portable surface-to-air missiles, so-called manpads. These weapons are capable of shooting down Syrian government aircraft as well as Russian warplanes, which have played a prominent role in providing air support to the Syrian army against the Al Qaeda-linked “rebels.”

The group, the Ansar al-Islam Front, exhibited the weapons, SA-7 Strela-2 missiles, in a video it posted on Sunday, claiming that it had “a good number” of them in its possession. The video, produced by a Dubai-based Syrian opposition propaganda network, shows the Islamists un-crating, assembling and testing the manpads.

“We, in Ansar al-Islam Front, have distributed several points of air defense to counter any attempt by the Syrian warplanes or helicopters, which bomb points in Quneitra Province. We have a good number of these missiles,” one of the Islamists states in the video, according to a translation posted by the web site Middle East Eye.

A second individual, identifying himself as Abu Bilal, tells an interviewer: “We, in Ansar al-Islam Front and factions of the FSA, are distributing equipment and soldiers toward Tal al-Hara, Mashara, Sandaniya and Jabata. And in the coming days you will hear good news from Quneitra and its surroundings.”

The shipping of these portable anti-aircraft missiles to Syria marks a major escalation of the US-backed war for regime-change that has devastated the country for the past five years, leading to the deaths of some 300,000 Syrians.

In September, US officials told the Reuters news agency that, after the breakdown of a brief US-Russian-brokered cessation of hostilities and amid renewed fighting around the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, Washington might resort to a “Plan B,” giving the green light to Saudi Arabia and Qatar to funnel the portable anti-aircraft missiles to the Syrian Islamists. At the time, however, State Department and administration official spokesmen denied the report.

Whether the delivery of the manpads has been ordered by the Obama White House, the CIA, the Pentagon or some faction within the vast US military and intelligence apparatus it is impossible to say. What is clear, however, is that they are intended to establish new “facts on the ground” in Syria before a Trump administration takes office in January.

Pressure for a US escalation in Syria has mounted since Trump gave an interview to the Wall Street Journal on November 11 in which the president-elect called into question the CIA and Pentagon operations for arming so-called “moderate rebels” in Syria, saying “we have no idea who these people are.”

In a rambling and incoherent statement to the Journal, Trump said he had “an opposite view of many people regarding Syria,” adding, “My attitude was you’re fighting Syria, Syria is fighting ISIS, and you have to get rid of ISIS. Russia is now totally aligned with Syria, and now you have Iran, which is becoming powerful, because of us, is aligned with Syria.”

The statement set off alarm bells within the US political establishment, whose predominant layers are committed to a strategy of escalating confrontation with Russia as part of drive to militarily assert US hegemony over the Middle East and, more broadly, the landmass of Eurasia.

The New York Times responded with an editorial “The Danger of Going Soft on Russia,” in which it accused Trump of acting as “Putin’s apologist” and insisted, “Since Mr. Trump has refused to criticize the Kremlin, it’s important that Mr. Obama figure out, before he leaves office, how to punish Russia...”

It would appear that shipping surface-to-air missiles to Syria, raising the prospect of US-backed forces shooting down Russian aircraft and triggering a far wider and more dangerous conflict, is part of this “punishment.”

As yet, Trump has enunciated no clear policy in relation to the conflict in Syria, outside of vows on the campaign trail to “bomb the shit out of ISIS.” At the same time, however, many of those surrounding him, including his vice president-elect Mike Pence and his nominee for CIA director Mike Pompeo, have strongly advocated direct US military intervention against the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad.

The group which received the anti-aircraft weapons, Ansar al-Islam, while apparently counted by Washington as part of the “moderate” opposition in Syria, was previously designated as a terrorist organization by the US and the United Nations, as well as a number of other countries, because of its affiliations with the Al Qaeda network.

It first emerged as an armed group in the wake of the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, fighting against US occupation troops and later the forces of the US-imposed regime in Baghdad. With the fomenting of the war for regime-change in Syria, it sent its members into that country to fight against the Assad government, thereby winning US backing.

Two years ago, the majority of the group’s leadership announced that it was joining the Islamic State (also known as ISIS), which is supposedly the main target of Washington’s ongoing military intervention in Iraq and Syria. Some elements, apparently including those who have now been armed with manpads, rejected the merger, despite their shared ideology and objectives.

Previously, US officials had warned against supplying such weapons to Syrian “rebels” for fear that they would end up in the hands of Al Qaeda-affiliated fighters and could be turned against not only Syrian and Russian warplanes, but also Western civilian passenger jets. In the past, weapons funneled to so-called CIA-vetted “moderates” have quickly fallen into the hands of the Al Nusra Front, Syria’s Al Qaeda affiliate. Now it appears that such concerns have been cast aside and the missiles have been supplied directly to forces tied to Al Qaeda.

The introduction of these weapons into the conflict in Syria in flagrant violation of international law is indicative of the growing desperation within US ruling circles over the debacle confronting its regime-change operation. Syrian government forces have made increasing inroads in the past few days in eastern Aleppo, the last stronghold of the US-backed Islamists, taking back at least a third of the area previously occupied by these forces.

The mounting hysteria found consummate expression in a speech delivered Monday at the United Nations by US Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power, the administration’s foremost standard-bearer of “human rights” imperialism. Power read out the names of a dozen Syrian military commanders alleged to have attacked civilians or overseen torture in Syrian jails, warning, “Those behind such attacks must know that we in the international community are watching their actions, documenting their abuses and one day they will be held accountable.”

Power made no mention of war crimes committed by the US-backed “rebels,” which are also under investigation by the International Criminal Court, nor of the recent report that the global court is investigating over a decade of torture carried out by the US military and the CIA in Afghanistan and at so-called “black sites” around the world. One could easily come up with a list of a dozen US commanders who carried out attacks leading to the mass murder of civilians, from the brutal sieges of the Iraqi city of Fallujah in 2004 through to the assault on the Doctors Without Borders hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan just a year ago.

Even as Power was speaking, a report filtered out of Syria that US warplanes struck a cotton mill in the village of Salhiyeh in the northeastern part of the country, killing 10 civilians, including children. Among the dead were three workers at the mill, a family of six who had taken shelter there after fleeing from a US-backed offensive in the area, and a bystander. Independent estimates place the number of civilians killed by US air strikes in the country at well over 1,000.