Australian PM accused of interfering in Papua New Guinea election

John Braddock

Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has rejected claims that he interfered with domestic politics in Papua New Guinea (PNG) by visiting Port Moresby and praising Prime Minister Peter O’Neill on the eve of national elections. Nominations for the PNG elections open within two weeks, and polling starts on June 24.

Turnbull’s first official visit to Australia’s neighbour and former colony took place on April 7–9. Former PNG Prime Minister Mekere Morauta criticised the “insensitive” and “dangerous” timing of the trip and accused Turnbull of seeking to endorse O’Neill. “That is a very dangerous position for the Australian Prime Minister to put himself in, especially with the prospect of a new government just around the corner,” Morauta said.

Turnbull dismissed the complaint, saying the timing was “entirely unrelated” to PNG’s domestic political events. He claimed the visit would focus on “trade, security, economic growth and education.”

During a joint media conference, however, Turnbull praised O’Neill for his co-operation in the “vitally important fight against people smuggling” and commitment to “strengthening relations” between the two countries. Turnbull also deflected questions about PNG’s dire economic situation. Asked if it was a concern that the PNG government was “broke,” Turnbull said management of the finances of PNG was “a matter for the PNG government.”

Deepening social polarisation and resentment over grinding poverty and austerity measures are fuelling a political crisis in the Pacific nation. Earlier this month, a rift erupted between the two main partners in the ruling coalition, O’Neill’s People’s National Congress (PNC) Party and the National Alliance (NA), over the state of the economy.

Treasurer Patrick Pruaitch, leader of NA, attacked the PNC for “mismanaging” the country, noting that last year’s per capita income fell for the first time in 13 years and is expected to drop again this year and for at least another four years. Since the financial boost from ExxonMobil’s Liquefied Natural Gas project first came on stream in 2014 the economy had “fallen off the cliff,” Pruaitch declared.

Gross domestic product (GDP) growth plunged to 2 percent last year, significantly lower than the population growth rate of over 3 percent. The government has borrowed K13 billion ($US4.1 billion) to take the total debt this year to K21.6 billion, above the debt-to-GDP ratio of 30 percent set by the Fiscal Responsibility Act.

As in every country, the working class and rural poor are profoundly alienated from all the established political parties. Over the past 12 months, the O’Neill government has repeatedly mobilised the police and armed forces to suppress mounting unrest, firstly among students, then against villagers living near the $US19 billion ExxonMobil site.

Visits to PNG by Australian leaders are infrequent. Turnbull’s trip was undoubtedly motivated by concern over Australia’s commercial and strategic interests. Addressing an Australia-PNG Business Council breakfast on Sunday, Turnbull told local business leaders Australia had a “vested interest” in the PNG economy. “Almost 5,000 companies are doing business in PNG,” he pointed out, with total investments worth $A5.8 billion.

Turnbull emphasised that PNG also receives $A500 million ($US375 million) annually in aid. Signalling Canberra’s determination to dictate the terms of the relationship, the Turnbull government in March rebuffed a request by PNG to shift the aid away from traditional programs and into the PNG government’s accounts, in order to fund core services such as health and education. Australia’s Minister for International Development and the Pacific, Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, bluntly declared that the aid program was “not a charity.”

Canberra also made clear that its interests will prevail in the planned closure of Australia’s refugee detention centre on PNG’s Manus Island. Last year the PNG High Court ruled that the centre violates the refugees’ constitutional right to personal liberty. Turnbull dodged questions about where his government would send the detainees if the Trump administration does not accept all 900 under a deal previously struck under Obama.

Australian Immigration Minister Peter Dutton told Sky News that any refugees not taken by the US would be settled in PNG, while non-refugees would be sent back to their home country. He said that under an agreement with the previous Australian Labor government, PNG had the “responsibility” to settle refugees not accepted by the US. “They are not coming to Australia,” Dutton asserted. “We have been very clear those people are not going to settle in our country because that would restart the people trade.”

Behind the scenes there is growing alarm over China’s influence in the region. The state-owned Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) reported in February that Beijing is investing billions in infrastructure and business developments in PNG. The $A260 million Edevu Hydro Project is funded by the China Development Bank, while Chinese companies are building roads in the highlands and redeveloping Lae’s port. The Chinese government has loaned PNG hundreds of millions of dollars to build roads, create a National Broadband Network and a National Identity Card system.

In a bid to counter Beijing, the Australian government recently announced it will pay at least a third of the costs of PNG’s hosting of next year’s APEC summit. The commitments, including a two-year extension to the deployment of 73 Australian Federal Police officers, will exceed $A100 million. Security, diplomatic support, advisory roles, immigration and intelligence processes will all be provided by Canberra. According to the ABC, security and foreign policy advisers warned that leaving the PNG government to fund the summit “would risk China filling the breach.”

Canberra and Washington are particularly concerned about PNG’s growing defence ties with Beijing. Following a state visit there last year, O’Neill expressed his government’s “respect” for China’s “legitimate and lawful rights and interest” in the South China Sea. O’Neill also endorsed China’s “One Belt One Road” trade route system across the Asia-Pacific, designed to counter the aggressive efforts by the US to isolate China.

O’Neill’s predecessor, Michael Somare, was ousted in 2011 with the backing of the Australian government because he was seen as too close to Beijing. O’Neill, who assumed office through an illegal parliamentary manoeuvre, has relied on Canberra’s backing. He welcomed an expanded Australian police and “advisor” presence, while supporting Australia’s neo-colonial interests in the wider region.

Under conditions of intensifying geo-strategic tensions, Australia is determined to see this continue, whoever wins the forthcoming election. Turnbull used the occasion to remind the PNG ruling elite of the historical ties between the two countries, dating back to previous imperialist wars. He visited Isurava, a 1942 battle site where Australian forces fought Japanese troops in World War II and the Bomana War Cemetery, where 3,800 Australian soldiers are buried.

Turnbull noted that Bomana has the largest number of Australian war dead of any cemetery. “Australia’s freedom,” he declared, “depends on courage, endurance, mateship and sacrifice of those Australians and Papua New Guineans who stood together and held back the Japanese advancement.”

UK CEO pay skyrockets as workers’ wages continue to plummet

Barry Mason

Chief executive officers at the UK’s Financial Times Stock Exchange (FTSE) firms are earning on average 386 times more than workers paid the national living wage.

In March, the Equality Trust issued its Pay Tracker report, comparing the pay of chief executive officers (CEOs) of the top 100 FTSE companies with workers on average pay and low pay in the UK.

The Equality Trust was founded in 2009, with a remit to reduce income inequality in the UK.

To produce its report the Equality Trust took the 2015 Annual Report and Accounts for the top 100 FTSE listed companies, with 2015 being the latest figures available.

It compared the total remuneration figure for each CEO against the annual UK figures for the average wage of £27,615, the National Living Wage (NLW) of £13,662 and the real living wage figure (outside London) of £16,034.

The average wage is based on of the median annual earnings of those in full-time employment for 2015. The living wage is the government set minimum wage for those over 25, due to rise to just £7.50 an hour from April 1 this year. The real living wage is a figure based on independent research arriving at a figure a worker and their family would need to earn in order to live. It is not a statutory figure and any employer paying it does so on a voluntary basis.

According to the report, topping the list of CEO remuneration packages is Martin Sorrell of the advertising and PR company WPP, with an annual income of over £70 million. It would take him about 20 minutes to earn what a worker on the national living wage earns in the course of a year.

The Equality Trust findings show that on average each CEO in the FTSE top 100 rakes in £5.3 million annually, representing 386 times the earnings of a worker on the NLW. In other words, the average top 100 FTSE CEO earns more in a day than a worker on the NLW earns for 365 days.

Two thirds of CEOs earn more than 100 times the average UK salary, while 90 percent of them earn at least 100 times more than the NLW.

Comparing the pay of CEOs with a series of job titles, the report highlights that the average top 100 CEO earns 165 times that of a nurse, 140 times that of teacher and a staggering 312 times the income of a care worker.

While the pay of top CEOs continues to rise, according to a recent Resolution Foundation report, the Equality Trust notes that the pay of public sector workers in real terms is set to fall. With increasing inflation and pay restraint, public sector pay will continue to fall over the next three years. The report notes that by the end of the parliamentary term in 2019/20, the real pay of public sector staff will be below 2004-2005 levels.

Commenting on the report, the Trust’s executive director, Dr. Wanda Wyporska, said, “The people who educate our children, look after our grandparents, and keep our families safe have seen their pay frozen, while fat cat CEOs continue to gorge themselves on obscene and undeserved rewards. They’re also stretching far away from their own employees. Being a top company CEO in the UK is like being a lottery winner—every year—guaranteed.”

Wyporska said the Equality Trust were “calling on Government to introduce mandatory reporting for large and medium businesses on the pay gap between their highest and average paid employee. Only then can we create a sense of trust and common purpose essential to build an economy and society that works for all.”

While the financial elite continues to rake in obscene amounts of wealth, conditions of poverty and social inequality prevail for the vast majority of Britain’s population. The pay of workers in the UK has seen a staggering decline since the imposition of mass austerity in the aftermath of the 2008 global financial crisis.

The Equality Trust report follows the publication of research by the Trades Union Congress, based on figures issued by the International Labour Organisation. These were issued as part of its Global Wage Report 2016/15.

The TUC noted, “The UK ranks 103 out of 112 countries for pay growth since the financial crisis” and “while workers in most countries saw real terms pay increases between 2008 and 2015, UK workers saw the value of their wages fall.”

The TUC added, “The Office for Budgetary Responsibility and the Bank of England both expect real wages to continue fall. … [W]ith prices being pushed up in the shops by the falling pound, the threat of another living standards crisis has increased.”

A Resolution Foundation report “Living Standards 2017,” issued in January, highlighted the decline in living standards hitting workers—with those already at the bottom being hit the hardest.

It stated, “We project that income growth will slow to 0.3 percent a year for the typical working-age household over the next four years, once we account for housing costs. This overall weak growth also hides a division between growth for some and falling living standards for others.

“Our projections suggest that incomes will rise slowly for high income households, stagnate in the middle and fall at the bottom. Very significant cuts to working-age welfare of over £12 billion are a key component of what looks set to be falling living standards for almost the entire bottom half of the working-age income distribution between this year and 2020-21. The result is the biggest rise in inequality since the late 1980s.”

Former Chancellor George Osborne, who was replaced in the first cabinet announced by Prime Minister Theresa May upon her taking office last summer, wasted no time in cashing in.

Osborne is in all but name a full-time CEO and part-time MP.

Since his removal, he has taken up a £650,000 a year role as a consultant to US investment firm BlackRock. On top of this, he pulled in £786,450 from 14 speeches given mainly to banks and other City of London financial institutions. Osborne also has a £120,000 a year academic position as the first ever Kissinger Fellow at the Arizona-based McCain Institute for International Leadership. In May, he will take on the position of the editor of the main London newspaper, the Evening Standard, with his salary for that not made public.

As a backbench MP, Osborne continues to receive £75,000 a year, plus expenses.

Even taking into account so-called “shareholder revolts” against excessive CEO pay, the heads of the UK main conglomerate continue to rake in vast amounts. Despite a reported voluntary 40 percent cut in pay, BP Chief Executive Bob Dudley pulled in £9 million in 2016. Reuters reported Friday that Dudley’s pay level was set “after around 60 percent of shareholders opposed BP’s pay policy at last year’s annual general meeting.”

The overall pay deal for BP Chief Financial Officer Brian Gilvary was cut by 18 percent, but he still took home £4.2 million.

Reuters noted, “Even after a cut of nearly $8 million, Dudley’s pay remains well above that of rival European oil companies.” It cited the 2016 salary of Shell’s Ben van Beurden (€8.2 million and a 60 percent increase year on year, and Total’s Patrick Pouyanne—paid €3.8 million last year.

The Equality Trust calls on the government to make it mandatory for large and medium companies to highlight the pay gap between the highest and lowest paid employers. More “transparency,” however, can in no way alleviate the growing divide, a product of the capitalist mode of production that results in the accumulation of ever greater wealth at one pole of society and ever increasing social misery at the other.

Far from being a restraining influence on the further enrichment of the super-rich, the government is beholden to and increasingly part of these sated layers.

Workers in UK “gig economy” charged hundreds of pounds for taking sick leave

Alice Summers

The number of self-employed workers in the UK has skyrocketed over the last decade, reaching 4.7 million in 2016. Businesses often classify workers who are, to all intents and purposes, full- or part-time employees as self-employed so they can avoid paying sick pay, holiday pay and pensions. Self-employed workers also have far fewer employment rights than employees.

Self-employed workers are some of the worst paid and most exploited in the UK, with over half on low pay, compared to 30 percent of all employees. The low pay is not compensated for by providing pensions, savings or investments—64 percent of low-paid self-employed workers have none of these, compared to 36 percent of low-paid employees. Across the country, 80 percent of self-employed workers live in poverty.

Many of these workers are a component part of the international phenomenon known as the “gig economy.” Some 162 million individuals in the United States and the European Union, or 20 to 30 percent of the working-age population, engage in “independent work.” This work, as defined by the McKinsey Global Institute, involves a high degree of autonomy; payment by task, assignment, or sales; and a short-term relationship between the worker and the customer.

The most brutal forms of exploitation exist in this growing sector of the economy.

Last month, a courier working for delivery company UK Mail, Emil Ibrahimov, was charged nearly £800 by the company for the several days he was forced to take off work after being involved in a car accident while on duty.

Ibrahimov was taken into hospital by ambulance after he was hit by a car in east London while taking out parcels to be delivered from the rear of his van. He received injuries to his legs and was instructed by doctors to rest and move around only on crutches.

After telling UK Mail that the accident meant he would not be able to work, the company informed him that he would be charged £216 a day, supposedly to recoup the costs of finding a replacement courier. For Ibrahimov, this meant a total fine of £789 for the time spent off work.

In an interview with the Guardian about his treatment, Ibrahimov spoke of the appalling conditions faced by workers at UK Mail. “Every day they were calling saying come to work. … I would say I couldn’t and they would say I was going to be charged. So after a few days I had to go back. It was very painful but I had to go. It is inhuman because this happened while I was doing their job. The car accident didn’t stress me out as much as what UK Mail did afterwards.”

In a previous incident, Ibrahimov also received a heavy fine from UK Mail, when a doctor signed him off work for two weeks with sciatica and acute back pain caused by lifting heavy parcels at work. Despite giving his employers a doctor’s note, Ibrahimov was forced to return to work after two days, despite the doctor’s advice, in order to avoid further losses.

In the past year, Ibrahimov has lost around £1,800 from taking only seven days off work, when UK Mail’s fines and his lost earnings are combined. In a typical week he worked five 12-hour days, but after expenses this saw him earn the equivalent of less than £7 an hour. This is below the national minimum wage (NMW), which stands at £7.20 per hour for over-24s. The national minimum wage does not apply to self-employed workers.

UK Mail, which made a profit of £16 million last year delivering for major retailers including Tesco, Homebase and O2, classifies their couriers as self-employed contractors and pays them per delivery. The system of charges for missed work is written into their contracts, with drivers required to find cover for any time taken off sick, and incurring punitive fines if they are unable to do so.

The company is by no means unique in employing these abusive practices. Other delivery firms, such as DPD and ParcelForce, also charge their couriers—like those working for UK Mail considered to be self-employed—extortionate rates if they cannot find cover. According to the Guardian, DPD charges their drivers £150 a day, while ParcelForce can charge their drivers as much as £250 for each day spent off work.

Despite claims from DPD that their drivers “own their own franchise and run their own businesses,” workers at the company maintain that their jobs do not remotely resemble self-employment. DPD requires couriers to attend compulsory training, uses a rota system, as well as having a uniform and requiring drivers to use DPD’s handheld computers.

One worker stated, “It is not real self-employment, it is employment,” with another courier declaring, “We have to adhere to the same procedures as employed people. The only difference is that we don’t get any holiday pay or sick pay and we have no rights at all.” Self-employed couriers are also required to fund their own vehicle, fuel, insurance and uniform.

Around 460,000 out of the 4.7 million self-employed workers in the UK could be falsely classified, according to the charity Citizens Advice. In November, a UK employment tribunal ruled that the car-sharing company Uber had been falsely classifying their 1 million workers—40,000 of which work in the UK—as self-employed, after two Uber drivers took the company to court. The ruling pronounced that Uber should now pay its drivers the national living wage, and opens Uber to claims from its drivers for holiday pay, pensions and other workers’ rights. Uber has appealed the verdict.

Last year, couriers for the food delivery company Deliveroo staged a protest outside the company’s London office, campaigning against plans to pay workers £3.75 per delivery instead of an hourly rate of £7 plus £1 per delivery.

The prevalence of these super-exploitative contracts is the result of decades in which both Labour and Conservative governments have committed to the wholesale deregulation of the UK economy, in the name of creating a “globally competitive economy.” With the active encouragement of the government, many companies have moved towards this form of employment in recent years as a means of slashing labour costs and other overheads associated with jobs with decent terms and conditions.

Last year, Conservative Prime Minister Theresa May announced a review into such employment practices, supposedly with the aim of protecting self-employed workers. The review will do nothing to change the super-exploitative conditions faced by millions of workers in the gig economy. This is confirmed by May’s appointment of Matthew Taylor—a former adviser of Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair and an ardent proponent of the flexibilisation of the economy—to head the review.

After being appointed, Taylor declared, “New forms of employment have many advantages for workers and consumers, but there are challenges and risks. We need to approach this issue with an open mind, recognising that within our flexible system of employment the same type of contract can have a diverse range of impacts on the people who use them.”

The trade unions, for their part, offer no way forward in the fight against the super-exploitation rampant in the gig economy. Frances O’Grady, the general secretary of the Trades Unions Congress (TUC), criticised the rapid rise of new, insecure forms of employment mainly from the standpoint of them being detrimental to the economy, with £4 billion a year in lost tax payments.

Fearful that the trade unions may lose their grip over the working class, and keen to reap the benefits of a potentially lucrative position managing this growing section of the labour market for the ruling class, she declared, “Getting more people into unions is key. Employees in unionised workplaces are twice as likely to be on better-paid, secure contracts.”

The reality is that the trade unions have carried out one betrayal after another of workers’ struggles over the past three decades, showing themselves to be completely unwilling to lift a finger in defence of the pay, terms and conditions of employed and self-employed workers.

Germany: Increased suicide rates among refugees

Carola Kleinert 

The brutal deportation policy of the central and state governments in Germany is driving more and more refugees to commit suicide.

In mid-March this year, WDR radio reported that, according to official figures, 433 refugees sought to commit suicide in the years 2014 to 2016, with 19 resulting deaths. In fact, the real figure for suicide deaths is undoubtedly many times higher. Only a few German states actually collect statistics on suicides and suicide attempts, and the data that is available is mostly based on individual case studies or on an evaluation of police statistics.

In the state of Bavaria alone, 162 refugees attempted suicide last year, according to the Süddeutsche Zeitung in early April. Christine Kamm, the spokeswoman for asylum issues of the Green Party, said that this figure has tripled compared to previous years. Among those attempting suicide were 43 people from Afghanistan.

Last December, German Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière imposed compulsory deportations for refugees from war-ravaged Afghanistan. The result has been growing despair and fear on the part of thousands of Afghans living in Germany, who in the past had been given protection due to the war raging in their homeland.

The Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) is now sending out a succession of deportation orders, irrespective of the problems or backgrounds of those affected. The deportations affect many Afghans who have been living in Germany for some time.

Immediately after receiving notice that his application to stay in the country had been rejected, a 20-year-old Afghan threw himself in front of an ICE high-speed train travelling in Haar near Munich. He had fled to Germany from the Afghan province of Kandahar 19 months ago and was reported to be severely traumatised and depressed.

Every day he had studied German for four to five hours, but had become increasingly reclusive in the past few weeks, a volunteer helper reported. “He had a huge fear of having to return,” she said. “The Afghans all receive negative decisions. Fear is spreading in the Afghans’ temporary collective accommodation.” The volunteer added angrily, “The rigid deportation policy of de Maizière killed him.”

Cologne-based lawyer Gunter Christ, a member of the Cologne Refugee Council, confirmed that the suicide risk had “dramatically increased” and condemned the refugee policy of the government. There were more and more people who would be hospitalised, he told Deutschlandfunk at the end of February. “To that extent, it is also a kind of suicide programme. Others do not kill themselves, but go completely insane and end up in psychiatry.”

The Bavarian refugee council also drew attention to two other cases: 24-year-old K. and 27-year-old S. had tried to take their own lives in a deportation prison.

K. had been living in Germany for six years. His planned marriage to a German woman was postponed due to a lack of confirmation of his status from the German Embassy in Kabul. K. then slit his wrists and swallowed a potion containing chlorine. After first aid at the deportation prison he was transferred to a psychiatric clinic in Wasserburg. His fiancée reported to the refugee council that the treating physician told the patient on the day of his arrival that he would be sent to a detention centre three days later (on March 27).

With the help of his lawyer, S. had been able to dispute the deportation detention order issued by Augsburg District Court. He was then, however, lured into the immigration office in Augsburg and arrested to await deportation.

Stephan Dünnwald, the spokesman for the Bavarian Refugee Council, condemned the cooperation between the government, doctors and magistrates: “A psychiatrist declares someone prepared to take his own life as healthy so the authorities can quickly put the person in question on a flight to Kabul. A judge at the District Court issued a detention order, well aware that only a few days previously a different magistrate had stated that there was no sufficient reason for deportation—these are the servile accomplices of the Bavarian minister for deportation.”

Dr. Tom Nowotny from the medical organisation IPPNW also criticised the doctors involved in the mass deportations, saying, “Refugees are declared fit for deportations to Afghanistan, although they are not.”

Refugees from other states are also affected. At the end of October 2016, the state of Thuringia, led by Left Party Premier Bodo Ramelow, hit the headlines when a highly depressed 15-year-old Somalian leapt off the top floor of a tower block building in Schmölln reserved for unaccompanied refugees. He had only recently been released from a psychiatric clinic.

On March 30, 28-year-old Pakistani Faisal Imran leapt from the roof of a hotel near Leipzig’s main station, as terrified passers-by looked on.

In some states, suicides by refugees are not recorded. This includes Thuringia, headed by the Left Party, and Baden-Württemberg, which is governed by the Greens. The red-red-green (Social Democratic Party, Left Party, Green Party) coalition in Berlin also does not yet provide statistics. Other states, such as Christian Democratic Union-ruled Saxony, record such numbers, but then play down their significance. The Saxony Interior Ministry recently declared that such figures had no “statistically conspicuous order of magnitude” and that “beyond existing measures” there would be no need for action.

Psychologists and social pedagogues reject this. The danger of a suicide attempt arises clearly from refugees’ experiences of war and flight from their country, which is then compounded by the surly treatment and inadequate housing they receive in their host country, Germany.

One psychologist, Corinna Klinger, told WDR the reasons behind suicide attempts were often “extreme fear of deportation and renewed confrontations with hostile forces back home. Lack of perspective, despair or the situation in an asylum shelter can be decisive.” Despite this crisis situation, adequate psychological care is lacking.

The Merkel government has long since turned its alleged “welcome culture” into a cold-blooded “deportation and isolation culture.” The opposition Green and Left parties are also involved in this policy at the local and state government level.

The tragic fate of Salah J. at the end of March exposed the cruel consequences of Germany’s refugee policies. The young Syrian father fled with his family to Turkey. He left his pregnant wife and little daughter back in Turkey because he wanted to secure their passage to Europe. In the meantime, the German government has suspended migration for the families of Syrian war refugees. His wife, no longer prepared to wait, drowned with their newborn child and daughter attempting the perilous passage across the Mediterranean.

US retail stores closing at record rate

Niles Niemuth

US retail store closures for 2017 are on pace to exceed 2008 when more than 6,000 locations were shuttered. In the first three months of this year 2,880 store closures were announced, compared to 1,153 in the same time period in 2008. If the current pace of retail bloodletting continues total store closures could top 11,000 by the end of the year, an unprecedented number.

Along with mounting store closures, retailers eliminated 30,000 jobs in March, with a similar number cut in February, making it the worst two-month period for workers in the retail sector since 2008, when the economy was in the depths of the recession caused by the bursting of the housing bubble and stock market crash.

According to Retail Metrics, the combined same-store sales for retailers in the first quarter of this year is expected to rise only 0.3 percent, the worst quarter in four years. Current expectations are well below the 0.8 percent growth in retail sales, which economists had predicted in February. Without positive sales growth posted by discount giant Walmart the retail industry would have posted negative figures. The dismal first quarter of 2017 follows poor in-store holiday sales at the end of 2016.

Traditional retailers are being slammed by competition from Internet retailers, in particular Amazon. Even as many companies are increasingly turning to online sales in an attempt to shore up their poor in store sales Amazon continues to dominate, accounting for 53 percent of all online sales growth in 2016.

Reviewing poor holiday sales figures last month Richard Hayne, the CEO of clothing retailer Urban Outfitters, told investors that too many stores had been built in the US inflating a massive financial bubble. “[L]ike housing, that bubble has now burst,” Hayne noted. “We are seeing the results: Doors shuttering and rents retreating. This trend will continue for the foreseeable future and may even accelerate.”

While market analysts point to the competition from Amazon as a key factor in retailer bankruptcies and store closures, another factor is the underlying weakness of the American economy and years of wage stagnation for the working class. Wage growth has been flat since the Great Recession and monthly year-on-year increases have not exceeded three percent since early 2009. According to the Economic Policy Institute average hourly wages are $3.22 behind where they would be if wages grew at 3.5 percent over the last decade.

Even as the stock market has boomed over the last nine years thanks to an infusion of unlimited cash through quantitative easing and other measures, the real economy has not recovered from the recession. The economic growth rate has not exceeded three percent in a decade and was a meager 1.2 percent in the first quarter of this year. Nearly all of the jobs created since 2008 have been either part time or temporary.

Retailers are shutting their doors and laying-off thousands of workers in predominantly poor and working class neighborhoods in both urban and rural areas. Nearly a third of US shopping malls will be hollowed out by store closures or lose a key anchor, with many of these threatened without outright closure without major department store locations and smaller chain retailers.

The last decade has seen a series of buyouts, mergers and acquisitions by private equity firms as part of last ditch efforts by retailers to avoid bankruptcy and outright liquidation by corporate raiders squeezing every penny before liquidating or reselling them.

An overview of the companies that have announced closing or filed for bankruptcy this year gives a sense of the current crisis.

Discount retailer Dollar Express will close all 323 of its locations, including a number which operated under the Family Dollar brand, eliminating almost 3,000 jobs, after being bought out by rival Dollar General.

Payless Shoes filed for bankruptcy earlier this year and announced plans to close 400 hundred stores, 10 percent of its stores nationwide. Rue 21, a clothing retailer targeting young adults, will soon file for bankruptcy, a few years after being bought by private equity firm Apax Partners

Indianapolis-based electronics and home appliance retailer HHGregg (liquidating all 132 stores), Omaha-based clothing retailer Gordmans (closing 48 stores) and St. Paul, Minnesota-based sporting goods retailer Gander Mountain (closing 32 of 162 locations) have filed for bankruptcy this year. Electronics retailer RadioShack has filed for bankruptcy for the second time in two years and announced the closure of 552 stores.

Major department stores Sears, Macys and JC Penney are on the verge of bankruptcy and are planning to close hundreds of locations.

Gamestop, which sells video games and consoles, is closing more than 150 stores in the US this year, nearly three percent of its locations worldwide. Office supply store Staples and the health goods and pharmacy chain CVS each announced plans to close 70 locations.

Family Christian bookstore, the largest Christian bookseller in the US, announced at the end of February it is closing all of its stores, more than 240 locations, two years after emerging from bankruptcy. Recent years have seen the failure and liquidation of most bookstore chains, including Borders and Walden Books, under pressure from Amazon and other online book retailers.

Hundreds of smaller clothing retail stores, mainstays of many shopping malls, are set to be closed this year, including Abercrombie and Fitch, Guess, Crocs, The Limited and Wet Seal locations. American Apparel is liquidating all 110 of its remaining stores and a factory in Los Angeles as the company completes the process of going out of business following years of legal and financial woes.

IMF documents labour’s declining share of global income

Nick Beams

In recent weeks, as part of the intensifying war drive against Russia, various US politicians have put forward the proposition that Vladimir Putin and his government’s campaign of “disinformation” are responsible for rising social discontent in the US and other major economies.

In US Senate hearings at the end of last month, Florida Republican Senator Marco Rubio claimed Putin was engaged in “informational warfare,” seeking to exploit social protests in order to portray America as a disaster.

Mark Warner, the ranking Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, claimed that Russia was using disinformation to “undermine America’s strength and leadership,” while Republican Susan Collins said the Russians were “trying to disrupt society” and “cast doubt on Western democracies.”

Senator Chris Coons, a Democrat, joined this chorus, claiming that the regime of Vladimir Putin was alienating people in the West from their governments and undermining trust in “our institutions.”

In other words, the growth of social opposition in the US, Europe and the major economies is the product of a Russian plot.

A report issued by the International Monetary Fund this week, Chapter 3 of its World Economic Outlook, prepared for its spring meeting later this month, exposes the farcical character of the attempts by the increasingly desperate ruling classes in the US and elsewhere to revive the propaganda of the Cold War.

Titled “Understanding the Downward Trend in Labor Income Shares,” it details the massive transfer of wealth from labour to capital over the past four decades, one of the main drivers of ever rising social discontent.

According to the IMF analysis: “In the advanced economies, labour income shares began trending down in the 1980s. They reached their lowest level of the past half-century just prior to the global financial crisis of 2008, and have not recovered materially since. Labour income shares are now almost 4 percentage points lower than they were in 1970.”

With advanced economies accounting for around half of global income, which is between $75 trillion and $80 trillion a year, workers are receiving some $1.5 trillion less in annual wages income than they would have had the share that existed in 1970 continued.

The research also found that despite more limited data, labour shares in emerging market and developing economies had also declined since the early 1990s, especially for larger economies in the group. In China, for example, over the past two decades the labour share of national income has fallen by almost 3 percentage points.

The analysis found that the falling labour share has contributed directly to rising social inequality. Within the workforce, the brunt of the fall has been borne by lower-skilled workers “amid evidence of persistent declines in middle-skill occupations for middle-skilled workers in advanced economies.” Over the period 1995–2009, the combined income share for this group was reduced by more than 7 percentage points.

The other side of falling labour share is a rise in the return to capital. With capital ownership concentrated in the upper-income groups, this has led to rising inequality.

The IMF report found that between 1991 and 2014, the labour share declined in 29 of the 50 largest economies, with the 29 where it declined making up about two thirds of global gross domestic product. Labour incomes declined in 7 of the 10 major industry groups, with the sharpest falls occurring in the most tradeable sectors, such as manufacturing, transport and communications.

The most significant factor in the advanced economies has been technological advancement, with empirical analysis suggesting that “about half the total decline in labour shares can be traced to the impact of technology.” The decline has been particularly sharp for middle-skilled labour, with routine-based technology “taking over many of the tasks” performed by that segment of the workforce.

One of the most striking phenomena of the past two decades has been the establishment of what are known as global value chains, in which segments of the production process are outsourced across the planet to take advantage of cheaper labour.

The IMF analysis noted that according to traditional theories, trade integration of labour-abundant emerging market economies should raise the labour share in those countries. However, “the actual evolution of labour shares in this group of countries… is at odds with this prediction.”

It pointed out that that rising inequality can fuel social tensions and also harm economic growth, and that low productivity growth, a characteristic feature of the major economies, “leaves little room for expectations of future wage growth.”

Together with subpar growth in the world economy, this had led to “an increasing recognition that the gains from growth often have not been broadly shared.” This has led to a “backlash against economic integration and bolstered support for inward-looking policies”—the phenomenon that US politicians are attributing to “Russian interference” and “disinformation.”

The authors are at a complete loss to explain the “forces behind the apparently widespread decline in labour income shares,” acknowledging that the experiences of different countries “are not well understood.”

In fact, they have been known for a long time, this being the 150th anniversary of the publication of Marx’s Capital in 1867.

Marx’s analysis revealed how under the capitalist mode of production, based on wage labour, the material forces of production take the form of capital, that is, self-expanding value. The basis of this self-expansion is the surplus value extracted from the labour of the working class in the production process.

Hence, every development in science and technology, leading to an increase in the material forces of production and thereby providing the basis for increasing social wealth for the mass of humanity, is pressed into the service of capital and becomes a means for extracting additional surplus value from the working class.

Consequently, Marx explained, the inherent logic of capital is the accumulation of wealth at one pole and poverty at the other.

During the post-war economic boom, bourgeois economists of all stripes and some self-professed Marxists who had come under their influence maintained that his analysis had been refuted by events.

But the course of economic history since the end of the boom, and particularly of the past two decades, conforms to the essential logic Marx revealed. This history has been characterised by the unprecedented growth of social inequality and the accumulation of vast wealth at the heights of society, to the point where eight billionaires own as much wealth as the bottom half of the world’s population.

All of this remains a closed book to the economists at the IMF. But their analysis is not without value because their data reveals the essential trend in both advanced and so-called emerging economies alike.

The analysis is a refutation, in facts and figures, of the assertions by right-wing populist and nationalist demagogues that workers in China and elsewhere are “stealing” the jobs and wages of workers in the advanced countries, demonstrating that all workers face a common struggle against the depredations of capital.

Turkish government presses for military escalation in Syria

Halil Celik

In the wake of the April 7 US missile strike at Syria’s Shayrat air base, the Turkish government is pressing for military a escalation and attacking Russia for not withdrawing its support to the Syrian regime. In an attempt to restore its position in the Middle East and prevent the creation of a Kurdish state along its southeastern borders, it is seizing on the chemical attack in Idlib province and the ensuing US missile attack to escalate the drive for regime change in Syria.

On April 9, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told journalists that after the US strike he asked his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, to withdraw Moscow’s support for the Syrian regime. “You should leave your persistence on [Syrian President Bashar] al-Assad and let the transition government begin,” he told Lavrov in a phone call.

Cavusoglu also criticized both Russia and the US for “competing” to win over the Kurdish nationalist People’s Protection Units (YPG). “It’s not acceptable that the two superpowers are competing over a terrorist organization,” he said. The YPG is the Syrian offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, a guerrilla organization that fights for the formation of an independent Kurdish state inside Turkey.

Cavusoglu also made a point of stating that his government was not in a position to choose between Russia and the United States.

He was echoing the reaction to the US missile attack by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who warmly welcomed the attack and called on Moscow to reconsider its support for Assad. In a televised interview on April 8, he dismissed the Astana talks on Syria, initiated by Russia and Turkey in parallel to the US-backed Geneva talks, stating that “unfortunately it did not develop as we wanted.” Instead, he hoped “that Russia will get involved as well” in the US-led regime change operation.

Earlier in the same day, Foreign Minister Cavusoglu signaled his support for US military escalation against Syria. He said last week’s attack on Syria would only be “cosmetic,” unless it was followed by more attacks. “If this remains limited to just one air base, if this regime can’t be removed from Syria, it will remain a merely cosmetic intervention,” he said. He reiterated Ankara’s insistence on carving out “safe zones” inside Syria and the “need to implement a transitional government in Syria as soon as possible.”

Ankara’s reckless and warmongering attitude on Syria was perhaps best expressed by Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus just after the US missile attack: he described it as “significant and meaningful,” and stated, “we do not only want to hear words, but we want to see action.”

Continued military action by the NATO powers against Syria threatens to escalate into all-out war with Russia and Iran, however. Russia, supposedly Turkey’s main partner in the Astana talks, has strongly condemned the strike against the Shayrat air base as a US “act of aggression.” The Russian Foreign Ministry has stated that Moscow will take “a range of measures to protect key Syrian infrastructure and reinforce and improve the effectiveness of the Syrian armed forces’ air defence.”

Turkey’s economically and strategically critical relations with Russia are again threatened with complete collapse. Before Ankara moved to build bridges with Russia last June, the two countries came to the verge of war in November 2015, when the Turkish air force downed a Russian plane that had allegedly violated Turkish airspace. Moscow called the Turkish government an “accomplice of terrorists” and imposed economic sanctions on Turkey, depriving the Turkish economy of an estimated $10 billion.

Last July 15, when US-backed sections of Turkish military attempted to topple Erdogan in a coup, Putin was the first major world leader to call and offer his sympathies to the Turkish president. In August, Erdogan travelled to Russia for a St. Petersburg summit, where he met with Putin and discussed how to improve economic and military ties. Despite ongoing differences over the future of the Syrian regime, Ankara and Moscow initiated the Astana talks to organize a cessation of hostilities in Syria.

Now, the US missile attack on Syria—a harbinger of more and broader military action to come—is throwing this collaboration into doubt, as Erdogan turns towards Washington and its preparations for war with Syria and, ultimately, Russia.

The US bombing came as Turkey’s own military intervention in Syria is in deep crisis. Turkish forces are still occupying a swath of territory all the way to Al Bab. On March 29, a day before US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s visit, Ankara announced that Operation Euphrates Shield had been “accomplished.”

Ankara launched its “Operation Euphrates Shield” last August to fight the Islamic State (IS) and, above all, to push the YPG-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the main proxy force of the US imperialism in Syria, back to the eastern bank of the Euphrates River. Just a month ago, after the capture of Al Bab from IS, Ankara stated that its offensive would continue to the SDF-held town of Manbij, and then to the IS stronghold, Raqqa. Ultimately, however, the Turkish army only managed to seize a narrow strip of Syrian territory and capture Al Bab at the cost of high casualties.

Adding to Ankara’s troubles, both Moscow and Washington have signaled in recent months that they will back and work with Kurdish nationalists in Syria. Russia has deployed military personnel to Afrin, the largely Kurdish-populated northwestern area of Syria and part of the YPG-controlled de facto autonomous region of Rojava, while the US Army is protecting Manbij with hundreds of Special Forces troops.

Operation Euphrates Shield’s objectives have not been accomplished, and the Turkish regime appears to be recklessly hoping to improve its military posture through a major US military escalation. Ankara is also discussing an escalation of its own military intervention into Iraq.

The Turkish president stated last week that the next stage of Operation Euphrates Shield would include northern Iraq. In an April 4 televised interview, Erdogan said, “There are the Tal Afar and Sinjar situations [in Iraq]. We also have kin in Mosul.” Such a military adventure in Iraq threatens to ignite a military conflict with Iraq and Iran, while escalating the simmering civil war between the Turkish army and the PKK within Turkey.

The Turkish government’s warmongering meets with no real opposition inside the Turkish bourgeois establishment, however. Last October, the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) voted for a resolution in the Turkish parliament that extended the government’s authority to launch cross-border operations for a year.

The pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), for its part, objected to Turkish military operations in Syria and Iraq, but only on the grounds that they target Kurdish nationalists; they enthusiastically welcomed the US-led regime-change operations in Syria.

Despite G7 endorsement of Syria airstrike, US-Europe divisions grow

Alex Lantier & Johannes Stern

The two-day G7 foreign ministers summit that ended yesterday in Lucca, Italy was marked by an obvious contradiction: despite the fact that all of the member states endorsed last week’s attack by the United States against the Syrian government, the meeting was characterized by deepening divisions between the US and Europe over foreign policy and trade.

With Lucca under police lockdown, the foreign ministers of what are supposedly the world’s seven leading democracies—Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America—collectively applauded Trump’s unprovoked act of war against Syria.

They also endorsed the pretext for the strike: unsubstantiated claims that the Syrian government launched a sarin gas attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun, which served as the pretense for last week’s US cruise missile strike against a Syrian government airfield. They ignored the widely reported fact that US-backed Islamist opposition fighters both possess and have previously used chemical weapons, including a 2013 attack in Ghouta for which the US sought to blame the Assad government.

The G7 communiqué declared, “We are shocked and horrified by the reports of use of chemical weapons in an airstrike in the Khan Shaykhun area of southern Idlib on 4 April... The subsequent US military action against Shayrat Airfield was a carefully calibrated, limited in scope response to this war crime and was directed against Syrian military targets directly connected to the 4 April chemical weapons attack in order to prevent and deter the proliferation and use of deadly chemical weapons in Syria.”

At the same time, however, the summit failed to agree on a US-backed plan for stepped-up economic sanctions against Syria and Russia, proposed by the British government, amid growing opposition from the continental European powers. French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said his British counterpart Boris Johnson had raised the proposal, but that it had not been discussed in depth.

“At the moment there is no consensus on new sanctions as an effective instrument,” said Italian Foreign Minister Angelino Alfano. He warned against imposing more sanctions, saying it could back Russia “into a corner.”

It was left to German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel to warn that further attacks and pressure on Russia could lead to war, and to signal to Washington that the continental European powers for now favor talks with Russia and Iran: “None of the G7 countries want military escalation, but rather a political settlement without a further spiral of violence. We want to persuade Russia to support the political process for a peaceful solution to the Syria conflict… Not everyone may like this, but without Moscow and Tehran, there will be no solution for Syria.”

The Italian government made its opposition to the US-led confrontation with Russia crystal clear, sending President Sergio Mattarella to Moscow to discuss Russia-European Union (EU) ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev during the G7 summit. The Italian president said the Russian-Italian friendship is “solid” and “remained strong.”

Remarkably, Mattarella stood by Putin at a joint press conference in which the Russian president identified the Khan Sheikhoun attack as a provocation, comparing it to the lies on weapons of mass destruction the Bush administration used to launch the illegal 2003 invasion of Iraq. Putin also warned that US-backed militias in Syria might launch another gas attack soon.

“It reminds me of the events when US envoys to the [UN] Security Council were demonstrating what they said were chemical weapons found in Iraq. We have seen it all already,” Putin said. He added, “We have information that a similar provocation is being prepared…in other parts of Syria, including in the southern Damascus suburbs, where they are planning to again plant some substance and accuse the Syrian authorities.”

The conflicts between the G7 diplomats are only a pale and distorted reflection of deep objective conflicts that are developing between the imperialist powers, as well as rising opposition to war in the international working class.

The Trump administration is unpopular both in the United States and in Europe, where Trump’s disapproval ratings after his inauguration were over 80 percent in Germany, France, and Spain. Trump’s turn to war has enormously exacerbated these political and class tensions. In Germany, strikes on Syrian targets have only 26 percent support, while in France, support for presidential candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon is rapidly rising after he criticized Trump’s missile strike.

As the summit took place, moreover, the initial stages of a trade war between European and American capitalism were beginning to unfold. Shortly after Trump threatened German car exports to the United States with steep tariffs, German steelmaker Salzgitter yesterday denounced tariffs the US Department of Commerce imposed on German, French, Italian and Belgian steel exports. “The decision and the level of duties for our products are not comprehensible for us,” said the company in a statement.

The world’s population is confronted with a catastrophic breakdown of the capitalist system. The bitter rivalry between US and European corporations for the division of markets and profits, which twice in the previous century exploded into world wars, threatens to do so again.

The Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ) published its lead comment on Tuesday on this issue, under the extraordinary title “Thoughts of war.” The leading German daily all but declared that it had to prepare for a military confrontation with the United States: “Someone threatened by trade war needs a defense strategy… This is the logic of the post-globalization epoch: Germany must defend itself against its most important ally.”

The SZ advised Berlin to look for allies within the EU and, provocatively, by exploiting divisions within the United States itself. It wrote, “The Germans can also find partners among the US states. The governors and senators of South Carolina, Tennessee and Alabama know very well that BMW, Volkswagen and Daimler are among the most important employers in their states.”

European officials all but publicly accused US officials of threatening to leave Europe, which is still militarily reliant on its relationship with Washington, unaided against Russia. Ayrault told Reuters that US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had asked him why US taxpayers should care about Ukraine—which has been racked by civil war since 2014, when Washington and Berlin toppled a pro-Russian government with a fascist-led putsch.

Ayrault manifestly viewed this question as an indication that US officials are no longer reliably committed to European security. “It is in the interests of US taxpayers to have a Europe that is secure and politically and economically strong,” Ayrault said he replied to Tillerson. “You do not want a Europe that is weak, divided in many small parts, and feeble.”

The powerful inter-imperialist rivalries driving the massive increases in European defense spending, the remilitarization of Germany, and calls for the reintroduction of the draft in France, are coming to the surface. “With 500 million citizens, we Europeans cannot stand on the sidelines and watch international politics unfold. Rather we have to become a confident player on the international stage,” Gabriel wrote in a comment in the German daily Tagesspiegel before heading off to Lucca.

When Gabriel and the European powers state their support for Trump’s air strike and press for Assad’s overthrow, they are not doing so as friends of US imperialism. Rather, they are biding their time and trying to advance their interests for the time being through the plunder led by Washington. At the same time, they hope that the decisive trial of strength with Washington will not come until their own remilitarization programs, financed at the expense of working people, allow them to more effectively assert their own imperialist interests.

Royal Institute of International Affairs (RIIA) Academy Africa Fellowship for Young African Leaders 2017 – UK

Application Deadline: 31st May 2017

Eligible Countries: Cote d’Ivoire, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, or South Africa.

To be taken at (country): The fellow will be based full-time at Chatham House, London. UK

Type: Fellowship

Eligibility: 

• The fellowship is open to citizens of Cote d’Ivoire, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, or South Africa.
• Applications will be accepted from applicants holding dual nationality which includes one of these countries.
• It is required that the applicant holds a completed BA degree or equivalent, Masters degree with an international focus is preferred.
• The fellowship is aimed at candidates at the mid-stage of their career and who come from academia, NGOs, business, government departments, civil society or the media. They should possess knowledge of, and an interest in, one of the policy-related challenges laid out in the research topics in ‘Research Topics.’

Selection Criteria: Our best candidates typically possess many or all of the following characteristics:

• Clear evidence of their leadership experience and background (personal or professional).
• Ability to explore problems with a holistic and inclusive perspective, with a natural curiosity towards issues and areas in the broader environment around their more specific research area of expertise.
• An original, relevant and clear research project proposal – feasible in the given timeline of the fellowship.
• Relevant background experience, demonstrated through their curriculum vitae.
• Strong track record in their area of expertise, including delivering research
• Good writing and presentation skills and a publishing record.
• Awareness of the international context of their research.
• A post-fellowship plan indicating how the candidate will apply their skills, knowledge and experience to impact and influence in their home country or region.
• A clear vision of their contribution to the Academy programme and fellowship cohort.

Applicants must adhere to stated word limits and are advised to read through the information on the Academy’s webpages before applying. Late or incomplete applications will not be considered, nor will any additional or supplementary materials.

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Fellowship: The fellow will receive a monthly stipend of £2,160.  Modest provision is made for the costs of relocation, fieldwork, and possible publication costs.

Duration of Fellowship: A fellow’s time (10 months) will be split between three key areas:

• Completing a personal research project of the fellow’s own design undertaken with the guidance of a Chatham House expert, (approximately 50%).
• Contributing to the ongoing research activities of their host research team and other Chatham House teams as appropriate (approximately 20%).
• Participation in the Academy’s Leadership Programme (approximately 30%). The Leadership Programme is a key part of the Academy fellowships. It provides fellows with the opportunity to develop their knowledge, skills, network and self-awareness, which they can then draw upon in their future careers as effective leaders in their field.

How to Apply: The recruitment round for 2017 is between 3 April and 31 May, applications made outside of this period will not be considered. Apply using our online application portal.

For more information on the application process please follow this link.

Visit Fellowship Webpage for details

Award Provider: The Africa Fellowship is a joint initiative between Chatham House and the Mo Ibrahim Foundation.

Fulbright Egyptian Student Program in Islamic Studies 2017/2018

Application Deadline: 27th May, 2017 – 4:30 P.M

Eligible Countries: Egypt

To be taken at (country): Egypt and the USA

Type: 

• Master’s Degree Grants, for persons wishing to pursue a master’s degree in the U.S.
• One-year grants, for persons registered for the Ph.D. degree who wish to conduct research in the U.S.
• Ph.D. Grants for persons wishing to pursue Ph.D. studies in the U.S.

Eligibility: 

• Egyptian citizenship; holders of U.S. green cards and/or passports are ineligible.
• Islamic Studies graduate from Al Azhar University or the faculties of Dar Al Ulum.
• Bachelor’s degree with a minimum of “Good”.
• For non-degree applicants: proof of registered doctoral thesis.
• Language Requirements:
  • For Master’s degrees or non-degree applicants: minimum Institutional TOEFL (ITP) score by an approved testing center of 450 or its equivalent iBT (45), or IELTS (4) from AMIDEAST Egypt (38 Mohy El Din Aboul Ezz Street, Dokki, or 15 Abdel Hamid El Abbady Street, Roushdy, Alexandria, General Tel: 19263) or any of the ETS approved centers listed below
  • For Ph.D. degrees: minimum institutional TOEFL (ITP) score of 550 or its equivalent iBT (80), or IELTS (6.5) from AMIDEAST Egypt (38 Mohy El Din Aboul Ezz Street, Dokki, or 15 Abdel Hamid El Abbady Street, Roushdy, Alexandria, General Tel: 19263) or any of the ETS approved centers listed below

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Scholarship: 

• Travel allowance
• Pre-academic intensive English language training
• Stipend
• Other allowances
• Medical insurance
• Tuition and/or university fees

Duration of Scholarship: Duration of Program

How to Apply:  Application:   https://apply.embark.com/student/fulbright/international
All applications and required supporting documents should be submitted via the online system.  If applicants are not able to submit the required supporting documents due to internet limitations, they may submit them directly to the Binational Fulbright Commission in Egypt at 21 Amer Street, Al Messaha, Dokki, 12311, Giza, Egypt

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: Fulbright Commission