Climate Change As Genocide

Michael T. Klare

Not since World War II have more human beings been at risk from disease and starvation than at this very moment. On March 10th, Stephen O’Brien, under secretary-general of the United Nations for humanitarian affairs, informed the Security Council that 20 million people in three African countries—Nigeria, Somalia, and South Sudan—as well as in Yemen were likely to die if not provided with emergency food and medical aid. “We are at a critical point in history,” he declared. “Already at the beginning of the year we are facing the largest humanitarian crisis since the creation of the U.N.”  Without coordinated international action, he added, “people will simply starve to death [or] suffer and die from disease.”

Major famines have, of course, occurred before, but never in memory on such a scale in four places simultaneously. According to O’Brien, 7.3 million people are at risk in Yemen, 5.1 million in the Lake Chad area of northeastern Nigeria, 5 million in South Sudan, and 2.9 million in Somalia. In each of these countries, some lethal combination of war, persistent drought, and political instability is causing drastic cuts in essential food and water supplies. Of those 20 million people at risk of death, an estimated 1.4 million are young children.

Despite the potential severity of the crisis, U.N. officials remain confident that many of those at risk can be saved if sufficient food and medical assistance is provided in time and the warring parties allow humanitarian aid workers to reach those in the greatest need. “We have strategic, coordinated, and prioritized plans in every country,” O’Brien said. “With sufficient and timely financial support, humanitarians can still help to prevent the worst-case scenario.”

All in all, the cost of such an intervention is not great: an estimated $4.4 billion to implement that U.N. action plan and save most of those 20 million lives.

The international response? Essentially, a giant shrug of indifference.

To have time to deliver sufficient supplies, U.N. officials indicated that the money would need to be in pocket by the end of March. It’s now April and international donors have given only a paltry $423 million—less than a tenth of what’s needed. While, for instance, President Donald Trump sought Congressional approval for a $54 billion increase in U.S. military spending (bringing total defense expenditures in the coming year to $603 billion) and launched $89 million worth of Tomahawk missiles against a single Syrian air base, the U.S. has offered precious littleto allay the coming disaster in three countries in which it has taken military actions in recent years. As if to add insult to injury, on February 15th Trump told Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari that he was inclined to sell his country 12 Super-Tucano light-strike aircraft, potentially depleting Nigeria of $600 million it desperately needs for famine relief.

Moreover,just as those U.N. officials were pleading fruitlessly for increased humanitarian funding and an end to the fierce and complex set of conflicts in South Sudan andYemen (so that they could facilitate the safe delivery of emergency food supplies to those countries), the Trump administration was announcing plans to reduce American contributions to the United Nations by 40%.  It was also preparing to send additional weaponry to Saudi Arabia, the country most responsible for devastating air strikes on Yemen’s food and water infrastructure. This goes beyond indifference.  This is complicity in mass extermination.

Like many people around the world, President Trump was horrified by images of young children suffocating from the nerve gas used by Syrian government forces in an April 4th raid on the rebel-held village of Khan Sheikhoun. “That attack on children yesterday had a big impact on me—big impact,” he told reporters. “That was a horrible, horrible thing. And I’ve been watching it and seeing it, and it doesn’t get any worse than that.” In reaction to those images, he ordered a barrage of cruise missile strikes on a Syrian air base the following day. But Trump does not seem to have seen—or has ignored—equally heart-rending images of young children dying from the spreading famines in Africa and Yemen. Those children evidently don’t merit White House sympathy.

Who knows why not just Donald Trump but the world is proving so indifferent to the famines of 2017?  It could simply be donor fatigue or a media focused on the daily psychodrama that is now Washington, or growing fears about the unprecedented global refugee crisis and, of course, terrorism.  It’s a question worth a piece in itself, but I want to explore another one entirely.

Here’s the question I think we all should be asking: Is this what a world battered by climate change will be like—one in which tens of millions, even hundreds of millions of people perish from disease, starvation, and heat prostration while the rest of us, living in less exposed areas, essentially do nothing to prevent their annihilation?

Famine, Drought, and Climate Change

First, though, let’s consider whether the famines of 2017 are even a valid indicator of what a climate-changed planet might look like. After all, severe famines accompanied by widespread starvation have occurred throughout human history. In addition, the brutal armed conflicts now underway in Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan, and Yemen are at least in part responsible for the spreading famines. In all four countries, there are forces—Boko Haram in Nigeria, al-Shabaab in Somalia, assorted militias and the government in South Sudan, and Saudi-backed forces in Yemen—interfering with the delivery of aid supplies. Nevertheless, there can be no doubt that pervasive water scarcity and prolonged drought (expected consequences of global warming) are contributing significantly to the disastrous conditions in most of them. The likelihood that droughts this severe would be occurring simultaneously in the absence of climate change is vanishingly small.

In fact, scientists generally agree that global warming will ensure diminished rainfall and ever more frequent droughts over much of Africa and the Middle East. This, in turn, will heighten conflicts of every sort and endanger basic survival in a myriad of ways. In their most recent 2014 assessment of global trends, the scientists of the prestigious Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that “agriculture in Africa will face significant challenges in adapting to climate changes projected to occur by mid-century, as negative effects of high temperatures become increasingly prominent.” Even in 2014, as that report suggested, climate change was already contributing to water scarcity and persistent drought conditions in large parts of Africa and the Middle East. Scientific studies had, for instance, revealed an “overall expansion of desert and contraction of vegetated areas” on that continent.  With arable land in retreat and water supplies falling, crop yields were already in decline in many areas, while malnutrition rates were rising—precisely the conditions witnessed in more extreme forms in the famine-affected areas today.

It’s seldom possible to attribute any specific weather-induced event, including droughts or storms, to global warming with absolute certainty.  Such things happen with or without climate change.  Nonetheless, scientists are becoming even more confident that severe storms and droughts (especially when occurring in tandem or in several parts of the world at once) are best explained as climate-change related. If, for instance, a type of storm that might normally occur only once every hundred years occurs twice in one decade and four times in the next, you can be reasonably confident that you’re in a new climate era.

It will undoubtedly take more time for scientists to determine to what extent the current famines in Africa and Yemen are mainly climate-change-induced and to what extent they are the product of political and military mayhem and disarray. But doesn’t this already offer us a sense of just what kind of world we are now entering?

The Selective Impact of Climate Change

In some popular accounts of the future depredations of climate change, there is a tendency to suggest that its effects will be felt more or less democratically around the globe—that we will all suffer to some degree, if not equally, from the bad things that happen as temperatures rise. And it’s certainly true that everyone on this planet will feel the effects of global warming in some fashion, but don’t for a second imagine that the harshest effects will be distributed anything but deeply inequitably.  It won’t even be a complicated equation.  As with so much else, those at the bottom rungs of society—the poor, the marginalized, and those in countries already at or near the edge— will suffer so much more (and so much earlier) than those at the top and in the most developed, wealthiest countries.

As a start, the geophysical dynamics of climate change dictate that, when it comes to soaring temperatures and reduced rainfall, the most severe effects are likely to be felt first and worst in the tropical and subtropical regions of Africa, the Middle East, South Asia, and Latin America—home to hundreds of millions of people who depend on rain-fed agriculture to sustain themselves and their families. Research conducted by scientists in New Zealand, Switzerland, and Great Britain found that the rise in the number of extremely hot days is already more intense in tropical latitudes and disproportionately affects poor farmers.

Living at subsistence levels, such farmers and their communities are especially vulnerable to drought and desertification.  In a future in which climate-change disasters are commonplace, they will undoubtedly be forced to choose ever more frequently between the unpalatable alternatives of starvation or flight.  In other words, if you thought the global refugee crisis was bad today, just wait a few decades.

Climate change is also intensifying the dangers faced by the poor and marginalized in another way.  As interior croplands turn to dust, ever more farmers are migrating to cities, especially coastal ones.  If you want a historical analogy, think of the great Dust Bowl migration of the “Okies” from the interior of the U.S. to the California coast in the 1930s. In today’s climate-change era, the only available housing such migrants are likely to find will be in vast and expanding shantytowns (or “informal settlements,” as they’re euphemistically called), often located in floodplains and low-lying coastal areas exposed to storm surges and sea-level rise. As global warming advances, the victims of water scarcity and desertification will be afflicted anew.  Those storm surges will destroy the most exposed parts of the coastal mega-cities in which they will be clustered. In other words, for the uprooted and desperate, there will be no escaping climate change.  As the latest IPCC report noted, “Poor people living in urban informal settlements, of which there are [already] about one billion worldwide, are particularly vulnerable to weather and climate effects.”

The scientific literature on climate change indicates that the lives of the poor, the marginalized, and the oppressed will be the first to be turned upside down by the effects of global warming. “The socially and economically disadvantaged and the marginalized are disproportionately affected by the impacts of climate change and extreme events,” the IPCC indicated in 2014. “Vulnerability is often high among indigenous peoples, women, children, the elderly, and disabled people who experience multiple deprivations that inhibit them from managing daily risks and shocks.” It should go without saying that these are also the people least responsible for the greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming in the first place (something no less true of the countries most of them live in).

Inaction Equals Annihilation

In this context, consider the moral consequences of inaction on climate change. Once it seemed that the process of global warming would occur slowly enough to allow societies to adapt to higher temperatures without excessive disruption, and that the entire human family would somehow make this transition more or less simultaneously. That now looks more and more like a fairy tale. Climate change is occurring far too swiftly for all human societies to adapt to it successfully.  Only the richest are likely to succeed in even the most tenuous way. Unless colossal efforts are undertaken now to halt the emission of greenhouse gases, those living inless affluent societies can expect to suffer from extremes of flooding, drought, starvation, disease, and death in potentially staggering numbers.

And you don’t need a Ph.D. in climatology to arrive at this conclusion either. The overwhelming majority of the world’s scientists agree that any increase in average world temperatures that exceeds 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above the pre-industrial era—some opt for a rise of no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius—will alter the global climate system drastically.  In such a situation, a number of societies will simply disintegrate in the fashion of South Sudan today, producing staggering chaos and misery. So far, the world has heated up by at least one of those two degrees, and unless we stop burning fossil fuels in quantity soon, the 1.5 degree level will probably be reached in the not-too-distant future.

Worse yet, on our present trajectory, it seems highly unlikely that the warming process will stop at 2 or even 3 degrees Celsius, meaning that laterin this century many of the worst-case climate-change scenarios—the inundation of coastal cities, the desertification of vast interior regions, and the collapse of rain-fed agriculture in many areas—will become everyday reality.

In other words, think of the developments in those three African lands and Yemen as previews of what far larger parts of our world could look like in another quarter-century or so: a world in which hundreds of millions of people are at risk of annihilation from disease or starvation, or are on the march or at sea, crossing borders, heading for the shantytowns of major cities, looking for refugee camps or other places where survival appears even minimally possible.  If the world’s response to the current famine catastrophe and the escalating fears of refugees in wealthy countries are any indication, people will die in vast numbers without hope of help.

In other words, failing to halt the advance of climate change—to the extent that halting it, at this point, remains within our power—means complicity with mass human annihilation. We know, or at this point should know, that such scenarios are already on the horizon.  We still retain the power, if not to stop them, then to radically ameliorate what they will look like, so our failure to do all we can means that we become complicitin what—not to mince words— is clearly going to be a process of climate genocide. How can those of us in countries responsible for the majority of greenhouse gas emissions escape such a verdict?

And if such a conclusion is indeed inescapable, then each of us must do whatever we can to reduce our individual, community, and institutional contributions to global warming. Even if we are already doing a lot—as many of us are —more is needed.  Unfortunately, we Americans are living not only in a time of climate crisis, but in the era of President Trump, which means the federal government and its partners in the fossil fuel industry will be wielding their immense powers to obstruct all imaginable progress on limiting global warming. They will be the true perpetrators ofclimate genocide. As a result, the rest of us bear a moral responsibility not just to do what we can at the local level to slow the pace of climate change, but also to engage in political struggle to counteract or neutralize the acts of Trump and company. Only dramatic and concerted action on multiple fronts can prevent the human disasters now unfolding in Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan, and Yemen from becoming the global norm.

Saving The Amazon Reef

Marianne Furtado de Nazareth

The Great Barrier Reef on the north-east coast of Australia which contains the world’s largest collection of coral reefs, has been the only reef which has been in the news of late  and has a UNESCO heritage label. Today with oceans heating up reefs are threatened and the world holds its breath, hoping to reverse the trend.

Interestingly, a newly discovered reef, the Amazon Reef, spread over 9500 km, at the mouth of the Amazon River is receiving focussed attention from the IUCN and marine scientists. It is important because it is like no other coral reef that we know of. While other reefs exist in clear, sunlit waters, the Amazon Reef lies in very muddy, sediment-filled waters of the Amazon, and is a product of unusual chemosynthesis. The reef lies in a uniquely bio- diverse area, and as scientists explore this area further, new exciting species of life are likely to be discovered.

The reef, which also serves as a natural carbon sink, is surrounded by the largest mangrove stretch in the world, which again is another massive natural carbon sink. Any threat to the reef will directly affect the earth’s ability to remove carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere (carbon sequestration)

Now, oil companies have plans to drill around 15 to 20 billion barrels of oil from the surrounding area, which, once up for consumption, will further adversely affect efforts to mitigate climate change and destroy this pristine habitat.

This is where Greenpeace India has stepped in with the goal of stopping oil exploration near the mouth of the Amazon river and guarantee that the ecosystem of the region, and its vital mangrove carbon sinks, will remain intact and protected.

Ravi Chellam, Executive Director, Greenpeace India, ” I strongly believe that our interactions with Nature, our environment and fellow human beings have to be based on a robust ethical foundation.  We, both as individual human beings and collectively as the human race have no right to damage and destroy any part of nature, especially if our actions will result in extinction of species as extinction is forever!  The case of the newly discovered Amazon reef is particularly compelling for us to take global and collective responsibility for it.  This reef is quite expansive in its scale, occupying at least 9,500 sq km and very unique in its location, at the mouth of the Amazon River and in muddy waters.  Currently we have barely documented 5% of these reefs and it would be unpardonable if we allow any damage to these reefs in the name of “development”.  I find it particularly distressing that the proposed development is for oil drilling when the dangers posed by global warming and climate change are increasingly becoming part of our daily lives.  If the global community has to deliver on the pledges made as part of the Paris Agreement, any future exploration for hydrocarbons, especially in biodiversity rich sites like the Amazon Reefs should be prevented.”

The reef is a new biome, located in a place where it was thought not possible for reefs to exist and is located in the mouth of the Amazon basin, where there is a lot of sediment brought by the river (largest in the world in volume of water), there are spots where only 2% of light passes through. So it is a new biome that needs to be studied as is very important for marine biodiversity and fish stocks.

The Amazon Reef is an ecosystem composed of corals, sponges and rhodoliths (calciferous algae). In the southern part of the Reef, there are mainly sponges, some of them are over 2 meters in length.In the 70’s, scientists speculated about the existence of a reef in the region, but no further research was done. Then from 2010 to 2014, scientists went on three expeditions to collect samples and study their findings. This system of corals, sponges and rhodoliths was revealed in April of 2016. Because of its characteristics and extreme conditions , this system of corals is unique. Its discovery was celebrated by specialists as one of the most important in marine biology in recent decades. According to Ronaldo Francini, one of the scientists who revealed the Reef to the world, “this is clearly a hotspot for biodiversity”.

At the same time, this area is risky to drill for oil – from 95 attempts to produce oil in the mouth of the Amazon basin since the 60s, 27 failed due to mechanical accidents, while the other attempts either didn’t find anything, or the reserves weren’t technically or economically viable. So the issue is why try again and again when there are other oil reserves already in the world and if we want to keep the climate below 1.5C, stop oil consumption.

The campaign will hasten the end of the oil age and maintaining global temperatures within 1.5C degrees and contribute to the erosion of political and economic power currently held by fossil fuel corporations globally by weakening their relationships with governments, customers and investors and undermining their social license.

The common man is being made more aware of these issues through online campaigns and what is known as ‘clicktivism’. The Amazon Reef Campaign has crossed 1 million signups globally. The fight to protect our natural treasures, functional ecosystems and a better world is gathering momentum in one more corner of the globe. Greenpeace India is very much part of this global campaign, we have received 3000 sign ups and counting within just four days of the launch of the campaign. Greenpeace India launched the Amazon Reef Campaign on 13th April and is running successfully. Several big names including, Leonard di Caprio,  supports the Amazon reef campaign.

“ India has taken on a leadership role in addressing global environmental issues and in tackling climate change, as seen by the commitment to the Paris Agreement. As citizens, it is our responsibility to work alongside the government to ensure that this global agreement succeeds in its implementation, because our future survival is at stake. It is therefore up to each one of us to stay vigilant and speak up when we see any significant threat to our environment, whether it is within our national borders, or anywhere else in the world.

Globally, over one million concerned individuals have already signed a petition asking for the Amazon Reef to be protected. It is now for us in India to also add our voice,” says Thiago F. C. Almeida a Brazilian Climate & Energy Campaigner.

Regarding the mangroves, they are not linked to the reef, but both mangroves and reefs play a very important role in biodiversity and carbon capture. The largest continuous mangrove in the world is on the coast of Amapá and if oil destroyed it, there is no technology to clean it up. And the mangroves play an important role in both marine and land biodiversity in the coast, extremely important for artisanal fishing communities – the coast of Amapá is home to several traditional communities, fishing, extractivist, indigenous and quilombola (former slaves from the 18th and 19th centuries that ran away).

Plus, coral systems are very susceptible to the impacts of climate change. Between the atmosphere and the ocean, there is an exchange of gases, primarily carbon dioxide (CO2), which is absorbed, and oxygen, which is released by the action of the algae. As we are emitting large amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere, the oceans are having to absorb much of this gas in a short period of time, which throws the system out of balance. One of the effects of this excess CO2 is that the ocean is becoming more acidic. And acidity harms mollusks and corals, which are unable to form with the same amount of carbonates.  As an analogy, it is as if the ocean has osteoporosis. A study published in Nature Climate Change shows that in corals reefs, the diversity and complexity of marine life falls as the acidity of the water rises. Species that use calcium carbonate to build their shells and skeletons, like mussels and corals, are particularly vulnerable to acidification. In addition, the areas surrounding mangroves and corals are inhabited by species of turtles, marine mammals, etc., that, we know today, play an important role in the sequestration of carbon in the ocean.

Oil exploration involves seismic surveys. The waves stun marine animals and diving birds, interfering with their navigation and communication abilities.  This can be deadly for individuals and species.  The drilling process also involves large volumes of waste being produced.  This includes extracted water mixed with oil and other contaminants, drilling “muds” (including toxic chemicals and heavy metals) to cool and lubricate the equipment and other forms of industrial waste. These inevitably end up in the ocean and are ingested by marine life of all sizes.  Some of the tiniest marine creatures, foundational to our ecosystems, the plankton, are particularly susceptible to crude oil pollution and suffer population reductions.

Oil companies are estimated to drill around 15 to 20 billion barrels of oil from the surrounding area, which, once up for consumption, will contribute immensely to global warming and adversely affect efforts to mitigate climate change. So we need to support the campaign, save the reef  and stop the drilling.

From Earth Day to The Monsanto Tribunal, Capitalism on Trial

Colin Todhunter

World Environment Day (WED) occurs on 5 June every year. Promoted by the United Nations, its aim is to encourage global awareness and action for the protection of the environment. Since its inauguration in 1974, WED has helped bring attention to various issues, including global warming, sustainable consumption and wildlife crime.

We also have Earth Day, celebrated annually on 22 April. On this day. various events are held across the globe to demonstrate support for environmental protection. Earth Day dates back to 1970.

Given the threats to the environment, these two symbolic days in the calendar promote laudable aims. For instance, consider that a range of species are endangered due to poaching and habitat destruction. The scaly anteater is probably the most trafficked mammal on earth. Over a million of these have been taken from the wild in the past decade alone. The illegal trade in live apes is also rife, and many other species across the planet are being trafficked.

The vast illegal trade in wildlife products is pushing whole species towards extinction, including elephants, rhinos, big cats, gorillas and sea turtles. Driven by a growing demand for illegally sourced wildlife products, the illicit trade has escalated into a global crisis. Thousands of species are internationally traded and used by people in their daily lives.

Former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has called on UN agencies and various partners to provide a co-ordinated response to wildlife crime and spread the message that there should be zero tolerance for poaching. As part of a wider approach, a strategy is being developed to create greater public awareness of the issue at hand, which will hopefully lead to reduced demand for wildlife products.

Palm oil and environmental destruction

As commendable as these aims are, however, on their own they will not be enough to save species or their habitat. That’s because the interests of powerful actors must be taken into account and the economic system they perpetuate has to be challenged.

For instance, between 2000 and 2009 Indonesia supplied more than half of the global palm oil market at an annual expense of some 340,000 hectares of Indonesian countryside. Planned expansion could wipe out the remaining natural habitat of several endangered species.

This is a ludicrous situation considering that Brazil and Indonesia spent over 100 times more in subsidies to industries that cause deforestation than they received in international conservation aid from the UN to prevent it. The two countries gave over $40bn in subsidies to the palm oil, timber, soy, beef and biofuels sectors between 2009 and 2012, some 126 times more than the $346m they received to preserve their rain forests.

If we want to see how not to manage the world’s wildlife and natural habitats, we need look no further than India, which is the world’s leading importer of palm oil, accounting for around 15% of the global supply. India imports over two-­thirds of its palm oil from Indonesia.

Until the mid-1990s, India was virtually self-sufficient in edible oils. Under pressure from the WTO, import tariffs were reduced, leading to an influx of cheap (subsidised) edible oil imports that domestic farmers could not compete with. This was a deliberate policy that effectively devastated the home-grown edible oils sector (see this) and served the interests of palm oil growers and US grain and agriculture commodity company Cargill, which helped write international trade rules to secure access to the Indian market on its terms.

Indonesia leads the world in global palm oil production, but palm oil plantations have too often replaced tropical forests, leading to the killing of endangered species and the uprooting of local communities as well as contributing to the release of climate-changing gases (see this analysis). Indonesia emits more greenhouse gases than any country besides China and the US and that’s largely due to the production of palm oil.

The issue of palm oil is one example from the many that could be provided to highlight how the drive to facilitate corporate need and profit trumps any notion of environmental protection. Whether it is in Indonesia, Latin America or elsewhere, transnational agribusiness – and the system of industrialised agriculture it promotes – fuels much of the environmental destruction we see today.

Without addressing the impacts and nature of corporate imperialism and a wholly corrupt neoliberal capitalism that privileges corporations and profit ahead of people and conservation, Earth Day or World Environment Day will continue to send out a valuable message but will have minimal impact.

The devastating nature of chemical-intensive industrial farming, its geopolitical role and its massive environmental, social and health costs has been highlighted at length in previous article I’ve written. There is no need to go over this again here. But one of the guilty parties which perpetuates this model of agriculture is of course Monsanto.

The Monsanto Tribunal

Earth Day came a few days after the legal opinion offered by the five international judges who presided over the Monsanto Tribunal in The Hague. The judges concluded that Monsanto has engaged in practices that have impinged on the basic human right to a healthy environment, the right to food and the right to health. Monsanto’s conduct also has had a negative impact on the right of scientists to freely conduct indispensable research.

The judges additionally concluded that a gap remains between the commitments and the reality of environmental protection. The Tribunal concluded that if ecocide were formally recognised as a crime in international criminal law, the activities of Monsanto could possibly constitute a crime of ecocide too.

The Tribunal called for the need to assert the primacy of international human and environmental rights law. However, it was also careful to note that an existing set of legal rules is currently in place to protect investors’ rights in the framework of the World Trade Organization and in bilateral investment treaties and in clauses in free-trade agreements.

These provisions undermine the capacity of nations to maintain policies, laws and practices protecting human and environmental rights, not least because key questions of human and environmental rights violations are to be resolved by private tribunals operating entirely outside the United Nations framework and the legal systems of nation states (see ‘Clear and Present Danger to Democracy‘, which highlights the disturbing shift in power as a result of investor trade dispute settlement provisions written into trade and investment agreements).

The Tribunal denounced the severe disparity between the rights of multinational corporations and their obligations.

Capitalism on trial

While the Monsanto Tribunal saw that company being put on trial and being found guilty of human rights violations, including crimes against the environment, in a sense we also witnessed global capitalism on trial.

Monsanto and other powerful corporations can only operate as they do because of a framework designed to allow them to capture governments and regulatory bodies, to use the WTO and bilateral trade deals to lever global influence, to profit on the back of US militarism (Iraq) and destabilisations (Ukraine), to exert undue influence over science and politics and to rake in enormous profits.

The World Bank’s ‘Enabling the Business of Agriculture’ and its ongoing commitment to a wholly corrupt and rigged model of globalisation is a further recipe for plunder, corruption and the concentration of power and wealth in the hands of the few. Whether it involves Monsanto, Cargill or the type of corporate power grab of African agriculture that Bill Gates is helping to spearhead, global capitalism (under the project of ‘globalisation’) will continue to ensure this happens while hiding behind platitudes about ‘free trade’ and ‘development’.

Brazil and Indonesia are subsidising private corporations to effectively destroy the environment through their practices. Canada and the UK are working with the GMO biotech sector to facilitate its needs. And India is facilitating the destruction of its agrarian base according to World Bank directives for the benefit of the likes of Monsanto, Bayer and Cargill.

“The Indo-US Knowledge Initiative in Agriculture with agribusinesses like Monsanto, WalMart, Archer Daniels Midland, Cargill and ITC in its Board made efforts to turn the direction of agricultural research and policy in such a manner as to cater their demands for profit maximisation. Companies like Monsanto during the Vietnam War produced tonnes and tonnes of “Agent Orange” unmindful of its consequences for Vietnamese people as it raked in super profits and that character remains.” Communist Party of India (Marxist)

These powerful corporations increasingly hold sway over a globalised system of food and agriculture from seed to plate. And with major mergers within the agribusiness sector in the pipeline, power will be further monopolised and the situation is likely to worsen. The overall narrative about farming has been shaped to benefit the interests of this handful of wealthy, politically influential corporations whereby commercial interest trumps any notion of the public good.

We require transparency, accountability and a system of decision making that does not take place within the overbearing shadow of commercial influence. However, in capitalism, the state’s primary role is to secure the interests of private capital. The institutions of globalised capitalism – from the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO right down to the compliant bureaucracies of national states or supranational unions – facilitate private wealth accumulation that results in the forms of structural inequalities and violence (unemployment, poverty, population displacement, bad food, poor health, environmental destruction, etc.) that have become ‘accepted’ as necessary (for ‘growth’) and taken for granted within mainstream media and political narratives.

When referring to Western countries, those narratives like to use the euphemism ‘austerity’ for deregulation, privatisation and gross inequalities and hardship, while hiding being the mantra ‘there is no alternative’. When referring to places like India or Africa, they use the euphemism ‘assisting development’ for corporate imperialism, while hiding behind the term ‘investing in’.

In the cynical world of ‘free’ market capitalism, an interlocking directorate of corporate interests have for a long time ensured that state institutions and international bodies are shaped and manipulated to facilitate the interests of private capital.

If the current myths about the necessity for perpetuating the stranglehold of capitalism go unchallenged and real alternatives are not offered or supported, we will see accelerated environmental destruction and human rights violations by powerful private interests and a dangerous march towards increasing militarism and possible nuclear conflict as a moribund capitalism approaches its ultimate crisis.

More warnings about the Australian housing market

Oscar Grenfell 

Australian house prices have continued their unprecedented ascent, with median home values in Sydney this week hitting a record $1.15 million and in Melbourne, $826,000, after rising by 13.1 percent and 7.6 percent respectively in the first three months of the year.

The frenzied growth of the east coast market has prompted a series of warnings pointing to the contradiction between inflated house prices and the stagnant or declining incomes of working people, amid a slump across manufacturing and other industries.

Last week, Moody’s cautioned that Australia’s housing market was among four in the world most susceptible to a crash in the event of an economic shock or a renewed downturn. The international ratings agency drew attention to the mountain of debt upon which the property bubble has been built, stating: “Australian households stand out for lower financial buffers and higher leverage.”

Moody’s drew a parallel between debt-to-liquid asset ratios in Australia, and in Ireland before the collapse of the property market in 2007. It commented: “[I]n the event of a negative income shock, the scope for Australian households to draw down parts of their financial assets to maintain debt service and overall spending is more limited than elsewhere.”

Deloitte Access Economics likewise pointed to the buildup of debt this week, noting that household debt to income ratios are the second highest in the world after Sweden. National household debt currently stands at 185 percent of annual disposable income, up from around 70 percent in the early 1990s.

Deloitte has estimated that house prices are around 30 percent overvalued compared to national income, the highest margin in over three decades. The firm’s director, Chris Richardson warned that in “global terms our housing prices are asking for trouble.”

In comments to the National Press Club last week, Richardson warned of the vast implications of any slowdown of the Chinese economy for the Australian housing market and financial system. He predicted that a sharp crisis in China could result in the collapse of house prices by around 9 percent, as part of a broader downturn that could destroy almost $1 trillion of national wealth.

Martin North, of Digital Finance Analytics, drew parallels with the US subprime mortgage crisis that played a key role in precipitating the global financial crisis of 2007–08. He listed declining incomes, rapidly rising household debt and a growth in mortgage stress as features in common.

North told Fairfax Media: “This falling real income scenario is the thing that people haven’t got their heads around.” National wage growth across the private sector was just 1.8 percent last year, the lowest level since records began in 1969. Modelling by North has indicated that 669,000 families, or 22 percent of borrowing households, are already in mortgage stress.

Other reports have pointed to the mounting social crisis caused by the ongoing rise in house prices, prompting warnings of a rise in mortgage arrears and defaults.

In its Financial Stability Review released last week, the Reserve Bank reported that around one third of mortgaged households have not built up any substantial repayment buffer, or are a month or less ahead of mortgage repayments. In other words, they are vulnerable to economic fluctuations and any change in their circumstances.

An ALI Group survey last month showed that 41 percent of homeowners feared that they would be unable to keep up with mortgage repayments if they lost their job.

This finding tallied with figures late last year from financial management software company Moneysoft, which found that more than 25 percent of non-investor home loans were “unhealthy.” Loans were deemed to be in bad health if they had grown by at least 5 percent over the course of the loan. Another 25 percent were termed “neutral,” meaning that they had neither grown nor substantially fallen.

The precarious situation of many has contributed to a growth in delinquent housing loans. They rose from 1.15 percent of all housing loans last December, to 1.29 percent in January, according to Standard and Poor’s. In some states the figure is far higher, with Western Australia, which has been hit by the collapse of the mining boom, registering 2.33 percent.

These conditions have led to intensified calls for the Reserve Bank to raise its official interest rate from a historic low of 1.5 percent, and take other measures to rein in speculative loans, including interest-only loans that do not require the borrower to pay off any of the principal for fixed periods of up to seven years.

Minutes from the central bank’s April meeting stated that it “would consider further measures if needed,” but did not spell them out. Any rise in interest rates, however, could lead to a rapid fall in borrowing, along with a rise in mortgage defaults, potentially provoking a dramatic contraction of the entire market.

The soaring cost of housing, which has made it unaffordable for many young people, has intensified the crisis of the Liberal-National government of Malcolm Turnbull. Like its Labor Party predecessor, the government has maintained capital gains tax concessions, and other policies, such as negative tax gearing, which have provided a boon for property developers.

Amid reported divisions within the government, various proposals have been floated, including allowing first homebuyers to access their superannuation funds to purchase a house and making limited reductions in the 50 percent capital gains tax concessions.

The Labor Party has demagogically denounced negative gearing tax incentives for investors. Their posturing was punctured by reports this week that federal Labor politicians own some 72 investment properties in total. Their Liberal-National and Greens colleagues likewise have substantial material interests in the ongoing housing boom.

None of the measures being discussed by the government, or any section of the political establishment, will resolve the housing affordability crisis and the massive growth of property market speculation that has fuelled it.

Loans to investors made up around 39 percent of all housing loans in January, with only 7 percent of loans for first homebuyers. The proportion of investors is higher in Sydney and Melbourne, the centres of the property boom.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, investor loans grew by 27.5 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis, between January 2016 and 2017. The growth was well above the 10 percent annual limit placed on the banks by regulatory authorities.

The rise has coincided with an ongoing decline in productive investment. Corporate investment in new buildings, equipment and machinery fell in each quarter last year, with a decline of 2.1 percent in the December quarter alone.

As has happened around the world, the deepening crisis of global capitalism and the escalating slump in the real economy has seen the corporate elite turn to ever-more speculative financial operations. These do not produce real social wealth but inflate the value of existing assets, in this case, leading to a housing crisis for millions of working people.

Over 8.3 million American adults suffer from severe psychological distress

Kathleen Martin

According to a report released Monday by the Psychiatrics Journal, 3.4 percent, or a staggering 8.3 million American adults, suffer from “severe psychological distress” (SPD).

The study examined the results of a study, the National Health Interview Survey, conducted by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention from 2006-2014. It focused on the data of 207,853 participants from over 35,000 households, aged 18-64, on 11 indicators: health insurance coverage, insufficient money for medications, delay in health care, insufficient money for health care, visiting a doctor 10 or more times in a year, change in place of health care, change of place in health care due to insurance, limitations in ability to work, limitations in activities of daily living, insufficient money for mental health care, and having seen a mental health care provider.

About 38 percent of the study’s participants’ family incomes were 400 percent or higher than the federal poverty line, currently at $11,880 per person.

The purpose of the study was to gather data on health care utilization after the implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), popularly known as Obamacare. The conclusions reached based on the study indicate that adults with SPD “had an increased risk of forgoing health care and prescription medications because of cost and were more likely to be uninsured. Adults with SPD were also more likely to exhibit greater nonadherence to mental care.”

“Yet earlier reports also showed that despite being more likely to lack health insurance coverage, adults with SPD visited doctors more frequently than adults without SPD,” the authors noted. “Our hypothesis was that SPD represents a risk factor for experiencing health care barriers independent of risk associated with other chronic health conditions.”

Over one-third of the study’s participants had no health care coverage whatsoever. Over another third had “private coverage,” meaning health care was either provided by the individual’s place of work—usually taken out of the individual’s paycheck—or that it was purchased separately by the participant. A larger portion of adults with SPD were also found to be more likely to have limitations on activities of daily living (ADL), meaning that the participant felt that they needed assistance in personal care needs—such as getting dressed, eating, and getting around the house—due to a physical, mental, or emotional problem.

“What’s been most surprising isn’t necessarily that the overall numbers [of those with SPD] have increased but that the cohort that is most impacted has changed,” Judith Weissman, who headed the study at the Langone Medical Center at New York University, told CNN.

“There’s a newfound high-risk group: middle-aged adults; that’s adults from about the age of 45 to 59 in the US, who previously had not been thought to be at high risk for mental illness or suicide, and now we’re finding that they are.”

The severe and deepening economic crisis paired with an increased lack of access to decent health care overall has resulted in tragedy for a large section of the population who can find no way out.

The suicide rate has increased drastically in the wake of the economic crash of 2008 for nearly every demographic but most notably for the Baby Boomer generation, whose suicide rates in previous years had stabilized or fallen. “The Great Recession of 2008 had a tremendous impact on adults with serious psychological distress,” Weissman said. From 1999-2014 the suicide rate increased by 24 percent, with the US seeing on average more than 43,000 suicides a year.

The study reveals that utilization of health care for the non-mentally ill has increased since 2006, the inverse of the mentally ill. In other words, those who fared the worst during the Great Recession have simultaneously had much more difficulty attaining proper medical care for mental health issues that were likely a result of the economic crisis to begin with.

While those suffering from SPD tend to have less money for medications and poor access to health care, they also visit a doctor much more than those who do not have SPD.

“It is paradoxical that although SPD is associated with several indicators of poor utilization and access, as well as relatively poor general medical health, it is also associated with high utilization of expensive outpatient care,” the authors note. “One possible explanation is that primary care physicians are providing mental health care and prescription refills to adults with SPD in lieu of general medical care.”

The researchers stressed that although these findings are significant, it is based on “noninstitutionalized civilians,” meaning that it excludes a large section of the population which has a higher tendency to suffer from chronic mental health issues: the homeless.

Over half a million people in the US are homeless on any given night, and data reports that anywhere from 20 to 25 percent of the homeless population suffers from some form of severe mental illness, compared to 6 percent of the rest of the population. “Our study must be viewed in light of these exclusions, which may underestimate associations between SPD and indicators of poor health care use and access,” the authors state.

Hunger strike by Palestinian political prisoners

Jean Shaoul 

Friday saw fresh clashes across the occupied West Bank between Israeli security forces and Palestinians demonstrating in solidarity with the Freedom and Dignity hunger strike by Palestinian political prisoners. Daily protests began Monday, when tens of thousands staged angry demonstrations to mark Palestinian Prisoners’ Day and support the mass hunger strike.

Led by Marwan Barghouti, a leader of Fatah, the dominant faction in the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO), the open-ended hunger strike is one of the largest in recent years. It involves some 1,500 prisoners in at least six jails from various Palestinian parties and factions.

It could precipitate a major political crisis for Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu, who faces a potential corruption charge, a coalition beset with factional infighting and signs of rising social discontent among Israeli workers.

The hunger strikers are seeking to highlight the appalling conditions of their detention in Israeli jails, which reflect the broader daily suppression of the Palestinian people. They are demanding an end to solitary confinement and the stringent restrictions on family visits that include a ban on bringing in books, clothing, food and other items, and taking photographs with relatives. They want Israeli authorities to resume bi-monthly family visits, install public telephones in every prison, provide air conditioners and restore kitchens.

Palestinian “security” prisoners are not even allowed to make phone calls to their families. Their families need Israeli permits to visit them, which are regularly refused on spurious “security” pretexts.

Many prisoners suffer from medical neglect. They have to pay for their own treatment and even then are not provided with adequate healthcare. Sick patients have even been denied water.

A crucial demand is for an end to administrative detention—prolonged imprisonment without charge, often indefinitely renewed—illegal under international law. Detention orders also violate Israeli law, which upholds the right to be informed of the nature and cause of an accusation and a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury in the state where the alleged crime was committed.

According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Israeli forces have detained more than 750,000 Palestinians since the start of the occupation after the 1967 June war. Almost every single family has had someone arrested and detained by the Israeli security forces.

There are currently 6,300 Palestinian political prisoners, around 500 of them in administrative detention on the orders of military courts, many for years on end, according to the Palestinian prisoners’ rights group, Addameer. More than 300 have been in jail since before the signing of the Oslo accords in 1993.

Among the prisoners are 13 members of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), including a woman, Sameera al-Halayqah, and Fatah leader Barghouthi, who is serving five life sentences for offences arising out of the Palestinian uprising that started in September 2000.

Since October 2015, when a wave of political unrest erupted across the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Israel following attempts by right-wing Israeli Jews to hold prayers in the al-Aqsa mosque compound in the Old City, Israeli security forces have detained 10,000 Palestinians, most of whom were from occupied East Jerusalem. About one third of the current Palestinian detainees are children and teenagers, of whom 300 are minors.

Writing in an op-ed piece in the New York Times last Sunday, Barghouti said, “Palestinian prisoners and detainees have suffered from torture, inhumane and degrading treatment and medical negligence... about 200 Palestinian prisoners have died since 1967 because of such actions.”

Barghouti accused Israel of conducting “mass arbitrary arrests and ill-treatment of Palestinian prisoners,” adding that a hunger strike was “the most peaceful form of resistance available.”

Last week, Amnesty International called Israel’s treatment of Palestinian prisoners “unlawful and cruel.” Its latest report on Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories for 2016-17 said, “Torture and other ill-treatment of detainees remained rife and was committed with impunity.”

Regional director Magdalena Mughrabi said, “Israel’s ruthless policy of holding Palestinian prisoners arrested in the occupied Palestinian territories in prisons inside Israel is a flagrant violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention.”

Israel has responded with characteristic brutality. Security Minister Gilad Erdan has refused to negotiate over the strike, calling the prisoners “terrorists and murderers”, and suspended family visits.

The Israel Prison Service (IPS) said Barghouti would be “prosecuted in a discipline court” as punishment for his New York Times op-ed. The IPS has transferred Barghouti and several others to another prison, placing them in solitary confinement, confiscating their personal belongings and clothes, and banning them from watching TV, because, it said, calling for a hunger strike was against prison rules.

The IPS has set up a military field hospital in the Ktziot prison especially for hunger strikers and banned the future transfer of hunger strikers with deteriorated health conditions to any civilian hospital.

This follows the refusal of Israeli doctors to implement a law, passed in the wake of a prisoners’ hunger strike in 2015, permitting the force-feeding of prisoners if their life is in danger, which is in breach of Israel’s Patient Rights Act. The Israel Medical Association has called the law “equivalent to torture and every physician has the right to refuse to force-feed a hunger striker against his or her will.”

Rami Hamdallah, the prime minister of the Palestinian Authority (PA), issued a cynical statement of support for the hunger strikers. The PA has played no small part in Israel’s suppression of the Palestinians, arresting around 400 Palestinians at Israel’s request during 2016 alone. It routinely passes on information to Tel Aviv used for the detention, interrogation and torture of Palestinians.

Conditions for the Palestinians under Israeli occupation are dire. Official figures, a pale reflection of reality, show that unemployment was 18 percent in the West Bank and 42 percent in Gaza, while youth unemployment in Gaza was a massive 58 percent. Such are the poverty levels in Gaza that 80 percent of its residents receive some form of aid.

In the West Bank, the Israeli authorities severely restrict freedom of movement, particularly around the Israeli settlements and the so-called Security Wall. The Palestinians are subject to collective punishment for any retaliation against the almost daily attacks that settlers carry out with impunity. At the same time, the Palestinians face the threat of losing further land should Israel annex Area C, 60 percent of the West Bank and currently under Israeli military control, as ultra-right-wing forces are demanding.

In Gaza, the Palestinians have electricity for only six hours a day, thanks to Israel’s 10 year-long blockade and Gaza’s struggle with the PA over who is to pay the tax on diesel fuel from Israel to the power station upon which the electricity supply depends. With the PA desperately short of donor funds that have all but dried up, it has refused to continue paying the tax, cut pay for PA employees in Gaza by 30 percent and threatened to stop all monetary transfers to Gaza unless Hamas, the political faction that controls the enclave, submits to the PA’s authority.

Latest economic data dampen US growth prospects

Nick Beams

A clear divergence is emerging in estimates for future US economic growth as the Trump administration approaches its first 100 days. The stock market has enjoyed a surge since Trump’s election win and indexes of consumer confidence are up on the back of his promises to stimulate the economy. Data on the real economy, however, tell another story.

The surge in the markets was largely the result of expectations that cuts in corporate and personal taxes, together with major deregulation, would provide a boost to the bottom line. The increase in profits would supposedly spark investment, leading to a lift in the US economy. Trump has said his aim is to lift annual growth to 4 percent.

But the latest data indicate that nothing like this sort of growth spurt is taking place, or is even in the pipeline.

According to Atlanta Federal Reserve estimates, gross domestic product (GDP) will show a rise of just 0.5 percent for the March quarter, well below the promises held out by Trump. The low GDP numbers continue a trend that has been in place for the past four years.

The main factors were the fall in manufacturing activity, which dropped for the first time in seven months, and a fall of 0.2 percent in retail spending in March, following a decline of 0.3 percent in February. One of the main factors was a sharp drop in auto sales, which have fallen by 10 percent since December.

The reasons for the decline in retail sales are not hard to find. Many households struggle to cope with large student loans, credit card debt and car loans under conditions of low wages growth.

Consumer prices were also significantly down in March, falling by 0.1 percent for items other than food and energy, contrary to expectations they would show an increase. It was the first fall in core consumer prices since 2010.

JPMorgan Chase chief economist Michael Feroli said the March price figures were a “huge downside miss” and would leave “lingering doubts about the popular reflation narrative.”

Bank of the West economist Scott Anderson said US economic indicators were throwing off “mixed messages.” He noted: “Stocks have soared along with business and consumer confidence measures since the November election in anticipation of renewed fiscal stimulus and stronger economic growth. Yet harder data on industrial production, retail sales, and even last month’s employment report have so far proved disappointing.”

Despite the lift in stock markets, the data on the real economy are starting to cause some concern in financial circles.

Larry Fink, the chief executive officer of BlackRock, the world’s largest hedge fund, told Bloomberg this week that lacklustre US growth and concerns about how quickly the Trump administration would be able to carry out its economic agenda posed some risks for financial markets.

Earlier this month, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said the inability of the administration to get its changes to healthcare through Congress impacted on the proposals for changes in the tax system. The original aim was to have them through by August but that now seems highly unlikely.

In an interview on Wednesday, Fink said: “There are some warning signs that are getting darker.” He pointed to the slowing auto sales and a cutback in merger and acquisition activity in financial markets as indications of increasing uncertainty over the economy.

Fink said the US economy had the lowest growth rate for any country in the G7 group of major economies. Price/earnings ratios on stocks were high, but this was based on expectations, and if they were not validated in the real economy then the market could fall by between 5 and 10 percent.

Another indication of the US economy’s direction is the fall in the yield on US 10-year Treasury bonds, which is now trending toward the historically low level of 2 percent. If inflation and increased growth are anticipated, then bond yields tend to rise.

Concerns over the ability of US corporations to deal with unexpected changes in financial conditions were a feature of the Global Financial Stability Report issued by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) this week. It said companies with almost $4 trillion in assets, amounting to 22 percent of the total US corporate assets, would be “weak” or “vulnerable” in the face of a fiscal expansion that went wrong and led to rising interest rates.

The IMF said such a scenario could result if the Trump administration’s tax cuts failed to produce a boost in the economy and led only to rising budget deficits and higher borrowing costs.

However, despite signs that prospects for economic growth are worsening rather than improving, and amid ongoing global political turbulence—not least the prospect of war—financial markets remain remarkably stable.

The Chicago Board Options Exchange Volatility Index, or Vix, known as Wall Street’s “fear gauge,” has remained at its lowest level its 24-year history. Last week the Financial Times published a major article under the headline, “The fearless market ignores perils ahead.” It noted the “disconnect” between the political chaos and the calmness of the markets.

“Yet this tranquillity,” it said, “is unnerving some analysts, who fear it has nurtured a panoply of trading strategies that could unravel if volatility returns to normal.”

Christopher Cole, the head of a hedge fund that specialises in volatility trading, told the newspaper: “We are at an unprecedented time of low volatility, which typically presages epic downturns.”

The fear is that given the state of calm on the markets, traders and their algorithmic programs are betting that any turbulence will be short-term. This ensures good profits if stability returns but can bring huge losses if it does not.

Cole likened low-volatility trades to the sirens of Greek mythology whose songs lured sailors to their death. “The siren call of risk is at its most powerful when we are at the point of maximum danger,” he said.

Media and politicians agitate against Turks living in Germany

Ulrich Rippert 

A hysterical smear campaign against Turkey is underway in German political circles following the Turkish referendum last Sunday which, based on a small majority, grants President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan broad dictatorial powers.

The fact that Turks living in Germany voted by 63 percent for Erdoğan’s authoritarian plans, while he gained only a wafer-thin majority of just over 51 percent in Turkey, is being exploited to justify this witch-hunt. What is barely mentioned is that only 46 percent of eligible Turks in Germany voted, while turnout in Turkey was above 85 percent.

The extreme-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) has used the referendum vote to launch a “Turks out” campaign, while Christian Democratic Union (CDU) right-winger Thomas Strobl is demanding an end to Germany’s dual nationality policy, thereby making xenophobia a prominent issue for this autumn’s federal election. At the same time, some of the most extreme witch-hunting of Turks originates from the Left Party and the ostensibly left-liberal political milieu.

A typical example is the commentary on Wednesday evening’s “Tagesthemen” news broadcast by Sonia Seymour Mikich. She began her contribution with an attack on all those who, given the above-average support for Erdogan, call for better integration of German-Turks and renewed efforts to win the hearts and minds of Turks living here.

Mikich’s dismissive comment in this regard is hard to beat for arrogance: “A little pampering because integration had worked out badly.” This is something she decisively rejects. It was not true that the Germans had driven the German-Turks into Erdoğan’s arms, she said. The real reason was a lack of respect by German-Turks for the German constitution, which provided “everyone with air to breathe,” protected minorities and established law.

Such xenophobic nostrums have hardly been heard in the state-owned media following the controversy a few years ago centred on right-wing demands for “recognition of a leading German culture” (Deutsche Leitkultur), recalling the old imperialist slogan “The German spirit will heal the world.”

Mikich then stepped up her demagogy: “I was shocked when, after the coup, Turks living here lionised their president, accompanied by loud cries for the [introduction of] death penalty.” Then insistently: “On the soil of a democracy, people—some with a German passport—called for the death penalty.”

It must be remembered that the mass Turkish demonstration in Cologne in late July last year, to which Mikich refers, took place just two weeks after the failed coup attempt in Turkey. President Erdoğan only very narrowly escaped an assassination squad. The coup was organized from the NATO air base at Incirlik, and there are many indications that US and German military were at least informed about it, if not actively involved.

Mikich acts as if the call for the death penalty had been the main demand of the rally, and then finished her comment by saying: “Those who support this, may have to give up their German passport!” She added, “I do not want to argue about this again. This is a red line! On this point, I am an integration refusnik.”

The sordid, vulgar way in which the slogan of the far right—“Foreigners out!”—is now put forward does not differ from the AfD and is repugnant. It makes clear how far the official political spectrum has moved to the right.

Sonia Mikich is not just anyone. The chief editor of broadcaster WDR has worked there for over 30 years, and has been a correspondent in Moscow, Paris and New York. She leads investigative programmes like the political magazine “Monitor” and moderates the “Sunday Press Club” on broadcaster ARD. In her student days in the 1970s, Mikich was a member of the International Marxist Group (GIM), the German section of the Pabloite United Secretariat.

Her right-wing, xenophobic commentary is an expression of a turn to the right by many of these former “lefts,” which can currently be observed in all countries. In the name of the defence of democracy and human rights, the situation in Turkey and the development of Erdoğan’s authoritarian regime is being used to advance the interests of Germany, or rather to better represent the new great power interests of German imperialism.

To avoid any misunderstanding: The Erdoğan regime is a reactionary bourgeois government and the constitutional reform is a step towards dictatorship. A few days ago, the WSWS published a statement of the Turkish organization Toplumsal Esitlik (TE, Socialist Equality Group), which is in political sympathy with the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI), advocating a “no” vote in the referendum.

But the fight against the Erdoğan government is not the task of the German government and its lackeys in the media, but rather the Turkish and international working class.

The claim that Germany, or rather, the German government, acts in Turkey—or in any other country—for democracy and human rights is pure propaganda, and is false through and through.

One need only look at Greece to see the reactionary role Germany plays via the institutions of the European Union. The economic and social system in this neighbouring country of Turkey has been ruined by the dictates of German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble. Thousands of working families have been forced into destitution and despair.

Although the death penalty has not been introduced in Greece, the number of suicides by the elderly and infirm who can no longer be supported by their families exceeds the number of state executions in any other country many times over.

But that is of no interest to Sonia Mikich and many other ex-lefts. Mikich’s flirtation with the socialist movement in the 1970s was never serious, and primarily served her own personal career advancement. Many from this pseudo-left milieu have become rich and powerful, and are now important propagandists of resurgent German power politics.

Sahra Wagenknecht and the Left Party are also moving ever further to the right. When Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte stirred up anti-Turkish and anti-Muslim sentiments in the recent election campaign, to outdo the extreme right-winger Geert Wilders, the parliamentary leader of the Left Party applauded. She praised Rutte’s decision to refuse entry to Turkish government members, and accused German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel of failing to show “as much backbone.”

The rightward shift of these ex-lefts is a response to the global crisis of capitalism and the intensification of the class struggle. In face of mounting social conflicts, growing resistance against exploitation, militarism and preparations for war, they see their privileged position in society under threat. They respond by calling for a strong state and developing sympathy for right-wing slogans.

Mikich’s provocative commentary is aimed above all at the working class. Many German-Turks are from working class families who came to Germany in the 1960s and ’70s as so-called “guest workers.” They have been involved in many labour disputes and form an important part of the working class.

Twelve dead as food riots spread in working class districts of Caracas, Venezuela

Eric London

Hundreds of workers from working class neighborhoods of Caracas poured into the streets in the Venezuelan capital city late Thursday and early Friday morning, demanding food and breaking into stores. The food riots left 12 dead, including eight who were electrocuted when they became entangled in a wire while trying to break into a bakery to steal bread for their families in the El Valle district.

Demonstrations also took place overnight in the working class districts of San Martin, La Urbina, Petare, and La Candelaria. Several of the dead were reportedly shot. Government forces fired so much tear gas against demonstrators in one neighborhood that a nearby children’s hospital was evacuated.

The outbreak of food riots in working class neighborhoods in Caracas alters the already tense situation in the country of 30 million. The government blamed the opposition for the riots, while the leaders of the right wing distanced themselves from the protests. The two warring factions of the Venezuelan ruling class fear that working class discontent is on the verge of boiling over.

In recent days, the right-wing opposition has held mass demonstrations aimed at forcing the chavista government to call elections or resign. Wednesday’s demonstration provoked clashes leaving three people dead, including a police officer, a student allegedly killed by another right-wing protester, and a third opposition protester.

Unlike in previous years, the opposition demonstrations have continued and remain substantial in size, indicating that the US-backed opposition leaders are making a calculated effort to escalate the crisis instead of negotiating with the government. On Friday, the opposition held a large demonstration to commemorate Wednesday’s deaths.

The working class has abstained from the opposition demonstrations and from a smaller pro-government demonstration held Wednesday.

But the New York Times noted that opposition demonstrations are “spilling into unrest in working-class and poor neighborhoods,” and that “throughout the night, the sounds of banging pots and pans reverberated through the capital” as workers protested food shortages. AFP reported that “pitched battles” between workers and government forces lasted from nine o’clock in the evening through Friday morning.

It is as yet unclear whether the food riots are isolated incidents or whether they will develop into broader spontaneous protests, but broad hostility exists among the Venezuelan working class against both the government and the opposition.

The chavista government has enriched a section of the bourgeoisie tied to the military, the state-run oil industry and finance capital, while slashing social programs to meet interest payments to foreign creditors. The opposition is a network of corporate executives and right-wing politicians who are correctly seen by the population as stooges of US imperialism. Many workers view the opposition’s complaints over the attack on democratic rights as fraudulent.

In 1989, the opposition’s forerunner, Democratic Action (AD), massacred over 1,000 workers and youth in the Caracazo riots, which broke out over hikes to transportation costs and attacks on social conditions imposed as part of an International Monetary Fund (IMF) “adjustment” program under the administration of President Carlos Andres Perez.

The US is closely monitoring the situation under the direction of former ExxonMobil CEO and current Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. On Thursday, US State Department spokesman Mark Toner expressed concern over the decision by the Maduro government to seize a General Motors production plant in the industrial city of Valencia.

On the same day, GM workers occupied the facility in an apparent dispute over the company’s failure to pay severance benefits as promised. GM ceased production at the facility long before the government seizure but now claims the seizure was illegal.

Maduro also launched a verbal attack against the Spanish corporation Movistar on Thursday for allegedly sending millions of text and email messages calling on Venezuelans to demonstrate in Wednesday’s opposition march.

In an attempt to forestall working class opposition, the leader of the pro-government Bolivarian Socialist Central trade union announced that the union would propose a rise in the national minimum wage to help combat rising inflation rates, which reached 800 percent in 2016, according to CNBC.

The poorest 75 percent of the country—some 22 million people—lost an average 19 pounds in body weight over 2016 due to lack of food.