1,500 Chevening Scholarships in UK for Developing Countries (Fully-Funded) 2018/2019

Application Deadline: 7th November 2017

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible African Countries: Developing countries

To be taken at (country): UK Universities

Eligible Fields of Study: Chevening Scholarships are awarded across a wide range of fields; including politics, government, business, the media, the environment, civil society, religion, and academia in any UK University

About Scholarship: Chevening Scholarships are awarded to individuals with strong academic backgrounds who also have demonstrable leadership potential. The scholarship offers financial support to study for a Master’s degree at any of the UK’s leading universities and the opportunity to become part of an influential global network of 44,000 alumni. There are approximately 1,500 Chevening Scholarships on offer globally for the2018/2019 academic cycle. These scholarships represent a significant investment from the UK government to develop the next cohort of global leaders.

Prior to starting your application for a Chevening Scholarship please ensure you have the following ready:

• Essential: Three different UK master’s course choices
• Optional: English language test results (if you’ve already met the requirements) 
• Optional: UK master’s university offer (if you’ve already met the requirements)

Scholarship Offered Since: 1983

Eligibility: To be eligible for a Chevening Scholarship you must:

• Be a citizen of a Chevening-eligible country.
• Return to your country of citizenship for a minimum of two years after your scholarship has ended
• Have an undergraduate degree that will enable you to gain entry to a post-graduate programme at a UK university. This is typically equivalent to an upper second-class 2:1 honours degree in the UK
• Have at least two years’ work experience
• Apply to three different eligible UK university courses and have received an unconditional offer from one of these choices by 13 July 2017
• Meet the Chevening English language requirement by 13 July 2017

Number of Scholarship: 1,500

Value of Scholarship: A full Chevening Scholarship award normally comprises:

• payment of tuition fees;
• travel to and from your country of residence by an approved route for you only;
• an arrival allowance;
• a grant for the cost of preparation of a thesis or dissertation (if required);
• an excess baggage allowance;
• the cost of an entry clearance (visa) application for you only;
• a monthly personal living allowance (stipend) to cover accommodation and living expenses. The monthly stipend will depend on whether you are studying inside or outside London. It is currently £917 per month outside London and £1134 per month inside London (subject to annual review).

Duration of Scholarship: One year

How can I Apply? To apply for a Chevening Scholarship, you must complete and submit an online eChevening application form.

It is important to go through the application instructions on the scholarship webpage before applying.

Visit scholarship webpage for details

Sponsors: Chevening Scholarships are funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), with further contributions from universities and other partners in the UK and overseas, including governmental and private sector bodies.

Important Notes: The process of selecting Chevening Scholars takes a minimum of eight months from the application deadline to when scholars are conditionally selected for an award.

The Instability of Britain and the US: How Do We Come Back From This?

Patrick Cockburn

There is a famous scene in Shakespeare’s Henry V on the night before the battle of Agincourt, when the French lords speak of the inevitability of their coming victory. Puffed up with arrogance, they deride the English: “Do but behold yon poor and starved band.” Of course, all this is to be exposed as bombast when the over-confident lords get their comeuppance the following day.

I was thinking about this scene when Donald Trump was elected President last year, contrary to the predictions of almost every commentator in the US. I thought about it again when pundits in Britain had their own St Crispin’s Day on 8 June, as Theresa May lost her majority in Parliament, dumbfounding expectations that Jeremy Corbyn was leading the Labour Party to calamitous defeat. A comical outcome of the general election was the way in which the commentariat, who has by and large lauded May as a mix of Queen Elizabeth I, Judi Dench and Margaret Thatcher, switched at high speed to seeing clear similarities between her and Inspector Clouseau.

It is always satisfactory to see anybody in the prediction business tripping over their feet and getting egg on their faces. Most commentators admitted error, noted that everybody else had also got the election wrong, but still managed to sound as if they knew what made the nation tick. It was particularly easy to move on the agenda in the week after the election because of the Grenfell Tower disaster.

The American political establishment – at the core of which is TheNew York Times and CNN – have been busily counterattacking Trump and his election victory as the outcome of a Russian plot. Evidence for this is scant.

The anti-Trump forces may well be right in their strategy. Simple innocence is not going to do Trump a lot of good, and refuting vague and exaggerated charges can be difficult because of their very lack of substance. The Republicans should know this because they persecuted the Clintons for years by manufacturing scandals such as the Whitewater real estate deal, the murder of the US ambassador in Benghazi and Hillary’s supposed mishandling of her private emails.

Current political battles are so intense that they mask crucial long-term developments: Britain and America both look much more unstable today than they have done at any time since the Second World War. Some weakening of Anglo-Saxon dominance on the world stage had been expected in the wake of the Iraq war in 2003 and the financial crisis in 2008, but suddenly both powers feel as if they are starting to implode.

The pros and cons of Brexit are furiously debated in Britain, usually with the point at issue being the ultimate political and economic outcome of leaving the EU. But two important negative consequences are already with us: Britain is far more divided than it used to be and the Government is entirely preoccupied with Brexit to the exclusion of anything else. Brexit is like the tremors of an earthquake that shake apart weak and vulnerable points in British society, state and nation.

The British ruling class used to have a high international reputation for intelligence and realism in pursuit of its own interests. This may have been exaggerated, but latterly it seems to have lost its touch and to be happiest when sawing off the branch on which it is sitting. Privatisation and globalisation since Margaret Thatcher took power in 1979 were always going to weaken Britain because these exalted private gain over public and communal interests. The political selling point was the old saying that a rising tide raises all ships, but this turned out to depend on how big or small a ship you were sailing in and many of the latter were soon foundering. What the three political earthquakes in the Anglo-Saxon world – the Brexit referendum, the British general election and the US presidential election – have in common is that they showed that there are many more people unhappy with the status quo than anybody had suspected.

Loathing for Trump on the part of most of the US media is so intense as to make sensible commentary a rarity. They see Trump as a demonic conman who is ruining their country and they may well be right, but this makes it all the more necessary to ask what are the real grievances among voters that he was able to identify and exploit. Edward Luttwak, political scientist and historian, has a compelling article in the Times Literary Supplement pointing to an all-important but little regarded statistic for car “affordability” in the US which shows that almost half of American households have “been impoverished to the point that they can no longer afford a new car”. This is in a country where a car is a necessity to get to work or shop for food, but where wage stagnation and the rising price of vehicles makes it an increasing strain to buy one. Luttwak argues that Trump got “the political economy” right in a way that none of his opponents even tried to do and this made him invulnerable to attacks on his character that his opponents thought would destroy him.

The affordability of housing is to the British what the affordability of cars is to Americans: the prohibitive cost of buying and the extortionate cost of renting a place to live increasingly determines political choices. Ownership of property underpins the political chasm separating young from old voters, the dividing line being the advanced age of 47. Below this, the majority vote Labour and above it Conservative. Students are supposed to have been energised into voting Labour by the promise of abolishing tuition fees, but when I talked to them they were much more worried about paying high rents for miserable accommodation which, unlike tuition fees, they have to pay cash down.

The results of the Brexit vote, the US presidential election and the British general election were all so close that any factor can be highlighted as the one which made the difference. Conservatives tend to point to a poor and over-confident campaign on their part, emphasising marginal considerations such as Theresa May’s spectacular lack of the common touch. Less talked about by Conservatives was the surprising failure of the campaign of vilification directed against Jeremy Corbyn which not only failed to sink him but confirmed his status as the anti-establishment candidate.

Corbyn is a much better person than Trump, but both men benefit from the impossibility of putting somebody on permanent trial by the media without continually mentioning their name. Trump evidently calculates that it scarcely matters what he is accused of so long as he tops the media agenda. Corbyn likewise draws benefits from media hostility so unrelenting that it discredits itself and no longer inflicts real wounds. Political establishments are baffled by successful challenges from those they had dismissed and despised, unlike Shakespeare’s defeated French leader at Agincourt who says: “Let’s stab ourselves. Are these the wretches we played at dice for?”

Apple’s China Surrender

Binoy Kampmark

“This is very dangerous precedent which can lead to same moves in countries like UAE etc. where government control access to internet.”

-Star VPN, Twitter, Jul 30, 2017

Caving in for the profit margin; stripping a function for the sake of the state rather than the customer. That’s the Apple approach, nudged along by political expediency and the heckling of the police state. In China, the company has pruned back its virtual private networks. It would have delighted the party hacks in Beijing, suspicious of any effort to subvert the censorship regime which has come to be called the Great Firewall.

As Emily Parker dourly notes, “Doing business in China requires playing by Chinese rules, and American tech companies have a long history of complying with Chinese censorship.” Apple has just been more enthusiastic than their counterparts. Earlier this year, it went as far as to remove New York Times apps from its Chinese store. How good of them to do so.

The words from Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook, have been discouraging for the technology battlers and those keen to run rings around authoritarian regimes. Cook, in fact, would rather get into bed with them. “We would obviously rather not remove the apps,” he explained earlier in the week. “But like we do in other countries, we follow the law wherever we do business.” The law, it would seem, good or bad.

As for the Chinese Communist Party, action on VPN technology has been placed at the top of the agenda ahead of the party congress. Operating such services now verges between inconvenience and hazard, given that authorities must approve them.

Such actions on the part of Apple further dispel the idea that accessing the Internet remains a sacred right and, it can be said, rite of passage into the digital age. The United Nations went so far as to declare it as such last year, highlighting the importance of “applying a comprehensive human rights-based approach when providing and expanding access to the internet for the internet to be open, accessible and nurtured.”

Countries may well be happy to front a view that accords with this, but states are far from happy permitting their public untrammelled use. Bollards are needed; security measures required. A free using public, in short, cannot be trusted by what it can find.

To the relief of such states, Cook is happy to comply. As, in fact, are other companies wishing to sacrifice the liberties of their users for their profit margins. Notoriously, Google bowed to the wishes of Chinese authorities in 2006 to censor search results, conduct which naturally gave the VPN drive a boost.

In 2005, by way of a dire utilitarian example, Yahoo furnished Chinese authorities with information on a journalist, Shi Tao, that led to a 10 year prison sentence. The sin there was sending an anonymous post to a website located in the US that contained, so it was claimed, state secrets.

In what was something of a dark year, Microsoft similarly got into line in censoring its Chinese-language wed portal. Business, after all, was business, and the tech giant wasn’t going to miss out on a vast market. As global sales and marketing director at the time, Adam Sohn, explained, the company was cooperating with its Chinese business partner to police inappropriate language.

When queried about what this entailed, Sohn ducked. “I don’t have access to the list at this point so I can’t really comment specifically on what’s there.” A clue about the list came in a report from Agence France-Presse claiming that bloggers were not permitted to post such terms as “human rights” or “democracy” on MSN spaces.

Sohn’s Mephistophelian explanation was simple. The company could still do business in China, despite the shackles, while helping the very populace they were complicit in hoodwinking. It all came down to how the services were used. “Even with the filters, we’re helping millions of people communicate, share stories, share photographs and build relationships. For us, that is the key point here.” Be safe, innocuous, non-political and insipid.

In 2006, the major giants doing business in the rich pearl of Cathay faced the music in a Congressional hearing. As California Democrat and house representative Tom Lantos claimed at the time, directing his comments to Yahoo, Google, Microsoft and Cisco, “I do not understand how your corporate leadership sleeps at night.”

What such conduct betrays, sleepless or otherwise, is that standards of resistance from these companies varies. Apple has been clamouring against efforts made in the US to unlock its iPhone technology. The FBI faced a defiant response when its order to access the phone of the San Bernardino shooter was frustrated. It is worth noting, as matter or proportion, that the shooter was behind the slaying of 14 people.

Cook would have none of this, seeing any comparisons as needlessly fatuous. “In the US case, the law in the US supported us.” Rather weakly, he suggested that the company had “to abide by [the law] in both cases. That doesn’t mean we don’t state our point of view in the appropriate way, we always do that.” Well, not always, and certainly not when it is inappropriate to sales. Dissidents, be wary.

Key Myths And Facts About The Atomic Bombings Of Japan

Robert J. Barsocchini

In 1945, US president Harry Truman (who had dictatorial control over the atomic bomb) and his advisor James Byrnes intentionally prolonged the US war with Japan until, and apparently so that, they could target Japanese civilians, without warning, with atomic bombs.

The bombings were planned and carried out, as Alperovitz notes in an almost thousand-page study, in a way that “specifically avoided significant war” and “industrial installations”, and instead deliberately “target[ed] large numbers of civilians” so as to make the most “profound psychological impression” possible.

The documentary record illustrates that the important actors, including Truman and Byrnes, believed clarifying the terms of Japanese surrender and/or allowing a Russian declaration of war would end the war. Truman and Byrnes alone decided to defy these findings and reverse course, changing the US momentum and going out of their way to alter the surrender terms so they would not be clarified, and made efforts to delay the Russian declaration of war so fighting would continue until the atomic bombs were ready.

The record further reveals the high-level actors, including Truman and Byrnes, did not believe a US invasion would be carried out in the absence of atomic bombings. Contingency planning shows that if an invasion had been carried out, it would have been be months later and would have involved between 40,000 and 46,000 US deaths at the extreme high end (subsequent studies have found it may have involved as few as 0 or possibly 7,000 to 8,000 deaths), not 500,000 or a million – figures with no basis in the documentary record that were later invented to help try to justify to the public (in a successful propaganda effort) the US targeting, killing, and prolonged torture via radiation of large numbers of civilians. (The US has repeatedly performed non-consensual human experimentation with radiation.)*

After industrial-scale targeting of civilians throughout Japan, and after wiping out hundreds of thousands of civilians in two cities with two different kinds of nuclear bombs, the US, in a “carefully worded response”, accepted Japan’s surrender (which US planners believed would occur without atomic bombings or a US invasion) on August 11th. Japanese officials, who did not witness the bombings and did not know they were much different from what the US had already been doing, said the surrender was largely a result of the the impending Russian entry into the war. On August 14th, the US hit Japan with a “grand finale”, bombing Honshu with 1,014 planes in the biggest single TNT bombing raid in history up to that point.

Before the atomic bombings, Truman had drawn a connection to the US Declaration of Independence’s Protocols of the Elders of Zion-style reference to “merciless Indian savages” by referring to the “merciless” “Jap” “savages” (“the Japs are savages… merciless…”), a probably-inadvertent, subconsciously ingrained repetition postcolonial scholars would note illustrates a through-line in US thought from origins in dehumanizing and wiping out civilian inhabitants of land and stealing resources coveted by US nationalists to doing so in many other global locales. After US targeting of civilians in Germany, Truman also noted German civilians had to “atone for the crimes” of the German dictatorship, a logic identical to that of Osama bin Laden in rationalizing killing 3,000 US citizens on 9/11/01 as the US killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis via siege.

James Byrnes, the sole man who went against the grain of all other top officials involved and convinced Truman to prolong the war so as to nuke Japanese civilians, went on, as a politician in his home state, to oppose the burgeoning grassroots civil-rights movement.

After the atomic bombings, major propaganda efforts were undertaken to cement an “acceptable”, though invented, rationale for the bombings in the public mind – a project that continues to be effective today, as US nationalists who have not studied the record continue to passionately insist on and believe the myths that the planners who decided to carry out the atomic bombings (Truman and Byrnes) thought a US invasion of Japan would take place and result in 500,000 or 1-million US deaths, that they thought the atomic bombings were necessary, that they were trying to end the war as soon as possible, and that they gave warning before carrying out the bombings. None of these claims are accurate.

Another noteworthy point is that when people in the US are asked whether they believe targeting civilians is ever acceptable, they mostly say no (though just barely; global polling has found “Americans are the most likely population in the world to believe military attacks targeting civilians are sometimes justified”). But when asked whether they think nuking civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki was justified, they still mostly say yes (though the number has been declining for years).

This may be an illustration of what George Orwell described as “doublethink” – holding two contradictory notions in mind at the same time – and may also relate to the self-serving notion that oneself or a group with which one feels associated is excused from laws and moral principles to which others must adhere, an idea prevalent in the US and which stems in large measure from the self-idolizing and self-serving attitudes of the religious and nationalist extremists who created the US state through slavery and the extermination or removal of the people occupying the lebensraum. However, thanks to propaganda efforts and psychological components of nationalism, most in the US may be unaware, or ideologically unable to accept, that the planners deliberately targeted civilians in the atomic bombings and sabotaged peace efforts, intentionally prolonging the war, to do so.

The UK’s rich get richer, while the poor get evicted

Barry Mason

“The Living Standards Audit 2017,” a report issued in mid-July by the Resolution Foundation, highlights the ever-growing gap between the richest one percent of the population and the vast majority in the UK.

The study provides a detailed picture of UK household income over the year prior to June’s snap general election. It records a plummeting decline in living standards over the last two decades:

“Despite employment reaching record highs, real average earnings are now falling in the UK—in both the public and private sector—and in addition the real value of many working-age benefits is falling as the benefit freeze interacts with rapidly rising prices. 2016-17 may have been just the beginning of a slowdown in income growth for low to middle income families and a rise in inequality for us all.”

The report shows that while all sections of society were hit by the financial crisis of 2007-08, the top one percent of income earners, those earning £275,000 [US$ 358,000] or more a year, has bounced back and is again racing away from the remainder of the population. This rise in income of the elite, the report finds, is the main driver of increasing inequality.

After a substantial fall in 2010-11, in the aftermath of the financial crisis, the income of the top one percent recovered. In 2015-16 their share of income was 8.5 percent—a near return to its peak value of 8.7 percent in the year 2009-10.

The think-thank states that its remit is to monitor and work “to improve the living standards of those on low to middle incomes.” For this group incomes after housing costs “are still lower than they were in 2003-04” and poverty for this group has risen. It details “that 39 percent of this group say they are unable to afford to save £10 per month, while 42 percent cannot afford a holiday away at least one week per year—up from 37 percent pre-crisis... we estimate that income growth for this group in 2016-17 ahead of the election was lower than for higher income groups.”

Since the 2016 referendum on European Union membership, despite ever higher levels of numbers of people in employment, the fall in the value of sterling has led to a rise in inflation which is now well above the two percent target of the Bank of England. This, together with lower pay rises and the freeze on welfare benefits, has resulted in a fall in real pay for those in the bottom and middle income brackets.

Adam Corlett, an economist with the Resolution Foundation and one of the report’s authors, explained, “For millions of young and lower income families the current slowdown comes on top of a rough decade for living standards, providing a bleak economic backdrop to the shock election result [which saw the Conservatives lose their absolute majority and major gains for Labour]. Over the last 15 years and four prime ministers, Britain has failed to deliver living standards growth for young families and those on low incomes. Rising housing costs have added further financial pressures.”

The fall in real incomes for large sections of workers and sections of the middle class has produced a deterioration in the housing situation for many. A recent report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, “Poverty, Evictions and Forced Moves,” highlighted the fact that some 100 tenants a day were being evicted. It tied the high levels of eviction to increasing rents while housing benefits levels were frozen:

“The cumulative impact of freezing Local Housing Allowance (LHA) or permitting only below-inflation increases has been that it now lags significantly below the 30th percentile of market rents to which it is in principle linked. Outside London, average monthly shortfalls range from £22 to £70 per month, whereas in central London average shortfalls range from £124 to £1,036 per month. The shortfall between the LHA rate and the 30th percentile rent means that tenants in receipt of Housing Benefit are either squeezed into the bottom end of the market, or are forced to make up the difference from other income.”

The dire lack of social housing and the inability of many on low and middle incomes to save enough to buy a property means an increased reliance on private rented property. Under the 1988 Housing Act, private landlords are able to make use of Section 21 “no fault” evictions—whereby landlords need only give two months’ notice of eviction.

Two-thirds of repossessions via the use of Section 21 legislation are in the London area, where privately rented properties are at a premium.

Among the key points raised by the report were:

“The number of tenants evicted by private landlords exceeded the number evicted by social landlords for the first time in 2014... Changes in welfare benefits have combined to make rents unaffordable to benefit claimants in many areas. As a result, tenants on low incomes are being evicted because their benefits do not pay market rents and they are unable to afford alternative homes in the private rented sector or access social housing.”

The report concluded:

“The experience of forced moves and evictions were extremely stressful for low-income households as they struggled to find alternative homes. In a housing shortage, landlords can choose who they want as tenants. Increasing eviction rates are linked to the overall growth of the private rented sector and to cuts to LHA. Whilst the greatest impact is being felt in London, similar issues were found in other high-pressure markets. The continuing programme of cuts and restraints on state assistance with housing costs will intensify this pressure.”

A report issued in June by the homelessness charity Shelter, “Shut Out: Households put at risk of homelessness by the housing benefit freeze,” concluded:

“Our analysis suggests that a million households in Britain (1,069,517) could be put at risk of homelessness by 2020, unless the freeze on LHA rates is lifted. This is because over a million households live in an area where there will be a shortfall between the amount of LHA they can claim, and the cost of renting one of the cheapest homes by 2020. Once their tenancy ends, they may struggle to find a new one, and be put at risk of homelessness. This number includes 586,368 families with dependent children, of which 374,543 are in work, 211,070 households where someone claims a disability benefit (and) 114,917 households above pension age.”

The report adds:

“Any shortfall puts a household at risk. This is because households eligible for housing benefit are already on very low incomes, and have limited resources to cover additional costs. But some households face very large shortfalls. Households living in London face the greatest shortfalls in the country, but this problem is not limited to the capital. In Cambridge, for example, a family with two young children would face a shortfall of £681.46 a month by 2020 between support and the rent for one of the cheapest two bedroom homes in the area. In Bristol, this family would face a shortfall of nearly £306.54 a month.”

British Army targets working-class schoolchildren for recruitment

Alice Summers

The British Army recently launched a recruitment campaign that specifically targets working-class youth. Blandly named “This is belonging,” the campaign identifies its main audience as economically deprived young people, including adolescents only 16 years of age.

A briefing document section titled “Target audience” spells out that the army is primarily aiming to recruit 16-24 year olds in the C2DE sociological category. The C2DE category refers to the lowest three economic groupings, which range from skilled manual workers through to unskilled labour and the unemployed. The document specifies that it is chiefly targeting those who come from families with an annual household income of less than £10,000 ($US 13,100), meaning that many of the children targeted live below the poverty line.

Although the campaign is UK-wide, the army document indicates that there are “up-weights” to cities in the North of England and in the West Midlands, such as Manchester, Sheffield and Birmingham. Urban centres such as these tend to have high rates of youth unemployment, at 22.8, 19.4 and 22.5 percent respectively, compared to a UK average of 14.4 percent (figures from August 2016).

Speaking to the World Socialist Web Site, Rachel Taylor, director of programmes at Child Soldiers International, condemned the army’s recruitment drive for targeting “the youngest and most vulnerable people for its most dangerous roles. Many children in these towns and cities have grown-up in communities with little economic capital or career opportunities and are easy targets for Army recruiters who are desperate to fill recruitment shortfalls.”

The fact that the armed forces are “preying on communities where unemployment and social deprivation is high … is a brazen, calculated policy to recruit 16- and 17-year-olds who have few options in life for dangerous infantry jobs that others do not want.”

The “This is belonging” campaign uses a series of short video clips showing staged scenes of young soldiers undergoing training or participating in mock combat situations, attempting to present the armed forces as a supportive, family environment. These videos were shown on social media, on television and in cinemas.

The army describes “This is belonging” as “a new inspirational and motivating creative campaign” to convey the message that recruits would be joining “a brotherhood and sisterhood formed of unbreakable bonds which … will accept you for you.”

Labelling these videos as “cleverly engineered propaganda which glamorises army life,” Taylor insisted that “the reality could not be more different.”

“Morale among the armed forces is plummeting. Forty percent of recruits are actively looking for other employment, while issues of bullying and abuse are commonplace, especially for the 24 percent of recruits who sign up under the age of 18.”

ForcesWatch, a non-profit organisation that scrutinises military recruitment practices, also criticised the army for targeting young people and for “appealing to the adolescent child’s need to belong.” The organisation argued that the army “have latched onto a very popular recruitment tool, powerful in particular among those who feel isolated or marginalised, or who have a sense of non-belonging and potentially low self-esteem.”

The UK is the only country in Europe, and one of only a handful in the world, that allows the recruitment of minors. The enlistment process into the armed forces can begin at 15 years and seven months, although training does not start until the child has reached 16 and these recruits cannot be deployed into active service until they reach 18 years.

According to a report by Medact, a non-profit organisation of health professionals, there are serious long-term consequences of child recruitment by the army. The study showed that these young recruits are more likely to suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, alcohol abuse and self-harm after leaving the army. Male under-20 recruits have a 64 percent higher risk of suicide than their adult civilian peers and have a higher chance of being wounded or killed during their career in the armed forces.

The report concluded that military recruitment techniques “[take] advantage of adolescent cognitive and psychological vulnerabilities” and that current child recruitment practices “do not meet the criteria for full and informed consent.”

The UK government has actively promoted army recruitment within schools, with Defence Secretary Michael Fallon announcing the creation of 150 new cadet units in schools last October. There are now more than 300 cadet units across UK schools, in which children as young as 12 are taught battle planning, weapon use and military discipline.

According to ForcesWatch, the military make thousands of visits to UK schools and colleges each year and even to primary schools and nurseries. These visits include recruitment stalls at careers fairs, curriculum and career-related activities, sessions with staff members and interviews for pre-recruitment courses at army bases, among other things.

Some schools are either sponsored by or have partnerships with the armed forces or arms industry.

ForcesWatch coordinator Emma Sangster rejected the Ministry of Defence claim that the army does not directly recruit within schools. She told the Guardian: “Recruitment is a process, it’s not a single event.” During visits to school, armed forces recruiters, “drip feed things of interest to children of school age. They sanitise what conflict involves, and also glamorise it. They focus on adventure, which young people are desperate for.”

The British state is attempting to indoctrinate and prepare the next generation of working-class youth to be cannon fodder in their imperialist wars abroad. This is confirmed by the analysis of Veterans for Peace (VFP). In its report, “The First Ambush? Effects of army training and employment,” VFP asserts that British Army policy is to “channel the youngest recruits and those from poorer backgrounds into the infantry, which uses the most coercive training methods … [and] carries the greatest risks in war…

“To ensure that recruits will follow all orders and kill their opponents in war, army training indoctrinates unconditional obedience, stimulates aggression and antagonism, overpowers a healthy person’s inhibition to killing, and dehumanises the opponent in the recruit’s imagination.”

The VFP report notes that recruitment policy is rooted in class divisions, with army recruiters “creaming off” high-achieving adults from English universities to become future officers, while “dredging” poorer areas to fill the lower ranks with working-class youth whose lives are seen by the ruling elite as more dispensable.

This recruitment drive and the militarisation of education comes in the context of the escalation of British and NATO operations in the Middle East and on Russia’s borders, with the British Army currently deployed in some capacity in over 80 countries across the world.

It is not just within Britain that the militarisation of social life is taking place. In 2011, the German Bundeswehr began recruiting in schools and universities as part of a broader drive by the Defence Ministry to recruit thousands of new soldiers. Last year, the Swedish Parliament voted to bring back conscription and French President Emmanuel Macron and his supposedly “left” opponent Jean-Luc Mélenchon each included the return of the draft as an electoral promise.

More than 75 years after the outbreak of World War II, ruling elites across the world are again seeking to create powerful armies able to enforce their geostrategic and economic interests through war. A century after the Russian Revolution of 1917, the international working class is once again confronted with the necessity of building a revolutionary socialist and internationalist movement in order to prevent the descent into a catastrophic world war.

Mélenchon and Socialist Party launch symbolic legal challenge to French labor law reform

Anthony Torres 

Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s group in the National Assembly is mounting a legal challenge to a bill enabling French President Emmanuel Macron to reform labor legislation unilaterally by decree. With Socialist Party (PS) and French Communist Party (PCF) deputies, it launched an appeal against the bill, now approved by the Assembly and the Senate, to the Constitutional Council.

This is the reaction of Mélenchon’s Unsubmissive France (LFI) movement, of the PS, and of the Stalinist PCF to growing working-class opposition to Macron’s reforms. According to an Institute Elabe poll for BFM-TV, 61 percent of French people oppose the president’s proposed reform of labor law. Three months after his election, Macron only has a 36 percent approval rating, according to a YouGov poll; it is the lowest level for a president who has so recently been elected in over 20 years, since Jacques Chirac in 1993.

Mélenchon’s decision to ally with the PS—which initially presented the reactionary labor law that Macron now intends to propose, but took out the measures Macron is now proposing in the face of mass protests—underscores that he is laying a trap for the workers. The legal challenge is a cynical propaganda maneuver. The PS has no intention of blocking a measure that it first proposed itself, and that continues the austerity policy it carried out under former PS President François Hollande.

The appeal is “principally over the lack of clarity on the powers given to the government in the decrees and on the right to a full repayment of damages suffered due to illegal sackings,” stated a joint communiqué published by Mélenchon (LFI group), André Chassaigne (PCF group), and Olivier Faure (New Left-PS group).

They continue, “The adoption procedure of this law was marred by delays and material conditions that prevented the parliament from playing its constitutionally specified role, and tramples in particular on the demand for clarity and sincerity in parliamentary debate. By sowing confusion on the measures being prepared, the law…gives the government full latitude to modify the Labor Code at will, without any guarantee that workers’ fundamental rights will be respected.”

To launch an appeal to the Constitutional Council, at least 60 deputies’ votes are needed. LFI, the PCF, and the PS rump jointly explained that “a joint initiative is the only way to allow our groups to appeal to the Constitutional Council and ensure that the bills voted by the majority are constitutional.”

The Constitutional Council now has one month to reach a decision. However, given the overwhelming support within the ruling class for Macron’s austerity policies, the appeal has no chance of successfully halting the onslaught of attacks against the working class. Several press reports indicated that the Constitutional Council is expected to rapidly render a judgment, well before the end of the month, in order to eliminate any uncertainty over the fate of the reform.

While proclaiming the death of the “left” in populist tones, Mélenchon is maintaining his ties to the discredited PS and trying to pass it off as an opposition party after it was discredited by Hollande’s record. The PS imposed its labor law, attacking the Labor Code, by using emergency powers and without a vote in parliament. It brutally repressed protests last spring and summer, particularly by university and high school students, mobilizing riot police under France’s state of emergency.

When physical repression failed to intimidate the workers and youth, then-Prime Minister Manuel Valls threatened to ban strike protests against the law. This was a fundamental attack on democratic rights, insofar as the right to strike is constitutionally protected. The attack nonetheless reached its goal, as the trade union bureaucracies reacted by immediately calling off further protests, apart from one symbolic protest in the autumn.

While it succeeded in imposing its labor law, the PS had nonetheless taken out certain elements, like limits on fines to employers for unfair dismissal, and the right for companies to violate industry-level accords and the national Labor Code, that Macron now aims to reintroduce by decree.

The decision of the PS to launch a joint appeal with Mélenchon does not signify any shift in its position on the points that Macron is now trying to impose again. Thus, the deputy of the New Left/PS group told Le Parisien that he opposed Mélenchon’s criticisms of Macron: ”We are not certain that we are prepared to accept the tone that LFI takes. And besides, we do not have the same conception of how to oppose the government.”

The political character of the opposition movement that Mélenchon pledged last month to build against Macron is ever clearer. It is not a question of mobilizing the working class to take power, but to sow illusions and false hopes about the role of the old trade unions and PS bureaucracies, which were discredited by their role under Hollande.

Mélenchon plans to exploit certain layers of youth and workers, mobilized under the control of the traditional bureaucracies, to boost the strength of the small, impotent LFI minority in the Assembly. This minority has also sympathized directly with the army, having backed the budget requests of the former chief of staff, General Philippe de Villiers. Mélenchon is also seeking to coordinate with the trade union bureaucracies who will organize a few protests, while negotiating the “trade union check” and other pseudo-legal bribes Macron aims to give them in his decrees.

Mélenchon’s perspective flows directly out of his cowardly role during the presidential election this spring. Mélenchon refused to call for a boycott of the election between Macron and neo-fascist Marine Le Pen, to mobilize the working class on an independent line against the incoming government. With this total abdication of his political responsibilities, he implicitly supported a vote for Macron against Le Pen.

Opposed to an independent struggle of the working class, Mélenchon then peddled illusions that his LFI party could win the legislative elections and impose its policy on Macron with Mélenchon as prime minister. In the event, the PS and Mélenchon together are barely able to win a small rump in the Assembly.

The entire strategy of Mélenchon aims to control and demobilize the workers. Its central characteristic, as his alliance with the PS shows, is its national and parliamentary orientation. This strategy cannot and will not be anything other than an impediment to the development of struggles that will erupt in France and across Europe in the coming months and years.

Fire in Chinese workers’ dormitory kills 22

Robert Campion

A recent fire in the city of Changshu in Jiangsu province has once again drawn attention to the poor and dangerous conditions endured by millions of China’s internal migrant workers.

The blaze broke out on July 14 in a two-storey residential building at 4.30 a.m. and quickly enveloped the structure. Around 71 firefighters and 13 fire engines were called and it was over an hour before the flames were extinguished. Tragically, the fire killed 22 people and injured another three.

There was little chance for residents to escape the blaze. Various reports, including the State Administration of Work Safety, have stated that the doors were locked from the outside and all the windows had security grills. Only six people managed to get out of the building.

The building was being rented out by a nearby restaurant for 29 of its staff. A fellow employee told the Chinese media that all of the victims were colleagues, including waiters, waitresses and chefs, and young, 25 years on average, and from all over China.

The police reportedly found traces of petrol at the scene and began an arson investigation. According to China News Service, a suspect was captured hours later hiding inside a water tank, and additional suspects were identified by surveillance footage.

Arson attacks have occurred in the past as a result of workplace disputes, in which the frustration has boiled over.

In 2012, a worker angry over unpaid wages of 3,000 yuan ($461), set an under-garment factory in Guangdong, southern China on fire. The blaze killed 14 female workers and left one seriously injured. All were young workers between the ages of 18 and 20, who were unable to escape because of barred windows.

The grievance over wages extended back three years after the worker quit the factory. He told the Guangdong TV broadcaster, “The whole time, I’ve been very impulsive, very angry about this… so I did these things.” When asked if he regretted the loss of life from the fire, he replied that he “didn’t think about these things.”

It is unclear whether last month’s fire was arson and, if it was, what provoked the attack. No motive was made public and the fire quickly dropped out of the news.

It is common for employers to provide accommodation for their staff, as many poorly-paid workers, particularly migrants, cannot afford to live in decent housing in the cities. Such houses and dormitories are typically fire traps with cramped conditions and lacking fire exits or fire extinguishers. Faulty wiring can start fires.

In Beijing, one of the most unaffordable cities in China, hundreds of workers were recently discovered living underneath a luxury apartment complex. More than 400 migrant workers were crammed into an old air raid shelter located under the spacious “Julong Gardens.” The shelter had been subdivided into dormitories with kitchens.

One resident expressed safety concerns to the media over the use of rice cookers and fridges, as well as a gas tank. One room was reserved for smokers. There were no windows for ventilation, and only one fire exit. According to one estimate, a million Chinese migrants are living in such underground bunkers and bomb shelters.

Employers are seldom prosecuted. Recently a landlord in Sanya, Hainan province, was jailed for 15 days over a fire at his flat which he had leased to 72 tenants, according to Hainan Daily. No casualties were reported in that fire.

China is currently in the midst of a speculative housing bubble. According to the Wall Street Journal, the real estate sector in 2007 accounted for 10 percent of China’s gross domestic product, but by 2017 it accounts for 30 percent driving up prices and rents.

A study in 2016 by the Global Cities Business Alliance also showed that employees in Beijing with average incomes, such as nurses, teachers and bus drivers, often paid rental rates of between 1.1 and 1.5 times their incomes.

Millions of migrant workers coming to the cities from rural areas simply cannot afford decent accommodation, compounding their oppressive conditions.

Internal migrants are still subject to what amounts to a hukou system, instituted under Mao in the 1950s, which makes them second-class citizens. Unlike urban residents, they do not have access to basic services including welfare, education, health, housing and pensions.

The system was designed to control the movement of people and the uneven development in a rapidly industrialising economy. Now, however, corporations rely on this underclass of poorly paid and highly exploited workers. There are currently 282 million people in China classified as rural migrants, constituting over a third of the labour force.

The poor conditions facing migrants means that many families are split between the city and the countryside for most of the year. Over 61 million “left behind children” are isolated from their parents in the country and suffer as a consequence. Cases have been reported of children dying of starvation and drowning due to neglect.

The profits extracted from rural migrant workers have led to the rapid growth of a super wealthy elite. Last year, Greater China accounted for five of the world’s “top 10 billionaire cities,” according to the Hurun Report. Beijing overtook New York as the city with the most billionaires, 100 to 95 respectively.

Venezuelan military claims suppression of attempted coup

Bill Van Auken 

Venezuela’s top military commanders claimed Sunday that the country’s armed forces had crushed an abortive coup staged by “terrorists” and “mercenaries” linked to the country’s right-wing opposition and foreign governments.

The reported coup attempt apparently involved little more than two dozen armed men who attempted to take over the strategic Paramacay military base of the 41st Armored Brigade in the central Venezuelan city of Valencia.

The alleged coup came a day after the newly convened constituent assembly voted to fire the country’s attorney general, Luisa Ortega, a long-time supporter of the ruling party who had publicly challenged the legitimacy of the election for the assembly held last Sunday.

Ortega had earlier prosecuted members of the security forces for acts of repression carried out during anti-government demonstrations organized by the right-wing opposition. Four months of protests have left over 100 dead, nearly 2,000 wounded and more than 500 detained. A significant number of those killed have been members of the security forces, as elements of the extreme right have employed increasingly violent methods.

After the constituent assembly voted for Ortega’s removal, armed members of the national guard surrounded her offices in downtown Caracas, blocking her when she tried to enter the building.

Ortega has charged that the real reason for her firing was that she was pursuing cases against members of President Nicolas Maduro’s ruling PSUV (United Socialist Party of Venezuela) for illicit links to the Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht. The company has admitted to paying $98 million worth of bribes to secure contracts in Venezuela, and Ortega had indicted the wife and mother of a former government minister last month in connection with these schemes.

In the same session in which the assembly voted for Ortega’s ouster, Diosdado Cabello, a powerful member of the PSUV’s leadership and former military officer, announced that the body would remain in session for two years. A constituent assembly called into session through a referendum convened by Maduro’s late predecessor, Hugo Chavez, had a life span of only four months.

The leader of the alleged coup attempt in Valencia was identified as Juan Carlos Caguaripano, a former captain in the national guard who was cashiered in 2014 after making public declarations against the government. He subsequently appeared on CNN’s Spanish language network denouncing Maduro and reportedly went into exile in the US.

Appearing Sunday in a YouTube video with about a dozen men in camouflage uniforms, some armed with automatic weapons, Caguaripano declared: “This is not a coup d’etat. This is a civic and military action to re-establish constitutional order. But more than that, it is to save the country from total destruction.”

Conflicting accounts of the military action included claims that elements within the armored brigade supported the action before it was put down by forces loyal to the government. The government claimed that the armed group was immediately suppressed by the troops.

According to a communique released by the defense minister, Vladimir Padrino López, the captured gunmen admitted to having been recruited by elements of the “Venezuelan extreme right” acting in conjunction with foreign governments.

There were also reports of a small number of civilian demonstrators coming out into the streets near the military base to support the uprising before they were driven off by security forces using tear gas and rubber bullets.

Others in Valencia, however, were quoted by the local media as expressing the opinion that the entire affair had been “staged” by the government to divert growing popular anger.

Similar reactions were expressed in late June when a former police captain and part-time movie actor seized a helicopter and dropped grenades on the Venezuela supreme court building.

Whatever the case, the Maduro government is extremely sensitive to the threat of unrest within the military, which has served as its principal pillar since Chavez, a former paratrooper colonel who led an unsuccessful coup, was first elected to power in 1999. Current and former officers fill roughly a third of the government’s cabinet posts and comprise nearly half of the country’s governors.

The latest developments unfolded as the White House is reportedly considering the imposition of more sweeping sanctions against the government of Maduro, whom members of the Trump cabinet have branded as a dictator. The US government has imposed sanctions against Maduro personally, making him only the fifth sitting head of state to receive such treatment. The other four include Iraq’s Saddam Hussein and Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi—both assassinated—and Syria’s Bashar al-Assad and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un—both targeted for war and regime change.

While more sweeping economic sanctions had been proposed, the crisis and shake-up in the Trump White House have delayed the measures. White House chief of staff John Kelly, a recently retired Marine general and former head of the US Southern Command, which oversees US military operations in Latin America, reportedly wants to personally direct the escalation of US aggression against Venezuela.

The other issue is that the imposition of sanctions against Venezuelan oil, the main economic lever at hand for US imperialism, would be a two-edged sword. Last year, the US imported some $10 billion worth of Venezuela crude oil to feed American refineries. While a cutoff of these imports would likely force Venezuela’s state-owned oil company PDVSA into default and further sink the country’s already plummeting economy, it would also spell higher gasoline prices in the US itself.

The imposition of US economic sanctions would mean a further deterioration in the living standards of the Venezuelan working class. Lack of oil revenues would mean even less ability to import basic necessities like food and medicine. Seventy-five percent of Venezuelans reported losing an average of 19 pounds in 2016 due to widespread food scarcity, and the country’s infant and maternal mortality rates soared during the same year, by 30 and 65 percent respectively.

In the last year, the country’s currency, the bolivar, has lost 94 percent of its value on the exchange market, drastically reducing the real wages of Venezuelan workers, even as the so-called boliburguesia, the capitalist layer that, together with the military, forms the principal base of support for the Maduro government, has enriched itself off of currency speculation and manipulation.

Suicide rate among US teenage girls hit all-time high in 2015

Kate Randall 

A new analysis reveals that the suicide rate among teenage girls in the United States reached a 40-year high in 2015. Statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show that between 2007 and 2015 the suicide rate among girls aged 15-19 doubled, while it tripled for younger girls, aged 12-14. The analysis was based on government records kept since 1975.

The rate of young women aged 15-19 taking their own lives was recorded at 2.9 in every 100,000 girls in 1975. While this rate increased to 3.7 by 1990, by 2007 it showed a decline, to 2.4. By 2015, however, it had doubled, reaching 5.1.

While not showing as dramatic an increase, the suicide rate among teenage boys rose by 30 percent between 2007 and 2015, according to the CDC. However, the rate of suicide among teenage boys has been historically much higher than among teenage girls. The rate of young men aged 15-19 stood at 18.1 in every 100,000 people in 2015, compared to 10.8 percent in 2007.

Suicide is the third leading cause of death for adolescents aged 15-19, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP). In 2015, half of suicides of people of all ages were committed with firearms. The other leading methods were suffocation, including hanging, at 26.8 percent, and poisoning, 15.4 percent.

Behind these figures stand thousands of fractured families struggling to deal with the tragic deaths of their young family members. Teenagers committing suicide are likely to have a history of depression, a previous suicide attempt and a family history of psychiatric disorders. They are frequently suffering from substance abuse.

However, the reasons teenagers take the desperate action of suicide cannot simply be reduced to these very real mental health struggles. Factors driving young people to take their own lives must also be traced to the growing social and economic tensions in 21st century America.

The most obvious catalyst for the uptick in teen suicide between 2007 and 2015 was the global financial crisis that peaked in 2008. Tom Simon, an author of the CDC report, told CNN: “One of the factors that people have talked about as a potential contributor to the trend is the economic downturn that we saw in 2007-2009. As economic problems go up, suicide rates go up.”

The financial crisis, which the Obama administration declared over by mid-2009, has inflicted economic hardships on millions of US families that persist to this day. The effects on teenagers and their family members have been myriad: unemployment, poverty and hunger, student debt, unpaid medical bills, homelessness. These economic pressures are major factors contributing to mental distress among teens.

In the CDC’s suicide policy guidelines, violence is also regarded as one of the major factors leading to teen suicide: “Exposure to violence (e.g., child abuse and neglect, bullying, peer violence, dating violence, sexual violence, and intimate partner violence) is associated with increased risk of depression, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), anxiety, suicide, and suicide attempts. Women exposed to partner violence are nearly five times more likely to attempt suicide as women not exposed to partner violence.”

While social media is pointed to by suicide prevention advocates as a vehicle for promoting bullying, prompting suicide and other self-harm, what young people post on Facebook, Snapchat and other social media outlets is itself often a reflection of the brutal realities confronting youth today. As the CDC points out, social media could be used as a tool to fight bullying, and would be used in this way under different social conditions.

The violence of the US ruling elite must also be included in the experience of teenagers. Teens aged 12-19 today have never lived in a world when the US was not prosecuting a war of aggression. The list of countries the US was at war in between 2007 and 2015 include Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen. If the actions of the US political establishment and its two big business parties are to serve as a model for US youth, the outlook is bleak indeed.

There is also the example of the thousands of young people who have been gunned down by police during this period. And there is the massive US prison system that incarcerates 2.4 million people, overwhelmingly poor and working class. From 2007 to 2015, the US states that continue to practice the death penalty have executed 365 death row prisoners.

AAP notes that psychosocial problems and stresses, “such as conflicts with parents, breakup of a relationship, school difficulties or failure, legal difficulties, social isolation, and physical ailments … commonly are reported or observed in young people who attempt suicide.” Gay, bisexual and transgendered adolescents also exhibit high rates of depression and “have been reported to have rates of suicidal ideation and attempts three times higher than other adolescents.”

Teenagers living through these problems will receive nothing but scorn and ridicule from the fascistic, misogynist psychopaths that currently occupy the White House. Treatment for young people suffering from mental illness is also woefully underfunded, while hundreds of billions are squandered on war. The CDC estimates that only 10 percent of those needing mental illness and substance abuse treatment receive it.

The staggering new figures on teen suicide must be viewed alongside declining life expectancy, rising infant and maternal mortality, epidemic levels of opioid addiction and other societal ills as an expression of the inability of the capitalist system to meet the social and economic needs of young people and workers in the United States.

Amid high tensions, UN votes for harsh sanctions on North Korea

Peter Symonds

Under heavy pressure from the Trump administration, the UN Security Council voted unanimously on Saturday for a resolution imposing punitive new sanctions on North Korea over its two long-range missile tests last month. The sanctions, which will hit North Korea hard, will compound the tense confrontation on the Korean Peninsula that threatens to descend into war.

Unlike previous UN resolutions which were narrowly targeted against Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs, the latest is broadly aimed at economically crippling the North Korean economy. It imposes outright bans on North Korean exports of coal, iron, lead and seafood which is estimated will slash export income by about $1 billion or a third of the total.

The resolution also prohibits countries from hiring extra North Korean workers and bans new joint ventures with North Korea or any new investment in current joint enterprises. It adds nine individuals and four business entities to the UN’s blacklist for travel bans and asset freezes. This includes North Korea’s state-owned Foreign Trade Bank that functions as the country’s primary foreign exchange bank.

US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley bragged that the resolution imposed “the most stringent set of sanctions on any country in a generation,” telling Fox News later that “we basically gave them a kick in the gut … that they are going to begin to feel right away.”

Speaking at the UN, Haley praised China for supporting the resolution, but warned: “We should not fool ourselves into thinking we have solved the problem. Not even close. The North Korean threat has not left us, it is rapidly growing more dangerous. Further action is required.”

The US dramatically ramped up the pressure on China following North Korea’s launch of a long-range ballistic missile on July 28 that could potentially reach the American mainland. President Trump blasted Beijing for doing “nothing for us on North Korea” and warning that “we will not allow this to continue.”

The Pentagon carried out one show of military force after another—joint live fire exercises with South Korea, including launching missiles into the sea, were followed by despatch of two strategic B1 bombers over the Korean Peninsula. Last Wednesday, the US tested its own intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) over the Pacific—its fourth test launch this year.

The US threat of a war on China’s doorstep was compounded by leaks last week that the Trump administration was preparing trade war measures against China over the issue of intellectual property rights. US trade penalties against China now appear to have been put on hold.

Trump, who is currently on vacation, tweeted his approval of the UN resolution, declaring the sanctions will have a “very big financial impact” on North Korea. He also praised China and Russia for supporting the new sanctions.

Beijing, however, is continuing to push its own proposal for restarting talks with North Korea—a halt by Pyongyang of its nuclear and missile testing, and, in return, a freeze by the US and South Korea on their major joint military exercises. Washington has repeatedly rejected any halt to these drills, which amount to a rehearsal for war with North Korea.

China’s ambassador to the UN, Liu Jieyi, also reiterated Beijing’s opposition to the US deployment of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) anti-ballistic missile system in South Korea. While nominally aimed against North Korea, the THAAD installation allows the US military to peer deep inside Chinese territory. Washington has ruled out any halt to the deployment.

China’s foreign minister Wang met with his North Korean counterpart, Ri Wong-ho, at the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) Regional Forum in Manila over the weekend. He told the media that he had warned Pyongyang: “Do not violate the UN’s decision or provoke the international community’s goodwill by conducting missile launching or nuclear tests.”

Wang, however, also urged “other parties like the US and South Korea to stop increasing tensions.” He said that sanctions were not an end in themselves, emphasising that “the goal is to bring the Korean peninsula nuclear issue back to the negotiation table and to seek a final solution through negotiation.”

At Beijing’s insistence, the UN resolution called for all sides to return to six-party talks involving the US, China, the two Koreas, Japan and Russia. But these negotiations have been effectively dead since US President George W. Bush undermined a 2007 agreement for North Korea to denuclearise by demanding extra inspections and safeguards. The Obama administration never moved for the resumption of the six-party talks sponsored by China.

Last week, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson suggested that the US might be prepared to negotiate with North Korea. “We do not seek a regime change, we do not seek the collapse of the [Pyongyang] regime, we do not seek an accelerated reunification of the peninsula, we do not seek an excuse to send our military north of the 38th parallel [dividing the two Koreas],” he told reporters.

At the same time, Tillerson made unmistakeably clear that talks would be possible only if North Korea was prepared to give up its nuclear weapons. Negotiations, he said, could “only be achieved by denuclearising, giving up their weapons of mass destruction,” and that “only then will we be prepared to engage them in talks.”

Tillerson, who is also in Manila, met with Wang as well as the South Korean and Japanese foreign ministers. But no official talks took place between American and North Korean representatives at the ASEAN summit. Indeed, the US made a failed attempt to have North Korea’s membership of the forum suspended.

As a result, the prospect for talks is slim. North Korea has declared itself to be a nuclear state and insists that it will continue to build a nuclear arsenal. A commentary in the state-owned Rodong Sinmun warned the US to give up its “hostile policy” and threatened to sink the US mainland in “an unimaginable sea of fire” if it attacked the country.

Such belligerent but empty threats play directly into Washington’s hands as it exploits the crisis on the Korean Peninsula to accelerate its military build-up in the Asia Pacific aimed not primarily against North Korea, but rather against China, which the US regards as the main challenge to its regional and global dominance.

In an MSNBC interview yesterday, Trump’s national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, stated that it was “impossible to overstate the danger” posed by North Korea and again declared that all options, including military strikes, were on the table. He acknowledged that it “would be a very costly war … [in] terms of the suffering of mainly the South Korean people,” but did not back off from the threat and noted that the US president had been “deeply briefed.”