Cuban Report Says U.S. Blockade Causes Much Grief and Immense Monetary Loss.

W.T. Whitney Jr.

Cuba’s Foreign Ministry every year prepares a report on Cuba’s experience with the U.S. economic blockade of the island, in force since 1962. On October 22 Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez presented this year’s report at a press conference in Havana. The Ministry releases the reports ahead of an annual vote in the United Nations General Assembly on a Cuban resolution calling for an end to the blockade. Usually the vote takes place in early November, but because of uncertainties relating to the COVID-19 pandemic, it will take place next in May, 2021.

The Report is supposed to inform the General Assembly delegates and the public as to the nature of the blockade and its impact on Cuba and the Cuban people. The blockade is the principal tool the United States uses to undermine Cuba’s government. A State Department official in the Eisenhower administration, in 1960, expressed counter-revolutionary purpose. In recommending a blockade, Lester D. Mallory sought “a line of action which … makes the greatest inroads in denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.”

The 53-page Report, covers U.S. measures taken against Cuba and effects experienced in Cuba and elsewhere during the twelve months between April 2019 and March 2020. It summarizes the U. S. legislation and administrative decrees used to authorize the blockade’s rules and regulations and details U.S. and worldwide opposition to the blockade.

The authors of the Report condemn the blockade as cruel and as illegal under international law. They speak of genocide, Cuban sovereignty endangered, and Cuba’s economic and social development under assault. The entire report is accessible here.

According to the Report, the Treasury Department’s Office for Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) levied penalties against dozens of U.S. and third-country entities. Examples are listed. OFAC derives its authority mainly from the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992, which stipulates that third-country companies face penalties on exporting goods to Cuba that contain at least 10% U.S. components. In October, 2019 the U.S. government applied that rule also to goods exported to Cuba by a country that had imported them from another country.

In September, 2019, OFAC sharply limited the dollar amount of remittances Cuban Americans may send to families on the island. On October 23, 2020 – not within the period covered by the Report – the U.S. government ruled that Financiera Cimex SA, Cuba’s sole agency for distributing family remittances to Cubans, was no longer eligible to receive them from the United States. Remittances constitute one of Cuba’s major sources of foreign currency.

The Report devotes much attention to the plethora of fines levied against foreign banks and other financial institutions after they handled transactions involving Cuba and the U.S. dollar. It cites dozens of individual examples. Intimidation is now so widespread as to have persuaded many such institutions to avoid dealing with Cuba altogether.

The document highlights U.S. implementation of Title III of the Helms Burton Law that, beginning in May 2019, has led to law suits against foreign businesses brought before U.S. courts on behalf of former owners of nationalized property in Cuba. They are seeking damages. The resulting anxiety among foreign investors has led to “cancellation of commercial operations, cooperation actions and foreign investment projects.”

Detailing specific examples, the Report condemns U.S. penalties imposed on ships, companies and individuals involved in shipping oil to Cuba. The Report’s authors regard that new phase of the blockade as “a qualitative leap in the intensification and implementation of non-conventional measures in times of peace.”

Additionally, the U.S. government has threatened thousands of Cuban doctors working abroad in various ways. Many of the doctors working abroad generate income for the government. The Report records the prohibition on cruise ships arriving in Cuba.

The fallout is considerable, especially for the healthcare sector. Dozens of U.S. companies, on being asked, refused to sell medical equipment and drugs to Cuban importers. When purchased through a third-country agent, they are more expensive. And supplies and medications manufactured in third countries may not be readily available on account of the aforementioned ten-percent rule.

Cuba’s fight against COVID-19 took one hit when blockade regulations prevented the unloading in Cuba of a Chinese shipment of donated anti-pandemic supplies, and another one when Swiss manufacturers refused to sell ventilators to Cuba. Cuban food imports are expensive in part because of extra expenses involved with the purchase of U.S. food products, allowed through congressional action in 2000. Blockade-related fuel shortages hamper agricultural production by interfering with planting, transportation, and storage.

The blockade has hit education, sports and cultural development in Cuba. Supplies and fuel are frequently in short supply and transportation and travel are often unavailable. Cuba’s manufacturing and service sector lost an estimated $610.2 million, 7.7 % more than during the previous year, according to the Report. Losses incurred in the bio-pharmacological industry exceeded $160.3 million. U. S. restrictions interfere with Cuba’s export of drugs, vaccines, and diagnostic tests.

The Report indicates that during the 12-month survey period, Cuba’s tourist industry lost $1.9 billion. Losses stemmed from new U.S. travel restrictions and from prohibitions on tourist services, particularly hotels. OFAC has now prohibited U.S. airlines, or airlines with U.S. connections, from flying into Cuba, except to the Jose Martí Airport in Havana. That action deprived Cuba of an estimated $1.8 billion. OFAC regulations affecting the communications, construction, and transportation sectors made for additional Cuban losses. Cuba’s hobbled foreign trade, both imports and exports, registered losses of $3,013,951,129, of which export losses accounted for $2,475,700,000.

According to this Report, the workings of the U.S. blockade deprived Cuba of $5,570,300,000 between April 2019 and March 2020 – some $1.2 billion more than during the previous year. Among estimates figured into the amount are expenses incurred in buying materials at inflated prices in distant places, losses from foreign sales that never happened, and revenues the crippled tourist industry might have generated. The human cost in lives lost or blunted is not part of the calculation.

Cuba has lost $144.4 billion over the course of almost six decades. Dollar depreciation over the period puts the total up to $1.098 trillion. Why, one asks, does the blockade continue?

The U.S. blockade, with moving, interlocking parts that may be at cross purposes, looks like a machine dangerous to human well-being. It could well have provoked the U.S press and politicians into loud complaints. But near silence has reigned. The absence of real debate signifies overall acceptance of the blockade such that expressions of dissent, even President Obama’s dissent, have gained little support.

Silent acceptance marked other horrors abroad helped along by U.S. agents, especially as they were unfolding, or immediately thereafter. These were killings usually associated with regime change. One recalls Guatemala (1954), Iraq (1963), Brazil (1964) Dominican Republic (1965), particularly Indonesia (1965-1966), Chile (1973), Operation Condor in South America (1975-1976), and Colombia (sporadically from 1964 on).

Anti-Communism became the pretext for these situations in which U.S. emissaries abroad characteristically stopped at nothing. In his recent book The Jakarta Method (Public Affairs Press, 2020), Vincent Bevins connects U.S.-induced atrocities throughout the Global South, anti-Communism, and the installation of neo-liberal governments.

Reasonably enough, public officials do maintain silence when their governments are complicit with crimes like these. The assumption here is that the U.S. anti-Cuban blockade represents one more instance of resort to extremes in the name of anti-Communism, which, once more, is surrounded by silence.

The anti-Cuban blockade is a substitute for military action. U.S. strategists evidently perceived that military intervention or provocation of an internal coup wouldn’t work to ensure counter-revolution in Cuba. They perhaps realized that well-heeled, entrepreneurial Cubans friendly to the United States wouldn’t be there to help out, most of them having departed the island. Elsewhere in the Global South, as reported by Bevins, their kind stayed put and were able to collaborate with U.S. facilitators to instigate violence.

They are still there, in their various countries, as are their neo-liberal regimes. Their staying power validates the U.S. strategic goals pursued in the post- World War II era that were energized by anti-Communism. Perhaps political leaders in Washington associated with both major political parties see continued backing of the Cuban blockade as a way of reassuring their far-flung neoliberal colleagues, and the ones nearby, that their old cause is still intact.

Beheadings in France

Liaquat Ali Khan

History is a merciless teacher.

In October 2020, beheadings in France outraged the people and President Emmanuel Macron, who explained that” Islam in crisis” attacks France’s “core values.” First, a Chechen-born teenager, who entered France as a refugee, beheaded a history teacher sharing the Charlie Hebdo cartoons of the Prophet of Islam with his students. Soon after that, a Tunisia-born tourist “virtually beheaded” a woman and a man inside a church in Nice.

Both perpetrators used sharp blades.

Like all others, Muslims committing murders in any country, including France, must be punished under the territory’s laws where they commit crimes.

For nearly 200 years (1789-1981), the law of capital punishment in France was beheading through a world-famous instrument, called the guillotine. Before the 1789 French revolution of enlightenment, expressed through the slogans of liberty, equality, and fraternity, France carried out capital punishment through the torture wheel, tearing up the defendant’s bones and flesh until he or she died.

Amid the enlightenment, Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, a physician and a member of the Parliament, came hard on the historical execution methods. They are barbaric, he claimed. In 1789, he proposed to humanize capital punishment in harmony with the French revolution’s core values. Incorporating compassion into the killing, France invented the machine and named it the guillotine.

The guillotine was a tall frame equipped with a sharp, angled blade mounted at the top. At the bottom of the frame, a shackle trapped the defendant’s neck and precisely positioned it right below the blade’s edge. When released, the hard and incisive blade fell ferociously on the neck, severing the head from the rest of the body. The machine’s mercy lay in its efficiency as compared to the torture wheel.

In 1793, King Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette were guillotined among thousands of others, upholding the revolutionary principle of equality. For the most part, the guillotine executions were crowd-pleasers. In Paris, women sat by the scaffolds, chatted, waited, and knitted while the heads chopped away from the bodies.

For decades, the guillotine fascinated French intellectuals. Poems, plays, and short stories celebrated the awe and beauty of the machine. Guy Maupassant (1850-1893), an iconic French storyteller, wrote: “March 20th. It is done. He was guillotined this morning. He made a good end, very good. It gave me infinite pleasure. How sweet it is to see a man’s head cut off! The blood spurted out like a wave, like a wave. Oh, if I could, I would have liked to have bathed in it! What intoxicating ecstasy to crouch below it, to receive it in my hair and on my face, and rise up all crimson, all crimson! Ah, if people knew!” Hopefully, Maupassant was writing a satire.

The guillotine turned into a noble French invention. In the revolutionary spirit of fraternity, France exported the guillotine to brotherly and non-brotherly nations, such as Spain, Germany, Sweden, and Italy. In the 20^th century, the Nazis adored the machine, despite reservations about France. Throughout colonization, the French practiced no discrimination in delivering the guillotine to Algeria, Tunisia, and other Middle Eastern colonies.

Fernand Meysonnier (1931-2008), a Frenchman, operated the guillotine in Algeria for fifteen years until Algerian independence in 1962. He was proud of the machine and the justice it furnished to the Algerian legal system. “But of course! Yes, yes. Five, seven liters empties out. It’s not the electric chair, eh jets of blood spray out three meters,” said Meysonnier in an interview with Sarah Richards of Walrus. Unlike Maupassant, Meysonnier believed in the guillotine.

In 1977, Hamida Djandoubi, a Tunisian immigrant, who had lost his leg in a work-related accident in Marseilles, became the guillotine’s last casualty for choking a woman with a scarf around her neck. Neck for neck said some.

In October 1981, the French National Assembly abolished the death penalty; and in 2007, the French constitution was amended to prohibit capital punishment. This constitutional ban abandoned a core enlightenment value exemplified in the mercy machine.

Under French laws, Muslim terrorists beheading the people in France will face no guillotine or capital punishment by any other method, nor can they be deported to a country that enforces the death penalty.

However, it appears that the French police have borrowed the concept of police encounters, prevailing in some countries, under which the police officers shoot and kill a defendant on the spot. Though unlawful, this prompt justice makes it efficient for the system to process terrorists without going through due process and appeals. The Chechen teenager met his end in the police encounter the day he beheaded the history teacher.

Charlie Hebdo Cartoons and Blasphemy Laws in Contemporary Times

Ram Puniyani

The murder of French school teacher Samuel Paty by an 18 year old Muslim boy of Russian origin has opened the Pandora’s Box all over. Few days’ later three people were killed in Nice, in France again. There were protests against France in few Muslim majority countries like Bangladesh and there was boycott of French goods in many of them.

On one side, French President identified with the slain teacher and pledged to fight political Islam, on the other Turkey’ President Erdogan made derogatory comment on French President who withdrew its Ambassador from Turkey. French goods are being boycotted in many countries. At yet another level many a Muslim countries are raising their voice against French President and there are protests in Pakistan, Bangladesh among others.

This all is sequel to the highly condemnable murder of Paty, who in his class was teaching about freedom of expression and was using the Charlie Hebdo cartoons as an example. Just to recall the cases related to murder of cartoonists in Charlie Hebdo (2015) are beginning in the Courts. In this context the cartoons derogatory to Prophet Mohammad were republished by the paper. The cartoons connect terrorism with Islam and the Prophet. This in a way was in the backdrop of 9/11 after which the term ‘Islamic Terrorism’ was coined and popularised by US media. As Charlie Hebdo published those cartoons their office was attacked in which nearly 12 cartoonists were killed. The responsibility of this attack was taken by Al Qaeda. One recalls that Al Qaeda itself was promoted in the beginning in few Madrassas based in Pakistan, where Salafi version of Islam was used to indoctrinate Muslim youth and the syllabus of indoctrination was prepared in Washington. US had pumped 8000 million dollars to indoctrinate the future Al Qaeda Recruits. US also supplied 7000 tons of armaments to this outfit.

During last few decades as the global scene has been dominated by rise of Terrorism particularly in West Asia. It is outcome of the politics to control oil resources in this region. The extremist’s trends within Muslims have seen a new peaking. With this many countries have introduced Blasphemy laws, and some Muslim countries have made blasphemy punishable by death. These include Pakistan, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Nigeria.

In our neighbouring Pakistan the death penalty for blasphemy was introduced after Zia regime intensified the Islamisation of Pakistan. At the same time the popular opinion in many of these countries has been shifting to the extremist versions of Islam. We saw as to how in case of Asia Bibi, she was framed for blasphemy and Punjab (Pakistan) Governor Salman Taseer was done to death as he demonstrated his protest against this law by meeting Asia Bibi. The murderer was treated like a hero by large section of Muslims!

The historians of Islam tell us that there was no such law of blasphemy in Islam till two centuries after Prophet Mohammad. It came up during Abbasid rule, in the beginning of 9th Century. It was to strengthen the ruling dynasty’s hold on power. Similarly in comparatively recent times Zia UL Haq, a military ruler also introduced this law to strengthen his own authoritarian rule. The purpose of this was only to legitimize his regime under the garb of an ‘Islamic state’. This was an attempt by the military dictatorship to increase its hold over the society. The concept of apostate (Kafir) runs parallel to it and all non Muslims, and Muslims differing from the ruling sections interpretations are also so labelled and are liable to be killed. In Pakistan the major victims of this law are Muslims like Ahmadiyas and Shiyas. Of course Christians and Hindus are also on the firing line of this concept and the laws of blasphemy.

In one of the engrossing webinars on the topic on 25th October, organized by Muslims For Secular Democracy, Islamic scholar Zeenat Shaukat Ali quoted Koran extensively to say that the holy book does not prescribe violence against those who do not subscribe to the holy book, (To you your religion to me mine). In a refreshing way the webinar’s moderator Javed Anand pointed out, “We are here to condemn in unequivocal terms, no ifs and buts, not only the man responsible for this barbaric act but all those who had any role in the instigation of the crime as also all those who seek to justify it. We are here not just to condemn the slaying of Mr Paty, but also to demand the abolishing of apostasy and banishing of blasphemy anywhere and everywhere across the world”.

This in tune with many interpretation of Islam by the likes of Asghar Ali Engineer; one of the outstanding scholars of Islam who points out that Prophet Mohammad was so spiritual that he would never ask for revenge for insults against his own self. Engineer narrates an incident from Prophets Life. One old woman used to throw garbage on him whenever he was passing that way. One day at that spot, she was not there to throw the garbage. The Prophet straightaway went to see her and inquired about her well being, she felt ashamed of herself and embraced Islam.

There is a need to understand as to why the intolerant tendencies in Islam are more dominating in current times. While history is also replete with Muslim rulers who used these concepts to increase their power, in current times there is an added dimension to the phenomenon. In 1953 Mossadegh regime, an elected regime was overthrown in Iran, as he was out to nationalise the oil companies dominated by US-UK nexus. His regime was overthrown; leading the coming to power of fundamentalist Ayatullah Khoemini in due course. Later with Russian occupation of Afghanistan, America deliberately started promoting the Islamic groups pursuing intolerant versions of Islam. Training of Mujahidin, Taliban, Al Qaeda was part of the same process.

Finally with the continuous intervention of US in West Asia, attacks on Afghanistan, Iraq etc. led to intolerant groups  becoming more dominating leading to acts like the one of murder of Paty. The discussion and debate over rejection of concepts like blasphemy and ‘kill the kafir’, is the need of the hour for a saner World.

Marriage is no child’s play

Shobha Shukla

According to a report by UNICEF, India is home to the largest number of child brides in the world, accounting for more than one third of the global total of 650 million women and girls who were married as children. Of the country’s current total of 223 million child brides, 102 million were married before turning 15. Despite a legal ban on marriage of girls below 18 years of age, 27% of the girls in India are married before their 18th birthday and 7% are married before the age of 15. Girls living in rural areas are at greater risk. Structural inequalities, local culture and tradition, lack of education, poverty and insecurity, are some of the factors that are cited for this social evil that plagues our society.

Efforts, largely spearheaded by civil society organisations, have been able to reduce India’s annual rate of child marriage to 5.5%, but a lot more remains to be done.

During tenth virtual session of the 10th Asia Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Health and Rights (APCRSHR), Dr Pramesh Chandra Bhatnagar, Senior Director (Programme) at Voluntary Health Association of India (VHAI), shared how peer-led approaches under the aegis of More Than Brides Alliance are helping to change socio-cultural norms to reduce child marriage and promote youth friendly sexual and reproductive health services in 40 districts of India.

Dr Bhatnagar presented the details of one such comprehensive strategy being implemented by VHAI that has succeeded in not only making 44 villages child marriage free in Khalikote block of Ganjam district in Odisha, but has also brought about meaningful socio-economic changes in the lives of adolescent girls and boys through their active participation.

A baseline survey done in 177 villages of this block found that knowledge about sexual and reproductive health in adolescents was very low at 7%. Only 10-11% girls had any knowledge about menstruation, even among those who had started menarche. Only 2-3% youth knew about any HIV/AIDS related information. And yet, surprisingly there was a high prevalence of premarital sex, with more than 40% of the girls being in such relationships. Thus brewed a lethal potion comprising low knowledge of sexual and reproductive health and higher level of sexual activity among adolescents. The baseline survey also helped to identify barriers for adolescents’ access to sexual and reproductive health services and reasons for high prevalence of child marriages.

The next step was mapping the adolescent population in the project area. This was followed by workshops to facilitate formation and capacity building of more than 500 adolescent groups comprising over 11000 adolescent boys and girls. Group members themselves chose their peer educators. These peer educators were then trained in sexual and reproductive health and life-skills education. Capacity building of the existing community groups and community leaders of the villages was also done to engage diverse groups of actors in promoting adolescent sexual health and prevention of child marriage.

Adolescent girls were motivated to develop their Charter of Demand, focussed particularly on child marriage. The women’s community groups developed a community-based monitoring tool with indicators on sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) and child marriage. This proved to be a very empowering tool that has helped the local community to monitor outreach activities in the villages for not only addressing youth’s sexual and reproductive health issues but also looking into other developmental projects taking place in the community.

The community groups have monthly meetings wherein the villagers come up with a village health improvement plan, which the workers are supposed to fulfil and report in the next meeting. If they have any problem the village women and adolescent girls make the required intervention, especially by visiting the local staff.

This comprehensive model has used a multi-pronged approach that goes beyond preventing child marriages and improving sexual and reproductive health of adolescents. It has also resulted in economic and social empowerment of the girls, which includes giving them vocational training and supporting them to start small initiatives. The two major fields which the girls of these villages preferred, and where they excelled most, were computer training and mobile phone repairing. Providing the girls with bicycles proved to be a game changer as it empowered them to commute easily to school and training venues, even if they were far away from their homes.

Adolescent leadership was enhanced through capacity building, promoting their education and social skills, helping them in getting vocational training and providing them with job opportunities. Alongside, engaging other stakeholders, like village health workers, school teachers, local panchayat members and district government officials has helped in influencing the socio-cultural norms around child marriage and youth sexual and reproductive health.

These efforts have helped in averting 128 proposed child marriage cases, in which the girls, peer educators and their groups played a major role, by negotiating and advocating directly with the families involved. Also, as of date, no child marriage has taken place in 44 villages since the past two years.

The project has also helped in increasing institutional deliveries and birth registrations to 95%, uptake of contraceptives, and community monitoring of adolescent friendly sexual and reproductive health services.

70 information dissemination centres were formed for adolescents’ vocational and recreational activities as well as for dissemination of information on sexual and reproductive health, including demonstration of use of contraceptive products by government health staff. These centres are managed by the adolescent peer educators themselves. 11 government health centres have been converted into adolescent friendly health centres. They are open in the afternoon only for the youngsters, who can visit them after school hours to discuss sexual and reproductive health related issues with an auxiliary nurse, midwife or a medical doctor.

Dr Bhatnagar informed that even during the COVID-19 lockdown, regular interaction with the peer leaders and adolescent group members has continued through social media applications (like WhatsApp) and online sessions on themes such as menstrual hygiene, sexual and reproductive health and safety precautions for COVID-19. A local phone HelpLine has also been created on which queries on COVID-19, sexual and reproductive health issues, reporting of child marriage cases are answered (7 am to 9 pm, six days a week). Some girls were trained to stitch masks and this helped them earn an extra income.

However, the pandemic has given a setback to many global efforts to put an end to child marriage. According to a recent report published in the Lancet, up to 2·5 million more girls around the world are at risk of marriage in the next 5 years because of the pandemic. An estimated 500,000 more girls are likely to be forced into child marriage and 1 million more are expected to become pregnant in 2020 itself due to its economic impact.

The situation in India is no better. According to the Indian Ministry of Women and Child Development, during the pandemic lockdown period of March to June, its nodal agency Childline intervened to prevent 5584 such underage marriages across India. Many more must have gone unreported. When the lockdown eased in June and July, child marriages spiked, marking a 17% increase over the previous year.

We are getting pushed back further in our efforts to implement Agenda 2030 whose sustainable development Goals (SDGs) target 5.3 envisages to eliminate all harmful practices (such as child, early and forced marriages), and one of its indicators is the proportion of women aged 20 to 24 years who were married before age 18, which still remains considerably high with an annual increment of 12 million child brides.

Venezuela: Maduro’s anti-blockade law deepens debate over revolution’s future

Federico Fuentes

Venezuela’s National Constituent Assembly (ANC) passed a controversial anti-blockade law on October 8.

Elected in July 2017, the ANC was an initiative taken by President Nicolas Maduro to counter months of violent right-wing opposition protests. Its official mandate is to promote a national dialogue on reforms to the constitution as a way out of the country’s deep economic and political crisis.

But three years on — and with few, if any, initiatives emanating from the ANC — the economic crisis has only deepened.

This has been largely due to the United States ramping up sanctions on Venezuela since 2017. These sanctions have worked to cripple Venezuela’s oil industry, blocked its access to international financial markets and scared off potential investors under threat of financial punishment. It is estimated that the economic sanctions have cost Venezuela’s economy upwards of US$116 billion, and contributed to the deaths of more than 40,000 Venezuelans.

Faced with this dire situation, Maduro proposed the new anti-blockade law, arguing it is essential to helping circumvent the sanctions. But some sectors believe it represents an important departure from the socialist policies of his predecessor, Hugo Chávez.

Under Chávez, the Venezuelan state nationalised key natural resources and industries for the purposes of redistributing wealth towards fighting poverty and rapidly expanding access to education, healthcare and basic services.

Based on the premise that the only way to get rid of poverty was to give power to the poor, the government targeted funds at initiatives that encouraged the self-organisation of the people. This included experiments in community-run social missions focused on education and health, attempts at democratising workplaces through cooperatives and worker-run enterprises, and initiatives in local grassroots democracy such as community councils and communes. These elements of peoples’ power became the backbone of Chávez’s Bolivarian Revolution.

But due to the brutal sanctions regime and hyperinflation, which has pulverised workers’ wages, Venezuelans have seen many of these social and democratic gains reversed. Survival, not self-organisation, has become the main focus of daily life for many.

Shift in economic policy

Speaking to Green Left, revolutionary activist and sociologist Reinaldo Iturriza said the anti-blockade law should be viewed as part of a broader shift in the government’s economic orientation, which dates back to the Bolivarian Economic Agenda launched in 2016.

Back then, amid a severe drop in oil revenue and defeat in the December 2015 parliamentary elections, the government found itself at a crossroads. Through the Bolivarian Economic Agenda initiative, Iturriza explained, the government opted for the path of building “alliances with certain sectors of the capitalist class”.

“This was, without doubt, a point of inflection in the Bolivarian process; not necessarily because the government decided to ‘negotiate’ with a section of the capitalist class,” something it had done previously, including under Chávez. Instead, the key difference was it was now negotiating from “a position of weakness.”

A former minister in Maduro’s government, Iturriza acknowledges that in the situation faced by the government, retreating in order to “reorganise your forces” made sense. “However, what has happened since then has resembled more a disorderly retreat than anything else.”

With popular mobilisation at an ebb, moderate forces within Chavismo “felt their time had come”. Increasingly, certain party leaders and state officials began to publicly speak out against further expropriations and in support of re-privatising certain activities in the oil sector, views that “until then had been inconceivable” within the revolution.

In the absence of any national debate promoted by the government over the need to re-orientate government policy, these voices at the time appeared to be “isolated opinions”. But, with hindsight it is clear they represented a “sign of the new times”, said Iturriza.

“Mismanagement of certain public companies and corruption, along with deliberate disinvestment and a profound lack of confidence in the organised people … contributed to positioning the idea that it was indispensable to establish ‘strategic alliances’ with sections of the capitalist class in order to get out of the quagmire.”

Doing so, it was argued, required opening up new areas for investment, including through the reversal of nationalisations that had occurred during the Bolivarian Revolution.

“The problem, I insist, was not the ‘strategic alliances’ that, in certain cases, were undoubtedly necessary or convenient. This is not a question of principles,” said Iturriza.

“The real problem was that in many cases, the choice was made to disinvest: to abandon public companies with the aim of privatising them.

“Disinvesting is a political decision, and not the inevitable consequence of mismanagement. In fact, in many of these cases (we still don’t know the full story, because the process has been very opaque) undoubtedly the opposite was true: public mismanagement was the inevitable consequence of disinvestment, as well as corruption.

“In any case, the key here is that the decision could have been made to correct errors in management and guarantee public ownership.”

Concession or re-orientation

The Bolívar and Zamora Revolutionary Current (CRBZ) is a left-wing grassroots current inside the governing United Socialist Party of Venezuela.

While acknowledging that “constructive criticisms” have been made of the law, CRBZ activist Jonatan Vargas told GL that, when judging its content, we have to “take into account the reality of what Venezuela is living through”.

For Vargas, the new law is a “political weapon” that could help “stabilise the economy and promote foreign investment, all of which is needed to produce and develop the country”.

Moreover, he adds, the law “strengthens the state” by “unifying all existing public powers behind the central objective of defending the economy”, as it attempts to maneuver around the criminal sanctions.

“What we need to do now is continue the debate around the anti-blockade law among all Venezuelans, so that everyone can comprehend its objectives, functions, capacities, reach, limitations and the controls it is subject to.

“Now, the fundamental subject of the revolution, the people, must guarantee its application through revolutionary vigilance, to push forward and avoid distortions.”

The Unitary League of Chavista Socialists (LUCHAS), which is also active within the PSUV, has taken a very different view.

LUCHAS spokesperson Stalin Perez Borges told GL that, while understanding the need for “an anti-blockade law, an emergency economic law”, the reality is that “this is not what they have presented to us.”

“Rather than confiscating the property of those who have sabotaged the economy, the law will grant them greater powers for investment. Moreover, it could lead to the violation of important laws, and even the constitution, all of which were approved under Chávez and were the result of big, societal-wide debates.”

Similar concerns have been raised by, among many others, high-profile left intellectuals such as Luis Britto Garcia and Pascualina Curcio, constituent assembly members María Alejandra Díaz and Telémaco Figueroa, pro-revolution parties such as the Communist Party of Venezuela and Homeland for All, and popular movements including those involved in For All Our Struggles.

Among the articles of concern are those that remove democratic controls or protections by, among other things: allowing for the creation of a separate budget for the purpose of promoting the Bolivarian Economic Agenda, but that lacks any legislative oversight (Article 18); the removal of the National Assembly’s competency to ratify international agreements and contracts (Article 10); and infringements on the right to free speech of those who make information public regarding certain contracts, potentially, even if this is done to expose acts of corruption (Article 37).

Critics have also warned of the pro-privatisation logic of articles that allow the executive to modify “the constitution, management, administration, functioning and participation of the state in certain public or mixed companies” (Article 26), as well as “stimulate or benefit the partial or complete participation, management and operation of the national and international private sector in the development of the national economy” (Article 29).

Britto Garcia writes that “rather than expanding state ownership or social administration, as a socialist government should do, the law tends toward broadening and strengthening private property, above all that owned by international interests.”

Perez Borges said: “It’s clear that the intent is to privilege private investment. The government is under the illusion that this law will help the country get around the blockade and get out of the crisis.

“But this is highly unlikely, given the current state of affairs in Venezuela and the global economic situation. Even if this was a possibility, nothing can be done at the expense of our sovereignty and our constitution.”

Summing up the project, Perez Borges said: “This law is very concerning, because it represents a profound shift away from the political project of 21st century socialism.

“The government should present its proposal again, but this time to the country, so that everyone can debate it instead of trying to hide its new pro-imperialist and anti-democratic orientation.”

Debate is critical

Yet, rather than promote discussion, some figures within the PSUV simply denounced critics as “aiding the right”. Controversially, the bill was approved by the ANC without any formal discussion, and with some delegates stating they were denied access to the assembly after voicing criticisms.

Others within the governing party, however, believe a debate on the government’s economic orientation is critical to the future of the revolution.

Responding to the debate, former vice-president and PSUV leader Elias Jaua wrote: “It has been a long time since I have seen such important factors within Chavismo challenge and demand explanations with such courage and passion, in support of the principles that sustain the Bolivarian and Chavista project…”

“This debate, forced upon us by public opinion, has allowed us to see that broad sections of Chavismo are willing to defend the foundational values of the Bolivarian Revolution.”

While stopping short of casting judgement on the new law, Jaua wrote: “We will have to wait and see what the [government’s] concrete plans are in order to evaluate if this [new law] signifies, as it appears it might, a shift away from one of the fundamentals of Chavismo: the safeguarding national property in the hands of the state.”

In the meantime, we need “to open up authentic spaces for internal debate, where any changes being made to the model constructed by Chavez as a result of the current circumstances, are properly outlined…”

“In politics, tactical manoeuvres have to be explained in a transparent manner; it is necessary to convince others,” because frank discussion is crucial to revolutionary unity, Jaua wrote.

“Humility, correct methods of leadership, and the willingness to convince rather than impose are key to maintaining unity and lifting the spirits of a force confronting the gravest foreign aggression of modern times.”

“Beyond the anti-blockade law”, said Iturriza, “I believe there are few more important things that could be done than to carry out a critical balance sheet of the Bolivarian Economic Agenda”.

A good starting point, argues Iturriza, would be for the revolution’s leadership “to understand that the opacity that has characterised the government’s actions in the area of economic policies has been a crass error”.

“Given the results, there is more than enough evidence that, in attempting to find a way out of this mess, we have ended up deeper within the labyrinth,” he said.

“If what occurred was a disorderly retreat, then what we need to do is reorganise our forces so that at some point we can be in a position to go on the offensive.

“It would be good if we acknowledged that we chose one among many possible paths, and that, given the results have not been favourable to the popular majorities, we can and should choose a new one. Within the revolution, always.”

Déjà Vu In France: Change Attitudes

Chandra Muzaffar

As events unfold in France centering around Islamophobia, there is a feeling of déjà vu. We have witnessed a few times before this sequence of events.  There is some provocation or other targeting the Prophet Muhammad initiated by a non-Muslim group or institution. Predictably, Muslims react.  In the midst of demonstrations and rallies, an act of violence occurs perpetrated by an offended Muslim and/or his co-religionists. The violent act leads to further demonization of Muslims in the media which by this time is in a frenzy.  Feeling targeted, some Muslim groups escalate their emotional response, sometimes causing more deaths to occur of both Muslims and non-Muslims even in countries far away from the place where the provocation first occurred. One also hears of calls to boycott goods produced in the country where it all started.

On this occasion too it was French president Emmanuel Macron’s vigorous assertion that cartoons of the Prophet produced by the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo , in January 2015 and republished since  represented freedom of speech that angered a lot of Muslims in France and elsewhere, though some other remarks he had made recently about ‘Islam being in crisis’ and ‘Islamic separatism’ had also annoyed some people. However, it was the beheading of a French schoolteacher who had shown the cartoons in a class discussion on freedom of speech by a Muslim youth of Chechen origin that provoked not only Macron but also other leaders and a huge segment of French society to react with hostility towards Muslims and even Islam. It should be emphasised that almost all major Muslim leaders and organisations in France also condemned the beheading.  So did many Muslims in other parts of the world.

It is not enough just to denounce an ugly, insane murder of this sort. Not many Muslim theologians have argued publicly that resorting to mindless violence to express one’s anger over a caricature of the Prophet is an affront to the blessed memory of God’s Messenger. For even when he was physically abused in both Mecca and Medina, Prophet Muhammad did not retaliate with violence against his adversaries. He continued with his mission of preaching justice and mercy with kindness and dignity. It is such an attitude that should be nurtured and nourished in the Muslim world today especially by those who command religious authority and political influence among the masses.

If a change in approach is necessary among some Muslims, French society as a whole should also re-appraise its understanding of freedom of speech. Freedom of speech should never ever glorify the freedom to insult, to mock, to humiliate another person or community or civilisation. Respect for the feelings and sentiments of the religious other should be integral to one’s belief system, whether it is secular or not. Just because the French State and much of French society have marginalised religion, it does not follow that it should also show utter contempt for a Muslim’s love and reverence for his/her Prophet especially when 6 million French citizens profess the Islamic faith.

Indeed, respecting and understanding the sentiments and values that constitute faith and belief has become crucial in a globalised world where at least 80 % of its inhabitants are linked in one way or another to some religion or other.  We cannot claim to be champions of democracy and yet ignore, or worse, denigrate what is precious to the majority of the human family. This does not mean that we should slavishly accept mass attitudes towards a particular faith. Reforms should continue to be pursued within each religious tradition but it should not undermine respect for the foundations of that faith.

French leaders and elites who regard freedom of speech or expression as the defining attribute of their national identity, should also concede that there have been a lot of inconsistencies in their stances.  A French comedian, Dieudenne, has been convicted in Court eight times for allegedly upsetting “Jewish sentiment” and is prohibited from performing in many venues. A cartoonist with Charlie Hebdo was fired for alleged “ anti-Semitism.”  There is also the case of a writer, Robert Faurisson in the sixties who was fined in Court and lost his job for questioning the conventional holocaust narrative. Many years later, the French intellectual Roger Garaudy was also convicted for attempting to re-interpret certain aspects  of the holocaust.

The hypocrisy of the French State goes beyond convictions in Court. While officials are rightfully aghast at the violence committed by individuals, France has a long history of perpetrating brutal massacres and genocides against Muslims and others. The millions of Algerians, Tunisians and Moroccans who died in the course of the French colonisation of these countries bear tragic testimony to this truth. Vietnam and the rest of Indo-China reinforce this cruel and callous record.  Even in contemporary times, the French State has had no qualms about embarking upon military operations from Afghanistan and Cote d’ Ivore  to Libya and North  Mali  which serve its own interests of dominance and control rather than the needs of the people in these lands.

Honest reflections upon its own misdeeds past and present are what we expect of the French state and society in 2020. There is no need to pontificate to others. This is what we would like to see all colonial powers of yesteryear do —- partly because neo-colonialism is very much alive today.

Migrant Lives Matter: Crisis of Migrant Workers in the Era of Pandemic

Nupur Pattanaik

The ordeal encountered by the migrant workers globally is very reflected due to the epidemic. According to the World Economic Forum, there is an estimated amount of 139 million migrants in the country. The International labour organisation has estimated that the pandemic will leave around 400 million people poverty-stricken. The mass exodus and reverse exodus has endangered the lives of migrants irrespective of caste, class, faith, gender and other construed identities. As the country is witnessing unlock in different phases and we are in the unlock 6 phase, where there are multiple brutality beyond covid has been encountered by the migrant workers, it raises several questions as about the plight and predicaments of migrants. Economist Jean Dreze has mentioned that the lockdown has been a death sentence for the underprivileged in our country so far as the lives of the migrants are perturbed. The brink of crisis looms large on them as the problem is far from being over, as they are not only labourers, but domestic care workers, heath care and many confined in unorganised sectors like small factories, etc. The vulnerability and challenges are numerous as they have to survive the stigma of the pandemic and many more prejudices which makes their lives miserable in the post-covid times.

Migration Matters

The pandemic has brought to the spotlight that how migration is important and human mobilities matters, Migration is linked to human development, people migrate in search of livelihood, may be forced or voluntary, Women migrated traditionally to join their spouses abroad but today female migrate independently as the concept of breadwinners has changed, earlier it was a man who was a bread winner but today women have become breadwinners too. The pandemic has exposed them to various prejudices not only during the lockdown, and has also posed several questions that whether they need to work or not, as poverty will be more dangerous than pandemic so migrating for work is the only measure left for them. These workers are most affected by the catastrophe with no residual means. Lack of safety nets, destitution, social crisis unconditional circumstance for working has left them marginalised and has significantly affected. The importance of Migrants is quite apparent because of the pandemic, it has made them gained prominence that they are a part of wider community and their existence is vital and needs to be addressed. Historically, signification of migration is essential for global growth, remittances have been an important feature in human development which fosters social and economic development.

Stigmas and Shame

As they are the frontline workers, existing inequalities has been exacerbating xenophobia, discrimination and inequalities, hate speech are rampant online harassment of labourers, everyday prejudices and crime. Women, children are in a state of being endangered as trafficking and child marriage among the vulnerable migrants is on rise. Exploitation of women migrants and their children due to the catastrophic conditions has increased violence against women and children. Termination of work due to the disease has also overblown the workers harder which has affected their subsistence levels. Even the elderly migrants agonized due to the terror of pandemic as well as the associated detriments and biases. Unable to find work, and inability to send remittances home due to the covid calamity, it has affected their families too. Migrant smuggling, bonded labour and trafficking have been some of the issues that have been doubled due to the pandemic as the universal pandemic has put them at risk. Due to necessity and survival, migrants are becoming victims of these social menaces.

Migration Governance

Addressing the vulnerabilities and providing a counter framework to eradicate all forms of discrimination against them is needed at this time. Stigma related sensitisation and awareness among the masses should be the priority. Migrant volunteering and awareness is the need of the hour, role of NGOs and Civil Society, Media is equally important to empower the migrants, and adopting better strategies and legislative measures to curb different forms of violence against them is what the requirement is. Enhancing, monitoring and proactively addressing the needs of the migrant workers is a vital necessity, ensuring better communication strategies, safe , orderly and regular migration, for prospering the society and  preparing them for a better post-covid world will  promote and cultivate  a better world for them.

Months of unpaid wages spark strikes by delivery drivers across China

Lily Zhao

Express delivery workers in many cities across China have been engaged in work stoppages to protest their unpaid wages. The wave of strikes involves workers from at least five major express delivery companies in China, including: ZTO Express, Yunda Express, STO Express Co, YTO Express Group Co, and Baishi. Delivery workers’ protests are a response to the restructuring carried out by the delivery companies, which have cut their operating costs to boost profits and have led to non-payment of labor. The owners have slashed payments to local delivery stations, where delivery workers are actually employed.

A Chinese delivery driver (Credit: Meituan, Weibo)

Package delivery is a huge and rapidly developing industry in China, connected to the fast expansion of the e-commerce market. There is a dense national network that covers 97 percent of the towns and villages across the country. In 2019 alone, more than 60 billion packages were delivered.

At one end of this lucrative industry stand the big delivery companies, investors and their connections in the state apparatus. Among the five companies, the most profitable one, ZTO Express, had a net profit of 5.2 billion RMB (about $743 million) in 2019, while the other four also had net profits on the same order of magnitude. Behind them, Alibaba, which is based on e-commerce and is heavily dependent on the courier industry, is a major shareholder in all five companies and made a hundred times more profit than them last year. The founder of Alibaba, Jack Ma, is the second wealthiest man in China, as well as a member of the Chinese Communist Party. In 2018, he received a medal of “a pioneer of reform” from the Communist Party for “making outstanding contributions to the market reform.”

At the other end, stand millions of workers who are employed in this industry, largely as contractors. They ride on bikes or electric bikes and are estimated to handle several hundred packages a day. Their working conditions were dreadful even before the pandemic. According to a survey published by the State Post Bureau in 2019, 75 percent of delivery workers earned less than 5000 RMB (about $700) per month; at least 60 percent of them have less than 2 days off every month; 53 percent work for longer than 10 hours a day. As a result of the pandemic, the average wage has dropped by about a third. Some workers said they now earn as little as 0.25 RMB ($0.04) per package. Not being paid one or more months wages greatly exacerbates their precarious conditions.

On October 12, at a local courier station of Yunda in Changsha, in central Hunan Province, delivery workers first initiated a protest and refused to keep working, demanding payment of wages in arrears for months. A delivery worker said that he has only received a total salary of 5,000 RMB since April. He estimated that for all employees at this local station, the total amount of unpaid wages was more than 300,000 RMB (~$42,860). The local station had not received any money from the area branch for months, and could not pay its delivery workers. Hundreds of packages were piled up in the warehouse, including some containing produce that was already rotting.

On October 19, in Fuzhou, in south-eastern Fujian Province, at least 10 workers at a local courier station refused to work because they had not received their salaries for one or two months. The manager only “conceded” that he could pay anyone who came back to work 3,000 RMB (~$430), or about two-thirds of a monthly wage. For those who did not return to work, he refused to pay them anything.

These strikes started to attract public attention. As the hashtag “#express delivery workers on strike” trended, more reports emerged on social media of similar work stoppages across multiple provinces, including Shanghai, Jiangsu (southeast China), Henan (east-central China), Xinjiang (northwest China), Shanxi (north China), Shaanxi (northwestern China). Many courier stations that employed these striking delivery workers were bankrupt, and their owners had disappeared. Workers were left in the dark as to where to direct their demands for unpaid wages.

Strikes of express delivery workers have been taking place since the beginning of this year. According to the strike map of Hong Kong-based China Labour Bulletin, there have been at least 25 strike actions this year, involving workers from all the major express delivery companies. However, this is only the tip of the iceberg. According to Service Worker Notes, a keyword search for “express delivery workers on strike” on Baidu Tieba (a Reddit-type platform) returned more than 100 separate threads in the past month and over a 1,000 more from the past year.

Chief responsibility for the wage arrears does not lie with the local courier station owners. All the major express delivery companies have been engaged in a “price war” for years, seeking to gain an advantage over their rivals by cutting their prices for package delivery.

For example, in 2013, Baishi first significantly lowered its delivery price in order to insert itself into the already highly competitive express delivery market in Yiwu, a city of southeastern Zhejiang Province. It is home to one of the largest small-commodity wholesale markets, where billions of packages are shipped out each year. All the other major express delivery companies have followed in the steps of Baishi since 2013, lowering their prices to gain market share. From 2015 to 2019, the average price to mail a package from Yiwu dropped by half. Many smaller companies in Yiwu went into bankruptcy because they could not compete with their larger rivals.

The pandemic has only intensified the “price war.” Most major express delivery companies have suffered a sharp dip in profits, due to the lockdown measures imposed across China in early January and most of February. According to a study by China Merchants Bank, the total number of transactions across the industry in February was only half that in May, June, or July. Every company responded to these losses by significantly lowering their prices. The study found that the average delivery price per package across China, during the first half of 2020, was 11.3 RMB, a fall of 7.8 percent compared to the same period last year. In Yiwu, the average price dropped by 32.8 percent, from February to May this year.

At the same time, to maintain or boost profits, these big express delivery companies shifted the burden of lower prices to local courier stations and exploited delivery workers more harshly. Most major delivery companies operate on a franchise model, with a network of courier stations around the country. Local courier stations are responsible for their own profits and losses. They are paid by the company for each package, then hire their own delivery workers to deliver packages to customers in their area.

After the lockdown, many express delivery companies unilaterally announced that they would reduce the per-package payment to local stations. In some cases, this payment was reduced to as low as 0.5 RMB (~$0.07) per package. Since a delivery worker was usually paid about 1 RMB (~$0.14) per package, at least before the pandemic, local stations did not even earn enough to hire delivery staff, let alone cover for rent and other expenses.

Companies also implemented other measures to further extract profits from their local franchise stations. Since May, local courier stations have been required to meet a drastically increased monthly quota on the number of packages they deliver, and are punished 3 RMB per package if they fall short.

Under such huge pressures, many local courier stations have gone bankrupt, leaving months of wages in arrears for their delivery workers. Even those stations still struggling to operate are forced to slash wages. Some workers reported that their wage had dropped from 1 RMB per package to 0.8 RMB, or even lower.

Both in China and internationally, the ruling elites are using the Covid-19 pandemic to implement further pro-company restructuring measures. The plight of delivery workers and small franchise owners in China is not unique. Massive wage cuts and the cancellation of social benefits, including insurance and pensions, have been reported in both private and public sectors. Large sections of food delivery workers, manufacturing workers, bus drivers, public school teachers, nurses, and base level civil servants are impacted by this restructuring.

Right-wing propagandists in Germany promote “herd immunity”

Gregor Link

In the past several days, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI)—the German federal government agency and research institute responsible for disease control and prevention—has reported unprecedented numbers of new infections in Germany: 14,964 on Wednesday, 16,774 on Thursday, 18,681 on Friday and finally 19,059 new infections on Saturday. In other words, more than one in seven of the 500,000 or so people who have been diagnosed as infected in Germany so far were infected last week.

Restaurants will be closed but not schools

As the World Socialist Web Site has repeatedly pointed out, the governments of Europe are pursuing a policy of systematic infestation that endangers the lives of millions of people. On Wednesday, Chancellor Angela Merkel (Christian Democratic Union, CDU) announced a “package of measures” due to come into force Monday.

The package is fully geared to guaranteeing the profits and interests of the super-rich and big business. It rules out a life-saving shutdown of industry. Workers will continue to be sent to work and students to school in the midst of the pandemic.

This murderous and politically criminal policy is accompanied by a reactionary propaganda campaign in politics and the media.

This was most clearly summed up on Thursday by the leader of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) parliamentary group, Alexander Gauland, whose extreme right-wing party is once again being brought into position, as it was at the time of the “refugee crisis,” to pave the way for a common right-wing policy agreed to by all parties. In his speech before the German Bundestag (federal parliament), Gauland warned against “a second lockdown of the economy” and declared: “This price is too high... We must weigh up the costs, also at the price of people dying.”

Business daily Handelsblatt published a similar comment. Under the headline, “The virus is manageable without the lockdown—Lockdown 2.0 is a mistake,” author Thomas Tuma rages against the “hysteria,” the “panic mongering,” the “doomsday scenario” and the “deafening cacophony” of media coverage in regard to the coronavirus. Tuma is a jury member of the Axel Springer Journalism Prize and deputy editor-in-chief of Handelsblatt, where he also oversees the publication of a supplement on “fashion and lifestyle topics.”

Tuma pleads for medical experts, media and “parts of the government” to “engage in a kind of voluntary coronavirus silence” in the interest of German business—in other words, to practice self-censorship and cover-ups under the conditions of an exponential spread of the pandemic throughout Europe. Such a disinformation campaign, which would undoubtedly be at the expense of countless additional lives, would be “comparatively harmless” and would “not even cost much,” according to Tuma.

News about the “new infections and cumulative sickness figures published by the Robert Koch Institute, which, as is long known, say nothing,” the author calls “half-truths” and “fake news.” Politicians who raised any warnings were “horsemen of the apocalypse” who should be sent on “vacation.” After all, there were already warnings “not to exaggerate things with our fight against the pandemic.”

In his thundering “commentary,” the Handelsblatt editor explicitly refers to the so-called “Great Barrington Declaration”—a document that underpins the strategy of the Trump government and has been described by the WSWS as a “manifesto of death.”

In addition, Tuma cites a joint position paper by the National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians (KBV) and professor of virology Hendrik Streeck (University of Bonn) and Jonas Schmidt-Chanasit (University of Hamburg), which demands that a renewed “lockdown” should not be the “reflex consequence” to the growth in infection rates. The current strategy of “containment through contact tracing” should have less priority in the future.

In words that could come from AfD party headquarters, the paper says, “The decline in case numbers is an urgent political task, but not at any price.” The virus “will accompany us in the coming years.” What is needed is a coexistence “in the greatest possible freedom,” which is based on “personal responsibility instead of paternalism,” since the latter “does not correspond to our understanding of a free democratic basic order.”

By “freedom,” these gentlemen understand a kind of Social Darwinism, i.e., the sacrifice of innumerable human lives in order to slow down “the decline of entire branches of the economy.”

Streeck, Schmidt-Chanasit and KBV chairman Andreas Gassen have long been the “medical” spokesmen for a brutal policy of loosening all safety measures, which amounts to the systematic infection of the population. Gassen told the Süddeutsche Zeitung that “a blanket lockdown” would “reduce the number of infections in the short term,” but that it would “be neither target-oriented nor proportionate.” He recommended that members of the so-called “risk group” should “reconsider” their “contact behaviour” individually—everyone should “decide for themselves what risk they want to take.”

HIV virologist Streeck is systematically promoted and built up by large parts of the media and political establishment. In addition to appearing on talk shows and in various tabloid papers, news weekly Der Spiegel recently devoted a comprehensive and “personal” cover story to him under the title, “The Anti-Hero.” It makes it clear, once again, that the former US Army immunologist is well networked with politics and the media—including Free Democratic Party (FDP) leader Christian Lindner, PR strategist Michael Mronz, North Rhine-Westphalia state Premier Armin Laschet and the billion-dollar slaughterhouse operator Clemens-Tönnies.

Streeck had already hit the headlines in April because he had the unfinished “Heinsberg Study,” which trivialized the dangers of the pandemic, published by an exclusive PR agency. At that time, according to Der Spiegel, he had been advised “from quite high up in the federal government to withdraw from the public coronavirus debate.”

Streeck quite openly advocates the pseudo-scientific policy of so-called “herd immunity,” which is rejected by leading virologists and epidemiologists. He told the Frankfurter Rundschau on Wednesday, “I think it is possible that by the end of next year we will be at a point where the pandemic will be ended by the virus itself... That so many people will have become infected that the chains of infection will break off again and again by themselves in many places.”

In the same interview, Streeck made clear that life-saving investments in public health and care systems running into billions were not an option for him, nor for the German government. “We have limited resources.”

The same line is taken by the Hamburg virologist Schmidt-Chanasit. Due to the allegedly unalterable fact that “capacity is simply lacking,” “it is necessary to refrain from making any contact with young people,” he told NDR radio on Monday. At the same time, the Hamburg-based tropical medicine specialist called on politicians to create “free space” for larger parties—although a recent YouGov youth study showed that the overwhelming majority of young people consider the protective measures currently in force to be “appropriate” or “insufficient.”

In an interview with the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Schmidt-Chanasit added that adherence to hygiene rules and the use of the federal government’s coronavirus warning app were “perfectly sufficient to survive the pandemic well.”

The paper by Gassen, Schmidt-Chanasit and Streeck bears the lofty subtitle, “The Common Position of Science and the Medical Profession.” This is a deliberate deception. Although it is supported by numerous doctors’ associations, these are not scientific institutions, but professional bodies primarily concerned with the material interests of doctors.

Numerous physicians have meanwhile distanced themselves from the paper. The Professional Association of German Anaesthetists (BDA), whose name is on the list of supporters, has protested against it. They had been named as signatories without consultation. BDA President Götz Geldner told the press that he “did not support the content of the position paper” and “had no advance knowledge of the paper.”

This view is also shared by the German Society for Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine, with more than 15,000 members. The President of the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine (DIVI), Uwe Janssens, said he “had no sympathy for accusations of panic.” At the beginning of the week, Janssens had issued an urgent warning of an impending catastrophic overload of intensive care units in Germany.

The scientific research bodies unanimously reject the policy of herd immunity proposed by Streeck, Gassen and Schmidt-Chanasit. In a joint paper entitled, “It is serious,” they demand: “The number of cases must be reduced before bed occupancy in hospitals becomes critical.” To prevent a “sharp rise in the death rate,” contact had to be systematically reduced by three-quarters. “This is the only way to interrupt the chains of infection and contain the situation again.”

The paper goes on to say, “Every infected contact that escapes the health authorities is the origin of a new chain of infection that then escapes control... Overloading the health authorities can therefore lead to an ever increasing number of unreported cases and ultimately to an uncontrolled exponential growth in the number of cases. The health authorities are already overloaded in many circles.”

The signatories—the German Research Foundation, Helmholtz Association, Max Planck Society, Leibniz Society, Fraunhofer Society and Leopoldina—predict a daily case number of more than 100,000 new infections by the end of November if no measures are taken to restrict contact.

According to scientific studies, the original lockdown measures in the spring, which were imposed by governments under the pressure of spontaneous strikes and overwhelming public pressure, saved a total of 3.1 million lives in eleven European countries.

A week ago, Germany’s leading virologists had already vehemently opposed the policy of herd immunity: “We note with concern that the voices are once again growing louder in favour of natural herd immunity as a strategy for combating the pandemic,” warned the German Society of Virology (GfV).

It firmly rejects this strategy, which “would lead to an escalating increase in the number of fatalities.” It justified this by saying that “even with the strict isolation of pensioners, there are still other risk groups that are far too numerous, too heterogeneous and in some cases unrecognized to be actively shielded.”