Sri Lanka’s National Security Council to discuss “violence” in estates

W. A. Sunil & K. Ratnayake

Public Security Minister Sarath Weerasekara, an ex-rear admiral, told the Sunday Times last weekend that Sri Lanka’s National Security Council (NSC) will today discuss “security issues” in the plantations. His statement was in response to claims by planters and the police that workers are unleashing “violence” in the estates.

Uda Rathalla Estate workers picketing last September against austerity measures (WSWS)

The NSC is headed by President Gotabhaya Rajapakse and includes Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapakse, key ministers, senior officials from the armed forces, police and intelligence, and other leading state bureaucrats. That the NSC is discussing so-called estate violence as a top priority is a serious threat against plantation workers, who are involved in a long and bitter struggle for higher wages, improved social conditions and democratic rights.

On March 3, hundreds of estate superintendents staged a provocative demonstration in Hatton demanding weapons and weapons training to defend themselves from physical threats by plantation workers.

Ceylon Planters’ Society (CPS) President Dayal Kumarage told the media that his organisation wanted a meeting with the president, prime minister and defense secretary to discuss “security matters.” He called for authorities to “provide adequate security and, if possible, to patrol the estates as well.”

Weerasekera told the Sunday Times that the government would not provide managers with weapons because that would produce more unrest among workers. He made it clear however, that the NSC meeting would “take up” the concerns of regional plantation companies [RPCs] and “ensure security was provided to estate management.”

Provocative protest by estate managers outside Hatton court (Photo credit K. Kishanthan)

The March 3 protest by planters was initiated in response to so-called violence against Alton tea estate superintendent Subash Narayanan in Maskeliya. The planters claimed that a group of workers physically attacked Narayanan, who had to be hospitalised for several days. The CPS also alleged that attacks have occurred in two other estates.

Police, with the active assistance of Ceylon Workers’ Congress (CWC) officials, have arrested 10 Alton workers—eight on February 23 and two more on March 1—claiming they were involved in the alleged assault.

The CWC, the main plantation trade union, is part of the Rajapakse government. CWC leader Jeevan Thondaman is minister of estate infrastructure. The CWC and all the other estate unions have a long and sordid history of collaborating with the government, the plantation companies and the police against plantation workers.

On March 3, when the 10 arrested Alton workers appeared at the Hatton magistrate court, the planters’ lawyer accused them of violence and declared: “This is how terrorism emerges.” Defence lawyers rejected the outrageous claim, describing it as an insult against the hard-working plantation workforce.

The magistrate refused bail and remanded the arrested to Kandy prison until March 10. All the arrested workers have rejected the company-police allegations.

Deepening its treachery against the estate workers, the CWC has said it will bring 16 additional workers before the Hatton magistrates. A spokesman for the UpCountry Federation of Civil Organisation (UFCO) revealed yesterday that CWC lawyer Perumal Rajadurai, on the instructions of Thondaman, would present these workers to the courts on March 10. The UFCO is an NGO that works closely with the unions.

These latest 16 “suspects” and the 10 jailed Alton workers are the victims of a company-police conspiracy to break indefinite strike action at the estate that began on February 2, fighting for higher wages and against management threats.

A manager physically assaulted Alton workers, injuring one female employee, after the strikers blocked the transport of processed tea from the estate on the first day of their walkout. The Alton strike began three days before a February 5 national estate strike called by the CWC for a long-demanded 1,000-rupee ($US5.12) daily basic wage.

The union’s national strike was an attempt to dissipate plantation workers’ anger over their declining living conditions. The 1,000-rupee daily wage claim was originally raised six years ago, in 2015, but the CWC and the other plantation unions have consistently betrayed workers’ strikes and protests over this issue.

On February 17, Alton workers demonstrated outside the manager’s bungalow in protest against his strike-breaking activities. This is the incident that the company alleges was estate workers’ “violence.”

On March 1, the Rajapakse government, nervous about the eruption of mass action by estate workers—and walkouts by other sections of the working class—gazetted a 1,000-rupee daily wage for plantation workers. This consists of 900-rupee basic wage and a 100-rupee cost of living allowance payment.

The RPCs, however, have not agreed to this grossly inadequate increase. Instead, they have threatened to abrogate previous collective agreements, including clauses providing employees with 300 working days per year for a guaranteed minimum income.

The RPCs claim they cannot increase wages because maintenance costs are higher. They insist productivity must be driven up and other cost-cutting measures imposed in order to be internationally competitive.

This is the background to the allegations of “estate violence” and the government’s decision to treat this as a national security issue. More repressive measures will be unleashed to crush estate workers’ unrest and impose plantation owners’ demands, including the restructuring and privatisation of “unproductive” estates.

In recent days, a police jeep has been patrolling the Alton estate, with no opposition from the unions, in a foretaste of the sort of violent operations being prepared.

These developments vindicate the warnings made by the Socialist Equality Party in its March 1 statement, “Release jailed Sri Lankan estate workers! Defend all workers from company-police conspiracies!”

The statement urged plantation workers to form their own action committees, independent of the unions, to demand the release of the Alton estate workers and discuss the class actions and political program required to defend the social and democratic rights of all workers.

The employer-state and trade union conspiracy now being unleashed against the Alton estate workers is an attack on the entire working class. It is yet another indication that the Rajapakse government will attempt to crush all opposition to its austerity attacks on the working class, amid a sharp economic crisis that the COVID-19 pandemic has intensified.

The Rajapakse government came to power promising the capitalist class it would boost profits and impose the burden of the rising foreign debt and falling export earnings on the working class. In order to carry out this agenda, it is whipping up racial and religious tensions against Tamils and Muslims to divide and weaken working class and preparing a presidential dictatorship based on the military.

Somalia: a Knotted Web of Causes

John Clamp

In one translation of Seneca’s Oedipus Rex, the unfortunate (anti)hero laments his dark fate by complaining of being ‘tangled in the knotted web of causes’. The words have an aptness far beyond their origin. Somalia is a perfect expression of the metaphor. Its dysfunction has so many potential—nay, likely—causative factors that who the hell knows why the country is such a goddamned mess?

Could the source lie in the complete idiocy of the Italian colonial ‘masters’? How about the fissiparous constellation of sultanates? Or, better yet, let’s blame it on Cold War eye-pokery, with the Soviets backing the frankly disgusting dictator Mohammed Siad Barre to the hilt. Maybe it’s U.S. support for favoured post-Barre warlords that led to the current assholery. Or the total lack of functional state institutions. The secessionist dreams of Somaliland and Puntland? Could the Saudis have a shine for fundamentalists Al-Shabaab? It might make sense if you want control over the vital Gulf of Aden.

No answer comes: the web of potential causes is too knotted. Al-Shabaab has control of much of the countryside. And that means these days that it’s a free-fire drone zone, with multiple platforms aloft and killing people at any given time of day. It’s such a ‘rich target environment’ that the CIA’s drones are all over, flying off aircraft carriers or from the surprisingly numerous regional U.S. bases, including a secret one in Mogadishu reported on by the indefatigable Jeremy Scahill.

Somalia, blessed with the longest continental coastline, was once a famed medieval entrepôt (the northeastern region of Somalia, known as Puntland, is incredibly strategically placed along the southern flank of the Gulf). Yet its riches have evaporated. These days, it’s a civic desert, with barely a functional institution. The ‘country’ has a population of 16m, with anywhere between 1,500,000 and 2,000,000 internally displaced, mostly by the random violence of either Al-Shabaab or state forces trying to mess up Al-Shabaab. Or drones.

It’s a particularly knotty version of African basket-casery, that’s for sure. Up to a million or more refugees have fled the region outright. Many hundreds of thousands have been forced to seek refuge in Somalia’s neighboring countries (Djibouti, Ethiopia, and Kenya) since 1991, when Barre was assassinated and the current round of inhumanity started. That’s 30 years, counted in Somali blood.

Today’s problematics are borne of a very sorry set of circumstances. No factor, no vector has held promise. The superpowers suspended Somalia in aspic, and Barre deluged the country with corruption and iniquity. These days, the republic is fraying, central authority is a rose-tinted dream, and violence abounds.

Opposition presidential candidates now shorn of an election are pissed. They say the incumbent president, Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed sabotaged the election process to extend his overlordship.As always, it’s complex. But ordinary people, poverty-stricken before, are now eking out a terror-stricken living in marginal conditions in the region. They’ve been plagued with war, then locusts, then drought. It’s been a living hell. A solution is nowhere after 30 years.

Russia Foreign Minister’s Gulf tour: A bellwether of US-Saudi relations

James M. Dorsey

As Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov embarks on a four-day visit to the Gulf, Middle Eastern leaders are either struggling to get a grip on Joe Biden’s recalibration of US policy in the region or signaling their refusal to adapt to the president’s approach.

Mr. Lavrov’s visit to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar comes a week after the United States released an intelligence report that pointed fingers at Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for allegedly ordering the 2018 killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Earlier, the United States halted the sale of weapons to the kingdom that could be deployed in its six-year-long devastating offensive in Yemen.

Even though he is not stopping in Istanbul and Jerusalem, Mr. Lavrov is travelling in the region as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is still waiting for a phone call from Mr. Biden and Israel is suggesting that it may not engage with US efforts to revive the 2015 international agreement that curbed Iran’s nuclear program and could act on its own more aggressively to counter the Islamic republic’s nuclear ambitions.

Mr. Lavrov is certain to want to capitalize on Mr. Biden’s rattling of Middle Eastern cages amid perceptions that recalibration of relations with Saudi Arabia and delayed phone calls suggest that the United States is downgrading the Middle East’s importance in its global strategy, reducing its security commitments, and potentially considering a withdrawal.

There is little doubt that the United States wants a restructuring of its commitments through greater burden-sharing and regional cooperation but is unlikely to abandon the Middle East altogether.

The question is whether Mr. Biden’s rattling of cages constitutes simply signaling US intentions or a deliberate attempt to let problematic allies and partners stew in uncertainty in a bid to increase the administration’s leverage.

Potentially the longer-term strategy may be an unintended yet beneficial consequence of the administration’s conviction that addressing domestic emergencies such as the pandemic and economic crisis as well as repairing relations with America’s traditional allies in Europe and Asia is a pre-requisite for restoring US influence and leverage that was damaged by former President Donald J. Trump.

If so, Mr. Lavrov may unwittingly be doing the Biden administration a favour by attempting to exploit perceived daylight between the United States and its allies to push a Russian plan for a restructured security architecture.

That plan envisions a Middle Eastern security conference modelled on the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and a regional non-aggression pact that would be guaranteed by the United States, China, Russia, and India.

In doing so, Mr. Lavrov would be preparing the ground for debate about a concept that has been discussed in different forms at various points by US officials, in which a United States that credibly is getting its house in order would retain its dominant position as the military backbone of a new security architecture.

It would also drive home the point that neither Russia nor China are willing or capable of replacing the United States and that Middle Eastern countries are likely to benefit most from an architecture that allows them to diversify their relationships and potentially play one against the other.

It is early days, but so far, Saudi Arabia has insisted “that the partnership between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United States of America is a robust and enduring partnership” even though it rejected in the same statement the US intelligence report as” negative, false and unacceptable.”

For now, Saudi Arabia appears determined to counter strong winds in the White House as well as Congress rather than rush to Moscow and Beijing in a realignment of its geopolitical and security relationships.

To do so, the kingdom, in the run-up to the release of the report, has broadened its public relations and lobbying campaign to focus beyond Washington’s Beltway politics on America’s heartland where fewer people are likely to follow the grim reality of the war in Yemen, a country that the Saudi-led bombing campaign has turned into world’s worst humanitarian crisis or the gruesome details of Mr. Khashoggi’s killing.

The campaign appears designed to create grassroots empathy for Saudi Arabia across the United States that would filter back from constituents to members of Congress.

“We recognize that Americans outside Washington are interested in developments in Saudi Arabia and many, including the business community, academic institutions and various civil society groups, are keen on maintaining long-standing relations with the kingdom or cultivating new ones,” said Fahad Nazer, a spokesman for the Saudi embassy in Washington.

Filings show that companies lobbying on behalf of Saudi Arabia reported that half of their  2,000 lobbying contacts in the last year were with individuals and groups outside of Washington.

Working with local and regional companies outside the US capital, including Larson Shannahan Slifka Group (LS2 Group) in Iowa and its subcontractors in Maine, Georgia, North Carolina and other states, Saudi lobbyists contacted local chambers of commerce, media, women’s groups, and faith communities among which synagogues.

The lobbyists distributed materials touting the benefits to women in sports and other sectors accrued from Prince Mohammed’s social reforms in a country that banned women from driving as recently as three years ago.

The Saudi focus is unlikely to deter Mr. Lavrov from peddling Russian military hardware during his tour of the Gulf, including the S-400 anti-missile defence system that Saudi Arabia expressed interest in long before the US election that swept Mr. Biden into the White House.

The kingdom has so far not taken its interest any further. Whether it does so during this week’s visit by Mr. Lavrov will serve as a bellwether of whether Saudi Arabia will turn towards Russia and China in a significant way.

So far US analysts appear to be unconcerned.

Said former US intelligence official Paul Pillar, a frequent commentator on Middle East affairs: “The attractiveness of doing business with the United States will remain without the coddling, as is true of Saudi choices regarding arms purchases, given that their defences have been built largely around US hardware.”

COVID-19 Vaccines, Access and the Intellectual Property Wars

Binoy Kampmark

By now, anybody speaking about vaccine equality and equity of access must surely be coming across as slightly deranged.  In the field of COVID-19, traditional proprietorial instincts remain.  Add to this the disparity in terms of manufacture, bureaucracy and the nasty flavour of politics, and we would all be entitled to long draughts of cynicism.

The COVAX (COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access Facility) scheme, supposedly a levelling measure in ensuring global equitable and cheap access to vaccines, risks looking like a rhetorical bauble.  Co-led by Gavi, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness and Innovations (CEPI) and the World Health Organization (WHO), these collaborators seek to “accelerate the development and manufacture of COVID-19 vaccines, and to guarantee fair and equitable access for every country in the world.”  The aim of the group is to supply 2 billion doses by the end of 2021.  Last month, the WTO reported that 130 countries, comprising 2.5 billion people, had yet to receive a single dose.

The project has hit a rather large snag.  Many countries are not willing to play along.  If they do, they are doing so in two-timing fashion.  WHO senior adviser, Bryce Aylward, is worried that “some countries are still pursuing deals that will compromise the COVAX supply.”  This lack of fidelity to the cause is also of concern to the WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.  “We can’t beat COVID without vaccine equity. Our world will not recover fast enough without vaccine equity, this is clear.”

A suggestion of dealing with the problems of accessing COVID-19 vaccines has been put forth by several states and international bodies.  Last Friday, the WHO called for an agreement dealing with the waiver of intellectual property rights to vaccines. “If not now, when?” asked Ghebreyesus.

In October 2020, India and South Africa submitted a proposal for waiving “certain provisions of the TRIPS [Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights] agreement for the prevention, containment and treatment of COVID-19.”  The waiver would be granted to WTO members so that they would not have to apply or enforce certain provisions under Part II of the TRIPS Agreement, namely section 1 (copyrights and related rights), 4 (industrial design), 5 (patents), and 7 (protection of undisclosed information).  The waiver would be in place for a duration agreed to by the General Council and till widespread global vaccination had taken place, with the majority of the world’s population rendered immune.

A briefing document on the proposal, authored by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), merely confirms that the proposed waiver was specific, applicable only to COVID-19 and not “all TRIPS obligations, nor does it suggest a waiver beyond what is needed for COVID-19 prevention, containment and treatment.”  Were the waiver to be granted, patents would not be enforced or granted on “all COVID-19 drugs, vaccines, diagnostics, and other technologies, including masks and ventilators, for the duration of the pandemic.”  Collaboration in research and development (R&D), manufacturing, scaling up and supplying COVID-19 tools could also take place.

In discussions held by WTO members at the TRIPS Council over October 15-16 last year, the opponents nailed their colours to the mast.  Australia, Brazil, Canada, EU, Japan, Norway, Switzerland, United Kingdom and the United States were either formally opposed to the measure, or not in support of it. The COVID-19 vaccine world had been clearly demarcated: the wealthy and the rest.

The justifications from such states do not make for pretty reading.  All centre on one essential theme: the importance of maintaining an ironclad IP system in the name of innovative practice.  An EU spokesman suggested somewhat speciously that no evident nexus could be shown between access to vaccines and IP barriers. “There is no evidence that IP rights in any way hamper access to COVID-19 related medicines and technologies.”  The UK government decided to upend the cart with its reasoning, underlining the importance of having strict IP rules if access to new products to battle the pandemic were to be made available. The chair of the WHO Solidarity Trial of COVID-19, John-Arne Røttingen insists that “IP is the least of the barriers” relative to necessary facilities for production, knowledge and infrastructure.

South Africa sought to address such claims on October 16 at the TRIPS Council meeting and again at the Council Meeting on November 20.  Examples included the manufacturers of monoclonal antibody therapeutics, such as Regeneron and Eli Lilly, which had restricted their capacity via bilateral arrangements.  Specifically on vaccines, South Africa could point to the struggle between MSF and Pfizer being waged in India over the pneumococcal vaccine, protected by a patent effectively blocking the development of alternatives.

As if further proof was needed about efforts by pharmaceutical behemoths to freeze and halt both innovation and access in the field of vaccines with generous IP shields, one need look no further than the case of South Korea’s SK Bioscience. The company was embroiled in patent litigation with Pfizer in developing a pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PVC) by the name of Skypheumo.  SK Bioscience lost the suit, with the Supreme Court ruling that it could not sell Skypheumo until 2026, when Pfizer’s composition patent for Prevenar 13 expires.

Given that WTO decisions tend to be made through consensus, the waiver proposal has been stuck in diplomatic purgatory in the TRIPS Council.  Requests from Chile, Australia and Canada for evidence that the waiver would achieve increased capacity for vaccine manufacturing and assist ameliorate shortages have not helped.  Burcu Kilic, research director for access to medicines at Public Citizen sees the unfolding of a crude agenda.  “What [high-income countries] are hoping is that they can discuss and drag the issue out that things will be OK by the summer.”

The WTO General Council meeting held at the start of this month did not see a change of heart from high-income countries towards the South African-Indian proposal.  Neither the US nor EU wished to even discuss it.  What instead kept delegates busy was the proposal by WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala to pursue a meek third way alternative.  That option would involve, according to Okonjo-Iweala, the licensing of manufacturing to countries ensuring “adequate supplies while still making sure that intellectual property issues are taken care off”.

Ahead of officially commencing her duties as Director-General, she reiterated the idea that there was a way of increasing access “through facilitating technology transfer within the framework of multilateral rules” and for pharmaceutical giants to make licensing arrangements permitting other manufacturers to produce vaccines.  Music, no doubt, to representatives of Big Pharma.

To date, the doses-ordered per capita read as a comparison of states looks stark.  The US has 10.2 doses per person, the UK 7.6, the EU 6.5, and Australia 5.  David Legge and Sun Kim, both of the People’s Health Movement, note that the African Union (AU), in sharp contrast, has deals covering a mere 970 million doses for 1.34 billion people.  Vaccine coverage, at this point, looks meagre.

Some 115 European Parliamentary members, on February 24, issued a declaration pleading for the European Commission, and the European Council to review their opposition to the TRIPS waiver proposal. Certain EU member states and the European Commission had spoken about COVID-19 medical products “as global goods” but there were no “actionable realities.”   A waiver, the members urged, would not only cast aside onerous legal barriers to production but enable “the sharing of know-how and technologies with GMP manufacturers from third countries”.  EU strategy had, however, been tribal, emphasising domestic production with the potential to exacerbate “a dangerous North-South divide when it comes to affordable COVID-19 diagnostics, personal protective equipment, treatment and vaccines.”

The vaccine fault lines suggest different timetables and differently filled pockets.  Regions of the world risk remaining unvaccinated, with infections and deaths set to continue.  Legge and Kim rightly see this as an abandonment by wealthier countries to chance, death and despair in favour of self-interest.  Should low- and middle-income countries have to wait another year or two in the face of wealthier states “commandeering the vaccines, there will be about 40-50 million more cases of infections and perhaps 2 to 3 million additional deaths.”  A good number on those charts of mortality will be health workers.

The Horrible Dowry System and Its Wider Manifestation in India

Bharat Dogra

Nearly 60 years have passed since the dowry abolition system legislation was passed in India but we still have the cruel reality of 20 dowry deaths a day in the country ( dowry killings, or women pushed by dowry related cruelty towards suicide). Each one of these deaths is a hugely tragic story, and it is being repeated 7000 times in a year.

Yet this is only  one aspect of the many sides of the wider manifestation of the dowry problem in India. In a narrow sense dowry refers to the gifts or cash a bride is supposed to bring to her husband’s home ( or to her in-laws) at the time of marriage. That this should be considered an essential part of marriage is bad enough. But the reality is worse because in practical terms the manifestation is much wider. It is more realistic to consider all the financial implications and burdens of marriage of a daughter. The gifts, material goods and cash constitute only one aspect. But in addition there is the ever-increasing burden of the other grand and expensive arrangements the bride’s side have to make to welcome the barraat or the bridegroom party. The total number of guests may be in hundreds. There is increasing pressure to arrange the grand party in a banquet hall or hotel or other expensive place on a lavish scale. This is not all. The financial burden on the bride side does not end with marriage. Often financial and other demands continue much after the marriage, and the treatment the bride gets related to the extent these demands are fulfilled. If she is working, often almost her entire salary may be grabbed.

Now consider all this from the point of view of honest, hard working, ordinary  parents having three daughters. How are they to provide for this wider dowry system for three daughters ( or even one or two daughters)? If they are farmers will they have to sell their land? If they are petty salary earners, will they have to incur heavy debts? It is worries like these which needlessly become the main worry for many households. And if despite their best efforts of arranging the wider dowry, the daughters are mistreated then this again becomes an abiding source of distress in old age. To avoid this distress to parents, the daughters facing cruelty may hide this, eventually perhaps being driven to a cruel death at a relatively young age.

All this completely avoidable distress can be traced to the deadly combination of two sources—gender injustices of traditional society to which the relentless consumerism and shameless greed of capitalism and neo-liberalism are added.  As these  trends have accentuated, the dowry system in its wider manifestation went on becoming more cruel and shameless despite the passing of dowry abolition legislation.

What is worse and even more worrying is that the entire fervor , the entire zeal of social reform is gone along with the strengthening of the shameless consumerism and greed of capitalism and neo-liberalism. So we no longer have a social reform movement for curbing this growing wider manifestation of the dowry system. I have visited many villages during drought years and found that even in times of hunger there is even greater distress and stress regarding marriages that may have to be postponed if not cancelled altogether.

Somehow the social reformist zeal of our society has to be revived and recreated as without this rapidly growing serious social problems like this wider manifestation of the dowry system cannot be resolved. How can there be equality for women when the cruel dowry system continues to flourish? There is even evidence of more adverse sex ratio in those states where dowry system is worse.

Unequal Britain: An academic defence of social inequality

Julie Hyland

The report Unequal Britain: attitudes to inequalities after COVID-19 by the Policy Institute at King's College London is indicative of the hostility of an upper middle-class layer in academia to the class issues posed starkly by the pandemic.

That COVID-19 is a “poor man's disease” which has hit the working class hardest—driven into unsafe workplaces under the policy of herd immunity—is a verifiable fact.

It led the British Medical Journal to accuse the world's governments of “social murder” in their response to the pandemic. Its editorial, “Covid-19: Social murder, they wrote—elected, unaccountable, and unrepentant”, drew attention to the phrase’s origin with Friedrich Engels, the lifelong collaborator of Karl Marx.

The report, "Unequal Britain: attitudes to inequalities after COVID-19" by the Policy Institute at King's College London

Describing the “political and social power held by the ruling elite over the working classes in 19th century England”, the BMJ wrote, Engels' “argument was that the conditions created by privileged classes inevitably led to premature and 'unnatural' death among the poorest classes.” Social murder was “very real today, exposed and magnified by COVID-19. It cannot be ignored or spun away.”

Ignored was exactly the response of the media to the BMJ's damning indictment. Unequal Britain is an attempt to spin away the class causes and implications.

The study was based on an online questionnaire of 2,226 adults who had registered specifically to participate in such surveys. It divides those participating by support for either Conservative or Labour and those voting for Leave or Remain in the 2016 Brexit referendum. This is supposedly to provide balance.

It notes that the pandemic has “ruthlessly exposed how our vulnerability to shocks varies hugely, determined by a complex web of existing inequalities, across genders, age groups, races, income levels, social classes and places.”

But social classes do not feature in the report. In fact, “class” only appears once in its 88-pages. Its central thrust is against arguments that “Greater action on inequality” is a “logical progression from the unprecedented state intervention that’s been required to weather the COVID-19 crisis”. Rather “the crisis has, for the most part, not bridged political divides in support for action on inequality, and there is only a limited consensus on what the country’s most pressing inequalities are,” it asserts.

Even if one puts to one side such critical matters as the fact that we are not “after Covid-19” but still very much in it, and that the “unprecedented state intervention” has largely consisted of massive bailouts for the super-rich, the authors assertions are not supported by their own findings.

The report begins by noting there is “significant agreement” that the most serious inequalities are geographical (61 percent) and the outcome of “disparities in income and wealth” (60 percent).

Six in 10 (62 percent) believe Britain was somewhat or very unequal before the pandemic, with just 12 percent believing it was “relatively equal”. More than eight in 10 (81 percent) believe the gap between high and low incomes is too large, compared to 1 percent who say it’s too small.

Questioned as to the impact of the pandemic, 84 percent believed inequality between more and less deprived areas would widen, and 81 percent that this would be the case as regards income and wealth. Three-quarters considered widening geographical/income inequality to be a very big, or fairly big problem.

These are extraordinary majorities. However, the report dismisses the concerns expressed on income inequality specifically, complaining that “public perceptions of the extent of economic inequality often diverge from reality.” People “significantly overestimate” the concentration of wealth amongst the rich, showing that “the public” have only a “general, 'ordinal' sense of the extent of wealth inequalities...”

Far more time is spent assessing the apparent failure of people to place racial and gender inequalities on a par with income. One result that especially exercised the authors, and the Guardian newspaper, was that 4 percent believe black people earn less or are more likely to be unemployed because they have a “less in-born ability to learn”.

That the question was posed in this way is extraordinary on its face and, as would have been expected, it solicited a racist response from a tiny minority. But the entire questionnaire is loaded along these lines. Much is also made of the fact that, when asked what role “luck” played in people losing their jobs during the pandemic, 31 percent said it was very or fairly important. When asked to choose whether individual performance played a role in job losses, 47 percent selected very, or fairly likely.

The report concludes that such answers show the British population have strong “meritocratic and individualistic tendencies”, which “temper calls for action on inequality.”

No objective observer, even considering the skewed and limited nature of the survey, could draw such a conclusion. While the authors assert that it proves most people believe “hard work and ambition remain key drivers of success”, the findings again and again show a majority believe socio-economic factors, in particular wealth—for which read class—inequalities, are the major drivers.

With regards to the impact of the pandemic on education, health and income, the overwhelming majority responded that the low-paid and poor, especially those living in deprived areas/conditions, would suffer most.

Racial and gender inequalities were similarly identified with social circumstances/context. 67 percent considered rising income inequality between ethnic minorities and white people a “big issue” and (65 percent as regards rising income inequality between men and women).

Asked to what extent they agree or disagree that the pandemic proves the need to redistribute income away from the rich, 51 percent agreed (18 percent opposed), while 55 percent supported government measures “to reduce differences in income levels”, (15 percent against).

Despite this, the report concludes that there is “no widespread appetite for change” regarding government action on inequality. According to one of the authors, Professor Bobby Duffy, this is because Britain “starts from a relatively individualistic worldview” and that “our perspectives on these issues [inequality] are deeply divided and tied up with our underlying values and identity.”

He would make such an assertion. Director of the Policy Institute, he was previously “seconded to the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit.” At first glance this appears a strange place for an apparent progressive. But then Duffy is part of the Progress Network, launched last year, by its parent, New America.

Headed by Anne-Marie Slaughter, a former high-ranking State Department official and close associate of Hillary Clinton, the New America think tank produces policy papers in line with the interests of the US military and intelligence agencies and the corporate establishment. Its Progress Network spin off is aimed at challenging “the inevitability of chaos and collapse by connecting and amplifying prominent voices pointing our world in a more positive direction…”

The survey is part of the institute for Fiscal Studies Deaton Review of Inequalities, which is studying “inequality not just of income, but of health, wealth, political participation, and opportunity; and not just between rich and poor but by gender, ethnicity, geography, age and education.”

“This will give the UK government, and those in other developed countries, a far clearer and more holistic view of the effectiveness of available policy options, how they can best work alongside each other and the trade-offs between them.”

The IFS is a pro-market research foundation, specialising in UK tax and public policy to shape fiscal decisions in the interests of the wealthy. The “trade-off” means finding academic justifications to oppose any redistributive measures in favour of working people.

True to form, the Guardian’s Polly Toynbee was on message. Invoking Tony Blair’s refusal to talk about inequality, she suggested current Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer was justified for his “caution” on the issue. The report meant “those on the left are forced to confront some dismal realities about British public attitudes”. “Tackling inequality” may be a “rebarbative word with too many voters”, she wrote.

As US states reopen businesses and schools, experts warn of “hurricane” surge of COVID-19

Patrick Martin

With states throughout the US reopening businesses and schools, health experts are warning of a surge of COVID-19 cases in the coming months as new variants take hold across the country.

Epidemiologists and other health care experts warned Sunday that the current plateau in the number of coronavirus infections in the United States is only temporary and could be followed by a new and more terrible upsurge, particularly if the American population follows the lead of state governments that are ending mask mandates and other restrictions.

The starkest warning came from Dr. Michael Osterholm, a former coronavirus adviser to the Biden transition and director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. He appeared on the NBC program “Meet the Press” and declared, “we are in the eye of the hurricane right now. It appears that things are going very well. You can see blue skies.” But the reality was a new storm coming, he said.

COVID-19 patients lie on beds at a field hospital built inside a sports coliseum in Santo Andre, on the outskirts of Sao Paulo, Brazil, Thursday, March 4, 2021. (AP Photo/Andre Penner)

He cited the upsurge in B117, the so-called UK variant, which has gone from one to four percent of the viruses analyzed four weeks ago to 30-40 percent today. “And what we’ve seen in Europe, when we hit that 50 percent mark, you see cases surge. So right now, we do have to keep America as safe as we can from this virus by not letting up on any of the public health measures we’ve taken. And we need to get people vaccinated as quickly as we can.”

While congratulating the Biden administration on speeding up vaccine distribution, he pointed out that more than half of American seniors, the most vulnerable age group in terms of coronavirus deaths, have still not been vaccinated, including large numbers living in long-term care facilities.

Dr. Osterholm added a warning about school reopenings, pointing out that the B117 variant is especially infectious in school settings and that large clusters of infections have been found in his home state of Minnesota, connected with the resumption of high school sports. At this point his host Chuck Todd hurriedly ended the interview.

On other Sunday programs, experts linked more closely to the Biden administration limited their comments to warning about the impact of lifting of mask mandates. Seventeen US states have either lifted mandates or never had them in the first place, with Texas becoming the first state with a large urban population to do so.

Dr. Anthony Fauci told the CBS program “Face the Nation” that the recent decline in cases is starting to plateau, and that “plateauing at a level of 60,000-70,000 new cases per day is not an acceptable level. That is really very high.” Judging from the example of Europe, where the plateau several weeks ago was followed by an increase in cases, he warned that this was a real danger. “It really would be risky to have yet again another surge,” he concluded.

On ABC News, Dr. Ashish Jha of Brown University, another former Biden transition adviser, tried to put a more favorable spin on the figures but admitted the utter waste in new deaths caused by relaxation of restrictions and mask mandates. “Anybody who gets infected today and dies in three or four weeks is somebody who would have gotten vaccinated a month from now,” he said. “This is why it’s urgent to just keep going for a little bit longer.”

All these warnings came as news programs showed scenes of thousands of unmasked and undistanced revelers on Florida beaches during spring break, encouraged by Governor Ron DeSantis and other state officials who have portrayed the “right” to infect others and to become infected as the essence of “freedom.” This under conditions where young people in the 17-25 age bracket can contract COVID-19 and spread it just as easily as any other age group.

At a press conference on Friday in Geneva, the top officials of the World Health Organization made even more dire warnings. WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus pointed especially to the huge upsurge in cases in Brazil, which has gone from 114,000 cases a week in November to 374,000 cases a week in February, and from 2,500 deaths a week to 8,000 deaths a week over the same period. During this period, Brazil has become the launching pad for many new variants of the virus, some more infectious or more resistant to antibodies.

Dr. Michael Ryan, WHO director for health emergencies, said that “exiting” from social measures imposed to limit the pandemic had to be carried out with great care and required resuming strong contact tracing and other preventive measures which have been largely abandoned in the worst hit countries. He was particularly concerned about the abandonment of mask wearing and social distancing. “I understand what’s driving this. We think we’re out of this, but we’re not,” he warned. “We should not waste the hope that vaccines bring by dropping our guard in other areas.”

These warnings, whether open and direct or hedged about with considerations of a political and diplomatic character, are consistent in their thrust: the apparent success of vaccinations, at least in a few countries, does not alter the reality of a global pandemic. The most rigorous protective measures are still required, both in countries where vaccination has had some impact, as in the United States and parts of Europe, and in those, like most of Latin America, Africa, and Asia, where mass vaccination is still an empty promise.

The lifting of protective measures in many American states and the outright repudiation of them by heads of state like Brazil’s fascist President Jair Bolsonaro are crimes against humanity. This label applies as well to the back-to-school drive embraced by the Biden administration and enforced by state and local governments headed by the Democratic Party.

Earlier this week, Arizona Governor Doug Ducey, a Republican, ordered all elementary schools to offer in-person education, which will be followed by middle and high schools.

Areas controlled by Democrats are likewise moving ahead with school reopenings. Chicago will allow high school students to return to class starting today, while the San Francisco School District said Friday it will reopen schools starting April 12. On Friday, the Massachusetts Education Board pushed ahead with the reopening of schools by granting the state education commissioner control over when in-person education can resume, in defiance of local authorities.

The reality of the policy being carried by the American ruling class was stated most brutally by Governor Tate Reeves of Mississippi, speaking Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” program. “Our objective in Mississippi has never been to rid ourselves of the virus or make sure that no Mississippian actually gets the virus,” he said, “because we don’t think that’s a realistic goal.” He added, “our approach has been to not only protect lives, but to also protect livelihoods. We have to get our economy rolling, so that individuals can get back to work.”

Whether enunciated with the Southern drawl of Reeves, the incoherent bromides of Joe Biden or the fascistic rants of Bolsonaro, the policy of the financial aristocracy is the same. Coronavirus policy is subordinated to the defense of the capitalist system. The profit requirements of the corporations and banks take precedence over the health of workers and their families.

Number of super-rich individuals grew worldwide during the pandemic

Kevin Reed

The global real estate consultancy Knight Frank published its “Wealth Report” for 2020 on March 1. The 15th annual report shows that the number of Ultra High Net Worth Individuals (UHNWI) around the world grew by 2.4 percent over the past year to more than 520,000 people.

As always, Knight Frank enthusiastically defines UHNWI as “someone with a net worth of

over US$30 million including their primary residence.” Knight Frank sees no problem whatsoever in celebrating the expansion of the number and wealth of the richest people in the world during a year dominated by the devastation of the coronavirus pandemic.

Credit: The Wealth Report

Like the Forbes 400 list of the wealthiest Americans or the Institutional Investor ’ s “Rich List,” Knight Frank’s wealth report hails the unprecedented expanding economic inequality that is a primary characteristic of the world capitalism in the 21st century. This celebration took on a particularly ghastly shade during 2020 when COVID-19 infected 100 million, killed more than 2 million and—due to the drive by the capitalist elite to take advantage of the public health emergency to increase its wealth—has plunged hundreds of millions of people around the world into the greatest social crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Knight Frank is marking its 125th anniversary this year. Dealing in residential, commercial and agricultural real estate since 1896, the agency currently has more 500 offices in 60 countries and is involved in nearly $1 trillion in property asset transactions on behalf of its ultra-rich clientele each year.

The report contains a Wealth Sizing Model that predicts an increase by 27 percent in the number of UHNWIs over the next five years to 663,483. Significantly, the report also contains information about High Net Worth Individuals (HNWI)—also known as millionaires—and points out that the number of these individuals declined over the past year.

Although the report does not make the point, the separation of the ultrawealthy from the “merely” wealthy is the material basis for much of the conflict within bourgeois politics including that within the US between the Republicans and the Democrats. As has been analyzed by the World Socialist Web Site, the identity politics of the Democrats is an expression of the desire by better-off layers of the middle class to gain entry into the upper echelons of the financial elite.

The 88-page wealth report is introduced by Rory Penn, Head of the Knight Frank Private Office in London. Penn says he is “delighted” to present the report and makes a passing reference to the pandemic, “I can honestly say that during my career in property, I have never seen things changing as quickly as they are now. ... Some of the long-term trends that we examined last year, such as the changing role of the office, have been supercharged by the Covid-19 pandemic.”

Penn concludes that his firm will help its customers to “capitalize on the opportunities that are being created by this acceleration of trends,” that have taken place during the pandemic. If he were honest, Penn would say that the global wealth gap has been “supercharged” by the trillions in government and central bank funds that have been poured into the financial markets for plundering by the super-rich under the guise of “stimulus.”

Liam Bailey, Knight Frank’s Global Head of Research, reviews the key findings of the wealth report. Bailey writes that the objective of the Knight Frank report is “to assess how the fortunes of UHNWIs are changing, where they spend time, what they invest in and what they are likely to do next. From policymakers to investors, a lack of insight into the behaviour and attitudes of the ‘1%’ risks a serious misreading of economic trends. This is the knowledge gap we fill.”

In other words, according to Bailey, Knight Frank has its finger on the pulse of the financial oligarchy that controls world capitalism. The wealth report, based upon an Attitudes Survey, declares itself a guide for governments and hedge fund and institutional investors because it knows what makes the ultrawealthy tick.

The report explains, “The 2021 instalment is based on responses provided during October and November 2020 by over 600 private bankers, wealth advisers, intermediaries and family offices who between them manage over US$3.3 trillion of wealth for UHNWI clients.”

There are 11 wealth trends that Knight Frank analyzed, the primary of which is that “the global response to the pandemic supported the wealthy.” The report says, “With lower interest rates and more fiscal stimulus, asset prices have surged” and this was a major factor in the 2.4 percent growth in the number of UHNWIs in the past year.

A section of the report called “Wealth: resilience through turmoil” explains further “why wealth populations kept growing despite the last year’s economic turmoil” and there were “winners and losers” in 2020 among the ultrawealthy. The report’s findings show that half of UHNWIs increased their wealth in the past year.

Noting that these differences were regionally based, “The expansion in wealth was not universal, with a fall in the number of UHNWIs in Latin America, Russia and the Middle East as currency shifts and the pandemic undermined local economies.”

Another identified trend is the rise of UHNWIs in Asia, “The US is, and will remain, the world’s dominant wealth hub over our forecast period, but Asia will see the fastest growth in UHNWIs over the next five years.” The report then goes on to point out that Asia is home to 36 percent of the world’s billionaires and that “The Chinese Mainland is the key to this phenomenon, with 246 percent forecast growth in very wealthy residents in the decade to 2025.”

That these international and regional differences in wealth accumulation indicate anything significant or fundamental about the direction of geopolitical conflict and the intensification of national antagonisms is glossed over by the researchers as Knight Frank. Although geopolitics and trade war are included as a topic in the Attitudes Survey, it comes in at number four in the top “wealth worries” among the wealthy elite behind concerns about COVID-19, domestic government policy and taxes.

The same subjective approach is taken to all of the major objective economic, social and political trends in 2020. The fact that outgoing US President Donald Trump attempted to overturn the results of the 2020 elections through a fascist coup is given exactly one sentence in the wealth report, noting, “with the democratic process being called into question, by the then sitting US president no less, we could see populism come to the fore once more.”

It is clear from this that the Knight Frank real estate investment advisers see the emergence of fascism in the United States and elsewhere in the world as a potentially beneficial wealth generating opportunity for the superrich.

In a section entitled, “New social order,” the wealth report addresses the growth of extreme wealth inequality, which came in seventh out of the nine items on the “wealth worry” list. The report states, “While only 8 percent of our respondents cite inequality as a direct issue affecting their clients’ wealth, it could have an impact on domestic government policy and tax issues, which 49 percent and 42 percent respectively of them do cite as a concern.”

According Filippo Noseda, a private client lawyer at Mishcon de Reya cited by Knight Frank, “We could see a shift to more wealth taxes as governments scramble to cover the huge costs of the pandemic, and targeting the wealthy tends to be uncontroversial with voters.” The coming revolutionary confrontation of the working class that will be “targeting the wealthy” is not something that the advisers at Knight Frank care to admit or discuss.

Myanmar military unleashes bloodiest crackdown since coup

Owen Howell

The military regime in Myanmar is escalating its use of lethal force and unrestrained violence against protesters, after launching a deadly crackdown last Wednesday that killed at least 38 people and wounded many more, according to the United Nations. Implementing a variety of methods, the junta’s repression is aimed at intimidating protesters and halting the nationwide movement against the February 1 military coup.

Mass arrests, night time raids, and brutal assaults on protests have become more frequent over recent days in the lead-up to a planned general strike today. An alliance of nine major trade unions called on members and “all Myanmar people” to participate in a “full extended shutdown” of economic activity, the Straits Times reported.

Wednesday’s bloodshed surpassed the vicious crackdown on February 28, only three days earlier, which resulted in the deaths of at least 18 protesters. As previously, riot police and combat troops armed with assault rifles mounted a coordinated offensive early Wednesday morning in towns and cities across the country, firing live rounds on peaceful demonstrators with little warning.

Protesters shout slogans during a protest against the military coup in Mandalay, Myanmar, Sunday, Feb. 28, 2021. Police fired tear gas and water cannons and there were reports of gunfire Sunday in Myanmar's largest city Yangon where another anti-coup protest was underway with scores of students and other demonstrators hauled away in police trucks. (AP Photo)

In Mandalay, the second-largest city, three protesters were shot dead as police and soldiers broke up a rally of around 1,000 teachers and students. One of the victims, Ma Kyal Sin, 19, was reportedly shot in the head by a rooftop sniper after she busted a water pipe so that protesters affected by tear gas could wash their eyes. Before attending Wednesday’s demonstration, Kyal Sin posted on Facebook her blood type, a contact number, and a request to donate her body for medical science, prepared to risk possible death at the hands of the military.

According to data compiled by an analyst who spoke anonymously to Associated Press, two deaths were also reported in the town of Salin, Magwe Region, while Mawlamyine, Myingyan, and Kalay each had one death. In the central city of Monywa, the scene of several large protests, eight protesters were killed and at least 30 injured. Moreover, multiple medics claimed to have seen two other bodies dragged away by security forces, but could not confirm if they had died.

Yangon, the country’s largest city and centre of anti-coup protests and strikes, saw the worst of the violence with an estimated 18 people killed. In response to a recent wave of state crackdowns across the city, protesters have erected barricades from tyres and barbed wire to block major roads.

In Yangon’s North Okkalapa Township, a morning march of over 1,000 people was quickly targeted by security forces, who chased and detained hundreds. Protesters hiding in nearby residences could hear continuous gunfire. Myanmar Now news agency reported that one protester heard conversations between soldiers and police outside: “We heard them saying, ‘Can’t you shoot? What are you afraid of? Shoot them all! Kill them all!’”

Social media footage showed lines of young men, hands on heads, filing into army trucks as soldiers stood guard. Video taken by North Okkalapa locals, observing from above, showed a man who was pulled out of a building by police and executed on the spot before his body being dragged away.

That afternoon, residents gathered together and urged police to release the numerous wounded detainees inside prison trucks. Soldiers armed with semi-automatic machine guns turned on the crowd and fired non-stop for around five minutes, witnesses said. Stun grenades and tear gas were also used amid the chaos before the trucks finally left.

Outrage erupted on social media after a widely circulated video taken from CCTV footage was published by Radio Free Asia, showing a mob of police officers brutally kicking and thrashing three ambulance crew members with rifle butts—in retaliation for providing medical aid to injured protesters. In general, police appear to be singling out medical workers for arrest because the healthcare sector was among the first to resist the military junta and establish the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM) of strikes and work stoppages over a month ago.

Later that night, soldiers continued to terrorise residents as 20 military trucks entered the township and started firing indiscriminately. Eight people were confirmed dead from the North Okkalapa crackdown, while another 73 sustained serious injuries, some of them life-threatening.

“It’s horrific, it’s a massacre. No words can describe the situation and our feelings,” young protester Thinzar Shunlei Yi told Reuters of the military’s assault in Yangon.

Aid agency Save the Children said that four children were among Wednesday’s fatalities, including a 14-year-old boy who was reportedly shot dead by a soldier on a passing military convoy. The troops loaded his body onto a truck and left the scene.

Nearly 1,700 people have been arrested since the coup, according to UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet, among them 29 journalists. In reality, the number is far higher, as state-run media previously said 1,300 people had been detained on February 28 alone.

Despite the dramatic intensification of the military’s crackdown on protesters, continued have continued undeterred around Myanmar every day since Wednesday.

On Thursday, police dispersed gatherings with tear gas and gunfire in several cities, but their repression was more restrained than the day before. More protesters came equipped with hard hats, motorbike helmets, facemasks, and makeshift shields. The CDM’s Twitter account released a video of young protesters conducting drills with shields, in anticipation of future military onslaughts.

A crowd of thousands of engineering students marched through Mandalay on Friday, the day after Kyal Sin’s funeral drew tens of thousands from around the city. The crowd chanted, “We’re not scared because you threaten us.” Police opened fire on the protesters and then on nearby houses with guns and slingshots.

One resident, Ko Zaw Myo, 26, who attempted with fellow neighbours to block a road and protect protesters from police, was shot in the throat and died, leaving behind his pregnant wife and son. His death brings the number of those killed by security forces—as currently indicated by domestic media outlets—to at least 60, although this figure likely underestimates the real death toll.

The situation in North Okkalapa remains tense, as internet connections were shut down Saturday night and police set barricades and residences on fire. Meanwhile, police are regularly making late night arrests around Yangon, raiding homes and using stun grenades.

Ahead of Monday’s general strike, some of the biggest protests in recent weeks were held on Sunday. Tens of thousands joined mass sit-in protests in Yangon’s Thanlyin Township and in Mandalay, where thousands of doctors, engineers, and teachers went on a joint strike. Military repression continued as live ammunition was fired on protests in the ancient temple city of Bagan, leaving a young man badly wounded.

According to reports and witness accounts on social media, police and soldiers performed a raid on Monywa University, arresting lecturers and students and causing a large crowd of concerned locals to assemble around the campus in protest. Similar operations are being undertaken to occupy 52 universities across Myanmar with the aim of both repressing students—a key component of the protest movement—and establishing temporary bases for security personnel. Soldiers have currently set up camp at five universities and two public hospitals.