NATO’s Baltic blockade opens new front in war against Russia

Andre Damon

On Monday, the Baltic state of Lithuania, a member of NATO, imposed an effective blockade on Russia, preventing the transportation of many goods, including steel and coal, between mainland Russia and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.

Traditionally, the imposition of a blockade has been seen as an act of war. With this reckless provocation, the United States and its NATO allies are seeking to goad Russia into a military attack on NATO territory, which would lead to the invocation of Article V of the NATO Charter and a full-scale war with Russia.  

Faced with a series of military reversals on the ground in Ukraine, the US, NATO and the European powers are seeking to open a new, northern front in the war. 

Lithuanian officials implied that the decision to implement the blockade against Russia was taken in close consultation with other NATO members and Washington. “It is not Lithuania doing anything, it is European sanctions that started working,” Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said.

Responding to the blockade, Russia’s foreign ministry bluntly warned, “If cargo transit between the Kaliningrad region and the rest of the Russian Federation via Lithuania is not fully restored in the near future, then Russia reserves the right to take actions to protect its national interests.”

A sharp warning must be made. The United States and European powers, each facing a raging economic, social, and political crisis and fearing a growing social movement of the working class, are recklessly escalating a war that threatens the use of nuclear weapons.

The imposition of a blockade against Russia by a NATO member comes just days after a series of highly provocative statements by European military and civilian leaders.

In an internal message to military service members, Sir Patrick Sanders, the Chief of the General Staff, declared, “There is now a burning imperative to forge an Army capable of fighting alongside our allies and defeating Russia in battle.” In a chilling allusion to the First and Second World Wars, he concluded, “We are the generation that must prepare the Army to fight in Europe once again.”

Speaking to the German newspaper Bild am Sonntag, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said, “We must not cease to support Ukraine. … we need to prepare for the fact that it could take years.”

Writing Saturday in the Times of London, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson called on NATO to “finish this war on the terms that President Zelensky has laid out,” that is, to reconquer the Donbas and Crimea, which Russia sees as part of its territory.

In yet another blood-curdling threat, Ingo Gerhartz, head of the Luftwaffe (German Air Force), declared that Germany must be prepared to use nuclear weapons, saying, “We need both the means and the political will to implement nuclear deterrence.”

Already, hundreds of Ukrainian troops are dying every single day. What would it mean for the UK and other European countries to fight “alongside” Ukrainian forces in a war against Russia and for this conflict to last “years”?

European officials are describing a war spanning the entirety of the European continent, with deaths in the hundreds of thousands or millions. All of Europe is to be transformed into a massive killing field.  

Who was it that decided that a new generation of the youth of Europe should be sent to die en masse in the trenches? Who asked the public if there should be a repeat of World War I?

These statements give the lie to the claims by the US and NATO powers that they are not at war with Russia. This claim, accompanied by the declaration that Russia is “unlikely” to use nuclear weapons, is a desperate attempt to lull the population to sleep while their governments embroil them in a war that threatens to kill millions.

In the latest pretense to further inflame the war, Josep Borrell Fontelles, the European Union’s top foreign policy official, accused Russia of war crimes for allegedly preventing Ukraine from exporting grains. Breaking the “blockade” of grain exports has been the pretext for an operation, first proposed by Admiral James G. Stavridis, to stage a naval battle between NATO and Russian warships in the Black Sea. 

The Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad was successively under Polish, Prussian and German control from 1525 to 1945. After the Second World War, it was annexed by the Soviet Union. Kaliningrad is the only Russian Baltic Sea port that remains ice-free year round, and it is critical to the maintenance of Russia’s Baltic Sea fleet. Polish officials, including the former commander of the Land Forces of the Polish Army, have claimed that Kaliningrad is part of Poland.

The Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia have powerful right-wing movements in dominant government positions. Lithuanian Foreign Minister Landsbergis is the grandson of Vytautas Landsbergis, who founded the far-right Sąjudis movement and has advocated banning all symbols of socialism. 

The most recent cabinet of Estonia included the fascist Conservative People’s Party of Estonia, whose minister of the interior repeatedly photographed himself flashing a white power hand gesture. The current cabinet of Latvia draws its ministers for economics, culture and agriculture from the fascist and fanatically anti-Russian National Alliance.

These politically unstable statelets, dominated by the extreme right, are being given carte blanche and political support to provoke war with Russia by the imperialist powers. 

The actions by the NATO powers speak to a staggering degree of recklessness, which cannot be explained merely by the military setbacks suffered by Ukraine. 

Every imperialist country is facing an economic and social crisis for which they have no solution. The COVID-19 pandemic, having killed over 20 million people worldwide, is accelerating in its third year. The governments of the US, France, the UK and Germany are beset by crisis and instability. All over the world, the cost of living is surging out of control. 

In order to impose the cost of the inflationary crisis on the working class, the US Federal Reserve and other central banks are working to raise the unemployment rate by increasing interest rates, in the process triggering a selloff of every financial asset that is, by some measures, without precedent since the Great Depression.

The inflationary crisis is propelling workers into struggle, most visibly manifested in the UK rail strike that begins today. Historically, ruling classes have used war as a means to divert attention outwards, while using the war effort as a pretense to suppress strikes and working class opposition.

The response of the Putin government is completely bankrupt. Putin believes that through military brinkmanship, some settlement can be made with the imperialist powers allowing for a more egalitarian distribution of global power. His belief is that, by applying pressure on Russia’s “Western partners,” there could be some sort of settlement to the war.

But there can be no peaceful settlement of the global crisis that has led to the eruption of the war in Ukraine. The imperialist powers are bent on the subjugation and carve-up of Russia and China. They are engaging in a series of provocations that threaten a civilization-ending nuclear war. Any military escalation by Putin in response, like the invasion of Ukraine, can only produce a bloodbath that plays into the hands of the imperialist powers.

There is no military solution to the present crisis, which ultimately cannot be resolved within the framework of the nation-state system. The war is the most advanced expression of a crisis gripping all of capitalist society.

Decades of Research Document the Detrimental Health Effects of BPA

Tracey Woodruff

Whether or not you’ve heard of the chemical bisphenol A, better known as BPA, studies show that it’s almost certainly in your body. BPA is used in the manufacturing of products like plastic water bottles, baby bottles, toys and food packaging, including in the lining of cans.

BPA is one of many harmful chemicals in everyday products and a poster child for chemicals in plastics. It is probably best known for its presence in baby bottles due to campaigns by organizations such as Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families and Breast Cancer Prevention Partners.

An extensive body of research has linked BPA to reproductive health problems, including endometriosis, infertility, diabetes, asthma, obesity and harming fetal neurodevelopment.

After years of pressure from environmental and public health advocates, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration agreed in June 2022 to reevaluate the health risks of BPA. This is significant because a vast body of research has documented that BPA is leaching from products and packaging into our food and drink and ultimately our bodies.

What is BPA?

BPA is not only used in plastics and food and drink containers but also in pizza boxes, shopping receipts, liners of aluminum cans and much more. Scientists have found that BPA is an endocrine disruptor, which means it disrupts hormonal systems that support the body’s functioning and health.

Hormonal disruption is a particular problem during pregnancy and fetal development, when even minor changes can alter the trajectory of developmental processes, including brain and metabolic development.

Over the last two decades, public awareness about the risks led many companies to remove BPA from their products. As a result, studies have shown that BPA levels in people’s bodies appear to be declining in the U.S. However, a nationwide research team that I helped lead as part of a national NIH consortium showed in a recent study of pregnant women that the decline in BPA could in part be explained by the fact that BPA replacement chemicals have been on the rise over the last 12 years. And other studies have found that many BPA substitutes are typically just as harmful as the original.

As an environmental health scientist and professor and director of the University of California, San Francisco Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment who specializes in how toxic chemicals affect pregnancy and child development, I am part of a scientific panel that decides if chemicals are reproductive or developmental toxicants for the State of California. In 2015, this committee declared BPA a reproductive toxicant because it has been shown to be toxic to ovaries.

BPA and the FDA

BPA was first approved for use in food packaging by the FDA in the 1960s. In 2008, the agency released a draft report concluding that “BPA remains safe in food contact materials.” This assessment was met with pushback from many health advocates and environmental health organizations. The FDA claimed BPA to be “safe in food contact materials” as recently as 2018.

Meanwhile, since 2011, Canada and Europe have taken steps to ban or limit BPA in children’s products. In 2021, the European Union proposed “dramatic” decreases in BPA exposure limits due to a growing body of evidence linking BPA to health harms.

One of the major challenges to limiting harmful chemicals is that regulatory agencies like the FDA try to figure out the levels of exposure that they consider harmful. In the U.S., both the FDA and the Environmental Protection Agency have a long history of underestimating exposures – in some cases because they do not adequately capture “real-world exposures,” or because they fail to fully consider how even small exposures can affect vulnerable populations such as pregnant women and children.

Latest research

A large body of research has explored BPA’s effects on reproductive health. These studies have also revealed that many BPA substitutes are potentially even worse than BPA and have looked at how these chemicals act in combination with other chemical exposures that can also come from a variety of sources.

And while much attention has been paid to BPA’s effects on pregnancy and child development, there is also significant research on its effects on male reproductive health. It has been linked to prostate cancer and drops in sperm count.

In a study our research team conducted that measured BPA in pregnant women, we asked study participants if they knew about BPA or tried to avoid BPA. Many of our study participants said they knew about it or tried to avoid it, but we found their actions appeared to have no effect on exposure levels. We believe this is, in part, because of BPA’s presence in so many products, some of them known and some unknown that are difficult to control.

What you can do

One of the most common questions our staff and clinicians that work with patients are asked is how to avoid harmful chemicals like BPA and BPA substitutes. A good rule of thumb is to avoid drinking and eating from plastics, microwaving food in plastic and using plastic take-out containers – admittedly easier said than done. Even some paper take-out containers can be lined with BPA or BPA substitutes.

Our recent review of the research found that avoiding plastic containers and packaging, fast and processed foods and canned food and beverages, and instead using alternatives like glass containers and consuming fresh food, can reduce exposures to BPA and other endocrine-disrupting chemicals.

Research has shown that when heat comes into contact with plastic – whether water bottles, Tupperware, take-out containers or cans – BPA and other chemicals are more likely to leach into the food inside. One should also avoid putting hot food into a food processor or putting plastic containers into the dishwasher. Heat breaks down the plastic, and while the product might appear fine, the chemicals are more likely to migrate into the food or drink – and ultimately, into you.

We also know that when acidic foods like tomatoes are packaged in cans, they have higher levels of BPA in them. And the amount of time food is stored in plastic or BPA-lined cans can also be a factor in how much the chemicals migrate into the food.

No matter how much people do as individuals, policy change is essential to reducing harmful chemical exposures. A large part of our work at UCSF’s Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment is to hold regulatory agencies accountable for assessing chemical risks and protecting public health. What we have learned is that it is essential for agencies like the EPA and FDA to use the most up-to-date science and scientific methods to determine risk.

Hung parliament emerges from French legislative elections in debacle for Macron

Kumaran Ira & Alex Lantier

President Emmanuel Macron’s Ensemble (“Together”) coalition failed to win a majority of France’s National Assembly in the second round of the French legislative elections yesterday. The result, coming amid a wave of strikes and protests against inflation, is a stinging defeat for Macron. It is the first time since 1988 that the president’s party failed to win an absolute majority of 289 in the 577-seat Assembly in legislative elections immediately following a presidential election.

French President Emmanuel Macron delivers his speech during a presidential campaign news conference in Aubervilliers, north of Paris, France, Thursday, March 17, 2022. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)

According to Interior Ministry figures early this morning, Ensemble won 246 seats, Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s New Popular, Ecological and Social Union (NUPES) 142, Marine Le Pen’s neo-fascist National Rally (NR) 89, and the right-wing The Republicans (LR) 64. Abstention hit a record high of 54 percent.

Macron campaigned on an anti-worker programme of raising the retirement age by three years to 65, forcing welfare recipients to work for their benefits, and hiking university tuition. Coming amid strikes in airports, health care, trucking and mass transit against the surge in prices and to demand wage increases and more purchasing power, the result was a disaster.

Leading Ensemble candidates suffered humiliating defeats. Former Interior Minister and parliamentary group chairman for Macron’s Republic on the March (LREM) party Christophe Castaner lost to NUPES candidate Léo Walter in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence. Former National Assembly speaker and LREM leader Richard Ferrand was beaten in the Finistère region of Brittany.

Several ministers of the interim government Macron installed after the April 24 presidential elections failed to win re-election. Health Minister Brigitte Bourguignon, Sea Minister Justine Benin and Ecology Minister Amélie de Montchalin were all eliminated and will now have to leave the government. Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne narrowly won re-election with 52 percent of the vote against a young and unknown NUPES challenges, Noé Gauchard.

Former Health Minister Olivier Véran told TF1 television that despite failing to win a majority, Macron would manage to keep ramming through his social cuts. “We will very rapidly build a majority so it becomes absolute in the National Assembly, we will see what the conditions involved will be,” Véran said, adding: “Other parliamentary groups will provide us with enough votes to present reforms and get them passed.”

LR parliamentary group president Christian Jacob announced that his deputies would not support Macron’s agenda. “As far as we are concerned, we campaigned in the opposition, we are an opposition, and we will stay in opposition,” Jacob said.

Mélenchon, whose NUPES coalition is now the principal parliamentary opposition party, said that the “debacle of the presidential party” was “total.”

Mélenchon repeated his argument that France is now polarized in three camps, between Macron’s “liberals,” the far right, and his “popular” party. He said, “France expressed itself, insufficiently it must be said, because the abstention levels are still far too high, which means that much of France does not know where to turn, and the three blocs are at similar levels.”

He criticized Macron’s party for not clearly calling to vote for NUPES against RN candidates and thus helping the RN reach its record score in the elections. “It’s the failure of Macronism, the moral failure of all those who lectured everyone. They reinforced the RN. The Macronists lectured us but they were not able to give a clear vote call in 52 districts, which means that they can’t give us moral lessons about anything at all.”

Mélenchon won a large vote by pledging to bring the retirement age back to 60, freeze prices, and oppose Macron’s anti-social agenda. However, it is also clear that his entire perspective for the legislative elections, based on ignoring the class struggle and making no attempt to mobilize his millions of working class voters in mass protests or strikes, has failed. He said he could impose his social agenda by winning a majority of the Assembly and becoming prime minister.

While polls always showed that the NUPES would fail to win a majority, Mélenchon claimed that his parliamentary actions would stop Macron’s cuts and impose a more progressive government.

The hung parliament reveals the rapid escalation of political tensions in France and internationally. It portends a protracted crisis, as Macron scrambles to rally support for his legislative agenda, perhaps from either LR or Mélenchon’s NUPES. At the same time, the ruling class is channeling enormous efforts and resources behind neo-fascists and allied elements of the officer corps who have called for the deployment of the army in France to carry out domestic repression.

Le Pen hailed her RN’s parliamentary group, noting that it is “by far the largest in the history of our political tendency. … The people has decided to send a very powerful parliamentary group of deputies from the National Rally to the Assembly.” She declared forthrightly that she plans to take power after Macron’s term is over.

Calling the newly-elected RN deputies the “vanguard of the new political elite that will take power when the Macron adventure ends,” she said: “We have attained the three objectives we set ourselves. These were: making Emmanuel Macron a minority president; … seeking to carry out the necessary political recomposition; … and building a viable opposition group to both the deconstructionists from above, the Macronists, and the deconstructionists from below, the anti-Republican far left.”

The hung parliament, the collapse of Macron’s party and the rapid growth of both the far right and of Mélenchon’s party are so many warnings that irreconcilable political and class conflicts are mounting in France and across Europe.

France and the entire NATO alliance are recklessly waging war with Russia in Ukraine, and Macron has called to issue requisitions to French industry and impose a “war economy” on the workers. At the same time, the explosive growth of inflation is provoking an upsurge of class struggles across the region. There have been nationwide public sector strikes in Tunisia and Italy, there will be similar national strikes in Morocco and Belgium today, and airports are on strike across Europe. In France, truckers and public transport workers are preparing a wave of strikes over the next two weeks.

Mélenchon’s failure to call substantial protests or become prime minister, as he had claimed he would, must be taken as a warning. Amid an explosive upsurge of the class struggle in France and across Europe, the ruling class is responding by putting forward law-and-order figures like Macron and supporters of far-right repression like Le Pen. Mélenchon himself, who has remained virtually silent on the coup threats from General Pierre de Villiers and his entourage, has outlined no clear perspective to mobilize a struggle against them.

Instead, when Macron traveled to Kiev to pledge Ukraine military assistance and put France in a “war economy” to prosecute war with Russia, Mélenchon supported him. Mélenchon told France Bleu radio: “I want to first of all echo [Macron’s] message of solidarity with Ukraine. I did this during the entire presidential campaign, I think it is good for the president to recall what side the French people are on—all of them, without exception.” This capitulation to Macron’s arguments for imperialist war sets the stage for capitulation to Macron all down the line.

The solution to the mounting crisis of capitalism will not be found in the French parliament, or in the manoeuvres of Mélenchon and the French union bureaucracy, but in the global class struggle. A powerful and growing movement of strikes is opposing mass impoverishment via inflation and the mounting danger of all-out war between the major nuclear powers.

Senate panel approves record US military budget for 2022-2023

Patrick Martin

The Senate Armed Services Committee has voted to approve a record $858 billion in military spending for Fiscal Year 2023, an increase of $45 billion over the Biden administration’s budget request, and nearly $80 billion over the amount appropriated by Congress for the current fiscal year.

The vote came by a margin of 23-3, demonstrating the support of both capitalist parties, Democrats and Republicans, for a further build-up of the US war machine, including the US intervention in the war in Ukraine. 

It is the 62nd consecutive year that the two parties have joined together to approve the yearly National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which has rubber-stamped US wars in Vietnam, Serbia, Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, as well as military aggression in Bosnia, Kosovo, Panama, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and across the Middle East and North Africa.

The gargantuan sum of $858 billion proposed under the NDAA is approximately a 10 percent increase over what was authorized last year and nearly 6 percent more than the Biden administration asked for.

US tanks are unloaded in Antwerp, Belgium to take part in the Atlantic Resolve military exercises. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)

Much of the increase was to take into account the impact of inflation, particularly skyrocketing fuel costs, on the operations of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines. American workers are expected to tighten their belts to pay for gasoline approaching $6 a gallon, but the US war machine will not be restricted in any way by such considerations.

The Biden administration budget was already based on assuming a 7 percent inflation rate, but both Senate Republicans and Democrats insisted on a higher figure in calculating the Pentagon’s costs. The White House proposed an increase of $31 billion over the current fiscal year, from $782 billion to $813 billion. The Senate committee version of the NDAA thus represents a total increase of $76 billion over the current year.

Both the Democratic chairman and the Republican ranking member on the committee praised the legislation effusively. Chairman Jack Reed of Rhode Island said, “The committee held a robust debate and came together to support a bill that will help safeguard the nation against a range of evolving threats while supporting our troops both on and off the battlefield.” 

This year’s NDAA is named in honor of the Republican ranking member, James Inhofe of Oklahoma, who is leaving Congress at the end of this year. Inhofe said of the increased spending, “It’s everything I hoped for.”

The bill authorizes $817.3 billion for the Department of Defense, as well as $29.7 billion in military programs in other departments, mostly for nuclear weapons production by the Department of Energy. Another $10.6 billion will be provided for other “defense-related” programs, bringing the total to $857.6 billion.

The rapid approval of the NDAA—it is expected to pass both houses of Congress before the end of July and be sent to President Biden for his signature—is in sharp contrast to the legislative roadblocks erected to the far smaller legislation to fund COVID-19 programs that have exhausted their resources, ending funding to subsidize free vaccinations and prophylactic drug treatments for the deadly pandemic.

The increase in military spending is more than the entire amount requested by the Biden administration for COVID relief, which has since been whittled down to only $10 billion, less that the Armed Services Committee backed for “other,” unidentified military-related spending. The COVID relief bill, now apparently doomed, amounts to barely more than 1 percent of the total military budget.

Under its standard procedure, Congress asked each armed service command to provide an “unfunded priorities” list of spending that had been rejected by the White House as unnecessary. The total came to $21.5 billion, and the Armed Services Committee funded every dollar, effectively overruling the civilian authority in favor of the military brass.

Among the weapons purchases authorized are 68 F-35 warplanes, an increase of seven over the Pentagon request, and eight new warships, including two more nuclear-powered submarines, two destroyers and a frigate.

The bill provides an across-the-board military pay raise of 4.6 percent, while setting service levels at 1,338,000 total: about half a million for the Army and half a million for the Navy and Marine Corps combined, with the balance in the Air Force and Space Force.

The bill also requires women to register for the draft, which has not been utilized for 50 years but could be required in the event of a major war against Russia or China. Three right-wing Republicans opposed that provision, but it is not clear whether they were the three votes against the overall bill.

Only one Democrat, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, opposed the NDAA in the committee last year. This year, however, she praised the legislation for its “green” character. “The legislation would require at least 75 percent of all nontactical vehicles, such as cars, vans, and light-duty trucks purchased or leased by DoD or procured or leased by the General Services Agency (GSA) for DoD, to be electric or zero-emission vehicles, while applying Buy American and other standards to create good American jobs,” according to a statement from her office.

The House Armed Services Committee passed similar legislation before the vote by the Senate panel but at a lower level of spending. The House committee will mark up a final version of the NDAA on June 22 and is expected to raise spending along the lines of the Senate version.

Certain provisions in the NDAA indicate the priorities of American imperialism for the coming year. Some of the extra money would bulk up funding for Ukraine amid its war with Russia. Specifically, the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative would get $800 million, instead of the $300 million requested by the Biden administration, according to a bipartisan summary of the bill. This is for the fiscal year that begins October 1, indicating that US officials fully expect the war to continue raging.

Another $2.7 billion is for the Pentagon to order additional munitions, including artillery rounds, to replace those already sent to Ukraine.

Other sums are earmarked for “security challenges posed by China,” including $1 billion for the National Defense Stockpile to “acquire strategic and critical minerals,” and $245 million for the establishment of a joint forces headquarters in the Indo-Pacific region.

The bill makes it US government policy to position US forces “to deny a fait accompli” in terms of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. This would involve increasing US deployments in the region to block China from “using military force to unilaterally change the status quo with Taiwan.”

The NDAA also authorizes procurement of several weapons systems from Israel, including the Iron Dome short-range rocket defense system and two others: the “David’s Sling Weapon System” and the Arrow 3 Upper Tier Interceptor Program.

Young Scots for Independence embraces NATO

Darren Paxton

Young Scots for Independence (YSI), the youth wing of the Scottish National Party (SNP), has voted in favour of an independent Scotland joining NATO.

The YSI had opposed NATO membership for a decade after the SNP reversed its previous opposition to the US-led military alliance. The YSI’s shift signals that all pacifist and anti-war sentiments around the SNP will be suppressed and underscores the party’s full support for the proxy-war against Russia by US and British imperialism in Ukraine.

Jack O’Neil, a leading YSI member who spearheaded the policy change, tweeted it was, “One of the proudest moments in my political life. Over the moon that the YSI have affirmed their support for NATO. Delighted to propose the resolution and play my part over years in adopting this sensible foreign policy.”

His tweet included a photo of himself and a YSI colleague holding a NATO flag.

O’Neil is the type of political careerist that stuffs every level of the SNP. His LinkedIn profile shows he has served as Communications Assistant for the House of Commons for four years, doubtless building relationships with senior political figures in and out of the SNP.

In running for a National Executive Committee (NEC) spot, he boasted of his rapid rise through the ranks of the SNP, “I joined the SNP prior to the 2014 referendum… I quickly became a Youth Officer, and later PEO [Political Education Officer] of the Ellon/District branch”. He moved to Aberdeen and then Dundee where he was elected as branch convener, one of the youngest in Scotland to hold this position. He joined the YSI’s NEC serving as Northeast regional convenor, a position he held longer than any other member in the party’s history.

O’Neil’s careerism, youth and pro-war politics are a perfect resource for the SNP, explaining his rapid rise in the party.

His Twitter feed showcases O’Neil’s admiration for the SNP’s viciously pro-war Westminster defence spokesperson, Stewart McDonald, whom he regularly retweets. He has also retweeted Toomas Hendrik Ilves, president of Estonia from 2006 until 2016. Ilves’s Twitter feed is littered with anti-Russia propaganda depicting Russian soldiers as emotionless child murderers, with retweets advocating “shell the Russians” to “oblivion”. O’Neil mixes these with reposts celebrating Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian forces from pro-war pages including the fascistic ‘Defence of Ukraine’ run by the Ukrainian state.

In celebrating the YSI’s endorsement of NATO, O’Neil describes the imperialist military alliance as “progressive” and in “stark contrast to… Imperialist Russia”. This turns reality on its head. The war in Ukraine is raging as a direct result of NATO’s expansion eastwards and military encirclement of Russia. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is not an expression of “Russian imperialism” but rather a reactionary and reckless response to NATO aggression. The sanctions on Russia have been so devastating precisely because Russia is not an imperialist power.

The NATO alliance described by the YSI as “progressive” has reduced entire societies to rubble in the Middle East and countless other war zones. Millions lost their lives and centuries of development was wiped out by NATO-backed military intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan, far eclipsing anything Putin is accused of in Ukraine.

In the aftermath of the YSI’s vote, O’Neil absurdly claimed that the SNP’s nominal opposition to Trident nuclear weapons was compatible with its advocacy of membership in a pro-nuclear NATO. He wrote, “This does not for a second put us at odds with our commitment to remove nuclear weapons from Scotland, nor does it end our opposition to the existence of weapons of mass destruction.” The delirious celebration of NATO across the SNP exposes its opposition to Trident as window dressing for a right-wing and pro-war party of the British establishment.

Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s First Minister and leader of the Scottish National Party, made this clear on May 16, when she travelled to the Brookings Institute in Washington. There she prostrated the SNP before NATO and grovelled to US imperialism.

Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo)

Sturgeon spoke at the Brookings Institute’s “European Energy Security” webinar titled, “Scotland and the future of European energy security”. Her session explored how Scotland can help isolate Russia economically and advance NATO’s operations in Europe.

John Allen, President of the Brookings Institute, introduced Sturgeon, reminding her what Scottish capitalism stands to gain in destroying Russia, “With enormous stakes not just for Europe but for the entire planet, this discussion comes at a critical time. And today’s conversation will focus on Scotland’s not-insignificant role... and the benefits of transitioning to a greener economy and what’s needed, especially in the wake of Russia’s destabilization of fossil fuel energy supplies to boost Scottish and European energy security and self-reliance.”

The First Minister fell over herself committing Scotland to NATO’s war, “I want to be very clear today to you here in the United States that Scotland stands with the United Kingdom, the European Union, and countries around the world, including of course the United States, in our condemnation of Putin’s actions. We support the severity of economic sanctions on Russia and also the supply of military assistance to Ukraine.”

Sturgeon has been one of the loudest advocates for a no-fly zone over Ukraine that would provide a pretext for all-out war with Russia. She continued this belligerent stance in her Brookings speech. She called for maximum participation in the war, proclaiming it was the “duty” of every so-called democracy “to offer tangible support and solidarity to Ukraine…”

Sturgeon lauded German militarism as an example for the rest of the world’s “democracies” to follow, “Germany has reversed its long-standing position of not supplying arms to conflict zones, and it has set out plans to significantly increase its own defence spending.” She continued “I am firm in my view that–coupled with a strong relationship with the UK–membership of the EU and of NATO will be cornerstones of an independent Scotland’s Security policy.”

The SNP leader signalled her willingness to use Scotland’s geographic position in NATO’s war plans against Russia.

“The Scottish Government is acutely aware of Scotland’s strategic position... close to the Arctic”, she said. The Arctic is critical for NATO. A report by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in 2010, “U.S. Strategic Interests in the Arctic: An Assessment of Current Challenges and New Opportunities for Cooperation”, explained how global warming was opening new transportation pathways to “oil, gas, minerals, fish” as “viable sources of profit.” It called for a “plan of action” against Russia to ensure “US leadership” over the region.

Sturgeon did not mention it, but another strategic battleground making Scotland vital to NATO’s war against Russia is the so-called GIUK Gapvast stretches of the North Atlantic separating Greenland, Iceland and the UK. A report and tabletop exercise “Forgotten Waters” from the think tank CNAS (Centre for a New American Security) in May 2017 explored precisely how NATO would utilise this region in a Third World War against Russia.

The report explained that control of this “gap” is vital in isolating Russia and controlling the movement of military and cargo ships through this passage, “The GIUK Gap forms the principal choke point between Russia’s great Northern Fleet and its strategic interests in the North Atlantic and all points south”. The region is also filled with underwater telecommunication cables that are critical for military communications and daily life. The report called for a massive increase in sea, air and land arms spending.

Sturgeon pledged at Brookings that an independent Scotland would be a trustworthy ally, “And so we are clearer than ever that membership of NATO would… be the principal way in which an Independent Scotland, in an interdependent world, would contribute to the collective security of our neighbours and allies”.

Turkey arrests Kurdish journalists, politicians and prepares to invade Syria

Ulaş Ateşçi

Sixteen of the 20 Kurdish journalists detained in Diyarbakir on June 8 were arrested and sent to prison on Thursday, as President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s government escalates attacks on press freedom.

The World Socialist Web Site condemns these attacks and demands the release of all journalists. Faced with ever-increasing inflation and poverty, as well as a growing opposition and strike movement within the working class, the Erdoğan government is trying to use militarism and chauvinism to suppress the class struggle and target basic democratic rights.

IMAGE: Arrested journalists from Kurdish press. [Credit: Mezopotamya Agency]

Among the arrested journalists are Dicle Fırat Journalists Association (DFG) Co-Chair Serdar Altan, Xwebûn Managing Editor Mehmet Ali Ertaş, JinNews Director Safiye Alagaş, JinNews Editor Gülşen Koçuk, and Mezopotamya Agency (MA) Editor Aziz Oruç.

The journalists were arrested on charges of “membership” in the outlawed Kurdistan Communities Union (KCK), an umbrella group that includes the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), the Democratic Union Party (PYD) in Syria, the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK) in Iran, and Kurdistan Democratic Solution Party (PÇDK) in Iraq. This so-called accusation is a pretext that the Turkish state has used for decades to carry out arrests.

According to the Mezopotamya Agency, the investigation, based on testimony from secret and open witnesses, alleges that journalists used interviews with KCK leaders as “instructions” to make TV shows. One of the charges leveled against the arrested journalists is that they made shows for Kurdish television stations abroad.

One charge against Elif Üngür is that she made a TV show on the campaign to free imprisoned Kurdish artist Nûdem Durak, who has been supported by artists such as Roger Waters internationally. Üngür is also accused of showing images of Qamışlo, a town in northeastern Syria held by Kurdish-nationalist forces, in a TV show.

While JinNews Editor Gülşen Koçuk was asked whether she followed the “Justice Watch” campaign for sick prisoners, journalist Lezgin Akdeniz was asked about his phone calls with news sources and his TV show on murders by JİTEM. An unofficial state intelligence agency, JİTEM was infamous for many unsolved civilian murders in the Kurdish region during the Turkish state’s war on the PKK in the 1990s.

The journalists’ arrest was justified on the grounds that their news reports “informed the group [KCK] about the Turkish Army’s course of action, praised and encouraged the group’s [KCK] acts of force and violence.” Resul Temur, one of the journalists’ lawyers, told the daily BirGün that the whole process was full of lawlessness and irregularities.

Temur said that during the 8 days the journalists were in detention, they were not given any information about their case or even shown the detention and confidentiality order. He added, “The prosecutor’s office even told [a journalist during the interrogation:] ‘You mentioned the ‘Kurdish problem. What kind of problem do Kurds have?’ But they did not record this in the minutes. There was an 80 hour-long content in the investigation, but we couldn’t see it... In fact, we saw that there was no reason for them to be detained.”

These arrests follow a series of police raids on the legal Kurdish-nationalist Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) and associated parties in Turkey. Earlier this month, 29 executives of the Peoples’ Democratic Congress (HDK), an umbrella organization of which the HDP is also a member, were arrested on charges of “being KCK members” and “making propaganda for the group” as part of an investigation by the Tekirdağ Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office.

On Thursday, 12 people, including journalist Saliha Aras from the Demokratik Modernite magazine and executives and members of the HDP, were detained in house raids in Istanbul.

Last week, HDK and several other organizations tried to organize a march from various parts of the country to Gemlik, where PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan is being held on an island named İmralı, to protest the isolation imposed on him. Öcalan has been in prison since 1999. The last time Öcalan was allowed to meet with his lawyers was in August 2019, and the last time he was allowed to make phone calls was in April 2020.

While marches to Gemlik from cities such as Istanbul, Diyarbakır and Van were not allowed, dozens of people were detained during police attacks on the protests. Two of those detained in Kadıköy, İstanbul were arrested.

The mass arrests of Kurdish journalists and increased crackdown on Kurdish politicians comes as the Erdoğan government continues its operation against PKK forces in Iraq and prepares to attack the US-backed, PYD-linked YPG militias in Syria.

On May 23, Erdoğan signaled an invasion into Syria, stating: “We are starting to take new steps soon regarding the remaining parts of the works which we have launched to create 30-kilometer-deep secure zones along our southern borders.”

Ankara has demanded that its NATO allies, particularly Washington, stop supporting the YPG as a proxy force in Syria, and has carried out numerous operations in Syria since 2016 to block the emergence of a Kurdish state on its southern borders. The Turkish Armed Forces and their Islamist proxies now control around 10 percent of Syria, where 4.4 million people reportedly live.

The latest military announcement came after Erdoğan threatened to veto Sweden’s and Finland’s request to join NATO against Russia, on the grounds that they support the PKK and YPG.

In early June, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken made clear Washington’s opposition to a Turkish invasion targeting its main proxies in Syria. He said: “Any escalation in northern Syria is something that we would oppose, and we support the maintenance of the current ceasefire lines.”

The Russian government also criticized Erdogan’s plans. “Such a move, in the absence of the agreement of the legitimate government of the Syrian Arab Republic, would be a direct violation of Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” said Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson María Zakharova, adding: “We hope that Ankara will refrain from actions that could lead to a dangerous deterioration of the already difficult situation in Syria.”

Moreover, speaking to RT on June 9, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said: “If there is an invasion, there will be popular resistance in the first stage.... Of course, in the places where the Syrian army is positioned, and it is not deployed to all regions in Syria, and when military conditions allow for confrontation, we will do this.”

The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), whose backbone is the YPG, said it would respond to a possible Turkish invasion by seeking military support from the Syrian regime. However, the US and Turkey have waged a war for regime against Assad’s government since 2011, leading to hundreds of thousands of deaths and turning millions more into refugees.

On June 5, SDF commander Mazloum Abdi said that the Syrian government should use its air defence systems against Turkish planes and that the SDF were “open” to working with Syrian army to fight off Turkish forces.

This points to the potential for a dangerous escalation that could once again pit NATO member state Turkey against Russian-backed Syrian forces. Ankara’s preparations to invade Syria and the Kurdish-nationalists’ role as a US proxy expose the bankruptcy and reactionary character of Turkish and Kurdish nationalism, both of which seek to cut deals with imperialism.

One in five Canadians eating less due to food price rises, as Liberal government squanders billions on war

Steve Hill

A recent survey commissioned by Food Banks Canada revealed that a growing number of Canadians report they are facing hunger and food insecurity due to rising inflation and housing costs. Inflation hit a three-decade high in April, reaching almost seven percent.

Food bank (Credit: U.S.Air Force)

The survey, conducted by Mainstreet Research, shows that one in five, an estimated 7 million Canadians, now report going hungry—with 23 percent reporting that they are eating less “than they think they should” because they do not have enough money for food. The percentage among those earning less than $50,000 per year who are eating less was almost double the overall average.

Food banks across Canada typically see an easing of demand during the summer months, but this year there has been no sign of slow-downs. “Food banks in most regions of Canada are experiencing an influx of Canadians visiting food banks for the first time—a number that's increased by up to 25 percent in some regions, which we haven't seen since the first few months of the pandemic,” stated Kirsten Beardsley, Food Banks Canada’s CEO.

“The biggest sign that inflation is seriously impacting hunger and food insecurity in Canada, is that the reasons why people say they are coming to food banks is changing,” Beardley noted. “In the past, people would turn to food banks during times of job loss, or due to lower wages—but over the past six months, Canadians are telling us that they are running out of money for food because of rising housing, gas, energy and food costs.”

Statistics Canada reports that consumers paid 9.7 percent more for groceries in April compared with a year ago, the largest year-on-year increase since September 1981. Pasta prices were up 19.6 percent, cereal products rose 13.9 percent, bread increased 12.2 percent and fresh fruit costs jumped 10 percent.

Speaking to CBC News, Breanna Cordeiro of Oakville, Ontario, said the rising price of gas combined with stagnant wages has forced her family to find ways to economize. “Where you look at budgeting, it’s like, where can we make some cuts?” she said. “And unfortunately, sometimes it has to be food.” Opting for more meatless meals and stocking up on groceries based largely on what is on sale goes so far, but even then, the mother of two said it can be tough. “The flyer comes out every Wednesday or Thursday, and it’s like, 'This is on sale? This is the sale price? That's what you used to pay full price, even six months ago’,” she said.

The Stop Community Food Centre, a Toronto food bank, cannot keep up with the growing number of people arriving hungry at its doors, and has been forced to reduce how much food it gives to each person. The food bank’s three locations currently serve about 400 meals a day—a 40 percent increase from 2019. During the pandemic, it allowed families to collect groceries twice a month, but they have been forced to change that policy. Maria Rio, director of development and communications, told The Breach, “With food costs and an increase in new clients, this became harder and harder to maintain so now we are back to once-a-month access per household.”

The grocery business in Canada is monopolized by five large corporations: Loblaws, Costco, Sobeys, Metro and Walmart, which control over 60 percent of retail market food sales. Every major chain has squeezed their customers and their employees. Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) economist David Macdonald reports that grocery stores “booked $7.3 billion in pre-tax profit in 2021.” That’s “more than double what they were clearing the year before the pandemic,” according to Macdonald.

The skyrocketing profits for big business on the one hand and stagnant wages for workers on the other as the cost of food and other basic necessities surge are not merely the product of economic forces, but the intended outcome of the policies pursued by the establishment political parties and the trade unions for decades.

The unions have enforced one round of concessions after another on workers, while systematically sabotaging their struggles against real-terms pay cuts, the gutting of benefits like cost-of-living adjustments, and the destruction of jobs. All political parties, from the New Democrats on the “left” to the Tories on the right, have presided over a low-tax, deregulated regime that has proven to be a bonanza for the super-rich and major corporations.

These long-standing developments were dramatically accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. The federal Liberal government, supported by the unions and NDP, handed over $650 billion to the financial markets and major banks overnight to protect their vast wealth, while forcing workers to remain on the job in dangerous conditions as the deadly virus spread.

With inflation surging over recent months, workers have been straining against the straitjacket imposed on them by the unions and have waged militant struggles for wage increases and improved working conditions. These struggles include 40,000 Ontario construction workers, more than 20,000 New Brunswick public sector workers, and rail workers at Canadian Pacific.

Aware of the anger building up among working people, the New Democrats have absurdly sought to portray themselves in a series of demagogic statements as friends of workers.

On June 8, New Democratic Party leader Jagmeet Singh posted a video on TikTok and Instagram of himself speaking in the House of Commons about the struggle faced by growing numbers of workers to feed themselves. “One out of every four Canadians in this country is going hungry because they cannot afford groceries. At the same time, corporations are making record profits. They’re breaking record after record. Our plan is to tax the excess profits,” Singh claimed.

Nobody can take such cynical posturing seriously. Singh’s NDP has been propping up the minority Liberal government since 2019 with the full support of the trade union bureaucracy. It backed the Trudeau government’s bailout of the super-rich at the beginning of the pandemic and the back-to-work campaign, which was aimed  at making working people pay for the hundreds of billions of dollars made available to the banks and major corporations. At the same time, all NDP MPs have backed Liberal budgets that have included billions of additional dollars in funding for Canada’s military.

In March of this year the NDP signed a “confidence-and-supply” agreement that will keep Justin Trudeau’s Liberal minority government in office through June 2025. The NDP and its backers in the unions explicitly hailed the deal as necessary to ensure “political stability,” allowing Canada to continue playing a major role in the imperialist powers’ war against Russia.

As the WSWS explained at the time, “The specific task of the NDP and their union allies will be to suppress worker struggles, while providing the Liberals with ‘left’ cover as the government pursues imperialist aggression and pivots to renewed austerity and “growing the economy”—a euphemism for a raft of pro-business policies from deregulation to privatization.”

The inflation rate has been spiraling upward for more than a year as the economic costs of the failure to end the pandemic, and the massive handouts to wealthy corporations, are imposed on the working class by the ruling elite’s policies. For more than two years, the NDP has collaborated with the unions and the Liberals to suppress strikes and deny legitimate wage demands, while promoting Canada’s imperialist ambitions around the world.

Yves Giroux, the Parliamentary Budget Officer, recently released a report stating the federal government would need to spend an additional $75.3 billion on defence over the next five years for Canada to reach NATO’s target of spending two percent of GDP on defence. Based on government figures, Giroux forecasts that Canada’s total military spending will increase from $36.3 billion in the 2022-23 fiscal year to approximately $51 billion in 2026-27.

Notwithstanding Singh’s blather about taxing the corporations, his party is the fifth wheel in a government that is committed to ensuring that the funds needed to fund Canada’s massive rearmament program will come from gutting what remains of the social safety net and ratcheting up the exploitation of the working class.