27 Oct 2016

EU crisis deepens as trade deal with Canada stalls

Jordan Shilton

The Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) between the European Union (EU) and Canada, which was to have been signed today in Brussels, is in limbo and could soon fall apart after two of Belgium’s four regional administrations demanded changes.
On October 14, the regional parliament in French-speaking Wallonia voted against granting the federal Belgian government the right to approve the deal. It has since been joined in its rejection of CETA by the Brussels region. Wallonia objected to the deal’s impact on its agriculture if it has to compete against imports from Canada, one of the world’s leading agricultural exporters.
Other issues are involved, however, including the deep-rooted frictions between Belgium’s French and Flemish-speaking ruling elites, and concerns that CETA will bolster corporate power at the expense of the capitalist nation-state.
On Monday, Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel announced his government could not sign the deal. This followed last-ditch talks over the weekend, as EU officials tried to cajole the Belgians to sign the deal, while urging Canada not to prematurely abandon efforts to secure CETA’s ratification.
Last Friday, Canadian Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland walked out of the negotiations, declaring that the EU could not secure the requisite unanimous support of its member states. Before departing for Canada on Saturday after talks with the head of the EU Parliament, Martin Schulz, Freeland tempered her remarks, saying Canada had done all it could and the ball was now in Europe’s court.
Yesterday, EU Council President Donald Tusk held out hope that the signing ceremony could proceed, and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he would travel to Brussels today regardless. However, as of late Wednesday evening, talks between the regional and federal Belgian governments had failed to secure an endorsement of CETA, though the parties had reportedly agreed to a formula under which Belgium or any of its regions could sign the deal with reservations leaving them free to leave CETA at any time.
CETA, like the free trade deal being pursued between the EU and United States, is a reactionary plan to boost corporate profits by eliminating trade tariffs and giving corporations unprecedented powers to take legal action against states that implement policies counter to their interests. These trade and investment deals would also go a long way to eliminating what little remains of labour protection, wage guarantees, environmental regulations and consumer protection rights.
Whether or not the deal is finalised, conflicts over CETA have once again starkly exposed the advanced state of decomposition of the EU.
Leading EU politicians view the present impasse as intolerable. Bernd Lange, the Social Democrat chair of the European Parliament’s trade committee, told Spiegel Online that the failure to conclude CETA is “a further step in the destruction of the EU.”
Manfred Weber, chairman of the conservative European People’s Party group in the European Parliament and a close ally of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, called for limiting the powers of national states on foreign trade, stating Tuesday that the right of regional and national parliaments to block such deals had “nothing to do with more democracy.”
Their concern is not merely CETA, but the impact the delay will have on the EU’s ability to conclude larger trade agreements with the United States (the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, TTIP) and China. The progress of TTIP already appears highly doubtful, as leading politicians, including French President François Hollande and German Deputy Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, have declared the talks to have failed due to deepening transatlantic divisions.
As a series of official papers published since the Brexit vote make clear, France and above all Germany are determined to more aggressively assert their interests through the EU, both by concluding trade deals and by carrying out an autonomous foreign policy from Washington. Merkel said the issue was how to “assert our interests—economic, social, ecological, foreign and security policy—against global competition.”
This agenda was summed up by Tusk at the European Parliament yesterday. He warned that Europe’s global position would be damaged if it could not reach a trade deal with Canada, “the most European country outside Europe and a close friend and ally.”
Similarly, Germany’s Spiegel Online described the blockade of CETA by Wallonia as possibly “the greatest debacle in the history of its foreign trade policy.”
Trudeau made similar warnings earlier this month. Falsely casting CETA as “progressive,” he stated in a joint press conference with French Prime Minister Manuel Valls : “In this post-Brexit situation where there are a great many questions about Europe’s usefulness. If Europe cannot manage to sign this agreement, then that sends a very clear message not just to Europe, but to the whole world.”
The failure of CETA would also be a major setback for Canada’s ruling elite, which is anxious to expand economic ties with Europe and Asia. Canada’s economy is among the most trade-dependent in the world, but both of the major trade deals being pursued by Ottawa—CETA and the US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)—are in jeopardy.
As ruling classes worldwide turn towards protectionist policies, the Canadian bourgeoisie also faces the prospect of a renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) after the US presidential election. While Republican Donald Trump has led the way in attacks on NAFTA, Democrat Hillary Clinton has also expressed reservations about it.
The former Conservative government of Stephen Harper launched negotiations on CETA, hoping to make Europe a major export market for Canadian agricultural products and oil. This goal became more tangible with the sanctions imposed on Russia following the February 2014 Western-backed coup in Ukraine and the rise of explosive geopolitical tensions between Moscow and NATO.
Trudeau’s Liberals endorsed CETA, giving it a higher priority, at least publicly, than the TPP. After last June’s Brexit vote, sections of Canadian big business argued that implementing CETA was all the more important as Britain would no longer be a reliable gateway to European markets.
For their part, British ruling circles are viewing the crisis of the CETA deal with mounting concern. Supporters of Brexit previously pointed to the Canada-EU trade deal as a possible model for the future British-EU relationship, but CETA talks took seven years and could potentially now end in failure.
The Financial Times noted on Tuesday that increased pressure from national parliaments for a say on trade deals meant that a country like Britain trying to seal an agreement with the EU would “face a very difficult challenge.”
James Moore wrote in the Independent on the potential pitfalls in Britain-EU trade talks: “Perhaps the Spanish will decide to throw a spanner into the works unless there’s some movement on the question of Gibraltar. You could hardly blame the Poles for digging their heels in given the way Britain has treated the citizens of that country who live here. Maybe the French will decide it’s time for some payback for past British obstructionism.”

China: CCP plenum on tightening party discipline signals inner crisis

Peter Symonds

The Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been meeting in closed-door session this week to focus on a further tightening of party discipline as President Xi Jinping, who is also CCP general secretary, consolidates his grip on power. The four-day plenum started on Monday and is the sixth since Xi was installed as party leader in late 2012.
Xi’s determination to stamp out any threat from rivals is not just the product of personal ambition, but reflects the inner crisis of the Stalinist regime which confronts a slowing economy, mounting social and class tensions and Washington’s aggressive “pivot to Asia” aimed at undermining and subordinating China. The CCP, which is riven with factional divisions and rests on a narrow social base, represents above all the interests of the super-wealthy oligarchs who have enriched themselves from the processes of capitalist restoration over the past four decades.
After assuming office, Xi launched a sweeping anti-corruption campaign that has resulted in punishment being meted out to more than one million CCP members. The Chinese president has used the purge to weaken and remove factional rivals and make a pitch to broad public hostility against the privileged bureaucratic apparatus that presides over a widening social gulf between rich and poor.
In a televised speech last Friday, Xi outlined the agenda for this week’s sixth plenum, declaring that “we must strengthen the party’s leadership, persist with strict party discipline.” Pointing to the dangers confronting the regime, he said: “We must work to prevent the systemic risk [in the economy] and avoid the risks of [political] upheavals.”
The plenum takes place in the lead-up to next year’s CCP congress which will preside over leadership changes. While Xi and Premier Li Keqiang seem certain to retain their positions on the seven-member Politburo Standing Committee—the party’s top decision making body, the other five members are due to stand down. Xi is seeking to ensure that the replacements will be loyal to his leadership.
Since 2012, Xi has used the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection to carry out an unprecedented crackdown that has terminated the careers of more than 150 officials, military officers and state-sector business executives with the rank of vice-president or higher. In the past six months, more than a dozen provincial party chiefs have been replaced by party officials regarded as being close to Xi.
The anti-corruption purge and calls for party discipline have focused on stemming any criticism of the top CCP leaders, especially Xi himself, who is increasingly being referred to as the “core” of the party leadership.
The New York Times reported that the Ministry of Public Security was not exempt from inspection. “Hundreds of officers were marched into a cavernous auditorium to listen to investigators excoriate senior ministry officials for lacking ‘political judgment’ and demand greater loyalty to Mr. Xi and the party,” it stated. Minister of Public Security Guo Shengkun responded by vowing that his officers would be “even more steadfastly and conscientiously” obedient to Xi and other party leaders.
The head of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, Wang Qishan, is a loyal ally of Xi and has been central to Xi’s purge of the CCP bureaucracy, leading to speculation that Xi might seek to retain him in his post and on the Politburo Standing Committee.
During his four years in office, Xi has steadily consolidated his personal hold over the military and state apparatus. His military reform program not only puts greater focus on the navy and air force at the expense of the army but also consolidates the administrative structures under the Central Military Commission chaired by Xi. The president has also established a number of Leading Small Groups under his control that enable him to direct policy across a range of key issues, including the economy and foreign affairs.
Xi and Li have already publicly disagreed on economic policy. The premier, who is nominally in charge of the economy, is an advocate of reducing obstacles to further foreign investment in line with the demands of the IMF and World Bank. In July, Li’s prepared comments to the State Council stressed the need to “slim down” state-owned enterprises and make them “follow market rules.” In his remarks to the same meeting, Xi called for “stronger, better, bigger” state corporations with a central management role for the CCP.
In early August, the CCP announced a major reorganisation of the Communist Youth League, halving its budget and slashing its personnel. The league is the base for one of the main factions of the CCP leadership including Li. According to a Reuters report last month, Xi is determined to curb the influence of the Youth League faction in the lead-up to next year’s congress and leadership changes, including its numbers on the Politburo Standing Committee. The reorganisation was accompanied by a campaign in the state media branding the organisation as “elitist and inefficient.”
Xi’s efforts to strengthen his control over the top party leadership is also driven by fears of rising social tensions fueled by a slowing economy that has already led to plans to shed millions of jobs in so-called state-owned zombie companies—enterprises that are being kept afloat by state bank loans. The number of strikes as tabulated by the Hong Kong-based China Labour Bulletin has risen dramatically over the past year. Divisions in the CCP leadership always have the potential to open the way for a mass movement from below.
The current plenum also takes place amid the uncertainty being generated by the US presidential elections. Xi’s response to the Obama administration’s confrontational “pivot” has been to boost the Chinese military while at the same time trying to reach an accommodation with Washington. Any easing of US-China tensions is unlikely whether Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump wins the election.
The plenum this week is the prelude to intense factional manoeuvring in the lead-up to next year’s congress. Following the meeting, the process for the selection of around 2,300 delegates to the congress will begin. The plenum itself could take an informal straw poll as a gauge of the support for various figures vying for positions on the top party bodies.

Clinton preparing a bipartisan government of austerity and war

Barry Grey

With Election Day less than two weeks away, the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic Party are stepping up their preparations for the first 100 days of a Clinton administration. At the center of these efforts is an attempt to forge a bipartisan consensus with the Republican Party establishment on a government dedicated to intensifying US military operations in the Middle East and internationally and making the working class bear the cost through stepped-up austerity measures.
Most of the US media and political establishment have concluded that a Clinton victory over Republican candidate Donald Trump is a virtual certainty. While the opinion polls in general have swung in Clinton's favor in recent weeks, this conclusion could still prove to be premature. Despite her edge over Trump, Clinton continues to be viewed as honest and trustworthy by just 39 percent of the electorate, making her the second most disliked presidential candidate in US history, behind Trump.
The Republican candidate continues to attract broad support on the basis of his demagogic appeals to the anger and frustration of broad layers of workers and middle class people whose living standards have been decimated by the corporate-financial establishment the billionaire real estate mogul claims to oppose. The Clinton campaign, for its part, is strengthening its orientation to the Republican establishment and wealthier social layers that normally vote Republican but are put off by Trump's overt racism and extreme nationalism and his overall anti-establishment pose.
Developments such as Monday's government announcement that Obamacare premiums will rise an average of 25 percent next year, or revelations contained in Clinton emails yet to be released by WikiLeaks, or an unanticipated economic or political shock could have unforeseen consequences for the outcome of the vote.
What is clear, however, is that this presidential election will bring to power the most right-wing government in modern American history, regardless which of the two major party candidates wins.
Clinton, the candidate favored by most of Wall Street and the corporate elite and large sections of the Republican Party establishment, is seeking to assemble something akin, within the framework of the US political setup, to a grand coalition between the Democratic Party and the Republican leadership.
Earlier this week it was reported that Clinton had initiated back-channel talks with congressional Republican leaders over the basic policies and leading personnel of a Clinton administration. It was also reported that Clinton’s transition team had hired more staff and stepped up its efforts to put together a new Democratic administration.
Clinton’s transition team is chaired by Ken Salazar, a former senator from Colorado and secretary of the interior during President Obama’s first term. Salazar is on the right wing of the Democratic Party. He has spent his political career fronting for big oil and other energy interests and sparked controversy within the Democratic Party when he introduced George W. Bush’s extreme right nominee for attorney general, Alberto Gonzales, and sat beside Gonzales during the latter’s Senate confirmation hearing.
The central political axis of a future Hillary Clinton administration is evident in the anti-Russian, McCarthyite-style campaign she is waging against Trump. She is seeking and gaining support across virtually the entire bourgeois political spectrum on the basis of an intensification of the US war for regime-change in Syria and an even more aggressive and reckless confrontation with Russia. In Syria, she is calling for the imposition of no-fly zones, which top US military figures have acknowledged would mean war not only with Syria, but also with Russia.
The Russia-baiting is intended to stampede and disorient public opinion, which is broadly anti-war, and enable an incoming Clinton administration to claim a mandate for military escalation. There have been numerous media commentaries pointing to broad dissatisfaction within the American foreign policy establishment, cutting across party lines, with Obama’s policies. The basic argument is that his administration, which has continued the war in Afghanistan, extended it into Pakistan, carried out devastating wars in Libya and Syria, launched a new war in Iraq, backed a Saudi-led war in Yemen and carried out hundreds of drone missile attacks across the Middle East and Africa, is too timid.
Last week, the Washington Post reported: “The Republicans and Democrats who make up the foreign policy elite are laying the ground work for a more assertive foreign policy, via a flurry of reports shaped by officials who would probably play senior roles in a Clinton White House.”
The article noted that the Democratic secretary of state under Bill Clinton, Madeleine Albright, is leading a “bipartisan and international team looking at US strategy in the Middle East” for the Atlantic Council. It quoted her as saying, “We do think there needs to be more American action—not ground forces but some additional help in terms of the military aspect.”
The ruling class knows that in carrying out such a foreign policy it risks a further growth of social anger and anti-capitalist sentiment. This has already found an initial expression in the mass support for the Sanders campaign and, in a more distorted form, the support for Trump’s supposed challenge to the status quo.
The problem facing the ruling class is compounded by the fact that the domestic side of a foreign policy tied to increased military spending is deeper social cuts. Clinton’s talk of taxing corporations and the rich to pay for a vast program of jobs and social reforms, such as “debt-free” college, is belied by the lopsided support for her campaign on Wall Street and among corporate CEOs.
To cite a few relevant facts:
* Of the $88 million donated by billionaires to the presidential candidates of the two major parties, $70 million has gone to Clinton.
* Corporate-funded super PACs have favored Clinton over Trump by a two-to-one margin.
* As of July, not a single CEO of a Fortune 100 company had donated to Trump’s campaign or endorsed him. Clinton had received contributions from 11 of the corporate chiefs.
* According to polls, 45 percent of households earning more than $100,000 a year plan to vote for Clinton, compared to 28 percent for Trump. For those earning $250,000 or more—the top 5 percent—the margin for Clinton is even greater, with 53 percent planning to vote for the Democrat and 25 percent favoring Trump.
Transcripts released by WikiLeaks of Clinton speeches to Wall Street bankers, for which she received six-figure paychecks, show her praising the recommendations of the 2010 Simpson-Bowles deficit-reduction commission, which called for sweeping cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid; the elimination of 200,000 federal jobs; a tax on employees’ health benefits; and huge cuts in income taxes for the wealthy and corporate taxes.
Incoming Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer told CNBC last week that Clinton will propose allowing US corporations to repatriate their $2.5 trillion in profits stashed overseas at tax rate far below the corporate rate of 35 percent (perhaps as low as 10 percent), providing a huge windfall for big business.
To carry out such policies and fend off mass opposition from below, the ruling elite wants a united front of the two corporate-controlled parties. This may become all the more critical should the Republicans lose control of the Senate, considered likely, or even the House of Representatives, and find itself irreparably split.
A central task before an incoming Clinton administration would be to rescue and rehabilitate the Republican Party and shore up the two-party system. This is what Clinton and the Democrats are seeking to deliver, as evidenced by Clinton’s increasingly pronounced effort to present herself as the candidate of the entire political establishment.
Speaking Monday in New Hampshire, for example, she declared: “I’m proud to see Americans coming together—Democrats, Republicans and independents—to reject hate and division… I’m proud to have the support of more than 150 Republican leaders in the state who put country before party.”
As New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, a media surrogate for Clinton and the Democrats, put it in a column on Wednesday: “The country desperately needs a healthy center-right party…”

Refugee deaths surge in the Mediterranean

Martin Kreickenbaum

This year is the deadliest ever for desperate refugees fleeing across the Mediterranean to Europe in order to escape wars in the Middle East and Africa.
“We can now confirm that at least 3,800 people have died, making 2016 the deadliest ever,” William Spindler, a spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), declared yesterday. The previous record number of deaths, 3,771, was set in 2015. Nonetheless, despite a sharp drop in the number of refugees fleeing across the Mediterranean, from 1.01 million last year to 327,800 so far this year, the number of deaths is surging.
“From one death for every 269 arrivals last year, in 2016 the likelihood of dying has spiraled to one in 88,” Spindler said at a press conference in Geneva on Tuesday.
“On the Central Mediterranean route between Libya and Italy, the likelihood of dying is even higher, at one death for every 47 arrivals,” Spindler said. “This is the worst we have seen,” he added.
Political responsibility for these deaths lies above all with the European Union (EU). Having pushed aggressively for war in the Middle East and North Africa, notably with the 2011 NATO war in Libya, it then has moved to hermetically seal its borders against hundreds of thousands of people fleeing the catastrophic consequences of those wars.
It destroyed semi-seaworthy boats on the cynical pretext that this would advance the "fight against smugglers" and hired mercenaries to deter refugees, putting them in additional peril and forcing them to seek out ever more dangerous routes on unseaworthy boats.
“People smugglers are today often using lower-quality vessels, flimsy inflatable rafts that often do not last the journey. Several incidents seem to be connected with travel during bad weather,” Spindler said. He noted that refugees were also being forced to rely on “mass embarkations of thousands of people,” adding, “This may be to do with the shifting smuggler business model or geared towards lowering detection risks, but it also makes the work of rescuers harder.”
The navies and armed forces of the NATO countries are intervening, but to destroy seaworthy refugee vessels and to initiate and cover up brutal attacks carried out against defenseless migrant vessels.
An incident documented by the aid organization "Sea-Watch" on Tuesday with photos and logbook entries is symptomatic. On the night of October 21, the Libyan Coast Guard attacked a refugee boat, struck the inmates with clubs, and destroyed their dinghy. In the resulting panic, 30 people drowned.
The incident occurred about 26 kilometers off the Libyan coast in front of the crew of the rescue vessel "Sea-Watch 2", which had been called by the Italian rescue center to come to the aid of a flimsy inflatable dinghy. The Libyan patrol boat forced to one side a boat that was accompanying "Sea-Watch 2," which was distributing life jackets to the refugees; it then attacked the dinghy. After the incident, "Sea-Watch 2" rescued 124 refugees and recovered four bodies. There was no trace of a further 25 refugees.
The European Union and the Libyan Coast Guard—a force set up by and operating under the military control of NATO, which continues to launch air strikes in Libya against Islamic State (IS) members—both downplayed the incident.
A Libyan spokesman said a patrol had boarded the aid ship to check whether it was in Libyan territorial waters.
The Italian and German navies, which are on the scene due to the EU's Operation Sophia, claimed to have no knowledge of the incident.
It was not the first time that the Libyan coast guard has used brutal force against refugees and rescue boats.
In August, the ship ”Bourbon Argos”, run by the Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) organization, was fired on by a Libyan patrol boat. At the time, the Libyan Navy declared that only “warning shots” had been fired, under the assumption that the "Bourbon Argos" was involved in smuggling refugees.
The Libyan coast guard has also repeatedly intercepted refugee boats outside its territorial waters and forced them back to Libya, although this is illegal under international maritime law.
Nonetheless, the EU and NATO are sticking to their plans to upgrade the Libyan coast guard and use it as a mercenary force against refugees. Around 1,000 members of the Coast Guard are to be trained and equipped in Libya as part of Operation Sophia.
“The aim was to start the training this week, and it will start this week,” Antonello De Renzis Sonnino, the spokesman for Operation Sophia, told Reuters. According to the German government, the training will start on two ships, one Italian, the other Dutch. Weapons and trainers are being provided by Italy, Germany, Greece, Belgium and Great Britain.
According to the German armed forces, the training of the Libyan coast guard has little to do with rescue at sea, and will concentrate on navigation and military issues. Sea Watch spokesman Ruben Neugebauer told the German public radio station Deutschlandfunk: “Those responsible always say it is about gaining control of this region of the sea in order to reduce refugee numbers. If it were really a question of training a search-and-rescue force, then you could also train civilian rescuers. Then it would be unnecessary to train military forces.”
A huge contingent of warships has been sailing along the central Mediterranean route between Libya and Italy for months. Rather than making the sea crossing safer for refugees, the flotilla has only added to the risk of drownings.
Since May this year, the EU's Operation Sophia has been mainly targeting smugglers providing boats for refugees. In addition, NATO ships and airplanes are operating in the central Mediterranean within the framework of Operation Sea Guardian.
The patrol ships of Operation Sophia have destroyed many wooden fishing boats, which were at least in part capable of navigating the high seas. As a result, refugees are now attempting the crossing in crude and completely unseaworthy inflatable boats. These are much more difficult to detect and often have only sufficient fuel to reach international waters, but not the European shore. The refugees must then count on rescue on the high seas.

US-Russian war tensions mount over Eastern Europe and Syria

Bill Van Auken

NATO defense ministers convened a two-day meeting in Brussels Wednesday to thrash out final plans for the deployment of some 4,000 combat troops organized in four battle groups within striking distance of Russia’s border.
These front-line forces are to be backed by a 40,000-strong rapid reaction force capable of going into battle within days.
The plan represents the largest military escalation in the region since the height of the Cold War between the US and the former Soviet Union and carries with it the heightened threat of an armed confrontation between Washington and Moscow, the world’s two largest nuclear powers.
At the end of Wednesday’s session, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg confirmed that the United States, Britain, Germany and Canada had agreed to provide the leading elements of the battle groups to be deployed respectively in Poland and the three former Soviet Baltic republics: Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia.
Stoltenberg added that other NATO member states would contribute soldiers and armaments to the buildup. Describing the deployment as “multinational,” he stressed that it underscored that “[a]n attack on any ally will be considered an attack on us all.”
US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said that Washington would send a “battle-ready battalion task force” of approximately 900 solders into eastern Poland. The troops are to be drawn from the 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment, named for the Stryker armored fighting vehicle. The unit was sent repeatedly into the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
In addition, the Pentagon is sending the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team of the 4th Infantry Division, replete with battle tanks and heavy artillery, which will be based in Poland, but operate in the general periphery of ex-Soviet republics and former Warsaw Pact nations on Russia’s western flank. Also being sent is the 10th Combat Aviation Brigade, equipped with Black Hawk attack helicopters.
Washington has also announced it is dispatching 330 Marines to a base in Norway after the Norwegian government approved the deployment Monday. “We expect a sustained challenge from the East, from Russia, by way of its military activity,” David Lute, the US ambassador to NATO, said in explaining the move.
Britain, meanwhile, spelled out its plans to deploy 800 troops to Estonia, equipped with battle tanks, armored infantry fighting vehicles and drones. It is to be joined by units from France and Denmark. British warplanes are also being sent to Romania.
Germany will deploy a battalion of between 400 and 600 troops to Lithuania, marking the first entry of the German military into the country since its occupation by the Nazis, who carried out the murder of close to a quarter of a million Jews there. The German deployment will be backed by units from Netherlands, Norway, Belgium, Croatia and Luxembourg.
Canada is reportedly sending 450 troops to Latvia, to be joined by 140 Italian military personnel.
Defending the deployments in an interview with the German broadcaster, Deutsche Welle, the outgoing American deputy secretary general of NATO, Alexander Vershbow, claimed the US-led alliance “had no choice.”
“Russia changed the whole paradigm in 2014 with its aggression against Ukraine, its illegal annexation of Crimea,” said Vershbow.
This is a barefaced lie. The crisis in Ukraine was triggered not by “aggression” on the part of the Kremlin oligarchy, but rather the conspiracy of Washington and Berlin to overthrow the elected government in Kiev through the mobilization of violent fascist and right-wing nationalist forces. The US openly associated itself with this coup, with Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland bragging that the US had spent $5 billion to further Ukrainian regime change.
The reintegration of Crimea into Russia--it was only placed under Ukrainian administration in 1956, when both Russia and Ukraine were part of the Soviet Union--was overwhelmingly supported by the territory’s population in a popular referendum. From Moscow’s standpoint, this was a defensive measure taken to safeguard the historic base of Russia’s Black Sea fleet.
The coup in Ukraine was the culmination of the relentless military encirclement of Russia, which has seen NATO shift its borders 800 miles eastward. Now, the deployments announced Wednesday have turned into a dead letter the agreement negotiated between NATO and Moscow not to send “substantial” numbers of Western troops into these areas.
In the wake of the Ukrainian coup, US President Barack Obama flew to Estonia to declare Washington’s “eternal” commitment to defend it and the other two Baltic states with “American boots on the ground,” thereby committing the US to war in defense of three tiny territories ruled by right-wing and fanatically anti-Russian governments eager for confrontation.
Further justifying the current NATO buildup, Stoltenberg declared Wednesday, “Close to our borders, Russia continues its assertive military posturing.” Given that NATO has expanded its reach to Russia’s own borders, this effectively means that Russia is a threat because it maintains armed forces on its own soil.
Tensions with Russia, as well as within the NATO alliance itself, have been further ratcheted up over Moscow’s dispatch of an eight-vessel flotilla led by the aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov to the eastern Mediterranean to support Russian operations in support of the Syrian government.
After reports that this Russian flotilla would stop in Ceuta, the Spanish-ruled port city on the north coast of Africa, for refueling, the NATO powers exerted immense pressure on the Spanish government to refuse to allow the Russian warships to dock there.
British Defense Secretary Michel Fallon declared that his government “would be extremely concerned if a NATO member should consider assisting a Russian carrier group that might end up bombing Syria.”
Spain has reportedly allowed nearly 60 Russian warships to take on fuel and supplies in Ceuta since 2011. The practice led to denunciations in the US Congress and an amendment being attached last May to the US military spending bill requiring the Pentagon to report to Congress on countries hosting Russian vessels.
The Russian media reported Wednesday that Moscow rescinded its request to refuel at the port, while Russian government sources said the ships had adequate fuel and supplies to reach their destination.
The controversy reflects the widening divisions that have opened up within the NATO alliance under the pressure of the escalating confrontation with Russia. The countries of southern Europe, particularly Spain, Italy and Greece, have grown increasingly hostile to the regime of sanctions against Russia that has only deepened their own economic crises. Meanwhile, Germany and France have floated plans for turning the European Union into an independent military alliance, reflecting the growing conflict between US and European interests.
NATO officials have couched the issue of the Russian flotilla in alleged “humanitarian” concerns over the situation in Syria, with warnings that the fighter jets onboard the Kuznetsov will join in air strikes against eastern Aleppo and other areas controlled by the Al Qaeda-linked Islamist militias supported by Washington and its allies.
Undoubtedly a more fundamental concern is that the Russian naval buildup in the eastern Mediterranean, coupled with Russia’s deployment of fighter jets and advanced mobile S-400 and S-300 missile defense systems in Syria itself, is challenging the control of the area historically exercised by the US Sixth Fleet, which has been sorely depleted by the US “pivot” to Asia.
The Russian firepower in and around Syria has also effectively precluded the imposition of a “no-fly zone,” a policy promoted by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and much of the US foreign policy establishment, outside of a direct military confrontation with Russia.
This was acknowledged Tuesday by US Director of National Intelligence James Clapper in remarks to the Council on Foreign Relations. “I wouldn’t put it past them to shoot down an American aircraft if they felt that was threatening to their forces on the ground,” Clapper said of the Russian military during a talk at the Council of Foreign Relations. “The system they have there is very advanced, very capable, and I don’t think they’d do it--deploy it--if they didn’t have some intention to use it.”
Whether the flashpoint emerges in Eastern Europe or in Syria, the drive by US imperialism to achieve global hegemony is steadily escalating the threat of world war.

Obamacare: The reality hits home

Andre Damon

On Monday, the US Department of Health and Human Services announced that premiums for health insurance plans sold under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) will increase on average by 25 percent in 2017, raising health care costs of millions of working people by thousands of dollars.
Coming on top of extremely high deductibles and co-pays and severe restrictions on doctors and hospitals available to most of those insured under the ACA, better known as “Obamacare,” the steep premium increases testify to the fact that the Obama administration’s “signature” legislation is a reactionary fraud, aimed at increasing corporate profits by gutting the health benefits won by workers over the course of decades of struggle.
The entire health care overhaul is a scheme devised in collaboration with the insurance conglomerates to dismantle the system of employer-paid health coverage that emerged in the United States out of the mass struggles of the 1930s and 1940s, which established the industrial unions and extracted health insurance as a concession from the corporations. The lack of a government run program of universal health care in the United States was the result of the political subordination of the labor movement to the corporate-controlled Democratic Party by the anti-socialist trade union bureaucracy.
On the basis of the so-called “individual mandate,” which requires all those not covered by employer-sponsored plans or government programs such as Medicare and Medicaid to purchase health coverage from private insurance companies on exchanges set up by the government, Obamacare has established a model whereby each individual “consumer” is placed at the mercy of gigantic insurance companies, which are virtually unrestricted in setting fees and conditions.
Those who fail to buy insurance under Obamacare are subject to a tax penalty equal to at least 2.5 percent of their annual income. This will rise to $700 or more in 2017.
The government provides limited subsidies to low-income people insured under the ACA, setting a precedent for the eventual transformation of Medicare and Medicaid into market-based programs, with vouchers applied to the purchase of private insurance.
Obamacare encourages the setting up of private exchanges outside of those overseen by the government and includes a so-called “Cadillac tax” to penalize plans with supposedly “overly generous” benefits, i.e., union-linked plans covering millions of workers. The aim is to encourage employers to dump their plans and throw their employees onto the exchanges. This is increasingly taking place.
This deeply reactionary counter-reform was elaborately packaged and marketed by the Obama administration and its liberal supporters and apologists as a progressive reform and major step in the fight for universal health care. In essence, a liberal Democratic president, elected on the basis of popular hatred for the pro-corporate and war policies of the Republican Bush administration, was assigned the task of carrying through a right-wing assault on health care traditionally associated with the Republicans.
The ruling class as a whole had by the beginning of the new century concluded that the existing system, which left more than 50 million people totally uninsured, was too unwieldy and expensive. What was needed was a plan to provide bare-bones coverage to a portion of the uninsured and place the cost squarely on the backs of the broad mass of working people. Above all, nothing could be permitted that in any way challenged the profit interests of the health care monopolies.
The result is a health care disaster that still leaves 29 million Americans without any coverage whatsoever.
But this is only the beginning. It is being widely reported that the next administration, whether headed by Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump, will implement major changes to Obamacare to lure the big insurance firms, which have largely withdrawn from the ACA exchanges, back into the system by ensuring their ability to extract bigger profits. Under discussion are such measures as higher tax penalties for people who fail to buy insurance, more restrictions on those who apply, and bigger cash subsidies to the companies for insuring high-cost customers.
These developments fully confirm the warning made by the World Socialist Web Site in July 2009 that the Affordable Care Act “is a counterrevolution in health care, being carried out in the profit interests of the giant pharmaceutical companies, insurance conglomerates and hospital chains, as well as the corporations, which will be encouraged to terminate health care for their employees and force them to buy insurance plans providing less coverage at greater out-of-pocket expense.”
Obamacare is not only an attack on health care for working people, it is the spearhead of a broader social counterrevolution aimed at reversing all of the social gains won by the working class in the course of more than a century of struggle. The cynical modus operandi by which it was imposed characterizes the Obama presidency as a whole.
This product of the corrupt Chicago Democratic Party machine, whose first job was with Business International, a firm with CIA connections, was catapulted into the leadership of the Democratic Party and then into the White House to provide a “left” gloss to viciously anti-working class policies. On the basis of his anti-war posturing and his slogans of “hope” and “change,” and exploiting the belief among voters that he would be sympathetic to their needs because of his ethnicity, Obama came to power in 2009 and immediately set about implementing a right-wing program, both foreign and domestic, in continuity with that of his predecessor.
A major share of political responsibility for his ability to do so rests with the Democratic Party’s pseudo-left apologists such as the International Socialist Organization, which declared Obama a “progressive” and hailed his election as a “transformative event in US politics.”
Obama continued the war in Iraq, escalated the war in Afghanistan and extended it into Pakistan, launched new and devastating wars in Libya and Syria, backed a bloodbath led by Saudi Arabia against Yemen, and ordered the drone killings of thousands of people in Central Asia, the Middle East and Africa.
Domestically, he expanded the Bush bailout of the banks, oversaw the slashing of autoworkers’ wages in the forced bankruptcy of General Motors and Chrysler, supported the slashing of city workers’ pensions and health benefits in the Detroit bankruptcy, and accelerated the assault on teachers and public education with his pro-charter “Race to the Top” program.
By means of the “sequester” bill worked out with congressional Republicans, Obama saw to it that federal non-military discretionary spending fell to its lowest level as a percentage of gross domestic product since the early 1950s. On the basis of these policies, Obama has overseen a huge stock market boom and the biggest redistribution of wealth from the bottom to the top in American history.
The slashing of social spending has freed up funds for the breakneck expansion of US military capacity, with the Obama White House initiating the greatest military modernization program since the 1980s, including a $1 trillion nuclear weapons upgrade.
The working class must draw the lessons of the eight years in which Barack Obama and the Democratic Party have done the dirty work of the banks and corporations. It is not possible to defend jobs, wages or living standards within the framework of the Democratic Party and the capitalist system.
The defense of the social rights of the working class, including high-quality health care for all, requires the building of a mass political movement of the working class armed with a socialist program to reorganize society on the basis of social need, not corporate profit.

26 Oct 2016

GAIA Agtech Innovation Challenge for Women Agricultural Entrepreneurs in East Africa

Application Deadline: 28th October, 2016
Winners will be announced on 31st October.
Eligible Countries: Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania
To be taken at (country): Nairobi, Kenya
About the Programme: Applications are now being accepted from institutions and enterprises until October 28, with winners to be notified on October 31.
GAIA is pleased to announce that Gender in Agribusiness Investments in Africa (GAIA) is now accepting applications from institutions and enterprises for the 2016 GAIA AgTech Innovation Challenge.  GAIA has been launched by AWARD.
to increase agribusiness investments in technological and business model innovations that benefit African women value chain actors. Do you have a big idea that has been piloted successfully in East Africa that focuses on:
  1. Closing yield gaps in crop and livestock value chains
  2. Reducing post-harvest losses
  3. Improving agri-market efficiencies
We are looking for institutions and business enterprises with innovations spanning the research-to-commercialization continuum, and those addressing business model re-invention.
GAIA is looking for enterprises that are women-led or have women managers, have a clear for-profit business model with high potential for scale, have some proof of concept on the ground, have conducted pilots and are preferably generating revenues.
Type: Entrereneurship Pitch Programme
Eligibility: AWARD GAIA is looking for enterprises that:
  • Are in the agriculture or allied sectors with an innovative technology or business model
  • Are women-led or have women managers
  • Have an experienced, credible and dedicated investors and management team
  • Have a clear for-profit business model with high potential for scale
  • Have some proof of concept on the ground, conducted pilots and are preferably generating revenues
  • Are looking for funding to commercialize/scale
  • Have operations in Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania
Number of Awardees: 20
Value of Programme: Winners will benefit from participation in an intensive, 2-day boot camp, which will culminate in a showcase to potential investors, partners, and other key players in the agriculture sector.
Duration of Programme: Companies will be showcased from November 7-10, 2016.
How to Apply: Apply here
Award Provider: AWARD

VU Holland Scholarship Programme for International Students 2017/18

Application Deadline: 1st February 2017
Offered annually? Yes
Eligible Countries: International (non-EEA countries)
To be taken at (country): Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands
About the Award: The Holland Scholarship Programme (HSP) is financed by the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, Dutch research universities, and universities of applied sciences.
Students eligible for the VU Holland Scholarship Programme are students from outside the European Economic Area (EEA) who are applying for a Master’s programme in the Netherlands. Students from Suriname and Switzerland are not eligible to apply for the HSP scholarship.
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam embraces diversity as an enrichment to our teaching, research and our contribution to society. Furthermore, we aim to prepare our students for a global and diverse society and workplace.
Type: Masters
Eligibility: 
  • You hold a non-EEA nationality that is not Surinamese or Swiss.
  • You are applying for a full-time English taught Master’s programme at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.
  • The degree with which you are seeking admission has not been obtained in the Netherlands.
  • You need to have applied for VUFP. We will only award HSP scholarships to recipients of the VU Fellowship Programme.
  • We select excellent students who contribute to the diversity at our campus.
Value of Scholarship: The scholarship amounts to € 5,000.
Duration of Scholarship: You will receive this in the first year of your studies.
How to Apply: VU Amsterdam will contact you about the outcome of the selection procedure no later than 1st April 2017. Here are the procedures for applying for scholarship at VU Amsterdam:
  • Register for Master’s programme: Students register for a Master’s programme in Studielink(see in link below) and after that in the VUnet portal(see in link below). Here you can find more information on how to apply for one of our English-taught Master’s programmes. Please note that you must have applied for the Master programme before you can apply for the HSP scholarship.
  • Submit your HSP application: Submit your HSP application in VUnet.
For HSP application 3 documents are required:
A. Proof of excellence/ GPA       
Students who apply for a HSP scholarship need to have a GPA of at least 80% of the highest possible mark (calculated over full previous degree). For example, if the highest possible mark is a 10, you need to have an average of at least a 8.
 B. Motivation letter       
Write a personal statement in which you reflect on your own identity. You may refer to your experiences in both international and local settings in the motivation letter. For the purpose of this scholarship, diversity includes (but is not limited to) ethnic, religious, gender, socioeconomic, sexual and cultural diversity. In this statement please reflect on how your identity has contributed to your academic interests and performance, and your involvement with diversity issues. Include how your identity has evolved by going through different experiences with diversity issues and your interaction with diverse groups or individuals (max 500 words).
C. Curriculum Vitae (CV)
We strongly recommend the use of the Europass format. The following three points must reflect on your CV to proof that you are an added value for diversity on our campus:
1. Describe your experiences with interacting in an intercultural setting. In your description, point out how you have developed intercultural competences (such as intercultural sensitivity, intercultural communication skills etc.) through these experiences. This can be both in local and international contexts
2. Give an example of how you have been involved with social justice issues. This includes, for example, the empowerment of marginalized groups, diversity education, different forms of activism and advocacy etc. Elaborate on your motivation for this involvement and the results that you have accomplished.
3. Elaborate on your current or previous commitment to service in your community, your motivation for commitment and how this has impacted the persons you work with. Reflect on your personal understanding of community service.
It is important to go through the Application requirements before applying.
Award Provider: Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science.

Türkiye Success and Support Scholarship Programmes (Bachelors,Masters, PhD) for International Students 2017/18

Application Deadline: 30th October 2016
Eligible Countries: International
To be taken at (country): Turkey
Eligible Field of Study: All
Type: Undergraduate,Masters and PhD
About the Awards: The Government of Turkey is offering TWO (2) separate scholarship programmes to current international students studying in Turkey:
1. Success Scholarship: This scholarship scheme is open to those holding foreign citizenship (Turkish citizens holding dual citizenship and exchange students are ineligible). Success Scholarship rewards top performing Undergraduate, Master and PhD students studying currently in any programme in Turkish universities based on academic merit and ambition.
Eligibility:
  • Applicants must have not previously been awarded a place in Türkiye Scholarships (including Devlet, Hükümet, Himaye, Success and Support Scholarships).
  • Students currently benefitting from these scholarship schemes or students whose grants have been cancelled for any reason are also ineligible for Success Scholarship.
  • Holders of any other scholarship given by other institutions cannot apply for this scholarship.
Success Scholarship Application Requirements:
• Actual Transcript (required)
• Photocopy of a valid ID or passport (required)
• Passport Photo (required)
• National & international exam results (optional)
• Foreign language exam results (optional)
!!! Those who are currently studying in Turkey and transferred to another Turkish university, provided they completed at least one academic year (2 terms – except prep school) in Turkey, must upload the documentation of both universities to the application system.
2. Support Scholarship: This scholarship scheme is open to those holding foreign citizenship (Turkish citizens holding dual citizenship and exchange students are ineligible). Support Scholarship are awarded to Undergraduate, Master and PhD students studying currently in any programme in Turkish universities based on financial need.
Applicants must have not previously been awarded a place in Turkiye Scholarships (including Devlet, Hükümet, Himaye, Success and Support Scholarships). Students currently benefitting from these scholarship schemes or students whose grants have been cancelled for any reason are also ineligible for Success Scholarship. Holders of any other scholarship given by other institutions cannot apply for this scholarship.
Eligibility:
  • Applicants must be holding foreign country citizenship (Turkish citizens holding dual citizenship are ineligible).
  • Applicants must have have completed at least one academic year (two terms – except pre school) in a Turkish universitywith a CGPA of min. 2.00 (out of 4.00) in the actual transcript of current level of study.
  • Applicants must have not previously been awarded a place in Turkiye Scholarships (including Devlet, Hükümet, Himaye, Success and Support Scholarships). Students currently benefitting from these scholarship schemes or students whose grants have been cancelled for any reason are also ineligible.
  • Holders of any other scholarship given by other institutions cannot apply for this scholarship.
  • Applicants should need financial support.
Support Scholarship Application Requirements
• Actual Transcript (required)
• Photocopy of a valid ID or passport (required)
• Passport Photo (required)
• National & international exam results (optional)
• Foreign language exam results (optional)
!!! Those who are currently studying in Turkey and transferred to another Turkish university, provided they completed at least one academic year (2 terms – except prep school) in Turkey, must upload the documentation of both universities to the application system.
General Eligibility: 
  • There is no age limit for applicants.
  • Scholarship schemes cannot be combined; therefore, students must apply for one scholarship scheme only. Students who submit application for both schemes will be classified as ineligible.
  • Bursaries are only open to those currently enrolled in Turkish universities and cannot be held in conjunction with any other scholarship (Except exchange students). Turkish citizens and those holding Turkish citizenship among dual citizenship holders are ineligible for the scholarships.
  • Applications will be evaluated based on academic merit. Nevertheless countries and fields of studies will be taken into consideration.
  • Applicants must fill out the application form completely, scan and upload the required documents to the online form in a proper file format (pdf, jpeg). Otherwise, applications will be classified as invalid.
  • Any application where false or missing information or document is provided will be treated as invalid. If such information or document is found after the awarding of scholarship the student will be required to pay back the scholarship received to date in accordance with the applicable rules and regulations.
Value of Scholarships: The value of each monthly scholarship to be paid is:
  • 400 TL for students in associate and undergraduate programmes,
  • 550 TL for students in Masters programmes,
  • 800 TL for students in PhD programmes.
Duration of Scholarships: The bursaries are being made available to cover monthly stipend and will only be paid during term time.
How to Apply:  CLICK FOR APPLICATION
It is important to go through the Application Requirements on the Scholarship Webpage before applying.
Award Provider: Türkiye Buslari Committee