More restrictive laws target refugees after Berlin attack

Martin Kreikenbaum

Less than three weeks after the terrorist attack on a Christmas market in Berlin, Justice Minister Heiko Maas (Social Democrats, SPD) and Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière (Christian Democrats, CDU) have agreed on a number of more restrictive laws targeting, above all, refugees and migrants. A dramatic expansion of deportation detention is planned, as well as a tightening of residency regulations for asylum seekers and the introduction of electronic tags for so-called “potential threats.”

“The protective rule of law is the best answer to the hatred of the terrorists,” Maas stated at the press conference following consultations with de Maizière. Both ministers also got backing from Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU), who announced on Monday that the government would rapidly draw the appropriate conclusions and “really [show] its true colours” on questions of internal security. In fact, the current tightening of regulations represents an assault on basic democratic principles and clears the way for the creation of thought crimes and the concept developed by Nazi jurist Carl Schmitt of enemy criminal law.

In total, Maas and de Maizière have agreed on nine measures.

The restriction on detention pending deportation for those obliged to leave the country, among those who cannot be deported within three months, is to be lifted. As a result, any rejected asylum seeker could end up behind bars for up to 18 months even if they have committed no crime.

In addition, custody prior to departure, a form of internment ordered by a court to ensure the deportation of a refugee, is to be lengthened from the current maximum of four to 10 days. This measure, which was only established in July 2015, will also be used much more frequently. According to the wishes of de Maizière, a large number of detention centres will be built close to airports. Refugees taken into custody prior to departure will be gathered there and deported.

Even more significant is the introduction of a new legal justification for detention pending deportation. Thus far, detention pending deportation, referred to legally as “security detention,” could only be ordered if a foreigner was obliged to leave and it could be proven that he or she wanted to avoid deportation. For this, the suspicion that someone poses a “terrorist threat” or “a significant threat to security” will be sufficient, as de Maizière explained.

This refers to “potential threats,” a concept that has no legal basis. It actually refers to people whom the police or intelligence agencies suspect of representing “a danger to public security,” without any firm grounds for that suspicion existing. The Federal Criminal Agency (BKA) reportedly counts some 550 people as being “potential threats,” of whom less than half live in Germany. Only 62 of them are, in fact, obliged to leave the country.

The term “potential threat” was introduced in September 2001 under the anti-terrorism law implemented by then Interior Minister Otto Schily (SPD). In immigration law, Schily introduced the concept of a “threat to public security” as an additional reason for deportation. On the basis of a simple suspicion that someone supported a terrorist organisation and poses a threat to security, asylum applications could be automatically dismissed since this change.

Maas and de Maizière are pushing this regulation to the limit by effectively removing the presumption of innocence for foreigners. They can now be detained for up to 18 months without having been legally convicted of a criminal act or even being suspected of a specific crime.

This thus amounts to the creation of a system of enemy justice, whose traditions go back to the jurist Carl Schmitt, who used it to provide juridical cover for the crimes of the Nazis, and finds its contemporary expression in the US prison camp in Guantanamo, Cuba.

Detention pending deportation is thus returning to its historic roots. It was first introduced into German law in May 1919 in Bavaria after the suppression of the Munich Soviet Republic. Detention pending deportation served at that time as a preventive measure against the activities of foreign socialists so as to block revolutionary upsurges. In 1938, the regulation was adopted word for word by the Hitler regime and written into the policing order on foreigners, where it survived beyond the end of the Nazi regime and remained as law in the Federal Republic until 1965.

The surveillance of “threats” by means of an electronic tag agreed to by Maas and de Maizière leads in the same direction. Originally, the justice minister only wanted to use tags on criminals who had been convicted of terrorist crimes and released from custody. But instead, this drastic attack on personal freedom will be expanded to include the simple suspicion that a person could pose a threat.

However, criminologists and jurists question whether this will bring any benefit to security. The former president of the Constitutional Court in North Rhine-Westphalia, Michael Bertrams, views the electronic tag and the use of detention pending deportation on “threats” as a clear violation of Germany’s Basic Law. He wrote in the Kölner Stadtanzeiger, “The preventive detention or internment of threats, who are seen as innocent before the law, cannot be legitimised in a state under the rule of law. I doubt whether a law regulating this would pass judgement with the Federal Constitutional Court.”

But this has not troubled the ministers for justice and the interior, whose offices are actually supposed to protect the constitution. On the contrary. Maas already signalled prior to the announcement that democratic rights ought to be jettisoned. He stated that “confirmed threats who are obliged to leave must be deported as quickly as possible. To ensure the deportation of ‘threats,’ we must take them into detention pending deportation. Detention pending deportation ought therefore to apply to ‘threats’ in the future when their state of origin fails to cooperate with repatriation.”

Additional legal changes agreed include the tightening of residency requirements for asylum seekers who make false claims about their identities. This will mainly affect civil war refugees unable to travel with identification documents or who were compelled by smugglers to dispose of them.

States refusing to accept rejected asylum seekers from Germany will face sanctions in the future, either by cutting development aid or increasing requirements for citizens to obtain travel visas. Maas said at the press conference, “We must increase the duties placed on countries of origin. We should not exclude the cutting of financial aid. It must be clear that whoever does not cooperate will be sanctioned.”

The two ministers explicitly avoided dealing with the plans previously presented by de Maizière to radically restructure Germany’s security agencies by centralising them and to do away with the separation between the police and intelligence agencies. These demands contained in his guidelines for a strong state aim to transform Germany into a police state.

But this is how legal changes are enforced which do away with basic democratic rights, particularly for refugees and immigrants. The Berlin attack is being systematically exploited to place foreigners, refugees and immigrants from North Africa in particular under a cloud of suspicion and massively strengthen the state apparatus.

The deployment of police during New Year’s Eve in Cologne, which implemented personal checks on people based on their obviously non-German appearance and issued bans on them being present in the local area, was welcomed by all parties represented in parliament as a harsh but necessary measure to deal with allegedly aggressive foreigners willing to use violence.

In the case of Anis Amri, the police and intelligence agencies had close contact with the alleged Berlin attacker over a period of many months and knew a great deal about his intention to conduct a terrorist attack. The attack, which killed 12 and injured dozens more, occurred under the noses of the security agencies and raises the question as to whether Amri was allowed to strike in order to provide a justification for the reorganisation of the security authorities and a drastic restriction of basic democratic rights.

But virtually nobody is questioning this. The reason is that all of the political parties agree on the abolition of democratic rights, the expansion of surveillance and police powers, and the centralisation of the security agencies. This not only applies to the governing parties, but also to the Left Party and Greens.

After Green chairwoman Simone Peter was publicly savaged for her criticism of the Cologne police on New Year’s Eve, all party leaders are now demanding an expansion of video surveillance and an acceleration of deportations.

Left Party leader Sahra Wagenknecht has in the meantime adopted the slogans of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) and blamed the influx of refugees for the Berlin attack. As she put it, “Along with the uncontrolled opening of the borders, the police have also been cut to the breaking point, and no longer has the personnel or equipment appropriate to the threat level.”

PS candidates signal continuity with French President Hollande’s policies

Alex Lantier

On Thursday night, seven Socialist Party (PS) and allied presidential candidates participated in the first nationally televised debate in the run-up to the PS presidential primary on January 22 and 29.

The debate takes place amid a historic collapse of the PS—one of the French bourgeoisie’s main ruling parties since its foundation in 1969—which has been deeply discredited by President François Hollande’s agenda of austerity, police-state rule and war. At 4 percent approval ratings, Hollande is France’s most unpopular president since the creation of the office in 1958. Hollande himself has declined to stand again, and there are rising fears in ruling circles that the PS could disintegrate and collapse, like its social-democratic sister party, Pasok, in Greece.

This underscores the extraordinary character of Thursday’s debate. The fears of the imminent annihilation of the PS notwithstanding, not a single candidate could make a forthright criticism of Hollande or call for a shift in policy in the interests of working people. The seven presidential candidates all signaled, in their own fashion, that they would continue the basic thrust of Hollande’s despised agenda.

The first speaker was Hollande’s former prime minister, Manuel Valls, the candidate most directly representing Hollande’s legacy. He issued a bald defense of Hollande’s policies of austerity, police-state build-up, and appeals to far-right sentiment, while cynically presenting his candidacy as a barrier to those of the conservative François Fillon and the neo-fascist Marine Le Pen.

“According to every prediction,” Valls said, “the left will be eliminated from the second round of the presidential election. Our country would only have two options: the far right or the hard right. I refuse to accept that. I love France, she gave me everything.”

Having admitted that the French people despise the Hollande administration’s record, Valls went on to defend its most draconian policies, including the imposition of a regressive labor law without a parliamentary vote, as well as of an indefinitely extended state of emergency.

Valls, backed by the other candidates, insisted that France was “at war” with terrorism and defended Hollande’s targeted extrajudicial murders: “What must be done must be done, what should be kept secret should be kept secret.”

Valls thrust aside criticisms of the PS’s failed attempt earlier this year to inscribe in the French constitution the policy of deprivation of nationality. This was an appeal to the far right, as the policy was used in the Nazi Occupation to justify the initial deportation of Jews, particularly children, to death camps and to outlaw the French Resistance. “But come on, who did this law target? It did not target the children of the Republic due to their origins. It targeted terrorists,” Valls said.

The other candidates—PS ex-ministers Arnaud Montebourg, Benoît Hamon, and Vincent Peillon, former Green deputy François de Rugy, Democratic Front leader and ex-Green Jean-Luc Bennahmias, and Radical Left Party (PRG) candidate Sylvia Pinel—either endorsed or made perfunctory criticisms of Hollande’s record.

While Peillon said it provoked “incomprehension” and de Rugy called it “mixed,” Montebourg said it was “hard to defend but contains some improvements.” Hamon declared that it gave off an “unfinished feeling, as if we abandoned a lot of things in midstream.”

The debate featured a long discussion of Hamon’s plans for a universal guaranteed revenue, which he presented as a way of addressing the lack of jobs in France, by allowing people to survive based on long-term unemployment. Insofar as the monthly revenue Hamon wants to guarantee would be somewhere between €600 and €800, this simply underscores that his plan is to legislate generalized poverty and joblessness—and then try to pass this program off as progressive.

One measure of the discrediting of the PS was that the moderators raised the possibility that the PS candidate would be eliminated and would have to back either Hollande’s former economy minister, investment banker Emmanuel Macron, or possibly former PS minister and former Left Party leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon in the second round of the elections.

Business circles are promoting Macron, a pro-austerity and pro-European Union (EU) candidate who has met during the campaign with right-wing nationalists like Philippe de Villiers, and was in Berlin this week to pledge more austerity. It appears that their concern is not only to ensure a safe pair of hands to continue Hollande’s policies, but also to try to find a leader around which the French ruling elite can rebrand the PS machine and prevent the collapse of the EU.

Financial magazine Challenges wrote, “if Macron is ahead, the PS candidate will have a choice of falling in line behind him or collapsing. If it falls in line, the PS survives. If it collapses, it dies.”

The PS primary debate exemplifies the deep political crisis facing the French and indeed the entire European bourgeoisie. After nearly a decade of deep economic crisis and social austerity since the 2008 Wall Street crash, and escalating imperialist interventions from Mali and Libya to Iraq, Syria, and Ukraine, longstanding institutions of European bourgeois rule are deeply discredited. After the collapse of Pasok and of the Spanish Socialist Party (PSOE), the PS is heading for a debacle of historic significance.

The PS was built after the May-June 1968 general strike as a bourgeois party designed to block a revolutionary struggle of the working class and stabilize bourgeois rule in Europe. It was always deeply hostile to the working class and to socialism. A party that regrouped ex-Vichy collaborators like François Mitterrand, former social democrats, and various ex-Trotskyist and ex-Stalinist forces, it was well to the right of the old social-democratic party.

It formed the Union of the Left alliance with the Stalinist French Communist Party (PCF), as well as with various renegades from Trotskyism, in order to associate itself falsely with the 1917 Revolution in Russia. At the same time, it supported the denunciations of Marxism and of proletarian revolution by postmodernists like Michel Foucault and his allies, anti-Communist New Philosophers like Bernard-Henri Lévy and André Glucksmann. This paved the way for Mitterrand’s election to the presidency in 1981 and a vast shift to the right in official politics in France.

After less than two years in office, Mitterrand had abandoned the social concessions he had pledged to make and was rapidly moving to implement a pro-business agenda. The PS justified its “austerity turn” with claims that they were necessary to continue European integration and align France on the most competitive European economies. Throughout the 1980s, it pushed for the formation of the EU, culminating in the 1992 Maastricht treaty and of the common euro currency, which it hoped to use to contain Germany.

The discrediting of the PS and the collapse of social-democratic parties across Europe is part of the broader discrediting of these institutions, set up by the European bourgeoisie twenty-five years ago at the time of the Stalinist dissolution of the USSR. With the EU a byword for austerity and war and the euro torn apart by tensions between the different countries in the euro zone, the PS has nothing to offer but even more attacks on the working class.

Report to Davos summit: Rising inequality threatens “market capitalism”

Nick Beams

The year 2016 was characterised politically by the emergence of deep hostility to the official political and economic establishment as a result of rising social inequality. This was manifested most sharply in the Brexit vote in Britain and the election of Donald Trump to the US presidency, with right-wing nationalist forces being the main beneficiaries to date due to the reactionary anti-working class policies of what passes for the political “left.”

This shift has found expression in a warning sounded by the World Economic Forum, which hosts its annual gathering of world business and political leaders in Davos, Switzerland next week. The annual “risks report” prepared for the meeting concludes that the growing concentration of income and wealth at the very top of society is the biggest single risk to the stability of the economic and political order over which the millionaires and billionaires assembling in Davos preside. The report identifies “rising income and wealth inequality” as the most significant force driving global politics over the next decade.

The report cites the weakness of the economic “recovery” following the financial crisis of 2008 as one of the reasons for the anti-establishment backlash, but warns that boosting growth is not sufficient to shore up the credibility of the capitalist system.

There is a need to revive growth, “but the growing mood of anti-establishment populism suggests we may have passed the stage where this alone would remedy fractures in society: reforming market capitalism must also be added to the agenda,” the report states.

It continues: “The combination of economic inequality and political polarization threatens to amplify global risks, fraying the social solidarity on which the legitimacy of our economic and political systems rest.”

The report notes that the policy of quantitative easing by the world’s central banks—the pumping of trillions of dollars into the global financial system—has “exacerbated income inequality” by boosting “the returns enjoyed by the owners of financial assets, while workers’ real earnings have been growing very slowly.”

Productivity growth has been slow to recover from the crisis and structural rates of unemployment remain high, particularly among young people in Europe, while in the United States there has been a marked decline in the labour participation rate, signifying that large numbers of workers are dropping out of the workforce.

The report points out that “in contrast to the pre-crisis era, when China’s rapid expansion bolstered overall growth rates, there is no market game-changer on the horizon,” with China in a gradual slowdown as its economy moves away from investment-led growth.

“In sum, it is difficult to identify routes that will lead back to robust global rates of economic growth,” the Davos report concludes.

In line with other studies, the report points to rising inequality in the US, with the incomes of the top 1 percent rising by 31 percent between 2009 and 2012 compared to less than 0.5 percent for the rest of the population.

“Middle-class income stagnation,” it states, “is particularly affecting youth; recent research shows that 540 million young people across advanced economies face the prospect of growing up to be poorer than their parents.”

In examining longer-term trends, the report dwells on the impact of new technologies associated with the advance of computerisation and the Internet. According to one study it cites, some 47 percent of jobs in the United States are at risk from automation, affecting more than 80 percent of low-income work.

“Technology is also contributing to the changing nature of work, with secure and predictable jobs giving way to more sporadic and short-term self-employment,” with research suggesting that the number of people in so-called “alternative work arrangements” in the US increased faster than overall employment between 2005 and 2015.

In fact, the rate at which this is taking place is increasing. A recent study has found that 94 percent of the 10 million jobs created during the Obama administration were temporary, contract or part-time positions, with the proportion of the workforce engaged in such occupations rising from 10.7 percent to 15.8 percent. The number of full-time jobs today is 1 million below the level at the start of the recession.

The increased use of technology provides the material foundation for the advance of living standards. But under the profit system, it is the means for driving down the living standards of the mass of the population.

According to statistics prepared by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and cited in the World Economic Forum report, up to 80 percent of the decline in labour’s share in national income between 1990 and 2007 was the result of the impact of technology. This trend will only have accelerated in the past decade.

The report warns that one way in which technological change could prove disruptive is via the labour market, with incomes pushed down and unemployment pushed up in affected sectors and regions, leading to “disruptive” social conditions. This is in line with the overall finding of the report that “the most important of global risks is the pairing of unemployment and social instability.”

While pointing to the rise of populist and nationalist movements, the report does not offer much in the way of in-depth analysis. But it does at least indicate one of the most significant factors, noting that “the economic policies of historically mainstream parties from the right and the left have converged in recent decades,” making it possible for “once-fringe movements” to rise by “portraying the established parties as part of the same technocratic political class, focused on self-enrichment.”

The overriding fear of the World Economic Forum, though not stated explicitly in the report, is that popular opposition will shift to the left. As other commentators have noted in this, the centenary year of the Russian Revolution, there is a parallel between the conditions that prevailed a century ago and those of today.

Summing up its findings, the report concludes that it is a “febrile time for the world,” where “deep-rooted social and economic trends are manifesting themselves disruptively across the world,” and “persisting inequality, particularly in the context of comparative economic weakness, risks undermining the legitimacy of market capitalism.”

The World Economic Forum, which begins in the alpine resort of Davos, Switzerland on Tuesday, will involve the usual round of networking by business chiefs, political leaders and the heads of NGOs, as lucrative deals are made and relationships established. Of course, it will produce no solutions to the deepening social, political and economic malaise. How could it, as the forces gathered there preside over the very social order that has produced the crisis?

But for the global elites, the taste of the champagne, the delicacy of the canapés and the flavour of the haute cuisine may be somewhat tainted by the smell of death wafting up from the grave opening up before them.

China and Russia to counter US anti-missile systems in Asia

Peter Symonds

China and Russia have agreed to take unspecified “countermeasures” against US plans to install a sophisticated anti-ballistic missile system in South Korea. While nominally directed against North Korea, Washington’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) deployment is part of an expanding US network of anti-missile systems in Asia aimed at preparing for war against China and Russia.

The two countries issued a joint statement following a meeting co-chaired by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Morgulov and Chinese Assistant Foreign Minister Kong Xuanyou. The countermeasures, the statement declared, “will be aimed at safeguarding interests of China and Russia and the strategic balance in the region.”

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said yesterday that the US decision to deploy the THAAD anti-missile system “seriously threatened China’s security interest” and also undermined the regional strategic balance. “China and other countries have to address our own legitimate security concerns and take necessary measures to safeguard our security interest,” he said.

Russian Deputy Defence Minister Anatoly Antonov also expressed concern in October over the continued build-up by “the US and its allies of the Asia Pacific segment of their global missile system, which will inevitably lead to disruption of established strategic balances both in the Asia Pacific and beyond.”

Antonov said the “deployment of US missile defense systems in South Korea clearly goes beyond the tasks of deterring ‘the North Korean threat’.”

Moscow and Beijing are fearful that the continual expansion of US anti-missile systems is aimed at laying the groundwork for a devastating first nuclear strike by the United States. The THAAD and other anti-missile systems are being installed to neutralise any retaliatory strikes by Russia or China.

This year’s US National Defence Authorisation Act significantly expanded the scope of the American anti-missile program by amending the 1999 National Missile Defence Act. It now calls for “robust” defences against complex threats, rather than anti-missile measures to counter a “limited” threat.

The US has currently deployed a THAAD battery in Guam, as well as two associated X-band radar systems in Japan. The high-altitude inceptor system is part of a more extensive network involving shorter range land-based and ship-based anti-missile systems.

The presidency of Trump, who has called for a major expansion of US nuclear forces and the military more generally, will greatly heighten tensions in Asia and internationally. Trump has already threatened trade war measures against China, denounced its land reclamation in the South China Sea and criticised Beijing for failing to rein in North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.

In his confirmation hearing on Thursday, Trump’s nominee for Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson went far further, declaring that the US would not allow China to access the islets it controls in the South China Sea—implying that US warships and aircraft would block Chinese ships and planes, which would be an act of war.

At the same time, Tillerson ramped up the pressure on China over North Korea, saying the US could not continue to accept “empty promises” from Beijing about putting pressure on Pyongyang. He said his approach to North Korea would involve a long-term plan based on further sanctions and their proper implementation.

Asked if Washington should consider imposing “secondary sanctions” on Chinese entities found to be violating existing sanctions on North Korea, Tillerson said: “If China is not going to comply with those UN sanctions, then it’s appropriate ... for the United States to consider actions to compel them to comply.”

Trump has already indicated that North Korea will be at the top of his foreign policy agenda when he assumes office amid continuing speculation, particularly in the American media, that Pyongyang will soon have a nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

Trump has emphatically tweeted that a North Korean ICBM test launch “won’t happen”—a menacing threat not only to Pyongyang, but also Beijing. Neither Trump nor Tillerson has indicated how they would strong-arm China into preventing a North Korean missile launch or pressuring Pyongyang to disarm. But any punitive measures will only compound an already tense situation.

A Russian foreign ministry statement yesterday declared that the situation around the Korean Peninsula was “exhibiting a high likelihood of becoming volatile.” Without naming Washington, it criticised “the counter-productiveness of the line being taken by certain governments in exacerbating these tensions and instigating an arms race in the sub-region, as well as the increase in the scale of military drills.”

As well as the installation of THAAD battery, the US is restructuring its bases in South Korea and has adopted an aggressive operational plan—OPLAN 5015—in the event of war with North Korea that includes pre-emptive strikes and the assassination of top North Korean leaders. This year the US and South Korea held their largest-ever joint military exercises, involving 300,000 South Korean troops and 17,000 US personnel, backed by sophisticated armour and artillery, as well as air and sea power.

China and Russia have given no indication as to what countermeasures they will adopt to the installation of the THAAD system in South Korea. The two countries held a joint anti-missile drill last May after Washington and Seoul began discussions about deploying a battery. They have announced a second drill will take place in October this year.

South Korea has complained that China is taking “retaliatory measures” over the THAAD decision. Seoul has pointed to a partial ban on South Korean television broadcasts as well as some pop singers. China has also launched an investigation into South Korean retail giant Lotte, which does business in China.

This week South Korean Trade Minister Joo Hyung-hwan told parliament that he planned to raise the issue again during a meeting with Chinese officials yesterday over a free trade agreement.

The determination of the Trump administration to confront China across the board—diplomatically, economically and militarily—including on dangerous flashpoints such as the Korean Peninsula and the South China Sea, will only intensify the danger of an accelerating arms race in the region and a plunge into war.

Obama expands NSA spying

George Gallanis

With the inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump only days away, the Obama administration announced on Thursday a vast expansion of the spying power of American intelligence agencies. Under the new rules, the National Security Agency (NSA) can now share raw bulk data consisting of private communications with 16 other intelligence agencies, including the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security.

In response to the recent rules set forward by the Obama administration, NSA Whistleblower Edward Snowden Tweeted on Thursday, “As he hands the White House to Trump, Obama just unchained NSA from basic limits on passing raw intercepts to others.”

Previously, NSA analysts were required to sift out information they judged irrelevant and withhold the names of individuals deemed innocent before passing along information to other agencies. Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch signed the new rules, which grants multiple agencies access to “raw signals intelligence information,” on January 3. The director of national intelligence, James R. Clapper Jr., approved the measure on December 15, 2016.

Executive Order 12333, enacted into law by the Ronald Reagan administration and then expanded by the George W. Bush administration, serves as the quasi-legal basis for much of the NSA’s vast surveillance dragnet. Through it, the NSA gathers information from around the world via phone and internet servers and connections, from sites such as Google, and consumes entire phone call records from whole countries and monitors satellite transmissions.

In 2014, The Intercept disclosed that the NSA used Order 12333 to search over 850 billion phone and internet records and amass raw, unfiltered information on the activities of millions of American citizens.

The new rules stipulate the NSA to share explicit surveillance information and feeds to different agencies only if the information is deemed pertinent to that agency’s surveillance operations.

Agencies may be granted access if they intend to use the raw bulk data for foreign intelligence or counterintelligence investigations, and if an American citizen is found to be an agent working for a foreign country. In other words, agencies will use the raw data to spy on foreign individuals across the globe and American citizens in the United States.

In an attempt to present some kind of checks and balances to its new sharing capacities, according to the New York Times, the NSA will only grant agencies access to information “it deems reasonable after considering factors like whether large amounts of Americans’ private information might be included and, if so, how damaging or embarrassing it would be if that information were ‘improperly used or disclosed.’”

This will do nothing. Given that the personal information of millions upon millions of people has already been amassed and carefully combed through by the NSA and other intelligence agencies, it is unlikely any agency will be denied access.

In short, raw data previously investigated by the NSA will be thrown open to 16 other agencies, with entire personal information of millions of people exposed to and combed through by the CIA, FBI, and other agencies.

Perhaps most significant, under the new rules, any incriminating information of American citizens will be sent to the Justice Department, setting forth a wave of possible new accusations and investigations for thousands of people, if not more.

The Obama administration has sought to downplay the significant dangers of the new rules. Robert S. Litt, the general counsel to Clapper, stated, “This is not expanding the substantive ability of law enforcement to get access to signals intelligence. It is simply widening the aperture for a larger number of analysts, who will be bound by the existing rules.”

In reality, this is another step in the attack against democratic rights and a turn towards more authoritarian forms of rule, which has characterized the legacy of outgoing president Barack Obama.

During the last eight years, Obama has not only continued the illegal spying on billions of people around the world, but has dramatically increased it.

In May 2011, Obama signed three provisions of the widely-hated USA Patriot Act. Under the new provisions, spy agencies were granted access to using “roving wiretaps,” the authorization to intercept all communications of suspects; unlimited access to business, purchases, and travel records of suspects; and the surveillance of individuals with no suspected connections to foreign organizations.

In July 2013, Obama renewed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which forces US telecommunications companies to turn over bulk telephone records to spy agencies. The FISA act was used by the George W. Bush administration to warrantlessly wiretap millions of people.

The revelations of whistleblower Edward Snowden showed the NSA had, under the Obama administration, illegally collected phone records from over 120 million Verizon customers. Snowden also revealed the existence of the massive surveillance program known as PRISM, which collected the e-mails, phone calls, text and video chats from Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Yahoo, Apple and other tech giants of both foreigners and Americans.

In the aftermath of Snowden’s revelations, the Obama White House crafted an NSA “reform” package, based on recommendations by a panel representing the spy agencies themselves, that further institutionalized the NSA’s illegal domestic spying operations, while putting in place stringent security measures to prevent disclosures of its crimes.

The Obama Administration has prosecuted more whistle-blowers than any presidency in American history, and has viciously victimized those who sought to expose this program, imprisoning Chelsea Manning and forcing Julian Assange to seek refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London and Edward Snowden to go into hiding in Russia.

Throughout his term, Obama worked to defend and facilitate the crimes of the intelligence agencies, working with the CIA to suppress the revelations of the Senate’s report on torture under the Bush Administration and shielding the architects of the torture program from prosecution.

The complete cynicism and hypocrisy of Obama was on full display during his farewell speech in Chicago on Tuesday. Touting himself as a champion of American democracy, he neglected to mention the mass state spying apparatus which he has expanded and prepared for Donald Trump.

US Congress moves to repeal Obamacare in order to impose even deeper health cuts

Kate Randall

The Republican-controlled Congress took a major step toward repealing the Affordable Care Act (ACA) this week with the passage of a budget resolution that will be used to roll back the health care law. The resolution indicates that “replacement” legislation for the ACA, better known as Obamacare, will be ready two weeks from now (January 27), but it does not impose a hard deadline for a bill.

The Senate voted 51-48 in the early morning hours Thursday and the House voted 227-198 Friday afternoon, mostly along party lines, on a resolution that clears the way for ending major funding provisions of the ACA through the “budget reconciliation” process. By effectively repealing Obamacare via this parliamentary procedure, the Republicans are circumventing the normal legislative process under which Senate Democrats could block repeal by mounting a filibuster, which requires 60 votes to overcome.

President-elect Donald Trump has vowed that doing away with Obamacare will be his first order of business as president, asserting it will be replaced with something “cheaper” and “better.” He has made the highly dubious claim that “repeal and replace” will take place virtually simultaneously, even within the “same hour.”

He and congressional Republicans have made it clear that they intend to include in any replacement legislation provisions to effectively end Medicaid, the government health program for the poor run jointly by the federal government and the states. They plan to turn Medicaid into a state-run program funded via block grants from the federal government. Each state would establish its own guidelines and standards, funding would be drastically cut, care requirements would be lifted, and the program would be rapidly privatized.

The assault on Medicaid will represent a major step in the drive to dismantle and privatize Medicare, the government health insurance program for the elderly.

Congressional Democrats have offered to work with Republicans to salvage whatever they can of President Obama’s signature domestic legislation, pledging to agree to changes that would supposedly make health care “better” for ordinary Americans.

Democrats are fighting for popular provisions in the ACA to be maintained in any replacement legislation, such as the ban on insurers discriminating against those with preexisting conditions and a provision allowing children up to age 26 to remain under their parents’ coverage.

From the beginning, Obamacare was designed to cut costs for the government and corporations and increase the profits of the insurance industry, which was central in crafting the legislation. The ACA’s central component, the “individual mandate,” requires those without insurance from their employer or a government program to purchase coverage from private insurers or pay a tax penalty, with modest subsidies provided to qualifying consumers based on income.

Obama’s health care overhaul was also aimed at shifting away from the long-standing system of employer-sponsored insurance, which is deemed too expensive for corporations, toward a system in which people must fend for themselves on the private insurance market.

The legislation also includes measures to move from the existing “fee for service” system to a new model of health care delivery in which providers are reimbursed according to the “value” and “quality” of the care they provide—code words for cost-cutting, to be achieved by rationing care on a class basis.

The ACA includes more than $700 billion in cuts over the next decade to Medicare, the government health insurance program for the elderly and disabled, to be achieved through shifting the way doctors and hospitals are paid by providing financial rewards to providers who cut costs through the “value-based” approach.

As reactionary as Obamacare is, Trump and the Republicans are opposing it from the right, seeking to shift the US health care system in an even more pro-corporate, free-market direction without regard for the impact on the health and lives of the vast majority of Americans.

Displaying the oligarchic and anti-working class nature of the incoming administration, the Republicans are moving forward recklessly with Obamacare repeal, with the very real possibility that the legislation will be overturned before any substitute legislation is drafted, let alone passed and signed into law.

This raises the possibility that the 20 million people who have gained coverage through the ACA—on the Obamacare exchanges and through an expansion of Medicaid—will be left with no access to any remotely affordable options, even to coverage with high deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs, such as that provided under Obamacare.

While there is a great deal of popular opposition to Obamacare, a recent poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 75 percent of Americans either want to keep it or repeal it only when there is a replacement health care law.

The biggest concern of those polled was health costs. The vast majority—67 percent—said their top priority was “lowering the amount individuals pay for health care.” This very real concern will not be addressed by either the maintenance of Obamacare or the implementation of any of the various proposals being advanced by the Republicans to replace it. Health care costs for working and middle class Americans will continue to rise sharply under either scenario.

Now that the budget resolution has passed both houses of Congress, the next step is to actually begin writing the Obamacare repeal. Discussion will take place simultaneously in the relevant committees in both the House and Senate, then each committee will have to vote to report out a bill. The bills from the multiple committees must then be merged into one House bill and one Senate bill. Everything in the bills must have a significant impact on federal spending or revenue to be considered for the “filibuster-proof” budget reconciliation process.

These bills will then proceed to the full House and Senate to be voted on. Finally, a conference committee will be convened with representatives from both chambers to iron out any differences, with the final bill submitted for floor votes in the House and Senate. If passed by Congress, the legislation will have to be signed by the President to become law.

After that, the process of actually writing the replacement legislation will begin. Because this will involve non-budgetary measures such as mandates, provisions on preexisting conditions, etc., such legislation will in practice require 60 Senate votes, not just 51, to advance, which means the Republicans will have to win over at least eight Democrats.

It is unclear what plan will guide the Republicans’ Obamacare replacement efforts. Trump’s pick to head the Department of Health and Human Services, Tom Price, a Tea Party Republican from Georgia and chair of the House Budget Committee, has prepared a 242-page proposal for legislation to replace the ACA that is one option under consideration.

Price’s “Empowering Patients First Act” would particularly impact health care for older, sicker and poorer Americans. It would do away with the ACA insurance exchanges and its subsidies. It would instead offer fixed tax credits pegged to a person’s age rather than income, ranging from $1,200 annually for those age 18-35 to $3,000 for those 51 and older. These amounts would hardly make a dent in the cost of premiums and other out-of-pocket expenses for even the most limited insurance.

Price would also repeal Obamacare’s expanded Medicaid coverage in 32 states and the District of Columbia for “able-bodied” single adults, leaving this impoverished segment of society out in the cold.

It would eliminate mandates for insurers to provide a standard package of benefits, such as maternity services and pediatric care. It would also eliminate the limits on increased charges for older enrollees, allowing insurers to hike their premiums and other charges for older enrollees at will.

Price’s plan would allow health insurers licensed in one state to sell them across state lines. It would provide $3 billion over three years in grants to states to insure the “high risk” population, an amount that is woefully inadequate.

After Trump’s victory in November, Price told reporters that House Republicans would push this year for changes to Medicare, which covers 57 million seniors. He said Republicans would likely move “within the first six to eight months” of the new administration to begin implementing their plan, which would include raising the age of eligibility from 65 to 67 by 2020 and gradually privatizing the system with “premium supports,” or vouchers, to be used to buy insurance on the private market.

These vouchers would replace Medicare’s current guaranteed level of coverage, e.g., paying approximately 80 percent or more for a hospital stay, with a fixed sum to purchase coverage. The result would be a massive decline in health coverage and a sharp increase in poverty among the elderly.

Monash University Australia Full International Merit Scholarship 2017/2018

Application Deadlines:

• Round one: 15th October
• Round two: 15th November
• Round three: 15th January
• Round four: 15th March
• Round five: 15th April
• Round six: 15th May

Eligible Countries: International

To be taken at (country): Australia

Type: Undergraduate or Postgraduate (coursework) degree

Eligibility: 

• International student.
• Commencing students with a full Monash course offer or continuing students that have completed a minimum of 2 semesters
• Undertaking a full-time undergraduate or postgraduate (coursework) degree at a Monash campus in Australia
• Current students enrolled in the Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (Honours) MBBS must have completed at least 3 semesters.

Selection Criteria: 

• Based on academic achievement.
• Current students must have achieved a minimum 85 WAM
• Students will also be assessed on their scholarship application statement (500 words), and their potential to be an ambassador for Monash University.
• Preference will be given to commencing students.

Number of Awardees: 31

Value of Scholarship: 100% course fees paid until the minimum number of points for your degree are completed (excludes OSHC, accommodation and living costs).

Duration of Scholarship: Duration of programme. However, you must maintain a distinction average (70% or above) each semester to retain this scholarship.

How to Apply: 

• You must submit a separate application form for this scholarship (due dates as below).
• Before applying for this scholarship, you must have received a full Monash course offer with no conditions.
• Do not submit supporting documentation with your application – this will not be considered.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: Monash University

World Citizen Talent Scholarship for International Students 2017/2018 – Netherlands

Application Deadline: 31st March, 2017

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: Students from outside the European Union (and not from Iceland, Norway, Liechtenstein, Switzerland or Suriname)

To be taken at (country): The Hague University of Applied Sciences, Netherlands

Type: Bachelors/Masters

Eligibility: To be eligible for a World Citizen Talent Scholarship, candidate must:

• Come from outside the European Union (and not from Iceland, Norway, Liechtenstein, Switzerland or Surinam).
• Be enrolling for the first time at The Hague University of Applied Sciences.
• have to pay the full institutional tuition fee rate.
• Have never applied for this scholarship before.
• Have not applied for the Holland Scholarship.
• Have been provisionally accepted as a student (also-called offer of student position) on or before 1 May 2017.

Selection Criteria: Appointed judges will select the 54 students whose essays will have impressed them most to receive the scholarship. The decision of the jury is binding and you will be informed about it via email before 15 May 2017.

Number of Awardees: 54

Value of Scholarship: €5,000.

Duration of Scholarship: One-time

How to Apply: To apply for the scholarship, you must first apply to the Bachelor or Master programme of your choice and write an essay following the essay guidelines. Submit your essay by completing the scholarship application form between 1 November 2016-31 March 2017.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: The Hague University of Applied Sciences, Netherlands

Important Notes: Please note that you will only be awarded the scholarship after you have been conditionally accepted and have met all terms and conditions of enrolment. You will receive the scholarship amount of € 5.000, after your arrival in The Hague and have set up a Dutch bank account.

Attend the JR Biotek African Diaspora Biotech Summit 2017 – University of Cambridge, UK

Application Timeline:

• 7th January 2017: Summit application opens
• 28th February 2017: Application closes
• 7th March 2017: Selected candidates informed

Eligible Countries: African countries

To be taken at (country): University of Cambridge, UK

Field of Discourse: Four major areas to be discussed at the Summit are;

• Improving agricultural productivity and food security in sub-Saharan Africa between now and 2050
• Reforming Africa’s tertiary education system to make it globally competitive.
• Policy development and implementation to facilitate sustainable development in African nations
• The role and contribution of the African diaspora in developing Africa’s bioeconomy

About the Award: The African Diaspora Biotech Summit 2017 is a flagship initiative of JR Biotek Foundation. It was developed to inspire early-career life science and biotech professionals (including research scientists, innovators, entrepreneurs, policy experts, and present and future bio-industry leaders) from Africa and the diaspora to help find practical solutions that will contribute to Africa’s sustainable development.

The Summit will bring together, 70 students and early-/mid-career life science and biotech professionals (including research scientists, entrepreneurs, policy experts, and bio-industry leaders) from Africa and the diaspora to discuss the current state of Africa’s biotech industry. Our goal is to create a unique platform for Africa’s future leaders and key stakeholders, especially those in the diaspora, to better understand the challenges and opportunities in Africa’s biotech and life science sector, and how they may be involved in finding practical solutions that will help build the continent’s bioeconomy.

The Summit will include panel-led discussions and keynote addresses, which will set the stage for discussions about the urgent need to strengthen biotech and bioscience education, training and capacity building; research innovation, and biotech commercialization in Africa.

Type: Events and Conferences

Eligibility: The Summit is for early- and mid-career biotech and life sciences professionals, including research scientists, post-doctoral researchers, academics, biotech entrepreneurs, innovators, policy experts, and graduate students from Africa and the diaspora to join us at our inaugural African Diaspora Biotech Summit 2017. Selected applicants should demonstrate;

• Strong intellectual ability, capacity for leadership, and a commitment to help countries in Africa achieve sustainable development through biotech and life science education and capacity building, research innovation, and commercialization;
• Their knowledge of the current state of Africa’s biotech and life science industry, including its present challenges, opportunities for growth, and potential solutions. Selected candidates should be able to propose, at least one solution or idea that can contribute to the growth of Africa’s bioeconmy and improve lives, if implemented.

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Program: By attending the African Diaspora Biotech Summit 2017, attendees will;

• Better understand the key challenges and opportunities in Africa’s biotech and life science industry, and be better positioned to propose new ideas or solutions that can help improve agricultural productivity and food security, human health, industrial development, economic growth and environmental sustainability in African nations;
• Meet, connect and exchange knowledge and ideas with current and future African leaders and key stakeholders of Africa’s biotech and life science sector. This will facilitate collaborative relationships that can enhance efforts to build a sustainable African bioeconomy. It will also contribute to both your personal and career development;
• Be part of a solution-oriented meeting that can bring about significant and lasting change in core areas and sectors (e.g. agriculture, health care, education, the environment, etc.) that can create opportunities for employment, investment and sustained economic growth in Africa.

Summit attendees are not charged any fee to attend the Summit. However, the Summit attendees are expected to cover their travel and accommodation, which will be provided in one of the finest Colleges in Cambridge University. The cost for a single room is £45 per night, and this includes breakfast and Wi-Fi. For more information, please contact us at

Duration of Program: Tuesday, 4th April 2017 (24 hours)

APPLY HERE

Visit Program Webpage for details

Award Provider: JR Biotek Foundation

New Zealand Development Scholarships for African Students 2017/2018

Application Deadline: 15th March 2017

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible countries: Algeria, Angola, Botswana, Cameroon, Djibouti, Egypt, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe.

To be taken at (country): New Zealand

Fields of study: Preference will be given to candidates who apply to study in academic disciplines relating to one or more of the following:

Agriculture development

• Agri-business management: agricultural economics, agricultural systems and management, rural development, logistics, supply chain and distribution management, value chain development, agriculture marketing, international agribusiness
• Agriculture production: animal science, veterinary nursing, plant science, horticultural science, soil science
• Agriculture trade and technology: Phytosanitary, bio-security, biotechnology, agricultural trade
• Post-harvest: food production, food sciences/technology, post-harvest processing, food storage and packaging, food safety

Renewable energy

• Geothermal, solar, hydro-electric and wind energy, energy engineering, renewable energy distribution systems, energy sector management/reform, including energy economics and financials

About Scholarship: New Zealand Development Scholarships (NZDS) give candidates from selected developing countries an opportunity to gain knowledge and skills through study in specific subject areas which will assist in the development of their home country. Awardees are required to return to their home country for at least two years after the completion of their scholarship to apply these new skills and knowledge in government, civil society or private business organisations.

Who is eligibility to apply? Applicants must meet the following conditions to be eligible for a New Zealand Scholarship:

• Be a minimum of 18 years of age at the time of commencing your scholarship.
• Be a citizen of the country from which you are applying for a scholarship.
• Not have citizenship or permanent residence status of New Zealand, Australia, USA, Canada, European Union countries, United Kingdom, Japan, Israel, South Korea, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia. Have resided in your home country for at least two years immediately prior to commencing your scholarship. Have at least 2 years of work experience (part time or fulltime, paid or voluntary).
• Not be serving military personnel.
• Be able to satisfy Immigration requirements for international student entry to New Zealand or the country in which you will undertake your scholarship (i.e. medical checks, police clearances/character checks, etc.)
• Be academically and linguistically able to obtain an Offer of Place for the proposed programme of study from the tertiary institute where you will undertake your scholarship.
• Not have been previously terminated from a New Zealand Government Scholarship
• Seek a qualification that will contribute to the sustainable development of your home country
• Commit to return to your country for a minimum of 2 years at the end of your scholarship.

Number of Scholarship: Several

What are the benefits? New Zealand has first-rate education institutions that offer world-recognised qualifications. Successful applicants will have access to excellent academic knowledge in quality facilities. The scholarships include financial support for tuition, living costs while in New Zealand, and airfares. The partners of students are eligible for a work visa that allows them to live and work in New Zealand for the duration of their partner’s study.

Duration of sponsorship:

• Masters Degree (1 – 2 years)
• PhD (3 – 4 years)

How to Apply: The online application process has four steps, all completed on an online application site (external link). The site will explain each step in more detail.

1. Step one: Confirm your eligibility: Complete the Online Eligibility Test. This will give you a number that you will need when you register (step three).
2. Step two: Create a Real Me login: This will give you a login and password that you will use through the application process.
3. Step three: Register with New Zealand Scholarships online: This creates your application account, and means you will be set up to complete an application.
4. Step four: Complete your application: This step will only become available when applications formally opens. Check application dates.

If you are interested in applying for a scholarship we encourage you to complete steps 1, 2 and 3 before applications open in February 2017. We can then send you a message when Step 4 opens up.

Start your online application process here (external link).

Visit the Scholarship Webpage for details

Sponsors: The New Zealand Development Scholarships are funded by the New Zealand Aid Programme, the New Zealand Government’s overseas aid and development programme and managed by the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT).