Australian state premier’s sudden resignation highlights political instability

Mike Head

Mike Baird, the Liberal-National Coalition premier of New South Wales, the country’s largest state by population and economic size, abruptly announced on Thursday that he was quitting parliament next week, after less than three years in office.

His likely successor, state Treasurer Gladys Berejiklian, is set to become the seventh premier in just 12 years—none of whom lasted more than three years. Baird’s sudden departure underscores the brittleness of the political establishment nationally, adding to a long list of state premiers and federal prime ministers who have suddenly left office over the past decade, often via electoral defeats or backroom coups.

Baird’s resignation is another indication of the deepening political crisis produced by a deteriorating economic situation—both globally and in Australia—and the intensifying geo-strategic tensions, especially between the US and China. There is already widespread popular hostility to the entire political establishment after decades of austerity measures, cuts to jobs, wages and working conditions, and soaring social inequality.

Baird, a former investment banker, is getting out before the full deluge hits. He claimed to be resigning for family reasons, but sent a barbed message to Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, combined with a warning of a looming “cliff” in funding for health care.

Baird said his biggest regret was the Turnbull government’s retreat on “tax reform.” In 2015, Baird, together with his South Australian Labor Party counterpart Jay Weatherill, advocated lifting the regressive federal goods and services tax (GST) rate from 10 percent to 15 percent.

Above all, this represented the demands of the financial elite for a further shifting of the taxation burden away from business and the wealthy, and onto the working class, via the consumption tax. At the same time, the state premiers feared the public outrage they would incur when their governments had to further slash public health and education because the federal Coalition government, in its 2014 budget, cut $80 billion from federal health and education funding over 10 years.

Baird and Weatherill argued for lifting the GST, the revenue from which is earmarked for the states and territories, as a means of offsetting the $80 billion hole. The looming funding crunch became more stark as a result of last year’s federal election campaign, during which the federal Labor Party dropped its show of opposition to the $80 billion cut—$25.5 billion of which will come from New South Wales hospitals and schools.

However, after Turnbull ousted Tony Abbott as prime minister in September 2015, Turnbull eventually backed away from lifting the GST, fearing public opposition to the resulting hike in the cost of living.

The Australian Financial Review editorial yesterday accused the Turnbull government of leaving Baird “hanging out to dry” on the GST, and declared: “We need more Mike Bairds.”

In a thinly-veiled swipe at Turnbull on Thursday, Baird said: “I think there was a big opportunity there to do something very significant in terms of the competitiveness of the economy and the sustainability of funding services in the long term, and that’s something I’m disappointed [about].”

Baird was already facing mounting public opposition to his government. It imposed the dictates of finance capital, especially by privatising the state’s electricity network, major ports and other facilities. This sell-off has delivered a bonanza to banks, finance houses and corporate consultants, and boosted the state’s coffers to pay for pro-corporate infrastructure, at the expense of thousands of jobs of power and public sector workers.

Baird’s government also forcibly amalgamated many municipal councils last year, destroying more jobs, as a means of cost-cutting and removing constraints on property developers. Then it announced the privatisation of five large hospitals in regional areas, threatening further jobs and essential services.

As a means of cleaning up the state’s image for investors, the Coalition imposed late-night “lockout” laws in Kings Cross, Sydney’s nightclub precinct, and legislated to ban greyhound racing throughout the state. To suppress dissent, the Baird government passed draconian anti-protest laws that reverse a range of fundamental democratic rights.

Only last year, Baird was still being touted in the media as Australia’s most popular and successful political leader, precisely because of his delivery of the corporate agenda. He was declared “charismatic” and dubbed “Magic Mike.” But the seething discontent in working class and rural areas erupted to the surface last November in a by-election for the electorate of Orange, a regional city.

In an unprecedented 34 percent swing against the government, the seat, held for seven decades by the rural-based National Party, fell to the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party, a right-wing populist formation that calls for economic protectionist measures.

This electoral disaster forced Police Minister Troy Grant to resign as National Party leader and deputy premier. It also raised fears throughout the political establishment of the rise of the anti-immigrant Pauline Hanson’s One Nation and other populist oufits seeking to emulate US President Donald Trump in exploiting the growing social discontent.

Apart from more than $20 billion raised via privatisations, the Baird government’s revenues were enhanced by tax revenues derived from a debt-fuelled property bubble that has driven housing prices sky-high in Sydney, the country’s primary financial centre. Baird’s hasty departure came amid signs of an impending implosion of this boom.

Baird was installed as premier in 2014, when his predecessor, Barry O’Farrell, was forced to resign, supposedly for misleading a corruption inquiry about receiving a bottle of wine. Despite axing some 25,000 public sector jobs since taking office in 2011, O’Farrell was increasingly criticised by the media for not going far enough in cutting social spending and implementing the free market agenda required by the financial elites.

The Murdoch-owned Daily Telegraph had demanded that the state government “stop dithering” and privatise the remainder of the state’s electricity system, Baird quickly took up this call, and still managed to retain office at the next election, in 2015, despite losing at least 16 seats in the 93-seat lower house of parliament.

Both Baird and O’Farrell were beneficiaries of the landslide defeat of the previous Labor government in 2011. After 16 years in office, Labor’s vote plunged to just 25.5 percent, as a result of the disgust in the working class generated by Labor’s own pro-business record, which included numerous moves to sell-off the electricity infrastructure, and a string of corruption scandals. It recovered to just 34.4 percent in 2015.

Underlining the essential unity between the two traditional ruling parties, former state Labor premier Bob Carr on Thursday praised Baird’s record, saying he should be congratulated for privatising the electricity assets—a policy that Carr had unsuccessfully sought to implement. Carr, who held office from 1995 to 2005, said: “Barry O’Farrell hesitated over that decision: Mike Baird to his credit made the decision and got on with it.”

Likewise, the current state Labor Party leader Luke Foley, who had claimed to oppose the power sell-off, thanked Baird for his “service” to the state. Baird’s rapid exit is another indication of the political convulsions to come.

Additional 37 Crown Post Offices to close in Britain

Richard Tyler

The demise of the UK’s Post Office moves one step closer with the planned closure of a further 37 Crown post offices, threatening over 400 jobs, some 12.5 percent of the existing 3,344 workforce in these facilities.

Crown Post Offices are mainly larger branches, usually found on the high street of most towns or populous conurbations that provide an extensive range of services. Notwithstanding the tremendous developments in technology and global integration, the offices continue to provide an important function in many aspects of life.

For the powers-that-be, however, the post offices are just another lucrative source of profiteering, and the jobs, livelihoods and services it supplies are of no consequence. That is why postal services globally have been a target for privatisation and outsourcing and Britain is no exception.

At its highpoint in 1975, nearly one-half million people worked for the Post Office, making it one of the UK’s largest employers, with 177,625 in the postal service alone. The Post Office Annual Report for 2016 records a total of just 6,605 employees.

The breakup and privatisation of the Post Office began under the Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. Legislation passed in 1984 lifting the previous state monopoly over telecommunications accompanied the sale of 50 percent of the shares in the newly-created British Telecommunications, which had been hived off from the Post Office. In 1990, the Post Office’s banking arm, Giro Bank, was sold off to the Alliance and Leicester.

The process of dismantling and selling off what remained of the Post Office continued under the Labour governments of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.

In 2004, the second daily delivery of mail was abolished, and in 2006, Royal Mail lost its 350-year monopoly. The postal market was opened up completely to private sector competitors, who were now permitted to collect and sort mail, which was then passed over to Royal Mail for delivery.

Under Labour, in 2007, 85 Crown post offices were closed, 70 of which were sold to the private retailer WH Smith.

The growth of the Internet and online communications technology, such as email, saw a significant drop in the volume of letters being sent. In 2008, the Labour government sought a partial privatisation of Royal Mail. Although the legislation passed in the House of Lords, it was blocked by a number of backbench Labour MPs in the House of Commons.

Following the 2010 general election, the incoming Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition moved quickly to revive the privatisation plans developed under Labour. New legislation was passed allowing the privatisation of up to 90 percent of Royal Mail. Liabilities for the company’s pension scheme were transferred to the Treasury, and in 2012, the Post Office was split away from Royal Mail, to make the latter more attractive to prospective buyers.

This left the Post Office as a rump, responsible just for running the network of Crown post offices and sub post offices. In 2013, the Post Office announced plans to franchise another 70 Crown post offices by moving the operations into shops, further reducing the Crown network to around 300 branches.

Changes in the payment of pensions and benefits removed one of the crucial services provided by the Post Office.

As part of the floatation of Royal Mail on the stock market, it had to sign up to a 10-year inter-business contract to use the services of the Post Office. However, the growth of private collection and delivery companies, such as Hermes and Yodel, makes clear that the most likely outcome will be a further reduction in business for the Post Office once this contract expires.

Workers in the Post Office/Royal Mail have seen one assault on their jobs and conditions after another under both Tory and Labour governments. The sale of Royal Mail in 2012 at far below the market price saw shareholders reaping a bonanza. This was paid for through the destruction of tens of thousands of jobs in the drive to turn a vital public service into a source of private profit.

At the same time, many functions have been transferred into the private sector, where workers are paid the minimum wage, or are super-exploited on the basis of phony “self-employment” contracts—denying them even the minimum of protections and benefits still afforded an employee.

Those workers remaining in the Post Office face a situation in which the government is systematically removing its functions and starving it of investment as a prelude to its ultimate closure.

In a cost-cutting move and further attack on conditions, the Post Office and Royal Mail have implemented changes to their “final salary” pension schemes affecting some 100,000 workers.

Royal Mail has already closed its defined benefits pension scheme to new entrants—which links the pension to a worker’s earnings history, length of service and age. Now it wants to close the scheme to “future accrual,” drastically lowering the benefits that would be received on retirement. Under the changes, for example, a manager in their 40s would see their expected pension slashed from £38,000 to just £18,000 a year. A similar level of cuts would affect all grades.

The Post Office has begun a phony “consultation” process that will inevitably lead to it carrying out the same attacks on pension rights. This, according to the Communication Workers Union (CWU), is despite the pension fund being in a healthy surplus.

Not only does this mean that Post Office workers who have yet to retire will receive smaller pensions—those who have already retired could also see their benefits reduced. The employers have justified their slash and burn approach by claiming previous pension schemes were “simply unaffordable,” and so workers must be willing to accept lower benefits when they retire.

This stands in contrast to the generous treatment of former Royal Mail/Post Office chief executive Adam Crozier. When he left in 2007, after having received a 25 percent salary bump taking his remuneration to £1.25 million, he was awarded £158,000 in annual pension and benefits.

At the end of 2016, CWU members in the Post Office took strike action against the attacks on jobs and pensions. This struggle was sabotaged and undermined by the union from the start.

The strike was limited to just a few days involving the Crown Post Offices, with no action organised to include the far larger workforce at Royal Mail, who face the same attacks.

The CWU has done nothing to oppose the privatisation of Royal Mail/Post Office. It has functioned as a junior partner to management in imposing the speed-ups and deterioration of workers’ pay and conditions demanded to make the business “profitable” in face of the competition.

The New Year message from CWU Deputy General Secretary Terry Pullinger made clear that union is motivated not by a genuine desire to protect its members and their conditions, but by its own interests, to uphold its own role as co-manager.

Pullinger highlighted the fact that privatisation only went ahead with the cooperation of the union, and included a legally-binding agreement protecting the “industrial relations framework.” In other words, the deal safeguards the right of the CWU bureaucracy to sit alongside management when it comes to imposing further cuts, while continuing to receive its members’ dues through the check-off system.

Workers cannot look to the union to defend their jobs and conditions. The CWU shares the same pro-capitalist outlook as the management. It is not a vehicle for fighting back against the bosses and the government, but a mechanism to ensure such a fight does not succeed.

British Supreme Court rules claimants can pursue action against UK for torture

Jean Shaoul 

The Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision granting Libyan Abdel Hakim Belhaj and his wife Fatima Bouchar the right to sue British officials and institutions for their alleged roles in the couple’s kidnapping, rendition and torture.

The government had sought to prevent the former Labour Foreign Secretary Jack Straw and Sir Mark Allen, a former senior officer in Britain’s spy agency MI6, having to account for their actions.

The Supreme Court ruled that rights enshrined in the Magna Carta had to be put before an English court. Furthermore, the judges argued that ministers cannot claim “state immunity” or escape trial on the grounds of the legal doctrine of “foreign acts of state.” They added, “The principle that there is no general defence of state necessity to a claim of wrongdoing by state officials has been established since the 18th century.”

The judgement relates to one of three linked cases regarding legal issues involved in claiming damages for the British armed forces’ actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, in which UK officials were said to be complicit, which could pave the way for hundreds of other victims to bring their cases against the Ministry of Defence before a court.

The court’s decision is a blow for the British political establishment, which has fought for years to keep secret the torture and other foul operations of Britain’s spy agencies and Special Forces that operate outside the law and without public scrutiny. The government is now likely to demand that any subsequent judicial proceedings are heard in secret.

The case is doubly politically damaging because it was brought by right-wing Islamist opponents of the regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi of Libya, whose fate between the years 2004 and 2011 exposes the filthy manoeuvres undertaken by successive Labour and Conservative/Liberal Democrat governments.

The government had sought to prevent the Belhajs from pursuing a civil action for damages for the British government and its intelligence services’ complicity in their abduction by the CIA in 2004 to the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia, a British dependency and one of the agency’s global network of “dark sites.”

Detainees at these sites were subject to internment for years under the most inhumane conditions, torture, water boarding, sexual assault, sleep deprivation, forcing inmates to stand on broken limbs, and murder, for which no officials have stood trial. The Belhajs were subsequently rendered to Libya where they were imprisoned and tortured at a time when the US and UK were cultivating more friendly relations with Gaddafi.

Belhaj claims that during his six years in a Libyan jail, he was in fact interrogated by US and British intelligence agents. His pregnant wife claims she was chained to a wall for five days, then taped to a stretcher for the 17-hour flight to Libya where she was detained in prison until just before the delivery of her son, who was born weighing just four pounds.

Belhaj had previously fought against Soviet forces in Afghanistan. With close relations with al-Qaeda and later the Taliban, he went on to set up the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) in the mid-1990s, with the aim of overthrowing the Gaddafi regime and establishing an Islamic state based upon Sharia law.

In the 1990s, the British government allowed numerous Islamist groups to operate in London, which became known as “Londonistan.” The Libyan dissidents and the LIFG were allowed to develop a base of logistical support and fund raising because of Libya’s alleged involvement in the Lockerbie bombing in 1988.

MI6 even used an LIFG agent in London to mastermind Gaddafi’s assassination in an attack that killed or injured several civilians while leaving Gaddafi unhurt, according to a report by former British spy David Shayler that was subsequently confirmed by US intelligence.

All that changed in 2004, when the Labour government of Tony Blair brought Colonel Gaddafi in from the cold—ostensibly to help prosecute the so-called war on terror, but in reality to secure lucrative contracts for British oil companies.

As part of the deal, the authorities rounded up opponents of the Libyan regime in London and elsewhere, and sent them back to Libya. Belhaj and his wife were part of the deal as papers belonging to Libya’s intelligence chief Moussa Koussa, discovered after the ouster of the Gaddafi regime by NATO-led forces in 2011, revealed.

Sir Mark Allen, who was head of MI6’s counter-terrorism unit, had taken the credit for the kidnapping of the families in a letter to Koussa in which he wrote, “Most importantly, I congratulate you on the safe arrival of Abu Abd Allah Sadiq [Abdul-Hakim Belhaj]. This was the least we could do for you and for Libya to demonstrate the remarkable relationship we have built over the years. I am so glad. I was grateful to you for helping the officer we sent out last week.”

After his abrupt resignation in 2004, Sir Mark Allen subsequently went on to work for as a special advisor to oil giant BP on Libyan oil contracts.

Jack Straw, the then Foreign Secretary, has repeatedly denied any knowledge of Britain’s role in extraordinary rendition, calling it a “conspiracy theory.” The intelligence services, however, flatly contradicted him, saying that it was a “ministerially-authorised government policy.”

Sir Richard Dearlove, head of MI6 at the time, said, “It was a political decision, having very significantly disarmed Libya, for the government to cooperate with Libya on Islamist terrorism.”

The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), which has refused to press charges against anyone, has acknowledged that “the suspect,” meaning Sir Mark Allen, knew about the renditions of the Belhaj and Saadi families, and had “sought political authority for some of his actions.”

This was nothing short of an admission of Britain’s illegal and secret involvement at the very highest level in the extraordinary rendition programme organised by Washington. It blew apart the government’s mendacious attempts to keep its criminal role in renditions and torture under wraps via multi-million out-of-court settlements to its victims. Belhaj was determined to get an apology and admission of liability for what was done to him and his wife, which led to the government seeking to get the Supreme Court to block his case—citing arguments of “state immunity” and the involvement of foreign intelligence agencies.

He was in a position to do so because, in a further switch in foreign policy, during the 2011 NATO-led invasion of Libya, the UK and US worked with Belhaj.

Belhaj was released from prison as one of 170 Islamists as part of an attempted deal between Gaddafi and the LIFG in 2009. During the NATO invasion, he worked as part of the LIFG together with al-Qaeda-linked forces as US proxies to topple Gaddafi—just seven years after the Blair government had befriended him.

The same Islamist militias, along with large quantities of Libyan arms, were then shipped off to take part in the next US-sponsored regime-change operation in Syria, before more recently being rebranded as “terrorists” when the growth of Islamic State became a threat to US interests in both Iraq and Syria.

The close ties between Britain and various Islamist groups is one of the reasons behind its determination to prevent any court hearings that might expose the extent of its collaboration, which exposes the lies surrounding official policy at home and abroad.

Furthermore, there is every indication that Britain intends to resume practices such as abduction and torture overseas, as it aligns yet more closely with Washington under President Donald Trump.

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has repeatedly refused to rule out helping the incoming Trump administration in future rendition programs despite Trump stating that he favoured “a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding.” No official has publicly condemned Trump’s approval of torture, while the 2016 Investigative Powers Act has abolished the Intelligence Services Commission that oversees its overseas agents’ compliance with Britain’s own vague rules on torture.

US house fire deaths totaled 2,290 in 2016

Steve Filips 

Three hundred thirty people were killed in house fires during the month of December, up nearly 50 percent from the previous year. In total, 2,290 people were killed in house fires throughout the United States last year. These figures do not include the thousands that were physically injured and the incalculable impact on the survivors and their loved ones.

To underline the national nature of the problem, these fires are common in all regions of the US. Tennessee had the highest number of people killed in house fires in December, at 20. Nineteen people were killed in California, 17 in Michigan, 15 in Ohio, and 14 in Texas.

Two of the nation’s poorest states, Alabama and Mississippi, had 12 and 13 deaths respectively in December. Nationally, 59 children were among those killed in resident fires last month.

For all of 2016, Texas had the highest number of fire deaths at 132, followed by New York with 120, Pennsylvania with 113, Georgia with 111, and California with 106. When the size of the state is considered, West Virginia had the highest rate of fire deaths, followed by Alaska, Vermont, Alabama and Arkansas. Only Hawaii did not report any deaths.

The numbers killed are undoubtedly higher, as the US Fire Administration gathers the figures from news reports and many are never reported. Also, fires like the tragic warehouse fire in Oakland, California, where 36 people were killed on December 2, are not counted since the building wasn’t considered a home.

Basic information such as cause of the fire, name and age of victims, type and age of home, homeowner or renter, and whether smoke detectors and other safety equipment were present is not reported in most cases.

A common thread in these fires, however, is that loss of life is largely preventable. In any rational society, a yearly death toll from fires of more than 2,000 people would be considered a national tragedy and measures would be taken to prevent such a disaster. However, under capitalism the steps necessary to ensure safety cut across the profits of the utilities, construction companies, landlords and investors.

Most fire deaths could be prevented with long-established fire suppression and early detection technologies. Most building codes don’t require sprinkler systems or hardwired smoke detectors. Many slum landlords don’t even ensure that there are proper fire escapes and battery-operated smoke detectors are present and operating.

One of the frequent causes of home fires is the use of supplemental heating sources, i.e., space heaters, wood stoves and fireplaces. Families often turn to these measures to offset the high cost of heat, poorly insulated buildings or when utilities are shut off for overdue bills.

Families and friends are often forced to live together in overcrowded conditions to afford rent and utilities. Since the 2008 housing crisis there has been an explosion of investment firms and banks buying up foreclosed homes and turning them into rental properties, doing little if any needed repairs.

The blame for these deaths lies at the doorstep of the for-profit system, which wrings its gains from the working class and their vulnerable children, who often pay a steep price for living in inadequate conditions with the loss of their lives.

An Akron, Ohio house fire at 266 E. Tallmadge Avenue killed four people on Saturday, December 3, including long-time companions Omar Riley, 36, and Shirley Wallis, 33, along with their children, eight-year-old Shanice and nine-year-old Anilya. Also critically injured was Shaniya, Riley’s 12-year-old daughter, who jumped from the second floor to escape the flames.

Jennifer Koval was also a tenant, living in the attic converted to living quarters of the two-and-a-half story home. Her only escape was blocked by flames, which engulfed the stairway in what appears to have been the only safe egress from her apartment.

With no fire escape, she crawled out a window and slid down to a second floor porch roof and then made the jump to the ground, sustaining injuries. Jennifer’s son and her fiancée Glen Parker were not home at the time.

The American Red Cross reported that many renters were picking up free smoke alarms as demand surged after the fire, from 20-50 units a week to 150 units, indicating that many people are in the same life-threatening situation.

Akron is known as the rubber city, headquarters for Goodyear but no longer for Firestone, which moved to Nashville after a merger with Bridgestone. The poverty rate for the 44310 ZIP code, where the December 3 house first took place, is nearly 19 percent and just over 30 percent for those under age 18.

Two fires in Baltimore took the lives of four children and physically injured at least one other. The first blaze was in a row house on North Clinton Street in East Baltimore and broke out at approximately 9:00 p.m. on December 7.

There were five people inside, a mother and her four children. The fire claimed the lives of a nine-month-old boy and three-year-old sibling, Nigel and Exekial Ramirez respectively. The mother suffered injuries requiring hospitalization, while a two- and five-year-old managed to escape.

Neighbor Nicole Carter spoke with Channel 2 WMAR about what she witnessed on the night of the fire. She said that firefighters approached the mother, who was trying to save the children in the house and begging for help. “She just was like, ‘The babies! The babies!’ and then they went in there and they brought the babies out,” Carter said.

Also in Baltimore, a house fire on Dorton Court December 10 took the lives of Tylynn McDuffie, 10, and one-year-old Kamarl Ferrell. With no fire escape, a 27-year-old woman, identified only as the children’s mother, dropped her four-year-old to the ground from a window and then leapt out, retreating from the blaze, unable to save the other children while sustaining injuries.

Neighbor Aisha Wright spoke with WBAL Radio and said, “They were good kids. She’s a nice lady and everything. No family deserves to go through that.”

Once again revealing the frequency of tragic home fires in Baltimore due to the poor housing conditions, a house fire on January 12 claimed the lives of six children. (See Six Children dead in Baltimore house fire)

On December 30, a mobile trailer fire killed three members of a family in Lafayette, Tennessee. Those who perished were Wanda Rush Ray, 69, and her sons, Jimmy Lane Ray, 52, and Ronald Earl Ray, 51. According to the coroner, the cause of death for all was smoke inhalation.

Twin Brothers Brenton and Braeson Fortson with their sister BreChelle [Credit: Benjamin Fortson's Facebook page]

In the Watts section of Los Angeles, twin boys lost their lives to a house fire on December 28. The brothers who perished were Brenton and Braeson Fortson, two-years-old. Benjamin Fortson, their father, risked all in an effort to save them, fighting thick smoke and flames and ultimately suffering burns to his face. Firefighters pulled all three from the blaze, with the father currently in the hospital listed in critical condition. Firefighters could not locate any smoke detectors in the residence.

According to media reports, there were up to 12 people living in the three-bedroom house, which far exceeds the federal Housing and Urban Development (HUD) guideline of two persons per bedroom. According to US Census figures, the 2015 poverty rate in Watts was 37.1 percent, with nearly 50 percent of children living in poverty.

These figures serve to highlight growing social inequality, where the relegation of a growing segment of the population to poverty and unsafe housing conditions is leading to a increasing loss of life in house fires.

Fighting erupts in Turkish parliament as Erdogan pushes for presidential dictatorship

Halil Celik & Alex Lantier

Fist-fights erupted in the Turkish parliament yesterday as the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) moved to impose a series of constitutional amendments aimed at turning the country into a presidential dictatorship under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Two deputies, one of the AKP and another of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), were hospitalized with injuries after the fighting, which erupted after another deputy, independent Aylin Nazliaka, handcuffed herself to the speakers’ microphone. Nazliaka said her action was a protest at the handcuffing of the parliament by the broad powers the proposed constitutional reforms would grant to the president.

The parliament nonetheless continued voting on the measures, approving yesterday Article 12 of the 18-point constitutional amendment package. This article, approved with only 12 votes over the necessary 330-vote threshold, grants the president the authority to impose a state of emergency.

More broadly, the amendments in the bill extend the president’s power over the legislative and judiciary branches. They enable the president to issue decrees, appoint ministers and top state officials—including the majority of the higher judicial bodies—and to dissolve parliament, while making it considerably harder to try or dismiss the president.

To impose the bill, Erdogan and the AKP are working closely with the fascistic Nationalist Movement Party (MHP). During the debates, AKP lawmakers consistently attacked the members of the two opposition parties, the Kemalist Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the HDP.

The MHP’s legalistic denials of charges that it is working with the AKP to impose the constitutional amendment package only served to underscore the close collaboration between the two parties. The AKP and the MHP, MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli told reporters in parliament on Thursday, “are two separate legal entities. We will have discourses within which we will say ‘yes’ in our own way.”

Bahçeli denied reports that the MHP is supporting Erdogan’s amendment because it is certain that it will have seats in a future AKP-led government, however. “We are not in a state to answer such a question regarding the future,” he said. “We have not stated an opinion about the future in this process.”

In the meantime, however, AKP sources confirmed that they were coordinating their actions with the MHP. “We will evaluate what the MHP will do during the campaign,” an AKP source told Hurriyet. “The MHP will carry out its own rallies, but we will coordinate with them.”

The desperate manoeuvres by Turkish opposition politicians reflect a broad awareness in the ruling class that Erdogan’s amendments would undermine basic democratic rights and mark a major step towards dictatorship. On Monday, 62 former Turkish diplomats issued a statement against the amendments. “We are deeply concerned that such a development will further divide Turkey and will put it into a serious internal and external crisis at a time when the Republic of Turkey is facing terrorism, economic difficulties and the threat of war,” they said.

The drive of Erdogan and the AKP towards dictatorship is bound up with the intense and explosive crisis facing the Turkish bourgeoisie. Facing escalating social opposition in the working class and sharp conflicts with its imperialist allies in the NATO alliance over the war in Syria, Erdogan is strengthening a dictatorial regime to be used against the working class, as well as against further attempts by Washington and Berlin to topple his regime.

With strike activity increasing in Britain and in Spain, there are growing signs that the working class is going on the offensive in Turkey and across Europe. Some 2,650 metal workers in 14 factories in Turkey decided to go on strike, as collective bargaining between companies (General Elektrik Grid Solution, Schneider Enerji, Schneider Elektrik and ABB) and the trade union failed to reach a conclusion.

With the help of the United Metalworkers Union, which from the beginning worked closely with the government and did its best to block opposition among the workers, strike action was postponed by a cabinet resolution for 60 days. This was on the grounds that the strike was deemed to be of a “nature that will impair national security.” The decision points to the fact that the government aims to ban strike activity, fearing that the increasing economic and political crisis will drive ever broader sections of the working class into struggle.

The Turkish lira is plunging towards an unprecedented level of four lira to the US dollar, as tourist revenues collapse due to escalating terror attacks in Turkey, and Turkey continues to suffer from economic stagnation of its main export markets in Europe, hit by European Union (EU) austerity measures.

Above all, the Erdogan regime has been staggered by the failed coup attempt of July 15, carried out by sections of the Turkish army backed by Washington and Berlin. Arrests and dismissals of academics, police and army officers have become routine. Since July 15, some 43,000 people have been remanded in custody and 95,000 public employees from all state institutions and universities have been dismissed.

Ankara’s relations with its NATO partners are on the verge of collapse, as it develops ties with Moscow. Most significant was the agreement reached between Ankara and Moscow on the war in Syria, which excludes Turkey’s NATO partners, first of all the United States, in the process. Russia and Turkey have initiated a new round of Syrian peace talks in Kazakhstan, scheduled for January 23, and are moving to set aside disputes over the fate of President Bashar al-Assad.

The escalating dispute between Ankara and its NATO allies reflects the highly advanced state of the breakdown of the post-World War II order. A section of the Turkish ruling class, represented by Erdogan’s AKP, is seeking a better position for itself through an open conflict with its traditional allies in the EU and the Obama administration, by deepening its relations with Russia and China.

As it moves further from NATO and the EU, the AKP appears to cherish the hope that it will be able to work out more stable relations with the incoming Trump administration—a hope that may well prove to be illusory. Nonetheless, the AKP and the Turkish army are for now still pressing on with ties to Russia.

On Wednesday, Turkish and Russian air forces carried out a common operation against the Islamic State militia around al Bab, an unprecedented event for a NATO member, since its foundation in 1949.

Following months of bluster and threats against the Obama government and the European Union, mainly over Syria, their support to the failed coup attempt and the PKK, Erdogan continued his anti-Western tirades, this time over Turkey’s economic problems.

On Thursday, he blamed Ankara’s Western allies for the collapse of the Turkish currency, which recently plunged to record lows against the US dollar. “They try everything to slow the economy by troubling suppliers and consumers. They take every chance to scare investors and block investments. A lot of international institutions, notably the European Union, make unfair accusations,” he said.

After the pro-government newspaper Yeni Safak accused Germany’s Deutsche Bank of “economic terror” by recalling loans to Turkish companies before their due dates, the bank’s Turkish unit issued a statement stating that it was “unacceptable” for the paper to associate the bank, Germany’s largest, with terrorism.

Mexican government in deep crisis in wake of mass protests

Don Knowland

A poll published this week by the newspaper Reforma puts the approval rating of Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto at a historic low of 12 percent, down from 24 percent in December.

This plunge reflects popular anger over Peña Nieto’s decision to raise gasoline prices on January 1 by 20 percent. The Reforma poll showed that 85 percent disapproved of the increase, the so-called gasolinazo.

The gasoline price rise came in the wake of a plunging peso. The peso was at 12 to the dollar when Peña Nieto took office in December 2012. It recently reached a low of 22.50 to the dollar.

The peso’s drop has had an inflationary impact on the prices of basic goods and foodstuffs, with the price of beans rising by 12 percent in December alone. The increase in gasoline prices will filter throughout the economy to further stoke inflation.

A group of specialists interviewed this week by the newspaper El Universal emphasized that the gasolinazo will particularly impact those already on the brink of poverty.

Héctor Villarreal, director of the Center of Economic and Budgetary Studies, told El Universal that the gas price hike will make the basic basket of goods inaccessible for many families, putting around an additional 10 million at risk of falling into poverty.

While the daily minimum wage of 80.04 pesos (about US$3.70) went up by 9.4 percent on January 1 along with the 20 percent increase in gas prices, that was insufficient, said Ricardo Becerra Laguna, president of the Institute for Democratic Transition Studies, given the fuel price hike and the fact that prices of basic goods were already on the rise. Becerra Laguna agreed with Villareal that the rise in gas prices could create a “nation-wide surge of impoverishment.”

The fall in the peso stemmed in large part from a lack of confidence by investors in the Mexican economy arising from Donald Trump’s election victory. Trump campaigned on promises to lower US corporate taxes, place tariffs on imports from Mexico, forbid or tax remittances from Mexicans living in the US and deport what could be upwards of 5 million Mexicans.

Peña Nieto’s approval rating had already dropped to 30 percent by 2015, due to corruption charges and widespread government violence, including the disappearance of 43 Ayotzinapa teaching students, who had been protesting against Peña Nieto’s education reform. It sank into the 20 percent range last summer after he invited Trump to Mexico and then fawned over him, despite overwhelming Mexican hostility to the then Republican candidate.

Outrage was so high in Mexico that Peña Nieto made his finance minister and close confidant Luis Videgaray, who had arranged Trump’s visit, a sacrificial lamb, firing him soon thereafter.

Despite Videgaray being widely despised in Mexico as a Trump conciliator, earlier this month, Peña Nieto named him as Mexico’s new Secretary of Foreign Relations, as a sop to Trump. Trump called Videgaray a “wonderful man.”

Earlier this week Trump stressed that he would immediately undertake building his promised border “wall,” to be paid for by Mexico. Although he did not expressly mention this in his inaugural address, Trump promised to protect the US border from the “ravages” of other countries “making our products, stealing our companies and destroying our jobs.” This threat was directed most of all at Mexico and China.

In response, Peña Nieto was able only to express his deepening subservience to US imperialism. He tweeted his congratulations to Trump on taking office, calling for a “respectful dialogue” to “strengthen our relation with shared responsibility.”

Peña Nieto even delivered a present to Trump on the eve of his inauguration, the expedited extradition on Thursday of Sinaloa cartel head Joaquín (“El Chapo”) Guzmán Loera to US authorities. This seemed intended to appease Trump, who had cited drug dealing and violence as part of his campaign against Mexican immigrants, by suggesting that that the Mexican government was serious about combating the drug cartels rather than corrupted by them.

Guzmán Loera had filed a constitutional “amparo” petition with the Mexican Supreme Court in an attempt to postpone or defeat extradition. According to the La Jornada newspaper, the Mexican justices put denial of the amparo on a fast track in response to pressure from the federal government. Luis Videgaray had already promised such approval.

Mexico also announced on Thursday that Videgaray and other Mexican dignitaries will visit Washington DC on January 25 to meet, undoubtedly on bended knee, with key Trump administration officials, including chief of staff Reince Priebus, Trump son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner and senior adviser Stephen Bannon.

While some in the Mexican government have made demagogic calls for countermeasures to Trump’s policies—Mexico’s economy Secretary Ildefonso Guajardo suggested in the last week an immediate “neutralizing” “fiscal response,” that is, a counter-tax—these are not serious proposals, but rather public relations stunts. The Mexican government will dance to Trump’s tune.

Forthcoming changes in Mexico’s energy industry can only further destabilize the economy and the political situation. Mexico’s energy reform law enacted in 2013 ended the monopoly of Mexico’s national oil company Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex) on oil production. After bidding in 2015, private companies began investing in oil exploration and production in Mexico.

But opening oil refining, transportation and sales to private investment was put off to 2018, at which point the Mexican government intended for fuel prices to be brought in line with market prices. Until then, the government would set prices lower than the cost of production in the country.

Federal government revenue dropped sharply when oil prices collapsed in 2014. Despite attempts to hedge oil prices, oil revenue dropped from 852 billion pesos (about $40 billion) in 2012 to only 408 billion pesos in 2015. This fall in revenue was exacerbated by lowered interest in private bidding on Mexican production contracts.

In 2016, the government decided to accelerate the liberalization of refining and distribution of oil due to this revenue shortfall. That resulted in the price hike and two additional tax hikes on fuel sales on January 1.

The gas price increase on January 1 led to demonstrations throughout the country, which included blocking highways and fuel depots. They included teachers’ unions, transportation unions, various social movements as well as ordinary citizens. The protests were largely organized in a spontaneous fashion on social media, rather than by any centralized leadership. At the same time, the movement has lacked any coherent perspective or program.

The Mexican ruling class is too invested in the energy reform to backtrack on it. But it fears that protests will grow even larger, particularly if there is a violent crackdown by federal police or even the army. The already depleted support for Peña Nieto’s Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) could completely evaporate.

The government has resorted to sham “reform” measures as a political palliative. This week it signed with business leaders and labor unions an “Agreement for the Economic Strengthening and Protection of the Family Economy.” The agreement proposes various vague initiatives, such as maintaining stable prices for basic goods, modernizing public transportation, encouraging investment and employment and strengthening the rule of law. No one can take these measures seriously.

Mexico’s so called opposition parties are making every effort to suppress opposition in the Mexican populace. The right-wing National Action Party (PAN) has called for lowering fuel prices. However, the PAN, along with the fake “left” Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), supported the energy reform law, and both still do.

For its part, the PRD has sought to dissipate the protests, advocating that a million people file amparo petitions with the Mexican Supreme Court to invalidate the gas price hikes. This is nothing more than a stunt with no chance of success.

Finally, the National Regeneration Party, or Morena, headed by Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has called for all sides and parties to sit down in a show of “unity” to address the price rises. In other words, this bourgeois party once again seeks to contain opposition within bounds acceptable to the capitalist ruling establishment.

Others deeply imbedded in the Mexican ruling class have warned that the country’s institutions are in such a state of collapse that action at a more fundamental level is required.

Constitutional scholar Diego Valadés, formerly a Mexican Supreme Court Justice under PRI president Carlos Salinas de Gortari, told the magazine Proceso this week that the “institutional apparatus” is no longer responsive to the demands of society or able to fulfill the basic functions of the state.

Valadés has concluded, given the unprecedented and deepening distrust of the Mexican population, that the only alternative is the formation of a coalition government, presumably amongst all major political parties, or a return to “authoritarianism.” Such authoritarianism likely would extend to military intervention.

Canada’s ruling elite braces for reopening of NAFTA

Roger Jordan & Keith Jones

Canada’s ruling elite has become increasingly concerned in recent days as cabinet appointees and other top aides of incoming US President Donald Trump repeatedly declare that reopening the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is a top priority for the new administration.

The threat Trump’s protectionist “America First” policy represents to America’s closest neighbours was underscored by testimony Trump’s prospective Commerce Secretary, Wilbur Ross, gave at his confirmation hearing Wednesday. The former asset stripper, who is notorious for imposing massive job and wage cuts on steelworkers, said, “NAFTA logically is the first thing for us to deal with.”

Ross made clear that all parts of the 1994 trade agreement between the US, Canada, and Mexico are up for renegotiation and that the US could potentially altogether abandon what Trump has repeatedly denounced as the “worst trade deal ever,” if changes are not made to Washington’s satisfaction.

“All aspects of NAFTA will be put on the table,” said Ross, later adding that “you don’t have a deal until you have a deal on everything.”

Ross also indicated that the Trump administration views the reorganization of the US-led North American trade bloc—or what Ross termed “our territory”—as only the first salvo in a broader agenda of international trade war. “We ought to solidify relationships in the best way we can in our territory,” said Ross, “before we go off to other jurisdictions.”

Trump speaks on behalf of the faction of the American ruling elite that believes the US should prioritize direct economic, and if need be military, confrontation with China in the Asia-Pacific, even if that requires seeking a temporary accommodation with Russia. The incoming president has vowed to impose heavy tariffs on imports of Chinese products unless Beijing provides greater market access to US companies and manufactured goods. He has even signalled that he is prepared to use explosive geopolitical bargaining chips like US repudiation of the “One China” policy to gain leverage.

Trump has also lashed out at the European Union, declaring he is in favour of its breakup and denouncing Germany for unfair trade practices.

Ross did not shy away from spelling out the aggressive implications of Trump’s trade policy. He boasted about the recent collapse in the value of the Mexican peso and the further weakening of the Canadian dollar. “The president-elect,” said Ross, “has done a wonderful job of preconditioning other countries [with] whom we will be negotiating that change is coming. The peso didn’t go down 35 percent by accident. Even the Canadian dollar has gotten somewhat weaker—also not an accident. He has done some of the work that we need to do in order to get better trade deals.”

Washington’s calling into question of NAFTA represents an especially grave threat to the Mexican ruling class. It has secured substantial investments from global automakers and other major corporations in recent years on the basis of the cheap-labour and sweatshop conditions over which it presides.

Ross and Trump’s nominee for Treasury Secretary, the hedge fund manager Steven Mnuchin, are claiming that US protectionist measures will only target countries deemed to be engaging in unfair trade practices. Speaking Thursday at his confirmation hearing, Mnuchin said the Trump administration does not support a protectionist initiative backed by Republican House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan that would have the effect of imposing a 20 percent tariff on all imports. “I think we should provide access to our market to those countries that play fair and play by the rules and give everybody a fair chance to compete,” said Mnuchin. “Those who do not should not get away with it. They should be punished and severely.”

These and other remarks have been interpreted by the Canadian government and elite as indicating that they will be able to develop, if they play their cards right, a close working relationship with what will be the most right-wing US administration in history.

Aided by former Progressive Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, the Liberal government has held extensive talks over the past two months with top Trump aides, including his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and his chief strategist, the ultra-right winger Steve Bannon.

Pivotal to Canada’s courting of the Trump administration has been the offer of even greater military-security cooperation—that is support for US imperialism’s wars and military-strategic offensives around the globe.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberals have also signalled to Washington that they are ready to throw Mexico to the wolves and forge a trade pact with Trump based on a reversion to the 1989 Canada-US Free Trade Agreement, which was the direct precursor to NAFTA.

Nevertheless, Canada’s government and big business remain apprehensive that Canada could get sideswiped in any NAFTA renegotiation. Canada and the US are already mired in a series of trade disputes, including over Canadian softwood lumber and US drywall exports, and Canada’s oil giants are fearful the Trump administration will take measures to further boost US shale oil.

Even more fundamentally, Canadian big business fears it will be roiled in a Trump-provoked trade war between the US, China, Germany, and other great powers.

Canada’s central bank held interest rates steady at 0.5 percent at Wednesday’s regular policy meeting. But Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz warned “prospective protectionist trade measures in the United States would have material consequences” for Canada’s economy and consequently “a rate cut remains on the table.” Poloz’s comments sent the Canadian dollar plunging by more than a cent to US 75 cents.

Following last week’s cabinet shuffle to place renewed focus on Canada-US relations, Trudeau named Wednesday a former top Canadian Armed Forces’ general, Lieutenant- General Andrew Leslie, to the Cabinet Committee on Canada-US Relations. Leslie, who commanded Canada’s military forces in Afghanistan, will also be parliamentary secretary to Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, who is charged with overseeing trade relations with the US.

From his time in the military, Leslie reportedly has close ties to Lieutenant-General Michael Flynn, Trump’s nominee for national security adviser, and Marine Corps General James Mattis, his secretary of defense.

Bluntly summing up the reasons for Leslie’s appointment, a Liberal government official told the Globe and Mail, “We have drawn the conclusion that the two kinds of people these guys (i.e., Trump and Vice-President Pence) rely on is billionaires and generals. We want to put [Leslie] in a position where he can have good relationships in an official capacity. He knows all these [military] guys.”

Writing in the National Post Thursday, John Ivison indicated discussions are well advanced in the Trudeau government as to what changes will be necessary in Canada’s military-security posture to “appease” Trump and secure Canada’s privileged access to the US market. “Sources suggest,” wrote Ivison, “additional defence spending may be required to satisfy Trump that Canada is doing its part as a NATO ally.”

The emergence of the authoritarian billionaire Donald Trump as US president and his promotion, under the banner of “America First,” of an economic nationalist agenda akin to that which in the 1930s provoked trade wars that were the direct precursor of the Second World War, underscore the historic crisis of capitalism and the urgency of the international working class imposing its own, socialist solution.

But the trade unions, which in Canada like in the US have for decades suppressed the class struggle, and in the name of ensuring corporate “competitiveness” have imposed round after round of concession and jobs cuts, are instead rallying round Trump’s protectionist program.

The United Steelworkers (USW), which purports to represent workers in Canada and the US, is pushing for Trump to reach agreement with Trudeau on a common North American steel and aluminum trade policy targeting Chinese and other overseas producers. The USW’s Canadian-born president, Leo Gerard, has hailed Ross’ selection as Trump’s Commerce Secretary noting that the USW and Ross have a long working relationship—that is in restructuring the steel industry at workers’ expense through brutal concessions and mill closures.

Unifor, which with over 300,000 members is Canada’s largest industrial union, is also supporting Trump’s reopening of NAFTA. Fresh from imposing sell-out contracts on the 23,000 production workers employed by the Detroit Three automakers in Canada, Unifor President Jerry Dias declared earlier this month, “We should be joining with the Trump administration on a common front and saying, ‘here is how we’re going to deal with the trade imbalance with Mexico’.”

NAFTA is a reactionary trade bloc, which has facilitated the driving down of wages and working conditions across North America while boosting the profits of the global corporations.

But the renegotiation of NAFTA by Trump, Trudeau, and Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto will only be used to further pit workers against each other within North America and, with the aid of the pro-capitalist unions, to harness the working class to the agenda of the imperialist ruling elites of Canada and the US to uphold North American global hegemony through trade and shooting wars.

North American workers must instead assert their common class interests by uniting in a joint struggle against the American, Canadian and Mexican ruling elites to secure decent-paying jobs, quality health care and education, and a safe retirement for all. The basis for such a struggle is a socialist and internationalist program which rejects the private ownership of the means of production and the profit motive upon which capitalism rests, and strives to establish workers governments committed to the reorganization of society along socialist lines.

Declassified reports reveal torture techniques used by Bush-era CIA

Shelley Connor

Newly disclosed documents from the CIA detail the “enhanced interrogation” techniques—torture—used on detainees at black sites throughout the world. The documents, 50 in all, include information that was not presented to the Senate Intelligence Committee’s investigation into the CIA torture program in 2014.

This information has been released amid a pitched legal battle concerning the handling of the full 6,700 page document that was presented to the Senate Intelligence Committee.

The documents were released as the result of an American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Freedom of Information Act suit against the CIA. The documents describe, in clinical, disinterested prose, a harrowing array of torture techniques used against suspects, from extreme humiliation to potentially deadly force.

The use of “mock burials,” in which detainees were forced into coffin-shaped boxes with hidden ventilation holes, the slamming of detainees repeatedly into walls, and the exposure of denuded detainees to extreme cold stand out as particularly inhumane practices. The documents include an investigation into the 2002 death of suspected Taliban militant Gul Rahman, who died of hypothermia at a black site north of Kabul, Afghanistan. At the time of his death, Rahman was clad in nothing but an adult diaper, and had been chained to a vent in his cell throughout a cold, November night.

Attorneys for two of the CIA’s victims, Abu Zubaydah and Abdul Rahim Al-Nashiri, are currently fighting for the preservation of the full report of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s findings, which doubtless contain even more gruesome details.

Judge Emmet G. Sullivan, who is adjudicating Zubaydah’s habeas corpus request, issued a memo demanding that the United States government “immediately” deposit a complete and un-redacted copy of the Senate report with the court by February 10. Last week, Judge Royce C. Lamberth of the Federal District Court for the District of Columbia ordered the Obama administration to hand a copy over to the court, as well, in the case of Al-Nashiri. The Obama administration resisted on both counts.

Excerpts from the reports reveal how prisoners were subjected to torture through “walling” and waterboarding. During walling, a towel rolled up and placed behind the prisoner’s neck was the only precaution taken to ensure that the victims did not sustain concussions or spinal injuries when yanked upright by their chains and slammed into walls by their interrogators. Zubaydah was rendered unconscious and suffered seizures as a result of this treatment; to this day, he still experiences blackouts, headaches and seizures.

After three consecutive days of waterboarding, walling, and mock burials, Zubaydah was given a day-long reprieve from the aggressive interrogations. He was given Ensure, a meal replacement drink, and was again released to his cell, where interrogators disrupted his sleep purposely throughout the night. The next morning, interrogators again hooded Zubaydah and inflicted their torments upon him anew. After telling interrogators that he had no new information to offer, he was slapped and forced into a dark, upright box with a container for his waste.

Even after Zubaydah “showed distress,” he was left in the box for four hours. He was removed from this box, was walled again for two hours, and was then shoved into what interrogators called “the small confinement box.” Here, he was forced into a modified fetal position, with his back curved downward and his legs drawn up.

“Subject remained in the small box for one hour and ten minutes. Subject sounded distressed and did not appear to adapt as well to his time in the small confinement box,” interrogators recounted. He was waterboarded and walled for several more hours after being removed from the box. “Subject has not provided any new threat or elaborated on any old threat information. Medical assessment is that subject remains stable and that his physiologic condition is close to normal given his present circumstances,” the report affirmed.

Zubaydah himself remembers those events in much more excruciating detail. He told his lawyers that he remembered “screaming unconsciously,” in pain because he was unable to stretch his legs, unbend his back, or stand upright. The documentation of his torture reveals that the small box was used to the maximum amount allowable by interrogators.

The reports substantiate claims by several detainees that interrogators drugged them with powerful pharmaceuticals without consent during interrogation—a practice regarded as unethical by medical professionals. For years, the CIA asserted that detainees were only “sedated” as a last resort, mainly as a safety measure.

However, the released documents reveal another practice entirely. In April of 2002, interrogators documented plans to transport Zubaydah “in a state of pharmaceutical unconsciousness … to maximize the intended effect of disorienting.”

These documents have been released at a critical juncture. Obama ascended to the presidency eight years ago amid hopes that he would end the opacity and latitude the intelligence apparatus had enjoyed under Bush. Yet during his last week in office, he worked feverishly to ensure that the full, damning report of state-sanctioned torture would remain safely sealed in the presidential archives, where they would be free from public viewing until 2028. In response to Judge Royce Lamberth’s order to remand a copy to the court, Obama administration lawyers argued that doing so would endanger executive-congressional cooperation and that the document enjoyed enough protection by being included in Obama’s archives.

This action is of a piece with the rest of Obama’s presidency, which began with him granting immunity to war criminals from the Bush and Cheney era. Obama’s lukewarm expressions of distaste for torture are not borne out by his policies, through which domestic spying, extrajudicial assassinations and legalized entrapment have become standard operating procedure.

While Al-Nashiri fights for his freedom—and his life, as the Obama administration has sought the death penalty—James Mitchell, a primary architect of many Bush-era torture regimens, remains free.

Another criminal who walks free, CIA director John Brennan, worked to intimidate members of the Senate Intelligence Committee. He ordered CIA thugs to break into Senate staffers’ computers and delete information concerning the CIA’s torture program. He then brazenly claimed that those staffers should be prosecuted for possessing confidential information, and arrogantly stated that the CIA had a right to withhold information from the Senate Intelligence Committee, to which it is supposed to be answerable.

Obama doused the flames between Brennan and outraged members of the Senate committee by stating that no one would be prosecuted. This effectively granted Brennan immunity and provided a precedent for the cover-up of war crimes.

Meanwhile, whistleblowers such as Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden, and CIA analyst John Kiriakou were punished for the “crime” of revealing the sadistic nature of military and intelligence practices. Kiriakou, particularly, stands out as a symbol for the injustice of the Obama administration; while James Mitchell boasts openly to the press about waterboarding detainees, Kiriakou was prosecuted by the Obama Justice Department and sentenced to 30 months in prison for revealing the use of waterboarding to the American public.

Many Americans are rightly concerned about the dangers posed by recently inaugurated President Donald Trump. Attorneys for victims such as Zubaydah and al-Nashiri, among others, fear that Trump could, at the behest of Senate Republicans, destroy the full Senate torture report. Trump himself has expressed support for waterboarding and other techniques; “Torture works,” he has told reporters.

Yet as abhorrent as his arrogance and his support for the detention and torture program are, it remains clear that the platform he stands upon has been reinforced by the policies pursued by Obama. History will not reveal Obama’s legacy to be one of openness or transparency, much less of equality or justice. To the contrary, it will expose his presidency as having laced up the Trump administration’s jackboots.

If Trump succeeds in destroying the damning evidence against the CIA in the Senate Intelligence Committee report, the blame will lie at the feet of Obama, who refused to declassify it and sought in the last days of his presidency to keep it from seeing the light of day.