Macron launches anti-Muslim police-state crackdown after terror attack in France

Will Morrow

After Friday’s terrorist attack that killed middle-school teacher Samuel Paty in Conflans, the administration of Emmanuel Macron is carrying out a police-state crackdown. Hundreds of people have been deported, more than 50 Muslim associations have been targeted for dissolution, dozens of people are being arrested or raided with no connection to the terrorist attack at all and the government is seeking to criminalize protected free speech activities and eliminate anonymity on social media.

Macron’s policy is all but indistinguishable from the fascistic ravings of National Rally leader Marine Le Pen. An atmosphere of anti-Muslim hysteria is being whipped up to justify a further shift to the right of the entire political establishment, expand police powers and curb the democratic rights of the population.

Emmanuel Macron (en.kremlin.ru)

Macron set the tone in his speech to the national defense council on Sunday night, declaring that “the fear is now going to change sides,” and “the Islamists cannot be allowed to sleep peacefully in our country.” The Republicans leader in the Senate, Bruno Retailleu, replied with an open call to violence, demanding “arms not tears,” and attacked Macron for “leading a lexicographical battle while a portion of the country defies the fundamental values of France.”

Marine Le Pen called for the use of “force,” denouncing politicians who instead “would like us to hold candle-light vigils.”

Prime Minister Jean Castex announced Sunday that the interior ministry had requested the immediate expulsion of 231 people from France who were already on government watch-lists for Islamic radicalization, but who had no connection to the Oct. 16 terrorist attack.

In an interview with Europe1 on Monday morning, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin announced a series of further police state measures, and personally hailed National Rally leader Le Pen.

“Since this morning, police operations have been underway and will continue in the hours and days to come,” he said. He declared that the “dozens of individuals” targeted were “not necessarily connected to the investigation” into the Oct. 16 attack. They were people “to whom we clearly would like to send a message, that which the President announced at the defense council: not a night of peace for enemies of the Republic.”

Darmanin added that the government had already drawn up a list of 51 associations that it would seek to legally dissolve as so-called enemies of the Republic over the coming days. The list of these organizations has not been published, but it includes the Collective Against Islamophobia in France (CCIF), a legal advocacy organization that opposes discrimination against Muslims. The government has not attempted to provide any evidence that the CCIF was connected to the Oct. 16 terrorist killing of Paty.

Paty, a middle-school geography teacher in Conflans, northwest of Paris, was attacked by 18-year-old Chechen immigrant Abdoullakh Anzonov as he left school for the day. Anzonov stabbed Paty multiple times before beheading him on the street. Anzonov appears to have been motivated in this horrific crime by a public social-media campaign against Paty, including by the father of one of his students, accusing him of anti-Islamic conduct.

Paty had shown an anti-Islamic caricature by Charlie Hebdo to his class as the basis for a debate on “freedom of expression,” after warning students who may have found it offensive that they could leave the classroom if they preferred not to see it.

Once again, this week’s events have exposed the utterly bankrupt and reactionary perspective of terrorism. Paty’s death is not only a tragedy, but one the French ruling class is now exploiting to justify attacks on the rights of millions of working people.

The only connection to the CCIF provided by Darmanin was that the father of Paty’s student had called for people to contact the CCIF to state their opposition to Paty. Besides this, he said he “hoped” the CCIF could legally be dissolved because it “receives government support, tax benefits, and denounces the Islamophobia of the government,” and because “we have a number of elements that permit us to believe that it is an enemy of the Republic.”

Eighty people have already been arrested for having posted comments online after the attack that implied, “in one way or another,” that Paty “had deserved it,” Darmanin said.

He added that the government may seek to criminally charge anyone who had simply posted criticisms of Paty online before the attack as accomplices of a terrorist murder. “I would like to say that I agree with this idea that there are sponsors [of a crime] by hatred on social media,” he said.

Darmanin made clear that this was part of a broader effort to criminalize political opposition to the longstanding persecution of Muslims in France. “Political Islam leads sometimes to terrorism,” he said, “and one has to fight against political Islam with the same strength as against terrorism.”

The interior minister has also now taken to declaring that the father of one of Paty’s students had placed a “fatwa” against him. From a purely factual standpoint, this is obviously false, since a fatwa is a nonbinding legal opinion on Islamic law made by a qualified individual, such as a scholar, not a public denunciation made by a person who happens to be Muslim. But Darmanin is not concerned with the facts of the case, but with anti-Muslim provocations. He has adopted the term directly from the vocabulary of the extreme right.

Two days earlier, Jordan Bardella, the representative of National Rally, had denounced the “fatwa” that teachers who attempt to teach “freedom of expression” supposedly endure from Muslim parents of students.

The Macron administration is directly pursuing the policies of the National Rally. In an extraordinary exchange, indicating the extent to which the French ruling class is promoting fascist forces, Europe1 interviewer Sonia Mabrouk told Darmanin that “there is someone who has not yet come to power, that is Marine Le Pen, who says ‘stop’ to the politics of the vigil, ‘stop’ to this politics. Is she wrong?”

Darmanin responded by hailing Le Pen, saying “I respect Madame Le Pen like all the men and women of politics,” but then criticized her for failing to support the government’s police-state measures. Le Pen “cherishes the causes that will bring her to power, but she does not vote for any of the laws that we propose, none of the reinforcements of the anti-terrorist struggle. She rejected the phone-tapping laws that we have proposed to the European parliament. She is not in line with the laws of interior intelligence security.”

Darmanin’s attacks on Le Pen from the right make clear the fraud of the Macron government’s claim that it is defending “democracy” and “freedom of speech” against Islam. Macron, who infamously hailed the fascist dictator Pétain in 2017 as a “great soldier,” is directly promoting the far right to divide the working class and build up the power of the police against the population.

After two years of strikes and “yellow vest” protests that have been brutally attacked by police, the French ruling class is preparing to suppress an eruption of social anger over the intensifying social crisis and its criminal response to the coronavirus pandemic with a turn to dictatorship.

These events are also a sharp exposure of the entire political establishment and its supposedly “left” flank, which has unanimously lined up behind Macron’s campaign. Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the leader of La France Insoumise, declared that he had now been convinced to support Macron’s upcoming anti-Islamic law, to be brought before Parliament on December 9. While Macron’s government openly adopts the policies of the National Rally, viciously attacks Muslims and erects a police state, Mélenchon declares that workers and youth should support the demand from Macron for “national unity.”

World Bank: South Asian economies hit hard by COVID-19

Saman Gunadasa

The World Bank’s recently released South Asia Economic Focus, Fall 2020 report has revealed the sharp economic impact of COVID-19 in a region that is home to 1.38 billion people or one fourth of the world’s population.

Entitled “Beaten or Broken? Informality and COVID-19,” the report says that South Asia is experiencing its worst ever recession, with economic activity in the area brought “to a near standstill.” It estimates that the regional economy will contract by 7.7 percent this year, with India contracting by 9.9 percent and Maldives and Sri Lanka by 19.5 and 6.8 percent respectively.

Although the World Bank optimistically expects South Asia to rebound by 4.5 percent in 2021, its per-capita income will be 6 percent lower than in 2019 and its population far poorer than that year.

The report, which estimates that over three quarters of the total work force is in the informal sector, states that “more people will be added to the ranks of the extreme poor in South Asia than in any other region in 2020.”

South Asia Economic Focus

On October 14, South Asia had officially recorded more than eight million coronavirus cases and 125,000 deaths. These figures, however, are not reliable because of the low rates of testing and the deliberate negligence of data-gathering by governments in order to downplay the extent of the pandemic.

“Beaten or Broken? Informality and COVID-19,” reports that millions of jobs have been destroyed in India, producing a sharp increase in urban poverty and the creation of a “new poor.”

Indian economic growth, which was already slowing prior to the pandemic, underwent an unprecedented economic contraction of almost 25 percent in the April to June quarter. According to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE), an independent body, 18.9 million permanent jobs were destroyed in that quarter.

Pakistan has also been severely affected, particularly its service sector, with the overall economy expected to contract by 1.5 percent and a serious increase in poverty. The consumer price inflation has already risen to 10.7 percent and the Pakistani rupee has fallen by 13.8 percent so far this year.

Bangladesh’s economic growth is expected to fall from 8.1 percent in 2019 to 2 percent this year and poverty likely to “increase significantly” with the greatest impact on “daily and self-employed workers in the non-agricultural sector and salaried workers in the manufacturing sector.”

The average wages of salaried and daily workers in Bangladesh declined by 37 percent, compared to usual earnings immediately prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the World Bank survey. About 68 percent of the directly-affected workers are concentrated in Dhaka and Chittagong, cities that account for account for 26 million of the country’s 166 million population.

Afghanistan, which has been devastated by the US-led 20-year invasion and occupation, is expected to experience a 30 percent fall in revenue due to weak economic activity and disruptions to trade caused by the COVID-19. The World Bank report estimates that the “combination of reduced incomes and higher prices could drive the poverty rate to as high as 72 percent.”

The Sri Lankan economy, the survey notes, contracted by 1.6 percent in the first quarter of 2020 after growing by 2.3 in 2019. The fall “was driven by weak performances in the construction, textile, mining and tea industries.” The budget deficit is estimated to balloon to 11.1 percent, up from 6.8 percent in 2019, and debt-to-GDP ratio projected to exceed 100 percent, up from 86.8 percent in 2019.

Moody’s downgrading of Sri Lanka’s credit rating on September 28, from B2 to CAA1, further indicates how the existing economic crisis has been worsened by the pandemic. Sri Lanka’s credit rating is just one above debt default and in the same league as Iraq, Angola, Congo and Mali.

Moody’s also pointed to the “persistently weak revenue from textile garment exports, tourism and overseas remittances,” and said the “credibility of the government policy” is highly sensitive for “investor sentiment.”

Moody’s estimates that government liquidity and external risks will intensify, as the external debt service payments reach approximately $US4 billion between 2020 and 2025.

While the Rajapakse government has not released any data on job losses caused by the pandemic, the labour department reported that in July nearly 400,000 jobs were lost in the manufacturing sector alone. About 40 percent of Sri Lankan workers are employed in the informal sector, which has been severely impacted.

The Maldives, which has a population of about 515,600, is heavily dependent on tourism which directly employs 22,000 people, not including seasonal workers, third-party providers and guest house employees. COVID-19 has “paralysed” the industry and led to the destruction of tens of thousands of jobs.

“Tourism inflows,” the World Bank report notes, “remained anaemic even after borders reopened in mid-July. Only 13,787 tourists visited between July 15 and September 15, a 95 percent y-o-y decline; the average number of daily international commercial flights has declined to four (compared to 40 before the pandemic) and half of all resorts remain shut.”

“Beaten or Broken? Informality and COVID–19,” also reports on COVID-19’s impact on other South Asian countries, such as Nepal and Bhutan. Economic growth of Nepal is expected to drop to 2 percent, down from 7 percent last year, and Bhutan’s will be reduced from last year’s 3.8 percent growth to 1.5 percent.

Comparing South Asia with industrially developed countries, the report states that “people in lower-income countries, like in South Asia, are disproportionately affected because they are more exposed to the virus through their work in densely-packed urban areas and have fewer opportunities to enjoy fresh air.”

The report notes that, “COVID-19 will profoundly transform South Asia for years to come” and emphasises the need for “smartly designed recovery programs” for a “sustainable future.”

Hopes for “smartly designed recovery programs” are a fantasy under capitalism. The pandemic, in fact, has accelerated what was an already brewing economic downturn crisis in the region and internationally.

South Asian governments, like the counterparts internationally, are imposing homicidal “herd immunity” back-to-work policies and rubber-stamping company cuts to wages and jobs and increasing exploitation through longer working hours.

Nervous about the rising social anger, the Modi government in India, the Rajapakse administration in Sri Lanka and every regime in the region is rapidly moving towards autocratic forms of rule.

Spectre of Jihadi violence in France

K M Seethi

The gruesome murder of a French school teacher in a Paris suburb on Friday is yet another pointer to the spirit of Jihadi Islam being conjured up by the young generation to set in a troubling spectre of violence and terror in the name of ‘faith and commitment.’ Sadly—but not surprisingly—Muslim Ulama across the world still remain silent on such heinous acts perpetrated in the ‘service of God.’ How many of them would come up and argue that it has nothing to do with ‘faith’ as enunciated in the holy texts of Islam; nor does it have anything worthwhile as part of an Islamic ‘commitment’?

The fact that the killer belonged to the Muslim migrant/refugee community in a multicultural country like France has several implications. What is in store for them in the emerging scenario is unpredictable, particularly in the background of President Emmanuel Macron’s speech on 2 October which signaled that his government was contemplating measures designed to restrain the influence of radical Islam in the country and help develop what he called an ‘Islam of France’ compatible with the nation’s republican values.

According to reports, ten people have been arrested over the beheading of Samuel Paty, a 47-year-old history-geography teacher in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine. The killer, shot dead by police after the attack, was an 18-year-old Chechen refugee born in Moscow.  French anti-terrorism prosecutor Jean-Francois Ricard told media that the suspect, who secured a 10-year residency in France as a refugee in March, was armed with a knife and an airsoft gun. He also said that the killer’s half-sister joined the Islamic State group in Syria way back in 2014.

The killing was a sequel to some developments after Samuel Paty had engaged a class on secularism and the freedom of expression. He was reported to have discussed the controversy surrounding the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed by satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.  According to reports, Paty had asked his Muslim students to leave the class room because he was going to show some cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed that might hurt them. This had apparently angered some parents who registered a complaint with the authorities. The Minister of Education Jean-Michel Blanquer said the school had taken ‘appropriate’ steps in response to the complaints in setting up measures that both “supported the teacher and opened up a dialogue with parents.” Before the incident, the killer was reported to have been seen near the school asking students about the teacher, and the head of the School had also received threatening phone calls.

Even as the murder of Paty sent shockwaves across the country, the people recollect other incidents in the immediate past. It was only a few weeks ago that a 25-year old Pakistani attacked two people with a meat cleaver over the Charlie Hebdo cartoons, which the Muslims considered to be blasphemous. That attack came in the background of an ongoing trial of suspected accomplices of the 2015 attacks on Charlie Hebdo and a Jewish supermarket. Seventeen people were killed in the attacks that set in a wave of Islamist violence in the country that, according to reports, has so far claimed more than 250 lives.  Al Qaeda, the Islamist terror group that claimed responsibility for the 2015 attacks, threatened to strike Charlie Hebdo again after it republished the cartoons at the start of the trial.

Le Monde wrote in its editorial that “A man was savagely killed, with premeditation, because he had included in his teaching the freedom to think, to say and to draw. This freedom must be taught. It is among the founding values of our country, it is at the heart of our history, our identity, our culture, and it is under attack” (Le Monde 17 October 2020). In his speech on 2 October, President Macron said that the influence of Islamism must be wiped out from public institutions even as he admitted government failures in allowing it to spread. The measures he sought to bring in included placing rigorous restrictions on home-schooling and increasing surveillance of religious schools, making organisations that seek public funds sign a ‘charter’ on secularism. These measures would be applicable to all groups, but they are mainly envisaged to offset the emergence of radicals in the Muslim community. Through these measures, the Government also sought to end the practice of ‘importing’ foreign Imams to work in France (as they are often charged with preaching redundant or radical version of Islam). President also indicated the introduction of a new system of a France-based training and certification for Imams, besides making the financing and management of mosques more transparent. During his speech, Macron also pointed to an innate crisis in French society—the persisting difficulty to integrate significant parts of its large, non-white, Muslim population of immigrants and their descendants. He noted that the failure to integrate immigrant populations and their descendants has led to a growing inequality in France. At its worst, it has radicalized some young French, especially of North African origin, who went to fight for the Islamic State in Syria, or carried out terrorist attacks at home. Macron’s speech was a prelude to a comprehensive package that the Government was planning to bring out as a bill in December (The New York Times, 2 October 2020).

It may be noted that of the approximately 25 million Muslims who currently live in the European Union, France is home to the largest number—5.7 million (which is 8.8 per cent of the population). The size of the population living on French territory who were born abroad has increased since 2010. That year, the number of people born outside France was approximately 7.3 million. The 2015 refugee crisis did not change matters, with the number of people born abroad increasing over the years throughout the decade 2010. In 2019, this number grew to 8.1 million. In France, which has about 67 million population, Islam is the second religion (with 5.7 million Muslims) after Catholicism, and Islam has more adherents than the next three non-Catholic minorities combined: Jews, Protestants and Buddhists.

Muslims in France have different origins—most came from North Africa (Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia, known as the Maghreb). The largest number of Muslims reached France in the wake of the colonial wars of independence (1954–62). Their presence can be traced back to the period of decolonization, when many Muslims were recruited for labour, but much of the immigration was natural. Though France’s Muslim populations represent 123 different nationalities, nearly three-quarters are from the countries of the Maghreb: Algeria, Morocco, or Tunisia. The national census does count the total number of immigrants, which includes everyone born outside France to non-French parents (Muslims and non-Muslims). The Chechen immigrants began to appear in France as political refugees since 2000s, escaping from the civil war in their home. It is estimated that there are about 30,000 Chechens in France.

The problem of Muslim integration in France emerged a few years ago when a report appeared that 60 per cent of inmates in the country’s prisons came from the Muslim community. An analysis noted that the Muslim prisoners in France were usually unemployed and living in the most poverty-stricken suburbs. They are generally second-generation immigrants of Arab origin who arrived in France in difficult financial situations. They appeared to be frustrated for a variety of reasons, and often ended up perpetrating crimes as revenge against society (Al Arabiya News, 30 October 2014).  It was in this background that a survey conducted a few years ago had found 74 per cent of French citizens seeing Islam as ‘intolerant’ and ‘incompatible’ with French values (Ibid). It was also found that the perception of Islam in the West had worsened considerably since the rise of the Islamic State of Syria and Iraq militant group.

Like most immigrants in the Global North countries, the Muslims who reached France during the second half of the twentieth century had gone through several types of hardships. They were recruited to low-paid jobs, mainly in the industrial sector, as they arrived in the 1960s and 1970s.Their conditions became worse, when secure jobs of the post-war period vanished in the economic recession of the 1970s and1980s. That explains how the economic and social opportunities became inaccessible for this population. Muslim immigrants have experienced higher unemployment than the rest of the country’s population—accompanied by higher levels of crime and unrest. These problems were reinforced by the worsening economic situation in France, especially after 1990s. Added to these deteriorating conditions came negative stereotypes and consequent radicalisation. No wonder, the continuing alienation and frustration emerging from the socio-economic handicaps led to increasing rate of crimes, and   Muslims constitute a majority of the French prison population. It was estimated that Muslims were significantly overrepresented in French prisons and the majority of them belonged to the eighteen to twenty-four-year-old age group.

Over the years, the new generation of Muslims have come under the pressure of radicalisation of Islam. Though they constitute a small minority, their propaganda and activities led to increasing suspicion and surveillance across wider sections of the French multicultural society. Of course, this has been accentuated by the developments since 9/11, and more significantly after the Charlie Hebdo attacks in 2015.

In the present-day world, nobody disputes the fact that the injustices perpetrated on people give rise to legitimate grievances and struggles in several countries. However, there is nothing in Islam that would justify the killing of civilians, nor of unleashing any excess as a result of hatred. In Islam the pursuit of justice cannot be carried on violating the very principle of justice: “O ye who believe, be upright for God, witness in justice; and let mot hatred of a people cause you to be unjust. Be just—that is closer to piety” (5:8). The experience of the Algerian Muslims itself is a good reminder. Emir ‘Abd al-Qadir, the leader of the Algerian Muslims, showed a mature way of responding to the French colonial apparatus whose barbaric crimes were notorious. Reza Shah-Kazemi writes: “At a time when the French were indiscriminately massacring entire tribes, when they were offering their soldiers a ten-franc reward for every pair of Arab ears, and when severed Arab heads were regarded as trophies of war, the Emir manifested his magnanimity, his unflinching adherence to Islamic principle, and his refusal to stoop to the level of his ‘civilized’ adversaries, by issuing the following edict:

Every Arab who has in his possession a Frenchman is bound to treat him well and to conduct him to either the Khalifa or the Emir himself, as soon as possible. In cases where the prisoner complaints of ill treatment, the Arab will have no right to any reward (Shah-Kazemi 2005: 131-32).

Shah-Kazemi begins his essay with a quote from Emir ‘Abd al-Qadir:

When we think how few men of real religion there are, how small the number of defenders and champions of the truth—when one sees ignorant persons imagining that the principle of Islam is hardness, severity, extravagance, and barbarity—it is time to repeat these words: “Patience is beautiful, and God is the source of all succor (Quran, 12:18).

According to Shah-Kazemi, Emir’s engagements vis-à-vis the French colonialists exemplified an important verse from Quran: “God forbiddenth you not from dealing kindly and justly with those who fought not against you on account of your religion, nor drove you out of your homes. Truly God loveth those who are just” (Quran 60: 8). There are several verses in Quran which underline the importance of mercy and compassion in life-world situations of conflict and contradictions. For example, the verses, “Fight in the cause of Allah those who fight you but do not transgress limits; for Allah loveth not transgressors (2.190), “It is part of the Mercy of Allah that thou dost deal gently with them. Wert thou severe or harsh-hearted they would have broken away from about thee; so pass over (their faults) and ask for (Allah’s) forgiveness for them; and consult them in affairs (of moment)” (3. 159) etc are widely quoted by liberal traditions in Islam, but grossly ignored by Jihadis and other radical Islamists. Obviously, the traditional teaching of holy texts in French Islamic institutions disregards such liberal interpretation of Islam and the splendid history of Emir ‘Abd al-Qadir’s engagements with the French colonialists.

Neoliberalism and its criminal confessions

Bhabani Shankar Nayak

The pandemic has shaken up the neoliberalism as an economic project of capitalism. The economic architecture of neoliberalism based on austerity, liberalisation, privatisation, and globalisation has failed to provide basic dignity of life in terms of basic health, education, home and food security. The rise of unemployment, hunger and homeless are the direct products of neoliberal economic policies followed by the states and governments around the world. The neoliberal capitalist reincarnations have failed to provide dignity even to the growing number of dead bodies in the disposable bags as a result of the COVID-19.

The master of neoliberal prophesies and their prophets like Mr Klaus Schwab; the Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum argues to re-evaluate the global economic system based on neoliberal ideology of free market fundamentalism, which led to the emergence of global corporate monopolies at the cost of eroded workers’ rights and economic securities of people. Such criminal confessions from the shibboleths of neoliberal architecture of capitalist classes are part of the strategy to revive the legitimacy of a criminal economic and political system that took away dignity from human life and destroyed the planet in search of profit. It has destabilised countries and pushed regions into war and conflicts in the name of spreading free market democracy; the other name of neo-colonialism, which manufactures inequalities in a global scale.

Mr Klaus Schwab argues for sustainable development and green business for economic recovery for launching the ‘fourth industrial revolution’ with the help of technology and digitalisation and ensure our collective commitment to capitalism. He further argues that social progress is the results of capitalist entrepreneurship, efficient allocation of resources by the market forces and risk-taking abilities of the capitalists. These arguments are not only factually incorrect but also based on myopia driven by an ideology of fraudulent economic system called capitalism. There is not an iota of truth in it.

The contradictory ideas of Mr Klaus Schwab are not based on his ignorance or lack of knowledge. It is based on a long tradition of capitalist propaganda and its diversionary strategies. Deception is a crime but innate to capitalism as an economic, political, social and cultural system. Capitalism produces social miseries, economic alienation and political marginalisation, which destroys all forms of social progress based on science and technology by forming alliance with reactionary religious and authoritarian forces. Democratic deficit is part of the neoliberal free market economy that destroys the abilities of states and governments to pursue social and economic welfare of its citizens. His concerns for climate change and green economy is dubious as capitalism grows by destroying environment and exploiting people. Therefore, human dignity, freedom, democracy and sustainable development is not concomitant with capitalism as an ideology of exploitation. The new kind of capitalism with human and green face is another propaganda to hide the inhuman character of capitalism in all its forms. The pragmatic steps of capitalism are in the dead end. Capitalism can never be resilient, cohesive and sustainable.

The World Economic Forum has designed set of “Stakeholder Capitalism Metrics” during its 2020 annual meeting in Davos. The core of these values is based on environmental and social governance. Governance indicates transparency, accountability and rule of law. The rule of law is designed by the ruling classes and make it compatible with the requirements of the capitalist classes. Accountability and transparency are twin dangers to capitalism. Therefore, capitalism does not engage with any system that is accountable and transparent. But unfortunately, the entire model of neoliberal governance is designed to protect the shareholders of capitalism. It is neither accountable to labour and environment that produces profit for capitalism. Sustainable values are an anathema to capitalism. It destroys everything that is sustainable. The profit under capitalism is not based on creative destruction. It is based on absolute annihilation of all creative abilities if labour and nature. It requires repetitive labour, which works in compliance based regulatory regime. The dead capital is free but labour with life in bondages. It treats labour and nature as commodities.

The neoliberal economic policies and its austerity projects are dead but neoliberal political infrastructure is very much alive and thriving. The authoritarian and right-wing political regimes are growing and giving breathing space to capitalism at the cost of lives and environment. Therefore, any form of economic reimagination of economic alternative needs to reimagine the political system. The alternative political economy in the post pandemic world needs to focus on the conditions of production, distribution and exchange relationships. The market can be based on the direct relationship between producers and consumers with the help of information technology. The fourth industrial revolution and its economic system need to follow the models of workers cooperatives based on human needs and desires concomitant with environmental sustainability. These principles are fundamental to the ‘Great Rest’ the post pandemic economy, politics and society. The shared progress, peace, prosperity, human health and dignity and environmental sustainability depends on human abilities to overthrow capitalism and its rotten system. The survival of planet, people and prosperity depends on forward march humanity towards the ideals of equality, liberty, justice, fraternity in a world free from all forms of exploitation.

War in the Caucasus: One more effort to shape a new world order

 James M. Dorsey

Fighting in the Caucasus between Azerbaijan and Armenia is about much more than deep-seated ethnic divisions and territorial disputes. It’s the latest clash designed, at least in part, to shape a new world order.

The stakes for Azerbaijan, backed if not egged on by Turkey, are high as the Azeri capital’s Baku International Sea Trade Port seeks to solidify its head start in its competition with Russian, Iranian, Turkmen and Kazakh Caspian Sea harbours, to be a key node in competing Eurasian transport corridors. Baku is likely to emerge as the Caspian’s largest trading port.

An Azeri success in clawing back some Armenian-occupied areas of Azerbaijan, captured by Armenia in the early 1990s, would bolster Baku’s bid to be the Caspian’s premier port at the crossroads of Central Asia, the Middle East and Europe.

The Caspian is at the intersection of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR) from China to Europe via Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey and the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) that aims to connect India via Iran and Russia to Europe.

An Azeri military success would also cement Turkey’s claim to be a player in former Soviet lands that Russia views as its sphere of influence and bolster nationalist sentiment among Iranians of ethnic Azeri descent that account for up to 25 percent of the Islamic republic’s population, many of whom have risen to prominence in the Iranian power structure.

In an indication of passions that the conflict in the Caucasus evokes, Iranians in areas bordering Azerbaijan often stand on hilltops to watch the fighting in the distance.

Iranian security forces have recently clashed with ethnic Azeri demonstrators in various cities chanting “Karabakh is ours. It will remain ours.”

The demonstrators were referring to Nagorno-Karabakh, an Armenian enclave inside Azerbaijan that is at the core of the conflict in the Caucasus.

The demonstrations serve as a reminder of environmental protests in the Iranian province of East Azerbaijan at the time of the 2011 popular Arab revolts that often turned into manifestations of Azeri nationalism.

Baku port’s competitive position was bolstered on the eve of the eruption of fighting in the Caucasus with the launch of new railway routes from China to Europe that transit Azerbaijan and Turkey.

China last month inaugurated a new railway route from Jinhua in eastern China to Baku, which would reduce transport time by a third.

In June, China dispatched its second train from the central Chinese city of Xi’an to Istanbul via Baku from where it connects to a rail line to the Georgian capital of Tbilisi, the eastern Turkish city of Kars and onwards to Istanbul.

Azeri analysts charge that Armenian occupation of Azeri territory and demands for independence of Nagorno-Karabakh, threaten Baku’s position as a key node in Eurasian transport corridors.

“By continuing its occupation Armenia poses (a) threat not only to Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity but also to the regional stability and cooperation,” said Orkhan Baghirov, a senior researcher at the Baku-based Center of Analysis of International Relations, a think tank with close ties to the government.

Mr. Baghirov was referring to recent Russian, Iranian, Turkmen and Kazakh efforts to match Baku in upgrading their Caspian Sea ports in anticipation of the TITR and INSTC taking off.

Russia is redeveloping Lagan Port into the country’s first ice-free Caspian Sea harbour capable of handling transhipment of 12.5 million tonnes. The port is intended to boost trade with the Gulf as well as shipment from India via Iran.

Lagan would allow Russia to tap into the TITR that is part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) via the Russian railway system as well as Kazakh, Turkmen, and Azeri ports.

It would also bolster Russian, Iranian and Indian efforts to get off the ground the INSTC that would hook up Caspian Sea ports to create a corridor from India to Russia via Iran, and in competition with the Suez Canal, to northern Europe.

The INSTC would initially link Jawaharlal Nehru Port, India’s largest container port east of Mumbai, through the Iranian deep-sea port of Chabahar on the Gulf of Oman, funded by India to bypass Pakistan, and its Caspian Sea port of Bandar-e-Anzali to Russia’s Volga River harbour of Astrakhan and onwards by rail to Europe.

Iranian and Indian officials suggest the route would significantly cut shipping time and costs from India to Europe. Senior Indian Commerce Ministry official B B Swain said the hook up would reduce travel distance by 40 and cost by 30 percent.

Iran is further investing in increased capacity and connectivity at its Amirabad port while at the same time emphasizing its naval capabilities in the Caspian.

For their part, Turkmenistan inaugurated in 2018 its US$1.5 billion Turkmenbashi Sea Port while Kazakhstan that same year unveiled its Kuryk port.

The fighting between Azerbaijan and Armenia with Turkey and Israel supporting the Azeris; Russia struggling to achieve a sustainable ceasefire; Iran seeking to walk a fine line in fighting just across its border; and Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates attempting to stymie Iranian advances wherever they can, threatens to overlay port competition in the Caspian with aspects of the Middle East’s myriad conflicts.

Said Iran scholar Shireen T Hunter: “Largely because of the Iran factor, the Caucasus has become linked with Middle East issues. Israel and Saudi Arabia have tried to squeeze Iran through Azerbaijan… Thus, how the conflict evolves and ends could affect Middle East power calculations…. An expanded conflict would pose policy challenges for major international players.”

Chilean government mobilizes police and military on anniversary of social revolt

Mauricio Saavedra

Massive demonstrations are expected in Chile this week in the lead-up to an October 25 referendum to reform the country’s constitution. This week also marks a year since the eruption of massive protests and strikes against decades of free market policies that have produced only social inequality, police violence and poverty for the vast majority of the population. Without a doubt, the social unrest that extended into March of this year would have continued unabated absent the devastating impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the country’s working class.

The renewed protests are expected to be large precisely because of the criminal mishandling of the pandemic: the ultra-right government of billionaire president Sebastian Piñera has proven to be as indifferent to human life as it is to the livelihoods of students, youth, workers and the most vulnerable sectors. In a nation of only 19 million, the number of COVID-19 infections is reaching close to half a million people, and confirmed and suspected deaths have surpassed 18,170—3,500 of whom died without receiving hospital care.

Mass demonstration on Sunday in Santiago

Mass poverty hit levels last seen during the 1981-82 depression, with the official unemployment rate reaching 13 percent. If inactive workers are added to the unemployed, the figure increases to 29 percent, or almost 3 million people. The super-exploited informal sector, meanwhile, now accounts for 22.6 percent of the total workforce. Another 680,000 workers have been forced to eat into their social security due to a government directive permitting employers to furlough staff for months on end without pay. To top this off, some 40 percent of families who received an “Emergency Family Income” got a maximum of US$205 for three months, less than a third of the US$654 poverty line.

In response to the planned marches and demonstrations, Interior Minister Victor Pérez is preparing to deploy tens of thousands of militarized Carabineros police and Special Forces. The Minister of Defense, Mario Desbordes, announced the deployment of the military throughout the country in order to protect critical infrastructure from supposed “looting and attacks.” He is putting into effect a law passed early this year with support from the parliamentary “lefts” in the Senate—the Socialist Party, the Party for Democracy (PPD), Frente Amplio—that allows for the use of the armed forces for domestic purposes without decreeing a state of emergency, which requires congressional approval.

This was already put into practice four days ago in the working class southern Santiago commune of Puente Alto, where military personnel were stationed at strategic points and patrolled major arteries.

“They will be in a position to move if necessary to repel attempts to destroy critical infrastructure; they will be deployed in this respect...” Defense Minister Desbordes told Radio Pauta. “We are prepared to confront violent groups and we are not going to allow destruction” he said, adding chillingly, “anyone who goes there with that intention should assume the costs.”

Carabineros seizing demonstrator (Credit: Nicolás15)

The precedent was established earlier this year in La Araucanía, a major hotspot for unemployment, deep-seated poverty and now the uncontrolled spread of coronavirus among the indigenous Mapuche population. Under the pretext of combating so-called “terrorist activity,” Piñera militarized this southern region, and the people today live under virtual martial law. Ultra-right and fascistic UDI deputies, mayors and governors do the bidding of forestry multinationals, mining companies and power plants, with Carabineros Special Forces offering their services as a private security force. Mapuches are claiming land traditionally tended by indigenous communities but usurped under the 17-year military dictatorship.

Also, in recent weeks, the Carabineros police, Special Forces and the military have used indiscriminate and overwhelming force to repel spontaneous rallies. A fortnight ago, as protests against police repression were being dispersed with water cannon and tear gas, sixteen year-old Anthony Araya fell head-first seven meters into the shallow Mapocho River after he was pushed over the railings of the Pio Nono Bridge in the city centre by a Special Forces officer.

Unbridled police state repression against the working class has only intensified. Striking health workers and miners have also been dispersed with water cannon and faced arrest, while port workers were set upon by Carabineros and the Navy riot squad after picketing a container operator in Iquique. Union delegate and port worker from San Antonio José Ibarra was brutally attacked by cops, who claimed they mistook the worker for a burglar.

In the working class commune of Lo Hermida, in the southeastern Santiago district of Peñalolén, Carabineros Cpl. Oscar Cifuentes was exposed by neighbors as an agent provocateur. Cifuentes, who went by the name of “Giovany Arévalo,” infiltrated community groups to draw up lists of activists who were then followed by police outside their homes and with drones. The provocateur raised suspicions because he was constantly inciting youth to attack the local Carabineros headquarters—early morning raids were conducted in Lo Hermida, with ten people arrested on charges of attacking the police station.

Investigative news site CIPER reported that Cifuentes was operating under the auspices of an Orwellian intelligence law which empowers Carabineros to use infiltrated agents without judicial authorization, so no civil authority supervises their actions, which are financed with reserved funds. The Civil Registry provides Carabineros an undisclosed number of false or stolen identities for use by possibly hundreds or even thousands of agents, who are set loose in working class communities to prepare black lists, entrap workers, facilitate mass arrests and, most ominously, to round up political opponents as the military junta did in the immediate aftermath of the 1973 military coup. In the case of Cifuentes, the cop was given the stolen identity of a young man from Alto Hospicio in Northern Chile.

Interior Minister Pérez, however, insisted that the cop had not committed any crime by inciting the population. “He was in a context and acted within that context (...) He was fulfilling a task and a mission,” said the former Pinochet minister.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. Over the last year, the executive has built up a raft of laws criminalizing all social protest and beefing up the repressive forces of the state. This authoritarian, police state response is being carried out by a government that is deeply hated by the masses and finds itself besieged on all sides. Piñera and his band of extreme-right and fascistic ministers are mimicking their counterparts in the United States, Brazil and elsewhere. They are turning a blind eye to violence committed by fascistic layers in the police, the armed forces and among middle class reactionaries, and will sooner or later turn to putschist methods to stave off the threat of a working class revolt.

It falls on the parliamentary left and the pseudo-left organizations to desensitize students, youth and workers to this real danger by sowing illusions in the supposedly “democratic” and “parliamentary” traditions of Chile. They are promoting a referendum calling for constitutional reform set for October 25, which they claim will permit the “people” to decide on the nature of the constitution, and, ipso facto, on the character of the state itself. The “people” will have the option of voting for a constitutional convention that will allow for the overturning of Augusto Pinochet’s 1980 Constitution.

The constitution may indeed be redrafted, but on the very next day, when they come forward to demand social equality and their rights, the working class and youth will be brutally repressed because the class character of the Chilean capitalist state will not have changed. It did not change when Salvador Allende, on a crest of revolutionary struggles, came to power in the 1970s. At that time, he and the Stalinist Communist Party promoted Chile’s purported adherence to democracy and constitutionality right up to the point when his defense minister and chief military commander Gen. Augusto Pinochet toppled the Popular Unity government in a US-backed coup d’état.

The past must serve as a warning. The bloodstained Chilean bourgeoisie is ruthless, venal and utterly subordinate to imperialist financial and corporate interests. It has demonstrated before that it will not hesitate to drown an incipient revolutionary struggle in blood. The Chilean capitalist state will not change.

What must be prepared is the fight to establish a workers’ government where delegations of factory committees, neighborhood committees, production and distribution committees, communications and civil-defense committees composed of workers and youth take the lead.

This battle can be waged successfully only by throwing off the political caste of fake left organizations that sit in the parliament and dominate the trade union apparatus and social organizations. They represent the interests of an upper middle class layer that is hostile to the working class and seek only to position themselves in the bourgeois state and on the corporate and financial boards of directors themselves.

Macron promotes anti-Muslim “free speech” hypocrisy after terrorist killing

Will Morrow

Within less than 48 hours of the terrorist attack and murder of a teacher near Paris on Friday afternoon, the entire French political establishment has joined a campaign for “national unity” behind strengthened anti-Muslim laws.

Samuel Paty, a middle-school geography teacher, was murdered just after 5:00 p.m., while leaving his school in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, in the Yvelines region north-west of Paris. The attacker has been identified by police as Abdoullakh Anzonov, an 18-year-old Chechen born in Moscow in 2002, whose family obtained refugee status in France in 2011. Anzonov allegedly travelled 80 kilometers that day by public transport from his home to the school, armed with a 30-cm knife and air rifle, and waited for several hours for Paty outside the school building.

After following him for half a kilometer, Anzonov attacked Paty, stabbing him several times and beheading him on the street. When police arrived, Anzonov reportedly cried “Allahu akbar” as he exchanged fire with them. He was shot and killed on the spot.

Macron with French Army Chief of Staff General Pierre de Villiers in 2017 [Credit: Etienne Laurent/Pool Photo via AP, File]

The horrific murder of Paty has immediately been exploited by the administration of Emmanuel Macron to intensify its anti-Muslim campaign. The government has declared that the attack demonstrates the necessity for its already-proposed law on Islamic “separatism,” which will be introduced before parliament on December 9, and may now be further strengthened.

It includes a ban on Islamic schools where girls wear the headscarf, but no similar restrictions on Christian educational institutions, and gives the state vast powers to dissolve any association which does not adhere to “Republican values,” as determined by the prime minister.

Anzonov appears to have been motivated by videos shared on social media, including by the father of one of Paty’s students, accusing the teacher of attacking Islam and offending and discriminating against his Muslim students.

On October 5, Paty had announced to his class that the following day, as part of a class debate on freedom of expression, he would show an image to the class produced by Charlie Hebdo. The image, a naked portrait of Mohammed, is typical of the anti-Muslim provocations that the magazine specializes in. Paty signaled to the students that they may find the image offensive, and could either turn around or leave the room if they did not wish to see it.

Speaking on Friday evening, Emmanuel Macron sought to present his government as the moral defender of “Republican” values and free speech threatened by the menace of Islam. “It is not accidental that tonight, a teacher was killed by a terrorist, because he wanted to kill the Republic in its values, its Enlightenment, the possibility to make our children—wherever they come from, that they believe or do not believe, whatever their religion—into free citizens. This is our battle, and it is existential.”

He added that “they will not pass. The obscurantism and violence that accompanies it will not win,” and called on “all compatriots, at this time, to form a block, to be united without any distinction.”

It is difficult to describe the hypocrisy involved in the attempts by Macron to present himself as a bulwark for democratic traditions and free speech. His government is perhaps best known for being condemned by international human rights organizations for its police violence, and for video images of riot officers using tear-gas and shooting rubber bullets at “yellow vest” protesters. It is involved in imperialist wars across the Sahel and the Middle East, deliberately allowing thousands of refugees attempting to reach Europe by boat to drown in the Mediterranean.

As for “free speech,” the Macron administration has pursued Disclose journalists who revealed illegal French arms sales to support the Saudi Arabian war against the impoverished population of Yemen that has killed tens of thousands of civilians. The “separatism” law is only the latest in a continuing campaign of persecution by successive Socialist Party and Republican governments, which has cultivated a permanent xenophobic anti-Muslim atmosphere in France. This has included the ban on Islamic headscarves in 2004, and the burqa in public places in 2010.

Macron’s comments were immediately used by the extreme-right National Rally and Marine Le Pen to demand harsher measures against immigrants and Muslims. Answering Macron’s comment that “they will not pass,” Le Pen tweeted, “they’re already here.”

The entire political establishment, stretching from Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s La France Insoumise to the Socialist Party (PS) and the Republicans (LR), has joined behind Macron’s hypocritical call for “national unity.”

Yesterday, Prime Minister Jean Castex along with other government ministers joined a rally in Paris attended by several thousand people. Representatives of all the major parties attended, including LFI, the PS and LR. Other rallies from between several hundred and several thousand were held in major cities around the country, where many people attended to show their support for Samuel Paty.

The ruling elite is seeking to use the outrage in the population at the terror attack to build support for Macron’s reactionary program, whipping up an atmosphere of anti-Muslim hysteria.

In an interview with Le Parisien, Bernard Cazeneuve, the former PS prime minister of France, blamed the attack on “certain political formations whose elected representatives compromised themselves to win votes in municipal elections,” as well as “Islamo-leftism which looks lovingly eyes certain communalist organizations that have within them a defiance, not to say a form of hatred, for the republic.”

Manuel Valls, the former interior minister under the PS government of Francois Hollande, shared a tweet from the far-right commentator Céline Pia, who declared she wouldn’t be attending the Paris protest because the organizers “belong for the most part to the left that has declined into Islamo-Leftism.” Valls said he “shared many of Pia’s views” but would nonetheless attend the rally. He also Tweeted a call for the dissolution of the Collective against Islamophobia in France, a legal organization.

In an interview with BFMTV on Saturday, Jean-Luc Mélenchon connected Friday’s terror attack to a series of gang-related incidents in Dijon in recent months, on the basis that both have involved people from Chechnya. Asked if he would support Macron’s called for a national “bloc,” Mélenchon replied: “Of course…If the head of state calls for national unity, he is making a useful appeal, because the aim of the terrorists is to divide us.”

Mélenchon added that he had decided to support the Macron administration’s anti-Muslim law: “In the next law that will arrive, we will have—since it is now called the law of reinforcement of secularism—to take measures that are efficient to suppress the possibility for these people to group themselves.”

There remain many unanswered questions about how the murder of Paty was able to occur. He had been the target of an active social media campaign for more than one week before the killing. The same student’s father had filed a legal complaint against Paty for sharing of pornographic imagery, and Paty had responded by filing his own charges for defamation.

Abdelhakim Sefrioui, an Islamist who is closely watched by French intelligence, had publicly called for Paty’s resignation and denounced him on several videos. Yet it appears that no measures were taken for the protection of Paty or the school. In successive terrorist attacks in France, it has subsequently emerged that the attackers themselves were either known to or were being watched by French intelligence prior to the attack.

German parents’ associations protest against dangerous school openings

Gregor Link

Twenty of the largest parents’ associations in Germany have written a letter to Chancellor Angela Merkel (Christian Democratic Union, CDU) and other leading politicians to express their “serious reservations about current decisions” regarding the resumption of in-person teaching in schools.

They write that the current situation endangers “our children and thus the entire population” and is “irresponsible.” They go on, “The hygiene measures developed by the federal states for school openings are—as the past few weeks have shown—insufficient to ensure protection for the school community against infection.”

The letter is an expression of the growing anger and indignation among parents, teachers and students—not only in Germany, but throughout Europe. More and more workers and young people oppose the policy of herd immunity decreed by ruling circles, a policy that will result in the death of hundreds of thousands of people. Media outlets have remained conspicuously and ominously silent. With the exception of the teachers internet portal news4teachers, not a single major German publication has reported on the letter drafted by parents’ representatives.

Classroom in Dortmund, Germany, August 13, 2020 (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)

The letter begins with an analysis of the actual situation. “The number of people infected with SARS-CoV-2 [COVID-19] in Germany is increasing dramatically. This affects our schools in particular. Many thousands of students have been infected with SARs-CoV-2, as have a large number of teachers and other educational specialists and other school staff. We currently expect at least 50,000 students and an additional large number of teachers to be in quarantine.”

The parents’ associations criticise the indifference of school and health authorities and write that it is increasingly apparent “that respective school classes or year-groups are not being completely quarantined, but often only those pupils close to the infected person.” The letter continues: “The ministries have failed, however, to trace the routes of infection on the basis of scientific sequence analyses. Symptom-free infections cannot be tracked or detected because entire groups are, in many cases, not tested.”

At a state level, the parents’ associations complain that various similar appeals have fallen on deaf ears and have failed to elicit any “recognisable reaction.” Particularly serious is “the education ministers’ persistent ignoring of findings, such as those of Prof. Dr. Christian Drosten, on the infection and illness of children, adolescents and young adults with SARS-CoV-2.”

Against this background, the prospect of infection in schools assumes dangerous proportions: “It must be possible to apply the AHA rules [ Abstand, Hygiene, Atemschutz = distance, hygiene, respiratory protection] consistently in schools, especially with regard to those in particular need of protection.”

Among other measures, the parents’ associations call for a “state-specific binding, step-by-step plan” for hygiene measures, an “extension of the policy of the compulsory wearing of masks,” a “reduction in the size of learning groups,” and the “possibility of hybrid instruction in shifts” with “the greatest possible digital support” while “taking the needs of minorities into account.”

In addition, the letter declares that the “installation of room air filter systems,” the “provision of high-quality masks (FFP2) for all persons with increased risk” and the complete transparency of infection figures in schools, “as well as the subsequent testing of all those groups affected,” are all indispensable.

The public appeal by parents is an expression of the resistance developing among workers and youth across Europe against the criminal policies of their respective governments. As the World Socialist Web Site reported in the middle of a media blackout, students in both Poland and Greece have organised broad protest actions, school boycotts and occupations in recent weeks. In the Czech Republic, where infection rates are also rising exponentially, schools have recently been closed nationwide.

Millions of students, teachers and parents in Germany and Europe are increasingly conscious that their worries and demands bring them into direct conflict with education ministers and governments, which are more and more openly pursuing an inhumane policy of herd immunity.

A typical expression of the mood among teachers is an anonymous comment on the news4teachers portal. The author thanks the parents’ associations and demands that control over “group size, division, organisation, form of teaching” should no longer be exercised by education ministers and the school authorities. Instead, “the respective colleagues should be allowed to contribute ideas and make decisions together with the school management and parents.”

“We demand that current occupational safety regulations be implemented in schools,” writes teacher Marie on Facebook. “This would also benefit your children, by the way, because it would minimise their risk of infection. If you want to see where we are heading, you don’t have to look that far: France, Holland, the Czech Republic, Austria—the numbers are exploding all around us.

On Tuesday, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), the German government's central institution for the identification, surveillance and prevention of infectious diseases, published a non-binding “Recommendation for Action” for schools, which explicitly states that outbreaks are increasingly being observed in schools following reopening.

The document proposes that further preventive measures—such as the introduction of compulsory masks in class—should be taken, depending on a 7-day assessment of cases at a district level. On October 15, the president of the Conference of Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs, Stefanie Hubig (Social Democratic Party, SPD), told the press that she vehemently objected to such an “automatism,” which, the assembled ministers agreed “makes no sense.”

On news4teachers, one teacher, Georg, writes: “Keeping schools open is a top priority for politicians, apparently at any price! Severely ill students and teachers are then just unfortunate collateral damage to be accepted. You feverishly bend in any direction to avoid measures that would cost money.”

He suggests “shortening the curriculum to main subjects,” “halving classes one to seven” and “using the teachers of minor subjects” to supervise these classes. From the eighth grade onwards, Georg says, lessons in the main subjects should take place online when possible.

Another teacher adds: “The (secondary) schools in all other European countries are a crucial factor in the spread of Corona. With rising infection numbers and mortality rates, it is no longer possible to speak of effectively controlling infection. This irresponsible education policy is becoming the driver of the pandemic.”

One parent explains: “The economy comes first, that’s why everything in schools should remain as it is. Our child goes to first grade, all are without a mask and without the advised 1.5 meter distance to one another. There are 2 children sitting at one table. After the autumn vacations the plan is to ventilate classrooms every 20 minutes—but it is getting colder and colder! As a result children and teachers soon be lying flat with a bad cold or even pneumonia. This is just playing with lives!”

“It is clearly not about education, children or safety at work, but only about ensuring that parents can go to work,” writes Palim, another teacher. The task now must be to demand the “renting of rooms” and the exclusive use of “gymnasiums, refectories and other rooms” to teach small groups. In light of “mouldy rooms and ceilings in danger of collapsing,” Palim adds, it is “apparent how many classrooms do not even meet the standards for ventilation.”