Police crackdown on UK anti-monarchy protesters tears apart democratic pretensions of ruling elite

Robert Stevens

As the queen’s cortege has passed through various cities, ahead of the state funeral next week, police have arrested and threatened individuals protesting against the monarchy.

People watch as the Queens cortege with the hearse carrying Queen Elizabeth's coffin departs from St Giles Cathedral en route to Edinburgh Airport. September 13, 2022. [AP Photo/Petr Josek]

At least four people were arrested in Edinburgh, Scotland, including a woman who was subsequently charged. A man was arrested in Oxford during a proclamation event for Charles III and then de-arrested by Thames Valley Police.

Some of the cases included:

• In Edinburgh, a woman was arrested “in connection with a breach of the peace” for holding up a sign saying, “Fuck imperialism, abolish monarchy” outside St. Giles’ Cathedral where the Queen’s coffin was due to arrive.
• A 74-year-old in Edinburgh charged for the same “offence”.
• A 22 year old man, identified as Rory, was arrested for calling out, “[Prince] Andrew, you’re a sick old man” during Edinburgh’s royal procession. He was charged with breach of the peace.
• In Oxford, Symon Hill was arrested and handcuffed for “disorderly conduct” after shouting “Who elected him?” during a reading of Charles’s proclamation.
• On Monday a woman was led away from parliament in London for holding up a sign reading “Not my king” while Charles addressed MPs. A video of the incident posted by the Evening Standard went viral on twitter with over 4.7 million views.

The deluge of pro-monarchist bilge the population is being subjected to is whipping up, as intended, filthy right-wing elements.

When the young man in Edinburgh shouted comments about Prince Andrew [in relation to his friendship with a convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein], he was thrown violently to the ground by one man and then shoved by two more before being taken away by police and arrested.

The headline of the Sun tabloid newspaper hailed the “TAKE DOWN” of a “yob thrown to ground by royal mourners”.

For its part the BBC ran an interview with several people who attended the Edinburgh event as a supposed vox pop sample of the feelings of the population. Among these was a young man wearing a Rangers Football Club shirt who said he attended, “Because I’m a proud patriot in my own country. I think the monarchy holds a place, to the whole tradition and pride that I feel is going out of the window. There are not a lot of patriots left in Britain and Scotland anymore.”

Rangers is notorious for the considerable sectarian support among its fans for loyalist paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland.

Also Monday, Paul Powlesland, a solicitor, was threatened with arrest in London. Video footage of the event was seen by over 1.4 million people.

Powlesland tweeted, “Just went to Parliament Square and held up a blank piece of paper. Officer came and asked for my details. He confirmed that if I wrote ‘Not My King’ on it, he would arrest me under the Public Order Act because someone might be offended.”

Speaking on ITV’s GMB show Tuesday, Powlesland said, “I was outside Parliament, the centre of our politics, where someone has proclaimed himself King and said that I am their Subject. I think at least I get a chance to make my opinion on that in very polite terms.”

Widespread anger at the police clampdown led leading political commentators and newspaper columnists with a long record of upholding the interests of British imperialism to warn that police attacks on people with republican views—a position held by at least a quarter of the population—was undermining faith in the institutions of the state.

Andrew Marr, who until recently fronted the BBC’s flagship political comment programme, said as he opened his LBC Tonight with Andrew Marr show, “A monarchy which can’t survive some booing and a few pieces of cardboard is pretty flimsy, isn’t it?” He warned, “This kind of idiotic heavy-handed policing is actually, longer-term, dangerous for the monarchy. If the suggestion is that we can have a King or we can have free speech, millions of us will say - ooh, I think free speech, thanks.”

Guardian political editor Pippa Crerar tweeted, “Whether you agree with her or not, this woman [who was led away from Buckingham Palace by a phalanx of police] has a right to protest. Nor is this an isolated example. Police need to be careful not to over-step the mark.” Guardian columnist Marina Hyde also opined, “quashing public dissent can backfire in ways even those with power cannot foresee.”

By 9.16pm on Monday, London’s Metropolitan Police, which is mounting the largest policing operation in its history around the queen’s death, was forced to issue a statement by Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stuart Cundy declaring, “We’re aware of a video online showing an officer speaking with a member of the public [Powlesland] outside the Palace of Westminster earlier today. The public absolutely have a right to protest. We have been making this clear to all officers involved in the extraordinary policing operation currently in place and we will continue to do so.”

Many opposed to the clampdown noted that the police are threatening the arrest of people protesting the monarchy utilising draconian legislation brought in by the Conservative government just months ago.

In an article, “Could an anti-monarchy placard get you arrested after the Queen's death?” Sky News acknowledged, “The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, which became law this year, gives police more power to disrupt protests deemed to cause ‘significant impact’ on those nearby.”

The clampdown on freedom of speech would not be possible without the support of the Labour Party and trade unions. Within an hour of the queen’s death, the postal and rail unions called off current and upcoming national strikes. The Royal College of Nursing even halted an ongoing strike ballot of around 300,000 members out of “respect”.

On Tuesday, Guardian columnist and Labour member Owen Jones reported guidance “sent to all Labour MPs by the party leadership, banning them from posting anything on social media except for tributes to the Queen or whatever the party tells them, and banning them from talking to the media.”

Among the edicts handed down are, “All campaigning and party activity must remain suspended until further notice”; “When in public continue to follow the dress code (sombre and dark colours) during this period”; “All political communications, including MP updates/newsletters, should be postponed during this period.”

The events of the last days represented a devastating exposure of the democratic pretensions of the British ruling elite, which is putting into place the structure of a police state.

For the last eight months the population has been regaled with unrelenting propaganda that what is at stake in the war against Russia in Ukraine is the very future of democracy and the rule of law. The warmongers never tire of declaring that if anyone attempts to protest in Putin’s Russia, including holding up placards, they are immediately arrested.

Yet this is the very scenario being played out before the eyes of millions as a super-rich parasite is proclaimed head of state as his supposed birth right—the very antithesis of democratic rule. Powlesland was threatened with arrest a few yards from Westminster Hall, where the self-same King Charles III was pontificating that parliament was the “living and breathing instrument of our democracy”.

The state clampdown on anti-monarchy protests takes place as the Truss Conservative government prepares legislation to criminalise strikes in designated essential industries and services. It confirms that in a society riven by unparalleled levels of social inequality and amid an eruption of the class struggle that has only been interrupted by a period of compulsory national mourning, the bourgeoisie is embracing dictatorial forms of rule.

Far-right Sweden Democrats gain ground in election as composition of future government remains unclear

Jordan Shilton

The far-right Sweden Democrats, a party which emerged from Sweden’s neo-Nazi movement, was the clear winner in Sunday’s general election in the Scandinavian country. Although the vote totals for the two major blocs of parties remain so close that a final result will only be known after postal votes and overseas ballots are tallied on Wednesday or Thursday, the Sweden Democrats increased their support more than any other party and are now the second-largest political party in Sweden.

As of Monday afternoon, preliminary results gave the right-wing bloc of parties led by the conservative Moderates 175 seats and the “left” bloc led by the Social Democrats 174. However, the Moderates were replaced by the Sweden Democrats as the largest party in the right-wing four-party bloc, which also includes the much smaller Christian Democrats and Liberals. The Sweden Democrats saw its share of the vote increase from 17.5 percent in 2018 to 20.6 percent, while the Moderates dropped from 19.8 percent to 19.1 percent.

The Social Democrats remained the largest single party, making slight gains from their 2018 result to finish with 30.5 percent of the vote. Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson, who depended in the outgoing parliament on the toleration of the Centre Party, Greens, and Left Party to stay in power, has refused to officially concede defeat. There is still a slim chance that the remaining votes could secure the Social Democrat-led bloc the 175 seats required for a majority in the 349-seat parliament (Riksdag).

The election result is a damning indictment of what has passed for “left” politics in Sweden. Long held up by left-leaning media outlets and political parties internationally as a “progressive” paradise, Sweden has witnessed wave after wave of privatisations and public spending cuts, tax cuts for the wealthy, an explosion of military spending and the scapegoating of immigrants under successive governments of the “left” and “right.”

This culminated in the policies pursued by the Social Democrats under Andersson and former Prime Minister Stefan Löfven over the past eight years, including bringing Sweden into the NATO military alliance, lining up full square behind the US-NATO war with Russia, and championing a homicidal “profits before lives” pandemic policy that left Sweden with one of the highest death rates from COVID-19. Supported by the Greens and Left Party, the Social Democrats also enforced budgets dictated by the right-wing parties and adopted punitive measures against asylum seekers and immigrants.

Whatever the final outcome of the vote, the Sweden Democrats have emerged politically strengthened as the entire political establishment lurches sharply to the right. Even in the unlikely event that the Social Democrats manage to cling to power, the far-right Sweden Democrats would be the official opposition in parliament.

Prior to the election, Moderate leader Ulf Kristersson raised the possibility of forming a government consisting of the three traditional right-wing parties with himself as prime minister with the far-right Sweden Democrats providing parliamentary support from the outside. This proposal was a tacit recognition of the deep hostility felt by broad sections of the Swedish population to the far-right party, which has never before held government office.

But on election night, Sweden Democrat leader Jimmy Akesson made clear that the Sweden Democrats would not be satisfied with a supporting role, declaring, “Right now it looks like there will be a change of power. Our ambition is to sit in the government.”

On Monday afternoon, leading tabloid Aftonbladet reported that Akesson visited the Moderates’ headquarters for talks in central Stockholm. Talks were also held by the Moderates with Christian Democrat leader Ebba Busch and Liberal leader Johan Pehrson. Kristersson reportedly hopes to negotiate an arrangement whereby the Sweden Democrats and Liberals support a minority government consisting of the Moderates and Christian Democrats.

Akesson and the Sweden Democrats’ ability to play the decisive role in determining the incoming government’s policies and composition is the outcome of the far-right’s systematic integration into official political life by all the established parties. When the fascistic Sweden Democrats first entered parliament at the 2010 election, all other parties claimed that they would refuse to cooperate with them. In 2014, Social Democrat Prime Minister Löfven justified his acceptance of an agreement with the traditional right-wing parties as necessary to stop the rise of the far right. The deal involved Löfven committing the Social Democrats to enforce budgets based on the right-wing parties’ spending plan, which involved continued austerity for public services after decades of cuts and privatizations. In return, the right-wing parties promised not to topple Löfven’s minority government with the votes of the Sweden Democrats.

After Kristersson took over as Moderate leader in 2017, the Moderates switched course and began openly collaborating with the Sweden Democrats. This cooperation resulted in parliament voting last year in favour of a budget drafted by the Moderates and Sweden Democrats, which the minority Social Democrat government headed by Andersson agreed to implement. The Centre and Liberal parties, which constantly claim to oppose in principle joining or supporting a government that includes the Sweden Democrats, also voted for the budget.

Behind the parliamentary maneuvering, powerful objective forces have driven the Swedish ruling elite to embrace the far-right Sweden Democrats. Sweden has one of the fastest growing levels of social inequality among the OECD countries. This trend has been produced by the comprehensive dismantling since the 1990s of the social welfare system and public services, which were among the most generous in Europe during the postwar period. One of the most glaring expressions of this process is the increasingly segregated character of Sweden’s major cities, which have impoverished suburbs dominated by immigrant populations where unemployment is sometimes more than double the national average.

The Swedish ruling class is also playing a leading role in transforming Scandinavia into a second front in the US-NATO war with Russia, including by applying to join NATO with its neighbour Finland and sending weaponry to Ukraine. And last but not least, Stockholm spearheaded the homicidal “herd immunity” policy in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, a policy that found favour with the most reactionary political forces around the world, including the fascist-minded former US President Donald Trump.

The intensification of these policies under conditions of a global crisis of the capitalist system necessitates the mobilisation of openly fascist forces to intimidate working class opposition, as is underscored by developments in all the major capitalist countries. The rise of the Sweden Democrats to the position of the country’s dominant right-wing party resembles the transformation of the Republicans in the United States into an ever-more explicitly fascist party following the attempted coup on January 6, 2021, and the British Conservatives’ emergence as a vicious far-right party under the leadership of Boris Johnson and now Liz Truss. In a general election due later this month, Giorgia Meloni, leader of the neo-fascist Fratelli d’Italia that honours the fascist dictator Mussolini, has strong prospects to become Italian prime minister.

None of these far-right forces enjoys mass popular support. Rather, these forces’ political strength comes from two key factors: first, the support they enjoy from key sections of the ruling elite and its state apparatus; and second, the role played by the official “left” parties and their trade union allies in blocking the working class from intervening independently into political life. The latter factor has proven especially critical in Sweden, where the ex-Stalinist Left Party and the trade unions have kept working people subordinated politically to the Social Democrats as they have marched steadily to the right and adopted many of the Sweden Democrats’ key policies.

Fuel price hike sparks protests in Indonesia

Owen Howell

Last week, mass protests erupted across Indonesia after the government of President Joko Widodo announced price hikes that will result in the cost of subsidised fuel surging by over 30 percent. That is the first government ordered petrol price increase in eight years.  Rallies and demonstrations are continuing.

Student activists shout slogans after knocking down police barricade during a rally against sharp increases in fuel prices, in Jakarta, Indonesia, Thursday, Sept. 8, 2022. [AP Photo/Achmad Ibrahim]

The decision, announced on 3 September, was taken amid a global inflationary spiral that has sent the prices of essential commodities in Indonesia skyrocketing. This year, the costs of cooking oil, electricity, and multiple food staples have soared as a result of the massive infusion of government funds into the stockmarkets, the US-NATO proxy war against Russia in Ukraine war and the disruptions stemming from the “let it rip” COVID-19 program.

President Widodo said in a televised address that the hike was the “last option,” due to a ballooning energy subsidy budget caused by rising global oil and gas prices. 

Widodo’s initial announcement immediately sparked spontaneous rallies, involving workers and students who burned tyres and blocked roads. On September 5, the Indonesian Trade Union Confederation (KSPI) then stepped in, holding its own organised protests.

The KSPI called on the government to reverse the price hike and lift the minimum wage by 10 to 13 percent before next year.

The September 5 rallies involved tens of thousands of workers and students across the country in the cities of Jakarta, Surabaya, Makassar, Kendari, Aceh, Yogyakarta, Bandung, Medan and Semarang. Demonstrations were planned in a total of 34 provinces, union leaders told Tempo magazine, including in rural areas outside the offices of provincial governors and local officials.

In the capital city Jakarta, an estimated 5,000 industrial workers marched and chanted slogans outside Parliament, denouncing the government’s move and demanding higher wages. The protest was also attended by teachers, domestic workers, farmers and fishermen, as well as hundreds of university students.

In Makassar, a major city on the island of Sulawesi, student protesters raised that the price increase would especially burden workers who have not fully recovered from being infected with COVID-19.

Ahead of the rallies, a massive police presence was established across the archipelago. In Jakarta, around 7,200 police and military personnel were deployed in and around the capital, with the largest concentration of forces near Parliament and petrol stations. Roads leading to the Presidential Palace were blocked.

Price hikes in fuel and other basic commodities were the initial trigger for the mass protests in 1998 which toppled the Suharto dictatorship amid the South East Asia economic crisis. The last fuel price increase in 2014, just months after Widodo first assumed office, set off a wave of protests around the country.

The social conditions in Indonesia today are even more explosive. The pandemic, allowed by the Widodo government to rip through the country with minimal health measures in place, has wrought enormous physical and economic devastation on the Indonesian working class and rural masses.

The official pandemic statistics, 6 million cases and 150,000 deaths, are acknowledged by medical experts to be a vast undercount, the result of a chronically low testing regime and a large number of unreported deaths. The government’s criminal pro-business program of “reopening” amid the pandemic led to the horrific mass death caused by the Delta wave in July 2021, with over 2,000 official daily deaths at its peak and thousands more dying at home.

The massive corporate bailouts and injection of money into the financial markets worldwide has precipitated the inflation crisis, which the Indonesian government is seeking to resolve by austerity and further inroads into workers’ living conditions.

The fuel hike has raised the price of gasoline from about 51 cents to 67 cents per litre and diesel fuel from 35 cents to 46 cents. As subsidised fuel accounts for more than 80 percent of state-owned oil giant Pertamina’s sales, the price increase will have a major impact on workers’ families and small businesses, and is predicted to elevate food and energy costs.

Another protest last Thursday involved more violent clashes between demonstrators and police. Students gathering at Jakarta’s National Monument burned tyres and dismantled razor wire barricades erected by authorities. Footage released on social media showed riot police firing on student protesters with water cannon. Elsewhere in the city, protesters attempted to block the vice president’s motorcade, causing the convoy to quickly flee.

The unions have indicated rallies will continue until December and have said that they are considering a national strike. Said Iqbal, president of the KSPI, addressed the workers’ rally outside Parliament on Tuesday last week: “We have won before and we are confident that President Joko Widodo will hear the people’s voices alongside the voices of the elites who do not care about the interests of the common people.”

The KSPI, one of Indonesia’s peak union groups, has a long record of organising carefully coordinated one-day rallies outside government buildings, designed to allow workers to blow off steam and prevent a major social explosion. It has played a critical role in diffusing workers’ struggles over recent years amid growing opposition among workers to the Widodo government’s assault on their rights and conditions.

In November 2021, the KSPI held similar rallies in response to price rises of up to 10 percent for basic commodities. Workers also wanted to fight against the government’s anti-worker Omnibus Law, passed in 2020, which has allowed the financial elite to slash wages, job protections and further enrich big business. The KSPI’s demands for a minimum wage rise fell on deaf ears.

In 2019, protests of workers emerged after the government passed legislation weakening the official anti-corruption body. The KSPI declared that it would work “as a team” with the Widodo government and boasted of its backing for pro-business measures to “build a good investment climate.”

The unions, moreover, are an active participant in the sordid intrigues of official politics. During the 2019 presidential elections, the KSPI endorsed Widodo’s far-right opponent, Prabowo Subianto, a former general under Suharto. After Widodo’s victory, union leaders quickly pledged their fealty to the president.

This union is not planning to defend the “interests of the common people” before the “elites,” as Iqbal claimed. Instead, the KSPI is seeking to direct the mounting social anger back into the safe channels of feckless appeals to the Indonesian ruling class as it proceeds with its austerity program.

Yesterday, government ministers declared that they would “consider” some of the union’s demands. This is a clear sop to the union bureaucracy aimed at assisting it to end the protests without any change to workers’ conditions.

Russia’s debacle in Kharkiv

Andre Damon

By all indications, Russia has suffered a catastrophic military defeat near Kharkiv, the second-largest city in Ukraine, located in the country’s northeast.

Ukrainian soldiers fire into Russian positions from anti-aircraft gun in Kharkiv region, Ukraine, early Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2022. [AP Photo/Andrii Marienko]

In the course of six days, the Ukrainian military, armed and financed by the United States and NATO, has taken dozens of miles of territory. The Institute for the Study of War reports: “Ukrainian forces have penetrated Russian lines to a depth of up to 70 kilometers in some places and captured over 3,000 square kilometers of territory in the past five days since September 6—more territory than Russian forces have captured in all their operations since April.”

Borrowing the methods of the Stalinist Soviet bureaucracy, the Kremlin is responding to this catastrophe with lies and evasions. The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed that Russian forces are “regrouping,” a statement that is obviously false. It is impossible to deny that what is taking place is a rout and a massive military and political debacle.

The disaster in Kharkiv is the product of not only incompetent military leadership, but also, and more fundamentally, the bankrupt political strategy upon which Putin based his “Special Operation.”

Whatever the short term results of the defeats of the past week, the events continue the course of unending disasters produced by the Stalinist dissolution of the USSR and restoration of capitalism.

It will further intensify the crisis of the Russian regime, riven by factions that are arguing for a reckless escalation and those who are calling for concessions to be made to the US and NATO.

The Putin government’s decision to invade Ukraine was a desperate and reactionary response to the intensifying pressure of the US and NATO on Russia. Putin’s strategy, to the extent there was one, was to create the circumstances for a favorable negotiation of terms with the United States and its NATO allies.

Putin’s entire strategy in waging the war is bound up with the social outlook of the Russian oligarchic bourgeoisie, whose primary concern is to retain for itself control over the mineral and energy resources that the imperialists wish to plunder.

Putin sought to make an agreement with US imperialism that the Russian oligarchy could live with. Speaking for Russia’s capitalist oligarchy, Putin is far more concerned with domestic social opposition.

The US and NATO have shown, however, that they are uninterested in negotiation. They view the complete subjugation of Russia, including its carve-up into multiple statelets, as a critical strategic goal. Time and time again, the Kremlin has underestimated the determination of the US and its European imperialist allies.

The rapid breakthrough by Ukrainian forces is the result of the massive escalation of the conflict by the United States and NATO. American paramilitary forces are on the ground, directly coordinating the offensive. Ukrainian missile strikes are directed by the US intelligence agencies, which designate targets.

Increasingly, the rifles borne by Ukrainian troops, the armor they wear and the vehicles that transport them are all NATO-standard weapons, paid for by the US and its European allies. Most importantly, Ukraine has been provided with the forces to strike dozens of miles behind Russian lines in the form of the HIMARS guided missile system and M777 long-range howitzer, as well as the HARM anti-radar missile and the Harpoon anti-ship missile. Ukrainian troops are backed by the NASAMS anti-aircraft system, the same system that guards the White House.

The American media no longer seeks to conceal the extent of direct US involvement in the war. In the words of The Hill, the US has become “brazen” in its intervention in the war. “Over time, the administration has recognized that they can provide larger, more capable, longer-distance, heavier weapons to the Ukrainians and the Russians have not reacted,” former US Ambassador to Ukraine William Taylor told the newspaper.

The New York Times, ecstatic over the Ukrainian advance, wrote: “Senior Ukrainian officials stepped up intelligence sharing with their American counterparts over the summer as they began to plan the counteroffensive that allowed them to make dramatic gains in the northeast in recent days, a shift that allowed the United States to provide better and more relevant information about Russian weaknesses.”

The Times quoted Evelyn Farkas, a top Pentagon official for Ukraine and Russia in the Obama administration, as saying, “These guys have been trained for eight years by [US] Special Ops. They’ve been taught about irregular warfare. They’ve been taught by our intelligence operators about deception and psychological operations.”

To refer to the conflict as a “proxy war” is an understatement. The Ukrainian army has become a wholly-owned subsidiary of the US military, which has armed, funded and trained it to the standards of the US Armed Forces.

The US-led offensive has resulted in a catastrophic loss of life, both for Ukrainian forces and for Russia, with reports of more than a thousand people dying per day in recent fighting.

The capitalist governments of the United States and Europe are absolutely determined to carry out their goal of subjugating Russia. The consequences, in terms of the lives of Ukrainians and Russians, along with the disastrous economic and social impact on workers throughout the world, amount to nothing in comparison to the geopolitical imperatives of the ruling class.

It is not ruled out that the Kremlin will conclude from this military catastrophe that it is necessary to wage a massive military escalation, which would itself only lead to an escalation by NATO. Paradoxically, the desperate efforts by the Kremlin to reach an accommodation with imperialism do not preclude a series of actions that could trigger a thermonuclear war.

Putin opened the Russian offensive against Ukraine with a condemnation of Vladimir Lenin. But for all Putin’s bluster, the world we inhabit today is the world Lenin described in his 1916 work, Imperialism, which demonstrated that war and colonial domination express the essential characteristics of the capitalist system.

The Stalinist bureaucracy dissolved the Soviet Union based on the false belief that imperialism was merely an invention of Lenin, and that a capitalist Russia could reach a modus vivendi with European and American imperialism. The ensuing three decades have shown, however, that this was a colossal delusion.

The central task is to mobilize the working class in opposition to imperialist war. This requires a break not only with all of the forces of the petty-bourgeois pseudo-left that defend the US/NATO war drive, but those who claim that Russian nationalism offers a solution to the catastrophe created by the dissolution of the USSR.

It is necessary to make a warning: The debacle suffered by the Russian military over the past week only presages a further and even more bloody escalation of the war. The imperialist powers smell blood in the water, and they will redouble their efforts to conquer and subjugate Russia.

Russia’s debacle will only further embolden the most reactionary forces within Ukrainian society, as well as the US war planners, to believe they can reproduce this success by triggering a war with China over Taiwan.

But this escalation will at the same time intensify the war on the populations of the United States and Europe, who will pay the cost of the war in the form of surging prices and falling living standards. Already, the war has triggered a collapse in workers’ living standards amid a staggering escalation of military budgets, as prices for natural gas have surged ten-fold in Europe.

Pakistan faces massive humanitarian crisis as unprecedented flooding continues

Sampath Perera

Unprecedented flooding—arising from and demonstrably tied to climate change— continues to ravage Pakistan, with the official death toll rising by more than 250 since last week.

1,391 people are now reported as having perished due to the floods, which have inundated a third of the impoverished South Asian country. A further 12,700 have been injured. On Friday, Pakistan’s National Disaster Management Agency reported that 36 new fatalities had been recorded within the previous 24 hours.

An aerial view of Shahdadkot, Khairpur Nathan Shah, Mado, Faridabad, Mehar and other cities of Sindh, Pakistan covered with flood water in 2022. [Photo by Ali Hyder Junejo / CC BY 4.0]

The official death and injury counts are widely recognized to be gross undercounts, since many areas remain totally cut off due to the destruction of hundreds of bridges and other infrastructure. Furthermore, there is a growing threat of infectious disease.

More than 33 million people, or one in every seven Pakistanis, are variously described as displaced, homeless or directly affected by the floods. Among these are 16 million children.

Even prior to the devastation wrought by the floods, nearly half the population was considered food insecure. Millions of people are now forced to live in makeshift shelters or barely maintained camps. Due to a lack of emergency supplies at these sites, many people are sleeping in the open air.

Flood survivors face shortages of food, drinking water, and sanitary supplies. The lack of toilets has compelled camp residents to relieve themselves outside in the surrounding areas. Worst affected by these unbearable conditions are children and pregnant mothers. According to the United Nations Population Fund, there are 650,000 pregnant women among those affected by the floods, of whom 73,000 are expected to deliver this month.

The absence of adequate sanitary supplies has created ideal conditions for the spread of infectious diseases. Skin infections and stomach flu, spreading widely among those in the camps, have been attributed to the unavailability of toilets. More than 134,000 cases of diarrhea and 44,000 cases of malaria have been reported in Sindh alone. Other mosquito-borne infections are also spreading, with Karachi reporting 1,265 dengue cases in August and 347 cases in the first five days of September.

There is virtually no coordination of rescue efforts to locate people stranded by the floods. Nor are the relief efforts, largely entrusted to the armed forces, in any way commensurate with the scale of the crisis. 81 of the country’s 160 districts have been affected by flooding, and with heavy rain forecast for the coming days a rapid receding of the flood waters is unlikely.

The National Flood Response Coordination Centre (NFRCC) reported Wednesday that the military flew 20 helicopter sorties during the preceding 24 hours, rescuing 217 stranded individuals while delivering 30 tons of relief items to affected areas. The navy and air forces are also running rescue and relief missions, but of a smaller scale.

Despite a slight drop in water levels in recent days, Manchar Lake, the country’s largest fresh water lake, is under constant threat of bursting its banks, which could cause a massive loss of life. To prevent such an outcome, several planned breaches have been made in the lake, which is situated in the central part of Sindh province. As anticipated, the breaches have led to the flooding of many nearby villages and forced the evacuation of several hundred thousand people. On Wednesday, officials in Bhan Syedabad issued an evacuation alert to 150,000 residents, and 10,000 displaced people who had sought refuge there.

The provincial government of Balochistan, the poorest and least developed province in the country, described 32 of its 34 districts as “calamity hit” as of September 1. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in the north is also badly affected.

There are fears the flooding could wash away the ruins of Mohenjo-daro, one of the world’s most important archeological sites, which dates back to 2,500 BCE. Floodwaters have not yet touched the site, but it has been damaged by the exceptionally heavy rains, with several walls collapsing. A centre of the Harappan or Indus Valley civilisation, Mohenjo-daro has an elaborate ancient drainage system that has helped it survive previous floods. The site is considered the best preserved ancient urban settlement in South Asia.

On Aug. 30, the United Nations issued an urgent appeal to member states for $160 million to provide flood victims with food, shelter and medical supplies. Despite the massive humanitarian crisis, even this meagre amount has not been raised in the intervening week-and-a-half.

The top priority for Pakistan’s interim government, which is led by a coalition of the big-business Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) and People’s Party (PPP), is to restrict spending to the limits specified by the International Monetary Fund, as part of a loan bailout package.

To date, the government has allocated just 70 billion rupees or US $314 million for cash handouts to the more than 33 million flood victims—many of whom have seen their homes, crops and livestock destroyed.  

The floods were preceded by extremely high temperatures in March and April, which regularly surpassed 45 degrees Celsius (113 Fahrenheit) and in some places 50 degrees. This was followed by an early start of the monsoon season and rainfall that was three to eight times the average during July and August. The extended heat waves accelerated long-term glacier melting in the Himalayas and Hindu Kush mountains. This has triggered a phenomenon known as glacial lake outburst-floods, as large bodies of water formed by melting glaciers suddenly overflow their makeshift banks and rush down the mountainside to inundate lower-lying areas. In addition to the deadly flash floods, the glacial lake outbursts have triggered devastating landslides.

Dr. Fahad Saeed, the “regional lead for South Asia” for Climate Analytics, an international climate science and policy analysis organization, told BBC the devastating floods in Pakistan are “absolutely a wake-up call” to governments around the world. “All of this is happening when the world has warmed by 1.2 degrees Celsius. Any more warming than that is a death sentence for many people in Pakistan.”

Ahead of his visit to Pakistan on September 9, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres addressed the continuing refusal by global powers to respond to climate change. “There is a lot of attention,” said Guterres on the war in Ukraine. “But people tend to forget there is another war—the war we are waging on nature, and nature is striking back, and climate change is supercharging the destruction of our planet. To deal with climate change, that is the defining issue of our time, with a business-as-usual approach is pure suicide.”

Such purely rhetorical protests are falling on the deaf ears of the major powers.

Guterres did not mention that the United States is the leader in scuttling an effective response to climate change. This week, Washington pledged $30 million to assist Pakistan’s climate change victims, less than a dollar for every person impacted. This pitiful sum pales into insignificance compared with the tens of billions of dollars in military assistance the US has poured into Ukraine to expand a war against Russia that has already killed tens of thousands on both sides and threatens to trigger a catastrophic nuclear conflagration.

Last week Pakistan’s government placed flood damages at $10 billion, but that figure has been dramatically revised upwards as the scale of the disaster becomes more apparent. Its new estimate is $30 billion or more than 60 percent of Pakistan’s $47 billion national budget. According to Pakistani authorities, more than 5,700 kilometers of roads have been damaged, over 240 bridges destroyed or rendered unusable, and more than a million dwellings either washed away or heavily damaged. UNICEF says 18,000 schools have been damaged or destroyed.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization reported on August 29 that nearly 80 percent of the crops in Sindh, the country’s second largest province, have been ruined. Among the worst affected is the cotton crop. Raw cotton is Pakistan’s third largest export and is vital to Pakistan’s textile industry, the country’s biggest export earner.

The destruction of crops will also drive up food prices, under conditions where Pakistan, like countries around the world, is being battered by energy and other price increases. Earlier this month, the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics reported the inflation rate has reached an all-time high of 45.5 percent.

The biggest inflation driver came from the removal of subsidies for energy products, which caused prices to skyrocket. As part of an agreement with the IMF, which last week released a $1.16 billion loan tranche to Pakistan, the government is bound to increase gas prices by a further 53 percent. In addition, according to Dawn, it is pledged to revive the general sales tax on petroleum products and slash other price subsidies. The gas price increase alone is intended to generate 786 billion rupees in additional revenues for the government, more than 10 times the sum Islamabad has committed to support the tens of millions of flood victims.

Meanwhile, the floods in Pakistan are disrupting the food supply to Afghanistan, worsening the catastrophic humanitarian crisis in that landlocked country. There are also 1.3 million Afghan refugees living in Pakistan, of whom 420,000 are estimated to be living in the areas worst hit by the floods.

Prague: Mass protest against war and inflation reveals crisis of political perspective

Markus Salzmann & Peter Schwarz

Seventy thousand people demonstrated in the Czech capital of Prague on 3 September against rising energy prices and the NATO war in Ukraine, and demanded that the government resign.

They are rebelling against a social catastrophe that is dragging large sections of the working and middle classes into the abyss.

[AP Photo/Petr David Josek]

The former Eastern bloc country’s economic and social crisis, which has been simmering for years, worsened dramatically following the imposition of European Union sanctions against Russia. Before the sanctions, the Czech Republic used to get 90 percent of its gas and 50 percent of its oil from Russia. Now it is dependent on gas supplied from Germany, which is charging horrendous prices. Germany itself is in the midst of a huge energy crisis.

Czech electricity prices are among the highest in Europe and are driving masses of small and medium-sized enterprises into bankruptcy. The country’s official inflation rate was 17.5 percent in June and is expected to exceed 20 percent by the end of the year, according to the Czech National Bank.

The working class is being impoverished at a breathtaking pace. According to figures from the Czech Statistical Office, real wages in the second quarter of 2022 were 9.8 percent lower than a year ago. At the end of 2021, 9 percent of Czechs received an income below the official poverty line. This figure is now already 16 percent. Some 750,000 of the country’s 10 million inhabitants are bankrupt and can no longer pay their debts.

Although outrage at these untenable conditions drove tens of thousands onto the streets, the crisis found no progressive expression at the demonstration. The rally was dominated by nationalist and right-wing slogans. It began with the playing of the Czech national anthem and was submerged in a sea of national flags. Its official slogan was “The Czech Republic First”.

The speakers and organisers were mainly from the right-wing and ultra-right camps. ANO, the party of oligarch and former prime minister Andrej Babiš, supported the protest, as did Tomio Okamura’s far-right SPD. Corona deniers and smaller far-right parties were also prominently represented.

Sections of the country’s trade unions, citizens’ initiatives as well as the Social Democrats (CSSD) also called for support for the rally, and the Communist Party (KSCM) even provided its own speaker, leading many commentaries to refer to a “cross party front” of the left and right. The Czech head of government, Petr Fiala, against whom the rally was directed, denounced it as a “Russian propaganda and disinformation campaign” organised by “pro-Russian persons close to extremist positions”.

In reality, Fiala and the five parties in his governing coalition bear the main responsibility for allowing the right and far right to exploit social discontent. Fiala’s ODS party has its origins in the Civic Forum, which played an instrumental role in the so-called Velvet Revolution that led to the fall of the Stalinist regime in 1989.

The velvet glove of the “revolutionaries” of that period quickly revealed its iron fist directed above all at the Czech working class. They rejected Stalinism not because it oppressed the working class, but because it prevented them from making a career and enriching themselves as the middle class had done in the West.

Under its first leader, Vaclav Klaus, the Civic Forum moved rapidly to the right. It competed with ex-Stalinists in the social-democratic CSSD to see who could seize the largest share of former state-owned property. Under conditions of unbridled avarice and greed, Civic Forum and CSSD governments and coalitions broke up time and time again over corruption scandals, only to emerge anew in a different composition and form.

In 2017, Andrej Babiš, the country’s second richest man, came to power, using his wealth and right-wing populism as political weapons, much like Silvio Berlusconi in Italy and Donald Trump in the US. In 2019, in one of the largest demonstrations in the country’s history, 250,000 demanded Babiš resign over corruption. He was able to remain in office, however, for two more years until the current government replaced him.

The Fiala government is a coalition of five parties: the ODN, the Christian Democrats, the liberal TOP 09, the Pirate Party and the local mayoral party STAN. Their common feature is opposition to Babiš and support for the EU and NATO and its war against Russia.

The Czech Republic has supplied Ukraine with large quantities of weapons, and Fiala was one of the first heads of state to travel to Kiev after the war began, together with the Polish and Slovenian heads of government. His Defence Minister Jana Černochová rejoiced at the murder of Darija Dugina, a Russian close to Putin, comparing her death to the murder of Reinhard Heydrich, Hitler's governor in occupied Czechoslovakia. Five days before the mass demonstration, the German Chancellor Olaf Scholz gave a militaristic speech in Prague at Fiala’s invitation, advocating the militarisation of Europe under German leadership.

At the same time, the Fiala government has only contempt for the social misery of the Czech population. The chairperson of TOP 09, Markéta Pekarová Adamová, advised citizens to put on an extra jumper in winter as a measure against the impending lack of energy, while other government members have philosophised about the health benefits of poorly heated rooms.

The Fiala government is also even more corrupt than the predecessor regime led by Babiš. A leading politician of the STAN party, which won a fifth of the vote at its first showing based on its anticorruption campaign against Babiš, was arrested by the anticorruption police in June. “The sums illegally raked in by Hlubuček and another ten people with connections to the STAN party make Babiš look like a saint,” commented the German daily taz.

The central political problem in the Czech Republic is the lack of an independent perspective to guide working class opposition to the untenable social conditions and corrupt bourgeois parties. Decades of Stalinist repression and anti-socialist propaganda have left a legacy of confusion and disorientation.

A major contributor to this situation was the falsely named “communist” KSCM, which, like the social-democratic CSSD, emerged from the Stalinist state party and maintains relations with the German Left Party at a European level. The KSCM adhered to a pseudo-socialist rhetoric and achieved its best election result in 2002 with 18.5 percent of the vote. In some regions it was on occasion the strongest party.

In fact, the KSCM is pro-capitalist and nationalist and has repeatedly cooperated with the most right-wing forces. For example, from 2017 to 2021 it helped the oligarch Babiš gain a parliamentary majority with a tolerance agreement. At the recent rally in Prague, KSCM speaker Josef Skála explicitly advocated a cross-party front with the far right. “We need to join forces, we on the left of the political spectrum, and we also need a patriotic democratic right, and vice versa,” he roared.

Schlumberger Foundation Faculty for the Future Fellowship 2023/2024

Application Deadline: 11th November 2022

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: Developing Countries and Emerging Economies

To be taken at: Top universities abroad

Accepted Subject Areas: Physical sciences and related disciplines

About Fellowship: Each year, The Faculty for the Future fellowships, Launched by the Schlumberger Foundation, are awarded to women from developing and emerging economies who are preparing for PhD or post-doctoral study in the physical sciences and related disciplines at top universities for their disciplines abroad. Grant recipients are selected for their leadership capabilities as for their scientific talents, and are expected to return to their home countries to continue their academic careers and inspire other young women.

Offered Since: 2004

Type: PhD/Post-Doctoral, Fellowship

Selection Criteria: A successful application will have gone through four selection rounds, with the reviewers paying particular attention to the following criteria:

• Academic performance;
• Quality of references;
• Quality of host country university;
• Level of commitment to return to home country;
• Commitment to teaching;
• Relevance of research to home country;
• Commitment to inspiring young women into the sciences.

Eligibility: Applicants must meet all the following criteria:

• Be a woman;
• Be a citizen of a developing country or emerging economy;
• Wish to pursue a PhD degree or Post-doctoral research in the physical sciences or related disciplines;
• Have applied to, have been admitted to, or are currently enrolled in a university/research institute abroad;
• Wish to return to their home country to continue their academic career upon completion of their studies;
• Be very committed to teaching and demonstrate active participation in faculty life and outreach work to encourage young women into the sciences;
• Hold an excellent academic record.

Number of fellowships: Several

Value of Award: Faculty for the Future grants are awarded based on the actual costs of studying and living in the chosen location, and is worth USD 50,000 for PhDs and USD 40,000 for Post-doctoral study. Grants may be renewed through to completion of studies subject to performance, self-evaluation and recommendations from supervisors.

How to Apply: Interested candidates may Apply below

Visit Scholarship Webpage for Details

Government of Ireland Research Masters and PhD Scholarships 2023

Application Deadline: 21st October 2021

Eligible Countries: National and International

To Be Taken At (Country): Ireland

About the Award: The aim of the Irish Research Council Government of Ireland Postgraduate Scholarship, hereinafter referred to as the Government of Ireland Postgraduate Scholarship, is to support suitably qualified research master’s and doctoral candidates pursuing, or intending to pursue, full-time research in any discipline.

A number of targeted scholarships are offered in collaboration with strategic funding partners.

Type: Masters, PhD

Eligibility:

• Applicants must fulfil the following criteria:
  
  • have a first class or upper second-class honours bachelor’s, or the equivalent, degree. If undergraduate examination results are not known at the time of application, the Council may make a provisional offer of a scholarship on condition that the scholar’s bachelor’s, or the equivalent degree result is a first class or upper second-class honours. If a scholar does not have a first class or upper second-class honours bachelor’s, or the equivalent, degree, they must possess a master’s degree. The Council’s determination of an applicant’s eligibility on these criteria is final;
  • must not have had two previous unsuccessful applications to the programme, including strategic partner themes. This includes applications since 2010 to the EMBARK Scheme previously run by the Irish Research Council for Science, Engineering and Technology, and the Government of Ireland Scholarship Scheme previously run by the Irish Council for Humanities and Social Sciences;
  • in the case of applications for a research master’s scholarship, applicants must not currently hold, or have previously held, a Council Postgraduate Scholarship;
  • in the case of applications for a doctoral degree scholarship, applicants must not currently hold, or have previously held, any Council Postgraduate Scholarship other than those which would enable them to obtain a research master’s degree
• Applicants will fall under one of two categories based on nationality and residency. For category one, applicants must meet BOTH of the following criteria:
• be a national of a European Union member state, Iceland, Norway, Liechtenstein or Switzerland
  AND
• have been ordinarily resident in a European Union member state, Iceland, Norway, Liechtenstein or Switzerland for a continuous period of three of the five years preceding 1 October 2021.

All other applicants will fall under category two.

While the majority of scholarships will be awarded to applicants who fall under category one, a proportion of awards will also be made to exceptional applicants who fall under category two. Please note that the Council may request documented evidence of an applicant’s nationality and residence.

Number of Awards: Not specified

Value of Award: 

• a stipend of €16,000 per annum
• a contribution to fees, including non-EU fees, up to a maximum of €5,750 per annum
• eligible direct research expenses of €2,250 per annum

Duration of Program:

• Research master’s degree: 12 months
• Structured research master’s degree: 24 months
• Traditional doctoral degree: 36 months
• Structured doctoral degree: 48 months

How to Apply: Potential applicants should read the 2022 Call Documents like the FAQ as well as Terms and Conditions carefully to ascertain whether or not they are eligible to apply. Indicative versions of the applicant, supervisor and referee forms are provided for information purposes only. All participants must create and submit their forms via the online system.

Visit Program Webpage for Details