The US Mustn’t Turn Its Back on China

Tom Clifford

Beijing.

Ah, finally, we get it now. The Trump doctrine. Separate China from Russia circa 1972, except this time build bridges with Moscow, call Beijing’s bluff on Taiwan, sit back and wait for China to implode. That beautiful American word, cockamamie, barely does justice to such visionary, strategic thinking. A few small points to consider…The relationship between Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin is a great deal closer than that between Leonid Brezhnev and Mao Zedong.

There may come a time when Moscow wakes up to Chinese expansion in its own backyard of central Asia with the Belt and Road Initiative but that is some way in the distance. Right now, both countries are enjoying a convenient infatuation with each other.

Taiwan?  It is difficult to call a bluff when there is no bluff. There is nothing to suggest that China sees Taiwan as anything other than an integral part of its territory.  No art of the deal approach will change that fundamental viewpoint.

The China implode theory? Ah, yes, we have heard this before. The theory goes that with rampant corruption and ever increasing debt, the Chinese economy will slow down to such an extent that outbreaks of social unrest will occur which will spread like wildfire and hey presto, a new China.

First of all, China does have a debt problem, not to overseas creditors but to itself. It is trying to tackle it, has some way to go to get it under control, but it is not, at least not yet, a major issue heralding imminent collapse. From China’s point of view it is the UK and the EU that seem far more likely to collapse than the People’s Republic.

For the first time in 300 years, a generation of Chinese have passed on increasing wealth to another generation who in turn hope to do the same. For all the problems China faces, there is a tangible sense here that life will get better.  It may not be as fast as they want, nor as widespread, but change is in the air. Thirty years ago, they wanted bicycles, now they want cars (preferably German ones). I know Chinese people who as children never thought they would ever ride in a vehicle, not even a bus. Yes, the Chinese would like more democracy but they crave greater justice, healthcare and education and an end to corruption. The Communist Party has no divine right to rule, as atheists they could not believe in a divine right anyway, and they realize it. When Xi came to office he instructed the leading party members to read Alexis de Tocqueville’s The Old regime and the Revolution, a book that examines French society before the events of 1789.

Nothing is sacred under heaven, the Chinese more than any other people realize that.

There are rust belts in China too. Hundreds of thousands of workers in steel mills and smoke-stack industries have been made redundant this year in Hebei province, next to Beijing, where the rusting hulks of factories dot the landscape. There is still a huge imbalance between the prosperous coastal areas and the inland ones.  More than 7 million graduates will emerge next year from Chinese colleges. Even with a growing economy, finding these graduates jobs is not easy. The country is building the equivalent of a university every week as it tries to create an educated workforce to boost the transformation of the economy from low-skilled production-based to high-skilled services.

Foreign firms still face huge obstacles in China which is not as welcoming to foreign investment as it once was and debt-heavy state-owned companies are still shielded from rivals. Still, foreign direct investment in 2016 up to October grew 4.2 percent ($96.8 billion) compared to 2015. Negotiations over an investment treaty between the US and China, which began in 2008, have yet to be finalized after more than 24 sittings but an agreement does seem possible.

There may be much that has to be improved in the China-US relationship, but it is one worth nurturing.

It may be that we are on the verge of a different era, one more fraught and tense. But there is one beautiful American word to describe the US turning its back on China at this juncture.

Colombia: Peace in the Shadow of Genocide

Daniel Kovalik

After the first Colombian peace agreement was narrowly voted down in a nation-wide referendum in October, the Colombian Congress approved a revised peace agreement between the Colombian government and FARC rebels.  While the extreme right-wing in Colombia has tried to stir up fear about the peace process, arguing that it gives too much amnesty to the left-wing FARC combatants, and while Human Rights Watch has amplified these concerns, it is indeed the left which is being threatened and attacked in Colombia.  Specifically, the left is being attacked by the right-wing paramilitaries who see the peace between the government and the FARC as both a threat to their alleged raison d-etrê of allegedly fighting the guerillas,as well as an opportunity – to wit, the opportunity to wipe out the left as the FARC disarms.

Anyone who knows about Colombia is painfully aware of the historical precedent for such attacks upon the left during the cessation of hostilities between the government and the FARC.  As The Miami Herald explains:

For many in Colombian politics, the recent spate of killings seem depressingly familiar. In the 1980s and 1990s, anywhere from 1,000 to 3,500 members of the Unión Patriótica party were assassinated.

That political group drew followers from across the left, but its primary purpose was to give the FARC, which had signed a ceasefire at the time, a vehicle to participate in politics. In the succeeding years, however, UP members were indiscriminately murdered, including presidential candidate Jaime Pardo in 1987. The ceasefire collapsed, the FARC resumed fighting, and most of those murders were eventually pinned on right-wing paramilitary groups.

Others put the death toll of the assault against the UP (Patriotic Union in English) at well above that estimated by The Miami Herald.  Thus, as Telesur recently reported,

[Aida] Avella is the president of the Patriotic Union, a party that saw no less than 5,000 of its supporters, including sitting politicians and presidential candidates, killed by the state and its paramilitary allies in what was deemed a political genocide.

“I don’t think another genocide is starting, rather it is a continuation of the genocide against opposition sectors. That’s because the paramilitary structures have not been dismantled, they are completely intact,” Avella told Contagio Radio.

Avella makes a good point about the persistence of the paramilitary assault on Colombia’s “opposition sectors.”  Just this year alone, 72 social activists have been murdered in Colombia.    And, in the four years of its existence, the peace movement known as the Marcha Patriotica has lost 125 members to assassination by the paramilitaries.

Such violence has only accelerated in recent months as the peace process has approached final agreement.   Thus, in November alone, at least 12 leaders from the peace, indigenous and labor movements have been murdered. And, a day doesn’t go by that I don’t hear of more death threats and attempts against leaders of organizations I work closely with in Colombia.  Meanwhile, as the Washington Office on Latin America has reported, “the neo-paramilitary group Autodefensas Gaitanistas de Colombia (AGC) circulated a flyer warning of a major ‘cleansing’ in December of the very leaders who will be key to achieving peace in Colombia.”

Colombia does not receive near enough attention in the press as it deserves, especially given its dire human rights situation and its being the recipient of nearly $10 billion in military assistance from the U.S. since 2000.

In terms of human rights, Colombia is now the Western Hemisphere’s leader in disappeared persons with well over 92,000 persons disappeared – this according to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) back in 2014.    This is over three times the figure for Argentina – the country which usually comes to mind for most people when thinking about the phenomenon of disappearances in Latin America.  And yet, when did you last hear of the disappearances in Colombia?  It is the almost complete news blackout on Colombia which allows the unprecedented political violence there to continue.  Indeed, as the head of the ICRC himself decried, “[t]he problem of missing people in Colombia is as widespread as it is silent.”

Those of us who want peace for Colombia cannot remain silent as the number of victims continue to mount even as our tax dollars continue to support a military which is still entangled with the paramilitary death squads committing the lion’s share of that country’s violence.

Trump Trumpets His Real Plans

Ralph Nader

Even for a failed gambling czar, Donald Trump has been surprisingly quick to show his hand as he sets the course of his forthcoming presidency. With a reactionary fervor, he is bursting backwards into the future. He has accomplished this feat through the first wave of nominations to his Cabinet and White House staff.

Only if there is a superlative to the word “nightmare” can the dictionary provide a description of his bizarre selection of men and women marinated either in corporatism or militarism, with strains of racism, class cruelty and ideological rigidity. Many of Mr. Trump’s nominees lack an appreciation of the awesome responsibilities of public office.

Let’s run through Trump’s “picks”:

First there are the selections that will make it easier to co-opt the Republicans in Congress. He has appointed Elaine Chao, the wife of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, for Secretary of Transportation. Ms. Chao does not like regulation of big business, such as those for auto, aviation, railroad and pipeline safety. Next is Congressman Tom Price (R-GA) to lead the Department of Health and Human Services. Price wants to dump Obamacare, turn over control of Medicaid to the states – including Governors who dislike Medicaid – and even privatize (eg. corporatize) Medicare itself into the hands of the business sector already defrauding just that program by about $60 billion a year.

Trump selected Congressman Mike Pompeo (R-KS) to be the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Pompeo is a cold war warrior who believes in a militaristic, interventionist CIA, especially toward Iran, taking that agency even further away from its original mission of gathering intelligence.

Then come the Generals. Notwithstanding the Constitutional imperative that there should be civilian control over the military, Trump has placed two generals in charge of foreign and domestic military theatres. For Secretary of Defense, Trump chose recently retired Marine General James Mattis. This “Mad Dog” believes Barack Obama to be too weak, indecisive and without a strategic plan for the Middle East. He looks very much like he is a believer in the American Empire and the U.S. being the policeman for the world.

The next general is retired Marine Gen. John Kelly, chosen to run the Department of Homeland Security. He is seen as a modern believer in the Monroe Doctrine over the Hispanic world south of Florida and the Rio Grande. He shares dangerous views on Iran and Islam with Gen. Mattis.

Inside the White House, retired General Mike Flynn is slated to take the post as national security adviser. His public statements against Islam being an ideological, existential threat to the U.S., and his proliferation of inaccurate conspiracy theories have alienated his former colleagues in the military, including reportedly the incoming Secretary of Defense.

Then there are the Trump nominees selected to run the departments whose numerous missions under existing law they want to dismantle. The proposed Secretary of Labor, Andrew Puzder, is a chain restaurateur adamantly against raising the federal minim wage of $7.25 an hour and his labor views are so extreme that a progressive group of restaurant owners organized to oppose his exploitative positions and argue for a fair minimum wage.  In another flagrant display of bureaucratic obstruction, Trump wants to appoint climate change denier Scott Pruitt to head the EPA, the same agency he, as Oklahoma Attorney General, fought tirelessly to undermine.

Another magnet for Trump’s nominations are those who made big donations to his campaign. For Linda McMahon’s $7 million to pro-Trump Super PACs, she gets to head the Small Business Administration. As a highly controversial professional wrestling CEO, she worked to monopolize the professional wrestling market and stifle competition.

For the Department of Education, school children and their teachers will face Betsy DeVos. From a billionaire family, she is a ferocious advocate of using taxpayer money in the form of vouchers for private schools. She makes no bones about her hatred of public schools and her desire to have commercial managers of school systems.

To lead the Justice Department, Trump has selected Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL), who is big on police surveillance, weak on civil rights enforcement, a hard-liner on immigration and very mixed on corporate crime.

Add these strong-willed ideologues, coupled with Trump’s easily bruised ego, Twitter-tantrums on trivial matters and his penchant to always be the decision-making strongman, and you’ve got the making of an explosive regime with daily eruptions.

Whatever the media makes of the inevitable intrigue, in-fighting and likely resistance by the civil service to adhere to their lawful missions, it is the people who will be paying the price. President Trump will use the media to sugarcoat, falsify, distract, intimidate, glorify and massify the millions of people who believed, once upon a recent time, that he would “Make America Great Again.”

As the profiteers of Wall Street and the war hawks blend with the corporate statists, the super-confident Trump is telling us what their products will be like and that he’ll be their salesman.

If you think all this sounds predictable, there are going to be more than a few “black swans” (to use Nassim Taleb’s best-selling book title) coming over the horizon. It is time to mobilize as citizens in the Paul Revere mode.

Social And Economic Causes Of Disease: Health And Political Consciousness

Nayvin Gordon

Many of us are aware that the leading cause of death in the US during the first half of the 20thCentury was due to infectious diseases.  On the other hand there is a general lack of understanding that these diseases were eliminated for the most part, by Public Health disease prevention strategies, such as clean water, sewage treatment and food safety.    We can correctly call these killers “social diseases”- defined by Merriam- Webster Dictionary as “diseases whose incidence is directly related to social and economic factors”.  Today, many of us are unaware that our modern epidemic killer diseases, which developed in the second half of the 20th century, are also social diseases:  cancer, heart disease, unintentional injuries, diabetes, and obesity.  The magnitude of this epidemic can be appreciated by a study of the top two causes of death from the age of four through sixty four.  In 2013 this age group suffered approximately a quarter of a million deaths!  That is only one year of an ongoing epidemic.  Such senseless death is preventable through social and economic change.  Our present epidemics cannot be prevented by visits to the local medical doctor or hospital.  Recent studies have identified more specific social determinants of disease and have pointed the way to the necessary social changes needed to create a healthy society and eliminate the epidemics of the 21st Century.

During the 1854 Cholera epidemic in London, Dr John Snow discovered that the public drinking water was polluted and convinced the local council to disable the public well pump by removing the handle.  The epidemic promptly ended.  Dr Snow is considered the father of modern Public Health.   Epidemics of pneumonia, tuberculosis and diarrheal diseases were the leading killers in 1900. By 1940 the death rate had dropped by 75%.  This remarkable reduction in death rates occurred before the introduction of antibiotics and vaccines, was the result of major Public Health policy involving sewage disposal, water treatment, food safety, public education, chlorination and pest control.    Today the Center for Disease Control,(CDC 24/7 Saving lives, Protecting People), states “ chronic diseases and conditions , such as heart disease, stroke, cancer, obesity and diabetes… are among the most common , costly and preventable of all health problems.”  According to the Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 2011 (Action on Social Determinants of Health is Essential.), “Eighty percent of non communicable diseases could be prevented through primary prevention”. These diseases “arise from exposures’ throughout the life course, starting in utero.”   Poor quality diets filled with fats, chemicals, along with toxins in our air, water, food and job sites are known to be responsible for the majority of the present cancer epidemic.(see  The Politics of Cancer Revisited, Dr. S. Epstein 1998).  In 2003 the World Health Organization (WHO) published their “social determinants of health”.   A partial list includes:  Social inequality/ hierarchy, race, gender, lack of control over stress, unemployment, education, income inequality, working conditions, job security, and food.  These are John Snow’s modern water pumps of our society.    Multiple studies have supported the crucial role of inequality in causing diseases.  Greater inequality means higher mortality, “When you compare the highest versus lowest rungs of the socioeconomic ladder, the risk of some diseases varies 10-fold” (Scientific American, 12/2005).  Social inequality is also correlated with life expectancy.  “High levels of inequality, most notable the United States, experience worse overall health than do countries that are more egalitarian.”   This knowledge is well documented by Harvard Public Health Professors in their 2001 book, “The Health of Nations: Why Inequality is Harmful to Your Health”.  The more egalitarian a society is, the better the health of the people and the longer they live.  Unequal society has clearly been documented to cause shorter and unhealthier lives.   The proof of shorter lives down the social ladder has been documented throughout Western societies.  Soaring death rates over the last decade for middle age white women is a deadly reflection of accelerating inequality in the US.

Despite John Snow’s success in ending the cholera epidemic in London in 1854, cholera later returned due to Public Officials refusal to clean up the cesspools and sewers. Similarly today, vested interests in the status quo refuse to make the necessary changes.     This becomes apparent when we examine funding for Public Health Measures, which have largely failed to control the modern epidemics, such as deaths from cancer and heart disease.  Only 3% of the   $2 Trillion spent on health in the USA in 2009 went to Public Health activities.    Public Health Policy has not been robust given the power of the super rich.  The more hierarchy and income inequality that exists in society, “the more incentive the wealthy will have to oppose public expenditures benefitting the health of the community.” (Scientific American, 12/2005).   This reality is vividly seen in the massive power of lobbying in Congress.  Dennis Raphael, states, in Beyond Policy Analysis (2014), if “a nation’s political economy is dominated by the business and corporate sector, they are generally opponents of developing public policy that equitably distributes the social determinants of health.”

Despite the power of the corporate sector, the Public Health Department of Finland, during the late 1960’s, was able to lead a large coalition of health workers, and educators along with strong community involvement to change a number of socio economic factors, including:  the food industry, dairy industry, agriculture, schools, along with cigarette and alcohol consumption.  These changes resulted in dramatic health improvement.  The mortality rate from heart disease for men was reduced by 73% along with major reductions in all causes of mortality in just 25 years.

Ending the present US epidemic,  that is claiming a quarter of a million lives every year, will require social and economic  transformation that moves  our society as close to egalitarianism as possible.  Social diseases require social solutions.  Our scientific knowledge is a guide to action.   Overwhelming evidence indicates that only a society that is profoundly egalitarian has the potential to eliminate our modern disease epidemics.   In the words of the famous Dr. Rudolph Virchow (1821-1902), “Medicine is a social science, and politics is nothing else but medicine on a large scale”.     What would Dr. John Snow do now?

“Philosophers have sought to understand the world.  The point, however, is to change it.”  Karl Marx, Theses on Feuerbach

UK-Poland summit reveals growing national antagonisms in Europe

Clara Weiss

On November 28, the UK government of Prime Minister Theresa May hosted a summit between Britain and Poland aimed at fostering a strategic political and military alliance between the two countries. Amid a profound crisis of the European Union (EU) and the breakdown of the postwar order, the summit was another indicator of the return of open antagonisms and the defense of national geopolitical and economic interests by the various European ruling elites.

A press release issued by the British government termed the summit “historic”, stressing that a similar line-up of high-ranking officials in a bilateral meeting had never occurred before. Participants in the summit included, among others, the prime ministers of the two countries, the foreign and defence secretaries, as well as the Polish ministers of the interior and labor.

The summit was organised by May’s government, which finds itself besieged both domestically and internationally thanks to the fall-out from the Brexit referendum, the threatened breakup of the EU and an anticipated dramatic shift in US foreign policy under Donald Trump. London is now desperately trying to strike alliances in Europe to protect the interests of British capitalism. Poland is not only an important economic partner, but, under the right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) government, also shares key positions with Britain about the organization of the EU and foreign policy.

On the eve of the bilateral summit, Prime Minister May declared she was “determined that Brexit will not weaken our relationship with Poland, rather it will serve as a catalyst to strengthen it”. The summit, in her words, marked “the start of a new chapter in our relations ... We share a clear commitment to take our co-operation to the next level and to firmly establish the UK and Poland as resolute and strategic allies in Europe”.

May also announced that her government was working toward a first-ever bilateral defense treaty between Poland and Britain.

The UK and Poland, along with Estonia and Greece, are the only European NATO member states to fulfill the organisation’s requirement that countries spend two percent of GDP on defense. In relation to Russia, both London and Warsaw have stood at the forefront of the European military build-up and provocations. As a symbolic act underlining its commitment to increased military cooperation, the UK government––in the wake of the summit––confirmed its commitment to sending 150 troops from the Light Dragoons to the border between Poland and the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.

The Polish ruling elite has been troubled by the Brexit referendum and the EU’s growing problems. May’s Polish counterpart, Prime Minister Beata Szydło, published a commentary in the Telegraph prior to the summit, headlined “Poland stands ready to help its old friend Britain reach the best possible Brexit deal”. The Polish prime minister observed: “Poland was saddened, probably more than any other country, with the result of the British referendum. For us, Brexit means that supporters of reforming the EU into a more economically pragmatic organisation will soon lose an important strategic partner”.

Szydło went on to reassure the British government that “Warsaw will certainly be one of the capitals which will participate in Brexit negotiations in a constructive and down-to-earth manner. In our understanding, the United Kingdom is leaving the EU, but it is not leaving Europe. Regardless of Brexit, our political fates as well as our security and economic interests are intertwined”.

At the summit, the Polish and British government representatives discussed a range of policy issues, including energy and the NATO build-up against Russia. Of particular significance were the discussions about the common labor market and guarantees for some two million Polish workers currently employed in the UK.

Since the Brexit referendum, the issue of Polish workers and the attacks on them by right-wingers encouraged by the fomenting of racism during the Brexit campaign has been exploited by both the Polish and British elites to further their bilateral discussions about economic cooperation. At the summit, the Polish side again stressed the need for a quick settlement of the question, apparently pushing for a solution even before Brexit negotiations had started.

The summit was an obvious political provocation directed toward Berlin and Brussels. Both the British and Polish governments disagree with Germany not only over the conditions for Brexit, but also about foreign policy. They oppose the creation of an EU army, which would inevitably be dominated by Germany and France, and would undermine NATO.

While the German press remained conspicuously silent on the summit, Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, one of the most powerful figures in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition cabinet, reaffirmed the German government’s position on Brexit the very next day at the Foreign Policy Forum held at Berlin’s Körber Foundation. He insisted the main pillars of the EU had to be retained in the Brexit negotiations, arguing: “European unity is not a menu from which you can pick and choose what you want”.

Shortly before the Polish-British summit, May held talks with ultra-right Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orban in London. The discussions prompted Hungarian newspaper Magyar Nemzet to wonder whether a “London-Warsaw-Budapest troika” was now being forged, as all three governments “prefer a European Union based on free trade with decisions taken by the member states”. The return of this kind of language is testimony to the extent of the crisis of European capitalism and the EU. National antagonisms are reemerging in Europe, and the ghosts of the 20th century’s catastrophic world wars are once again haunting the continent.

The possible revival of a Polish-British strategic alliance in particular is fraught with ominous historical resonance. The attempt to undermine the considerable influence of British and French imperialism in Central and Eastern Europe was an important motivating factor in the Nazi attempt to militarily subjugate the region in World War II. When the German military invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, both Paris and London, in accordance with their treaties with Warsaw, declared war on Nazi Germany, marking the beginning of World War II. The various reactions in the Polish press about an emerging partnership with London indicated considerable nervousness. Conservative newspapers generally favorable to PiS government policies voiced concerns that such an alliance could lead to Poland’s isolation in Europe. The right-wing Rzeszpospolita, for example, warned that, while a military alliance with the UK was essentially inevitable, too great an orientation toward Britain could endanger Polish national interests. Another commentator for the same newspaper urged: “I hope we don’t sell the European Union just so the British can live well after Brexit”.

The Dziennik Polski argued that the strategic lining up with Britain could not “even out the bad relations with France and the uncertain future of relations with Germany”. Given that Great Britain would be out of the EU within three years, the newspaper reasoned, the alliance would be short-lived and only make for a “tactic, rather than a strategy”. It warned that an alliance with London would isolate Poland in Europe, commenting that “nobody will agree to easy Brexit terms that might tomorrow run the risk of encouraging Austria, the Netherlands, and France to leave the EU”.

Poland’s most important liberal newspaper, the Gazeta Wyborcza, acknowledged the “strategic interest” of working closely with Britain in the framework of NATO after Brexit, but warned that Poland was “walking a tightrope” when lining up behind Britain’s aim of “upsetting European unity on Brexit and playing member states off against each other”.

Spain’s Podemos aims to derail social anger through “back to the streets” campaign

Alejandro López

Since the installation of a minority government of the right-wing Popular Party (PP) in October, the pseudo-left Podemos and United Left (IU) parties, along with Spain’s trade unions, have launched a “back to the streets” campaign. They are going “back” to the streets after having held no significant protests for years, amidst the draconian austerity policies of previous governments.

The sudden about-face comes in a definite political context. There is deep anger at the Socialist Party (PSOE) for backing the PP government, for whom most of the Spanish people did not vote. The PP plans to impose €8 billion in European Union (EU)-backed cuts in two years, freeze pensions for the fourth consecutive year and slash public sector pay, unemployment benefits and public spending. It will pay €30 billion in interest on Spain’s debt and announced tax increases of €4.65 billion last week.

The PP government is so weak and discredited that it is seeking support from the unions and pseudo-left parties to impose its austerity policy. It fears unrest and explosive opposition among workers and youth, nearly half of whom are unemployed. This is compounded by its fear of growing social opposition to war and austerity internationally, after Donald Trump was elected as US president despite losing the popular vote.

The unions met with Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy and business representatives in late November to plan the austerity measures. After the meeting, the Workers Commissions (CC.OO) and General Labor Union (UGT) claimed that Rajoy had imposed “too many limits to social dialogue.” They then announced joint protests, on December 15 and 18, while insisting that they would keep negotiating with Rajoy, because “negotiations and mobilization” are not incompatible.

Podemos is now offering political cover to the unions’ maneuvers to contain and dissipate workers’ opposition to austerity. This well-worn tactic has been deployed internationally, above all in Greece. There, Podemos’s ally Syriza worked with the unions to call one-day protests before coming to power in 2015 and implementing the harshest austerity package in Greek history. At one point, the Syriza government even supported a strike against its own austerity measures, confident that the unions posed no threat.

Podemos started similar actions soon after the PP took power. Podemos parliamentarians protested Rajoy’s investiture outside parliament. Podemos then intervened in protests held against electricity company Gas Natural, after an 81-year-old woman died when her apartment caught fire. She was using candles to light the flat because she could not pay her electricity bill.

Suddenly, Podemos also began making a few stage-managed interventions in workers’ struggles. Last week, Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias, alongside his number two Iñigo Errejón and IU leader Alberto Garzón, attended a rally for a 24-hour strike of telecom workers. Iglesias said strikers were “the social opposition to the PP” and criticized “unjust” and “inefficient” austerity measures of PP and PSOE governments.

Garzón joined in to declare his support for “workers who are fighting for their labor rights,” as part of IU’s new, “Don’t let them screw your life” campaign.

Days later, Iglesias visited a trade union protest of Coca-Cola workers outside PP headquarters. He declared, “We have to continue not drinking Coca-Cola, because Coca-Cola is attacking workers’ rights,” and repeated that Podemos embodies “social opposition to the PP and large multinationals.”

The actions of the unions have been supported not only by Podemos but also by the PSOE, whose abstention in parliament secured the installation of a PP government. PSOE interim leader Javier Fernández, replacing the ousted general secretary Pedro Sánchez, met with the union leaders and declared that “PSOE will give political and parliamentary support to the social agenda of the unions” and will support their mobilizations.

These forces are all now promoting the unions as they maneuver with the PP. The union federations have demobilized the working class, even as wages fell by 22 percent since the economic crisis of 2008. The number of strikes has fallen to record lows, from 810 strikes and 542,508 strikers in 2008, to 777 strikes and 217,047 strikers in 2014, and 422 strikes and 96,795 strikers this year. At the same time, the unions negotiated austerity measures with PSOE and PP governments, and worked with companies to impose job and pay cuts in the name of competitiveness.

Podemos’s promotion of the unions is a cynical propaganda campaign, aimed at trapping workers behind bankrupt organizations, launched by a party that has declared its contempt for social protest. In July, right after the June 26 general elections, Iglesias declared that social change should occur through state institutions, and the “stupid things we used to say when we were far-left, that things change on the streets and not in the institutions, are lies.”

Months later, in October, Iglesias again stressed that his populist rhetoric did not aim to effect a change in state policy. He said that “populism ends when politics culminate in the [public] administration, when administrative decisions have to be taken from the state, the town hall or the party.” He added, “If we rule we will look for compromises and consensus, and we would openly say that our populism has ended, that it was useful in the fight.”

Podemos’s attempt now to posture as a voice of workers’ opposition and social protest is a conscious political fraud.

Created by a group of Stalinist academics and operatives of the Anticapitalist Left (IA) party in 2014, Podemos has worked primarily through the numerous media outlets offered to them by the bourgeoisie to channel social discontent back behind the political establishment. Just two months ago, Podemos was promoting illusions that it could create a “Government of Change” with the PSOE. Instead, the PSOE supported the PP.

Podemos has put its politics into practice. Over the last year and a half, it backed “governments of change” running in major cities, including Madrid, Barcelona, Cadiz, Zaragoza, Valencia and Santiago de Compostela. These have reduced their debts by at least €2.3 billion and earned the applause of the banks. In the words of Cádiz mayor José María González (a Podemos member), “even the [Ministry of the] Treasury recognizes that the local town councils of change do their homework.”

In Barcelona, former anti-evictions activist and Barcelona’s current mayor, Ada Colau, targeted migrant workers working as street vendors for mass arrests and deportations. Earlier this year, she opposed a strike of 3,200 workers on Barcelona’s public metro system and supported a “minimum service” requirement to keep trains running and crush the strike.

As for the Stalinist-led IU, its pro-austerity positions are a matter of public record. In 2008, IU reacted to the economic crisis by deepening its collaboration with the PSOE, implementing billions of euros in cuts in the Andalusia, Catalonia, Asturias and Extremadura regions. At the same time, it used its positions in the union bureaucracy to prevent strikes from developing into political struggles against PSOE and PP governments.

Syrian government retakes eastern Aleppo

Bill Van Auken

An agreement brokered by the governments of Russia and Turkey to evacuate remaining Islamist militia members and a relatively small number of civilians from the last remaining neighborhood of eastern Aleppo under “rebel” control appeared on Tuesday to have ended four years of fighting in what was previously Syria’s largest city and its commercial capital.

The fall of eastern Aleppo to Syrian government forces, backed by Russian airpower and Shia militias aligned with Iran, marks a turning point in the more than five-year-old war for regime change that was orchestrated by Washington and its regional allies. The enclave within the northern Syrian city represented the last significant population center under “rebel” control.

It also represents a debacle for the US and the other Western powers, along with Saudi Arabia and the other reactionary Sunni oil monarchies, which poured in billions of dollars of arms and funding for the Islamist militias, while funneling in tens of thousands of jihadist fighters from across the Middle East, Europe and beyond to ravage Syria.

This strategic setback for the US imperialist intervention in Syria has exacerbated the bitter internecine conflicts within the US ruling establishment over US foreign policy and particularly Washington’s war drive against Russia in the run-up to Donald Trump’s inauguration as US president next month. Trump had insisted during his presidential campaign that the US should ally itself more closely with Moscow in combating “terrorism” in Syria, a policy strongly opposed by top echelons within the Pentagon and CIA.

The bitter frustration of Washington and its allies was evident Tuesday at an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council in which the US, Britain and France denounced the Syrian government and Russia for alleged atrocities in Aleppo. Unconfirmed reports from the city have cited incidents in which pro-government militias have summarily executed prisoners, including civilians, while the death toll from aerial and artillery bombardment has continued to mount.

Both the Syrian government and Russia have denied the reports of massacres, charging that the Western-backed “rebels” had fired on civilians attempting to flee their zones of control and had attempted to use the population as “human shields.”

When the jihadist militias overran the same areas of eastern Aleppo in 2012 and carried out their own summary executions, it should be recalled, these same Western governments remained silent, while the Western media justified these killings by referring to the victims as supporters of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad.

The US ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, gave the most inflammatory speech to the Council, demanding of Russia whether it was “literally incapable of shame.” She went on to declare that the siege of eastern Aleppo would join “those events in world history that define modern evil, that stain our conscience decades later--Halabja, Rwanda, Srebrenica and now Aleppo.” Predictably, she left out war crimes carried out by US imperialism and its allies in Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Gaza and elsewhere.

Even as Power and her British and French counterparts were railing against Moscow and the Assad government, Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin reported that over the previous hour “military activities in east Aleppo have stopped,” and that the Syrian government had consolidated its control over all of Aleppo. He added that an agreement had been reached to evacuate the remaining “rebels” from the city to the western province of Idlib.

This agreement was confirmed by both the Turkish government and by representatives of the Nour al-Din al-Zenki militia. This Islamist outfit was one of the main so-called “moderate” factions backed by the US, backing that included the provision of TOW anti-tank missiles. It gained international notoriety last July when its members posted a video of themselves beheading a wounded 12-year-old Palestinian boy.

At least half of the so-called rebels in Aleppo were made up of the Al Nusra Front, Al Qaeda’s main affiliate in Syria, and the Ahrar al-Sham, another Al Qaeda-linked militia which has been designated by the United Nations as a terrorist organization. This latter group also confirmed the ceasefire.

The evacuation agreement was reportedly brokered between the Russian military and Turkish intelligence, with Washington apparently playing no role in the resolution of the crisis in Aleppo. The US had repeatedly blown up previous negotiations with Russia on reaching a cease-fire in the city because of its determination to rescue the Al Qaeda-linked forces upon which its efforts toward regime change have rested. The State Department was compelled to acknowledge Tuesday that it had received no advance notice of the Russian-Turkish agreement, underscoring the crisis gripping US policy in the region.

The speed with which the Islamist forces have collapsed appears to have taken Washington and their other Western and regional state patrons by surprise. In part this was due to ferocity of the Syrian government assault on eastern Aleppo, but it is also attributable to divisions among the various factions that make up the “rebels,” which as recently as last month erupted into armed clashes between them over control and influence.

While the Western governments and media routinely accuse the Assad government of “massacring its own people” and blame it for all of the hundreds of thousands who have died since the war for regime change began in 2011, a report issued by the anti-government Syrian Observatory for Human Rights Tuesday presents a different story.

According to its documented count, 312,000 people have died since the war began. Of these, Syrian government troops and pro-regime militias accounted for 110,000 of the dead. The toll also includes 53,000 members of Syrian anti-government militias and over 54,000 foreign jihadis. The number of civilians killed, according to the group’s report, is 90,000. These figures paint a very different picture than the propaganda narrative advanced by Washington and the various supporters of “human rights” imperialism. It is of a country that has been decimated by imperialist intervention.

This rape of Syria is not about to end. “Even if it is the end of the of the siege in Aleppo, it is not the end of the war in Syria. It will go on,” State Department spokesman John Kirby told reporters in Washington.

Similarly, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, the foreign minister of Qatar, a principal backer of the “rebels,” told Al Jazeera: “If Aleppo falls into the government, into the regime’s hands, this will be the end of the war? I don't think so. We believe that the Syrian people and the Syrian opposition are willing to resist, and to continue their efforts. This will not end the war.”

For its part, the Obama administration, barely one month before it leaves office, has ordered another 200 US special operations troops into Syria, joining 300 on the ground there, ostensibly to prepare Kurdish and allied militias to retake Raqqa, the so-called capital of the Islamic State (ISIS) in Syria.

And last week, Obama ordered a waiver of the US Arms Export Control Act with relation to “foreign forces, irregular forces, groups, or individuals engaged in supporting or facilitating ongoing US military operations to counter terrorism in Syria.” The presidential directive sets the stage for a major escalation of the US arms flow into Syria.

While the initial beneficiaries are the so-called Syrian Democratic Forces, the Kurdish-dominated militias that serves as the main proxy force in the US-backed offensive against Raqqa, the same ruling can be used to turn on the CIA spigot once again of US arms to Al Qaeda-linked forces fighting the Syrian government.

The fall of Aleppo raises the prospect of the Syrian government, backed by Russia, turning its own attention to Raqqa, even as Turkey’s intervention into Syria, ostensibly to combat ISIS, but largely in opposition to Washington’s Kurdish proxies, has already severely complicated the US offensive. A Russian-backed Syrian drive against the city would raise the real threat of a clash between the world’s two largest nuclear powers.

Should India be concerned about the China's Belt and Road Initiative?

Anand Kumar

The Belt and Road Initiative, also known as the One Belt, One Road (OBOR) project, launched by the Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2013 is one of the most ambitious projects of recent times. This project, which has both overland and maritime components, intends to link Asia with Europe and Africa. While China claims that this project will further its development goals, India believes that it has a strong political and strategic objective. 

In South Asia, the OBOR has two components. The first one is the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that passes through Pakistan, connecting Kashgar in western China with the Gwadar Port in the Balochistan province. China considers this section as the first chapter of the OBOR. Recently, this section has been made operational with the inauguration of Gwadar port. 

The second part of this initiative in South Asia is the Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar (BCIM) economic corridor that intends to connect Bangladesh and Myanmar with India. The BCIM also has a maritime component, which includes port infrastructure in Sri Lanka, among other places. Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and the Maldives have extended their support to the Belt and Road Initiative. 

This part of the OBOR is only partly functional. Ports in Sri Lanka are operational, but there is no similar progress in the BCIM corridor. To give momentum to this section Chinese President Xi Jinping recently visited Bangladesh, during which China reportedly gave Bangladesh a credit line worth US$24 billion. This is the highest credit line Bangladesh has received from any foreign country. Bangladesh and Chinese firms also signed trade and investment deals worth US$13.6 billion.

China has done well to link the objectives of the OBOR with the developmental plans of the participating countries. It has managed to dovetail the infrastructure deficit in these countries with the objective of OBOR to create infrastructure that can boost trade and connectivity. This also enables the use of the surplus capacities of the Chinese companies. 

The growing economic relationship between China and Bangladesh has caused concern in India. This development, however, may not necessarily be bad for India. A reduction of poverty in Bangladesh through greater Chinese engagement would be in India’s interest. It will have a two pronged impact. First, it will reduce the influx of illegal Bangladeshi migrants into India. This has been a major problem for India and latest Indian government estimates claim that nearly twenty million Bangladeshis are living illegally in India. Second, the growing economic prosperity of the Bangladeshis might reduce the increasing fundamentalism in the country. OBOR’s intended positive impact on Bangladesh would consequently enhance India’s security as well. 

At present, both India and China are important for Bangladesh. It draws important political and diplomatic support from India when it comes under pressure from the West over its democracy and human rights records, and look to China to boost its economic growth. 

However, the same conclusion cannot be drawn about the CPEC. This concern is for two reasons. First, CPEC passes through Gilgit-Baltistan, a disputed region that India continues to claim as part of its territory. Second, India is also concerned because of the hostile nature of the Pakistani state. While China might suggest that Gwadar is a commercial project, in the past Pakistanis have shown their willingness to convert it into a naval base and use it for activities that are inimical to India. 

The OBOR is actually designed to meet the requirements of the growing Chinese economy, the second largest in the world. In the process, it somewhat strategically constrains not only India but many other countries as well. The Chinese economic engagement in Bangladesh does not arouse much concern in India because Bangladesh has an India-friendly government. It requires both India and China to push forward the country’s interests. It is CPEC that is viewed as a much bigger challenge by Indian policymakers. This has not allowed any amicable solution to be reached on the Gilgit-Baltistan area. In fact, to draw maximum benefit from any Chinese economic initiative Pakistan too needs peace and stability in South Asia. This can only happen if economic development and not hostility towards India comes on the agenda of the Pakistani state. 

Belgium: Ghent University Full-fee Doctoral Scholarships for Developing Countries 2017

Application Deadline: 7th March 2017

Eligible Countries: Developing Countries

To be taken at (country): Belgium

About the Award: These grants take the form of a so called “sandwich” scholarship: the candidate obtains a scholarship for maximum 24 months to work within a span of 48 months on an alternating basis on the PhD at Ghent University (‘North’) and at the university or research centre in a developing country (‘South’). Only for the periods the scholarship holder works at Ghent University the scholarship holder will receive a monthly income. The rest of the PhD research is done in the partner university, for which no funding is provided through this scholarship. For this part of the PhD research students must prove that they will be financed at their home university (e.g. fulltime PhD scholarship or salary).

Eligible Fields of Research: No restrictions are imposed on the field of research, nevertheless  preference will be given to topics that are relevant for development. Relevance for development measures the degree in which the action of development corresponds with the expectations of the beneficiaries, the needs of the country, global priorities and the policies of partners and donors.

The proposals must be submitted by a candidate, a promoter at Ghent University and a supervisor at the local institution.

Type: Doctoral

Eligibility:To be admissible for this call, all of the following requirements must be met:

• Candidates need to come from – and have the nationality of – a developing country (see country list in link below);
• There must be a guarantee that the candidate will be able to work on the PhD project at the partner university in a selected developing country (South). This implies that there must be a local PhD supervisor at the partner university or research center.
• A written  statement is requested from the university authorities stating that the candidate is either a fulltime PhD student or a staff member of this university and will be sufficiently exempted from teaching or other assignments as to be able to fully concentrate on the PhD research in the South.
• This statement should also mention that the candidate receives a local PhD scholarship or salary when working on the PhD at the partner university in the South.
• CSC scholarship holders are not eligible to apply for a Doctoral grants for researchers from developing countries. CSC students are referred to the call Cofunding for Chinese candidates PhD candidates holding a CSC scholarship (deadline October 2017).

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Scholarship:

• The value of the scholarship at Ghent University depends on, a.o., the researcher’s family situation and is approximately € 1.958 per month.
• The Ghent University promoter also receives a bench fee of €15.440 to cover (part of) the operational costs, as well as the travelling costs of the student and both the Ghent University and the local promoter.

Duration of Scholarship: 

• The candidate obtains a scholarship for maximum 24 months which must be divided into several periods within a span of 4 years.
• Students are obliged to divide the scholarship into minimum 2 different research stays in Ghent (North) and need to return at least once to their home university (South)  in between (=‘sandwich- schedule’)
• The candidate must propose at least 12 months of locally funded research stay in the South after the first BOF funded stay in Ghent (North).
• Due to all practical arrangements (visa, housing, contract, …) students are advised to stay for long periods in Ghent (e.g. 1 year).
• This scholarship call does not intend to support students who plan only 1 research stay in Ghent.

How to Apply:

The candidate applies to Ghent University jointly with a promoter of Ghent University and a supervisor at the local institution.

The promoter at Ghent University has to fill in a separate document (‘promoter’s advice’) with advice on the candidate, stating the promoter’s opinion on the potential of the candidate as a future researcher.

The Research Council makes a selection of the applications based in part on the recommendations obtained from members of the Council for Development Cooperation. The recommendation is based on:

• the qualifications of the applicant;
• the doctoral project;
• the relevance of the research topic for development;
• the scientific/scholarly potential of the promoter’s research group(s);
• the partnership between Ghent University and the local institute;
• the scientific/scholarly potential of the local institute.

Download the Application Form via the Scholarship Webpage link below

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: The Beacon Equity Trust.

Indian Government (ICCR) Scholarship for 900 African Undergraduate/Postgraduate Students 2017/2018

Application Deadline: 15th January 2017 | 

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Field sof Study: Scholarship is available for courses offered at Universities in India

About Scholarship: At the inaugural plenary of the India – Africa Forum Summit held in New Delhi in April 2008, the Hon’ble Prime Minister of India announced the Government of India’s initiative to enhance the academic opportunities for students of African countries in India by increasing the number of scholarships for them to pursue undergraduate, postgraduate and higher courses.

The ICCR – Indian Council for Cultural Relations – implements this scheme on behalf of the Ministry of External Affairs.

Type: undergraduate, post-graduate and higher courses Scholarships

Eligibility

• Students applying for doctoral/ post doctoral courses should include a synopsis of the proposed area of research.
• Students wishing to study performing arts should, if possible, enclose video/ audio cassettes of their recorded performances.
• Candidates must have adequate knowledge of English.
• ICCR will not entertain applications which are sent to ICCR directly by the students or which are sent by local Embassies/High Commissions in New Delhi.
• Priority will be given to students who have never studied in India before.
• No application will be accepted for admission to courses in MBBS/MD or Dentistry/Nursing.
• Candidates may note that Indian universities/educational institution are autonomous and independent and hence have their own eligibility criteria which have to be fulfilled. Please also note that acceptance of application by the University is also not a guarantee of admission. A scholarship is awarded only when admission is confirmed by ICCR.
• Student must carry a proper visa. Students should ensure that they get the correct visa from the Indian Embassy/High Commission. Government of India guideline stipulate that if a scholar arrives without proper visa and his/her actual admission at the University/Institute does not materialize, he/she will be deported to his/her country.
• Before departing for India the scholars should seek a full briefing from the Indian Diplomatic Mission in their country about living conditions in India/the details of scholarship/the type and duration of the course to which he/she is admitted. Scholars should inform the Indian Embassy/High Commission of their travel schedule well in advance so that ICCR can make reception and other arrangements for them.
• Scholars are advised to bring some money with them to meet incidental expenditures on arrival in India.
• The scholars who are awarded scholarships should bring with them all documents relating to their qualification in original for verification by the respective college/university at the time of admission

Number of Scholarships: 900

Value of Scholarship: (figure is in Indian currency)

• Living allowance (Stipend) (Per Month)
• Undergraduate -5,500 , Postgraduate-6,000 M.Phil / Ph.D 7,000, Post-doctoral Fellow-7,500
• -House Rent Allowance (Per Month)
• In Grade 1 cities-5,000 and In other cities-4,500
• -Contingent Grant (per annum)
• Undergraduate-5,000, Postgraduate-7,000, M/Phil / Ph.D and M.Tech./ME-12,500, Postdoctoral studies-15,500, Tuition Fee/Other Compulsory Fee-As per actual (excluding refundable amount) –Thesis and dissertation Expenses (Once in entire duration of course)
• D Scholar-10,000 and for BBA/BCA/MBA/MCA/M.Tech and other course required submission of Project-7.000
• -Medical Benefits
• Under the scheme scholars are expected to seek treatment only at medical centre or dispensary attached to universities / Institutes where they enrolled or in the nearest Government hospital (Bill are settled as admissible according to AMA/CGHS norms)

Duration of Scholarship: For the period of study

Eligible Countries: Under this Scheme, the Council offers 900 scholarships to the following African countries:
Algeria, Angola, Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Cape Verde, Chad, Cote d’Ivoire, Comoros, Congo (Republic of), Djibouti, Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea (concurrent from Nairobi), Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Kenya, Libya, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Mali, Malawi, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, South Sudan (Republic of), Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sao Tame & Principe, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

To be taken at (country): India

How to Apply

Please read the instruction before filling out the application forms. Please also read the financial terms and conditions. The completed and signed application form which should be typed and not hand written along with other attachments must be e-mailed as a pdf document to the Embassy/ High Commission of India in your country. A hard copy along with 5 photographs should also be delivered to the Embassy/ High commission of India.

Download the application form

Visit Scholarship webpage for details

Provider: Government of India. The ICCR implements this scheme on behalf of the Ministry of External Affairs.