IV512 - September 2017

On 20 September 2017, the Civil Guard and the Spanish National Police arrested 14 senior officials of the Generalitat (the Catalan government) and carried out 40 searches of public buildings and private homes. A police operation then seized propaganda material of the CUP (Candidatura de Unidad Popular, the main party of the pro-independence left) and, without any legal authorisation, surrounded its headquarters for the whole day, for no reason other than provocation. Following the prosecution of more than 700 Catalan mayors who support the referendum on October 1st and after repeated complaints against the Bureau of the Catalan Parliament, these actions represent a qualitative leap in the escalation of repression by the Spanish state institutions against the referendum on self-determination.

While OBOR is an outbound development strategy that is expected to significantly expand China’s political and economic reach overseas, it also potentially has significant domestic implications. On the one hand, as highlighted above, OBOR is in part intended to solve domestic problems such as overcapacity issues, while on the other hand it should result in profits flowing back to China from overseas investments made by Chinese companies. Along with additional trade opportunities and investments made in China, according to some narratives of development, this should also contribute to improving prosperity domestically. Indeed OBOR is also intended to support the development and reform of all provinces and regions within China [1], with different provinces and regions intended to have different functions within the plan and many also passing their own development plans in relation to this.

There will be once again elections for the Bundestag on 24 September. Have we only the possibility of choosing “which assassins will give us orders, what thieves will do over our pockets?” as Ton Steine Scherben sings? If voting was for something, would not it be forbidden? Has that not already happened? On what criteria can a leftist know whether they should “make their small cross”, and if so, where?

In early August the UAW’s union recognition campaign at the Nissan plant in Canton, Mississippi ended in a disastrous 63% “no” vote — 10% greater than the loss at Volkswagen in Chattanooga, Tennessee three and a half years earlier.

On August 17, the Moon Jae-in administration in the Republic of Korea (South Korea) marked its first 100 days in office. One hundred days earlier, President Moon Jae-in came into office with a landslide victory. But he has many problems of political policy, especially towards the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea). North Korea is not impressed by his approach. [2].

The recent outpouring of anger over posters put up and removed from democracy walls at universities in Hong Kong once again highlights the growing erosion of political and academic freedom in the city.

Eric Toussaint is co-founder and spokesperson for the Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debt (CADTM), an international network which includes local committees in more than 30 countries and fights to elaborate radical alternatives to illegitimate debt, whether public or private. Victor Lustres of Global Research interviewed him in August 2017

In May and June, hackers took over thousands of computers around the world, encrypted their contents, and demanded ransom to decrypt them. They used tools developed by the National Security Agency (NSA) to exploit vulnerabilities in the Microsoft Windows operating system.

For the first time since 2011, the Damascus International Trade Fair was organized and held for ten days in mid-August 2017 in a bid to bring back foreign investors and promote an image of normalcy in the country. Many companies from Russia, Iran, China, Iraq, India, South Africa, and Lebanon participated among representatives of more than 40 countries. Despite the small economic impact of the Fair and a mortar attack which resulted in several deaths and confirmed the fragility of the security situation, the regime’s message through the organization of Trade Fair to local, regional and international actors was clear: Asad is here to stay and this is the beginning of the Syria’s reconstruction period.

We are witnessing a new cycle of international feminist mobilizations and this is something that can be seen especially in this last year. The response to the March 8 call, as well as the replications of the Women’s March around the world are something new with respect to recent decades. But also, since the cycle of 2011 we are experiencing a feminization of protest. We saw it in the Arab Spring; we have seen it in mobilizations in defence of the public; in peasant protests in Latin America or in a more particular form in the PAH [Platform for People Affected by Mortgages] in the Spanish State. It’s not by chance.