National News

Fascists attack union leader at London demo

by New Worker correspondent

FASCIST thugs launched a surprise attack on a group of railway workers outside a pub following a racist demonstration in central London last weekend. Although they were mob-handed the attackers got back twice what they gave, despite the advantage of surprise and numbers. But Steve Hedley, the deputy leader of the RMT transport union, suffered a head injury when he was glassed during the fighting.

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Communists meet in Edinburgh

by New Worker correspondent

THE fiRST Saturday in July saw the British ‘Pietro Secchia’ section of the Communist Party (Italy) hosting a meeting in Edinburgh with the New Communist Party (NCP) and the Communist Party of the Peoples of Spain (PCPE), with the three parties making presentations and a useful exchange of views. Both overseas parties and comrades from the Greek Communist Party are developing work with Edinburgh-based migrants from their countries.

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

May’s bill scrapes through parliament

PRIME Minister Theresa May’s Trade Bill, a vital part of her blueprint for Britain leaving the European Union (EU), scraped through the House of Commons on Tuesday evening by just a small margin. The government’s Trade Bill passed its final hurdle in the Commons by 317 votes to 286.

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Scottish Political News

by our Scottish political correspondent

Ministerial Careers

ON Wednesday afternoon first Minister Nicola Sturgeon named Gillian Martin, the first term MSP for Aberdeenshire East, as the new junior minister for further and higher education. By Thursday morning Martin’s ministerial care was finished with when Labour announced it would seek to block her confirmation in Parliament.

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Native Son Returns

Thousands of people took part in various marches across Scotland last weekend. Many were protesting about former US President Barack Obama’s immigration policies — but as they have only just noticed that they are disagreeable they turned out to protest against the current incumbent of that office

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Sledgehammer to Crack a Nut

Nicola Sturgeon will be delighted that Ofcom has ruled that the Russian RT network and Alex Salmond breached broadcasting regulations after it was revealed that four out of six tweets read out on his first TV current affairs came not from the audience but from people in the studio or his friends who had been primed to standby with their smartphones.

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Another Year of Struggle

by New Worker correspondent

COMRADES gathered at the Party Centre last weekend to celebrate the founding of the New Communist Party (NCP), which was established by Sid French in July 1977. Friends and comrades, old and new, joined NCP leader Andy Brooks and Party Chair Alex Kempshall in celebrating the anniversary with speeches. food and drink, and welcomed honoured guests that included three candidate members of the Communist Party of China on a summer course at the London School of Economics (LSE), Korean Friendship Association (KFA) chair Dermot Hudson and Marie Lynam from the British Posadist movement

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Ukrainian fascist regime denounced!

by New Worker correspondent

A PROTEST was held on 12th July in Whitehall, London, opposite the prime minister’s residence in Downing Street, in solidarity with anti-fascists in Ukraine. The protesters called for the British government to end its support for the fascist-infested government in Kiev such as sending military personnel to train members of the Ukrainian army, including those currently engaged in the four-year-long conflict in Donbas

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Korea in Posters!

by New Worker correspondent

KOREAN solidarity activists were given the rare opportunity to see quality Democratic Korean (DPRK) political posters at an exhibition that ran for over two weekends in Croydon. The Korean Friendship Association (KFA) exhibition entitled Reality of Juche Korea Seen Through Posters was held on 30th June and 7th July at the Matthews Yard cultural hub in Croydon, Surrey. The event, a first for the KFA, brought in many visitors and a number of the hand-painted posters were sold to the public

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Professor Stone’s Turkish delight

REVIEW

By New Worker literature correspondent

Turkey: A Short History by Norman Stone (first published 2010). Thames and Hudson: London, pp192. ISBN 10: 0500251754 ISBN 13: 9780500251751 THE OTTOMAN Empire effectively lasted from the capture of Constantinople in 1453 until the establishment of the Turkish Republic in 1923. The same period in English history would have begun during the Wars of the Roses and ended almost with the first Labour Government; in other words, from Henry VI to Arthur Henderson. The book gives a number of reasons why the empire lasted this long.

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

International News

Sad record of migrant refugee children

Radio Havana Cuba

UNICEF, the United Nations Children’s Fund, has just disclosed that the world is holding no less than thirty million children and adolescents that qualify as refugees, most of them without the company of an adult or family member — a regrettable situation the like of which had not been recorded since the Second World War, when the conflict devastated large portions of our planet

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Israeli Labour party quits Socialist International over BDS

by our Arab Affairs correspondenT

THE ISRAELI Labour Party has walked out of the Socialist International following the international social-democratic forum’s decision to support the Boycott, Divest and Sanction Israel campaign. The once mighty party, which dominated Israeli politics for six decades, called the decision hypocritical, and said Labour’s decision to suspend its membership was immediate and would become permanent if the decision is not cancelled. The party leads a parliamentary bloc called the Zionist Union that has 24 seats in the 120-strong Knesset, the Israeli parliament.

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Die Linke’s support of Israel condemned

THE COMMUNIST Party of Greece (KKE) has denounced the visit of the German Die Linke Party to Israel, exposing the support of the ‘European Left Party’ (ELP) to imperialist operations. The European Left includes a number of ‘communist’ parties including the French, Belgian and Austrian parties, and Die Linke goes back to the revisionist faction within the ruling party of the old German Democratic Republic. The KKE statement points out that the Palestine People’s Party had condemned the recent visit of the President of the Parliamentary Group of Die Linke to the Zionist entity. There he visited Zionist settlements and planted trees as “a message of support to the long-lasting occupation of Palestinian lands and of embellishing of the Israeli crimes against the Palestinian people.

[Read the complete story in the print edition]

Features

by the International Secretariat of the Danish Communist Party

THE COMMUNISTS in Denmark have consistently contributed to starting and developing the struggle against the European Union (EU). The resistance against the EU would have been much weaker without the communists; but at the same time broad political alliances have been the precondition to win a number of victories in referendums. The struggle against the EU is intense in many countries. In Denmark, the population is divided on the question of membership and has been so since Denmark became a member in 1972. Today, with monopoly-capital’s insistence on more and more EU-integration on the one hand and the British Brexit on the other, the struggle for and against the EU is fierce. The Danish Communist Party (DKP) wants to share a short history and analysis about the Danish struggle against Denmark’s membership of the EU. And likewise, we are happy to get access to experiences from other countries.

[Read the complete story in the print edition]