Lead story

Syria sends Turkish forces reeling

by our Arab Affairs correspondent

TURKISH FORCES are reeling back after a Syrian counter-attack that’s driven them out of parts of Idlib province they had briefly regained in a Turkish offensive at the beginning of the week.

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Postal struggles

by New Worker correspondent

POSTAL WORKERS are preparing to ballot for nationwide action at the Royal Mail. A meeting at the TUC last week for 500 Communication Workers Union (CWU) representatives saw leading union figures warn of serious battles ahead for the unions’ 110,000 Royal Mail members.

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Farewell to Ken Ruddock

by New Worker correspondent

FRIENDS and comrades gathered on a sad Friday morning at Guildford crematorium to pay their last respects to Ken Ruddock a life-long trade unionist and communist, who passed away at the age of 93 last month. Ken, a militant engineering worker, was a founder member of the New Communist Party. He was national vice-chair during the turbulent times of 1990s when the very existence of the Party was at stake and he remained a leading member of the NCP until ill-health forced him to ease up a few years a go. The Party was represented by Theo Russell from the Central Committee and Richard Bos, who had known Ken for over 40 years.

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Editorial

Learn from China

BORIS JOHNSON has, somewhat belatedly, responded to the coronavirus threat by convening the COBRA emergency committee which drew up a “battle plan” to deal with a potential pandemic in Britain. Most of it is common sense including calling up newly-retired doctors and nurses to help if the outbreak spreads. Other measures being considered include encouraging home working, relaxing pupil-teacher ratios in schools and the possible cancellation of major sporting events.

But the best thing that the Government can do is to study the Chinese experience and try to apply their methods in dealing with the possible spread of the virus throughout the country. The virus first appeared in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province in China, in December. It rapidly spread across other parts of the country. The people’s government responded with lock-downs, quarantines and the mass mobilisation of the medical services including the speedy construction of new hospitals to deal with the crisis. People’s China’s comprehensive, rigorous and thorough-going prevention and control measures have now contained the spread of the epidemic and the positive trend in the prevention and control work is expanding. Over 33,000 people have recovered in Hubei and they now outnumber existing confirmed cases for the first time.

By taking these strong measures the people’s government is doing its very best to ensure the health of the Chinese people and also working together with the World Health Organisation and other countries to safeguard global public health security. This is what communist leadership and a planned economy can do in times of crisis.

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