National News
Assange’s prosecution threatens press freedom
by Caitlin Vogus, Radio Havana Cuba
The American government argues that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange should be prosecuted because he’s a “hacker” not a journalist. So why isn’t it satisfied with punishing him like one? While awaiting extradition, Assange has now served five years in Belmarsh Prison – the statutory maximum sentence under American law for conspiracy to commit computer intrusion.
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FREE ALL UKRAINIAN POLITICAL PRISONERS NOW!
by New Worker correspondent
NCP leader Andy Brooks joined other anti-fascist activists protesting in Central London last week in solidarity with the of victims of savage fascist repression by the Zelensky regime in Ukraine, and with the millions of Ukrainians driven into exile since the imperialist-backed coup that overthrew the legitimate government in February 2014. Tens of thousands of opponents of the regime that seized power in 2014, including local elected officials, teachers, political activists, journalists and ordinary citizens, have faced summary executions, beatings, torture, imprisonment and seizure of property at the hands of the Nazi gangs who are integrated into the Ukrainian state structures, while the Western mass media have turned a blind eye.
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Stop Israeli terror now!
by Theo Russell
Over 80,000 people joined a London-wide protest calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza last Saturday, which ended in a mass rally outside the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, central London
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Scottish Political News
by our Scottish political affairs correspondent
Controversy has long surrounded the SNP Government’s series of Building a New Scotland papers promoting independence, of which 12 have been published so far. The disagreements are not so much about the content, but over the fact that public money has been disbursed on civil servants’ whose time has been spent on producing party political propaganda.
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International News
Winds of Change: Russians in – French out
by Ekaterina Blinova, Sputnik
Russian military special- ists have arrived in Ni- ger to provide combat training and deploy an air defence system in the land-locked country in West Africa. The arrival of Russian military instructors was preceded by a phone conversation between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Abdourahmane Tchiani, the chairman of Niger’s National Council for the Safeguard of the Homeland, on 26th March.
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Xi Jinping buries Zelensky’s bogus peace plan
by Lyuba Lulko , Pravda.ru
Western organisers of a conference in Switzerland in June intend to promote Ukrainian president Vladimir Zelensky’s “peace formula” to end the conflict with Russia. His “peace plan” calls on the Russians to pull back to their 1991 borders and pay reparations to Ukraine. Needless to say no Russian representatives will be going
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Palestine Congress defies German ban
by Jamal Iqrith , Junge Welt
The police storm a legal meeting by the Palestine Congress in Berlin that was holding a tribunal on German military aid to Israel. The conference was then banned. The German government also prevented an eyewitness of Gaza atrocities from entering the country to participate in the tribunal – Dr Ghassan Abu Sitta, a rector of the University of Glasgow. But the organisers succeeded in livestreaming the tribunal “against German complicity in the genocide in Gaza” on 14th April.
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Features
Baltimore bridge collapse: Profits before people
by Betsey Piette , Workers’ World (USA)
Six highway maintenance workers died while fixing potholes on the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore when it collapsed after being hit by a massive container ship on 26th March. All six worked for Brawner Builders.
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China can deal with every challenge
by Peter Walker , Global Times
Among the books predicting that China has reached its peak and is in a period of upcoming decline, the first one I remember was by Gordon Chang. This goes back probably over 20 years, and the book was titled The Coming Collapse of China. He was even quite specific, saying that by 2011, China would have collapsed. Obviously, that turned out to be dead wrong.
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Old Town blues
TV Review by Ben Soton
The BBC’s latest Monday night drama, This Town, is actually set across two towns, or more precisely cities in the 1980s. It covers some of the politics, music and culture of the period featuring the Handsworth riots in Birmingham as well as the IRA bombing campaigns . Also featured are the music based sub-cultures of the period; skins, rude boys and Zulus; whilst the involvement of organised crime gives it an updated Peaky Blinders feel.
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Middle East crisis: China stands for peace
Global Times
US propaganda is increasing its efforts to shift the blame for the escalation in the Middle East onto People’s China. On Monday, CNN published an article with the headline directly asking: “Can China play a role in avoiding an all-out war in the Middle East?
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