UK Ambulance workers set to vote on strike action

Around 3,000 members of Unite in England are being asked if they want to mount a campaign of industrial action

Ben Chapman

SENIOR DIGITAL PRODUCER
PUBLISHED Wednesday 26 October 2022 

Thousands more ambulance workers are set to vote on strikes in an increasingly bitter dispute over pay.

Around 3,000 members of Unite in England are being asked if they want to mount a campaign of industrial action.

Ambulance workers in the GMB, as well NHS workers in other unions, including nurses, are currently being balloted for industrial action in the same dispute.

Unite said its members, including paramedics and emergency call handlers, are angry over a 4% pay rise awarded by the Government in the summer, describing it as falling “well short” of inflation.

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “For more than a decade, NHS workers’ wages have been eroded, even as workloads became increasingly unmanageable. Now with soaring living costs, the situation is critical.

Ambulance workers in the GMB are currently being balloted for industrial action. Dominic Lipinski

“The impact of this current real terms pay cut will result in the flood of overworked and underpaid workers leaving the NHS becoming a tsunami. Rishi Sunak’s Government must put forward a proper pay rise or else the NHS will go from being on its knees to being on life support.”

Workers in the West Midlands, North West, Yorkshire, South Central, South East Coast, North East and East Midlands Ambulance Service Trusts are being balloted for strike action.

Workers in the East of England, London and South Western Ambulance Service Trusts will follow.

More than 2,500 NHS workers in Scotland will vote on strike action soon, and any industrial action could be coordinated across the UK.



BT and Openreach workers stage fresh strike action in long-running dispute over pay

Unite national officer for health, Colenzo Jarrett-Thorpe, said: “New Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and his ministers must get a grip of the staffing crisis in the NHS. They must put forward a better pay deal, one that does some not come out of existing, soon to be horrifically squeezed, budgets.

“As well as ambulance workers, we will be balloting other NHS members in strategic locations for strike action in the coming weeks. NHS workers cannot carry on like this. Waiting lists are lengthening and healthcare staff are leaving in alarming numbers. Unite is determined to win a better deal for its members.”

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “We are giving over one million NHS workers a pay rise of at least £1,400 this year, as recommended by the independent NHS Pay Review Body, on top of 3% last year when pay was frozen in the wider public sector.

“Industrial action is a matter for unions, and we urge them to carefully consider the potential impacts on patients.”

Brazil's Lula widens lead slightly over Bolsonaro for Sunday vote -poll

Leftist presidential candidate Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has increased his lead slightly over his far-right adversary President Jair Bolsonaro six days ahead of their runoff in Brazil's divisive election, a Monday poll said.

Anthony Boadle Reuters
Flavia Marreiro Reuters
OCT 24, 2022

 

CREDIT: REUTERS/RICARDO MORAES

BRASILIA, Oct 24 (Reuters) - Leftist presidential candidate Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has increased his lead slightly over his far-right adversary President Jair Bolsonaro six days ahead of their runoff in Brazil's divisive election, a Monday poll said.

Lula leads by 52.0% of the votes against 46.2% for Bolsonaro, according to the AtlasIntel poll, inching forward from 51.1% to Bolsonaro's 46.5% in the previous poll two weeks ago.

The poll was completed before a shooting incident on Sunday involving Bolsonaro supporter and former Congressman Roberto Jefferson, which had the president's campaign worried about a negative impact on opinion polls, a senior aide said.

The changes for both candidates were less than the margin of error of one percentage point, but with the election to be decided on Sunday even a stable race at this point favors frontrunner Lula.

"The poll is good news for Lula," said AtlasIntel chief executive Andrei Roman.

Although the survey did not reflect the impact of Sunday's incident where the Bolsonaro supporter shot and wounded policemen as he resisted arrest, Roman said the president's recovery since the first-round vote on Oct. 2 has stalled.

Bolsonaro had begun to reduce Lula's lead to 3 or 4 percentage points thanks to a wave of new social spending in the final months of the election campaign with benefits calculated by Reuters to cost 273 billion reais ($52 billion) to the Treasury this year and next.

Pollster Romani, whose firm does daily tracking for clients, said Bolsonaro's upward trend was interrupted by a previous incident where the president suggested that Venezuelan immigrant teenagers were prostitutes, and had to later apologize.

The botched arrest of Jefferson on order from the Supreme Court for insulting one of its justices highlighted rising political violence in the election.

On Sunday, when federal police officers went to Jefferson's house, he opened fire on their car and threw stun grenades. Two officers were injured.

(Reporting by Anthony Boadle and Flavia Marreiro; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Alistair Bell)

Brazil’s Lula hopes Bolsonaro will accept defeat in presidential election if he loses

Former president and front-runner hopes Bolsonaro has ‘1 minute of common sense’ if he loses vote

Bala Chambers |25.10.2022


BUENOS AIRES

Brazil’s presidential front-runner Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said Monday that he hopes far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro can accept defeat if he loses in the election.

The two contenders will face off in a second-round runoff vote on Oct. 30 amid a highly charged political environment.

"I hope that if I win the election, he has one minute of common sense, (that) he phones me, accepting the results of the election," Lula told journalists in the country’s financial capital, Sao Paulo.
"This is how people have acted in Brazil since I was a candidate for the first time in 1989,″ he added.

Lula, who served as president from 2003 to 2010, also hit out at the former army captain’s behavior.

“And if Bolsonaro loses and gets angry, he wants to cry...I lost three elections. Every election I lost, I went home,” he said.

The former union leader went on to say that Bolsonaro needs "discord" and "friction" to operate at a time when Brazilians need peace.

In recent weeks, the polarization has increased between the candidates, with both having political ads banned.

In the first-round vote, many polls had predicted a clear first-round win for Lula, who garnered 48% of the vote to Bolsonaro’s 43%.

But with neither candidate securing more than 50% of the vote, a second round automatically kicked in, underscoring how tight the race remained.

For over a year, Bolsonaro has raised doubts over whether he will respect the results of the polls and has cast doubt over Brazil's electronic voting system without providing evidence, with rights groups suggesting he may contest the vote.

Last week, electoral authorities also clamped down on the spread of disinformation ahead of the second-round vote, passing a resolution to combat "disinformation that threatens the integrity of the electoral process."

Ahead of the runoff, AtlasIntel published a poll Monday placing Lula ahead with 52% to Bolsonaro’s 46.2%. According to the polling company, the data was captured between Oct. 18-22 from 4,500 respondents, with the survey containing a plus or minus 1% margin of error

Explainer: What Brazil's election means for the Amazon rainforest

JAKE SPRING

October 26, 2022,
 

An aerial view shows a deforested plot of the Amazon rainforest in Manaus

SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazil's presidential election on Sunday may determine the fate of the Amazon jungle, the world's largest rainforest, after deforestation soared in the past four years under President Jair Bolsonaro.

He faces off against former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who has pledged to stop all Amazon destruction and act aggressively on climate change.

Protecting the Amazon is vital to stopping catastrophic climate change because of the vast amount of climate-warming greenhouse gas it absorbs.

What happens on Sunday?

Brazilians will choose between the top two presidential candidates from the Oct. 2 first-round vote: leftist Lula and right-wing Bolsonaro.

Lula bested Bolsonaro in the first round but fell short of the 50% needed to win outright. Bolsonaro performed far better than most surveys had indicated.

The latest opinion polls show Lula ahead, on 52.0% to Bolsonaro's 46.2%.

Why has deforestation soared under Bolsonaro?

Bolsonaro, who took office at the start of 2019, has pushed for more mining and commercial farming in the Amazon, saying it would develop the region economically and help to fight poverty.

He has weakened environmental enforcement agencies, cutting their budgets and staff while making it more difficult to punish environmental criminals.

His public criticism of conservation efforts has also emboldened illegal loggers, ranchers and land grabbers to clear the forest with less fear the government will punish them, scientists and environmentalists say.

How much has deforestation risen?

Destruction in the Amazon rainforest last year hit the highest level since 2006, according to the government's space research agency INPE.

An area of forest larger than the U.S. state of Maryland was destroyed during the first three years of Bolsonaro's presidency.

Preliminary government data indicates that deforestation rose a further 23% in the first nine months of 2022.

What is Lula's track record on deforestation?

Lula took office in 2003 with levels of Amazon deforestation near all-time highs. His administration strengthened federal environmental enforcer Ibama and created the parks service agency ICMBio.

By 2010, his last year in office, deforestation had fallen by 72% to near record lows.

But Lula also backed the massive Belo Monte hydroelectric dam in the Amazon, which destroyed river habitats and displaced indigenous people. Deforestation began to creep up again under his hand-picked successor, ex-President Dilma Rousseff, who weakened some policies to favor development.

What is Bolsonaro promising on the environment?

Bolsonaro has said little about his environmental proposals should he win a second term. A representative for his Liberal Party told Reuters that the campaign did not have a spokesperson or any way to answer media questions on the subject.

Bolsonaro's policy platform emphasizes that Brazilians have the right to develop natural resources in the Amazon. The campaign documents tout efforts by the military, police and other agencies to combat deforestation and forest fires. However, data shows that under Bolsonaro they have failed to reduce the destruction.

What is Lula promising on the environment?

Lula has vowed to bring deforestation to zero by rebuilding the government's environmental agencies. His campaign has likened his sweeping proposals to a post-war reconstruction after the rising environmental destruction under the current government.

He has committed broadly to the principles of "climate justice," saying that the environment can only be protected by increasing economic opportunities to reduce hunger and poverty.

But with Brazil's government facing a budget crunch, it remains unclear how he will pay for his policies.

What are indigenous groups saying?

Indigenous groups have broadly endorsed Lula, who promises to empower them to protect their lands from environmental destruction.

Illegal miners, loggers and landgrabbers have increasingly invaded indigenous land and killed tribe members under Bolsonaro, who has halted the process of demarcating tribal lands.

(Reporting by Jake Spring; Additional reporting by Lisandra Paraguassu; Editing by Brad Haynes and Rosalba O'Brien)

'No country is safe': Major climate study warns extreme heat death has surged 72% in Canada

A landmark study from The Lancet warns the world is at a 'critical juncture' as it reels under a deadly confluence of heat, flooding, drought, disease, war and a cost-of-living crisis.

Stefan Labbé

 Level of urban greenness in urban centres with more than 500,000 inhabitants in 2021. The normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) is a population-weighted metric measuring urban greenness.2022 Lancet Countdown on health and climate change

A major report tracking how climate change is affecting human health has found humanity’s failure to wean the planet off fossil fuels is putting the health of “all people alive” at risk.

The peer-reviewed Lancet Countdown on health and climate change involved dozens of authors tracing climate’s footprint across 86 countries. They warned the world is facing a confluence of shocks — from the COVID-19 pandemic to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, to a global-energy-and cost-of-living crisis — which, together with unabated climate change, is affecting “the foundations of human health.”

“The data shows that no country is safe,” said the report.

Over the last year, it pointed to devastating floods across every populated continent on Earth, which cumulatively killed thousands and displaced hundreds of thousands more.

Between the periods 2000-2004 and 2017-2021, heat-related deaths across the planet climbed 68 per cent; in Canada, the death from extreme heat surged by 72 per cent.

The damaging effects of heat can be especially dangerous for young children and seniors: Canadian children under one lived through an average of 440,000 additional person-days of heat waves annually from 2012-2021, compared to 1986-2005, found the study.

Adults over 65 years, meanwhile, experienced 9.3 million more person-days of heat waves per year over that same period.

By 2021, Canadians lost nearly 43 million potential labour hours in a single year due to heat exposure.

Globally, the risk from fire is also growing: Exposure to very-high or extremely-high wildfire danger has increased 61 per cent over a similar period, the report found.

The numbers all point to one conclusion, says the study: “Persistent fossil fuel over-dependence is rapidly worsening climate change, leading to dangerous health impacts being felt by people around the world.”
Climate can't be separated from disease, war and cost-of-living crisis

The science is getting better. Rapid attribution science has quickly advanced in recent years to allow researchers to understand how much climate change is having on extreme weather. That’s allowed scientists to calculate the impact human influence has had on a number of flooding and extreme heat events over the past two years, including a record heat wave and floods that hit British Columbia in 2021.

But no matter how much we understand its footprint, climate shouldn’t be seen in isolation, warn the authors. While extreme weather events make people with underlying conditions more vulnerable, they are also compounded by the rising spread of infectious disease.

Since the 1950s, the length of time suitable for malaria transmission rose by 32.1 per cent in the highland areas of the Americas and 14.9 per cent in Africa. Over the same period, climate change increased the risk of dengue transmission by 12 per cent, according to the report.

“Combined with the COVID-19 pandemic, the rise of infectious disease due to climate change has led to misdiagnosis, pressure on health systems, and difficulties in managing simultaneous disease outbreaks,” the report stated.

Outbreaks of disease have also affected local action on climate change: the COVID-19 pandemic reduced available financing in a third of the nearly 800 cities surveyed.

Outside of cities, climate change is hammering the productivity of global agriculture, adding pressure to supply chain disruptions leftover from the pandemic and the rising cost-of-living crisis.

Take the cost of food — in Canada, the growing season for corn has declined by 18.2 per cent compared to a 1981-2010 baseline. Over that same period, Canada’s soybean season has been cut short by 13.8 per cent, while the amount of time farmers can grow spring wheat has declined 11.8 per cent.
$400 billion in fossil fuel subsidies

Despite the cascading effects of a changing climate, 80 per cent of the countries studied were found to have provided a net subsidy to fossil fuel industries, totalling US$400 billion in 2019.

Canada bucked that trend. That year, its price on carbon exceeded the value of its fossil fuel subsidies. That resulted in $1.8 billion in revenue or one per cent of the country’s spending on health care, the report notes.

Almost 50 per cent of domestic energy, however, still comes from fossil fuels. Had Canada done better in 2020, it could have helped prevent the deaths of 1,100 Canadians who died prematurely due to particulate matter from fossil fuel combustion.

Experts say one of the best ways to reduce the urban heat island effect, improve air quality and benefit people’s overall physical and mental health is to redesign urban landscapes to include more green spaces.

But only 277 of 1,038 global urban centres were found to be at least moderately green in 2021. The study categorized two of eight major Canadian urban centres as moderately green or above — neither was in Western Canada.

Meanwhile, the global share of households with air conditioning climbed 66 per cent from 2000 to 2020, what the report calls “a maladaptive response that worsens the energy crisis and further increases urban heat, air pollution, and greenhouse gas emissions.”

‘Code red’ is here: Scientists say Earth’s vital signs show ‘humanity unequivocally facing ‘climate emergency’

Bushfires below Stacks Bluff, Tasmania, Australia. (Photo by Matt Palmer on Unsplash)

EARTH NEWS, ENVIRONMENT

by Study Finds

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Earth’s vital signs have reached such a dire state that humanity is unequivocally facing a “climate emergency,” a team of scientists warn.

The special report states that 16 of 35 planetary vital signs which track climate change are at record extremes, and that Earth has entered a “code red” level. New data shows more frequent and extreme heat waves, increasing loss of global tree cover due to fires, and a greater prevalence of the mosquito-borne dengue virus.

The international team, including researchers from Oregon State University, says that atmospheric carbon dioxide levels have reached 418 parts per million, the highest on record.

“Look at all of these fires, floods and massive storms,” says lead author Professor William Ripple in a university release. “The specter of climate change is at the door and pounding hard.”

Prof. Ripple and the team published their report, titled “World Scientists’ Warning of a Climate Emergency 2022,” in the journal BioScience. The authors start the paper off right away by writing: “We are now at ‘code red’ on planet Earth. Humanity is unequivocally facing a climate emergency. The scale of untold human suffering, already immense, is rapidly growing with the escalating number of climate-related disasters. Therefore, we urge scientists, citizens, and world leaders to read this Special Report and quickly take the necessary actions to avoid the worst effects of climate change.

‘Climate change is not a standalone issue’

The report follows up on a previous study from five years ago, which was signed by more than 15,000 scientists in 184 countries.

“As we can see by the annual surges in climate disasters, we are now in the midst of a major climate crisis, with far worse to come if we keep doing things the way we’ve been doing them,” adds postdoctoral researcher Christopher Wolf. “We implore our fellow scientists to join us in advocating for research-based approaches to climate and environmental decision-making.

“Climate change is not a standalone issue,” says Saleemul Huq of Independent University Bangladesh. “It is part of a larger systemic problem of ecological overshoot where human demand is exceeding the regenerative capacity of the biosphere. To avoid more untold human suffering, we need to protect nature, eliminate most fossil fuel emissions and support socially just climate adaptations with a focus on low-income areas that are most vulnerable.”

Their report points out that in the three decades since more than 1,700 scientists signed the original World Scientists’ Warning to Humanity in 1992, global greenhouse gas emissions have increased by 40 percent.

“As Earth’s temperatures are creeping up, the frequency or magnitude of some types of climate disasters may actually be leaping up,” the University of Sydney’s Thomas Newsome concludes. “We urge our fellow scientists around the world to speak out on climate change.”

South West News Service writer Danny Halpin contributed to this report.

 

'Human chain' protest in solidarity with Iran will link 30,000 people across the Lions Gate Bridge

It's expected to be the biggest human chain ever in B.C.

This Saturday, Oct. 29 over 140 major cities around the world will participate in a Global Day of Action, including Vancouver.

The Association of Families of Flight PS752 Victims has organized a human chain that is expected to be the largest in B.C.'s history with an estimated 30,000 people congregating on the Lions Gate Bridge.

The human chain is taking place in solidarity with protesters in Iran who have been fighting for the rights of women. The protests in Iran garnered international attention when Mahsa Amini died in police custody after being arrested, allegedly because her headscarf was too loose.

Since then, Vancouver's Persian community has held human chains and rallies that involved women removing their hijabs and cutting their hair.

This weekend's human chain is set to span from the North Shore to the Stanley Park Causeway along the pedestrian sidewalk on either side of the bridge. The event will begin at noon and will conclude later in the afternoon.

Organizers invite citizens, advocacy groups, multicultural communities, policy-makers, and Canadian elected officials to link arms in support of the people working to formally denounce the current regime that Iranian citizens are saying is committing violence and human rights violations against their own people.

"It is imperative that we send a clear message to the Iranian Regime that Canada is aware of the plight of ordinary Iranians—and that Canadians support their brave efforts to be free," says the event media release.

The Association of Families of Flight PS752 Victims is a registered non-profit named for a flight that was shot down by missiles on January 8, 2020 after taking off from Tehran’s IKA airport. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) admitted to bringing down the plane but the organization says that the reason why has not been revealed. Reportedly 176 passengers and crew were onboard including 55 Canadian citizens and permanent residents.

Global Human Chain Event

When: Saturday, October 29, noon - 2 p.m.
Where: Lions Gate Bridge

With files from Maria Diment

As protests rock Iran, its most feared security force is lying in wait

By Miriam Berger

October 26, 2022 

WASHINGTON POST

In a photo shared on Twitter, an unveiled woman stands on top of a vehicle as thousands make their way toward Aichi cemetery in Saqez, Mahsa Amini's hometown in Iran, on Wednesday. (AFP/Getty Images)

Thousands of people poured into the streets of Mahsa Amini’s hometown Wednesday and marched to her grave. Iranian security forces responded — as they have throughout the course of the nationwide protests inspired by her death — with violence and arrests.

The gathering in Saqez, in Iran’s western Kurdistan region, marked the 40th day since Amini’s death in the custody of Iran’s “morality police,” a traditional moment of remembrance in Islam. As the night wore on, demonstrators came out in other cities, as they have every day since mid-September.

But with Iran’s uprising now in its sixth week, the country’s powerful security state and the protesters calling for its downfall have reached an uncertain stalemate.

Despite escalating violence by security forces and a rising death toll among protesters, the clerics who lead Iran have yet to fully unleash the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a parallel military force created to defend the state at any cost. So far, only the IRGC’s volunteer militia, the Basij, has been deployed in significant numbers to quell the demonstrations, alongside regular law enforcement, riot police and plainclothes officers.

“We are in a situation where the protesters are incapable of overthrowing the regime and the regime is incapable of forcing people to go home,” said Ali Alfoneh, a senior fellow at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington.

But the longer the protests persist and the larger they become, analysts said, the more pressure will grow on the Revolutionary Guard to lead the crackdown.

Evin on fire: What really happened inside Iran’s most notorious prison

There is no sign that the IRGC’s loyalty to the government is wavering, as it derives its strength from the survival of the Islamic republic. For this ideologically driven and economically powerful fighting force, the unrest is an existential threat.

Despite decades of Western sanctions on the group — including new ones in recent weeks — its coffers and muscle have continued to grow. But each cycle of violence further erodes the legitimacy of the IRGC in the eyes of the Iranian public.

“Sure, they can show up with tanks tomorrow and kill enough people to put down protests for a while,” said Afshon Ostovar, an associate professor of national security affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School. “But they have lost this generation … With every violent act they are putting one more nail in their coffin.”

At the center of Iran’s uprising, Kurds now face a mounting crackdown

The IRGC was founded as a counterweight to Iran’s other security forces — a way to prevent a revolution like the one that first brought the Islamic republic to power in 1979.

The Revolutionary Guard are “so synonymous with the regime they can’t be divorced from it,” Ostovar said. “They are both the front end of the spear as well as the figure holding that spear.”

Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps personnel stand guard in downtown Tehran during a rally in April. (Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto/Getty Images)

After the overthrow of Mohammad Reza Shaw in 1979, the Shiite revolutionaries who won out purged the existing military, called the Artesh, and the shah’s fearsome intelligence agency. In their place, they created their own security state undergirded by the IRGC.

Then-Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini constitutionally tasked the Revolutionary Guard with protecting the Islamic Republic and its ideals inside and outside the country. The IRGC, in turn, created the Basij, a volunteer force modeled on Scouting organizations. The goal was to indoctrinate young people and infiltrate communities, said Alfoneh, turning civilians into agents of the state.

The IRGC’s profile rose during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, as the guard took charge of training young soldiers to send to the front. As a reward for its service — and to prevent massive unemployment among decommissioned fighters — the guard was given control of Khatam al-Anbiya, the first of Iran’s many military-run economic enterprises.

The engineering firm was tasked with rebuilding the war-battered country, said Roya Azadi, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Rhode Island. But the Revolutionary Guard profited mightily, diverting large amounts of money to its own banks and institutions.

“By giving it a role in the economy, they give it enough incentives to stay with the government if the army were to stage a coup or if there was a mass uprising as you see right now,” said Azadi.

Khatam al-Anbiya is now among Iran’s largest contractors, working in mining, gas, oil, petrochemicals and other industrial projects, Azadi said. The IRGC directly controls at least 275 firms, 54 of which are owned by the Basij, she said.

Over the years, Washington and its Western allies have imposed round after round of sanctions on the IRGC and Iran’s banking and financial institutions, efforts ramped up by President Donald Trump as part of his “maximum pressure” campaign.

But rather than punish and constrain the IRGC, critics say, sanctions have enabled the guard to dominate Iran’s isolated economy and its thriving black market, including the oil smuggling trade.

“The Revolutionary Guard has been sanctioned and stigmatized now for more than two decades, but in this period it has become more powerful, more enriched, more repressive at home and more aggressive in the region,” said Ali Vaez, director of the Brussels-based International Crisis Group’s Iran Project. “In the process, the middle class has been devastated and impoverished,” he added.

They dream of reaching America. Their forced service in Iran’s Revolutionary Guard locks them out.

The hollowing out of the middle class, as well as Iran’s growing isolation and entrenched corruption, have added to the fury of the protests now sweeping the country, which Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has blamed on “thugs” and foreign instigators.

More than 200 protesters have been killed and thousands more injured and arrested in the government crackdown, though reporting restrictions and communication cuts make the true toll impossible to verify. More than 30 members of the security forces have died in the unrest, including 18 members of the Basij and six members of the full-time Revolutionary Guard, according to Alfoneh, who cited media reports on funerals.

In cities, towns and universities across the country, protesters have been squaring off with volunteers from the Basij, often lower-class Iranians who see membership and its financial benefits as a ticket to social advancement, Alfoneh said.

IRGC offices and headquarters have also been a target of protesters, in particular in minority areas such as Kurdistan and Sistan and Baluchestan province, where the guards are often brought out as a first resort and have taken part in military-style occupations of some cities.

This uprising “is definitely the longest social movement” in recent times, Azadi said, but the Basij, along with regular law enforcement, have largely been able to contain the protests because demonstrators have avoided congregating in large numbers in a single location. By contrast, millions of people took to the streets in 2009 to support the Green Movement, sparking a more rapid deployment of the full-time IRGC troops.

So far this time, Iran’s leaders appear to be using “brute force deliberately” — including the use of live ammunition and the targeting of children — to coerce protesters back home, Ostovar said. “They have no problem doing it on a small scale,” he said. “The political risks of doing that [on a larger scale] are more severe and could be unpredictable.”
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By Miriam BergerMiriam Berger is a staff writer reporting on foreign news for The Washington Post from Washington, D.C. Before joining The Post in 2019 she was based in Jerusalem and Cairo and freelance reported around the Middle East, as well as parts of Africa and Central Asia. Twitter

UPDATED

‘This is a revolution’: On potent 40th day after Mahsa Amini’s death, protests erupt across Iran

Security forces open fire as Iranians protest in huge numbers on symbolic 40th day since death of 22-year-old

Borzou Daragahi
International Correspondent

Thousands flock to hometown of Mahsa Amini to commemorate 40 days since her death

Tens of thousands of Iranians across the country defied phalanxes of security forces to march and protest against the clerical regime on Wednesday, the religiously potent and politically symbolic 40th day since the death of Mahsa Amini while in the custody of the morality police.

In the central Iranian city of Shiraz, at least 15 people were killed in unclear circumstances after gunmen attacked a shrine, according to state media. Two alleged “terrorists” were arrested and another was being pursued, according to other reports.

The weeks-long movement born of Amini’s death is rooted in opposition to Islamic social rules and led by mostly secular Iranians, and among observers and activists, there were doubts as to whether they would take to the 40th day mourning tradition rooted in faith

But opponents to the regime embraced the day enthusiastically.

Mostly Iranian Kurds living in or near Amini’s western Iranian hometown of Saqez in western Iran could be seen walking for miles along highways and across fields to get to her burial spot after regime forces shut down or restricted vehicular traffic and menaced residents with gunfire since Tuesday night.

Video showed a massive crowd gathered in front of the governor’s office in Saqez.

“Don’t be afraid, don’t be afraid, we are all together,” they chanted.

Protests broke out on university campuses across the country, including in Tehran, the capital, Mashhad, Tabriz, Hamadan, and at high schools among teenagers walking home from classes.

A woman standing on top of a vehicle as thousands make their way towards Aichi cemetery in Saqez, Mahsa Amini’s hometown in the western Iranian province of Kurdistan, to mark 40 days since her death
(UGC/AFP via Getty Images)

“Basijis get lost! Basijis get lost!” women at al-Zahra University could be seen chanting, referring to the Basij paramilitaries terrorising Iranian protesters, as they confronted officials trying to bar their movement.

Doctors and dentists, marking Amini’s passing and as well as voicing anger over a detained fellow medical professional, poured into streets of Tehran, before they were chased away by regime enforcers firing teargas or shotgun rounds, according to video posted online. A shopping mall on central Tehran’s Vali Asr Square was flooded with young protesters, as was the traditional Grand Bazaar that was once the seat of commercial power.

“Freedom, freedom, freedom!” they chanted, according to a video posted online.

Even in the computer bazaar of Tehran, filled with Iranian yuppies who listen to western music and download the latest apps, tech workers in black beat their chests in a mourning ritual.

“We will kill, we will kill, he who killed our sister,” they chanted.

People march down the highway toward the Aychi Cemetery
(VIDEO OBTAINED BY REUTERS)

The country was also hit by labour actions. Workers at a refinery in Tehran went on strike, as did shopkeepers in commercial districts in many cities, including Tehran, Shiraz and Arak. Workers at the Tabriz stock exchange also staged a work stoppage, ostensibly to protest the state of capital markets.

In the Islamic and Eastern Orthodox Christian faiths, the 40th day after a death marks the deceased’s soul passing from the earth to the afterlife. It is often marked by friends and relatives returning to the gravesite to pay their respects.

In the run-up to the 1979 revolution that led to the establishment of Tehran’s clerical regime, 40th day commemorations of dead protesters were marked by political demonstrations met by gunfire and deaths, and further protests 40 days later, in cycles that built up momentum that led to the downfall of the country’s monarchy.

Analysts predict more unrest in the coming days as protesters also mark the 40th days of Nika Shakarami and Sarina Esmailzadeh, two juvenile protesters allegedly killed by regime enforcers.

“The 40th commemoration is tradition more than religion,” said Iranian activist Sharare Mahboudi, who left Iran three years ago after coming under the scrutiny of the security forces. “From now on, Iranians will look for any excuse to protest, even if that protest is religious. And if they beat their chests in mourning and wear black, maybe the security forces will go a little easier on them.”

State broadcast media mostly ignored Wednesday’s protests even as dramatic footage of mass unrest flooded the internet and opposition satellite television channels. The front page of the website of Iran’s English-language Press TV featured stories about protests over the cost of living in France and Spain, but not a word about the unrest at home.

Iranian police arrive to disperse a protest in Tehran
(AP)

The regime has responded to the protests with calibrated violence. At least 252 protesters, including 36 juveniles, have been killed in the violence, and at least 13,533 arrested, according to Hrana, a human rights monitoring group.

The regime blames outside agitators for provoking the unrest, and has vowed to take legal action against UK-based “hostile media" for supporting terrorism. In particular, it has blamed the popular Saudi-backed Iran International television network as well as BBC Persian, as well as Manoto TV, all based in London.

“The UK and the whole empire of lies based in London are sowing chaos and staging psychological warfare” to keep the protests going, said an editorial in the Javan newspaper, which is linked to the Revolutionary Guard.

As dusk settled, trash bins in central Tehran began burning, and streets of some quarters began turning into rock battles between security forces and citizens.


People walk across a pedestrian crossing in Vali Asr square in the centre of Tehran
(AFP via Getty Images)

“This is a revolution,” said Ms Mahboudi, who is regularly in touch with protesters in Iran, including teens who defy their parents’ wishes and take to the streets daily. “Maybe it will take one or two years. Probably a lot of people will die. The regime will kill anybody. They are merciless. And they have nowhere else on the planet to go.”

Iran Protesters Rally to Mark 40 Days Since Amini’s Death

Wednesday, 26 October, 2022 - 

A member of the Iranian community living in Türkiye attends a protest in support of Iranian women and against the death of Mahsa Amini, near the Iranian consulate in Istanbul, Türkiye, October 24, 2022. (Reuters)

Asharq Al-Awsat

Hundreds of protesters poured into the streets of a northwestern Iranian city on Wednesday to mark the watershed 40 days since the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, whose tragedy sparked Iran's biggest anti-government movement in over a decade.

In Amini's Kurdish hometown of Saqez, the birthplace of the nationwide unrest now roiling Iran, crowds snaked through the local cemetery and thronged her grave.

"Death to the dictator!" protesters cried.

State-run media announced that schools and universities in Iran's northwestern region would close, purportedly to curb "the spread of influenza."

In downtown Tehran, shops were shuttered and riot police were out in force. A group of schoolgirls marched through the streets, shouting against the government as cars stuck in traffic honked their support, witnesses said. Anti-government chants also echoed from the University of Tehran campus.

Amini, detained for allegedly violating the country’s strict dress code for women, remains the potent symbol of protests that have posed one of the most serious challenges to the regime.

With the slogan #WomanLifeFreedom, the demonstrations first focused on women's rights and the state-mandated hijab, or headscarf for women. But they quickly evolved into calls to oust the clerics that have ruled Iran since the 1979 revolution.

The protests have also galvanized university students, labor unions, prisoners and ethnic minorities like the Kurds along Iran's border with Iraq.

Since the protests erupted, security forces have fired live ammunition and tear gas to disperse demonstrations, killing over 200 people, according to rights groups.

Untold numbers have been arrested, with estimates in the thousands. Iranian judicial officials announced this week they would bring over 600 people to trial over their role in the protests, including 315 in Tehran, 201 in the neighboring Alborz province and 105 in the southwestern province of Khuzestan.

Tehran prosecutor Ali Salehi told the state-run IRNA news agency that four protesters were charged with "war against God," which is punishable by death in Iran.

Iranian officials have blamed the protests on foreign interference, without offering evidence.

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Tensions in Iraqi Kurdistan are high, following several missile and drone attacks in the region from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.

They were the worst attacks on their closest neighbours for a decade, and were tied to the ongoing protests inside Iran.

The BBC's Nafiseh Kohnavard has been to the highly sensitive border area, and sends this report.

Video by Daisy Walsh, Gabriel Chaim and Lina Issa

BBC

Mahsa Amini: Protesters take to Iran’s streets 40 days after her death

Oct 26, 2022

Channel 4 News

Across Iran hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets to mark the 40th day of mourning for Mahsa Amini, the young woman who died in police custody after being arrested for not covering her hair completely. In some places those protests have been met with force. The largest gathering was some 600 kilometres from Tehran, in Mahsa Amini's hometown of Saqez in the Kurdish region of Iran.

Iran: hundreds flock to Mahsa Amini's grave 40 days since her death

Oct 26, 2022

Guardian News

Iranian security forces clashed with protesters who gathered in Mahsa Amini's hometown, the northern Iranian city of Saqqez, as mourners marked 40 days since her death. Amini, 22, died on 16 September, three days after her arrest by the morality police while visiting Tehran with her younger brother. 

  

Iranian forces reportedly open fire on protesters 

mourning Mahsa Amini 40 days after her death

Al Jazeera English

It has been 40 days since the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini. The 22-year-old was arrested in Tehran by Iran’s so-called “morality police” for allegedly not wearing a hijab. She later died in police custody. Her death sparked protests in Iran and around the world. Tehran has imposed internet restrictions and arrested many for taking part in the demonstrations. Al Jazeera's @Dorsa Jabbari reports from Tehran, Iran.

Iranians mark 40 days of protest since death of Mahsa Amini | AFP

Oct 26, 2022

AFP News Agency

Amateur images show Iranian protesters marking 40 days since the death of Mahsa Amini, by blocking traffic in a street in the capital Tehran and gathering at her burial place in Amini's hometown of Saqqez. Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish origin, died on September 16, three days after her arrest by the morality police for allegedly violating the dress code.

Police open fire on protesters in the hometown of Mahsa Amini where thousands gathered 40 days after the 22-year old died at the hands of the morality police. FRANCE 24'S Olivia Bizot traces the events.

UK PM Rishi Sunak reinstates fracking ban in another reversal of Truss policy

Fracking will be banned in England under Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, reversing a decision made by his predecessor Liz Truss.

Reuters
London,

UPDATED: Oct 26, 2022 

Rishi Sunak was sworn in as Britain's first Indian-origin Prime Minister on Tuesday 

(Photo: AFP)

By Reuters: 

Fracking will be banned in England under Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, reversing a decision made by his predecessor Liz Truss, as the new British leader returned to a 2019 Conservative Party manifesto pledge.

During her short term as prime minister, Truss had lifted a moratorium on fracking, arguing last month that strengthening the country's energy supply was a priority.

In parliament, Sunak was asked about fracking, and said he stood by a 2019 manifesto commitment on the issue.

The Conservatives' 2019 policy prospectus said they would "not support fracking unless the science shows categorically that it can be done safely."

Asked by a reporter if Sunak's comment meant that fracking was "back in the bin", Sunak's spokesman said "That's correct."

"You've got the position set out in the manifesto, which the prime minister pointed to," the spokesman told reporters. "Obviously it'll be for BEIS (the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy department) to come forward with a bit more detail on that."

Truss had said fracking - extracting shale gas from rocks by breaking them up - would be allowed where it was supported by communities, but the plans had faced opposition from many lawmakers, including from her governing Conservatives.

Fracking has also been opposed by environmental groups and some local communities. It was banned in 2019 after the industry regulator said it was not possible to predict the magnitude of earthquakes it might trigger.

--- ENDS ---

 

UK Sunak government to ban strikes and protests

Robert Stevens

WSWS.ORG

The replacement as prime minister of Liz Truss with Rishi Sunak was carried out at the insistence of the financial oligarchy, whose main demand is that the government step up their attacks on the working class.

Newly Appointed Prime Minister Rishi Sunak holds his first Cabinet Meeting the morning after assuming office. October 26, 2022, London, United Kingdom [Photo by Simon Walker/No 10 Downing Street / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0]

Truss was thrown out because her September mini budget of £45 billion in tax cuts for the richest was paid for with borrowing, rather than the immediate imposition of additional austerity. While her axing revealed differences between factions of the ruling Conservative Party over how to finance further vast subventions to the super-rich, there are none when it comes to imposing the necessary dictatorial measures required to enforce this.

Boris Johnson’s 2019 election manifesto pledged to bring in Minimum Service Levels (MSLs) during transport strikes, which would make industrial action in the sector ineffective. Another policy aimed at neutering strikes, dating back to the 2015 Conservation election manifesto, was to legislate to allow agencies to supply temporary workers to cover workers taking industrial action.

The legislation on agency workers became law on July 21. At the same time legislation was passed to raise the level of maximum damages that courts can award against a trade union when strike action has been found “unlawful”. For the largest unions, the maximum is now £1 million.

These laws went through even though Johnson had announced his resignation on July 7, prompting the leadership election that brought Truss to power.

Truss announced she would seek to legislate on MSLs within 30 days of taking office. The task now falls to Sunak, with the law enacted in early 2023.

The scale of the government’s class war offensive is underscored by the Public Order Bill—one of the most draconian pieces of legislation in British history, effectively ending the right to protest and further clamping down on strikes.

The Bill has been used to revive sections of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 deemed so nakedly dictatorial they were voted down by the House of Lords. They include making it unlawful for a person to interfere with the use or operation of key national infrastructure, including airports, the road network, railways and newspaper printers. Effective industrial action in these sectors would be essentially illegalised.

Protests are deemed illegal if they include acts causing “serious disruption to two or more individuals, or to an organisation”. “Serious disruption” includes “noise”, meaning that any protest can be declared illegal.

Jail sentences of up to 51 weeks are introduced for people who “lock on” to immovable objects or each other.

Police are also granted massive new stop and search powers and the right to issue “Serious Disruption Prevention Orders”. An SDPO can be imposed on people who have participated in at least two protests within a five-year period, whether or not they have been convicted of an offence. The person can be served a two-year order forbidding them from attending further protests.

Those handed an SDPO can be forced to wear an electronic tag to monitor their movements.

To impose this dictatorial assault, Sunak brought back as home secretary one of the most right-wing figures in the Tory party, Suella Braverman. This was just days after she was forced to stand down from the position for breaching the ministerial code.

Home Secretary Suella Braverman leaves the first Cabinet meeting under Prime Minister Liz Truss in 10 Downing Street. September 7, 2022, London. [Photo by Simon Dawson/No 10 Downing Street / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0]

Two days before Truss resigned, Braverman slipped through a last-minute amendment allowing the home secretary of the day to apply for injunctions against anyone they deem “likely” to carry out protests that could cause “serious disruption” to “key national infrastructure”, prevent access to “essential” goods or services, or have a “serious adverse effect on public safety”.

In the final House of Commons vote on the Public Order Bill the government won with a majority of 49. Labour voted against only on the basis that the current repressive apparatus of the state was adequate to clamp down on protests. But Labour MP Sarah Jones boasted, “The Labour party, last April, called for greater injunction powers following the disruption by Just Stop Oil… We suggested injunctions because they are more likely to prevent further disruption to, say, an oil terminal than more offences to criminalise conduct after it has taken place, with all the added costs and logistics of removal. Injunctions are more straightforward for the police, they have more safeguards as they are granted by a court, and they are future-proof when protesters change tactics.”

With further protests held by environmental groups, Starmer warned of the repression he had lined up were Labour to take office. He told an LBC Radio phone-in show Monday that during his tenure (2008-2013) as director of public prosecutions, “we always had laws available” to prosecute people taking such action.

He added, “What we were pushing for in that was longer sentences for those who were gluing themselves to roads and motorways. We didn’t get that through, but that’s what I wanted.” Asked by host Nick Ferrari, “And that’s what you’d want in the future?”, Starmer replied, “Yes”.

The unions have done nothing to mobilise their millions of members against the legislation. The only response from the Trades Union Congress was a declaration from outgoing leader Frances O’Grady, “If ministers cross the road to pick a fight with us then we will meet them halfway… Read my lips: We will see you in court!”

Among the key section of workers the legislation is aimed at suppressing are tens of thousands of rail staff, who have taken national strike action throughout the last few months. The Minimum Service legislation sets the stage for mass firings, with the government stating that under it “specified workers who still take strike action will lose their protection from automatic unfair dismissal.”

Train drivers picket line at London's Euston station, October 1, 2022 [Photo: WSWS]

The main concern of ASLEF train drivers’ union leader Mick Whelan was that the Minimum Services Level Bill “will only lead to industrial strife lasting longer.” Whelan played down the dangers of the savage legislation and intentions of the Tory government, stating, “The government claims that similar legislation exists in other European countries, such as Germany, France, and Spain. Yes, it does, but what the government doesn’t know—or doesn’t choose to say—is that it is not enforced. Because they know it doesn’t work.”

This is false. Not only is such legislation used by these governments and others; even more draconian legislation has been used as the class struggle sharpens throughout Europe on a regular basis.

This year alone, striking Spanish airline workers and metal workers have been subjected to Minimum Service Levels. This summer Spain’s Socialist Party (PSOE)-Podemos government and Ryanair imposed a minimum service requirement preventing many workers from legally stopping work. In the case of the metal workers’ strike in Cantabria, 150 workers were banned from striking by the imposition of a 100 percent minimum service requirement in 12 companies.

This month the Macron government in France requisitioned striking refinery workers to force them back to work in order to break a powerful action hitting the arteries of the economy.

This offensive has accelerated over the last decade as the ruling class in Europe enforced brutal austerity to make workers pay for the 2008 global financial meltdown.

In December 2010, Spain’s PSOE government forced 2,200 air traffic controllers back to work at gunpoint to smash a wildcat strike. Armed soldiers stood over them with the threat of immediate arrest should they stop work.

In January 2013, the New Democracy-led Greek coalition government, which included the social democratic PASOK and the Democratic Left, placed striking metro workers under martial law, forcing them back to work under pain of imprisonment. The following month, the coalition invoked emergency powers in the form of a “civil mobilisation,” formally conscripting striking ferry workers into military service and ordering them to return to work.

The ruling class knows a new global economic crisis and new rounds of austerity can only be imposed on the working class by even more aggressive and violent means. Workers must be politically armed to face the class battles immediately ahead.