Memphis drag queen fears Tennessee drag ban bill would empower strangers to call the cops on her for how she dresses

Yelena Dzhanova
Feb 28, 2023

Bella DuBalle is a drag performer in Memphis, Tennessee. 

Drew Parker/Courtesy of Bella DuBalle

A bill that would outlaw drag is poised to head to Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee's office soon.
Bella DuBalle, a Memphis-based drag queen, said the bill is "terrifying" and puts her at risk.

"I could go to prison for six years for appearing in a public pride parade," she told Insider.

Bella DuBalle, a Memphis-based drag queen, is speaking out against a Tennessee bill that would outlaw drag if it becomes law.

The text of the drag ban bill says "adult cabaret performances" cannot be performed "on public property or in a location where the adult cabaret performance could be viewed by a person who is not an adult." The bill identifies "male and female impersonators" — drag kings and drag queens — as adult cabaret performers.

In an interview with Insider, DuBalle called the bill "terrifying" and said she's personally afraid for her own safety.

The bill specifies that a second offense would be considered a Class E felony, which carries a jail sentence of up to six years.

"I could go to prison for six years for appearing in a public pride parade," DuBalle said.

The proposed law has already received a majority vote from the state's Senate and House. A modified version of the bill needs one final approval in the Senate this week before it heads to Governor Bill Lee's office.

Lee told reporters on Monday that he expects to sign it into law.

Tennessee's public drag ban proposal is one of the latest anti-LGBTQ bills making their way through legislatures across the country. Drag in particular has become an avatar for right-wing attacks on LGBTQ rights. More than a dozen anti-drag bills were introduced in statehouses just this year.

Outside of drag, DuBalle identifies as nonbinary and said she worries the way she dresses could run her afoul of the law if it's passed.

"I'm scared if I'm wearing gender-nonconforming clothing in Kroger and somebody has their kids and they clutch 'em tight and call the cops, I could get arrested just for presenting the way I present in my daily life," she said.

DuBalle said the bill could make life hard for trans, gender-nonconforming, and nonbinary individuals.

Supporters of the bill have argued that it's written to protect children, a characterization DuBalle disagreed with.


"There has never once been a child who has been sexually assaulted or harmed at a drag show or a pride performance. If there had been, it would be a poster image for their campaign, we would see it everywhere," she said.

"If you want to contrast it with the absolute piles and piles of records of sexual abuse and misconduct in our churches, but we don't try and ban people from taking their kids to church," she continued.

DuBalle said she has noticed a vibe shift among her performer friends in Tennessee. She said their focus is now less on creating a festive and happy environment and more on educating audiences about the political history of drag.

She said she's noticed that many of them have begun to include a "somber" statement in their performance to demonstrate how the bill is affecting them.

The proposed legislation, she said, is an attempt to erase these performers.

"We can't ignore it and it's why I speak out in every single show now. It's why we've gotten so loud because if we don't fight for ourselves, we're afraid no one else will," she said.

Leaving Tennessee is not an option for DuBalle. The state has been her home for 43 years, and she's put down roots there, she said.

DuBalle said she also wants to stay to make sure queer kids in Tennessee feel safe there. The bill very much seems like an effort to oust LGBTQ people from the state and discourage them from moving in, she said.

"I grew up queer in Tennessee and I barely survived it," she said. "I feel that it is necessary for me to stay and fight to change the culture here for future queer kids that are going to be born and raised and can't run away or don't have the ability to leave."

The bill is part of a growing movement of anti-LGBTQ legislation in the United States. Utah recently passed a law banning gender-affirming care for trans youth. At least 21 other states are considering similar bills this year.

One 17-year-old affected by the Utah ban told Insider he's planning to uproot his life and move to Portland.

Insider also spoke with the mom of a 13-year-old trans child who said a South Dakota law that bans certain healthcare for trans youth has forced her to find and commute to doctors across state lines.

Recently, Iowa Republicans proposed a bill in which school officials and faculty members would be required to get permission from parents before calling students a nickname that does not "correspond to the biological sex" listed on their birth certificate.

Cuba’s demographic crossroads: no young workforce

By Latin America News

(RIGHT WING) RIO TIMES
February 28, 2023

Amid one of the biggest economic crises in its history, Cuba faces a crossroads: how to recover when its society is rapidly aging and there is no young workforce?

The communist-ruled Caribbean island is already the most aging country in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Two out of 10 Cubans (21.9%) are at least 60 years old, Antonio Ajá, director of the Center for Demographic Studies at the University of Havana (Cedem), told the news and image agency EFE.

The island is already the most aging country in Latin America and the Caribbean 

(Photo internet reproduction)

This means that of the 11.1 million Cubans, almost 2.4 million are over six decades old.

The scientist stresses this results from social policies introduced decades ago that have extended life expectancy (about 79 years for both sexes).

However, this brings a problem from an economic and social point of view.

“It is a challenge for the labor force, which is smaller, for social security systems, health and protection of the elderly,” he said.

In other words, there are more old people and fewer young people of working age to sustain the country’s economic activity.

And in the long run, to fund the pension system.

Data from the National Statistics and Information Office show that in 2021 there were 99,096 births and 167,645 deaths.

“Cuba has similar demographic behavior to developed countries (low fertility, high life expectancy), but the difference is that they are countries that receive immigrants and counteract demographic aging through their economic development,” Ajá said.

Cuban economist Tamarys Bahamonde told EFE that the number of “dependent” people is also increasing: those who do not produce and live off their pensions after contributing to the economy.

The retirement age in Cuba is 60 (women) and 65 (men), with a minimum monthly pension of ₱1,528 (US$12 at the official exchange rate and US$8.7 in the widely used informal market).

The unprecedented exodus of migrants can largely explain the loss of young people of productive age.

Last year alone, authorities apprehended over 313,000 Cubans along the southern US-Mexico border.

This represents 3% of Cuba’s total population.

This figure excludes thousands of islanders who have absconded to other countries such as Mexico, Spain, or South America.

This phenomenon was confirmed a few days ago by Ángel Luis Ríos, general director of production linkages for the state-owned Azcuba company.

Ríos told the official newspaper Granma that sugar factories – once the engine of the economy – have a reduced and aging workforce due to the “effects of emigration” and that this has led to a deficit in the harvest.

“Cuba has had negative net migration since 1930, which has increased since 1959 (when the revolution triumphed), so the country is losing a population that has its full reproductive and productive capacity,” Professor Ajá said.

Internal migration is also negative because rural areas are “depopulated and overaged,” which is a “worrying” problem, for example, regarding food production because there are no people to work the land, the expert said.

Another reason for the exodus of labor is the lack of incentives.

The average wage in Cuba is about ₱4,000 (US$32 according to the official exchange rate).

According to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), the fertility rate in Cuba is 1.4 children per woman, one of the lowest in the region (1.85 in 2022).

To maintain the level of reproduction in the population, a woman must have two children, one of which must be a girl, explained Ajá, who stressed that “Cuba has been below this indicator since 1978, with extremely low levels in recent years.”

For Bahamonde, the very low birth rate is rooted in the economic crises that are “chaotic for society, especially for women, since they are responsible for caring for the elderly.

Among the measures the government has taken to address this situation are the construction and maintenance of children’s circles, retirement homes, and maternity homes, as well as support for fertility programs and care for mothers with more than three children.

For Bahamonde, however, “the most important thing is to respond to the serious economic situation and then think about implementing complementary measures to boost the birth rate.”

In this sense, Ajá also believes that “we must strive to improve the economy and that the growth of the gross domestic product must be reflected in family income.”

“This must be accompanied by policies that promote the construction of housing, guarantee a solution to the problem of care for the elderly and children, and try to attract the Cuban population abroad,” added the director of Cedem.

Mexican president: Mexico has more democracy than US

Mexico's president says his country is more democratic than the United States

Via AP news wire

Mexico President
(Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

Mexico’s president said Tuesday his country is more democratic than the United States.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s testy comments came after U.S. officials took note of heated public debate in Mexico over López Obrador’s recently approved electoral reforms, which critics allege could weaken Mexico's democracy. The reforms would cut spending for the country’s electoral authorities.

López Obrador angrily rejected any U.S. comment, even though U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price was careful to say in a statement Monday that “We respect Mexico’s sovereignty.”

The Mexican president responded “there is more democracy in Mexico than could exist in the United States.”

“If they want to have a debate on this issue, let's do it," López Obrador said pugnaciously. "I have evidence to prove there is more liberty and democracy in our country.”

The Mexican president is notoriously touchy about criticism, whether it comes from human rights groups, non-governmental organizations, the press, or Mexican regulatory or oversight agencies.

Price said in a statement that “Today, in Mexico, we see a great debate on electoral reforms on the independence of electoral and judicial institutions that illustrates Mexico’s vibrant democracy."

"We respect Mexico’s sovereignty. We believe that a well-resourced, independent electoral system and respect for judicial independence support healthy democracy.”

At the root of the conflict are plans by López Obrador, which were approved last week by Mexico’s Senate, to cut salaries and funding for local election offices, and scale back training for citizens who operate and oversee polling stations. The changes would also reduce sanctions for candidates who fail to report campaign spending.

López Obrador denies the reforms are a threat to democracy and says criticism is elitist. He argues that the funds would be better spent on the poor.

Tens of thousands of people demonstrated over the weekend in Mexico City’s main plaza, calling the cuts a threat to democracy.

Xi Jinping bans ‘Western’ concepts from schools

Constitutional government, separation of powers and independence of the judiciary are now out. Previously, a directive had been issued encouraging students to report on teachers who deviate from the Communist Party line. Chinese liberals are a persecuted minority. Xi wants to promote China's ideological model in the world.


Beijing (AsiaNews) – Chinese President Xi Jinping has launched a campaign to ban Western democratic ideas from the country’s education system.

To this end, schools have been ordered to “oppose and resist Western erroneous views” such as constitutional government, separation of powers, and judicial independence.

On Sunday, the General Office of the Communist Party of China (CPC) issued new directives, ordering teachers and students to follow the legal principles laid down by the Party and its General Secretary, Xi.

The order comes a week before the National People's Congress, China’s parliament, holds its annual meeting, which also marks the start of Xi’s third term in office.

This is not the first time that the CPC has issued directives of this kind. Communist authorities already encourage students to report on teachers who praise Western forms of governance.

Now the regime wants the CPC’s education policy to be fully implemented in schools. People should be educated "for the Party and the country” and observe a “socialist rule of law”.

In China, most people have accepted total control of the state by the Party in exchange for improved economic conditions. Liberals are a clear minority, persecuted by the government.

Reformist academics like He Weifang, Xu Zhiyong, and Xu Zhangrun have ended up in prison or lost their jobs because they called for the implementation of the rule of law in China (in its true, liberal democratic version), with freedom of the press, an independent judiciary, and the protection of human and workers’ rights .

China’s constitution mentions respect for individual freedoms, including freedom of religion, but everything is subordinated to the supreme interests of the CPC.

It now seems that Xi, who is both CPC general secretary and the country’s president, also wants to promote China's ideological model to developing nations.

In a recent speech at the Party school, he said that China offers a new path for human progress and that "modernisation" is not synonymous with “Westernisation”.

Aleppo Marist: earthquake 'tragedy for all', Syrians 'discriminated' in aid

Nabil Antaki, a doctor in Aleppo, slams Western sanctions that have led to a different emergency response in Syria and Turkey. People "are desperate"; the displaced need of a roof. In the early stages, machinery and rescue teams that did not come could have saved lives. For Europe and the United States, this is a disgrace.

Aleppo (AsiaNews) – Nabil Antaki is a Christian doctor specialised in gastroenterology. For years, he has been directly involved in relief work for the victims of Syria’s brutal civil war. Three years ago, he turned his attention to helping people when the COVID-19 pandemic broke out; now he is grappling with the impact of the 6 February earthquake. He spoke to AsiaNews about the latter.

“After the first, devastating shock,” he said, “hundreds of thousands of people took refuge in churches, mosques, schools, and public gardens because their homes had collapsed or had been seriously damaged, or just out of fear. Today, three weeks later, most shelters have closed.”

A lay member of the order of Marist friars, he is one of the few doctors to remain in Aleppo after the start of the civil war.

At present, “The people of Aleppo are desperate,” he said. “In the last 12 years they have experienced non-stop tragedies, one after the other: the war, the economic crisis, COVID-19, a cholera epidemic, and now the earthquake.”

In the first two weeks, it was a rush to find food, blankets, mattresses amid “absolute emergency.” Now, “the primary work is fixing damaged buildings, rebuilding those razed to the ground; and, above all, guaranteeing a roof to the thousands of families who lost their homes.”

This is a huge task, given that in Turkey alone the earthquake caused US$ 34 billion in damages, this according to the World Bank.

Meanwhile, the combined death toll for the two countries has reached 51,000. in Syria though, estimating the real toll of the quake is difficult because the country is controlled by different groups.

Reconstruction depends on what will happen wilt international sanctions against Syria.

"Even before the earthquake, poverty and economic crisis were the consequence of sanctions, which blocked investment,” Dr Antaki explained.

“The UN estimates that about 82 per cent of the population lives below the poverty line. At present, we don't have digging machinery or rescue teams equipped to search under the rubble and many died because we could not look for them, and help."

Altogether, in addition to the damages caused by the quake and by the war, sanctions against the Syrian regime will weigh heavily in the future.

Necessities like bread, gas, fuel, electricity are in short supply; motorists, for example, can have 25 litres of petrol every 20 days, electricity is available for two hours a day.

"People are desperate, so much so that today we often hear that 'we lived better during the worst years of the war, under bombs and sniper fire,’ and 'we regret not having emigrated' in the two-year period, 2015-2016, when it was easier to leave.”

Today hope is also in short supply. “There is no light at the end of the tunnel and the only consolation comes from the huge generosity and solidarity of Syrians in the diaspora, whose help and support is unique.”

Christian NGOs are among the groups bringing help and support, providing housing, shelter in churches, food, clothing, electricity, starting with the Blue Marists of Aleppo who "took care of hundreds of Christian and Muslim families" in the first phase of the emergency.

"Now we are renting apartments for those who cannot return to their homes,” Dr Antaki noted. “Neither in the past nor in the present is there any confessional discrimination in providing aid; everyone is going through this tragedy, like the previous ones, in a spirit of total solidarity.”

For the doctor, whether in government-controlled Aleppo, or in Idlib, the only province still held by rebel and jihadi groups, or among Syrian refugees in Turkey (at least 1.7 million in the 11 provinces most affected by the earthquake), the “tragedy is the same for everyone.”.

What makes the difference are "the hundreds of planes that arrived in Turkey with aid, while none were sent to Syria for political reasons in the first hours after the quake. This is a source of shame for Europe and the United States. The response to people's suffering should have been separated from political and military issues.”

PAKISTAN

Supreme Court to hear case of Christian jailed for 21 years for blasphemy

by Shafique Khokhar

Anwar Kenneth was sentenced to death in Lahore in 2002 for defending Christianity against Islam in the weeks following the 9/11 attacks. After five court-appointed lawyers refused to defend him, one agreed to take up his case at the next hearing. For human rights advocates, defending one’s faith cannot be considered blasphemy.



AsiaNews (Lahore) – Anwar Kenneth, a Christian man from Lahore, has been on death row for 21 years following his conviction of blasphemy for defending Christianity in an exchange with a local Islamic leader in the aftermath of the attacks on 11 September 2001.

Anwar Kenneth’s odyssey is now before the Pakistani Supreme Court, which is expected to start deliberations on the matter tomorrow.

His legal troubles began when a complaint was filed against him on 25 September 2001 under the infamous Article 295c of the Pakistan Penal Code, the so-called blasphemy law.

The charge is based on a letter, the Christian man, a former Ministry of Fisheries employee, sent to Haji Mehmood Zafar, secretary of a Lahore mosque, who had written to him that, while Jesus is a prophet according to Islamic tradition, he neither died on a cross nor was resurrected.

In his reply, Anwar Kenneth argued that Muhammad was not the prophet and that the Qur'an was not the word of God. And, provocatively, he challenged his interlocutor to file a complaint for blasphemy, claiming that God would protect him.

Eventually, Anwar Kenneth went on trial on 18 July 2002, ending with a conviction, a fine of five million rupees, a death sentence, and immediate imprisonment. On 30 June 2014, the Lahore High Court upheld the court's verdict.

Anwar Kenneth has always refused to appoint his own lawyer claiming that God is his defence. Moreover, in 21 years, five court-appointed lawyers have refused to represent him in court.

On 24 January 2023, the Supreme Court asked the Bar Council to provide counsel to represent the defendant in the interests of criminal justice. A lawyer agreed, so the hearing is set for 1 March.

Joseph Jansen, president of Voice for Justice, spoke to AsiaNews about the case. “Religious freedom is a fundamental human right protected by national and international laws.”

Anwar Kenneth “is firm in his faith in Christianity, and his arguments and opinions should not be interpreted as an act of blasphemy.”

For Lawyer Abdul Hameed Rana, Anwar Kenneth is a devout believer and an innocent person. Like him, “There are billions of people in the world, who have their own religion and do not believe in Islam”.

None of them “are not liable to be prosecuted in any court of law for their beliefs.” Hence, “he must be acquitted as he has already spent 21 years of his life behind the bar for the offence he has never committed.”

For his part, activist Aneel Edger notes that the Supreme Court itself ruled in 2022 that depriving minorities of their religious beliefs and preventing them from professing and practising their religion is contrary to the Constitution of Pakistan.

Furthermore, written communication between two religious leaders who practise their respective faiths, Christian and Islamic, should not be interpreted as an act of blasphemy.

Tyre, policemen storm bank for non-payment of salaries

A group of policemen, like private citizens in the past, broke into an institution demanding the payment of their salaries. Behind the assaults was the freezing of current accounts, the economic crisis and the collapse of the local currency, which hit a new low yesterday. It has lost almost 90 per cent of its value since 2019.

Beirut (AsiaNews) - The economic crisis, the freezing of bank accounts and the gradual depreciation of the local currency, which yesterday recorded a new negative record, are pushing a growing number of Lebanese to the threshold of poverty, and of desperation.

Hence the decision to attack credit institutions in an attempt to recover part of their assets. Cases similar to this have become more and more frequent in recent times, with yesterday's assault by police officers in Tyre, in the south of the country, on a local branch of the General Corporation of the Bank of Lebanon, claiming payment of their salaries.

Protests continued throughout the country, with the lira hitting a new low, fuelling further discontent among the population. According to the National News Agency, this time ordinary citizens were also joined by a group of police officers - also frustrated at the non-payment of their monthly salary - who stormed the bank counters in an attempt to recover the money.

In the past year, the Land of Cedars has seen an escalation of armed robberies and assaults on banks, with citizens now exasperated by the economic collapse and restricted access to accounts. Widespread corruption, capital controls, the devaluation of the local currency, and the non-payment of the dollar portion of civil servants' salaries have fuelled the crisis.

Moreover, since the beginning of the crisis in 2019, the Lebanese lira has lost almost 90% of its value, prompting exasperated citizens to storm and burn banks and, the latter, to call a lockout at the beginning of the month that was only interrupted last week. In the crosshairs is the head of the Central Bank, Riad Salameh, himself accused of corruption and of embezzling millions in capital, so much so that he has ended up under investigation in France and Switzerland.

A judicial source, relayed by L'Orient Today, reports an 'investigation' against him to be opened shortly. An attempt to preserve the 'rights' of the Lebanese State to the assets that were allegedly - at least this is the accusation - misappropriated by the high official, although no further details are known at the moment and the investigators oppose secrecy.

In recent days, the Swiss daily SonntagsZeitung accused Salameh of having pocketed over 500 million dollars, deposited in at least 12 banks in Switzerland. He had been accused of undue gain last year, but the investigation never resulted in an interrogation and the suspect has always rejected the accusations.

 

Go to the Banks. Take What Is Rightfully Yours.’ Meet the Bank Robbers of Beirut | NYT Opinion

 Feb 28, 2023

A wave of armed bank robberies has been sweeping Lebanon amid its economic meltdown. But the heists have followed a highly unusual pattern: The robbers are the banks’ clients, and the money they have been demanding is the contents of their own accounts.

These thieves have been driven to such extraordinary lengths to get their savings because banks have imposed strict withdrawal limits to avoid collapse.

In the Opinion video above, Sali Hafiz, a Lebanese interior designer, describes how a health crisis in her family drove her to take up arms — actually, a toy pistol — and withdraw her money by force. But the film also argues that the true thieves are not citizens like Ms. Hafiz who are trying to get their hard-earned savings but, rather, corrupt financial and political leaders who have helped to run the economy into the ground.

Prosecutors from five European countries have been investigating Riad Salameh, the governor of Lebanon’s central bank, who has been accused of laundering public money in Europe. And last Thursday, The Associated Press reported, Lebanese prosecutors charged Mr. Salameh, his brother and an associate with embezzlement, forgery, money laundering, illicit enrichment and tax law violations.

texts

Expropriation

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Pëtr Kropotkin

Turkey expelled over 68,000 Afghan migrants in 2022

The recent shipwreck off Crotone put the spotlight on the eastern route into the European Union. Last year, Turkey expelled 120,000 people, including 12,000 Pakistanis. In Afghanistan, the situation has worsened since the Taliban came back in August 2021. Despite ongoing funding from the European Union, Turkey has failed to process asylum applications by Afghan refugees who arrive via Iran.

Milan (AsiaNews) – Last year, Turkey expelled some 120,000 asylum seekers, including 68,290 Afghans and 12,5001 Pakistanis, plus migrants from other countries deemed illegal, this according to its General Directorate of Migration Management.

As more tragedies strike the Mediterranean, public interest is rekindled in the eastern route that branches off on land (via Turkey, the Balkans, and Eastern Europe) and sea.

The latest episode took place a few days ago off the coast of Crotone, southern Italy, where a boat carrying migrants sank in rough seas; so far, the bodies of 60 people have been recovered, including some 20 Pakistani nationals.

Reacting to the incident, the Pakistani government ordered an official investigation into the smuggling networks operating in the country.

“A crackdown on the criminal network of human trafficking worldwide is the need of the hour,” said Minister for Overseas Pakistanis Sajid Hussain Turi.

“Since April 2022, over 600,000 people have been sent abroad for jobs,” he explained, urging his fellow citizens to be careful and “not to fall prey to human trafficking.”

Currently, Turkey hosts more than four million refugees, the highest number in the world, mostly Syrians (3.7 million) who fled the war that began in 2011, but also 322,000 registered asylum seekers from Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and Somalia.

Under a 2016 agreement with the European Union, Turkey has pledged to take charge of refugees in the country with EU funds.

Between 2016 and 2019, the EU allocated more than € 8 billion (US$ 8.5 billion) in humanitarian aid through two different mechanisms to ensure that Turkey stopped migrants from entering its territory. Between 2020 and 2023, it paid out more than € 960 million (US$ 1 billion).

Yet, after all these years, the fate of refugees in Turkey continues to be heartbreaking. In early January, the Directorate General for Migration Management announced plans to expel another 5,000 Afghan migrants, like in 2022.

According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, more than 98 per cent of refugees in Turkey live outside refugee camps in difficult and often precarious circumstances.

Many refugee families have exhausted their financial resources, and believe that they have no choice but to resort to survival mechanisms such as child labour, street begging, or marrying off underage daughters.

Afghans are also abducted for ransom. As an AsiaNews source noted, “many people” die along the Afghan-Iranian and the Iranian-Turkish borders in a "desperate attempt" to start a new life away from the Taliban.

Several humanitarian groups have spoken out on the fate of Afghan refugees in Turkey. According to a Human Rights Watch report last year, Turkish authorities systematically expel or turn away Afghan refugees without processing their applications for international protection.

The situation is worse since the Taliban seized power in August 2021. Not only did they impose bans and restrictions on women, but they are hard-pressed to cope with a catastrophic humanitarian situation with more than 90 per cent of the population living below the poverty line.

In Afghanistan, attacks by the local branch of the Islamic State group,[*] abductions of former government officials, and revenge killings by the Taliban have also increased.

In October last year, the General Directorate of Migration Management said it had prevented 238,448 "irregular migrants" from entering the country in 2022.

[*] Islamic State-Khorasan Province, IS-KP.

Iraqi Kurdistan’s KDP and PUK reach deal on election related issues

Published: February 28, 2023

AuthorEditorial Staff

HEWLÊR-Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan region,— Zana Khalid, the head of the Kurdistan Democratic Party’s (KDP) bloc in Iraqi Kurdistan region parliament, and Luqman Wardi, the deputy head of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan’s (PUK) bloc, announced that they have resolved most of their disagreements over election issues.

The two rival parties during a meeting, which was described as positive and productive, held in Erbil on Tuesday have agreed to activate the Electoral Commission and divide the Kurdistan region into four voting zones and rely on a biometric voter registration system for the upcoming parliamentary elections.

Following hours of discussion, both parties plan to meet again on Saturday and engage with representatives of other parties to discuss the upcoming elections.

The elections were originally scheduled for October 2022, but due to disagreements over the election law, the Kurdistan parliament extended its term by year. The extension came after political parties failed to hold the sixth parliamentary elections scheduled for Oct. 1, 2022, as specified by Kurdistan region president Nechirvan Barzani in February 2022.

Iraqi Kurdistan remains politically and geographically divided between the KDP, led by Massoud Barzani, and the PUK party, headed by the Talabani family. As a result, the region lacks a cohesive and unified governance structure, with the Barzanis in control of Erbil and Duhok governorates, while the Talabanis hold sway over Sulaimani.

Copyright © 2023 Ekurd.net. All rights reserved

UK

Labour: Starmer is paving the way for the triumph of dark politics

By waging an all-out war on the left and its ideas, the Labour leader is strangling hope of change in a time of crisis and risks driving voters towards right-wing authoritarians

Britain's main opposition Labour Party leader Keir Starmer waits to address delegates during the London Labour Regional Conference in central London on 28 January 2023 (AFP)

There is a reason - and not the one given - why Labour Party leader Keir Starmer has announced that he is banning his predecessor, Jeremy Corbyn, from standing as a candidate for the party at the next general election.

Corbyn has been sitting as an independent since Starmer exiled him from the Labour benches in late 2020 - after Corbyn observed that it was for “political reasons” he faced years of evidence-free accusations the Labour Party was beset by antisemitism on his watch. He called the accusation “dramatically overstated”.

The official grounds for Corbyn being permanently barred from returning to the parliamentary party are that he has refused to apologise for his comment.

No other political leader, not even Tony Blair, has haunted the thoughts of his successor in quite the way Corbyn continues to do so

Announcing Corbyn’s exclusion as a candidate, Starmer said Labour would "never again be brought to its knees by racism or bigotry. If you don't like that, if you don't like the changes we have made, I say the door is open and you can leave".

The establishment media - from right to supposed left - are trying to bolster Starmer’s claims about Corbyn and his supporters by continuing to weave a web of misrepresentations about the former leader being depraved and unhinged.

Antisemitism in Labour is apparently being kept at bay only because of Starmer’s vigilance, in contrast to Corbyn’s supposed indulgence. And, were Corbyn to be serving as prime minister today, we are warned, he would be taking “cranky” foreign policy decisions, like encouraging a diplomatic process to end the bloodshed in Ukraine.

No other political leader, not even Tony Blair, has haunted the thoughts of his successor - or the airwaves and pages of the billionaire-owned media - in quite the way Corbyn continues to do so.

Even a disastrous, if brief, prime minister like Liz Truss quickly faded from memory. Boris Johnson stays in the British public’s imagination only because the scandals and dramas he presided over are still playing out, and because in the crisis-plagued Conservative Party, he might yet manage to claw his way back into Downing Street.

So why the perennial concern about Corbyn, even as he languishes on the backbenches, outside the two-party chokehold on British politics, with no evident path back to power? Why does his shadow loom so large?

All-out war

The reason has nothing to do with antisemitism or Corbyn’s criticisms of the West’s response to the Ukraine war - or rather, not in the sense Starmer and commentators would have you believe.

Like the media, Starmer wants not just the solitary figure of Corbyn gone from British politics. He wants to eradicate something far more dangerous to the establishment: Corbynism, the ideas of a fairer, more equal society the former Labour leader gave life to, as well as the potential grassroots movement he represents.

Labour's Forde report is devastating on factional war against Corbyn

Read More »

In his light-on-detail speech last week, Starmer set out his top “five missions”, in which he chiefly sought to present himself as a better steward of neoliberalism than the ruling Tory party.

But even in purdah, Corbyn continues to serve as a symbol.

Starmer’s efforts to disappear his predecessor from the Labour Party - and from British political life - has operated in tandem with his all-out war on a large section of the party’s members, who have been gradually driven from the ranks.

That has very much included Jewish Labour members standing in solidarity with Corbyn. Under Starmer, they have been ousted from the party in disproportionately large numbers.

Notably, that is a fact barely reported by the media because it flies in the face of their phoney narrative: both that antisemitism thrived under Corbyn and only under Corbyn; and that it is Starmer who is eradicating racism from the party.

Even YouGov polling found that already low levels of antisemitism in Labour actually reduced during Corbyn’s tenure as the party drew in huge numbers of new left-wing supporters, attracted by his anti-imperialist, anti-racist, more egalitarian agenda.

A paradox, also unremarked by the establishment media, is that Starmer waited to make his move against Corbyn until immediately after the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) announced it was ending its monitoring of Labour for antisemitism.

It was the EHRC’s 2020 report that paved the way to Corbyn’s removal from the Labour benches, after its conclusions were heavily misrepresented by the media.

Vilifying Corbyn

Corbyn was judged to have interfered in antisemitism cases, with the implication that his office tried to stop antisemites from being expelled. The truth was the opposite, as the EHRC quietly conceded. His team “interfered” only in the sense that they tried to speed up the handling of disciplinary cases his right-wing opponents in the party bureaucracy stalled in a bid to fuel the antisemitism smears.

Starmer is interfering in disciplinary cases too - and doing so openly and proudly, including overturning a decision in late 2020 by his National Executive Committee to reinstate Corbyn as an MP. But this time the EHRC seems unconcerned.

The EHRC has given Starmer its official stamp of anti-racism approval even as his officials drive out Jewish members in unprecedented numbers. These are Jews whose mistreatment no one in public life seemingly cares about - because they back Corbyn.

Last week, hot on the heels of that stamp of approval, and mocking the idea that Starmer’s party is interested in tackling racism, Labour barred its local constituency parties from affiliating with a range of progressive groups.

Those included Jewish Voice for Labour, which represents Jews highly critical of Israel’s oppression of Palestinians, and the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, the main UK organisation representing Palestinian interests, as well as Somalis for Labour, Sikhs for Labour and the All African Women’s Group.

The Equalities watchdog’s “special measures” on Labour are also apparently not needed even though prominent Black party members, such as former shadow home secretary Diane Abbott, also a Corbyn ally, complain that Starmer’s Labour has done nothing to address anti-Black racism exposed in the recent Forde Report.

The truth is that Starmer and the establishment media will not be satisfied until they have driven a stake through the heart of Corbynism, and its genuine commitment to anti-racism and a more egalitarian approach to the economy. That is why they have never sounded more desperate to vilify him and his supporters.

An outburst on BBC TV last week by Guardian columnist Rafael Behr skated exceptionally close to libelling not only Corbyn but the entire British left as frothing-at-the-mouth Jew haters.

Sinking ship

As the saying goes, you can’t kill an idea. And the ideas Corbyn gave life to are even harder to kill when the country’s current leaders look not just inept but concerned only to asset-strip the ship before it goes down - while the best promised by Starmer, the opposition leader, is to slow down the looting.

Even to many of its admirers, capitalism, especially of today’s turbo-charged variety, increasingly looks mired in crisis. Bereft of solutions, its architects have to constantly peddle distractions and exploit emergencies, from the Ukraine war and growing tensions with China to the cost-of-living crisis and the pandemic.

The country's leaders look not just inept but concerned only to asset-strip the ship before it goes down - while the best promised by Starmer is to slow down the looting

In an age of climate breakdown, resulting from an over-consumption model impossible for our profit-driven corporations to wean themselves off, socialism’s appeal may quickly resurface - or, at least, that appears to be the establishment’s concern.

Karl Marx, the now unfashionable 19th-century political economist, observed that capitalism “sowed the seeds of its own destruction”. And sure enough, capitalism looks like it is being strangled by its own internal contradictions, forcing a stark choice between continuing wealth accumulation and our species’ survival on a finite planet.

The job of Britain’s politicians is not, of course, to air these contradictions or highlight their parties’ lack of solutions. It is to keep the ship on course, heading towards the iceberg. It is to keep underscoring threats from overseas “madmen”. It is to be in lockstep with Nato and its expansion through resource wars that further enrich the wealthy while justifying austerity for everyone else. And most fundamentally of all, it is to remain piously in thrall to the City and the euphemism of “economic growth”.

Any leader who refuses to abide by these stipulations faces a campaign of demonisation, as Corbyn found to his cost.

Gaslighting members

Over the past three years, Starmer has been busy setting out his conditions for remaining in the Labour Party tent - parameters that just so happen to mirror precisely the British establishment’s requirements for legitimacy in public life.

Starmer demands simple-minded patriotism and an unwavering commitment to the West’s Nato military alliance and its aggressive posturing and expansion. He ostentatiously prioritises the needs of big business and demurs about the right of those abused by neoliberalism to strike. He describes himself as a proud Zionist and decries any but the softest criticism of Israel as proof of antisemitism.

Alongside the anti-racist groups, Starmer has banned local constituency parties from affiliating with the Stop the War Coalition, which campaigns against the West’s endless military "interventions", the Labour Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, Corbyn's Peace & Justice Project, and the Campaign Against Climate Change Trades Union Group.

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In other words, in a system rigged to allow only two parties to contend for power, those who want Labour to serve as a vehicle for meaningful change are not welcome. Labour will not tolerate the struggle against imperialism, or efforts to stop endless resource wars, or trenchant opposition to Israel’s subjugation of the Palestinian people, or Britain’s further militarisation, or anything more than tinkering with gross wealth disparities.

And it is not even ideological differences being cited as the grounds for expelling members from the country’s only major “socialist” party. It is based on smears: that they are racists, antisemites, and stooges of Vladimir Putin.

Even as he denied Corbyn the right to stand as a Labour candidate, Starmer gaslit members, telling them Labour “will never again be a party captured by narrow interests. It will never again lose sight of its purpose or its morals”.

But Corbyn’s effective expulsion bluntly sends exactly the opposite message: that Labour has been fully captured by the boss class and will not permit any dissent.

Coup de grace

One might have expected a little pushback, if only from Britain’s self-declared liberal-left daily newspaper, the Guardian. But its columnists have been largely revelling in Starmer delivering the coup de grace against Corbyn.

Sonia Sodha called the decision "morally correct" and "to Starmer’s credit", while Polly Toynbee averred that excluding Corbyn was "inevitable" because the Labour Party could not afford to be even "a little bit racist".

Those who suggest Starmer is the broom needed to clean out Labour’s stables will doubtless get the outcome they predict. Running against a ruling Conservative Party in disarray and led by stale, colourless leaders reeking of privilege in a party mired in cronyism, Starmer is almost certain to win the next election - if only by default.

In blocking the left from a visible political presence, in stifling its ideas in a time of crisis, Starmer is leaving the field open to the far right

And that is as far as most pundits wish to look. But politics has long-term trends too. Capitalism’s crises, just like climate breakdown, are not going away. They will intensify, as will popular alienation, frustration and anger.

That means those offering a programme of radical change are going to prosper, and those clinging to a discredited status quo will face steady decline and marginalisation. Voters will increasingly be drawn to figures promising decisive action over inaction.

In blocking the left from a visible political presence, in stifling its ideas and creativity in a time of crisis, Starmer is leaving the field open to the far right. They will be only too eager to highlight and exploit the deficiencies of a soulless Labour Party, one that pays no more than lip service to resolving Britain’s problems.

And they will doubtless also scapegoat the usual suspects - not the rich, not those in power, but immigrants, Jews and “communists” - who will be blamed for bringing the UK to its knees.

Ultimately, the smearing of Corbyn and the Labour left will bring about the very things the Labour right and the establishment media claim they seek to avert: Britain will become a darker, more racist, more authoritarian place.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.

Jonathan Cook is the author of three books on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and a winner of the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His website and blog can be found at www.jonathan-cook.net