PERSPECTIVE

The class logic behind Washington’s anti-strike law against railroaders

Tom Hall

WSWS.ORG

As President Biden and both parties in Congress moved to unilaterally impose a contract on 120,000 railroaders, the constant refrain from all quarters of Washington was that this was necessary to protect “working families.” The impact of a national rail strike to the economy, they warned, would be $2 billion per day and lead to major shortages of necessities.

Though it found no reflection in the corporate media, which was busy creating a synthetic public opinion against the railroaders, the working class treated these warnings with contempt. Workers supported a rail strike and wanted to join them in a fight for a decent standard of living. The struggle on the railroads itself is part of the biggest upsurge of the working class in generations.

The cost of a strike to “working families” is a variation of a larger big lie repeated over the last two years that blames the push for higher wages by workers for the rising cost of living. Runaway inflation, according to this theory, is caused by a “wage price spiral,” in which wage hikes to compensate for inflation only drives inflation up even more. The only way to stop this vicious cycle is by curbing wage growth, politicians and major economists stressed.

But quietly, amongst themselves, they admit this is a lie that turns reality on its head. This was demonstrated by a recent notice to investors by Swiss bank UBS, first reported by The Hill, which acknowledged that “margin expansion”—i.e., profiteering by major corporations—is the main component of inflation, not wage increases.

“Unit labor costs, which are measured by the Labor Department to determine how much businesses are paying for workers to produce their goods and services, have been getting outpaced by profits over several quarters,” The Hill reported. The outlet also cited a report by the Bank of International Settlements, which found that the danger of “wage price spirals” has been grossly overstated.

Not taking into account inflation, wages have increased, amid massive labor shortages caused by the pandemic, by between 4 and 5 percent over the last two years. However, inflation is far higher, peaking at over 9 percent and currently at 7.7 percent. Meanwhile, profits in the United States reached a new high of $2.522 trillion in the second quarter of 2022, while margins have surged to 15.5 percent, the highest levels since 1950, according to Commerce Department figures released in August.

Major corporations have seized upon pandemic-related shortages, greatly worsened by the US-NATO proxy war against Russia in Ukraine and the buildup against China, to engage in unrestrained price gouging. As is well known, the surge in gasoline prices following the start of the war occurred even though the price of crude oil itself remained relatively unchanged. In the rail industry, the most profitable in America, carriers have made use of massive delays and congestion to justify further price increases.

This divergence between wages and profits is not a coincidence. Capitalism is a system of exploitation in which the source of all profits is created by the surplus value extracted from the labor of the working class. Inequality is a central feature of this system.

But it is also the outcome of deliberate policies carried out by the US and world governments designed to bolster profits by curbing wage cuts and attacking the standard of living of the working class. The policy of the Biden administration is determined not one iota by dishonest phrases meant for public consumption, but entirely by the class interests of American capitalism.

The rapid move to impose the anti-strike law came as a shock to many, but it is merely a continuation and deepening of the policies that Biden has pursued for nearly two years. His pledge to be the most “pro-union president in American history” was always meant to signify the administration’s support for the union bureaucracy, which has spent decades sabotaging workers and suppressing strikes.

The White House is in a corporatist alliance with the bureaucracy to suppress wages and labor costs. Earlier this year, they worked together to block strikes in the refinery industry and the West Coast docks. This result of this is that wage increases have been even lower for unionized workers than for nonunion workers, at roughly 3 versus 5 percent.

Now, the union bureaucracy is telling railroaders that they have no choice but to meekly submit to the congressional intervention. They are speaking not as innocent bystanders but as co-conspirators. They have worked deliberately with Washington to block a rail strike, first by supporting Biden’s appointment of a mediation board in July and then through endless delays to self-imposed strike deadlines to buy Congress time to intervene if necessary.

The other critical element to this policy is the sharp increases in interest rates by the Federal Reserve. For all of their professed concern about the potential damage to the economy by a railroad strike, the ruling class is deliberately trying to engineer a recession through its monetary policies.

“Reducing inflation is likely to require a sustained period of below-trend growth,” Fed chairman Jerome Powell explained in an August speech. “Moreover, there will very likely be some softening of labor market conditions. While higher interest rates, slower growth, and softer labor market conditions will bring down inflation, they will also bring some pain to households and businesses.”

This policy, including the propaganda lie of the need to combat “inflation” and a “wages-price spiral” used to justify it, is consciously modeled on the US monetary policy of the late 1970s, known as the “Volcker Shock,” after then-Fed Chairman Paul Volcker. In 1979, Volcker explained the policy more bluntly than even Powell when he demanded, “The standard of living of the average American has to decline.”

This sparked the biggest recession to that point since the Great Depression, wiping out hundreds of thousands of factory jobs in the space of a few years. It was consciously used as a weapon against the demands of workers for wage increases to keep pace with inflation, which fueled a significant strike wave in the mid-1970s.

The Volcker Shock was the beginning of a massive, decades-long redistribution of wealth from the bottom up. While wages and living standards for workers have stagnated or declined for the past 40 years, profits, share values and income inequality have risen to their highest levels on record. This was a global process, but it found its most extreme form in the United States, the center of the world financial system.

The main response of the US government to the pandemic was not to carry out public health measures to save lives, but to pump trillions of dollars to shield the financial system and major corporations from the economic impact. These vast sums of money, which dwarf even the bailouts in 2008–2009 during the Great Recession, represent a vast debt which can only be repaid through the increased exploitation of the working class. Living standards, already pushed to the brink, have to be reduced even further.

What has been the result? Workers are being reduced to the level of industrial slaves. Railroad workers are unable even to schedule doctors’ appointments or spend time with their families. “Our lives belong to the railroads,” as one railroader put it.

But the situation confronting rail workers is not unique. The conditions in the US increasingly resemble those of the 1800s, or are in some respects even worse. There are countless factories in the United States where 80 hour workweeks, and even working for months on end without a single scheduled day off, are the rule. To compensate for workers lost due to resignations, injury or COVID-19, thousands of poorly trained supplemental workers are being herded into workplaces. This has created unsafe working conditions that have led to horrifying industrial accidents, such as the death of Steven Dierkes when he fell into a crucible filled with molten metals at a Caterpillar foundry.

This has produced a surge of strikes and other forms of social protests, both in the US and around the world. The response of governments, driven by the logic of its class policy, is to resort to open repression. Biden’s attack on the railroaders’ right to strike finds its reflection in similar measures being taken by governments all over the world.

Three essential lessons for the working class flow from this. The first is the class character of the state, which is not a neutral body standing above society, but a “committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie,” as Marx put it. As workers enter into a struggle over wages, working conditions and other basic issues, they find themselves more and more locked in a political struggle with the capitalist state. The first condition for a victory in this struggle is the complete independence of the working class from all the capitalist parties, both right and nominally “left.”

The second is that a movement of the working class depends upon the development of organizations independent of the pro-corporate trade union apparatus—rank-and-file committees, composed of and controlled by the workers themselves, through which they can unify their struggles across industries and countries. To this end, the International Committee of the Fourth International has initiated the formation of the International Workers Alliance of Rank-and-File Committees (IWA-RFC).

The third lesson is the social interests of the working class are incompatible with the maintenance of the capitalist system. Capitalism, which long ago became obsolete, can only maintain itself through driving the working class to the brink. The opposition in the working class must therefore be rooted in an anti-capitalist, socialist perspective, based on the reorganization of society to meet human need, not private profit.

Large areas of Arctic seabed is damaged by trawlers

In some of the most popular fishing grounds north of Svalbard, more than half of the sea bottom has deep wounds from trawl bags.


Trawlers damage major areas of Arctic seabed. 

Photo: Atle Staalesen

By Atle Staalesen
November 28, 2022

The Norwegian marine researchers that set out on Arctic expedition this summer expected to find large areas of untouched seabed. But the actual situation was quite the opposite.

The studies that were conducted with a remotely operated underwater vehicle (ROV) showed deep wounds made by trawl bags over large parts of the area, the Norwegian Marine Research Institute informs.

“In the most popular fishing grounds we discovered tracks from the trawl bags over 52 percent of the studied area,” says marine researcher and head of expedition Pål Buhl-Mortensen.

“In total, we studied 233 sites at various depths and overall we found trawl tracks over 35 percent of the area,” he adds.

The damages in the seabed were found at depths down to 900 meters. The areas worst affected were located at between 200-400 meters depths. In some of areas there were tracks every three meter, Buhl-Mortensen explains.

The damages come when fishing vessels pull the trawl bags across the seabed for catch of shrimp and other marine species.

Consequences for local marine life is dramatic. Many of the species living on the sea bottom are considered endangered and they are very vulnerable to external pressure, the marine researchers say.

Some of the damages are believed to stretch back to the 1970s.

There are fishing vessels from a number of countries operating in the area. The biggest share of them are from Russia.

During the expedition, the researchers themselves experienced the pressure from the trawlers. “At times were were surrounded by trawlers of different nationality, among them from EU countries, Norway and Russia,” Buhl-Mortensen says.

Northern Sweden sees world’s first battery-powered underground mine truck made of fossil-free steel

Here it is, the full-scale working prototype truck to work deep down in the iron-ore mines of LKAB in Kiruna.

The prototype, a Minetruck MT42 Battery, has a dump box made from fossil-free steel. Photo: Epiroc

By Thomas Nilsen     
December 02, 2022

Said to be breakthrough sustainable innovation for the mining industry’s transition to low-carbon production, the very first battery-powered MT42 truck was presented this week.

LKAB, Europe’s largest iron-ore producer, is ready to put the vehicle into operations hundreds of meters under the surface at its mine inside the Arctic Circle.

Not only is the truck battery-powered with zero carbon emission when driving. The huge dump box to carry the ore is the first made from fossil-free steel made by Nordic steel giant SSAB near Luleå.

The Barents Observer has previously reported about the Swedish corporations’ efforts to be first in the world to produce steel with a minimum carbon footprint.

“Our fossil-free steel immediately reduces the carbon footprint to near zero without compromising the high quality and properties you would expect from SSAB steels. It is the same steel, just without the negative environmental impact,” says Johnny Sjöström, head of SSAB Special Steels.

Each of the dump boxes produced for the underground truck will result in a 10-tonne reduction of CO2 emission, the equivalent of taking five gasoline cars off the road for an entire year.

The battery technology for the Minetruck MT42 has been tested for over a year under extreme conditions in freezing cold mining environments, like the Kittilä gold mine in Finnish Lapland.

Last winter, the battery-powered mining truck was real-life tested at the Kittilä gold mine in northern Finland. Photo: Epiroc

Also Volvo has signed a deal with SSAB to use fossil-free steel in the manufacturing of its electric trucks for road traffic.

Volvo started series production of its heavy-duty electric 44-tonne trucks in September, and the first trucks are already delivered to Amazon and the Danish shipping company DFDS.

Fossil-free steel is produced by using hydrogen instead of coal in the ore reduction process, emitting water instead of CO2.

This story is posted on the Barents Observer

Researchers observe first Arctic fox in Finland for over 25 years

The Arctic fox has a thick fur with dense under-fur and long guard hairs to survive extreme cold. 

Photo: Thomas Nilsen

The combined population of Arctic foxes across the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian areas of Lapland may have hit a record high this year, according to David Bell, the head of the Felles Fjellrev Nord II project.

By  YLE News
December 01, 2022

The EU-funded Nord II project aims to save and protect the highly-endangered Arctic fox, which is also known as the white fox, polar fox, or snow fox.

Speaking to Swedish television channel SVT, Bell said that the population of the native Arctic tundra species has been restored to a viable level, with 19 dens recorded in Norrbotten, Swedish Lapland, while 16 were observed in northern Norway.

In Finland, an Arctic fox den was observed for the first time in over 25 years when researchers spotted one near the Enontekiö fells in Finnish Lapland during the summer.

The last confirmed sighting of such a den in Finland was in Utsjoki in 1996.

As recently as 2018, the adult population of the Arctic fox in the Nordic region was believed to have dropped to about 250 individuals, making the animal highly endangered amid serious fears for its extinction.

However, the Felles Fjellrev Nord II project’s findings indicate that the population across the Nordic region may have revived to such an extent that there is renewed hope for their survival.

“It is improving all the time. This year, a total of 162 confirmed pups were counted in Finland, Sweden and Norway. In Sweden there were 91, in Norway 70 and then in Finland this one,” Tuomo Ollila of Finland’s Parks and Wildlife agency Metsähallitus told Yle.

An Arctic fox pictured at a feeding site near the municipality of Enontekiö in Finnish Lapland. 

Photo: Metsähallitus

Although estimating the exact number of newborns is challenging, Ollila said that the figures suggest this could be a record year for the Arctic fox population in the Nordic region.

“It is difficult to say exactly how many pups there are, because the number of pups in many dens is not confirmed. But if you count by the average litter size, you would think that there would have been 600-700 pups, or at least 600 pups,” Ollila said.

The animal was hunted almost to extinction for its thick and white-as-snow fur, before it was protected by the introduction of a new law in 1940


This story is posted on the Barents Observer as part of Eye on the Arctic, a collaborative partnership between public and private circumpolar media organizations.

ARCTIC
Near Russia's main nuclear weapons test area comes heavy metals mine

The Pavlovsky mine will be located near nuclear weapons testing areas in Novaya Zemlya. Photo: First Ore Mine Company


Nuclear power company Rosatom gets final state approval for its zinc and lead mine in Arctic archipelago of Novaya Zemlya.

By Atle Staalesen
December 06, 202

Russia’s state expert appraisal company Glavgosexpertisa has officially approved the building of an ore processing plant in the far northern Novaya Zemlya.

The new mine will be located only few kilometres from areas extensively used for nuclear weapons testing until 1990. Novaya Zemlya is closed military area strictly controlled by the Russian Armed Forces.

Interestingly, Glavgosexpertisa marks its press release about the approved project with a “Z,” the symbol used by Russia in its war against Ukraine.

A major industrial development is now coming up in the remote island.

“This positive decision allows the First Ore Mining Company to start the development of the Pavlovskoye project,” representatives of the company inform.

The Pavlovsky mining area. Photo: pgrk.armz.ru

The mine will be located in the southern of the two islands, and is projected to produce an annual of 220,000 tons of zinc concentrate and 50,000 lead concentrate. The ores will be extracted from an open pit.

The First Ore Mining Company is a subsidiary of Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear power company.

From before, Glavgosexpertisa has approved the building of a project seaport in Bezimyannaya Bay on the shore of the Barents Sea. It will have capacity to handle up to 500,000 tons of goods per year.

The projected seaport on coast of Barents Sea. 

Picture by Eleron.ru

The Pavlovskoye mine holds a total of 19 million tons of ore, from which 620,000 tons of zinc, 131,000 tons of lead and 9,4 million ounces of silver can be extracted, Rosatom’s project development company VNIPIpromtekhnologia informs.

According to the project developers, a total of 7 alternative sites for the industrial facilities have been assessed along with as many as 28 alternative configurations for the seaport complex. Environmental considerations have been crucial, CEO Andrei Gladyshev explains.

“We have undertaken a big work to coordinate the project, including with environmental organisations, so that the construction works will not harm the environment,” he says.

Preparations for the mining operations have been going on for years. In the summer of 2018, engineers conducted preparatory works on site. A drilling rig collected sea bottom samples and there were also made assessments of the projected land-based parts of the terminal.

Rosatom originally planned to start production already in 2019.

Between 1973 and 1975, the southern island of Novaya Zemlya was used extensively for larger underground nuclear tests. Of the seven detonations that took place in the area, several ventilated radioactive gases to the atmosphere because the explosions were not deep enough in the ground.

From 1976 to 1990, all underground nuclear tests took place at the northern test-range in the Matochin Straight. Since 1990, only so-called sub-critical nuclear tests have been conducted at Novaya Zemlya.

Among the nuclear devices tested in the area is also the 58 megatons atmospheric hydrogen “Tsar-bomb” detonated on October 30, 1961.


This story is posted on the Barents Observer

US aircraft flew Norwegian airspace on surveillance mission outside Russia's nuclear sub bases

The U.S. RC-135 Rivet Joint surveillance aircraft (marked red) was over Often area around 14.00 Norwegian time on Wednesday en route south to the air base Mildenhall in Great Britain. The plane came from international airspace outside Russia's Northern Fleet bases on the Kola Peninsula. Screenshot from FlightRadar24.com


Norway’s reassurance policy towards Russia has for the most followed a practice that allied intelligence missions to airspace outside the Kola Peninsula should not take off, land, or fly over Norwegian airspace. On Wednesday, a U.S. Air Force plane was indeed inside Norwegian airspace, both before and after the flight aimed to monitor Russia's military forces from above the eastern Barents Sea.

Thomas Nilsen

November 02, 2022

The security crisis in Europe has rippling effects on the North.

After joint training with a pair of Norwegian F-35 fighter jets over Troms region inside the Arctic Circle on Wednesday, the American RC-135W aircraft continued to international airspace over the Barents Sea and flew a well-known surveillance route just north of Russia’s Kola Peninsula.

These are the home waters of the powerful Northern Fleet’s nuclear-powered submarines and surface warships.

The Barents Observer tracked the aircraft via FlightRadar24 after newspaper Nordlys earlier in the day published a photo taken by a local showing the RC-135 wing-by-wing with the F-35s over Ringvassøya.

At 12.45 pm (Norwegian time) the U.S. plane was north of Murmansk on return.

Flying a northwest route, the plane suddenly turned south from international airspace and entered Norwegian airspace just north of Honningsvåg. The plane continued south over Sørøya, Kvænangen and further towards the Ofoten region at 32,000 feet.

It flew along the Norwegian mainland towards Trøndelag and the southern regions of Norway before crossing the North Sea en route back to the military air base Mildenhall in Great Britain.

Spokesperson with the Norwegian Air Force, Lieutenant colonel Eivind Byre, confirms to the Barents Observer that there was joint training in the air earlier in the day.

“It was training with American and Norwegian aircraft over Norwegian airspace today. What the Americans did after the training, in international airspace, is something we can’t answer for,” Lt. Col. Byre said.

He declined to comment more in detail on the KC-135’s return flight over mainland Norway, as seen on FlightRadar24.

The plane landed at the airbase in Mildenhall north of London shortly before 4 pm local time.

The American military plane flew over Norway for most of the flight back from neutral waters north of the Kola Peninsula. Screenshot from FlightRadar24

Although the Defense Ministry in Oslo is reluctant to answer directly if there are any changes made, now greenlighting such flights, Wednesday’s activity is seen positively.

“Allied presence and activity in Norway and our surrounding areas is a prerequisite for allied support in the event of crisis and war, and constitutes a central element in our security and defense policy. We have extensive experience in working with the US and other allies on monitoring in the northern regions. This is positive and in line with the long lines of Norwegian security policy,” said spokesperson Ann Kristin Bergit Salbuvik in an email to the Barents Observer.

Norway was one of the 12 founding members of NATO. But, being a small nation with direct land border with the Soviet Union, the country has all since 1949 tried to balance its security relations with the much larger neighbor to the east on deterrence and reassurance.

The reassurance includes a ban on nuclear weapons on Norwegian soil, no foreign military bases and strict limitations on other NATO countries’ possibilities to exercise in the eastern part of Finnmark region. Foreign fighter jets or bombers should not fly in a defined security zone near the Russian border, limited to east of 28 degrees.

Also, as part of the reassurance policy, allied intelligence missions north of the Kola Peninsula are advised not to happen from Norwegian airports.
Case-by-case permission

Such surveillance flights in transit over Norwegian airspace to or from missions near Russian airspace in the north need special clearance from the Ministry of Defense in Oslo, in every single case.

Therefore, such flights by the United Kingdom or the United States starts from airbases in the UK and the flight up north have for the most been outside Norwegian airspace.

All airspace outside 12 nautical miles from a coastal state’s baseline is international airspace where all nations are allowed to fly.

Senior Defense Analyst Per Erik Solli with the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs explains that there is currently an opening on a case-by-case basis to allow allied non-combat aircraft on a Barents Sea surveillance mission to transit through Norwegian airspace.

“The Norwegian policy and rules and practice regarding Allied military aircraft missions in the High North is not written in stone. The regime has been adapted and adjusted several times since the 1950s, the last time in 2019,” Solli said to the Barents Observer.
Russian military activity

Last week, Russia tested its nuclear triad, including a Sineva ballistic missile launched from a Delta-IV submarine in the Barents Sea and Yars mobile ground missile launched from the Plesetsk cosmodrome in the Arkhangelsk region.

For this week, November 3 to 5, two larger areas in the Barents Sea and the White Sea are closed off with NOTAM warnings. It is not said what kind of military activity will take place, more than a mention of “rocket shooting” for the area west of Novaya Zemlya.

Russia has closed off two larger areas in the north for the period November 3 to 5. One Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) is activated over the Barents Sea west of Novaya Zemlya, while another is active over the White Sea north of Arkhangelsk. Source: NotamMap / Barents Observer
Military alert level raised

On November 1, the Government in Oslo decided to increase the readiness of the Norwegian Armed Forces.

‘We are confronting the most serious security situation we have seen in decades. There are no indications that Russia intends to expand its war to other countries, but rising tensions mean that we are more exposed to threats, espionage and foreign influence operations. This makes it necessary for all NATO countries, including Norway, to be more vigilant,’ said Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre.

Speaking at the Nordic Council meeting in Helsinki on Wednesday, Norway’s Defense Minister Bjørn Arild Gram said Russia’s brutal war on Ukraine causes long-lasting changes in the security situation for the Nordic region.

The minister underlined the importance of the Nordic defense cooperation.

“Finnish and Swedish NATO membership will be the start of a new era in Nordic security policies,” Gram said.

From Moscow, foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova noted Norway’s strengthened national security, calling it “Oslo’s conscious choice of the destructive policy of escalating tensions in the Euro-Arctic region.”

The spokesperson added:

“It is impossible not to notice that over the past few years Oslo has been consistently pursuing a policy of abandoning the policy of ‘self-restraints‘ and is stepping up military preparations in the northern regions adjacent to the Russian-Norwegian border.”

This story is posted on the Barents Observer

GANGSTA CAPITALI$M

UN aid chief: Gangs control about 60% of Haiti's capital

By Edith M. Lederer | AP
December 8, 2022 

UNITED NATIONS — Close to 60% of Haiti’s capital is dominated by gangs whose violence and sexual attacks have caused thousands to flee their homes, the U.N. humanitarian chief in the Caribbean nation said Thursday.

Ulrika Richardson said that has left nearly 20,000 people in the capital facing “catastrophic famine-like conditions” as a cholera outbreak spreads throughout Haiti.

Richardson painted a grim picture of a country in a downward spiral, with half its population in urgent need of food assistance as the number of cholera deaths has risen to 283. She said close to 12,000 people have been hospitalized with the disease since Oct. 2, and there are now a total of more than 14,000 suspected cholera cases in eight of the country’s 10 regions.

She said all but 1,000 of the 20,000 Haitians facing starvation are in the capital, Port-au-Prince, mainly in the Cite Soleil slum controlled by the gangs. Richardson said insecurity has led to “massive displacement,” especially in the capital, where 155,000 people have fled their homes.

She said at a news conference that the gangs are using “very terrifying levels of sexual violence as a weapon” to keep people under control, instill fear and punishment.

She said gang battles over territory and their criminal actions are tearing society apart and escalating insecurity.

Political instability has simmered in Haiti since last year’s still-unsolved assassination of President Jovenal Moïse, who had faced protests calling for his resignation over corruption charges.

Daily life in Haiti began to spin out of control in September just hours after Prime Minister Ariel Henry said fuel subsidies would be eliminated, causing prices to double. A gang led by Jimmy “Barbecue” Cherizier, a former police officer, blocked the Varreux fuel terminal, setting off a fuel crisis.

The U.N. Security Council imposed sanctions on Cherizier on Oct. 21, and he announced on Nov. 6 that his G9 gang federation was lifting the blockade.

But despite the availability of fuel, Richardson said, the humanitarian, security and political situation is worsening, saying that “everyone is affected by the violence.”

Hentry and Haiti’s Council of Ministers sent an urgent appeal Oct. 7 calling for U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to dispatch an international military force to tackle Haiti’s violence and alleviate its humanitarian crisis.

Richardson said U.N. Security Council members have held intensive discussions since then focusing on the “potential leadership and potential composition of such a force,” but so far there has been no decision.

“What is very important here is that the gang violence needs to be addressed,” she said.

While discussions are continuing in the Security Council, Richardson said the United Nations and a lot of countries are helping Haiti’s national police force — “and they need a lot of support in terms of equipment and training.”

In mid-November, the U.N. launched an emergency appeal for $145 million to respond to Haiti’s cholera outbreak and rising hunger, but so far it has received just $23.5 million, she said.

Richardson said the U.N. will be appealing for $719 million for Haiti for 2023, double the amount this year, because of the dramatic deterioration of the humanitarian situation.

On a positive note, she said, schools are being reopened at the level of about 53% throughout the country, mainly in the south. Many of the 4 million children in Haiti haven’t had any proper education since the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak in March 2020, she said.

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2022/12/gang-warfare-like-haiti-jamaica.html

Cholera’s continued spread in Haiti a ‘worrying trend’


08 December 2022



As cholera continues to spread in Haiti, a $145 million appeal to support the response is only 16 per cent funded, the top UN aid official there reported on Thursday.

Ulrika Richardson, UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in the Caribbean country, updated journalists in New York on the deadly outbreak, which was declared on 2 October.

So far, 283 people have died, nearly 12,000 have been hospitalized, and more than 14,000 suspected cases have been recorded.
Increase in cases

“What we are seeing in fact, is not only the continued increase of cholera cases, but also the spread to the regions,” she said.

“In eight of the 10 departments there are confirmed cholera cases, and this is a worrying trend for us and for the country.”

Ms. Richardson is at UN Headquarters for a three-day visit to meet with senior officials and colleagues on the outbreak, which is unfolding amid political instability, gang violence and unprecedented hunger.

The flash appeal was launched last month to support emergency cholera response and to provide life-saving assistance to 1.4 million people living in affected areas. Some $23.5 million has been received to date, she said.

 

UNOCHA/Christian Cricboom
Ulrika Richardson (centre), the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Haiti visits a cholera treatment centre in Port-au-Prince.

Insecurity and violations

While grateful for the funding, Ms. Richardson highlighted the immense needs as a new year approaches.

“In fact, the humanitarian needs continue to increase,” she said, adding that the UN is currently preparing the 2023 Humanitarian Response Plan for Haiti, which calls for $719 million, or roughly double the amount requested this year.

Meanwhile, “insecurity continues to be rampant, with really chilling reports of human rights violations,” she reported.

Gangs dominate nearly 60 per cent of the capital, Port-au-Prince, and use terrifying means to keep the population in control, including sexual violence. Women and girls are affected, but so are men and boys, as the gangs fight over territory.

“That territory is worth both fighting for and defending at all costs, and the cost here is a human cost,” she said.

The insecurity has also sparked massive displacement, particularly in the capital. Some 155,000 people have been uprooted – a nearly 80 per cent increase since August.
UN commitment

Ms. Richardson also pointed to a positive development, noting that more than half of schools have reopened, despite all the challenges.

School closures have affected some four million children, many of whom have not had proper access to education since the start of the COVID-19Opens in new window pandemic.

The Humanitarian Coordinator in Haiti underscored the UN’s continued support to the country, whether in cholera response, education, or distribution of food and other items to vulnerable families.

“We have logistical challenges, you can imagine, and the security challenge, but we are able to be present and we are able to help people,” she told journalists.

“We are obviously focusing on the most vulnerable, but we also try not to lose focus on the real structural root causes. So, we have corruption, we have impunity, we have governance, and all of that needs to really be at the centre also of our thinking as we go forward.”

Russian court sentences war critic to eight years for spreading ‘fake news’

By Mary Ilyushina
December 9, 2022

Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin is shown standing in the defendant's dock in a Moscow courtroom, just before he was sentenced to eight years and six months in prison for allegedly spreading "fake news" about the war in Ukraine. Russia has outlawed criticism of the war. 

Yuri Kochetkov/Pool/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

RIGA, Latvia — A Russian court on Friday sentenced an opposition politician, Ilya Yashin, to eight years and six months in prison on charges of “spreading false information” about atrocities by Russian forces in Ukraine — the latest criminal verdict intended to silence critics of President Vladimir Putin’s war.

Yashin, 39, posted a YouTube video in April in which he dissected the potential war crimes documented by Western journalists and Ukrainian officials in the city of Bucha, near Kyiv, in an effort to debunk the official Kremlin line that those reports were staged or fabricated to smear Russia.

The Kremlin in the early days of its invasion took aggressive steps to suppress criticism of the war by pushing through laws that made it illegal to criticize the military or the government, or even to call the war a “war” rather than a special military operation, with violations punishable by up to 15 years in jail.

While there have been dozens of prosecutions, the laws have been enforced selectively to target longtime opponents of Putin such as Yashin, while pro-war hawks and Kremlin propagandists are allowed to engage in fierce criticism of Russian military commanders who have overseen heavy battlefield losses.

Yashin’s YouTube video served as the basis of the criminal case initiated against him under the new laws, which also prohibited disseminating what the authorities consider “fake news” about the Russian military.

The threat of long prison sentences and the Kremlin’s far-reaching attempts to quash any dissent prompted thousands of Russians to flee the country, but some, like Yashin, decided to stay.

Shortly after the sentence was announced, Yashin’s lawyers posted a defiant message on his Telegram blog, urging his supporters to continue to protest the invasion.

“The trial was supposed to serve as the denunciation of ‘an enemy of the people,’ i.e. me, but it turned into an antiwar tribune, and in response, we only heard prosecutor’s incoherent Cold War slogans,” the post said. “I can only repeat what was said on the day of my arrest: I am not afraid, and you should not be afraid. Changes are coming.”

Yashin is a veteran of the anti-Kremlin opposition who rose to prominence during mass protests against fraudulent national parliamentary elections and Putin’s return to the presidency in 2011 and 2012. Later, Yashin led the People’s Freedom Party, known as PARNAS, and served as a municipal official in Moscow’s Krasnoselsky district.

During this week’s hearings in Yashin’s case, the prosecutor, Sergei Belov, accused the politician of spreading “Western propaganda” from “unfriendly states such as the United States and its satellites.”

“Yashin directly distributes enemy propaganda of low quality,” Belov said. “While our soldiers are at the front, and millions of citizens support the troops, Yashin is helping the enemy.”

In courtroom speeches throughout the trial, Yashin spoke about the need to remain in Russia to “speak the truth loudly” and help stop the bloodshed in Ukraine.

“It’s better to spend 10 years behind bars as an honest man than to quietly burn in shame over the blood spilled by your government,” he said during a hearing Tuesday.

Putin, when asked by a reporter in a news conference on Friday whether he thinks that “eight years for words is too brutal,” said of Yashin: “Who is he? Interfering in the work of the country is unacceptable and I consider it inappropriate to question the decision of the court.”

Yashin is a close ally of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who is also now serving a long prison sentence for violating terms of his parole on charges stemming from a fraud case that was widely derided as politically motivated. In August 2020, Navalny was nearly killed in a poisoning attack carried out by a Russian government hit squad.

“I have known Ilya Yashin since he was 18 years old, and he is probably the first friend I made in politics,” Navalny said in a message shared by his lawyers Friday on social media. “Another shameless and lawless Putin verdict will not silence Ilya and should not intimidate the honest people of Russia. This is another reason we must fight and I have no doubt that we will win in the end.”

The news of the verdict was cheered loudly by pro-war commentators. One said Yashin should “sew mittens for the army along with Navalny." Another called him “a Nazi holdover and liberal trash.”

Human rights advocates said Yashin was being persecuted for his political views.

“Ilya Yashin spoke out about some of Russian forces’ atrocities in Ukraine in full knowledge of the personal risks,” said Rachel Denber, deputy Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “That should never be grounds for legal action, yet the Kremlin relentlessly continues to persecute high-profile pro-democracy figures and opponents of Russia’s war in Ukraine.”

Since the beginning of the invasion, Russian authorities have arrested, detained or fined nearly 20,000 peaceful antiwar protesters and individuals who spoke out publicly against the war.

Yashin’s sentence is the harshest to date out of the nearly 100 criminal cases initiated by Russian prosecutors in the eight months since the new laws were adopted. In July, Moscow municipal deputy Alexei Gorinov was sentenced to seven years in prison on similar charges after he opened a public meeting with a moment of silence for those dying in the war.

In April, a Russian court charged dissident and Washington Post contributor Vladimir Kara-Murza under the same article, after he called the Russian government “a regime of murderers” in an interview. On Thursday, Russian media reported that Kara-Murza will remain in pretrial detention until Feb. 12.

Russia-Ukraine war: Nato chief fears conflict could become wider

AP
By Jamey Keaten
9 Dec, 2022

Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg gives a lecture on Russia, Ukraine and Nato's security policy challenges. Photo / AP

The head of Nato has expressed worry that the fighting in Ukraine could spin out of control and become a war between Russia and Nato, according to an interview released on Friday.

“If things go wrong, they can go horribly wrong,” Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said in remarks to Norwegian broadcaster NRK.

“It is a terrible war in Ukraine. It is also a war that can become a full-fledged war that spreads into a major war between Nato and Russia,” he said. “We are working on that every day to avoid that.”

Stoltenberg, a former prime minister of Norway, said in the interview that “there is no doubt that a full-fledged war is a possibility”, adding that it was important to avoid a conflict “that involves more countries in Europe and becomes a full-fledged war in Europe”.

The Kremlin has repeatedly accused Nato allies of effectively becoming a party to the conflict by providing Ukraine with weapons, training its troops and feeding military intelligence to attack Russian forces.

In comments that reflected soaring tensions between Russia and the West, President Vladimir Putin suggested Moscow might think about using what he described as the US concept of a preemptive strike.

“Speaking about a disarming strike, maybe it’s worth thinking about adopting the ideas developed by our US counterparts, their ideas of ensuring their security,” he said.

Keep up to date with the day's biggest storiesSign up to our daily curated newsletter for the day's top stories straight to your inbox.
SIGN UP
By signing up for this newsletter, you agree to NZME’s Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
I’m not interested in Top News Stories newsletter. Please don’t show me this again.

Long before the Ukraine war, the Kremlin expressed concern about US efforts to develop the so-called Prompt Global Strike capability that envisions hitting an adversary’s strategic targets with precision-guided conventional weapons anywhere in the world within one hour.

Putin noted that such a strike could knock out command facilities.

“We are just thinking about it, they weren’t shy to openly talk about it during the past years,” he said, claiming that Moscow’s precision-guided cruise missiles outperform similar US weapons and Russia has hypersonic weapons that the US hasn’t deployed.

An aerial view of Bakhmut, the site of the heaviest battles with Russian troops, in the Donetsk region, Ukraine. Photo / AP

Putin also said he was disappointed with former German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s recent comments that a 2015 peace deal for eastern Ukraine negotiated by France and Germany had bought time for Ukraine to prepare for the 2022 war.

“I assumed that other participants of the process were sincere with us, but it turned out that they were cheating us,” he said. “It turned out that they wanted to pump Ukraine with weapons and prepare for hostilities.”

Putin argued that Merkel’s statement showed that Russia was right in launching what he calls the “special military operation” in Ukraine. “Perhaps we should have started it earlier,” he said.

He also said her comments further eroded Russia’s trust in the West, complicating any possible peace talks.

“Eventually we will have to negotiate an agreement,” he said. “But after such statements, there is an issue of trust. Trust is close to zero. I repeatedly have said that we are ready for an agreement, but it makes us think, think about whom we are dealing with.”

In separate comments via video link to defence and security chiefs of several ex-Soviet nations, Putin again accused the West of using Ukraine as a tool against his country.

“For many years, the West shamelessly exploited and pumped out its resources, encouraged genocide and terror in the Donbas and effectively turned the country into a colony,” he said. “Now it’s cynically using the Ukrainian people as cannon fodder, as a ram against Russia by continuing to supply Ukraine with weapons and ammunition, sending mercenaries and pushing it to a suicidal track.”

Ukrainians say they are fighting for freedom against an unwanted invader and aggressor.


British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak spoke to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy by phone and both “agreed on the importance of preempting Russia’s insincere calls for a cease-fire”, Sunak’s office said. “The prime minister added that the Kremlin needed to withdraw its forces before any agreement could be considered.”

What Is Stiff Person Syndrome? Celine Dion Announces Diagnosis of Rare Disease

The rare neurological disease affects about one to two people in a million


Margaret Osborne
Daily Correspondent

December 9, 2022

Singer Celine Dion on stage during the 2016 Billboard Music Awards in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Photo by JB Lacroix / WireImage

Canadian popstar Celine Dion announced on Instagram this week the postponement of her upcoming tour due to a diagnosis of stiff person syndrome, a rare neurological disease that affects about one in a million people.

“I’ve been dealing with problems with my health for a long time, and it’s been really difficult for me to face these challenges and to talk about everything that I’ve been going through,” Dion says in her video. “I always give one hundred percent when I do my shows, but my condition is not allowing me to do that right now.”

So what exactly is stiff person syndrome?

It s an autoimmune and neurological disorder that causes rigidity and spasms in the torso and limbs, debilitating pain and chronic anxiety, per the Stiff Person Syndrome Research Foundation. The spasms can occur randomly or in response to environmental stimuli like loud noises or emotional distress, and they can last anywhere from seconds to hours, Pavan Tankha, the medical director of comprehensive pain recovery at Cleveland Clinic, tells the New York Times’ Nicole Stock. They can even be so violent as to dislocate joints or break bones.

“Just imagine having the worst Charley Horse you can have but it’s affecting a ton of muscles in your lower back and legs — and it’s constant,” Kunal Desai, professor of neurology at Yale University, tells the Washington Post’s Lindsey Bever, Richard Sima and Annabelle Timsit. “It’s very painful.”

Dion explains that the muscle spasms “affect every aspect of my daily life, sometimes causing difficulties when I walk and not allowing me to use my vocal cords to sing the way I’m used to.”

While the cause of the condition is unknown, research suggests it may be the result of an awry response in the brain and spinal cord, per CBS News’ Li Cohen. Some with the syndrome have higher levels of antibodies to an enzyme called glutamic acid decarboxylase, or GAD65. This enzyme facilitates the formation of a neurotransmitter called GABA that “helps to reduce nerve and muscle excitation,” per the Stiff Person Syndrome Research Foundation.

The disease can affect anyone, but it occurs more in women and people aged 20 to 50 and very rarely in children. Currently, there is no cure, but medications such as sedatives, muscle relaxants and steroids can be used to relieve symptoms.

Earlier this year, Dion canceled several shows on her North American tour and on her Las Vegas residency, citing health concerns. Now, eight of her shows scheduled for summer 2023 will be canceled and her spring 2023 shows will be rescheduled to 2024.

"This is just such a severe diagnosis to have, especially if you’re an entertainer [on] the world-class type of stage," Simon Helfgott, a rheumatologist at Harvard Medical School, tells NBC News’ Aria Bendix. "It’s going to be very, very challenging to be able to continue."

Stiff person syndrome itself is not fatal, but it can be debilitating and complications from the disease can lead to a shortened life expectancy, per the Times. While it’s difficult to predict how the disease will progress, most people see a worsening of stiffness and spasms over time. "In some cases, the condition can level off and stay the way it is. I have people who are like that — they're no different now than they were 10 years ago," Helfgott tells NBC. "In others, it is a slow, subtle decline."

Though Dion’s video was solemn, she says she remains optimistic. “I have a great team of doctors working alongside me to help me get better and my precious children, who are supporting me and giving me hope,” she says. “I have hope that I’m on the road to recovery. This is my focus and I’m doing everything that I can to recuperate.”

“I love you guys so much, and I really hope I can see you again real soon,” she adds.




Margaret Osborne | | READ MORE
Margaret Osborne is a freelance journalist based in the southwestern U.S. Her work has appeared in the Sag Harbor Express and has aired on WSHU Public Radio.