Oppose repression of mass uprising in Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

By Farooq Tariq

Published 31 July, 2026

In one of the most brutal attacks on an unarmed rally, Pakistani rangers and police killed at least 18 Kashmiris, and left dozens injured, on July 28.

The direct firing by state forces on demonstrators was without any provocation. Participants of the Long March to Kashmir capital Muzafarabad were camping for over a month in the outskirts of Rawalakot, one of the main cities in Pakistani-controlled Jammu Kashmir.

Thousands joined the call of the Jammu Kashmir Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC), a non-partisan civil society mass organisation who had led earlier mass campaigns for lowering electricity prices.

This time they were asking for election reforms to enable real representation for Kashmiris. They were demanding an end to the 12 seats for Muhajirs (migrants) Kashmiris settled in Pakistan. These seats were mainly a political gimmick used to form governments in Jammu Kashmir.

JAC was banned after lengthy negotiations with them by the state ministers that failed. The JAAC was deemed a terrorist organisation linked to India, and its main leaders as agents of India’s RAW [Research and Analysis Wing foreign intelligence agency]. Most of the main leaders were arrested. A curfew was imposed in Rawalakot, the main centre of resistance to state repression.

However, in one of the most glaring examples of mass awakening, the whole Kashmir was almost shut down on the call of JAAC. No shops opened and there was no internet or people in the streets. JAAC had become the real representative of Kashmiris.

The government wanted to go ahead with the scheduled July 27 general elections. However, a mass boycott of the whole process meant very small numbers of people voted.

The same day, JAAC announced its Long March to Muzafarabad, which was fired upon and attacked with tear gas.

One of the main characteristics of this mass movement for civil and political rights was the participation of women, who came in thousands every day to the sit-in outside Rawalkot for over a month. They brought food for participants and ensured the sit-in could continue.

Never has such a brave mass movement been witnessed in this region as the one currently unfolding in Pakistani-controlled Jammu Kashmir. More than 50 protesters have been killed by state forces since the movement started a month ago.

The Long March has started again from Rawlakot where, despite the bloodshed, participants were able to enter the city despite the security forces’ barriers.

Solidarity from international labour and civil society movements is urgently needed. Please condemn the deaths and repression by sending protest letters to Pakistan embassies. Please raise the issue wherever possible. The death of innocent Kashmiris should not go unheard.

The names of the July 28 martyrs are listed below.

1. Naeem Butt – Kotli, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

2. Usman Nazir – Rawalakot, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

3. Nisar Ahmed – Baloch, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

4. Kashif Yaqoob – Rawalakot, Pakistan-administered JammuKashmir

5. Sardar Fida Hussain – Tatrinote, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

6. Muzammil – Ali Sojal, Pakistan-administered JammuKashmir

7. Basit Shah – Hajira, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

8. Fahim Afzal – Chhota Gala, Rawalakot, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

9. Kamran Mushtaq – Panakha, S/o Mushtaq, Hajira, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

10. Zargham Khalil – Darek, Rawalakot, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

11. Saqib Hanif – Reerh Bann, Rawalakot, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

12. Saqib Ishaq – Numb, Gawara, Palandri, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

13. Areej Asghar – Tatta Pani, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

14. Usman Gul – Darek Dhok, Rawalakot, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

15. Jaffar Pehlwan – Tatrinote, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

16. Nisar Shaheen – Pakho, Narbai, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

17. Ali Hussain – Khari Sharif, Mirpur, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

18. Khawaja Abrar Latif Dar – Khurshidabad, Haveli, Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir

Deaths in Pakistani controlled Kashmir


Thursday 30 July 2026, by Farooq Sulehria, Farooq Tariq

Farooq Sulehria made this podcast for Struggle TV about events in Kashmir. International Viewpoint brings you the transcript. Farooq Tariq wrote on the same subject, his article follows. An appeal for solidarity has already been published “Jammu-Kashmir progressive organisations call for global solidarity”.

I’m doing this program with a very heavy heart. Yesterday in Rawalakot, another twenty one people were killed. This is second time in almost seven weeks that Rawalakot has been the site of another massacre.

Earlier, on the night, between 6 and 7 June, the security forces fired on a peaceful sit in in Rawalakot. And at least ten people were killed at that time. What is going on in Kashmir has largely been ignored in global media. Not only global media. Even the Pakistani mainstream media is either not covering it or is simply busy doing an ugly propaganda against an Intifada-like movement which has gripped Pakistani controlled Jammu and Kashmir.

I perhaps need to offer a bit of context to an international audience listening to this podcast. Well, there was a long march announced by Joint Awami Action Committee (or Joint People’s Action Committee), which is an organizational form of a huge social movement that has gripped this region of Jammu and Kashmir in about three years.

This was third time that they had announced a long march from Mirpur, which is an important town in one corner of the Jammu and Kashmir. And they were supposed to march on Muzaffarabad, the capital of Jammu and Kashmir. Jammu and Kashmir is an autonomous region. In a way, it is not part of Pakistan. It is not integrated into Pakistan the way India has integrated the occupied part of Jammu and Kashmir that India controls.

Jammu and Kashmir under Pakistani control, has its own parliament, own prime minister, own Supreme Court and elections were supposed to be held on 27 July, yesterday. The first round of elections was held in fact, yesterday, and it was largely boycotted. There were hardly any voters turning out to vote anyway.

Ahead of these elections, the Joint Action Committee had announced a long march on Muzaffarabad, and the key demand was to rescind twelve seats reserved for the refugees. The refugees from Indian held Jammu and Kashmir, who migrated to Pakistan and were settled in Pakistan for last about eighty years. There are twelve seats reserved for them now. The problem was: through these reserved seats. Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan. Or, you know, the Pakistani state, would control the election system and form a government of their choice in Muzaffarabad. So there was this demand by Joint Awami Action Committee to eliminate these seats, to end these reserved quotas for refugees, so that a genuine government that represents the people of Jammu and Kashmir, in Pakistani controlled Kashmir, can form a government of their choice. Ahead of this Long March, which was supposed to begin on 9 June, the security forces tried to kidnap one of the key leaders, Umar Nazir. Kashmiri, who comes from Rawalakot and Rawalakot, has been the hub of this movement. That’s where this movement started and was translated into an organizational form called Joint Awami Action Committee.

This Joint Awami Action Committee has a core committee. It has almost thirty three core members, and they represent all parts of Jammu and Kashmir. That is to say, Pakistani controlled Jammu and Kashmir. Every district has a branch of Joint Awami Action Committee. These people are elected by the by the residents of that area. The attempt to kidnap Umar Nazir Kashmiri outside of Rawalakot on 5 June, actually led to the killing of his close associate, Shahzeb, his close comrade. He was killed, a young man in his early thirties, and Umar Nazir Kashmiri himself was injured in the police firing. The residents of Rawalakot started a sit in with the dead body of Shahzeb outside of the local military hospital, and next night, the security forces, fired live ammunition on the agitators. And at least ten or twelve people were killed in the incident. This really agitated the entire region. And despite the atmosphere of fear, the Long March was started from Mirpur and on its way to Rawalakot, which is halfway Muzaffarabad, the long march was fired upon yet again, and at least five people were killed. And according to different accounts, seven people were killed. Well, this long march arrived, Rawalakot. Meantime, Rawalakot was under curfew and the whole region was under the siege, the state of Pakistan stopped the trucks bringing food for the region.

This is a landlocked region. Every food item, medicine, everything comes through. Pakistan. Internet shutdown has been imposed. It has largely been imposed ever since fifth or sixth of June, especially in Rawalakot region. It is very difficult to communicate with people. Even mobile services were disconnected, shut down. Anyhow, when this Long March arrived, Rawalakot, they started a sit in, a huge sit in which went on for over fifty days. In fact fifty three days until 26 July.

The security forces yet again attacked the sit in at least two times or three times. Some deaths occurred. So far, at least over seventy people have been killed in state violence from, you know, 5, 6 June to yesterday. But yesterday was the most violent day. At least, twenty one people, as I said earlier, have been killed.

Yesterday, the sit in which started its march yet again entered the city of Rawalakot, which was under curfew. Hundreds and hundreds of people. I do not have confirmed figure, but at least fifty to sixty thousand people were marching in the processions. From different sides, they entered the town. They wanted to end the siege of the town, curfew in the town and live ammunition was fired on the marchers. The violence continues. I’m doing this podcast at a time when I’m receiving more unsettling news from Mirpur, where a small protest demonstration was held to protest against the killings in Rawalakot yesterday.

More violence is feared, according to the reports that are pouring in. The security forces are still shelling at the the protesters, there is firing. There is use of tear gas. And the protesters, they are holding their ground. They refuse to budge. And they promise to continue their march on Muzaffarabad. I think by the end of this day, many people are fearing more deaths. This is a kind of very sad situation. And, even bigger tragedy is the fact that, this incident has been and the entire movement, which is in fact very promising, very progressive from many viewpoints, has been ignored internationally.

Now, the urgent appeal is to show solidarity, to speak about this ongoing Movement. The State of Pakistan should show restraint. Progressive forces all over the world should send protest and should show solidarity with this movement. Hopefully we expect that there will be some sort of dialogue process. And this violence will come to an end. Some of the key demands should be met. Even if Joint Action Committee has watered down its demands, the state is not listening them. The state is bent upon crushing this movement. State is bent upon showing zero tolerance, as they call it, for the movement. I will try to update you later this evening or maybe tomorrow morning. Let’s hope things de-escalate.

28 July 2026

---

Deaths in Pakistani controlled Kashmir

Farooq Tariq

Last night, on 27th July, in one of most brutal attack on an unarmed rally, Pakistani rangers and police have killed at least 19 Kashmiris, Dozens were injured.

This direct firing by state forces on the demonstrators was without any provocation. The participants of the long march to Kashmir capital Muzafarabad were camping for over a month in the outskirts of Rawalakot, one of main city of Pakistani controlled Kashmir.

They were in thousands who came on the call of Jammu Kashmir Joint Awami Action Committee, a non partisan civil society mass organisation who had led earlier mass campaigns for lowering of electricity prices.

This time they were asking election reforms which enable Kashmiris for real representation. They were demanding an end of 12 seats for Muhajirs (migrants) Kashmiris settled in Pakistan. These seats were mainly a political gimmick used to form the governments in Kashmir.

JAC was banned after lengthy negotiations with them by the state ministers that failed. The JAC was termed as a terrorist organisation linked to India and main leaders as Indian RAW agents. Most of the main leaders were arrested. A curfew was imposed in Rawalakot, the main centre of resistence to state repression.

However, in one of most glaring example of mass awakening, whole Kashmir was almost shut down on the call of JAC, no shops opened and no internet and no people in the streets. JAC had become the real representative of Kashmiris.

The Government wanted to go ahead with the scheduled general elections on 27th July 2026. It did go for general elections with a mass boycott of the whole process and very small numbers of people voting.

The same day, on 27th July, JAC had announced the long march to Muzafarabad, which was met with direct firing and tear gas.

One of the main characteristics of this mass movement for civil and political rights was the participation of women who came in thousands every day at the sit in outside Rawalkot for over a month. They brought food for the
Participants of the sit in and did all efforts that could help to continue the sit in.

Never ever such a brave mass movement is witnessed by this region as this one from Pakistani controlled Kashmir. Over 50 have been killed by the state forces since the movement started a month ago. Now around 20 more last night.

The long march will start again today from Rawlakot where despite the bloodshed, the participants were able to enter the city and break the barriers of the state to stop them.

This is to demand solidarity form the international labour and civil movements. Please condemn the death and direct firing and send protest letters to Pakistan embassies. Please raise the issue where ever possible. The death on innocent barre Kashmiris should not go unheard.

28 July 2026

Farooq Tariq

• Farooq Tariq is General Secretary, Pakistan Kissan Rabita Committee.
  and President Haqooq Khalq Party. He previously played leading roles Awami Workers’ Party and before that of Labour Party Pakistan.

Farooq Sulehria

• Farooq Sulehria teaches at Beaconhouse National University, Lahore. He is author of Media Imperialism in India and Pakistan (Routledge) and editor of Pakistan’s Foreign Policy and Strategic Relations in the Twenty-First Century, forthcoming for Palgrave Macmillan.

Urgent appeal: Stand in solidarity with the people of Jammu Kashmir

By Jammu Kashmir National Students Federation, Jammu Kashmir National Awami Party, Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front, Jammu Kashmir Students Liberation Front, Peoples Revolutionary Front, Daily Jeddojehad.com & South Asian Solidarity Network USA

Published 31 July, 2026

The people of Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir (PaJK) are facing one of the bloodiest episodes of state repression in recent history. A mass movement built around economic and democratic demands has been met with curfews, communication blackouts, live ammunition, and collective punishment. 

The administration in PaJK has once again exposed itself as a puppet of the Pakistani state, implementing policies dictated from Islamabad rather than responding to the democratic aspirations of the people. The Jammu Kashmir Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC) had announced a Long March on June 9 after months of mobilizing around economic and democratic demands. Instead of addressing these legitimate demands, the Pakistani state launched a sweeping crackdown on June 5. Internet and mobile services were suspended, raids and arrests intensified, and security forces attempted to crush the movement before it could gather momentum. 

Between June 5 and July 27, at least 45 people were martyred. Despite this repression, thousands of people established sit-ins on the outskirts of Rawalakot city and remained there even after repeated attempts by authorities to disperse them through force. Throughout this period, JAAC consistently reaffirmed its willingness to engage in peaceful dialogue and resolve the crisis through negotiations. The Pakistani state repeatedly used these negotiations as a delaying tactic while continuing its repression and preparing for further violence. 

On July 27, the Long March began. Defying curfew and state intimidation, thousands marched towards Rawalakot. Security forces opened fire on unarmed protesters, martyring 21 people. 

Despite these killings, the people successfully pushed back the Rangers (para-military troops) and continued their advance. On July 28, the massacre escalated further as another 14 people were martyred in Rawalakot, Mirpur, and other cities across PaJK. The repression has extended far beyond the use of lethal force. The Pakistani state has deliberately restricted access to food supplies and obstructed access to hospitals in Rawalakot, subjecting people of Jammu Kashmir to collective punishment in an attempt to break the movement. These actions constitute a grave assault on fundamental democratic rights and basic human dignity. 

We call upon the international working class, students, academics, trade unions, democratic, progressive, and socialist organizations to stand in solidarity with the people of Jammu & Kashmir. 

We urge organizations and activists across the world to organise demonstrations outside Pakistani embassies and consulates in their respective countries and to send protest letters/emails to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan, the Federal Minister for Kashmir Affairs and Gilgit-Baltistan (see below), and Pakistani diplomatic missions, demanding an immediate end to the massacre, the withdrawal of security forces from the streets, the restoration of internet and mobile services, unrestricted access to food supplies and medical care, the release of all detained protesters, and an independent investigation into the killings. 

The people of Jammu Kashmir are resisting extraordinary repression with immense courage. Their struggle deserves the active solidarity of workers, students, and all those committed to democracy and the right of oppressed peoples to determine their own future!

Emails:

Federal Minister for Kashmir Affairs and Gilgit-Baltistan: info@kagbsafron.gov.pk

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan: spokesperson.office1@mofa.gov.pk

The dark shadow spreading across Latin America

By Ana Cristina Carvalhaes

Published 30 July, 2026

This is an edited version of an article first published at International Viewpoint.

The Americas is the only part of the world where United States President Donald Trump has made significant progress with his national security policy goals. Yet at home, Trump faces significant difficulties in trying to limit his predicted setback in the November midterm congressional elections.

Trump’s failures

When it comes to the war on Iran — carried out with his sidekick, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — Trump has not only suffered a loss in popularity, but is losing the war itself. The White House is therefore desperate to cover up this humiliating defeat.

On the economic front, Trump’s tariff war against the world has yet to achieve any positive macroeconomic results, particularly in terms of reducing prices or the utopian dream of bringing back industries the US relocated abroad during the past 35 years. His tariff wars may end up being a complete failure.

On the technological competition with China front, which is key for Trump, the situation seems to be at an impasse despite large-scale protectionist measures targeting China’s electronic chips and AI. Beijing has responded with a conciliatory discourse combined with retaliatory measures based on the principle of “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.”

Progress in Latin America

The only region where Trump, his billionaire friends and the global far right can point to serious progress is, undoubtedly, the large region that stretches south of Mexico’s Rio Bravo (which the US insists on calling Rio Grande).

The world leader has besieged Latin America — so far successfully — through colonialist and authoritarian attacks. Hegemonic imperialism has launched a series of offensives, seeking to promote its Shield of the Americas [a military cooperation alliance involving far right and right-wing governments in the region to allegedly oppose transnational criminal organisations, in particular drug cartels]. This situation would not be possible without the more or less enthusiastic support of large sections of the capitalist oligarchies in Latin American countries, which have turned to neo-fascism.

These far-right governments have invited US companies and troops into their territories, applied ultra-neoliberal structural adjustment programs that benefit the most retrograde local capitalists, and suppressed democratic and social gains. Their objective is to eradicate all memory of the recent progressive reforms implemented in the region, and the governments that enacted them. Though limited, these reforms included important social policies, respect for human rights and defence of national sovereignty.

Trump and the far right won three important regional victories in June. Or, said differently, the left and social movements suffered three consecutive defeats: two electoral losses in Peru and Colombia, and the defeat of the street mobilisations in Bolivia.

Far right’s shadow spreads

Hegemonic imperialism has already invaded Central America and the Caribbean, deploying an unprecedented military contingent to maintain total regional domination and relying on help from allies such as Nayib Bukele in El Salvador and Raul Mulino in Panama. It is also sought to suffocate Cuba and restore capitalism on the island — a path that the Cuban Communist Party’s latest economic plan also appears to want to go down.

Trump’s strategists view Colombia and Venezuela as part of the Greater Caribbean [made of forty territories including an archipelago of Caribbean islands and a continental zone of countries in South and Latin America]. The latter country is currently dealing with the fallout of the devastating earthquakes, which Delcy Rodríguez’s puppet regime has been unable to deal with.[2] Since January, the birthplace of the Bolivarian revolution has become a colonial protectorate.

Meanwhile, Colombia will soon be ruled by a previously unknown extremist, Abelardo de la Espriella, inspired by former far right Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro and current far right Argentine president Javier Milei. With Keiko Fujimori’s narrow election win in Peru, the right and far right are clearly casting their shadow over South America through governments that will only worsen superexploitation, corruption, privatisation, land theft, environmental degradation, resource plunder and repression.

Growing polarisation

Without wanting to minimise this harsh reality and the setback that these governments represent for the region’s peoples, we also need to take a closer look at existing contradictions and ask: will these recent victories guarantee imperialism a pacified, stable and submissive “Western hemisphere” (how the neo-fascist in the White House calls the region)?

What happened in Peru and Colombia indicates that is not the most likely hypothesis, as in both countries the left and social movements showed they were capable of delivering their own surprises.

In Peru, no one could have imagined before the election campaign that a progressive representative from the provinces would make it to the second round. Yet the electoral confrontation ended in a technical draw, indicating that the decades-long crisis in this Andean country has not been resolved.

In Colombia, on top of likely fraud and brazen imperialist intervention in the electoral campaign — through financial backing and technological support to disseminate disinformation — the far right was also aided by the privatised political system. Yet, never before has the left united behind a candidate as it did in these elections and obtained such a high score, suggesting a difficult road ahead for the Abelardo de la Espriella government.

In Bolivia, the outcome was more complex: we saw the defeat of a peasant, indigenous and worker-popular uprising, led for the first time in decades by (divided) forces that did not belong to the former Movement Towards Socialism (MAS). It is too early to draw definitive conclusions, but this fragmentation — engendered by the former party-movement’s self-destruction — and the immeasurable difficulty of overthrowing an elected government in a very unfavourable regional context, will force the uprising’s protagonists to ask themselves whether it would have been more prudent to back down in an organised way, after the movement achieved a precious victory by blocking the neoliberal decrees on prices and land ownership.

The battle for Brazil

The next big battle has already begun in Brazil. Together with Mexico and Uruguay, these three Latin American countries are the only ones with governments that are, to more or less extent, on the left. Defeating current president Lula da Silva and the Workers Party (PT) in the October elections is crucial for the global far right — and for Trump in particular.

There is no doubt Trump and the tech giants will seek to replicate in Brazil the disinformation war they waged in Colombia. US imperialism’s leader has already declared his support — through photos and social media posts — for Flávio Bolsonaro, the eldest son of the former putschist president and only viable candidate on the right. But the US is also trying to interfere in the vote through the issue of public safety, with Trump labeling two Brazil-based criminal groups as “terrorist organisations”, and by stepping up his tariff war against Brazilian products.

Direct US interference in Brazil’s affairs is frowned upon in the country, even among some sections of Bolsonaro’s electorate. But the left will pay a price in these elections for the PT government’s weaknesses and limitations, and those of Lula in particular. The support Lula lent to Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz at the height of the popular revolt and the decision to procrastinate rather than act quickly and ruthlessly to remove members involved in financial scandals are two examples.

None of this, however, should prevent all left, progressive and democratic sectors in Latin America, and around the world, from supporting Lula’s candidacy for a new mandate and against the return of Bolsonarism and international neo-fascism. Similarly, the Cuban government’s steps towards capitalist restoration should not prevent us from standing unconditionally with Cuba in its struggle for sovereignty against the giant of the north.

Unity against imperialism and the far right

In Latin America, the question of defending national sovereignty against imperialism remains a central axis for organising resistance to neofascism — perhaps more so than in any other corner of the world right now. 

From Colombia’s Historic Pact — now a registered party backed by half the country — to the broad left coalitions in Peru, Argentina, Chile and Mexico, to the heroic resistance fighters in Venezuela and Central America, we need unity and mutual support amid this new period of struggle opening up against far-right governments (and those under Trump’s thumb), as we wait and hope Trump suffers an electoral setback in the US midterm elections.

FASCISM 101

Peru's newly inaugurated President Fujimori vows military-led crackdown on crime

Peru's newly inaugurated President Keiko Fujimori – the ninth in just a decade – pledged to deploy the armed forces to crime-ridden areas and adopt a hardline security strategy as Peru grapples with its worst wave of gang violence, extortion and illegal mining in decades.


Issued on: 28/07/2026 
By: FRANCE 24

Peru's President Keiko Fujimori speaks after taking the oath of office at Congress in Lima, Peru, 28 July 2026. © Guadalupe Pardo, Reuters

Peru's conservative President Keiko Fujimori took office on Tuesday, vowing to tackle the wave of crime sweeping the Andean nation.

On her fourth presidential bid, Fujimori won June's runoff by fewer than 50,000 votes.

Addressing Congress, the newly inaugurated leader announced plans to deploy the military to areas where crime, drug trafficking and illegal mining are rife.


"During states of emergency, the armed forces will temporarily take the lead in security operations" until they can "return these territories to the citizens", she said.

A group of leftist lawmakers left the room in protest at Fujimori's inauguration, which marks Peru's ninth presidency in a decade.

Latin American leaders, including Argentina's Javier Milei, Chile's Jose Antonio Kast, Bolivia's Rodrigo Paz, Ecuador's Daniel Noboa and Uruguay's Yamandu Orsi, attended the ceremony.

The 51-year-old ran a campaign shadowed by the divisive legacy of her father, who ruled Peru in the 1990s.

Alberto Fujimori was jailed for corruption and crimes against humanity committed during what he considered a fight against terrorism.

His daughter's hardline messaging taps into Peru's worst security crisis in decades, fueled by the spread of both local and foreign criminal gangs that oversee contract killings and extortion.

She has proposed fighting crime by expelling undocumented people, setting up courts with anonymous judges and making prisoners work for their food.

"She is going to be a replica of her father," said 80-year-old retiree Cesar Fuentes, who fears that a crime crackdown will lead to abuses.

But housewife Nelly Vega believes Fujimori "is going to lead us to something better".

"We're in a country with a lot of terror," the 68-year-old said.

The new president has also vowed to tackle the El Nino climate phenomenon, which meteorologists predict will be the most intense and devastating since 1998.
'Fighting for justice'

Right-wing parties in Peru's Congress still fall short of the majority required to push through the new president's initiatives.

But Fujimori's Fuerza Popular party, the largest one in the legislature, still carries a lot of weight.

"It is a party with deep popular roots that has had a dynamic presence in Peruvian politics, even when it was losing elections, because of its uninterrupted presence in Congress," said Jeffrey Radzinsky, director of the political consultancy GFP.

Fujimori will govern until 2031 following a decade of political chaos that has burned through eight Peruvian leaders, many of whom were removed from office or forced to resign by a Congress under Fujimori's influence.

"There are high expectations," independent worker Marci Angeles, 31, told AFP.

"But given how she has behaved as an opposition leader" in recent years, Angeles said, "the outlook is not good".

Fujimori has called for reconciliation between political camps, but the appeal has not gone down well with the families of victims of state violence.

On Monday, more than 100 people held a vigil in the capital, vowing to reject the incoming government and demanding justice for crimes committed under the last Fujimori administration.

"We expect nothing good from her," said Marly Anzualdo, who is still searching for the body of her disappeared brother Kenneth.

"For so many years we have been fighting for justice to be done, and we know how they operate," she told AFP.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP)

Peru takes ultraconservative turn as Fujimori becomes president

Issued on: 29/07/2026 

FRANCE24

Peru's new president Keiko Fujimori was sworn in on July 28, taking her oath of office before the country's Congress. The conservative leader now becomes the Andean nation's 9th chief executive in just 10 years - her electoral victory, an extremely narrow one - with just 50,000 votes separating her from left-wing rival Roberto Sanchez. Fujimori, wasting no time in naming her cabinet and rolling out new measures with an emphasis on fighting crime in Peru - which is facing its worst security crisis in decades.

Video by: Bryan QUINN

Venezuela: The urgency of shedding illusions

By Elías Jaua

Published 30 July, 2026

First published in Spanish at Horizonte en Disputa. Translation from Venezuelanalysis.

Innocence will not kill the people, but it won’t save them either. Their conscience will save them and that’s where I put my heart and soul.
Alí Primera

Still reeling from two consecutive earthquakes, our hearts heavy with sorrow for our compatriots who have died or been injured, moved by the pain of family members who are still searching for their loved ones, if only to give them a proper burial, and in solidarity with the anguish of the tens of thousands of families left homeless, with all the world’s sorrows converging at once, we cannot help but raise our voice about the need to fight for Venezuela’s independence and dignity. In fact, the tragedy striking us today makes this need all the more urgent.

Taking advantage of the catastrophic situation, armed US troops have landed in La Guaira, warships have been stationed off our coasts, and Venezuelan airspace is violated daily by drones, airplanes, and helicopters belonging to the occupying power. They have not rescued nor aided anyone. They merely occupy the territory, surveying land, and controlling port and airport facilities. They are humiliating us.

They announce lavish reconstruction projects alongside the Israeli government, whose top leaders face substantiated accusations of blatant genocide against the Palestinian people before the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice. A peaceful and solidarity-driven people like the Venezuelans, with a tradition of fighting for independence, peaceful coexistence, and the human cause, do not deserve this affront.

To add insult to injury, we witness a widespread silence of political leaders from all sectors with representation and responsibilities in various state institutions. They appear more interested in presenting themselves as the best option for collaborating with the Trump administration’s colonization plan than in fulfilling their constitutional duty to preserve the integrity and dignity of the Republic.

Under these circumstances, those of us who deeply love our Venezuelan homeland are compelled to denounce, once again, that the United States government:

1. Is exercising colonial rule in Venezuela, exploiting our resources and hijacking our economic revenues, which are, moreover, necessary for reconstruction following the earthquakes and for overcoming the precarious economic and social situation of the general population. This is exacerbated by the imposition of an unfair and corrupt debt service plan, which will tie up a high percentage of public finances for the remainder of this century.
2. Has violated the right to self-determination by imposing a political plan tailored to its annexationist intentions.
3. Has carried out a military invasion of our sovereign territory, beginning last August 2025, including the vile missile attack on January 3, 2026, which resulted in deaths and injuries, and continuing with several incursions and attacks in the following months. This invasion is currently manifested in the landing of heavily armed soldiers and equipment in La Guaira since late June, with the grave risk that this presence poses to the physical and moral integrity of the population, especially women and children.
4. It forces the implementation of a neoliberal, extractivist model that excludes the vast majority of the population from the common good and will irreversibly damage our ecosystem.
5. It draws Venezuela into its geopolitical war in West Asia, with dangerous consequences for our security as a nation.

Consequently, as a people, we must be aware of the gravity of the occupation and its consequences, and trust in our capabilities as a nation to advance a unified agenda that will allow us to:

1. Regain the right to political, institutional, and legislative self-determination. We, the Venezuelan people, are the ones who must democratically decide who governs us and what laws and institutions we need and want, within the framework of the Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.
2. Regain economic sovereignty: freely trade our resources and products. The Venezuelan State must manage, under strict fiscal controls, the revenues from these resources for the common good and, as a matter of urgency, to overcome the economic and social consequences of the emergency caused by the earthquakes and a decade of economic chaos and brutal, unjust, and illegal sanctions.
3. Demand the withdrawal of military troops and security agents from the United States and the State of Israel, and the cessation of any type of foreign military operation within Venezuelan territory. The security of the nation is the responsibility of the Venezuelan State.
4. Build a model and a plan for political, economic, and social development based on inclusion and social equality, agreed upon by all political currents.
5. Exercise our right to maintain peaceful and cooperative relations with all nations of the world that share the principles of humanity and international coexistence.

Fellow compatriots, there is an effort underway to convince us that we are incapable of governing our own nation, that the only way to achieve development and welfare is under the tutelage of or annexation by the United States government. This is utterly false. The Venezuelan people must understand that the United States neither promotes development nor generates well-being for the vast majority in the countries it occupies. This runs counter to its own doctrine.

This colonial administration will only establish oil and mining enclaves, with no economic benefits for the nation, no limits on the violation of the Venezuelan people’s rights, and with appalling environmental destruction. The consequence will be the deepening and generalization of structural poverty, as evidenced in all the countries occupied over the past decades.

It is necessary and timely to warn that La Guaira is set to undergo a process of gentrification and displacement of the local population, so that the Trump family, their associates, and business partners can secure the best plots of land to develop a real estate enclave linked to port, airport, and tourism services. This may likewise happen in some other coastal towns as well.

Current circumstances demand that we do everything in our power to reach a national accord aimed at restoring our Republic, and to prove to ourselves that we can indeed build a democratic society here on Venezuelan soil, where we can all live with equality, justice, and dignity. The Trump clan’s occupation will only structurally expand and entrench underdevelopment and poverty. Only by regaining our national self-determination can we attempt, once again and as many times as necessary, to build a homeland that shelters the entire Venezuelan family. In other words, a true Republic. So it shall be. Let’s fight!

The Money That Bought the War Is on the Blockchain

by Thomas S. Karat | Jul 30, 2026 |   Antiwar.com

Four days before Donald Trump took the oath a second time, a company controlled by the intelligence chief of a foreign monarchy wired the president-elect’s family its first installment. The date was January 16, 2025. The buyer was Aryam Investment 1, a vehicle backed by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, national security adviser of the United Arab Emirates and brother of its ruler, a man his own country’s press calls the spy sheikh. The purchase was 49 percent of World Liberty Financial, the Trump family’s cryptocurrency firm, for $500 million. Eric Trump signed it. Of the first tranche, $187 million went directly to entities the president owns. It was the first time a foreign government official had bought a major stake in the company of an incoming American president, and it was done in the open, on paper, before the man had even been sworn in.

What that money bought is the subject of this account. It did not buy a dinner, though there was a dinner. It bought the machinery of the American national-security state, piece by piece, and the transactions can be traced with the precision of a bank statement, because for once the participants did not trouble to hide them.

Begin with the chips. For years the export of the most advanced American semiconductors to the UAE had been restricted, on the assessment of American intelligence that the technology could reach the Chinese military through Emirati firms with documented ties to Huawei. Chief among those firms was G42, chaired by the same Sheikh Tahnoon. The restrictions were not arbitrary. They were the considered judgment of the people whose job is to keep the most powerful computing hardware on earth out of the hands of adversaries.

Months after Tahnoon’s money reached the Trump family, the administration reversed the controls and cleared the sale of hundreds of thousands of advanced AI chips to the UAE, a fifth of them reserved for Tahnoon’s G42. A former senior export-control official, asked to justify the reversal on its merits, told the Wall Street Journal that it was impossible to defend on national-security or economic grounds. There was, he said, only one explanation for it. The UAE paid for it.

Then the stablecoin. In March 2025 World Liberty issued USD1, a token pegged to the dollar, the kind of instrument whose issuer earns the interest on the reserves behind it. Five weeks later, a firm chaired by Tahnoon called MGX used $2 billion of USD1 to finance an investment in Binance, the largest crypto exchange in the world. The transaction floated a five-week-old Trump-family token into the top tier of the global market and placed the president’s family on the interest of a two-billion-dollar sum. The announcement was made from a stage in Dubai by Zach Witkoff, co-founder of World Liberty and son of Steve Witkoff, the president’s special envoy to the Middle East. It’s only the beginning, the younger Witkoff said.

Then the pardon. The founder of Binance, Changpeng Zhao, had pleaded guilty in 2023 to running an exchange that the government said moved money for terrorists and cybercriminals; the Treasury Secretary of the day said Binance had let funds flow to terrorists, cybercriminals, and child abusers. His company had helped launch USD1. The sheikh whose fund floated USD1 was his patron. In October 2025 Trump pardoned him. Asked on television how he answered the appearance of pay for play, the president said of the man whose exchange underwrites his family’s fortune that he did not know who he was. He knew, he added, only that the sentence had been four months, and that he had heard it was a witch hunt.

Foreign state money in; export licenses, regulatory surrender, and a pardon out. The circuit is complete, and every wire in it is visible. This is not the corruption of the past, which required a hidden account and a middleman and a plausible story. This is corruption conducted as commerce, itemized, timestamped, and posted to a public ledger, on the apparent calculation that a transaction carried out in full view cannot be called a conspiracy.

The meme coin was the retail version of the same machine. In January 2025 the president launched a token bearing his own name and his own face – the face from Butler, fist raised, blood on the ear, the words Fight, Fight, Fight beneath it. In May the top two hundred and twenty holders were invited to dine with him; they had spent, on average, $1.8 million each. Access to the sitting commander in chief was auctioned to whoever would pay, and a great many of those who paid were his own supporters, the ones who read the raised fist as a covenant. Of roughly 1.48 million wallets, 988,905 ended up underwater, down a combined $3.81 billion. From the same instrument the president reported income of $636 million. The faithful were the exit liquidity. The face that nearly took a bullet was the bait.

None of this would deserve the name of an antiwar story if the money stopped at enrichment. It does not stop there. The same Gulf capital that bought the coin and the chips runs, along a second channel, straight into the wars.

Consider the president’s son-in-law. Jared Kushner left the first Trump White House and, one day later, incorporated an investment firm; six months after that he took $2 billion from the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia, whose own screening panel had recommended rejecting the deal, citing the firm’s inexperience and its excessive fees, only to be overruled by the crown prince. By 2026 that firm, Affinity Partners, held some $6.16 billion, of which ninety-nine percent came from foreign nationals – the sovereign funds of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar. And through Trump’s second term, the man taking that money was simultaneously one of the chief American negotiators across the Middle East, at the same tables as Steve Witkoff, in the same rooms where the region’s wars are settled or prolonged.

When the president ordered the American attack on Iran, he explained the decision as the product of counsel. He struck, he said, after listening to what Steve and Jared and others were telling him. Steve is Witkoff, whose son runs the coin the Emiratis floated with two billion dollars. Jared is Kushner, ninety-nine percent of whose fortune is foreign sovereign money, whose largest backer is a Saudi crown prince whose government, the House Judiciary Committee noted in a letter to Kushner, had been pushing Trump to continue the war. You cannot both be a diplomat and a financial pawn of the Saudi monarchy at the same time, the committee’s ranking member wrote to him. You cannot faithfully represent the United States with billions of dollars in Saudi and Emirati cash burning a hole in every pocket of every suit you own.

This is the part the crypto ledger cannot show but the pattern makes plain. The men who counseled a war sat, at the very moment they counseled it, atop billions of dollars belonging to the Gulf monarchies that wanted the war fought. The advice and the money arrived through the same men. No intercept is required to see it; the disclosures are public, the letters are filed, the president named his advisers himself.

Set beside this the machinery built to prevent exactly this, and watch it fail. When Congress passed the GENIUS Act in July 2025 to regulate stablecoins, it barred members of Congress and their families from profiting off them, and declined to extend the same bar to the president and his family. The exemption was not missed. It was written. The Trump Organization offers a voluntary pledge against dealings with foreign governments, while permitting dealings with foreign companies – a wall that dissolves the instant a sovereign wealth fund is the buyer, which is to say always. The regulator of the president’s stable-coin answers to the president, who has placed the relevant agencies under his direct control by executive order. The largest holder of his meme coin, a crypto financier under SEC fraud charges, put $75 million into World Liberty and watched the case against him paused within three weeks and settled a year later for a fraction, with no admission of guilt. Every safeguard that might have caught the transaction was either exempted, evaded, or owned.

The Governor of California’s office counts nearly $2 billion in victim restitution erased by this president’s pardons. Congress is investigating whether the clemency was for sale. But investigations presume a hidden thing to uncover, and here there is nothing hidden. The dinner was advertised. The stable-coin deal was announced from a stage. The chip reversal was published in the Federal Register. The pardon was signed in daylight. The war counsel was described by the president on camera. The genius of the operation, if that is the word, is that it dispenses with the cover-up, and in dispensing with it strips the law of the thing it was built to find.

What is being sold is not merely access, and not merely the enrichment of one family, though it is both. What is being sold is the direction of American power – its export controls, its prosecutorial discretion, its clemency, and, at the end of the chain, its decisions about which countries to bomb. The buyers are foreign monarchies with wars they want fought and technologies they want acquired. The price is posted. The receipts are on a public blockchain and in the files of congressional committees. The president has told the country, of the men whose money moved through every link of it, that he does not know who they are. The country has been given every fact it would need. What it does with them is the only part of this that remains, for now, unwritten.

Thomas Karat writes investigative work published at karat.substack.com and the Libertarian Institute, drawing on a corporate career and academic training as a behavior analyst to examine how institutions manufacture consent and influence.