International Viewpoint - online socialist magazine

• USA

  Two Dead Americans—Two Americas

  20 July, by Dan La Botz

  Last week, the nation’s attention focused on two dead Americans, two men who couldn’t be more different, two men who seem to embody the nation’s divided politics, culture, and morality. One was John Lewis, the African American civil rights leader and legislator who died five years ago. The other was Jeffrey Epstein, the wealthy socialite and convicted pedophile who provided elite businessmen and politicians access to underage girls.

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• Britain

  Starmer’s first year – things can only get worse

  19 July, by Dave Kellaway

  Sitting in number 10 Downing Street after the government’s debacle and U turn over the welfare, Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Chief of Staff Morgan McSweeney must have thought: these people are so ungrateful.
  “Here they are taking a wrecking ball to Reeves and Kendall’s project to save £5 billion with welfare cuts. But I made these MPs. I ensured nearly every left wing candidate had been eliminated early from any selection process. My team assiduously sifted through thousands of social (…)

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• Latvia

  Let Vlad stay

  18 July, by Maiznica

  A Riga-based social-centre project called “Maiznica” is facing repression from state security services and the expulsion of one of their members from the country. In this press release from the Collective they aim to spread the news to a wider audience.

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• Syria

  Syria and the Dangers of Playing with Fire

  17 July, by Gilbert Achcar

  Whatever is the origin of the recent bloody clashes in the Suwayda Governorate—whether they were merely the result of the chaos prevailing in post-Assad Syria, or a manoeuvre by Israel in order to escalate its hypocritical intervention in the region, or a manoeuvre by Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) to extend its control over southern Syria—what is unmistakable is that the first factor, the prevailing chaos, provided the conditions for the explosion.

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• Kosova

  Remembering Srebrenica 30 Years On

  16 July, by Geoff Ryan

  11 July marked the 30th anniversary of the genocide in July 1995 of over 8,000 largely Bosniak men and male children by Bosnian Serb forces under the command of Ratko Mladic. They were buried in mass graves. Many thousand more fled into the forest and embarked on a harrowing journey lasting up to 7 days before reaching the eastern Bosnia village of Nezuk. What led up to the massacre and how it has been treated compared to two other wars: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians..

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...and the rest of the current issue

• Chile

  Communist Party triumph and opportunity in an adverse electoral scenario in Chile

• Iran

  Islamic Republic and state racism: we must put an end to this regime!

• USA

  Cracks in Trump’s MAGA Movement

• Togo

  A wave of bloody repression hit the demonstrations in Togo

• Kenya

  Renewed protests in Kenya

Recently posted Features

• Series: Governments submit to “Too Big to Fail” banks (part 3)

  Private banks shamefully enjoy a monopoly of lending to the public sector

  8 September 2014, by Éric Toussaint

  The eurozone banks have the monopoly of lending to the public sector. It is prohibited for the ECB and the eurozone’s central banks to grant loans to public authorities (see box on the ECB). The governments in the eurozone have the possibility of borrowing from publicly owned banks where they still exist, but they do not do so.

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• Series: Governments submit to “Too Big to Fail” banks (part 2)

  Governments make Gifts Galore to Private Banks

  8 September 2014, by Éric Toussaint

  Government aid is made up of guarantees, and injections of capital in order to recapitalize the banks. In the period from October 2008 to December 2011, €1,174 trillion (9.3% of EU GDP [1] ) worth of guarantees were underwritten by European Governments as a contingency measure. To these guarantees must be added €442 billion (3.5% of EU GDP) of public capital support to banks. During 2012 and 2013 the recapitalizations continued: about €40 billion in Spain in 2012 alone, more than €50 billion in Greece, about €20 billion in Cyprus, €4 billion more for Dexia bank in Belgium, €3.9 billion for Monte dei Paschi in Italy, €3.7 billion for the Dutch bank SNS, €4.2 billion in Portugal on top of the Portuguese bail-out of the Banco Esperito Santo in July 2014., not forgetting Ireland, Slovenia, Croatia This assistance was granted without any government supervision of the use made of the funds. [2]

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• Series: Governments submit to “Too Big to Fail” banks (Part 1)

  Central Banks lend massively to the banking sector

  8 September 2014, by Éric Toussaint

  Since the banking bubble burst in 2007, the major Central Banks of the most industrialised countries lend massively to private banks at very low interest rates in order to avoid their failure, thus permitting the big banks that take the most advantage to save considerable amounts in interest payments.

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• Last part of the series: The Banks and the “Too Big to Jail” Doctrine (Part 9)

  The Impunity Enjoyed by the Banks must Stop

  1 September 2014, by Éric Toussaint

  We all know the saying “Too big to fail.” In managing the crisis the banks have caused, the governments of the industrialised countries have adopted a new doctrine that might be summed up as “Too big to jail.”

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