[The demand: democracy. The response: advancing fascist movements
and state repression.]
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GLOBAL LEFT MIDWEEK – JUNE 14, 2023  
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June 14, 2023
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_ The demand: democracy. The response: advancing fascist movements
and state repression. _

Protesters at Place de la Nation in Dakar, Senegal, on March 8.
Credit, JOHN WESSELS/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

 

* Demanding Democracy in Senegal
* Making Movement Politics Planetary
* Clara Zetkin: Understanding Fascism
* Ukraine Information and Solidarity
* The AMLO Project
* Israel’s Protests
* Italy’s Democrats and the Left
* 14-Hour Day: South Korean Youth Push Back
* All Eyes on Colombia
* Rent Strike Wave in Toronto

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DEMANDING DEMOCRACY IN SENEGAL
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_Tanupriya Singh_ / Peoples Dispatch (New Delhi)

Last week, Senegal, often touted as a beacon of democracy in West
Africa, was rocked by clashes between state forces and protesters
following the condemnation of the country’s main opposition
leader, Ousmane Sonko for “corrupting youth”. The government
has arrested opposition leaders, restricted access to the internet
and social media platforms, and deployed the military in several
cities. 

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MAKING MOVEMENT POLITICS PLANETARY
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_Alexander Behr_ / Berliner Gazette

Establishing and politicizing links between environmental and labor
struggles means, not least, re-establishing the connection between
ecological catastrophes and the economic and social systems that
caused them. A further development of intersectional approaches under
the sign of planetary alliance politics and a solidarity-based
division of labor is fundamental for this.

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CLARA ZETKIN: UNDERSTANDING FASCISM
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_Jörn Schütrumpf_ / Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung (Berlin)

For Clara Zetkin, it was “evident that fascism has different
characteristics in every country, based on specific circumstances.
Nonetheless, in every country it has two essential features: a sham
revolutionary program, which links up in extremely clever fashion with
the moods, interests, and demands of broad social masses; and the use
of brutal and violent terror.”

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UKRAINE INFORMATION AND SOLIDARITY

* STATEMENT FROM INTERNATIONAL SUMMIT FOR PEACE IN UKRAINE
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  / Campaign For Peace, Disarmament & Common Security (Cambridge MA)
 
* CRITICAL REPORT ON THE SUMMIT   _Fabian Sommavilla_ / Der
Standard (Vienna)

[_This is an excerpted e-translation. Read the full report in German_
HERE
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It begins, how could it be otherwise, with “Imagine” by John
Lennon. The Lorely hall in the west of Vienna, which had to be rented
at short notice after being expelled from the Austrian Trade Union
Federation premises, is very well filled this Saturday morning. Around
300 people have come. Average age 50 plus. The protesters expected by
the organizers do not appear. “Everything inconspicuous,” says one
of the security guards, who are not necessarily immediately
recognizable as such. Leaflets, buttons and flags line the hall and
the vestibule. [...]

The linguist and left-wing activist Noam Chomsky gives an expected
zoom speech, in which he does not deny Ukraine its right to defend
itself, but repeatedly says vaguely that there are many alternatives
for creating peace. According to Chomsky, the world community is ready
for peace in Ukraine, but the United States is promoting the
continuation of the war. [...]

Gerhard Kofler from AbFaNg Austria, the Action Alliance for Peace,
Active Neutrality & Nonviolence, as one of the organizers, then opens
the peace effort “in neutral Austria”. He thinks that if only five
fewer people would die in Ukraine thanks to this event, then it would
have already achieved its purpose. Asked by the STANDARD how
concretely this should work, he does not really have an answer ready,
demands a reorganization of the UN Security Council and a chair for
peace research in Austria, and says that one simply has to discuss
peace more seriously. [...]

“Ceasefire means first of all that the daily killing and murdering
stops, thereby opening up avenues for negotiations that help overcome
intolerable conditions,” said co-organizer Reiner Braun, explaining
his central demand. Asked whether such a measure in Ukraine would not
lead to the entrenchment of military territorial gains by Russia, he
said that a ceasefire has sometimes led to the freezing of conflicts.
It would depend on political will.

Sean Conner of the International Peace Bureau, the second main
organizer, spoke next. The war must come to a “just and peaceful”
end, he says. History has shown that wars are not decided on the
battlefield, he says, whereas history has very much shown that
negotiated settlements after war have often been preceded by the
military defeat of one party to the conflict or a stalemate. “Listen
and learn,” he says, even if you disagree. [...]

He addresses Russia’s accountability for the war crimes committed
and says that the “question of territorial integrity” must, of
course, also be part of a long-lasting peace that guarantees that
Russia can no longer intervene. Postscript: of course, however, one
must look at whether the West has always acted correctly. [...]

Jeffrey Sachs, the most famous speaker at the event, takes the stage.
[...] His speech meets every criterion of the classic conspiracy
narrative. He constantly emphasizes that he has inside information
from the White House and from high-ranking members of the government,
which would supposedly prove that all evil in the world, every major
conflict in recent years, can only be traced back to the United States
and its will to intervene. The Syrian civil war then quickly becomes a
“so-called Syrian civil war”, the Russian war of aggression is a
war between two global fronts. [...]

In the afternoon, representatives of Ukrainian and Russian civil
society speak. Neither, however, represent majority positions in their
countries by any means. [...]

In the early afternoon, Nina Potarska, from the Women’s
International League for Peace and Freedom, brought to the 300 or so
peace supporters a Ukrainian perspective, for the first time, what a
ceasefire really means at the present time. [...] Families would
remain separated, the conflict itself would not be resolved, Russia
would probably once again illegally annex land. There would be no
guarantee that Russia would not try again. On the verge of tears, the
woman who had fled Ukraine said she probably wanted peace more than
anyone else in the room. “But what do you really mean when you want
peace,” she asked. We should be aware that singing songs while
living in peace is a privilege, she said. Unlike all the other
speakers, there was no applause during the speech, modest applause
afterward, and no standing ovation as with the previous speakers.

In front of the conference building, the STANDARD meets Viktor, 76
years old from Kherson. He fled at the beginning of the war, and
speaks good German. [...] He says that his homeland was first occupied
and now flooded by the dam burst. It is important to him to say, even
to those who do not want to hear it, that Russia is a terrorist state.

* UKRANIAN TRADE UNIONISTS’ STATEMENT
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  _Jim Denham_ / Shiraz Socialist (Birmingham UK)
 
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SPANISH STATE: A ‘PACIFISM’ THAT HELPS PUTIN
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Bech_ / Links (Sydney)

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FIGHTING FOR PEACE: RUSSIANS USE FAITH
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  Victoria Arnold / Religion Unplugged (New York)

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THE AMLO PROJECT
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_Edwin F. Ackerman_ / New Left Review (London)

AMLO’s overarching project has been to move away from neoliberalism
towards a model of nationalist-developmentalist capitalism. To what
extent has he succeeded, and what can the left learn from this
endeavour?  

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ISRAEL’S PROTESTS

* SWEET AND BITTER
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  _Gideon Levi_ / Haaretz (Tel Aviv)
 
* THE COLD SHOULDER
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  _Oren Ziv_ / +972 (Tel Aviv)
 
* BIL’IN’S SUCCESSFUL RESISTANCE
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  _Michael Schulz_ / Waging Nonviolence (Brooklyn)   

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ITALY’S DEMOCRATS AND THE LEFT
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_Norma Rangeri_ / il manifesto Global (Rome)

Precisely because there is a reactionary, conservative, fascistoid
government, the opposition forces should roll up their sleeves to try
to build a credible, plausible, lasting alternative from the
grassroots up. There’s no chance of that happening, though –
because, now as before, the impulse actually prevailing is that of a
self-referentiality that is as stubborn as it is nonsensical.

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14-Hour Day: South Korean Youth Push Back
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_Pablo León_ / El País (Madrid)

In March, a series of protests swept across South Korea. A proposed
labor reform met with widespread opposition. The Korean Confederation
of Trade Unions said it “would make it legal to work from 9 a.m. to
midnight for five days in a row.” The Korean Women’s Associations
United warned: “While men would work long hours, exempt from
care-taking duties, women would be forced to do it all.” 

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ALL EYES ON COLOMBIA

* SLOW-MOTION COUP
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  _Zoe Alexandra_ / Peoples Dispatch
 
* OPPOSING THE REACTIONARY FRONT
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  _Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, et al._ / Progressive international

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RENT STRIKE WAVE IN TORONTO
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_Mitchell Thompson_ / Jacobin (New York)

As Toronto grapples with skyrocketing housing costs, tenant unions
across the city are uniting against major corporate landlords in a
massive rent strike. The strike is vitalizing the fight for housing
justice in one of the world’s most expensive cities.

* senegal
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* democracy
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* repression
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* international solidarity
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* Fascism
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* Clara Zetkin
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* Ukraine
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* International Summit for Peace in Ukraine
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* Mexico
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* Andrés Manuel López Obrador
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* Israel protests
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* Palestine
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* Bi'lin
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* Italy
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* Italian Democratic Party
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* South Korea
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* working hours
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* Colombia
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* Toronto
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* rent strike
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