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Proudly owned by our readers | Incorporating the Daily Worker | Est 1930 | morningstaronline.co.ukMonday February 12 2018£1
8PAGE SYRIA: A LETTER FROM A YPG VOLUNTEER
11PAGE BOOKS: HILARY WAINWRIGHT6PAGE UKRAINE: MEDIA HUB ATTACKED
9PAGE
30,000 RALLY AGAINST RACISM
CORBYN’S GREEN ENERGY BATTLE
SIX NATIONS: SCOTLAND’S BOOST
■ WORLD
■ NEWS
■ SPORT
ITALIANS took to the streets at the weekend in a show against fascism following a shooting spree targeting migrants.
Turn to page 6
LABOUR leader reiterates calls for public ownership of Britain’s energy system to help combat the “threat of climate catastrophe.”
Turn to page 2
GREGOR TOWNSEND’S MEN have kick-started their Six Nations campaign with a 32-26 win over France.
Turn to page 16
As the NHS nears its 70th birthday on July 5, marches and demonstrations are
being held across 54 towns and cities today demanding action over the crisis NOW LABOUR PLOTTERS SET THEIR SIGHTS ON LEONARD
SCOTTISH LABOUR:
HOW NOT TO HANDLE
A GAFFE
SCOTTISH LABOUR ACTIVISTS SLAM ‘CONSTANT UNDERMINING OF LEADER’
by Our News Desk
SCOTTISH Labour grandees have been accused of plotting against party leader Richard Leonard, following a week of negative headlines.
On Sunday, his predecessor Kezia Dugdale claimed for the fi rst time that her resignation last year was over Labour’s Brexit stance, while STUC general secretary Grahame Smith accused Mr Leonard of
“lacking leadership” on Brexit.Days earlier, the Scottish
Daily Mail received fi gures suggesting that the Unite union had spent more on backing Mr Leonard’s lead-ership bid than on Scottish Labour’s elec-tion cam-paign.
A n d on Thurs-
day, a Holyrood insider leaked a story about former leader-ship contender Anas Sarwar apparently refusing to sit next to Mr Leonard during First Minister’s Questions.
Supporters of Mr Leon-ard’s leadership say that
these events stem from a hard core
of plotters on the party’s
r i g h t
who, in the words of one activist, are engaged in “the sort of refusal we saw to accept Corbyn’s victory in 2015, now being repeated in Scotland.” Mr Corbyn’s early leadership days were plagued by frequent negative briefi ngs from some parliamentary col-leagues.
The apparent seating snub was in response to an incident earlier this week, in which Labour MP Hugh Gaff ney was reprimanded by
the leadership for using the term “a chinky” to describe a Chinese takeaway during a speech.
Mr Sarwar and others have since accused Mr Leonard of a lacklustre response — but supporters argue that party procedures were followed to the letter, and Mr Gaff ney’s immediate apology and acceptance of a public repri-mand made an investigation unnecessary.
Turn to page 3
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@m_star_online2Morning Star Monday February 12 2018 news
n ENVIRONMENT
A green future for publicly owned energy, says Corbyn by Our Newsdesk
JEREMY CORBYN called this weekend for public ownership of Britain’s energy system to help combat the “threat of climate catastrophe.”
He accused the govern-ment of having left a “trail of environmental destruction” and lampooned Environment Secretary Michael Gove for fashioning himself as an “eco-warrior.”
Speaking at a Labour event on alternative models of own-ership, the Labour leader told attendees on Saturday that measures as radical as those taken by the 1945 government under Clement Attlee to rebuild Britain after WWII are needed to tackle climate change.
He said: “Nobody is fooled by Michael Gove’s reinvention of himself as an eco-warrior.
“Behind the rhetoric lies a trail of environmental destruc-tion.
“This is a government that has licensed fracking, declared a moratorium on renewable levies while massively subsi-dising fossil fuels, dithered over tidal, held back onshore wind, U-turned on making all new homes zero-carbon and is failing to take the necessary measures to meet our legal commitments to reduce CO2 emissions.”
He declared that “to go green, we must take control of energy” and that “it cannot be the workers who pay the price.”
He pledged that a Labour
government will offer a com-prehensive programme of retraining and employment to all workers displaced by transition in the energy sector.
Mr Corbyn said that a green energy system will look “radi-cally different” to the current one.
It would be heavily decen-tralised and locally account-able, with new sources of small and large-scale energy “from tidal to solar.”
Emissions reduction would be a central focus of a publicly controlled national grid.
Labour’s environmental pledges also include banning fracking, insulating four mil-lion homes, and delivering 60 per cent of our energy from renewable sources by 2030.
n DISABILITIES
DWP’s ‘scandalous’ efforts to deprive claimants of cashby Our News Desk
MORE than £100 million has been spent on administering reviews and appeals against disability benefit claims in just over two years, figures released today show.
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) spending is in addition to the tens of millions spent every year by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) on appeals.
Disability benefits make up the bulk of these MoJ tribunals and about two thirds of them have been won by claimants in the past year.
But the department is also facing questions from the work & pensions select committee over the figures amid claims it was not given similar infor-mation for its own inquiry into personal independence pay-ment (PIP) and employment
and support allowance (ESA).The DWP has spent £108.1m
on direct staffing costs for ESA and PIP appeals since October
2015, figures obtained by the Press Association through a freedom of information request show. The figure covers manda-
n BREXIT
McDonnell cautions against 2nd referendumSHADOW chancellor John McDonnell (pictured) said yes-terday that it would be better to let people express their views on EU membership via a general election than to have a second referendum on Brexit.
In an interview on ITV’s Pes-ton On Sunday, Mr McDonnell warned that a new referen-dum would “divide the coun-try again” and ran the risk of increasing xenophobia and hate crimes.
He said that an election would enable a “wider debate” on all the issues, adding that Labour would never “turn our back on democratic engagement.”
Back-bench Labour MPs have expressed a preference for a ref-erendum on the terms of exit.
While Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has not ruled out a potential referendum, he has made clear that he is not call-ing for one.
Shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry has also com-mitted to “doing as instructed” by voters, which “as things cur-rently stand” means leaving the
European Union.She told the BBC’s Andrew
Marr last month: “We have said that we must respect the result of the referendum, which means that we have to leave.
“But we have to look after the economy which, in my view, means that we don’t go very far.”
n ALCOHOL MISUSE
PARENTAL drinking is linked to more than one in three cases of the death or serious injury of a child through neglect or abuse in England, according to a report published today.
Yet more than half of councils still do not have a strategy to help children of alcoholics despite the dangers of addiction, the study commissioned by a cross-party group of MPs and peers found.
Alcohol misuse was a
factor in 37 per cent of neglect and abuse cases that resulted in death or serious injury of a child between 2011 and 2014. Birmingham Hodge Hill Labour MP Liam Byrne said that parents who misuse alcohol can cause “horrific” problems for their children.
Children report feeling isolated and are reluctant to seek help due to feelings of stigma, shame and guilt, according to the study.
Mr Byrne, who lost his father to alcoholism in 2015 and is chairman of the all-party parliamentary group for children of alcoholics, said: “Our campaign has now won a new commit-ment from government for a national strategy to stop parental alcohol misuse.
Freedom of information requests show that 92 per cent of the 53 councils that provided information are cutting budgets for addiction services.
‘Horrific’ problems faced by children of boozers SUNDAY OUTING: A mighty leviathan disturbs the peace of leafy Iver Heath in Buckinghamshire yesterday as it scrunches through the streets on its way to disgorge its king-size cargo at Uxbridge
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Morning Star Monday
February 12 2018news
■ FOREIGN POLICY
‘WHY ARE WE SUPPORTING THIS BRUTAL CRACKDOWN?’SHADOW foreign secretary Emily Thornberry demanded an explanation from the gov-ernment yesterday after it was revealed that British spyware was used by the Honduran government in a brutal crack-down on anti-government protests.
Her letter to Foreign Secre-tary Boris Johnson asked for detail on whether the spy-ware sales went through the procedures for arms exports, which involves four govern-ment departments.
Ms Thornberry also sought clarity on what purpose Brit-ish offi cials were told that the equipment would be used for and what steps were taken to confi rm this.
The equipment in question is worth at least £300,000 and can help intercept and monitor a broad range of telecommunications includ-
ing emails, phone calls and online messaging apps. It has been reportedly used in Hon-duras’s sweeping clampdown on protests that followed November’s disputed general election result; thousands of police and troops swarmed protests, resulting in dozens of casualties.
Multiple exports appear to have taken place, including two licences for the export of “telecommunications inter-ception equipment” in 2016 and 2017 and a further open licence of unknown value for other “information security equipment.”
Political repression in Hon-duras, including the monitor-ing of private communications, is well-documented. The coun-try receives millions in state
aid from the US.Since the 2009 coup d’etat
that ousted leftwinger Manuel Zelaya, allowing the still incumbent National Party to seize power, the administration has been accused of extrajudi-cial killings, election fraud and
involvement with organised crime.
Ms Thornberry accused the British government of double standards, pointing to minis-ters’ lack of response to repres-sion in Honduras — in contrast with vociferous condemnation of alleged state violence in Ven-ezuela, where the left is being threatened by a putschist oppo-sition funded by the US.
Labour MP for Brighton Kemptown Lloyd Russell-Moyle has tabled a written parliamen-tary question asking for the name of the fi rm behind the equipment sale.
A Department for Interna-tional Trade spokesman said it did not license exports in cases that it assessed there was a “clear risk that the goods may be used for internal repres-sion.”
Such sales are illegal under the 2008 Export Control Act.
HONDURAS: Thornberry demands answers over export of spyware to repressive regime
by Nathan Akehurst
■ FRONT PAGE
PLOTTERS TRAIN THEIR SIGHTS ON LEONARDFROM P1: Mr Leonard has charged his party’s equalities and diversity sub-committee with creating com-prehensive anti-discrimination and harassment guidelines following this case and other allegations of racism that predate his leadership.
Several sources attribute much of the plotting to Alan Roden, who was political editor of the Scottish Daily Mail before becoming Scot-tish Labour’s director of communi-cations, then running Mr Sarwar’s leadership bid.
More recently, he acted as a media adviser to Ms Dugdale dur-ing her stint on I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! and now works for her in the Scottish Parliament.
One campaigner said it would be a let-down for the thousands of party members who elected Mr Leonard “if Roden, Dugdale and Sarwar are working together to undermine” him.
Ms Dugdale had previously claimed that her resignation was motivated not by policy disagree-ments but the death of an old friend. A senior Labour source said: “From day one of Richard’s
leadership, starting with Dugdale’s jungle trip, right up to today with the leak of her comments about resigning just as Jeremy Corbyn is due to visit, there has been a con-stant attempt to divert headlines away from Richard.”
The source called on Ms Dug-dale and Mr Sarwar to “rein in” Mr Roden, “who is suspected of being at the heart of a dirty-tricks campaign against Richard, using all the experience he learned at the sexist, racist Daily Mail.”
“It really does beggar belief that, with his track record of articles attacking migrants, gay rights and so-called dole scroungers, that he is working for someone apparently so concerned with promoting an equalities agenda.”
Scottish Labour has surged in the polls since last year’s general election.
One activist said: “The recep-tion for Labour’s platform is get-ting better every time we are out; time the naysayers got their head out of Holyrood and back into the heartlands.”
tory reconsiderations, an inter-nal DWP review, and appeals to tribunals run by the courts service. The DWP said a “small proportion” of decisions were overturned.
Linda Burnip of Disabled People Against Cuts told the Star that these amounts do not cover the £1.6 billion paid over three years to US priva-teer Maximus to carry out work capability assessments. Atos and Capita have also received more than £416m to carry out the totally inadequate PIP assessments over three years.
Ms Burnip said: “These wasted amounts of money spent trying to stop disabled people access the benefi ts they need could easily have paid for them for many years instead.
“It is time taxpayers demanded real value for money and justice for disa-bled people rather than hav-ing their money squandered on paying private corpora-tions to continue failing and wasted on unnecessary and cruel reconsiderations and tribunals.
“Like most things this gov-ernment do, this is scandal-ous.”
The select committee is due to publish the results of its inquiry into PIP and ESA on Wednesday.
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LETTER: Emily Thornberry
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■ FOREIGN POLICY
Tories’ ‘incoherent’ position on Kurds slammed by MPsby Our News Desk
THE Foreign Offi ce has an “incoherent” position on the future of Syrian Kurds and has failed to defend Iraqi Kurds, MPs charged yesterday.
A damning report from the Commons foreign aff airs committee said that the Boris Johnson’s department needs a “clear view” on the Kurd-ish People’s Protection Units (YPG).
The YPG has formed a major part of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which the British government has been supporting with air strikes in the fi ght against Isis.
But Turkey views the group and its political wing the Dem-ocratic Union Party (PYD) as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which is classed as a terrorist organisa-tion by Turkey and Britain.
The MPs warned there was a “high risk that the expan-sion of the PYD/YPG will result in new confl ict in the region” as Turkey has already moved against the group and the Syrian government has threatened to do so.
The committee recom-mended the Foreign Offi ce “clarify its own position on the relationship between the
PYD/YPG and the PKK.”The criticism follows
renewed violence in the region.
Following the independ-ence referendum in Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish region — deemed unconstitutional by Baghdad — last year, Iraqi government forces stormed disputed territories in a cam-paign involving numerous allegations of rights abuses.
The committee heard that British government ministers held credible intelligence warning of links between Iranian and Iraqi state-backed militias.
In northern Syria, Turkey launched an off ensive aimed at removing Kurdish forces from the Afrin and Tel Rifaat areas three weeks ago. More than 60 civilians have been killed and the invasion has been dogged with allegations of war crimes, including the deployment of napalm.
Yet ministers had “little to say” on the corruption or human rights issues, accord-ing to the committee.
Opposition politicians have condemned the ongoing vio-lence and Labour leader Jer-emy Corbyn has expressed “solidarity with the Kurdish people.”
[email protected] ■ UTILITIES
McDONNELL VOWS TO END
WATER PROFITEERS’ REIGNA LABOUR government would end the “scandal” of a priva-tised water industry that has seen more than £13 billion paid out in dividends since 2010, John McDonnell said yesterday.
The shadow chancellor launched a scathing attack on water companies, which have a “stranglehold” on households and businesses that have no choice but to use a regional supplier.
Billions have been paid out to shareholders while custom-ers are forced to meet rising bills, analysis by Labour show, and taxpayers are also being shortchanged by companies receiving more in tax breaks than they have contributed.
In 2017 alone, six water companies — Thames Water, Anglian Water, Yorkshire Water, Northumbrian Water, Southern Water and South West — collectively paid out
more than £1.6bn in dividends, a rise of 24 per cent on the pre-vious year and over twice the amount they made in pre-tax profi ts.
These same water companies received £253 million more in tax credits in 2017 than they contributed in taxes. Collec-tively since 2010 these com-panies have received almost £500m more in tax credits than they paid in tax.
Mr McDonnell said: “The water industry is quick to waste customers’ money on funding reports by right-wing think tanks to attack Labour, while running from their shameful record.
“But these fi gures reveal that our water system is broken.
“It is a national scandal that
since 2010 these companies have paid out billions to their shareholders, almost all their profi ts, while receiving more in tax credits than they paid in tax.
“These companies operate regional monopolies which have profi ted at the expense of consumers who have no choice in who supplies their water.
“Yet at the same time they hike up prices and load up on debt while shelling out billions in dividend payments to share-holders.
“Rather than the scandal of rip-off prices and huge dividend payments, we will bring them back into public hands, so we see more investment and lower prices.
“The next Labour govern-ment will call an end to the privatisation of our public sector, and call time on the freeloading water companies
that have a stranglehold over many working households. Instead, Labour will replace this dysfunctional system with a network of regional, publicly owned water companies.”
SHADOW CHANCELLOR: Firms fl eecing the public have paid out £13bn in dividends since 2010
by Lamiat Sabin
UP IN ARMS: Hundreds of women, some dressed as suff ragettes, march through Glasgow on Saturday calling for equal pay from the city council
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n INTERNATIONAL SOLIDARITY
Young comrades protest at Kiev’s anti-communist lawsby Brett Perkin
BRITAIN’S Young Communists took to the streets across Brit-ain on Saturday in solidarity with their comrades facing repression in Ukraine.
They gathered in London, Glasgow, Edinburgh and Man-chester to protest against the Kiev regime’s “violation of the political and civil rights of Ukrainians by adoption of laws banning the use of communist symbols and ideology.”
In Manchester, they descended on the statue of Friedrich Engels that artist Phil Collins rescued from Ukraine, where it had been consigned to the scrapyard — a victim of Kiev’s ban on communist symbols.
Edinburgh protesters handed in a letter of protest at the city’s consulate but, in London, embassy staff refused to accept the letter to the ambassador, instead calling armed diplo-matic police.
YCL executive committee
member Robin Talbot told pro-testers: “We called this national day of action because we face a chilling reality. That reality is that nazi-fascism is back in power in Ukraine.”
He pointed out that February 10 was the 71st anniversary of the signing of the Paris peace accords, a post-World War II promise between the victori-ous allies to uphold peace and democracy.
“Britain and the countries of Europe swore that never again
would nazism rear its ugly head in Europe.”
At La Pasionaria statue in Glasgow, YCL chair Johnnie Hunter asked: “What do we see of Theresa May and the British government’s commitment to this promise in 2018?
“Britain along with the other Nato powers have provided advisers, training and weap-onry to the Ukrainian army, which is propped up with nazi paramilitaries.”
n INDUSTRIAL
New strike at museums over change to contractsMUSEUM workers are to stage a fresh strike in protest at contract changes which they say have led to extra work and shorter breaks.
Prospect union members at the National Maritime Museum and Royal Observatory Greenwich will walk out on February 17.
The visitor and sales assistants at the London museums took action on New Year’s Day, say-ing the imposed changes would mean them having to work an extra three weeks a year without proper compensation and reduce the length of their breaks.
Prospect negotiations officer Caroline Hemmington said: “This strike is not about stop-ping people from going to the museum but to highlight how detrimental these changes have been to the staff affected.”
A management spokesman said that, from November, Royal Museums Greenwich had “har-monised terms and conditions” for front-of-house staff due to a merger of two departments.
n NEW SEX ALLEGATIONS
Oxfam government funding at risk over prostitutes scandal by Lamiat Sabin
OXFAM could lose government funding over its handling of allegations that a number of its workers used prostitutes during aid missions abroad.
The charity lied and failed in its “moral leadership” in the wake of allegations of sexual miscon-duct, International Development Secretary Penny Mordaunt told yesterday’s Andrew Marr Show.
She condemned the behav-iour of some Oxfam staff mem-bers as a “complete betrayal,” warning the charity that the scandal exposed by The Times had put its relationship with the government at risk.
Oxfam is facing mounting criticism over its handling of sex allegations. It has denied that it tried to cover up the use of prostitutes by workers sent to Haiti after the 2011 earthquake.
After an investigation, four members of staff were dis-missed and three, including the country director, resigned. The charity said allegations that under-age girls may have been involved were not proven.
At the weekend, fresh claims
n INDUSTRIAL
PROTESTERS marched through Oxford at the weekend in support of a taxi driver who says he was sacked for being a trade union organiser.
About 100 GMB members turned out to protest at the treatment of Mohammed Fadllalla, who was told by 001 Taxis last month that his services were “no longer needed.”
The march, led by Mr Fadllalla, his wife and three children, started outside one of the com-pany’s offices and ended at another.
He first worked for 001 Taxis in 1998 and joined the GMB a year ago, after becoming embroiled in disputes with the firm.
Since being sacked, he has been feeding his fam-ily by borrowing money from other taxi drivers.
At Saturday’s protest, GMB national officer Mick Rix said: “Quite a number of taxi opera-tors across the country employ the same tactics.”
A tribunal case on Mr Fadllalla’s sacking is due to begin on February 28.
100 march for cab driver sacked over union work
emerged that employees had repeatedly invited sex workers to parties at Oxfam’s premises in Chad in 2006 and a senior staff member had been sacked.
Ms Mordaunt said that the organisation’s failure to pass on information to relevant authorities shows an “absolute absence of leadership.”
She said she would meet the charity today to discuss the cases and warned: “If the moral leadership at the top of the organisation is not there then [the Department for Inter-national Development] cannot have you as a partner.”
Charities including Oxfam have been told they will have funding withdrawn if they fail to comply with authorities over safeguarding issues.
The Charity Commission said on Saturday that it had written to Oxfam “as a matter of urgency” to request further information.
“Our approach to this matter would have been different had the full details that have been reported been disclosed to us at the time,” the commission said in a statement.
Oxfam’s chairwoman of trustees in Britain Caroline Thomson said the charity was “ashamed” of what had hap-pened in Haiti, adding that it prides itself on “being a trans-parent organisation.
“It is clear that such behav-iour is completely outside our values and should never be tol-erated,” she said.
Ms Thomson said she was working closely with chief executive Mark Goldring to address “underlying cultural issues” within the charity.
She added that safeguards would be improved in recruit-ment and vetting and a new independent whistleblowing helpline would be established.
OUTCRY: Young Communist League members demonstrate in Glasgow
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n ISRAEL
Netanyahu brags of dealing ‘harsh blows’ to Syria and Iranby Our Foreign Desk
ISRAELI Prime Minister Ben-jamin Netanyahu claimed yesterday to have dealt “severe blows” to Iranian and Syrian forces, talking tough following the downing of an Israeli jet by Syria’s anti-aircraft defences.
Tel Aviv launched a wave of air raids against Syria on Sat-urday, supposedly after inter-cepting an Iranian drone. The Britain-based Syrian Observa-tory for Human Rights said at least six Syrian soldiers and allied militia fi ghters had been
killed in the strikes.The bombers came under
anti-aircraft fi re and one F-16 crash-landed in northern Israel after being struck by a mis-sile — the fi rst time an Israeli plane has been shot down in a war zone since 1982.
Mr Netanyahu was at pains to stress that the fate of that aircraft would not deter Israel from continuing to illegally bomb Syria.
“We made it unequivocally clear to everyone that our rules of action have not changed one bit,” he said.
“We will continue to strike
at every attempt to strike at us.“This has been our policy
and it will remain our policy.”Israel has launched repeated
raids on Syrian troops and their Lebanese Hezbollah allies, leading to accusations from Damascus that it is actively aiding the Isis terror group.
The Israeli army is also accused of using hospitals in the Golan Heights — Syrian territory illegally occupied by Israel since 1967 — to patch up rebel fi ghters who then return to the fray.
Mr Netanyahu spoke to Rus-
HONG KONG: At least 19 people were killed at the weekend after a high speed double-decker bus crashed in the Tai Po area.
Police reported that the bus driver had been arrested for dangerous driving. Another 65 people were left injured in the deadly accident, where the bus fl ipped on its side and crashed into a lamppost.
It is Hong Kong’s deadli-est road accident since a bus crash in 2003 killed 21 people.
n POLAND
Outrageous claim over HolocaustISRAEL is annoyed at a law whitewashing Poland’s role in the Holocaust because of its “shame at the passivity of the Jews” during the genocide, a Polish presidential adviser has claimed.
Andrzej Zybertowicz told the Polska-The Times newspaper that Tel Aviv’s opposition to the law — criminalising reference to Polish complicity in the crimes committed under nazi occupa-tion — was anti-Polish, adding that Israel was “clearly fi ghting to keep the monopoly on the Holocaust.”
His claims follow open expres-sions of anti-semitism in some government-controlled media after Israel objected to the law.
On Saturday, ruling party leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski described anti-semitism as a “serious illness of the soul,” but said Poland does not have to agree with “either Poles or Jews” who want to “off end” Poland.
Mr Zybertowicz’s claims of passivity fl y in the face of the many acts of resistance carried out by Jews in Poland and else-where, the Warsaw Ghetto upris-ing being the most notable,
n UKRAINE
CPJ slams attack on news offi cesby Our Foreign Desk
THE Committee to Protect Jour-nalists (CPJ) has condemned a police rampage at the offi ces of Ukrainian media company Vesti.
Offi cers stormed the premises of the company, which pub-lishes the largest daily newspa-per by circulation in Ukraine and broadcasts a popular radio station, on Thursday.
Editor-in-chief Oksana Omelchenko said about 50 offi cers from the main mili-tary prosecutor’s offi ce and representatives of the anti-corruption agency Arma broke into the building, accompanied by unidentifi ed thugs wearing balaclavas.
Windows and equipment were smashed and police searched journalists’ personal eff ects. The newspaper staff say no warrant was at any point shown.
Vesti has previously rattled Arma by investigating its activi-ties. Tasked with recovering assets obtained through cor-ruption, the agency has been accused of targeting offi cials
of the previous Viktor Yanu-kovych presidency for politi-cal reasons.
The company has been repeatedly harassed by Ukrain-ian authorities, including with a bid to deny renewal of its broadcasting licence last year that attracted criticism from the International Federation of Journalists.
Prosecutor-general Yuri Lut-senko vowed at the new year to take action to block the publica-tion of the newspaper, which Kiev regards as pro-Russian.
“There is no justifi cation for the hostile raid by Ukrain-ian law enforcement against Media Holding Vesti, which appears to be part of an ongo-ing campaign of harassment against the critical outlet,” CPJ Europe and Central Asia programme co-ordinator Nina Ognianova said.
“We call on Ukrainian authorities to explain their forced entry, return property taken and stop harassing Media Holding Vesti so that its jour-nalists can resume their work.”
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n ITALY
ANTI-FASCISTS MARCH AGAINST RACIST SHOOTINGSby Our Foreign Desk
THIRTY-THOUSAND anti-racists rallied in the Italian city of Macerata on Saturday to mark a week since six black people were shot and wounded by a fascist gunman.
Demonstrators defied calls from Mayor Romano Carancini for the rally to be called off for fear of provoking “unrest” — far-right activists of the Forza Nuova party clashed with police last Thursday when they held a demo in the town claiming: “people die from immigration.”
Mr Carancini claimed at the weekend that his heart was with the anti-fascist protest, though he didn’t show up.
Shooter Luca Traini has told police his rampage, in which he drove around the city firing on anyone black he came across,
was a response to the mur-der of a young Italian woman in which a man of Nigerian descent is the prime suspect.
While Forza Nuova chief Roberto Fiore claims to deplore the shootings, he also remarked that Mr Traini was “also a victim.”
But Thursday’s provocation by about 40 right-wing activ-ists was dwarfed by Saturday’s giant rally, which saw participa-tion from the National Associa-tion of Italian Partisans (Anpi), an organisation of veterans of the second world war anti-fascist resistance which over-threw and hanged Mussolini, the Potere al Popolo (“power to the people”) left electoral alli-ance, socialists, communists and trade unionists.
The crowds chanted: “If there’s unemployment blame the government, not the migrants” and on parts of the route resi-
dents clapped and cheered the march as it snaked past.
“We have a constitution that is, above all, anti-fascist and I want the laws against fascist ideology to be applied,” marcher Giuliano Denti told reporters, while Mafalda Quartu added: “In recent years we have allowed the right to flourish. I have always demon-strated, but now we need to do so more than ever.”
Interior Minister Marco Min-niti told a press conference that he agreed with action against far-right parties, saying “there are limits beyond which we can-not go in a democracy and we will not allow anyone to breach them.” He added that “fascism and nazism are dead forever.”
But Tuscany regional presi-dent Enrico Rossi retorted: “Fas-cism and nazism can be reborn. Our task is to prevent that.”
MACERATA: 30,000 demonstrators defy mayor’s bid to call off rally
n TURKEY
TURKEY’S Peoples’ Demo-cratic Party (HDP) began its congress yesterday, seeking to elect new leadership following the arrest and impris-onment of the previous ones.
MPs Pervin Buldan and Sezai Temelli are expected to be elected co-leaders in place of Sela-hattin Demirtas, who is behind bars awaiting trial for alleged links to the banned Kurdistan Work-ers Party (PKK), and Ser-pil Kemalbay (pictured) — who herself was elected to fill in after former co-leader Figen Yuksekdag was arrested and jailed.
A warrant for Ms Kemalbay’s arrest was issued on Friday on the grounds that she has expressed opposition to
Turkey’s invasion of Syria’s Afrin canton, but she had not been arrested when the Morning Star went to press and addressed the congress.
Hundreds have been arrested in Turkey for criticising the attack on Syria’s Kurds, while seven other HDP MPs had already been jailed as part of the massive clampdown on critical voices by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan following 2016’s failed coup.
HDP begins congress to replace arrested leaders
sian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday, apparently agree-ing to avoid escalation.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry described the Israeli air raids as “absolutely unacceptable,” saying they endangered its own troops in Syria who were present “at the invitation of its legitimate government.”
The US sided with Israel, saying it supported its “right to defend itself” and calling on “Iran and its allies to cease provocative actions.”
Israel has condemned the Syrian government for fighting alongside Hezbollah and also alleges a significant Iranian presence in Syria, although independent journalists such as Robert Fisk say they have come across no evidence of this.
LAST STRAW: A man dressed in the traditional ‘straw man’ costume is pulled to his feet during the winter carnival in the alpine village of Evolene, Switzerland, where locals build the Hom Strom, a giant straw man, and then set it on fire, supposedly to chase away winter and welcome spring
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@m_star_online8Morning Star Monday February 12 2018 features
ATTEMPTS to start a war within the Labour Party over Brexit do not help our movement north or south of the border.
They also show misplaced priorities by too many on the left, who are continuing to shadow-box on battle lines drawn by the ruling class when ordinary people have moved on.
Westminster politicians and media pundits assumed, after the unexpected victory for Leave in 2016’s referen-dum on EU membership, that Brexit would be the issue of our time.
A panicked Conservative government — David Cameron had staked everything on a Remain win and was forced to resign when the outcome became clear — couldn’t believe its luck as Labour MPs decided to blame their own leader for the result and waste an entire summer in a futile bid to reverse the will of the party membership by removing him.
Establishment voices sailed into last summer’s election again predicting disaster for Labour and assuming that voters would divide along Brexit lines.
A super-majority was predicted for Theresa May’s Tories, who shouted from the rooftops that only they could be trusted to carry out the will of the people on Brexit.
The Liberal Democrats, reduced to roughly a tenth of their previous parliamentary size in the 2015 election, saw an opportunity to crawl back from the abyss by hoovering up Remain voters disillusioned with Labour’s supposed lack of clarity on the issue.
As we know, Tories and Lib Dems miscalculated. Labour fought a campaign on economic justice, pledging an end to rip-off privatisations, action on poverty pay and insecure work and more money for public services. It paid off with the biggest increase in vote share the party had seen in seven decades.
That forward movement was discernible in Remain-voting Scotland as well as in Leave-voting England, with a failure, deliberate or otherwise, to properly resource candidates assumed to stand no chance of ousting Scottish National Party MPs depriving the party of an even more dramatic comeback north of the border.
Since then, Labour has come to dominate the national conversation. Its ideas around expanding public ownership and democratic control, responding to the automation revolution that in its current form poses a threat to jobs and creating a new deal for workers through improved workplace rights and stronger trade unions show an ambi-tion and dynamism the Tories clearly lack.
Against this backdrop, a number of MPs continue to snipe at the leadership because of its principled decision to respect the referendum result on the EU.
Nicola Sturgeon might whinge that this is “effectively backing the Tories’ extreme Brexit,” while Vince Cable, the coalition kingpin who privatised Royal Mail and helped the Tories tear up our NHS, might have the gall to accuse Jeremy Corbyn of “collusion” with his former allies in the Conservative Party.
Both are being deeply dishonest. Labour has not backed the Conservative position on Brexit, forcing the govern-ment to bring any deal back to Parliament. Corbyn has detailed priorities including an end to undercutting wages and negotiating new, fairer international trade models which couldn’t be further from the free-market fantasies of David Davis or Liam Fox.
In truth, Sturgeon and Cable, like some on the right of the Labour benches, fixate on reversing the referendum or frustrating its verdict because Corbyn’s radicalism frightens them.
Far better a party returned to the Establishment’s neo-liberal comfort zone, tied down to the free market prin-ciples enshrined in the EU treaties, than one offering a fundamental challenge to an exhausted status quo.
From the SNP or Liberal Democrat perspective, these pot shots make sense. It is disappointing when such attacks come from within the labour movement itself.
Labour cannot let Brexit divide the party – to do so would spell disaster
Star comment MY KURD-ISH nom de guerre, given to me by the People’s Pro-tection Unit
(YPG), is Tirpan Cudi.I am a communist and one
of three Irishmen now in Afrin to resist the Turkish invasion of Rojava, northern Syria.
I have been fighting here against Isis since 2016 as part of the International Freedom Battalion, an alliance of Turk-ish communist parties and international communist and anarchist volunteers.
My closest comrades have been here since the battle of Kobane in 2014. They are mostly from Communist Party of Turkey/Marxist-Lenninist (TKPML) and the Liberation Army of the Workers and Peas-ants of Turkey (TIKKO).
They have been active since 1972, mainly in the Dersim mountain range and are made up of a mix of ethnicities typi-cal of this region: Kurds, Turks, Armenians, and people of the Allevi religion — a progressive sect of Islam that holds Moham-ed’s daughter in reverence.
You realise quickly that there is not one oppressed ethnicity in the region, but alongside the Kurds, there are tens of major groups with their own languages and histories that are threatened by Turkish chauvinism.
However, allies in great number are still thin on the ground. The only thing close to a friendly neighbour in the area is in the very south of the Iraqi Kurdish Regional Govern-ment (KRG).
Since the Kurdish referen-dum, the Iraqi government rolled back a lot of the KRG’s autonomy, so the relatively small assistance they were previously able to get from the Patriotic Union of Kurdis-tan (PUK) party areas has gone.
Former Iraqi Kurdistan presi-dent Masoud Barzani’s Kurdis-tan Democratic Party (KDP) is in charge of the KRG overall, and crucially that includes all of the regions that actually bor-der Rojava.
He is an ally of Turkey and completely hostile. Even when Isis was at its strongest, he stood aside and even impeded the YPG’s fight whenever he could.
The KDP’s politics are not even Kurdish nationalist, they are feudal, tribal, opportunisti-cally friendly with Turkey and Israel, and the party are total clients of the United States, which injects millions of dol-lars into its failing statelet.
The relationship with the Syrian government is compli-cated but I wouldn’t describe it as hostile today. Rojava is not a separatist project, its ambition is autonomy within what the Russians propose, a new Syrian Republic.
The YPG and Syrian forces have worked together in the past in the liberation of Aleppo. Many of the city neighbour-hoods of Qamishli in Rojava are under government control. But even as a foreigner you can walk or drive through the
checkpoints with no problems.The Syrian Arab Army (SAA)
has not been obstructing us in our defence of Afrin, which it could easily do.
Russia has given a decent amount of military assistance to the YPG in the past, though less than the US. It proposes replacing the current Syrian Arab Republic with a new Syr-ian Republic, with Kurdish autonomy, and state recogni-tion of all minority languages.
Russia has tried to get the Syrian Kurds a place at the table for the peace negotiations, and for the first time secured one for the planned Sochi talks.
However, Russia allowing Turkey to invade Afrin shows it is no more reliable than the US. Our alliances with it were tactical and temporary, just like the YPG said from the start.
International solidarity is therefore vital. One party active here, the Marxist-Lenin-
ist Communist Party (MLKP), put the Afrin resistance like this: Kobane was Stalingrad, make Afrin Vietnam.
This is how I would explain it to the anti-capitalist left in Europe and the United States who still struggle to under-stand and support us.
Like Vietnam, we have made alliances with the big powers in the past and played them off one another. But now we face Turkey, and therefore Nato imperialism, head on.
The YPG will fight the war, but you must conduct a huge and militant solidarity cam-paign back home. We need actions, protests and trade union declarations. We need slogans on the walls of the West.
Militarily, fighting a Nato army will be different to fight-ing Isis, like I did in Manbij and Raqqa, due to the Turkish air
Kobane was Staling
make Afrin Vietnam
GARY OAK presents a
letter from an Irish
volunteer in the YPG facing
invasion from Turkey
morningstaronline.co.uk morningstaronline @m_star_online 9
Morning Star Monday
February 12 2018features
force. But ideologically speak-ing it is not so different.
Both Isis and Turkish Presi-dent Recep Tayyip Erdogan want the total destruction of the Kurdish people, both are Islamist and, in typical fascist fashion, both are trying to res-urrect an older, glorious order. While Isis wanted a caliphate, Turkey has neo-Ottoman ambi-tions.
The assistance Turkey has given to Isis is well documented but it failed to crush the Rojava project. So now, to weaken Rojava ahead of the Sochi peace negotiations, Turkey is taking matters directly into its own hands with the invasion of Afrin.
Given the 2015 Turkish cam-paign against the Kurds in Bakur, eastern Turkey, where they flattened large civilian areas of cities such as Cizre and Nusaybin inside Turkish
borders, we can expect a com-plete disregard for civilian life.
However, in 2015 there were barely any journalists, inde-pendent or otherwise, cover-ing those massacres because the Turkish state was able to close off the area.
The Rojava Kurds are more famous and have played a much better media game. Now the world is watching Afrin and asking why the heroes who lib-erated Raqqa from Isis yester-day are being abandoned today.
Even though we have seen some BBC reporters embedded with the Turkish side, we also have reporters on our side of the line.
In comparison to Isis there are three things I am glad I won’t have to deal with this time. The first is suicide car-bombs driven at speed towards us. Some of those were more powerful than the average air strike.
I arrived in the wake of one once. It had gone off at a cross-roads and totally vapourised everything on the road and almost levelled all the apart-ments on the four corners.
The second is mines, booby traps. There are ridiculous amounts of mines planted by Isis. When they retreated they riddled the places they vacated with mines. In one apartment building in Raqqa we found 35 traps set with explosives.
The third thing is the suicide vests loaded with ball bear-ings on individual fighters. Although these could make a reappearance given that so many Isis and other jihadis have been recruited to Tur-key’s side.
Despite Turkish troop num-bers and air power, I’m opti-mistic. Unlike most of Rojava, Afrin is mountainous and hilly. We can fight a guerilla campaign here during the inva-sion, and if needs be during an occupation.
Even if we lose major areas, we will either get them back as soon as Turkey withdraws, or Turkey will eventually face losses that will cost Erdogan politically.
Having removed all the peo-ple from his administration who might have talked sense into him, Erdogan’s invasion is nothing but a madman lashing out.
The legal implications of fighting a sovereign power and Nato member state do not concern me. I’m in a sovereign state, it’s called Syria, and it’s currently being invaded ille-gally by Turkey.
I’m a member of the YPG, a Syrian army that’s increas-ingly gaining de-facto recog-nition. I don’t care about the legality. Turkey and its Free Syrian Army (FSA) goons have no business here and need to be crushed in their craven neo-Ottoman Salafist efforts. We are not leaving until that job is done.
If we win, then facts on the ground makes prosecuting us unlikely, or at least very unpopular as the West will be on friendly terms with the Rojava project again. If we lose we will be dead.
SCOTTISH MP Hugh Gaffney was — rightly — repri-manded last week for remarks about
Chinese people at a Labour event.
I would prefer it these things never happened, but such incidents should be judged on the aftermath as much as the event.
Gaffney gave a swift, hum-ble apology. He faced public censure, and will now attend training where he will hope-fully emerge with a serious understanding of how words can bite in a culture that still struggles with the real, mate-rial impact of racism.
Hopefully this shows that Shami Chakrabarti’s review into internal racism following anti-semitism allegations — the first modern protocol on iden-tity-based discrimination to be drawn up by a major British political party — is working.
Meanwhile the Tories have a Foreign Secretary who throws around terms like “water-melon-smiled piccaninnies” and uses Libyan corpses as the butt of conference speech jokes, while they preside over an economy that has damaged minority communities and sponsor an immigration con-trol regime that has returned racial profiling to our streets.
Labour is the party of the first black female MP, of the Race Relations Act, and of the Macpherson report. But that doesn’t mean we always get it right.
A year ago, 12 of the 14 con-stituency Labour parties in spe-cial measures were ones with large minority communities.
I hear regular stories about strategists relying on an “eth-nic vote” over real community engagement, or of MPs making casually racist remarks.
Only a few years ago, former immigration minister Phil Woolas was turfed out of office by the courts for a campaign based on, in his aide’s words, “getting the white vote angry” by smearing local Muslims.
So it was horrifying to hear former Scottish Labour MP and leadership contender Anas Sar-war allege that a Labour figure had told him Scotland was “not ready for a Paki leader.”
The merit of these claims is for the party to determine, and hopefully Sarwar is engaging with its procedures. But this incident aside, I’ve no doubt that Anas — like me — has seen racism inside and outside Labour throughout his life. That’s a matter for solidarity beyond factional lines.
But some responses to Gaff-ney’s gaffe smack of factional-ism. Sources on Labour’s right have been heavily briefing that Gaffney was “let off” by Rich-ard Leonard and Jeremy Corbyn because he’s on Labour’s left.
Yet there is nothing to sug-gest disciplinary procedures were not followed precisely. In any case similar and worse incidents have been ignored by previous leaderships.
And of course Sarah Cham-pion (no Corbynite) got away
with lots of concerning com-ments before pressure finally came on her to resign last year. Woolas was ardently defended by party grandees even after the courts slapped him down.
Furthermore, the leaking of Sarwar’s apparent refusal to sit next to Leonard at First Minister’s Questions last week smacks of a deliberate attempt to turn the issue into a question of Leonard’s leadership.
It isn’t. Leonard has stood up against racism throughout his career, joined an anti-racist rally barely a week ago, and there is no suggestion he is weak on the issue.
It seems an open secret in Scottish Labour circles that just as some Labour figures attempted to destabilise Corbyn prior to the 2016 coup, a few hope to execute similar, more successful manoeuvres against Leonard.
In spite of surging polls for Scottish Labour over the last year, sections of the party’s right remain unhappy.
Some would be perfectly willing to exploit ongoing rows for political gain. But any race issue in the party is a collective, not factional, issue.
The charge against Gaffney is now led by, of all outlets, the Scottish Sun. This is the same paper that routinely denigrates Muslims, refugees and other minorities it regards as undesir-able, and whose English sister paper has a roll call of hatred that could fill volumes.
A senior Sun journal-ist claims Scottish Labour “moder-ates” are worried by Leonard’s response.
The “moderates” were less worried when they appointed a former Scottish Daily Mail political editor as the party’s director of communications, after a record of minority-bashing headlines.
This spin doctor subse-quently ran Sarwar’s failed leadership bid, accompanied former leader Kezia Dugdale on I’m A Celebrity to provide media advice, and has now returned to Holyrood politics — according to some sources to head up the anti-Leonard fac-tion behind the scenes.
The Sun, Daily Mail and Labour right are not the peo-ple to lead a crusade against racism.
Sarwar said he wants to see “deeds not words.” So do I — I will judge people on their contributions to building a better world, not their level of performance-outrage every time someone makes a boorish comment.
The Chakrabarti principles, and the Labour party’s democ-racy review, will allow us to strengthen a climate where peo-ple can report discrimination.
But it’s a backward step when any allegation is weap-onised for partisan gain, which still happens too often.
Let’s hope that any ques-tions of discrimination in Scottish Labour stay clear of the intrigue and plotting which the party can do without.
This time, please, let’s keep
factional politics
out of anti-racism,
says NATHAN
AKEHURST
Scottish Labour, and how not to handle a gaffe
APOLOGY: Hugh Gaffney
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morningstaronline.co.uk morningstaronline
@m_star_online10Morning Star Monday February 12 2018 features
IT might be thought that the Tet offensive, a key moment of the Vietnam war that started at the end of January 1968, 50 years
ago, is something that the Western media might prefer not to dwell on too much.
The line in 1967 from Dem-ocratic US president Lyndon Johnson had been that the war was reaching its final stages, that Vietnam would stay as two countries: a communist state in the north and a US client state designed to maintain US impe-rial interests in Indochina in the south.
General Giap, the military leader of the Vietnam People’s Army, had other ideas.
At the end of January he launched an assault on the south, capturing the city of Hue and making advances in other areas.
The offensive was overcome in due course, and in the nature of war, many were killed and injured on both Vietnamese
and US sides. The US army was a conscript force includ-ing many who had no desire to be there.
The political impact on the US was profound. It also created waves in Britain. Harold Wilson had not sent troops to support
the US in Vietnam as Tony Blair did later in Iraq.
There were reasons for this. The US was using British mili-tary facilities in the Far East to provide assistance for its Viet-nam operation. Wilson kept this quiet.
What he did not keep quiet was Britain’s role in the Viet-nam “peace” talks. These were jointly run by Russia and Brit-ain.
Russia was held, broadly, to support the North, while Brit-ain was the US representative supporting the South.
As 1968 started the aim had been to move towards an agree-ment. That meant essentially that the communists gave up their idea of a united socialist Vietnam and in return the US,
retaining its regional power base in Saigon, would stop attacking the North.
Tet completely changed that equation. For Wilson there was a wider imperial and military issue and one that is still play-ing out 50 years on.
The debacle of Suez in 1956, where Britain had acted with-out US backing in an attempt with France and Israel to police the Middle East and was forced to withdraw in short order, had led to a serious rethink about Britain’s role as a world power.
By the late 1960s it was clear that Britain could no longer afford a military role in the East. The issue was what role could be played and how to maintain the special relation-ship with the US.
The impact of the Tet offen-sive was immediate. By the end of March, president Johnson had announced a ceasefire and proposed further talks.
He concluded his speech with the words: “I shall not
seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your presi-dent.”
It was the beginning of the end for the US in Vietnam and the events of early 1968 sparked anti-Vietnam war protests around the globe including sev-eral well-known ones at the US embassy in Grosvenor Square, central London.
The right-wing commentator Max Hastings reflecting on Tet after 50 years in the perhaps unlikely space of the Daily Mail noted: “Here is a lesson for all modern wars: generals can sometimes claim victory — as the West did after the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2001 and in the 2003 invasion of Iraq — yet find that is far from the end of the story.”
Blair, whose New Labour project deliberately eschewed historical knowledge, did not however learn the lessons of Vietnam, committing Britain to join the US in the Iraq war.
British imperialism and the Tet offensiveKEITH FLETT looks back
50 years to one of the
turning points of the
Vietnam war
WITH the new N u c l e a r P o s t u r e Review (NPR) released on
February 2, the Trump admin-istration is revealing its plans to significantly upgrade the US nuclear weapons arsenal, develop new types of smaller-yield weapons, more closely integrate nuclear and conven-tional war-fighting capabilities and expand the circumstances under which nuclear arms might actually be used.
Despite the NPR’s repeated claims that these moves are “not intended” to “enable nuclear war fighting,” ana-lysts from a broad range of arms control and disarmament organisations are pointing out that the measures are unneces-sary, enormously expensive and greatly increase the possibility of a devastating nuclear war.
The new NPR states that the US “will maintain the range of flexible nuclear capacities needed to ensure that nuclear or non-nuclear aggression against the United States, allies and partners will fail to achieve its objectives and carry with it the credible risk of intolerable con-sequences for potential adver-saries now and in the future.”
The new plan would also “strengthen the integration of nuclear and non-nuclear military planning.”
Besides the current nuclear triad — submarine-launched
missiles, land-based intercon-tinental missiles and bomb-ers — two new nuclear-armed weapons would be developed: a submarine-launched cruise missile and a “tactical” low-yield submarine-launched bal-listic missile.
The NPR also makes resump-tion of nuclear weapons tests more likely. The US signed, but never ratified, the Com-
prehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) when it was opened for signature in 1996. The new NPR explicitly states that Washing-ton will not seek to ratify the CTBT.
The NPR would also reverse over four decades of efforts by both Republican and Democrat-led administrations which have cut the US nuclear arsenal from over 30,000 weapons to about
4,000, of which 1,550 are oper-able.
It is estimated that over the next two decades, carrying out Trump’s NPR would double the portion of the military budget earmarked for nuclear weap-ons, with costs rising by up to $50 billion annually.
Congressional approval of such spending will be essential.
In a February 2 commentary for The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Lawrence Korb, a senior fellow at the Centre for American Progress (and in the 1980s an assistant secretary of defence for manpower in Ronald Reagan’s administration), noted that many US military officials see development of low-yield weapons as a potential “gateway drug” for nuclear war.
“Adding a nuclear cruise missile to the inventory,” he said, “means that the Russians would have to assume that any cruise missile is in fact a nuclear weapon.”
Korb also pointed out that “such new weapons undermine the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, Article VI of which obligates its signatories to take steps to nuclear disarmament.” The US ratified the treaty in 1970. The new document com-pletely omits any reference to Article VI.
In another commentary pub-lished the same day, the Union of Concerned Scientists’ co-director and senior scientist Lis-beth Gronlund cited the NPR’s
wide-ranging list of non-nuclear aggressions by others that could lead to US first-use of nukes.
Among them: “Attacks on the US allied or partner civilian population or infrastructure, and attacks on US or allied nuclear forces, their command and control, or warning and attack assessment capabilities.”
Gronlund pointed to the dis-connect between the new US position and the NPR’s admo-nition to Russia that nuclear first-use on any level “will fail to meet its objectives, funda-mentally alter the nature of a conflict, and trigger incalcu-lable and intolerable costs for Moscow.”
Korb also pointed out that the NPR “overestimates the extent to which our geopoliti-cal rivals are expanding their arsenals.”
He cited Trump’s rejection of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s offer to extend the 2010 New Start treaty committing both countries to significantly cut their nuclear arsenals. Korb also noted that China has “only some 60 intercontinental mis-siles, capable of carrying some 300 warheads.”
Calling the “world security situation … as dangerous as it has been since World War II,” The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists’ Science and Security Board on January 25 moved its Doomsday Clock 30 seconds closer to midnight.
It said the new setting, at
two minutes to midnight, is “the closest the Clock has ever been to Doomsday, and as close as it was in 1953, at the height of the cold war.”
Showing just how much the world’s other nations are con-cerned over the present nuclear weapons situation, in July, 122 United Nations member coun-tries voted to approve the new UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which would ban developing, test-ing, producing, manufacturing, transferring, possessing, stock-piling, using, or threatening to use nuclear weapons.
One country opposed the treaty, one abstained, and oth-ers including the nine nuclear-armed countries boycotted the talks and did not sign.
As the treaty’s initiating organisation, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons was awarded this year’s Nobel Peace Prize.
Ican’s executive director Bea-trice Fihn called the treaty “a choice between the two end-ings: the end of nuclear weap-ons or the end of us.”
After the release of the new NPR, Peace Action’s Paul Kawika Martin wondered: “Who in their right mind thinks it’s a good idea to make nuclear weapons ‘more usable?’ … Who let Dr Strangelove write the Nuclear Posture Review?”
■ This article appeared at peoples-world.org.
Learning to love the bomb: Trump
policy makes nukes ‘more usable’ MARILYN BECHTEL examines the implications of the new Nuclear Posture Review
morningstaronline.co.uk morningstaronline @m_star_online 11
Morning Star Monday
February 12 2018books
Living Contradiction: A Teacher’s Examination of Tension and Disruption in Schools, in Classrooms and in Self
by Sean Warren and Stephen Bigger(Crown House Publishing, £18.99)
THIS extraordinary book about education poses an essential question to teachers. “Is it possible to build good, posi-tive relationships with pupils without sacrificing order and discipline?”
Central to that question, in a profoundly honest and lucid
narrative, is the classroom odyssey of one of its authors, Sean Warren.
It tells the story of how he went to school in east London while living on the Coventry Cross estate, one of the worst in Tower Hamlets and, coping with very challenging fam-ily circumstances, left school at 16 and became a builder’s labourer. Through his own determined volition, he even-tually qualified as a teacher.
Self-critically, he recounts his embrace of classroom authoritarianism, how he became a champion of behav-iourist approaches, quick-
fix solutions based around zero tolerance, “assertive discipline” and rigid sanctions and how he patrolled the corridors with the “undiluted support” of the head.
He became the exem-plar of the new model teacher advocated by Ofsted and took on the state-approved and teacher-pressuring role of the county’s behaviour and attendance consultant. His own practice he describes as increasingly draconian. “Con-trol had come to define me. I was contributing to a climate
of fear masquerading as respect.”
Yet all this power-centredness was hav-ing a contradictory effect upon his own psyche and he began to realise that in his arrogance “there is clear evidence of my
administering sovereign power over others. I also actively sup-pressed myself.”
He began to recognise that what he was demonstrating to others was also gradually pull-ing him down. “I psychologi-cally adopted a bullish mask of confidence, assurance and
assertiveness. It manifested in my walk and in my stance; it exuded from my personality,” he explains.
Such realisations made him determined to change his methods and behaviour as a teacher and the book charts Warren’s struggle to shake off this authoritarian persona, which he began to understand was destroying any opportuni-ties to achieve a self-activated learning, student co-operation and a democratic classroom. As such, it is a teacher’s story that is entirely gripping and relevant.
The 14-year-old Sean Warren,
now 52, was in my class in Pop-lar in the late 1970s and was a powerfully creative student. He was the co-author with Paul Parris, a black classmate, of the fine anti-racist play Moonlight, published by the Inner London Education Authority.
When we showed it the great Caribbean actor Norman Bea-ton, he was strongly impressed by the text and offered his own brand of generous encourage-ment. “Keep on keeping on!” he said, with a huge smile.
It seems that Warren never forgot that, hence this powerful book some 38 years later.
CHRIS SEARLE
n EDUCATION
Top marks for educational read by a teacher transformed
The Econocracy: On the Perils of Leaving Economics to the Experts by Joe Earle, Cahal Moran and Zach Ward-Perkins(Penguin, £9.99)
WHILE studying economics at the University of Manchester, the three authors of Econoc-racy became disillusioned with how little their education was helping them understand the causes and aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis.
In response, they set up the Post-Crash Economics Society and are now members of the Rethinking Economics net-work linking 40 groups in 13 countries.
Their broad thesis in the book is that economists wield a huge amount of influence in society — think of the impor-tance the media gives to the post-budget analysis of the Insti-tute for Fiscal Stud-ies — but have become dangerously discon-nected from the gen-eral population, with little public oversight.
And they argue that eco-nomics as it is taught in uni-versities today means that eco-nomics graduates are “grossly underprepared” to understand how the world works.
To prove this, the authors conducted an in-depth review of the curriculum at seven Rus-sell Group universities, find-ing “a remarkable similarity in the content and structure of economic courses.”
Capitalist-friendly neoclassi-cal economics, with its mech-anistic focus on rational and self-interested individuals, dominates, as does textbook learning, theoretical models
and multiple-choice questions.Worryingly, they note that
the 83 per cent of exams on economic courses at the top-ranked London School of Eco-nomics “entailed no form of critical or independent think-ing whatsoever.”
For the authors, this amounts “to nothing less than the dictionary definition of indoctrination.”
The narrowness of the cur-riculum is not an outcome of conspiracy, they explain, but of historical forces and a market-orientated higher education landscape in which fund-ing, publication and career advancement is largely predi-cated on adhering to a single strand of limited economic thought.
Those looking for how change can be forced on this con-servative world will be interested in the book’s short section detailing the growth of student groups attempting to reform the teaching of economics.
Believing that economics is too important to be left to the experts, in 2015 the authors launched the pilot Commu-nity Crash-Course In Citizen Economics, a six-week evening class for interested members of the public.
Endorsed by Noam Chom-sky, Owen Jones and econo-mists Ha-Joon Chang and Mar-tin Wolf, The Econocracy is a tightly-argued, level-headed critique of the dominance of neoclassical economics.
If there has been a more important book written in the last 10 years about the role of economics in society I’d like to see it.
IAN SINCLAIR
n ECONOMICS
Hand grenade that blows neoliberal indoctrination apart
A New Politics from the Leftby Hilary Wainwright(Polity Books, £9.99)
THIS book is a reminder of why Hilary Wain-wright is one of conte mp ora r y British socialism’s
most perceptive and thoughtful writers.
Yet, while there is much which the socialist reader will agree with and be intrigued by, hers is by no means a per-fect analysis in advancing ideas about a “new politics” from the left.
In an approach that con-sciously avoids too much theo-retical referencing, Wainwright builds up her argument through her own and others’ empirical experiences. She considers the various models that have recently challenged the relationship with the capitalist state and the profit-driven ethos of the whole globalised system.
Opening her account by exploring the politics of knowledge, Wain-wright (pictured) effec-tively juxtaposes the prevailing orthodoxies of social democracy and neoliberalism with the prac-tical and tacit knowledge of real people.
She explores examples of where this knowledge has been used to transform, albeit fleet-ingly, the way organisations operate, from autocratic and bureaucratic entities to open, transformative democracies placing social good at the heart of their existence.
Helpfully, she examines examples from Britain in depth, including the radical Lucas Plan of the 1970s and the transforma-tive City Service experiment in Newcastle during the early
years of this century. Examples elsewhere include Fairmondo, the Catalan co-operative alternative to Amazon, with the author placing particular emphasis on the transformational benefits of the co-oper-ative model.
Echoing Raymond Williams’s The Long Revolution, she posi-tions such efforts in the broader context of the growing shift to self-determination. Correctly, she states that, even when these initiatives fail or are heavily com-promised by capitalist agencies, the learning and inspirational value for succeeding generations to try again is invaluable.
In spite of individual setbacks, this slowly building movement, based on the implementation of
the practical and tacit knowl-edge of people, is propelled by technological advances and their use as open-source oppor-tunities, with information and insights shared in common.
But Wainwright is too astute a writer to assume that these semi-autonomous movements can automatically in themselves challenge the prevailing eco-nomic system without an equal effort to capture the command-ing heights of the economy from the centre. She cites Greece as a clear example of where capitalist structures, even once controlled by a supposedly radical party, are very difficult to bend towards the will of the people.
Some would go further and cite Lenin in his On Co-oper-atives that such efforts may actually be counterproductive in the fight for a better society as “transforming present-day society into socialism without taking into account a fundamen-tal question like the question of the class struggle … is why we
are right in regarding … co-oper-ative socialism as being entirely fantastic.”
Wainwright’s book not only largely ignores a class-based analysis, it obliquely dismisses its application of being of any value. She approvingly records Williams as “fetishising none as more ‘revolutionary than oth-ers’”, hence dismissing much core Marxist-Leninist thought and practice over the last cen-tury and more.
And the Communist Party comes in for criticism, as its “attitude to popular participa-tion and the democratisation of knowledge would often — at a leadership level, at any rate — be hostile.”
This is a shame, as an explora-tion of how democratic central-ism leveraged disproportionate working-class material and polit-ical gains — which it still could within the looser and broader movements outlined here — might have assisted in squaring the trans-formative circle. Recent history demonstrates the ease with which the capitalist class infiltrates, dis-sipates and fragments movements that don’t have a co-ordinating cen-tre and strategy.
Nonetheless, Wainwright’s conclusions about the trans-formed Labour Party and Momentum’s growing influ-ence, not only among activists and trade unionists but in secur-ing the internal mechanisms of the party, suggest that we are on the cusp of a truly transformed socialist movement that com-bines coherence with front-line experimentation.
We live in exciting and hope-ful times and this book goes some way to explaining why.
n POLITICS
Persuasive points on new politics from the leftHilary Wainwright’s analysis of the recent upsurge in anti-capitalist movements is well worth reading, says PAUL SIMON
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ANOTHER week ahead and, hopefully, another week to look forward to receiving a nice big lump sum for our fund.
As it is only Monday and there’s nothing to report over the weekend, we’re all hopeful that things will pick up as the week goes on.
The recent news on Scottish Labour proves just how impor-tant this paper is when it comes
to supporting the best leaders for the job.
Scottish Labour leader and Morning Star columnist Rich-ard Leonard has faced more than his fair share of stabbings in the back over the last week, even by people who should know better.
No doubt this is all thanks to Scotland’s right-wing press — with the hateful Scottish Daily
Mail unsurprisingly fi lling peo-ple’s heads with utter rubbish.
This is why the Morning Star’s role is more important than ever — there has to be a daily sensible voice to counter the right-wing press’s vicious articles.
We’re almost half way through the month but unfor-tunately we still need more than half of our total.
We can do it, our readers and
supporters are like no other. So keep it coming in, all, and per-haps not only will we smash through our target — as we’re sure we will — but maybe one day we’ll have enough money to have a separate Scottish Morning Star — making our coverage of Britain’s labour movement even better.
Well, that’s enough dream-ing for now.
TODAY
Further wintry showers across northern areas, with some accumula-tions of snow expected, even to lower levels in places. Elsewhere a cold and windy night, with a widespread frost developing.
NEXT FEW DAYS
A squally band of rain and snow moves east-wards tomorrow, with sunshine and showers following. Further wind and rain moves east on Wednesday, then sunshine and showers on Thursday.
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QUIZMASTER with William Sitwell
TODAY’S QUESTIONS
YESTERDAY’S ANSWERS
1. Which British comedy duo play the detectives in Done To Death (1972)?
The Two Ronnies (pictured)
2. A work of art by Paul Klee, done in 1922, is
what type of machine? Twittering
3. Was a Tyer’s railway tablet or token circular, square or elongated? Circular
1 How many musicians make up the British jazz band Dinosaur?
2 Which part of the body is measured using a Brannock device?
3 Which island in the Dutch Caribbean has an airport called Flamingo?
Solution tomorrow…
DAILY SUDOKU (middling)
WHY don’t they fall over? That’s the baffl ing thing about all this stuff on ice at the Win-ter Olympics.
The curling, for instance: high-speed street cleaning on ice, and yet nobody falls over.
It’s the same with all these Scandi-noirs, too. Gadding about in the snow and ice, nobody ever comes a cropper: a hint of frost or a fl ake of snow, over I go.
The BBC’s halfpipe-to-luge coverage of the Winter Olympics skids off down the runway at 9.15am on BBC1. For those with-out the staying power, there’s a handy hour-long catch-up, Winter Olympics Extra, at 8pm on BBC4. And you can brush up on your curling with the mixed doubles fi rst semi-fi nal live at 12.10pm.
A David Hare-written TV drama is a rare and noteworthy
event, and the cast-list for Col-lateral (9pm BBC2) makes this new four-parter almost compul-sory viewing: Carey Mulligan, John Simm, Nicola Walker and Billie Piper top the bill, but the quality runs deep.
Hare told the Radio Times: “… my aim became to show how” the killing of a refugee working in the gig economy “could reso-nate through a whole series of diff erent worlds.” A must-watch.
Before Donald Trump, before Bobby Charlton even, there was a geezer called Caesar who tried to stave off his follicular fate with a comb-over. Marvellous Mary Beard gets to shine a light on his bald patch and much else in Julius Caesar Revealed (9pm BBC1).
Robert Rauschenberg: Pop Art Pioneer (BBC4) is a chance for a ponder at the work of the US trailblazer, whose incorpo-
ration of everyday objects and images in his collage and “com-bine” pieces is the missing link between the Dada of Duchamp and the kitsch of Warhol.
Art bloke presenter Alastair Sooke, though: he wouldn’t be missed.
A four-way 9pm dilemma is fulfi lled by Stonewall Uprising (PBS America), which looks at the protests that followed a police raid on a New York gay bar that became a catalyst for the modern gay rights move-ment in the US and around the world.
Film of the day? A 2013 drama by Ryan Coogler, who recently directed the new superhero movie Black Panther. Fruit-vale Station (11.20pm Film4) recounts the fi nal hours of Afri-can-American Oscar Grant, shot by San Francisco transit police on New Year’s Day 2009.
TV preview with Neil Jenkin
But when’s the curling mixed doubles fi rst semi-fi nal on, I hear you demand
Weekend crossword 1,225
Saturday’s sudoku
Previous solutions
morningstaronline.co.uk morningstaronline @m_star_online 13
Morning Star Monday
February 12 2018letters
GRAHAM STEVENSON explores the Star archives
■ THE Daily Worker of February 12 1938
revealed the “methods by which wealthy candidates have won parliamentary elections,” following their exposure in the Com-mons by Major James Milner, Labour MP for Leeds South East, when he moved the second reading of the Election (Motor Cars) Bill.
This legislation aimed to prevent voters being taken to the poll in cars unless they were aged or infi rm. There was concern that, otherwise, wealthy candidates could provide an almost unlimited number of cars on election day, given that their individual cost then exceeded the annual income of 75 per cent of the population.
Maj Milner pointed out that in Northwich, a con-stituency of 179 square miles, one candidate at the 1929 general election had 150 cars and his oppo-nent only fi ve. Yet the Tory winner had a major-ity of only four votes over his Labour opponent.
At Glasgow Kelvin-grove, Labour voters in the 1935 general election
had to queue up for buses and trams to get to the polls and many failed to arrive before closing time, consequently being disenfranchised. Mean-while, the cars of Walter Elliot, the Tory secretary of state for Scotland, were speeding past half empty. Yet he won a majority of only 149 over his Labour opponent.
An even more strik-ing case was that of one wealthy candidate in Leeds who hired a special train to bring 70 private cars from London.
The Bill failed, being talked out at its second reading, due to the Conservative-led overn-ment’s sizeable majority and because it would mean many Tories losing their seats.
When cars could win an election
80 YEARS AGO TODAY...
You can read editions of the Daily Worker (1930-45) and Morning Star (200 0-today), online at
Ten days’ access costs just £5.99 and a year is £72
mstar.link/DWMSarchive
US regime-change goal is what keeps war going
■ SYRIAN CONFLICT
WHY does Chris Purnell say that President Bashar al-Assad of Syria has a record of tortur-ing and massacring his oppo-nents (Letters February 8)?
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, when the death toll in the war reached 100,000, about 40 per cent of those killed were Assad fi ghters and 15 per cent were rebels. Did the rebels carry out massacres as well?
Even the mainstream media is not accusing Assad of mas-sacring enemy fi ghters. There is a terrible war going on with heavy casualties on all sides.
Regarding the allegation of torture, one of the main sources for this is a series of pictures, called the “Caesar” photographs, showing muti-lated corpses.
I have seen serious grounds to question these photographs on reputable internet sites. It is normal practice for hospitals to photograph the bodies of dead soldiers in war and that could be the source of these pictures.
Chris says we must support the YPG. I think he needs to spell out the fact that this means supporting violence. The methods of the YPG are the same as those of the IRA.
He says Russia must use its infl uence to bring about a dem-ocratic Syria in which Syrian Kurdistan has full autonomy.
I believe Moscow is entirely open to that possibility. It has never dictated any terms for Syria other than that it should be the people who choose the country’s rulers.
The fact is that it is the
United States, not Russia, which has always been the power bro-ker in Syria.
Washington is now pushing the Kurds to continue fi ghting and it is also talking about building up a border force. The US has made no serious attempt to bring about compro-mise between the Kurds and the Syrian government, though
there are indications that both sides are open to this.
The US, if it chose to do so, could almost certainly bring about peace, but it is hell-bent on regime change. As former CIA director John Brennan put it, “Syrians will continue dying” until Assad goes.
BRENDAN O’BRIENLondon N21
UNHOLY ALLIANCE: A US offi cer with the head of the Manbij Military Council, part of a Kurdish-led rebel coalition
WHAT, NO TRAIN? Portillo on one of his Great American Railroad Journeys
AS a Labour Party member, I would like to add comment to Mark Holt’s letter regard-ing anti-semitism (M Star February 6).
Just this morning, I heard Theresa May on Radio 4 link-ing the problem of hate speech against women and Muslims to anti-semitism. Thus, the weaponisation of this issue by the anti-Corbyn wing of the Labour Party has
been a gift to the Tories to undermine the left’s voice.
What is missing, in my view, is actual examples of anti-semitic language from the left, whether verbal or online.
I once tried to elicit this information from a Jewish colleague who had quit Face-book and the Labour Party over this issue. He got very upset, but he never replied.
The exchange stemmed from an email from a mutual colleague in the US (someone well-educated and intelligent) which contained such absurdities as a list of banks which the Rothschilds controlled, including the Bank of England.
I have heard comrades air-ing such nonsense at confer-ences. I hope, and believe, that they have just got car-
ried away with anger against banksters and are unaware of the history of the Jews in banking and the real anti-semitism which existed here until the early 20th century.
This is surely not what it’s all about.
As comrade Holt says, this is purely about Israel and Palestine.
CAROL WILCOXHighcliff e
Show us proof of left-wing anti-semitism■ HATE SPEECH
YOUR TV pundit Ann Douglas is no fan of Michael Portillo and his Great American Railroad Jour-neys (M Star January 22), I note.
For me, it’s a great show to watch, relax and catch up on all the other news in our new, fresh-looking Morning Star.
Seeing the other fare on
off er from ITV and Channel 4, this BBC teatime show is a rest from Trevor McDonald and his show Look Who I Interviewed on Death Row and that other barrel of laughs, listening to Piers Morgan.
MARTYN LEWISLeighton Buzzard
Hands off Portillo’s nice relaxing show
■ TELEVISION
TOM UNTERRAINER’S arti-cle This is Not a Drill (M Star January 20-21) was a welcome reminder of the dangers that the world faces.
His mention of Hiroshima and Nagasaki recalls the second world war. We should not for-get 1941 and Pearl Harbour in Hawaii — the Japanese attack on which is also an event.
JERRY STILESMitcham
We should not
forget the Pearl
Harbour attack
■ HISTORY
HAVE YOUR SAYWrite (up to 300 words) to 52 Beachy Rd, London E3 2NSor email [email protected]
FOG OF WAR: The aftermath of the December 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour
morningstaronline.co.uk morningstaronline
@m_star_online14Morning Star Monday February 12 2018 sport
n MEN’S RUGBY
ENGLAND WEATHER THE
STORM FOR TITANIC WINEngland 12-6 Walesby David Nicholsonat Twickenham
ENGLAND clung on for victory against Wales on Saturday to rack up a record-breaking 15th con-secutive Six Nations home win.
In a titanic battle of unre-lenting intensity both teams stood toe-to-toe at Twicken-ham under terrible weather conditions.
In the tweet of the day, the Welsh Rugby Union joked that they had requested the stadium roof be closed for the match.
Thank goodness England doesn’t have a roof in west Lon-don as the wet and cold February weather helped make this game the enthralling spectacle it was.
Jonny May had never scored in the Six Nations before but broke his barren spell with a brace of predatory tries that cemented his reputation as a speedster.
Head coach Eddie Jones lauded the winger in his post-
match press conference, saying he was the only England player fast enough to have got to the ball for the first try.
May could be seen waving as Owen Farrell assessed the attacking possibilities in the second minute of the game.
Farrell kicked low to the wing threading the ball through the Welsh defence and May easily won the foot race to the line.
Within 20 minutes, May was over for his second try after Joe Launchbury, with sensitive hands for a forward, passed to his winger from the tackle.
When Farrell added the conversion the scoreboard showed an English lead of 12 points with just a quarter of the match played.
That they failed to trouble the scoreboard again for the next 60 minutes was a tribute to Wales.
The ferocity of the tackling from both sides was immense as the two old rivals fought for supremacy.
England’s discipline wavered
under an intense Welsh come-back.
Referee Jerome Garces played advantage after England con-ceded another penalty and full-back Gareth Anscombe fought Anthony Watson to ground the ball after the ball rebounded off Steff Evans.
To the fury of Welsh fans watching the replays on the stadium’s big screens television match official Glenn Newman ruled out a try.
Coach Warren Gatland was incandescent about the inci-dent after the match. “It looked like a try to me. It’s such a piv-otal moment in the game.
“The TMO has one big deci-sion to make and unfortunately he’s made a terrible mistake. At this level, in front of 82,000 peo-ple, you have to get those right.”
Garces awarded the original penalty and Rhys Patchell duly put points on the board for the visitors.
English ill-discipline saw the side pinged for 10 penalties,
against a highly disciplined Welsh side, which only con-ceded two penalties the whole game.
Man-of-match Mike Brown was reliable under the high ball and led the stats for England’s ball carries for the afternoon, but conceded the penalty after 74 minutes that brought Wales back to within a converted try for the victory.
But this game was not to follow previous scripts, such as the 2015 World Cup, where Wales have managed to con-jure a victory from the jaws of defeat.
This England side have won 23 out of 24 games under Jones and now have the character to keep their nerve and grind out a victory.
“This was a win built around a lot of courage,” the home coach said afterwards. “It showed that we can hang in there, that we can find a way to win and that’s an important habit to have.”
n WOMEN’S RUGBY
England still on course for title defence after Wales drubbingENGLAND’S defence of their Six Nations title continued with a 52-0 victory over Wales at Twickenham Stoop.
Poppy Cleall and Ellie Kil-dunne ran in two tries each while Abigail Dow, Leanne Riley, Rachael Burford and Marlie Packer also crossed in a match watched by Prince Harry.
England led 26-0 at half-
time and had the bonus point sewn up within half an hour with lock Abbie Scott among the key performers.
Up in Glasgow, a Women’s Six Nations record crowd of 2,792 watched France thrash their hosts 26-3.
Scotland had gone up courtesy of a Sarah Law penalty, but after that it was one-way traffic.
n WINTER OLYMPICS
Cold warrior Pence earns himself an icy receptionUS VICE-PRESIDENT Mike Pence was left out in the cold in South Korea over the week-end, as his efforts to prevent any thaw on the peninsula were given a frosty reception.
Pence spent the days leading up to the Games warning that the North was trying to “hijack the message and imagery of the Olympic Games” with its “propaganda.”
But the North was still wel-comed with open arms to what
South Korean President Moon Jae In called the “Olympic Games of peace.”
Moon was all smiles Saturday as he greeted Kim Yo Jong, the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, and Kim Yong Nam, the country’s 90-year-old nominal head of state, for lunch at the presidential residence.
Kim Yo Jong offered an invi-tation from her brother for Moon to visit the North, in the strongest sign yet of an
expanding diplomatic open-ing opposed by the US.
Pence said on Friday that the US would oppose talks between the two Koreas until the North agreed to open negotiations on ending its nuclear programme, and he was silent Saturday on the news of the invitation.
Moon and Pence spoke on Saturday while taking in the speedskating, but aides did not say whether the invitation came up during the discussion.
At the opening ceremonies on Friday, Pence sat stone-faced in his seat as Moon and North Korean officials stood together with much of the stadium to applaud their joint team of athletes.
White House officials claimed that Pence had only clapped the US team.
US officials denied that Pence had been blindsided by the seating arrangements: the North Koreans were in the row
behind him, allowing Kim Yo Jong to be easily pictured in profile next to the vice presi-dent.n Olympic organisers are investigating a possible attack on their internet systems that took place about 45 minutes before the opening ceremony.
Organising committee spokeswoman Nancy Park said the defence ministry and a cybersecurity team were inves-tigating the Friday night outage.
n WINTER OLYMPICS
Cross-country star Musgrave skis to Britain’s best-ever finishANDREW MUSGRAVE secured the best Winter Olympics result by a British cross-coun-try skier with seventh as Nor-way claimed a clean sweep of the 30km skiathlon podium in Pyeongchang yesterday.
Simen Hegstad Kruger led the Norwegian 1-2-3 ahead of Martin Johnsrud (silver) and Hans Christer Holund.
The 27-year-old Scot, at his third Olympics, was behind only Kruger, who had a clear lead, as the skiers entered the stadium for the final time, with 3.75km remaining.
Musgrave finished 25.7 seconds behind Kruger.
“It’s a decent result but I’m not at the Olympics to come seventh. I’m here to fight for a win,” Musgrave said.
Redmond Gerard became the first Winter Olympics gold medallist born this millennium with a sur-prise snowboard slopestyle gold medal on day two of the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang.
At 17 years and 227 days, the US snowboarder became the second youngest male ath-lete to win an individual gold medal at a Winter Games, after Finnish ski jumper Toni Nieminen in 1992.
SOUR GRAPES: South Korean protesters burn an image of Pyongyang leader Kim Jong Un and the flags of North Korea and Korean unification during a small rally against North Korea’s participation in the Winter Olympics yesterday.
morningstaronline.co.uk morningstaronline @m_star_online 15
Morning Star Monday
February 12 2018sportn MEN’S FOOTBALL
SPURS BATTLE TO NORTH LONDON
VICTORY BEFORE A RECORD CROWDSpurs 1-0 Arsenalby Harry Cortonat Wembley
TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR extended the cushion between them and north London rivals Arsenal with a fine 1-0 vic-tory at Wembley on Saturday in front of a record Premier League attendance of 83,222.
The Gunners succumbed to Premier League top goalscorer Harry Kane’s 23rd of the cam-paign.
Conversely, Arsenal’s lead-ing scorer Alexandre Lacazette failed to convert his team’s best
chance after coming on as a substitute.
Arsene Wenger cited the strikers’ confidence level since losing his starting place to new signing Pierre-Emerick Aubam-eyang.
“Maybe it’s not at the highest because he has seen a competi-tor coming in for him but he created two chances. That is a quality in itself,” the Arsenal manager said of Lacazette.
After an even first half, Spurs came out swinging after the break, with the Gunners on the ropes. Ben Davies’s cross was met with timely perfec-tion by Kane, rising high and
nodding the ball back across goal, leaving Petr Cech rooted to the spot.
Minutes later the England striker went close to doubling his team’s lead with a similar chance. This time the striker lost his markers to reach Eric Dier’s cross but the ball skidded just wide of the post.
Kane may be unhappy not to have claimed the match ball for a hat-trick during a five-minute frenzy after the goal. His third chance, a well-struck volley, was denied by a good stop from Cech.
Spurs continued to probe and it wasn’t long until Cech
was called into action again. Christian Eriksen’s free kick bound for the corner needed a fine save to the keeper’s right to keep it out.
Next it was Arsenal’s turn to test the goalkeeper when the ball fell to Jack Wilshere on the edge of the box. His curl-ing left-footed effort required Hugo Lloris to leap to his right.
A lapse of Arsenal concen-tration then allowed Dele Alli through on goal but the Eng-land midfielder couldn’t find the back of the net.
A flurry of missed opportu-nities to put the game to bed nearly cost Spurs dearly when
Lacazette missed a duo of injury-time chances that he may have buried on another day.
Defeat for Wenger leaves his side in sixth place in the league falling further behind in the race for European foot-ball next season and making their Europa League trip on Thursday to face Ostersunds even more important.
He denied that this result changes the team’s feelings towards Europa League. “I would have gone for it anyway”, he said. “I will play a normal team. Especially because we aren’t in the [FA] Cup, there is no reason to rest players.”
Kane adds a 23rd goal to Premier League campaign to seal hard-fought derby win before an 83,222-strong Wembley
n MEN’S FOOTBALL
Wolves skip Coady: Nuno has brought a bit of biteWolves 2-1 QPRby Simon Williamsat the Molineux
WOLVERHAMPTON Wander-ers captain Conor Coady has praised the influence of Nuno Espirito Santo since his arrival at Molineux.
The former Porto manager replaced Paul Lambert as Wolves manager last May and since then has guided Wolves to the summit of the Champi-onship table.
And following a hard-fought 2-1 home win over Queens Park Rangers on Saturday, Coady eulogised about the qualities Nuno has brought to the club.
He said: “He’s fantastic. It’s brilliant. You listen to him when he talks and you know what he wants. He makes things clear in terms of how we go into a game.
“We’ve always got a way of playing, our way of playing, but we always look at the opposi-tion as well and respect them and what they bring to the table.
“We talk about it game by game and it’s instilled within the whole football club. That’s what the boys are doing and
that’s what we’ve got to do. It’s what got us here and hopefully we can keep on listening and learning.”
Wolves had not beaten QPR in a league game at Molineux since April 2009 but were ahead against the Hoops after 12 min-utes on Saturday when Alfred N’Diaye opened the scoring, slotting home a cross from Ivan Cavaleiro before the Por-tuguese winger set up Helder Costa for the second nine min-utes later.
But the league leaders didn’t have it all their own way and the lead was halved when Conor Washington hooked in for QPR six minutes after the break.
And the visitors nearly took a share of the spoils only for Coady to clear Eberechi Eze’s effort off the line late in the game before Ryan Bennett’s last-ditch challenge denied Washington.
“You can see from our sec-ond-half performance today that we weren’t at our free-flowing best,” said Coady.
“But it’s about digging in, being resilient and keeping our shape. That’s all come from [Nuno], the boys listen and hopefully we can keep on doing it.”
n MEN’S FOOTBALL
De Bruyne’s hat-trick of assists help Aguero hunt down FoxesMan City 5-1 Leicester Cityby James Naltonat the City of Manchester Stadium
KEVIN DE BRUYNE tried to take the match ball from Ser-gio Aguero after his hat-trick of assists helped Manchester City to a 5-1 rout of Leicester City on Saturday.
Aguero’s four goals meant he kept the memento on this occasion, but De Bruyne pushed him close for the Man of the Match award.
Their manager Pep Guar-diola is now looking forward to the Champions League which resumes this week, and he hopes to defeat FC Basel in the last 16 and steer his side to the quarters.
“We start in the Champions League and the first target is
to go to the next step forward and achieve the quarter-finals,” he said.
“We try to do better than last season and hopefully we can go through.”
They head to Switzerland for the first leg on a high following this dismantling of Leicester. De Bruyne set up Raheem Sterling to get his side on the scoreboard early, but this was cancelled out when Jamie Vardy pounced on a Nicolas Otamendi error before slotting past Ederson.
But the home side came out firing in the second period, and Aguero got the first of his four goals just three minutes into the half when he tapped in De Bruyne’s cross.
The Belgian’s through ball set the striker up for his sec-ond, before a mistake from Leicester goalkeeper Kasper
Schmeichel laid on the hat-trick goal which Aguero chipped over the stranded Dane.
The fourth was the most impressive of them all as the Argentine blasted the ball from a distance, seeing it dip just under the crossbar at the last second to evade Schmeichel.
Guardiola warned that his side’s progress in Europe may not come as easy as it has in the Premier League. The Catalan coach is using their only league defeat of the season, against Liv-erpool at Anfield where they conceded three in 10 minutes, as a lesson for his players.
“The Champions League is another competition, com-pletely different,” he said.
“The Champions League is about how you control the emotion and how you control the bad moments.”
RED INFANTRYCatterick 3:05 (nap)
ADELPHI PRINCECatterick 4:35
Farringdon’s Doubles
DUBAWI FIFTYWolverhampton 6:40
Houseman’s Choice
TODAY’S TIPS
in brief
FOOTBALL: Ahli Al-Khaleel (Hebron) top the West Bank league, and remain unbeaten, after seeing off Thaqafi Tulkarem 3-0.
Shabab Al-Khaleel slipped to second following their surprise 1-0 defeat to Al-Birah Institution.
Taraji Wadi Al-Nes thumped Shabab Dora (Hebron) 7-0, Shabab Alsamu squeezed past Jabal Al Muka-ber (Al Ram) 2-1 and Markz Balata (Nablus) edged out Shabab Al-Dhahiriya 3-2.
Bottom club Shabab Al Khader (Bethlehem) are still without a win after los-ing 3-0 to Jerusalem’s Hilal Al Quds.
Ahli Al-Khaleel top West Bank
FOOTBALL: Grimsby parted company yester-day with manager Rus-sell Slade after a run of 12 games without a win.
The Mariners sit 17th in League Two — nine points clear of the rel-egation zone — with the recruitment of five loan players in January fail-ing to halt an alarming slump in form.
Former Yeovil, Cardiff and Charlton boss Slade began his second spell at Blundell Park last April but Saturday’s 3-0 defeat to Crawley proved to be his last game in charge.
It’s gudbuy t’ Slade from the Mariners
GOLF: Thailand’s Kiradech Aphibarnrat secured a fourth European Tour title after beating James Nitties 2&1 to win the World Super 6 Perth.
Aphibarnrat claimed the last of the 24 spots in the Super 6 via a play-off and then had to come through five rounds of match play yesterday.
He overcame Ben Eccles, Yusaku Miyazato, Sean Crocker and Lucas Herbert before triumphing over Nitties.
England’s Sam Horsfield claimed third place after beating Herbert 3-1.
Aphibarnrat takes fourth Tour title
Monday February 12 2018
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SPORT Monday February 12 2018
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MSTAR 2018-02-12 MON 1.0
WEEKEND RESULTS
n WOMEN’S
Parris brace helps Man City to waltz over RedsNIKITA PARRIS scored a brace as Manchester City waltzed to a 4-0 victory against Liver-pool and moved back ahead of Chelsea at the summit of the Women’s Super League.
Chelsea had taken top spot following a 2-0 win against Birmingham on Saturday, but Parris fired City on their way to victory when she opened the scoring in the first minute.
Izzy Christiansen then dou-bled the home’s side tally from the penalty spot with 56 min-
utes gone before Parris scored her second with a header on the hour mark.
Abbie McManus netted a fourth after 73 minutes to move unbeaten City two points clear of Chelsea.
Danielle Carter and Beth Mead both scored twice for Arsenal as they moved up to third following a commanding 4-0 win against Yeovil.
In the day’s other match, Ever-ton held off a fightback from Reading to secure a 2-1 victory.
n MEN’S FOOTBALL
Magpies pluck priceless win off UnitedNewcastle 1-0 Man Unitedby Roger Domeneghettiat St James’ Park
A SECOND-HALF goal from Matt Ritchie and a string of superb saves from debutant goalkeeper Martin Dubravka secured a priceless win for Newcastle.
It was the Magpies’ first win at home in the League since October, dragging them out of the drop zone and up to 13th in the process.
“There have been so many games here that we deserved to win but we have been unlucky,” said Newcastle boss Rafa Beni-tez, “so to do it against a top side in front of our fans was fantastic.”
Defeat leaves his counterpart Jose Mourinho still searching for his first league win on Tyneside at the seventh time of asking. It
also leaves his Manchester United team languishing 16 points behind their cross-city rivals.
Despite his disappointment the United manager had praise for the home side. “After the 1-0 the Newcastle United players fought for their lives and that is a beautiful thing in football,” said Mourinho. “But obviously I am disappointed because I think we did more than enough to come away with the points.”
Newcastle made all the running in the first 15 min-
utes, crafting five chances, to the visitors’ none. It was not until the 32nd minute that the Red Devils put any pres-sure on Dubravka in the home goal. Alexis Sanchez played in Jesse Lingard but the debutant keeper was able to turn the deflected shot wide.
Three minutes later United broke on the counter attack. Nemanja Matic played a long defence-splitting pass through to Anthony Martial marauding into the box but Dubravka, on
loan from Sparta Prague, was equal to the challenge, turning the low shot away for a corner.
United started the second half with more intensity. Lukaku had the ball in the back of the net after 52 minutes but it was disallowed for Chris Smalling’s foul on Paul Dummett. Two min-utes later Sanchez found himself unmarked with the goal seem-ingly at his mercy only to see his shot blocked by Florian Lejeune.
But it was the home side who made the breakthrough in the 65th minute after Smalling was booked for a dive. Lejeune rose to meet the resulting free kick, Dwight Gayle did well to keep the ball alive for Ritchie to hammer home low past David De Gea.
The visitors came close to an equaliser deep in injury time when Juan Mata’s low cross was flashed towards goal by Michael Carrick, but again Dubravka was equal to the challenge.
n MEN’S RUGBY
LAIDLAW RESTORES SCOTLAND’S PRIDEScotland 32-26 France
GREIG LAIDLAW booted 22 points on his return to Scot-land’s starting line-up as Gregor Townsend’s men kick-started their Six Nations cam-paign with a 32-26 win over France.
The home side were under pressure to prove they were genuine contenders after being humiliated by Wales in last week’s opener in Cardiff.
And they did just that, with tries from Sean Maitland and Huw Jones providing the per-fect response after Teddy Tho-mas’s blistering pace had twice cut them apart.
That left the game finely poised in the second half but Laidlaw — making his first Scotland start in a year — slot-ted over all eight of his kicks to breathe fresh life into Scottish championship hopes.
Townsend’s frustration was understandable as his men missed three opportunities to halt Thomas scoring the first try after just three minutes.
Remi Lamerat did the Rac-ing 92 wing no favours by pass-ing to his feet but even that did not stop Thomas as he handed off Finn Russell, side-stepped Peter Horne and then galloped
past Stuart Hogg for the line.When Maxime Machenaud
booted over a penalty soon after the Scots found them-selves 10-0 down before they had even got started.
But they responded magnifi-cently on 13 minutes. Having been criticised for their insist-ence on going wide against Wales, Scotland showed they
are capable of bludgeoning right up the middle as Jonny Gray sat Machenaud down with a shuddering shoulder barge.
Grant Gilchrist and Russell then moved the ball quickly out to Maitland to dot down in the corner.
Russell’s errant kicking let the French off the hook as he
failed to find touch and that mistake was punished on 27 minutes as Thomas’s wiz-ardry once again opened up the Scots.
He picked up the ball as France swept left to right and chipped the ball over Hogg before charging for the line.
But just as Laidlaw looked set to bail out the hosts,
a wicked bounce took the former skipper out of the equa-tion and Thomas was left free to score.
Scotland, though, were prov-ing harder to shake off than last week and hit back again on 31 minutes.
Hogg’s drive split the French defence and with Les Bleus scrambling for cover Jones spotted a chink as he raced in to score under the posts.
The teams then exchanged a pair of penalties apiece as Machenaud and Baptiste Serin knocked over for France, with Laidlaw twice responding for Scotland.
France again turned up the pressure but all they got was another Serin penalty as the Scots stood firm through 20 bruising phases — but again Scotland battled back with Laidlaw knocking over two kicks to put them level with 16 minutes left.
Now it was Scotland mount-ing the cavalry charge, forcing France to concede yet another penalty on 70 minutes which Laidlaw once again punished to put Townsend’s team in front for the first time.
The Clermont Auvergne scrum-half then made sure of the victory with three minutes left as he again fired over.
Scrum-half kicks 22 points to atone for nation’s humiliation against Wales last week
Premier LeagueEverton 3 1 Crystal PalaceManchester City 5 1 Leicester CityStoke City 1 1 BrightonSwansea City 1 0 BurnleyTottenham Hotspur 1 0 ArsenalWest Ham United 2 0 WatfordHuddersfield 4 1 BournemouthNewcastle 1 0 Man United
ChampionshipBarnsley 1 1 Sheffield WednesdayBolton Wanderers 1 1 FulhamBrentford 1 1 Preston North EndBristol City 3 3 SunderlandDerby County 1 1 Norwich CityIpswich Town 0 0 Burton AlbionMiddlesbrough 2 1 ReadingNottingham Forest 0 2 Hull CitySheffield United 2 1 Leeds UnitedWolves 2 1 Queens Park RangersAston Villa 2 0 Birmingham City
League OneAFC Wimbledon 1 3 NorthamptonBlackburn Rovers 2 2 OldhamBlackpool 2 2 WalsallBradford City 2 2 BuryDoncaster Rovers 1 1 CharltonGillingham 1 1 PeterboroughMK Dons 1 2 PortsmouthOxford United 1 2 Bristol RoversScunthorpe 1 2 RotherhamShrewsbury 1 2 Plymouth ArgyleSouthend 3 1 Wigan Athletic
League TwoBarnet 1 0 Notts CountyCarlisle United 1 1 ColchesterCheltenham Town 5 1 Port ValeCoventry 0 2 Accrington StanleyCrawley Town 3 0 GrimsbyCrewe Alexandra 0 0 YeovilExeter 1 1 Wycombe WanderersStevenage 1 1 Luton TownSwindon 1 0 Mansfield Town
Welsh PremierCarmarthen 3 2 NewtownCardiff Met 0 2 Connah’s
Scottish ChampionshipLivingston 0 0 Dunfermline
Scottish CupCeltic 3 2 Partick ThistleCove Rangers 1 3 FalkirkDundee 0 2 MotherwellHearts 3 0 St JohnstoneKilmarnock 4 0 BroraMorton 3 0 DumbartonAyr United 1 6 Rangers
Scottish League OneAlloa Athletic 1 0 Forfar AthleticEast Fife 0 2 Queen’s ParkRaith Rovers 2 1 Airdrieonians
