On June 11, Laos (Lao People’s Democratic Republic)—a country of 7 million in Southeast Asia—said it had temporarily prevailed over COVID-19.
Author Archive | Vijay Prashad
The U.S. and UK are a wrecking ball crew against the pillars of internationalism
In both the case of the sanctions against the ICC and the theft of Venezuela’s gold, the United States and the UK demonstrate their disregard for international institutions and for international law.
Venezuela’s borderlands have been assaulted by COVID-19
Venezuela’s rate of infection remains low, despite the U.S. unilateral sanctions that have denied the country the right to import drugs and tests for the population.
Billions of children are being punished by the pandemic
There are immense casualties from this Great Lockdown. Incomes have collapsed for half the world’s population, while hunger rates are on the rise. But there are other casualties, other victims, often less remarked upon.
Ten-Point agenda for the Global South after COVID-19
In 1974, the United Nations General Assembly passed a New International Economic Order (NIEO), which was driven by the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM).
![Oslo City Hall - The place where the Nobel Peace Prize is presented Oslo City Hall (Norwegian: Oslo rådhus) houses the city council, city administration, and art studios and galleries. The construction started in 1931, but was paused by the outbreak of World War II, before the official inauguration in 1950. Its characteristic architecture, artworks and the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony, held on 10 December, makes it one of Oslo's most famous buildings. It was designed by Arnstein Arneberg and Magnus Poulsson. The roof of the eastern tower has a 49-bell carillon which plays every hour. It is situated in Pipervika in central downtown Oslo. The area was completely renovated and rebuilt to make room for the new city hall, back in the late 1920s. In June 2005 it was named Oslo's "Structure of the Century" [Wikipedia.org]](https://mronline.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/29879653935_b62010aaca_c-200x200.jpg "Who deserves the Nobel Peace Prize in a time of pandemic?")
Who deserves the Nobel Peace Prize in a time of pandemic?
A few weeks ago, I was talking to Noam Chomsky about the state of the world. At one point, Noam smiled and said that he is not aware of any German doctors in Italy, even though both countries are in the European Union; instead, Cuban and Chinese doctors went to Italy to help the Italians […]
Living is no laughing matter
The United States government has withdrawn its support for the World Health Organisation (WHO) based on accusations that the WHO has not been forthcoming about the novel coronavirus and based on U.S. President Donald Trump’s questioning of the WHO’s independence from China, calling the organisation a ‘puppet of China’.
Tear down the racist statues, end racist debt and pay for reparations
Bring down the statues, surely. But more than that: cancel the debt and provide reparations to the formerly colonized for the centuries of theft and brutality.
Goliath is not invincible
Last year, I walked with Mariela Machado in her housing complex known as Kaikachi in the neighbourhood of La Vega (Caracas, Venezuela). After Hugo Chávez was inaugurated president in 1999, a group of working-class residents of the city saw an empty piece of land and occupied it. Mariela and others went to the government and […]
CoronaShock and the Hybrid War against Venezuela
CoronaShock is a term that refers to how a virus struck the world with such gripping force; it refers to how the social order in the bourgeois state crumbled, while the social order in the socialist parts of the world appeared more resilient.
The murder of George Floyd is normal in an abnormal society
There is no need to wonder why George Floyd (age 46) was murdered in broad daylight in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25, 2020. The script of his death is written deep in the ugly drama of U.S. history.
If you do not feel for humanity, you have forgotten to be human
The coronavirus continues its contagious march across the planet: almost 350,000 known deaths and over 5.4 million people infected. Meanwhile, in the Bay of Bengal, Cyclone Amphan makes its fierce landing, its immense energy tearing a corridor through Bangladesh and India (Odisha and West Bengal).
The Bouficha appeal against the preparations for war
On 23 March, the UN Secretary General António Guterres called for a ceasefire. ‘The fury of the virus’, he said, ‘illustrates the folly of war’. In a recent report, the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) wrote that the ‘call for a global ceasefire has not had the desired result’.
How the United States Government failed to prepare for the Global Pandemic
On March 20, just after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a global pandemic on March 11, the U.S. National Security Council (NSC) sent a cable to U.S. State Department instructing officials how they should speak about China and the novel coronavirus, according to the Daily Beast, which obtained the cable.
Hunger gnaws at the edges of the World
On 21 April, the head of the UN World Food Programme (WFP) David Beasley said that the world was experiencing a ‘hunger pandemic’. That day, the Global Network Against Food Crises and the Food Security Information Network released the 2020 Global Report on Food Crises.
The U.S. Military is hell-bent on trying to overpower China
The absence of a strong world peace movement with the capacity to prevent this buildup by the United States is of considerable concern for the planet. The need for such a movement could not be greater.
It takes a revolution to make a solution
I admit upfront that this is a hard newsletter to read. It is about debt. There is a bloodless quality to the way that we talk about the debt of the poorer nations. There is nothing poetic here. The numbers are alienating, their outcome shocking.
Farewell to the god of plague
The Communists were determined to eradicate disease. In the 1930s, Mao joined the Chinese Communist Party’s Public Health Commission; in 1934, when he was in the Jiangxi Soviet, Mao placed public health at the top of the list for party work.
Leftword Books Editor Vijay Prashad on Life and Legacy of Italian Marxist Com. Antonio Gramsci
Leftword Books Editor Vijay Prashad on Life and Legacy of Italian Marxist Com. Antonio #Gramsci. #Bennito #Mussolini’s court stated, “For twenty years we must stop this brain from functioning” during the trail of Com Gramsci.
Either socialism will defeat the louse or the louse will defeat socialism
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) says that the Great Lockdown, which has no end date, could very well lead to a loss of $9 trillion to global Gross Domestic Product over the entirety of 2020 and 2021; this number is greater than the combined economies of Japan and Germany. This scenario, the Fund’s managing director […]
