The ambush on May 25 by Maoist guerrillas in the Darba Ghati valley (in the Sukma area of the Bastar region in southern Chhattisgarh), 345 kms south of the state capital of Raipur, of a convoy of provincial Congress Party leaders has shocked the Indian state apparatus. The Z-plus and other categories of armed security […]
Geography Archives: Asia
Countries in the continent of Asia
KCK: The Gezi Resistance Is a Message for a New Turkey
The KCK (Union of Communities in Kurdistan) Executive Council said that the Gezi Park protests, which began as social resistance, have sent a message calling for a new, democratic Turkey. The KCK called on the Kurdish people to take initiative, saying that the Kurds should fulfill responsibility by working with the democratic forces in Turkey […]
Crises of Capitalism and Social Democracy
John Bellamy Foster is best-known as author of Marx’s Ecology (2000; in which he corrects the popular misapprehension that Marx did not ‘get’ environmental limits), and as editor of Monthly Review (monthlyreview.org), the journal founded by Marxist economist Paul Sweezy in the late 1940s. In his latest book, The Endless Crisis (2012; written with […]
Interdom at Eighty: Reflections in Russia, on Dreams Old and Renascent
Russia, as travelers have noted over the centuries, is immense. Most of it is far from large bodies of water. And yet, in a first visit after many years, I came upon some unusual islands right in the heart of the country. But they were not islands in the geographic sense. Some were children’s islands. […]
International Crisis Group Against Venezuela
The International Crisis Group (ICG) sells itself as “working to prevent conflict worldwide” but there is one country where their mission looks more like promoting rather than preventing conflict. Exhibit A is their report on Venezuela, released on Friday. There is a lot wrong with this report — most of it reads like a statement […]
Economic Development and Rana Plaza
The official death toll from the April collapse of the Rana Plaza building in Dhaka, Bangladesh, which housed clothing factories, has now passed 1,100. How exactly will the staggering costs of that overwhelming tragedy be figured? Will they count as part of capitalism’s contribution to economic development across Asia, Africa, and Latin America? In capitalism’s […]
On a Long March: Sanjay Kak’s Red Ant Dream
Red Ant Dream / Maati Ke Laal (2013) 120 minutes; English version, with subtitles Direction: Sanjay Kak Photography: Ranjan Palit, Sanjay Kak and Setu Sound Design: Madhu Apsara Writers: Sanjay Kak and Tarun Bharatiya Editing: Tarun Bharatiya www.redantdream.com You are far away from the sterile atmosphere of much of academia with its politically correct […]
A New Pakistan?
“These people who are commonly known as leaders view politics and religion as that crippled, lame and injured man, displaying whom our beggars normally beg for money. These so-called leaders go about carrying the carcasses of politics and religion on their shoulders, and to simple-minded people who are in the habit of accepting every word […]
Interview with Hong Kong Dockworkers Leader
The battle of the Hong Kong dockers, as Union of Hong Kong Dock Workers (UHKDW) Secretary Wong Yu Loy reveals, was important not only because of the rarity of strikes in Hong Kong, or because it was a pitched battle with Hong Kong’s wealthiest corporate magnate, but also because of the way corporate globalization set […]
Gal Sun Chapna, Raj Lay Aa Apna
Laal is a revolutionary band from Pakistan. Lyrics by Habib Jalib. Directed by Taimur Rahman. | Print
Once Again on So-called “Extractivism”
Since Marx, we know that what characterizes and differentiates societies is the way in which they organize the production, distribution and use of the material and symbolic resources they possess. In other words, the mode of production1 is what defines the material content of the social life of the distinct human territorial collectivities (nations, peoples, […]
Imprisoned Oil Workers’ Strike Leader Roza Tuletaeva Starts Hunger Strike
On 22nd April, Roza Tuletaeva, one of the activists from the Zhanaozen oil workers’ strike, started a hunger strike. She has taken this extreme step because she has been refused essential medical aid at the women’s prison colony in Atyrau, where she is currently serving a lengthy jail sentence. She was arrested after the […]
Crushed Lives, Crushed Dreams: Deadly Building Collapse in Bangladesh Kills More Than 175 Garments Workers
Bangladesh stands petrified as an unprecedented horror unfolds in Savar, near the capital city of Dhaka. In the morning of the 24th of April, a nine-story building crashed down in Savar Bazaar. Thousands of garments workers were in the building. The death toll, as of this writing, was more than 175, with over 1,000 […]
Drones, Sanctions, and the Prison Industrial Complex
In the final weeks of a six-month prison sentence for protesting remote-control murder by drones, specifically from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri, I can only reflect on my time of captivity in light of the crimes that brought me here. In these ominous times, it is America’s officials and judges and not the anarchists […]
What’s Behind the US Escalation Against North Korea?
Aijaz Ahmad: Ever since this young man [Kim Jong-un] became the president, the head of state, of North Korea . . . the West has been testing his will, to see whether he can be stared down. . . . Every year these very provocative war games take place, involving South Korea and the […]
Stumble Stones in Germany
The late, late snow has finally disappeared from Berlin’s streets. Visible once again, here and there, are the “stumble stones” — Stolpersteine in German. Many Berlin tourists will enjoy the night life. They may also look upwards — at the giant TV tower, the Brandenburg Gate, at ancient and less ancient churches. There is a […]
Can Worker-Owners Run a Big Factory? How Mexican Tire Workers Won Ownership of Their Plant With a Three-Year Strike and Are Now Running It Themselves
Part 1: Mexican Workers Win Ownership of Tire Plant With Three-Year Strike “If the owners don’t want it, let’s run it ourselves.” When a factory closes, the idea of turning it into a worker-owned co-operative sometimes comes up — and usually dies. The hurdles to buying a plant, even a failing plant, are huge, and […]
Change of Epoch: Imperialism Counterattacks, But Chávez Lives, the Struggle Continues
Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa‘s idea that we are not “living in an epoch of change” but rather “in a change of epoch” is very much to the point. There is an obvious worldwide decline of existing imperialisms and historic changes in the correlation of social, class, and nation-state forces. There have arisen popular movements of […]
On the Shahbagh Movement Against War Criminals of 1971
This article was featured in the March 2013 issue of Analytical Monthly Review, a sister edition of Monthly Review, published in Kharagpur, West Bengal, India. — Ed. Some young people gathered on the crossroads of Shahbagh in Dhaka on February 5, 2013, to protest against the judgment of the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) which […]
World Social Forum Opens in Tunisia
Tunis, Tunisia Tens of thousands of people marched through downtown Tunis on Tuesday in a spirited march celebrating the beginning the 13th World Social Forum — the first to be held in an Arab country. The majority of marchers were from Tunisia and neighboring nations, but there was substantial representation from Europe, as well as […]
