International

Venezuela Elections – Overcoming Odds, Maduro Triumphs

VENEZUELAN President Nicolas Maduro was re-elected as the president on May 20, with 6.2 million votes, beating out his closest rival Henri Falcon, who secured 1.9 million votes. Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE) announced the result stating that Maduro had won with 67.79 per cent of all votes cast, ahead of Henri Falcon, who won 21.01 per cent. Due to a boycott announced by the main opposition parties of the right-wing Democratic Unity Roundtable (MUD) coalition, the turnout was 46 per cent, with only 9,085,629 of Venezuela’s 20,527,571 registered voters casting ballots.

18th Conference of Association of Indian Communists

THE AIC conference was held on March 31 and April 1, in the historic industrial city of Manchester for the first time. Delegates and friends representing the diverse Indian diaspora from cities across UK and Ireland assembled in the Comrade Avtar Singh Nagar for the rally and conference.

General secretary of the CPI(M), Sitaram Yechury was joined in solidarity by leaders of the Communist Party of Britain and Awami Workers’ Party from Pakistan and local dignitaries.

FOLA-India Holds Seminar on Women in Socialist Movements

FRIENDS of Latin America-India – (FOLA-India) has organised a seminar titled “Women in Socialist Movements” on March 19, at JBMRC Auditorium in Kolkata. The seminar was organised jointly with the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta. The official message from the collective of the Cuban Embassy in India on the occasion of the seminar was read at the beginning of the seminar.

Elections in Italy and the Vanishing Centre

ELECTIONS held to the Italian parliament on March 4, had followed the recent electoral trends of the European continent. One, these elections, by Italian standards, witnessed large scale voter abstention. Two, election results show that the ‘establishment parties’ lost badly, while those challenging these parties have won by significantly increasing their vote share. And finally, the voters did not give any party complete majority, thus throwing up a hung assembly.

Never Again – Guns and the Culture of Violence

THE rampant gun culture and shooting of innocents has claimed the lives of 17 young school students and their teacher in Parkland, Florida, US on February 14. This is one of the deadliest high school massacres in the history of the US. Since 2012, there have been more than 1,600 mass shootings, killing more than 1,800 people and wounding more than 6,400. In fact, four of the five deadliest gun rampages were in the past year and a half, after Donald Trump assumed presidency.

Attacks on Communists – Sudan and Turkey

WHILE the heads of States of various countries and economic honchos are meeting at Davos in the World Economic Forum, discussing the ways and means to further their exploitation of resources and markets, people in various parts of the globe are coming out in protests. Determined and militant protests are seen in countries like Sudan and Turkey, initiated by the communists. The dictatorial and authoritarian governments, led by religious fundamentalist forces in these two countries are trying to quell these protests unleashing brutal repression.

Why are Iranians Protesting?

IRAN is witnessing unprecedented protest demonstrations for the past one week. Hundreds of thousands of people are on the streets demanding a better life. This is the first time in eight years, since the protests against alleged electoral fraud in 2009, that Iran is once again witnessing such protests and unrest. According to official statistics released by the government, more than 20 people have died and hundreds were injured in the protests. Thousands more were detained by the security forces.

Latin America: Staring at Challenges

IN the run-off for Chilean presidential elections held on December 17, right-wing, businessman Sebastian Pinera (representing the coalition ‘Let's Go Chile’) won securing 54 per cent of the votes. He has defeated centre-left ruling coalition (New Majority) candidate Alejandro Guillier. The run-off was called as the election could not be decided in the first round with no candidate able to secure the mandatory 50 per cent of the polled votes. With Pinera’s victory, Chile joins the list of South American countries with conservative leaders, Argentina, Brazil, and Peru.

WFTU Working Women Asia Pacific Regional Conference

THE WFTU Asia Pacific regional conference of women workers was held in Hanoi, Vietnam on December 6-8, 2017 as a prelude to the World Working Women’s Congress scheduled to be held in Panama from March 8-10, 2018. The conference was hosted by the Vietnam General Confederation of Labour (VGCL). 14 women trade unionists from seven countries – Bangladesh, India, Iran, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines and Sri Lanka, representing 10 affiliated unions, participated in the conference. From India, A R Sindhu from CITU and K Mallika from AITUC attended the conference.

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