China Denounces US Plans to Dock Nuclear-Armed Submarines in South Korea

 

The Chinese foreign ministry says the plan runs counter to the goal of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula

 

by Dave DeCamp, Antiwar. com, April 27, 2023 

China on Thursday denounced US plans to dock nuclear-armed submarines in South Korea, saying that the plan runs counter to the goal of a “denuclearized” Korean Peninsula.

“The United States has put regional security at risk and intentionally used the issue of the peninsula as an excuse to create tension,” said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning, according to The South China Morning Post.

“What the US does is full of Cold War thinking, provoking bloc confrontation, undermining the nuclear non-proliferation system, damaging the strategic interests of other countries, exacerbating tensions on the Korean peninsula, undermining regional peace and stability, and running counter to the goal of the denuclearization of the peninsula,” she added.

The submarine deployments are part of a plan to increase nuclear weapons cooperation between the US and South Korea that was announced by President Biden and South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol at the White House on Thursday. While nuclear-armed submarines patrol waters all over the world, they haven’t docked in South Korea since the 1980s, and the move is a purposeful provocation toward Pyongyang and is sure to raise tensions.

The US removed nuclear weapons it had stationed in South Korea in 1991. President Biden said the US doesn’t plan to permanently deploy nuclear weapons in South Korea under the new deal, but “visits” by nuclear-armed submarines and other US strategic assets could become frequent.

“We’re not going to be stationing nuclear weapons on the peninsula,” Biden said in a joint press conference with Yoon. “But we will have visits to ports, visits of nuclear submarines and things like that.”

𝐈𝐬𝐫𝐚𝐞𝐥𝐢 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐮𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐬 𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐬 𝐌𝐚𝐲 𝐃𝐚𝐲 𝐦𝐨𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐢𝐧 𝐟𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐩𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧

Raid on Nazareth HQ seized flags and arrested city party secretary, Communist Party of Israel warns


ISRAEL’S Communist Party is calling for mass mobilisation for May Day marches to defy growing police repression in the country.

The Communist Party of Israel (CPI) said demonstrations should “rise against the occupation, against fascism, against class oppression and against exploitation” given Israel’s far-right government’s bid to weaken the judiciary and accelerate the colonisation of Palestine.

The party appealed for international solidarity after police raided its Nazareth headquarters on Wednesday, arresting the city’s party secretary and illegally seizing flags.

“A large force of Israeli police and its gendarmerie, the ‘Israel Border Police,’ raided the headquarters ... demanding we take down the Palestinian flag,” the party said in a statement.

The CPI, which sits in the Knesset as part of the Hadash coalition, is the only party in Israel with both Jewish and Arab members.

“Comrades of Nazareth confronted the police forces and refused them access to the building. The police did not possess any warrant, and called for back-up, climbed walls, removed the Palestinian flag and the red flags, and confiscated them, all while arresting the secretary,” the party said.

Following complaints from the party leadership the police returned the flags, which were raised again over the building.

But the CPI warned that the “outrageous provocation and intimidation” is aimed at “suppressing and attacking political freedoms in implementation of the orders of the settler [National Security Minister] Itamar Ben-Gvir.”

The CPI says government plans to form a national guard organisation under Mr Ben-Gvir — which even former Israeli prime minister Benny Gantz says will be a “private army” — would amount to a “fascist militia” for the suppression of democracy activists and terrorising Israeli Arabs.

The weekend was expected to see more mass demonstrations against the Benjamin Netanyahu government’s judicial reforms, which would allow the Knesset to overturn Supreme Court rulings.

But a huge far-right demonstration on Thursday night — estimated by organisers at half a million in size, while police put the figure at 200,000 — called on ministers not to back down on the legislation, which has been paused because of widespread opposition.

“We will not give up,” Israel’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a self-described “fascist homophobe,” told crowds who trampled on portraits of Israel’s Supreme Court president.

https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/israeli-communists-call-mass-may-day-mobilisation-face-worsening-police-repression

May Day Greetings

 

 -- Nasir Khan

Greetings to all those people who uphold the cause of peace and work for human rights. The struggle for peace is also a struggle against war and war-mongers. After the collapse of the USSR, the US imperialism and its allies had a free hand to unleash genocidal wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and other places. It killed millions of people, made millions homeless, made millions orphans and widows. All peace-loving people condemn these crimes and violations of international law.

 

The people of Palestine under Israeli occupation have struggled to survive in dire circumstances. They have continued their struggle against Israeli occupation and to end the siege of Gaza, the largest concentration camp in modern times. The Israeli occupation, the expansion of illegal settlements in occupied land and oppression against the defenseless people of Palestine continues. The American government and the US Congress support whatever Israel chooses to do with the people of Palestine. 

 

We can only ask our friends, comrades and peace-loving people to oppose the militaristic policies of Washington and its allies and stand for the rights of the victims of wars and violence.

 

Some comments on 'Matter and Mind'

 

--Nasir Khan

In response to my short article 'Mind and Matter', Linden Wilson wrote a long comment.

I am reproducing below that comment followed by my reply. This exchange is suitable for anyone interested in Western philosophy or the history of ideas.

Linden Wilson wrote: 

 

Nasir, my friend, you have every right to express what you believe, but you can't claim what you believe as fact, just as i can't claim that the non-physical mind does exist is fact, even though i believe it. However, there are sophisticated arguments for the existence of such things, which cannot be so easily dismissed or counter-claimed, which is why the argument rages on, Descartes was never essentially disproved, nor i would claim, can he be, and recent philosophers such as Ryle, Churchland, Dennett etc, have not succeeded in proving their cases that such ideas are just illusions of various kinds. I could point you to Frank Jackson and David Chalmers and whole host of others who take a different stance, in fact not only is there a philosophy of mind, but there is now a thriving philosophy of consciousness, and even of emotions, because these things do not 'fit' the physicalist paradigm, which only dominates science because only such 'physicalist' things were measured 'scientificly, for obvious reasons. Whichever way you analyse consciousness, emotions, thoughts, sensations and other such 'mind' things, all the things which make us 'alive', there are no such things as, to put it crudely, 'atoms of consciousness or emotion' etc which can be physically pinpointed, described, and systematized in the way material phenomena can be, they perfectly elude such attempts, which perhaps should make us think again but that's only my perspective. I also think biasedly, that these things are the most interesting things to study because they make us 'alive', could we call ourselves 'alive' if we had no consciousness, no conscious thoughts, no emotions, feelings, sensations, imaginings etc? I would have to say no, so what are these things, the mystery deepens?

-

Nasir Khan replied:

 

Dear Linden Wilson, I speak and write as a materialist. As a result, I see my views as a reflection of that particular philosophical outlook in all its ramifications. I disclaim to be a spiritualist or an idealist. Obviously, you raise some important points and they reflect your approach to many metaphysical issues. I again repeat in light of what you say that metaphysical questions are not something we can scientifically prove or disprove! So, your judgments seem somewhat light-hearted to me! When you talk about consciousness, feelings, emotions and thoughts, etc., you are putting them just outside the ambit of matter. But things can't be compartmentalized or categorized in so easy a manner.

In fact, I had given my views on this matter in my short explanation above. Perhaps, you may read again what I said and then see what you have written in your large comment, which I appreciate nonetheless. I don't know on which grounds you say that Descartes was not disproved, or Ryle, etc. did not 'prove' their case. Descartes' duality of mind-body problem is too mouldy now for any serious discussion. But Ryle approached the problem of mind in a distinctive way. In fact, he struck at the roots of the non-existing problem of mind, and showed its vacuity.

Russia’s Lavrov warns EU becoming more militarised

RUSSIA’S top diplomat warned on Tuesday that the European Union “is becoming militarised at a record rate.”

Roger McKenzie, Morning Star, April 26, 2023

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told a news conference he has no doubts that there is now “very little difference” between the EU and Nato, following closer co-operation agreements between the political and military blocs.

Mr Lavrov said a recently signed joint declaration essentially states that the 31-member Nato military alliance will ensure the security of the 27-member EU.

The foreign minister was referring to a January 19 EU-Nato declaration on their “strategic partnership” which calls last year’s invasion of Ukraine by Russia “the gravest threat to Euro-Atlantic security in decades.”

The declaration calls the present moment “a key juncture for Euro-Atlantic security and stability” and urges closer EU-Nato co-operation to confront evolving security threats, saying this will contribute to strengthening security in Europe and beyond.

And it encourages the fullest possible involvement of Nato members that don’t belong to the EU and EU members that aren’t part of Nato.

Irish communists have warned that participation in military exercises under an EU umbrella has undermined their country’s longstanding neutrality and non-membership of Nato.

Ukraine is seeking EU membership but has been offered no firm timetable for talks on joining the organisation.

Mr Lavrov was asked whether the war in Ukraine was a miscalculation given the invasion prompted Finland to join, with Sweden next and Ukraine pushing for a roadmap to do so.

“Nato never had any intention of stopping,” Mr Lavrov replied.

He said that Sweden and Finland were “increasingly taking part in Nato military exercises and other actions that were meant to synchronise the military programmes of Nato members and neutral states.”

Matter and Mind

-- by Nasir Khan

Our material existence has also mental, psychological and occasionally psychic conditions. We think, imagine, visualize and fantasize. Our ways of looking at the world as sentient beings can include all such mental conditions and much more.

To be a materialist pertains to a philosophical view of looking at the world. Some thinkers have held such views since the ancient times, where matter (in all its various forms, including energy) is seen as the foundation on which everything rests.

Speaking only about human beings, their ideas, thoughts, feelings, etc., take place within their physical bodies. Without bodies, their thoughts and ideas cannot float as disembodied things in the air. In other words, without a living body, there is no mind or its activities. On our physical death, mind and its activities cease.

US Ambassador Blasts Hungary’s Call for Ceasefire in Ukraine as ‘Cynical’

by Kyle Anzalone, The Libertarian Institute, Apr 26, 2023 Ambassador David Pressman’s Introductory Remarks at the Hungary-Ukraine Relations Panel Discussion

The top American diplomat in Hungary attacked Budapest for insufficient commitment to the NATO proxy war against Russia, with the ambassador claiming that support for a ceasefire in Ukraine was “cynical.”

US Ambassador to Hungary David Pressman made the remarks during the opening of the Hungary-Ukraine Relations Panel on Wednesday. “It is cynical to call for a ceasefire when it is not your country that is almost 20 percent occupied by a foreign invading army,” he said. “The United States wants peace, one that is just and lasting. And that is precisely why we are standing shoulder to shoulder with the victims, with Ukraine.”

In February, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban called for a truce. “[Russia] cannot win because the entire Western world has lined up behind [Ukraine],” he tweeted, “At the same time, [Russia] is a nuclear power and a nuclear power cannot be cornered because they may trigger a nuclear war. We need a ceasefire and peace talks. The sooner the better.”

“[Ukraine] is fighting valiantly and they have our full sympathy. But the only thing that can save lives in the [Ukraine War] is a ceasefire,” the PM added.

Pressman went on to accuse Budapest of hindering dialogue between the North Atlantic alliance and Kiev. “Amidst a land war in Europe, consultations with our partner Ukraine are vitally important to our shared security as Allies, and Hungary’s policy of standing alone in an effort to block high-level meetings of the NATO-Ukraine Commission is untenable,” he said in his speech on Wednesday, adding that this “will no longer be accepted.”

Hungary has taken issue with Ukrainian language laws which impact the 150,000 Hungarians living in the country, even vowing to block Kiev’s bid to join NATO over the legislation. The NATO-Ukraine Commission has not met since 2019 because of Budapest’s objections.

Last month, NATO civilian head Jens Stoltenberg declared that the alliance would go through with another meeting despite Hungary’s protests. “This is an established framework. I have the mandate to convene it,” he said. “In respect for the issues that Hungary has raised I have not convened that for some time, but now I will continue to convene the meetings of the NATO-Ukraine Commission.”

About Kyle Anzalone Kyle Anzalone is news editor of the Libertarian Institute, opinion editor of Antiwar.com and co-host of Conflicts of Interest with Will Porter and Connor Freeman.

The World Is Changing, But Is Washington Finally Noticing?

by Ted Snider, The Libertarian Institute, Apr 26, 2023

Recent statements by two Biden administration officials hint that the United States is finally noticing that the world around them is changing.

On April 11, CIA Director William Burns spoke at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. In a somewhat stunning statement that has, perhaps, not been so clearly and publicly articulated before, Burns said that we are in one of “those times of transition that come along a couple of times a century. Today the United States still has a better hand to play than any of our rivals, but it is no longer the only big kid on the geopolitical bloc. And our position at the head of the table isn’t guaranteed.”

Burns’ classifying the transition that is now taking place as a “transition that come along a couple of times a century” echoes Chinese President Xi Jinping’s comment to Russian President Vladimir Putin last month that, “Together, we should push forward these changes that have not happened for 100 years” and recognizes the significance of the tectonic geopolitical shift that is occurring. The unipolar world is extinct and has been replaced by an evolving multipolar world in which the United States “is no longer the only big kid on the geopolitical bloc.” China’s diplomatic role in brokering an agreement between Saudi Arabia and Iran demonstrated America’s “position at the head of the table isn’t guaranteed.”

The ever strengthening partnership between Russia and China has tilted the weight of the world toward a multipolar one. In March, Xi visited Putin in Moscow where they not only “reaffirm[ed] the special nature of the Russia-China partnership,” but “signed a statement on deepening the strategic partnership and bilateral ties which are entering a new era.”

But the Sino-Russian relationship in the new multipolar world isn’t just bilateral. Countries are lining up to join Chinese and Russian-led multipolar organizations like BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. From the call for multipolarity among the many African nations attending the Russia-Africa in a Multipolar World conference in Moscow in March, to Saudi Arabia’s assertion that “We do not believe in polarization or selecting between one partner and another,” to India’s continued diplomatic and economic cooperation with Russia and China, to Brazil’s promise to uphold and strengthen multilateralism, to France’s surprising call for Europe to become a “third pole,” countries around the world are leaving the U.S.-led unipolar world for neutrality in a multipolar world.

One of the mechanisms for multipolarity is emancipation from the monopoly of the U.S. dollar. Most international trade is conducted in dollars, and most foreign exchange reserves are held in dollars. As the United States has recently demonstrated in Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, and Russia, the position of the dollar allows it to be very powerfully and quickly weaponized.

Sanctions have not only accelerated the evolution of the multipolar world by creating a community of sanctioned countries that turn to each other, forming a second pole, but they have also weakened the U.S.-led unipolar world by weakening willingness to depend on the dollar.

In the second stunning statement by a U.S. official, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on April 16, “There is a risk when we use financial sanctions that are linked to the role of the dollar that over time it could undermine the hegemony of the dollar.” She explained, “Of course, it does create a desire on the part of China, of Russia, of Iran to find an alternative.”

>p>And find an alternative they have. Yellen’s statement suggests that the United States is beginning to recognize that escaping the monopoly of the U.S. dollar is gaining momentum as a mechanism for ending, not only the “hegemony of the dollar,” but of the United States itself.

Recent demonstrations of the American ability to cut off countries that challenge it has awoken opposition. Several countries and regions, including Russia, China, India, Iran, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, France, Latin America, BRICS, and the Eurasian Economic Union, have all expressed interest in and even made moves towards partially escaping the U.S. dollar.

Russia and China are now conducting 65% of their trade in their own currencies. China and Brazil are now conducting bilateral trade in their own currencies, as are China and Pakistan. Iran and Russia are now settling trade in rials and rubles instead of dollars and recently announced that they have circumvented the U.S. financial system by linking their banking systems as an alternative to SWIFT for trading with each other. Saudi Arabia has said that it sees “no issues” in trading oil in currencies other than the U.S. dollar. The Eurasian Economic Union has agreed on “a phased transition” from settling trade in “foreign currency” to “settlements in rubles.” Robert Rabil, Professor of political science at Florida Atlantic University, says that the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and Israel have all made some movement away from the U.S. dollar.

Brazil has raised the idea of a Latin American currency. And Brazilian President Lula da Silva recently asked, “Why should every country have to be tied to the dollar for trade? Who decided the dollar would be the [world’s] currency?” “Why,” he suggested, “can’t a bank like the BRICS bank have a currency to finance trade between…BRICS countries?” BRICS and the SCO are both considering abandoning the dollar in favor of trade in the currencies of member states.

While American activity suggests a foreign policy that drives on, unaware of the new terrain its entered, the recent statements by Burns and Yellen suggest that at least some in the Biden administration are beginning to notice that the world is changing. U.S. hegemony, its “position at the head of the table,” is no longer “guaranteed.”

- About Ted Snider Ted Snider is a regular columnist on U.S. foreign policy and history at Antiwar.com and The Libertarian Institute. He is also a frequent contributor to Responsible Statecraft and The American Conservative as well as other outlets.

 

To All Who Care about Humanity’s and the Planet’s Future

International Just started this petition

Humanity has reached a tipping point. It is time for governments, international institutions and people everywhere to take stock and act with renewed urgency.

The Ukraine conflict is inflicting death, injury, displacement and destruction, exacerbating a global food crisis, driving Europe into recession, and creating shock waves across the world economy.

The Taiwan conflict is threatening to escalate into outright war that would devastate Taiwan and turn East Asia into a powder keg.

More troubling still is the toxic relationship between the United States on the one hand and China and Russia on the other. Here lies the key to both conflicts.

What we are seeing is the culmination of decades of gross mismanagement of global security. The United States has been unwilling to accept, let alone adapt to, the rise of China and the re-emergence of Russia. It remains unwilling to break with outdated notions of global dominance – a legacy of the Cold War and the triumphalism that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union. 

A global power shift is taking place. The West-centric world, in which first Europe and then the United States held sway, is giving way to a multi-centric, multi-civilisational world in which other centres of power and influence are demanding to be heard.  

Failure to accept this new reality spells immense danger. A new Cold War is now in full swing, which can at any moment mutate into a hot war. In the words of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, “humanity is one misunderstanding, one miscalculation away from nuclear annihilation”. 

Even if nuclear apocalypse is averted, discord between nuclear armed states inhibits cooperative problem-solving, the provision of global public goods and an effective and independent UN system.

To rise to the challenge we need a coherent, sustained and multifaceted response by governments and international institutions, inspired and driven by an ever watchful and engaged civil society. Several steps suggest themselves, some immediate, others longer term.

The first steps must aim to end the conflict in Ukraine and defuse the tensions over Taiwan. More substantial efforts are needed to foster a framework of cooperative coexistence between the United States, Russia and China – an essential building block for peace across both Europe and Asia. 

To this end, we believe the UN Secretary-General or a group of middle powers acting – ideally the two acting in concert – could set in train a multi-pronged initiative aimed at securing an effective and durable ceasefire in Ukraine and the relaxation of tensions over Taiwan.

In the case of Ukraine, the aim must be to secure the cessation of all combat by Russian and Ukrainian forces and separatist groups based in the Donbas region. This would be a ceasefire monitored by a United Nations team reporting regularly and directly to the UN Secretary-General. 

A ceasefire, however, is unlikely to hold for long without a durable settlement of the Ukraine-Russian conflict. This will in turn depend on bringing to an end the cynical use of the Ukraine war by great powers intent on pursing their geopolitical ambitions. Only then will it be possible to achieve:

·      the phased withdrawal of Russian military forces; 

·      an end to the delivery of lethal military aid to Ukraine;

·      a constitutionally enshrined policy of neutrality for Ukraine;

·      the resolution of jurisdictional issues, notably Crimea and the Donbas region, coupled with a process aimed at healing regional, ethnic and religious animosities within Ukraine.

·      All prisoners of war, refugees, and civilians in captivity to be returned to their respective countries and all their rights respected as provided by the Geneva Conventions.

These arrangements will need to be complemented by a wider agreement involving other interested parties, with a view to securing: an adequately funded international program to address the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine; international guarantees to safeguard Ukraine’s independence, neutrality and territorial integrity; and the removal of all sanctions placed against Russia and the restoration of normal trade relations. 

In the case of the Taiwan conflict, the first step must be to defuse the current level of tension. To this end, the international community should reaffirm the principles set out in the Shanghai communiqué of 1972, notably the ‘one China’ principle which now commands widespread international support. In line with this principle, the international community must use all means at its disposal to dissuade Taiwan from making any unilateral declaration of independence. The UN Secretary-General in tandem with ASEAN is well placed to spearhead such a course of action.

These relatively short-term initiatives must pave the way for a series of interlinked consultations, culminating in an international conference, whose primary purpose would be to frame a new global security architecture, sustained by appropriate reforms in global governance and designed to:  

1.     Stop the march to nuclear oblivion, and set in motion an ambitious program for nuclear disarmament, beginning with a series of arms control and disarmament agreements and leading within a specified timeframe to universal membership of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons;

2.     Reflect the reality of a multi-centric, multi-civilisational world which respects the independence and legitimate rights of all sovereign nations, and in which no actor seeks to exercise imperial or hegemonic ambitions. 

3.     Enshrine the principles of common, cooperative and comprehensive security, and translate these into effective regional arrangements, especially in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region;

4.     Initiate a series of measures that can reverse the militarisation of the international system, including limitations on the reach and scope of military alliances and overseas deployments of military forces, as well as a progressive reduction of national military budgets, thereby redirecting resources to areas of pressing social, economic and environmental need;

5.     Set in motion the far-reaching reform of international institutions, especially the UN system, so that they can more effectively mount the necessarily cooperative response to existential threats, notably climate change, biodiversity loss, and present and future pandemics.

None of this will happen without a massive global awakening of human wisdom and energy. Important as governments and international institutions are, the initiative for a coherent response to the challenges we face lies largely with the people, with civil society.

Leadership of various kinds is needed. Which is why this message is also addressed to intellectuals, artists, scientists, journalists, religious leaders, advocates and other engaged citizens.

Equally, we have in mind groups working on the rights of indigenous peoples, aid and development, conflict resolution, civil liberties and human rights, violence against women, refugees and asylum seekers, climate change and other threats to our environment, public health (not least Covid), justice for the poor and marginalised, and ethnic, religious and cultural diversity.  ALL are adversely affected by great power confrontation, oppressive security laws, rising military budgets and destructive military activities, not to mention the prospect of nuclear catastrophe. ALL have a crucial part to play.

Trade unions, professional networks (in education, law, medicine, nursing, media, communications), farmer organisations, religious bodies, human-centred think tanks and research centres have also much to contribute to the conversation for a habitable future.

It is time for people everywhere to take the initiative personally and collectively – to set in motion conversations, small and large, formal and informal, online and in person, using the written and spoken word, as well as the visual and performing arts. This is a moment for collective reflection on where we’re at, where we should be heading and the steps needed to get us there. 

The stakes are high. We need bold thinking that connects people and issues within and between countries. We must revive and reframe the global security conversation. There is not a moment to lose.

 

 

Prepared by

Richard Falk, Emeritus Professor of International Law, Princeton University; Chair of Global Law, Queen Mary University London; Research Associate UCSB

Joseph Camilleri, Professor Emeritus, La Trobe University, Melbourne; Fellow, Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia; President, Conversation at the Crossroads 

Chandra Muzaffar, Former Professor of Global Studies, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang; President of the International Movement for a Just World (JUST)