A Day to Remember

by New Worker correspondent

Do Minh Hung welcomes the guests

NCP leader Andy Brooks joined other communists at the Vietnamese embassy in London this week to commemorate the liberation of south Vietnam on 30th April 1975. The Ambassador, Do Minh Hung, spoke about those heady days which saw the defeat of US imperialism and the re-unification of the country and the giant steps that the new Socialist Republic of Vietnam has taken in the years since re-unification. This was followed by the screening of a documentary about the liberation struggle and the global campaign to stop imperialist aggression that played an important part in moulding public opinion and ending the American occupation.
Tens of thousands of Vietnamese turned out to see the parade in Ho Chi Minh City, the former capital of the puppet regime, as part of the ceremony marking the 50th  anniversary of the Liberation of the South and National Reunification  on 30th April.
The fly-past and military parade was followed by communist and national banners symbolising the victorious ideals and firm belief in the leadership, wisdom and bravery of the Communist Party of Vietnam, as well as the strength of national unity – drawn from history, igniting the present, and illuminating the future. With them came a vehicle bearing a portrait of President Hồ Chí Minh, the communist leader who led the resistance to victory over the Japanese occupiers during the Second World War to build the first people’s government – the Democratic Republic of Vietnam – in the north of the country after US imperialism partitioned in the former French colony in 1954.
But communist-led resistance soon grew. The Americans, who started sending “military advisers” to prop up the puppet regime in the south in 1960.The imperialists believed that they could crush the Vietnamese people with  air terror but when that failed they poured hundreds of thousands of troops into the country to try and quell the mounting resistance to their neo-colonial rule.
By 1969 the Americans had had enough.The Nixon administration began to withdraw US troops from Vietnam from its peak of 540,000 to once again turn to air power in a renewed attempt to crush the National Liberation Front (NLF)that the Americans called the Viet Cong and bring the communist government in the north to its knees. But that didn’t work either. The NLF now controlled most of the countryside in south Vietnam. Resistance to the corrupt southern puppet leaders and their US masters was spreading inside the towns and cities still held by the Americans. Even units of the south Vietnamese armed forces were moving to change sides – which many eventually did in the final liberation offensive in 1975.
 Led the NLF guerrillas and the northern people’s army defeated the might of US imperialism and freed their country. Though he never lived to see the final liberation of the south Hồ Chí Minh charted the revolutionary path to a series of historic victories, including the great Spring Victory of 1975 that ended partition and reunified Vietnam.

A taste of China!

 

by New Worker correspondent

London Craft Week kicked off on 12^th May with events featuring the very best in the craft and design world taking place across the heart of the capital.Now in its eleventh year, 400 events, exhibitions, creative classes, and around a thousand international artisans demonstrated their skills via a very impressive programme of master-classes, demonstrations, workshop tours, talks and exhibitions. And during the festival NCP leader Andy Brooks joined academics and leaders in the tea trade for a Chinese cultural event at the historic former Royal Mint complex near the Tower of London.
China has participated in the London Craft Week since 2015 continuously promoting cultural exchanges and cooperation with the UK and others.
The Anxi Tieguanyin: Tea from the East presentation show-cased the contemporary development of Chinese tea and its culture as well as a performance of the traditional Chinese tea ceremony. Anxi Tieguanyin tea goes back back fourteen hundred years to the days of the Tang Dynasty. Favoured by the imperial court its fame later spread throughout China and even across the globe.
This was followed by launch of a new childrens’ book set in the tea plantations of China. The author, Daishu Ma, is a Chinese illustrator and graphic artist working in East London. Her first graphic novel Leaf was published in 2014. Her latest, Tiger Don’t Worry, tells the story of a little girl and her Tiger friend trying, against all odds, to make good tea. Published by Post Wave it’s available in most London bookshops for only £12.99.

Remember Odessa 2014!

by New Worker correspondent
 
On Saturday 3rd May members of International Ukraine Anti Fascist Solidarity and several other organisations held a vigil in solidarity with the families of those who died in the Odessa massacre of 2014 outside the Ukrainian embassy in London.
They carried signs saying "Remember Odessa 02.02.2014" in English, Russian and Ukrainian. After the vigil they laid flowers at the gate of the embassy, and a letter addressed to ambassador Valery Zaluzhnyi was left by New Communist Party of Britain general secretary Andy Brooks.
Eleven years after the tragic events of 2nd May 2014 no-one has been brought to justice for these crimes, and no independent, local or international inquiry has ever been held. And according to the European Council an investigation by Ukrainian authorities in November 2015 “had lacked "institutional and practical independence".
On 13th March 2025 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the Ukrainian authorities had failed to prevent or end the violence on that day or to “ensure timely rescue measures for those trapped in the fire,” and said that since 2014 the Ukrainian authorities had “failed to institute and conduct an effective investigation into the events”.
The court ruled that these failures were in violation of Article 2 (right to life/investigation) and Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life) of the European Convention on Human Rights.
While the ruling was widely covered by the Russian and Ukrainian media it appears to have been totally ignored by leading Western media outlets, including the BBC, Reuters and CNN.
However the virulently pro-Ukrainian website EUvsDisinfo dismissed the ruling as "recurrent pro-Kremlin narrative about the Odessa tragedy and about Nazi Ukraine". EUvsDisinfo is run by "a team of experts" called the "East Stratcom Task Force", which operates under the EU High Representative. Kaja Kallas, a former Estonian prime minister.

Boycott Barclays Now!

by New Worker correspondent

Palestinian solidarity campaigners were outside Barclays Bank’s Annual General Meeting in London this week to call out their complicity with Israel's genocide in Gaza while others, inside the hall, disrupted the meeting to protest against the bankrolling of Israeli terror in Palestine.   
Barclays holds over two billion pounds-worth of shares and provides £6.1 billion in loans and underwriting to nine companies whose weapons, components and military technology are being used by Israel in its attacks on Palestinians.
This week, Israel has committed to intensifying its genocide in Gaza by sending yet more troops into the Palestinian enclave. An Israeli government minister has said Gaza is "to be entirely destroyed". We must respond by escalating our campaigning against corporations that enable Israel's atrocities. 
Barclays has an agreement with Israel to act as a 'primary dealer' for its government bonds. This means it directly helps Israel sell bonds to raise money to fund its genocide against the Palestinians. Barclays has underwritten at least £500 million of Israel government bonds since October 2023. 
In addition, Barclays provides investment and loans worth billions to arms companies supplying Israel with the weapons and military technology it uses in its crimes against Palestinians. There must be no business-as-usual for companies like Barclays while they enable Israel's genocide.  

Remembering Neil Harris

by New Worker correspondent

Neil Harris, a leading member of the New Communist Party, sadly passed away in March 2018 following a long battle against cancer. Neil always wanted his ashes scattered at the Kremlin where Lenin’s tomb and Stalin’s ashes, together with hundreds of other honoured citizens from Soviet times, remain. This was raised by Theo Russell, the NCP delegate to the international anti-fascist forum in Moscow, last week only to be told that the scattering of ashes anywhere near the Lenin Mausoleum is, in fact,  strictly forbidden by the Kremlin authorities. But he asked our comrades in the Communist Party of the Russian Federation for advice and with their help Theo scattered Neil’s ashes into the Moskva river from a boat as it passed the Kremlin. Many comrades who have fond memories of Neil Harris  will be pleased to hear that his last wish has now been granted.

May Day in London

by New Worker correspondent

London comrades and other activists from the International Ukraine Anti Fascist Solidarity campaign joined the May Day march through central London this week with banners calling for justice for the families of those murdered at the Odessa Trade Union House on 2nd May 2014, and for solidarity with the many thousands of political prisoners in Ukraine, many of whom have been beaten, tortured, or murdered. Many organisations at the march expressed their support for the banners. Many photographers also took pictures, some of which have already appeared on British social media channels.