Drop the sanctions, Return the gold!

by New Worker correspondent

Venezuela was struck by two back-to-back earthquakes last week. La Guaira – a densely populated coastal strip just north of Caracas has been declared a disaster zone. The death toll stands at over 2,250, with 40,000 feared missing. In the face of this catastrophe protesters called for the return of Venezuela’s gold at a picket outside the Bank of England last week. They were demanding that the British government return the 31 tonnes of gold stolen from the Venezuelan people and hoarded in the coffers of the Bank of England.
The Venezuelans were frozen out of their own gold deposits when the British government refused to recognise the legitimacy of the elections that returned Nicolas Maduro to the president’s office in Caracas in 2018. Today this is valued at three billion pounds.

Boycott Barclays Bank!

by New Worker correspondent

Palestinian rights campaigners have plastered tube trains in London to make sure that tennis fans travelling to Wimbledon this week know the truth about Barclays, the tournament’s sponsor. Campaign poster ads are going up across the London Underground faster than the authorities can take them down. And the message is ‘Boycott Barclays’! 
A number of British companies have seedy and nefarious financial ties with Zionist Israel. The ongoing genocide in Palestine has intensified calls for an immediate ceasefire and sparked an international campaign supporting Palestinians in their fight against oppression. Campaigners have been raising awareness on the economic ties a vast number of UK institutions have with companies that are providing Israel with the military and technological equipment to facilitate its oppressive regime. Barclays is one of them.
Barclays Bank is bankrolling Israel’s genocide and apartheid against Palestinians. Barclays provides investment and loans worth more than eight billion pounds to arms companies supplying Israel with weapons used in its genocide in Gaza, and military assaults across the West Bank. Barclays took over Tesco Bank on 1st November 2024 so campaigners are calling on all Tesco Bank customers to shut their accounts as part of the boycott of Barclays. 
The Boycott Barclays campaign began in 1969 when the bank was exposed as a major investor in racist, apartheid South Africa. In recent years the focus has been on the bank’s colossal investments in Zionist Israel. 
 It works. Recently, data revealed that the bank has stopped underwriting Israeli government bonds under pressure from our boycott and protests.  
We must continue our campaigning to force the bank to permanently and publicly withdraw as a primary dealer of Israeli government bonds, and to divest from all companies arming Israel’s genocide and apartheid against Palestinians.
The Boycott Barclays campaign want as many people as possible to close their account on a single day, to send a clear message to the bank that its complicity in Israeli apartheid has a cost – it will lose a sizeable number of its customers who stand with Palestine, and this will have a greater impact if it is on a single day.
So if you’re still a Barclays or Tesco Bank customer, join the next mass account closure day on Thursday 30th July!

Defend People’s Korea!

by New Worker correspondent

NCP leader Andy Brooks joined other comrades at a protest picket outside the American embassy in London last weekend. Braving the abnormally hot weather to show solidarity with People’s Korea the protesters were marking the 76th anniversary of the Korean war and demanded an end to the American occupation of south Korea.
The demonstration was called by the Korean Friendship Association (KFA), whose chairman, Dermot Hudson said “We are here today picketing the US embassy because a few days ago on Tuesday 25th of June, it was the 76th anniversary of the provocation of the Korean War which is known as the Fatherland Liberation War in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. The was not a war between Koreans but between a small country, the DPR Korea, and the American empire. Indeed it was a war against Korea, against the Korean people. 
“Let’s remember that the United States is not some wonderful land of ‘freedom and democracy ‘ but the head of a giant corrupt empire that gave you Jeffrey Epstein and has military bases in every corner of the globe”.
A message of solidarity from KFA Germany was read out by KFA organisation secretary Alan Bolon which stated “The US-imperialists threw 600 000 tons of bombs and napalm on the DPRK. 600 000 tons. Almost four times as much as on Japan during the Pacific war. An unimaginably high number. One ton is 1,000 kilograms. So the US-imperialists threw 600 million kilos of bombs and napalm bombs on Korea. Those bombs did not just hit military targets. These bombs destroyed over 50,000 industrial facilities, over 4,500 school buildings, almost 600 scientific facilities, over 8000 cultural and media facilities and over two million dwelling houses. That´s a two with six zeros. 
“But has there been any reparation? Any apology? No, to the contrary! The US imperialists still try to destroy the DPRK. Until this day the ‘United Nations Command’ troops, including soldiers from Germany and the United Kingdom are stationed in south Korea... Until this day the US imperialists threaten the DPRK with aggressive military manoeuvres and try to economically destroy the DPRK with sanctions”.

Remember their sacrifice!

by New Worker correspondent

In Russia the 22nd June is the Day of Remembrance and Sorrow. On that day in 1941 Nazi Germany and its allies launched a treacherous attack on the Soviet Union. This marked the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, one of the most tragic chapters in our history. It claimed the lives of 27 million Soviet citizens and left millions more wounded, bereaved and scarred by its devastation.

On that day Vasili Tsyganov, Minister-Counsellor of the Russian Embassy in London, laid flowers at the Soviet War Memorial in the gardens by the Imperial War Museum in Lambeth.
Unveiled in 1999, the monument stands as a symbol of the British respect for the heroism and self-sacrifice of the Soviet citizens and soldiers who lost their lives during the Second World War in the struggle against Nazism. It serves as a reminder of the price of victory and the enduring importance of preserving historical memory.