Guardians of Peace

 by New Worker correspondent

Ambassador Zheng welcomes the guests

NCP leader Andy Brooks joined diplomats and politicians at a reception at the Chinese embassy in London last week to celebrate the 98th anniversary of the founding of the People's Liberation Army of China (PLA). The Chinese Ambassador, Zheng Zeguang, and Defence Attaché Major-General Feng Min addressed over 300 guests that included government officials, politicians, diplomatic envoys and defence attachés together with Ben Merrick, the Director of International Security at the Ministry of Defence.
During the formal part of the event Ambassador Zheng pointed out that under the strong leadership of the Communist Party of China, the PLA has braved wind and rain and grown from strength to strength over the past 98 glorious years. It has made remarkable contributions to the liberation of the people, the development of the country, and the security of the motherland, making indelible achievements for the Party and the people. Under the guidance of Xi Jinping Thought the PLA is stepping up efforts towards the goal of building a world-class military by the PLA’s centenary. The PLA will continue to provide strategic support for realising the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation and make new contributions to peace and stability in the world.
Ambassador Zheng pointed out that this year marks the 80th anniversary of the victory over fascism in the second world war. The peoples of China and the UK fought valiantly against fascist aggression on the main Eastern Front and the European battlefield, making huge sacrifices for the cause of justice and important contributions to the global victory against fascism. China’s fight was the earliest to begin, and the longest-lasting. The Chinese people suffered the most significant human and material losses before ultimately defeating the Japanese aggressors. Now the current international situation is experiencing transformation and instability. The international community should resolutely defend the outcomes of the victory in 1945, firmly uphold true multilateralism, steadfastly safeguard world peace, stability, fairness and justice, and jointly build a community with a shared future for humanity. 
He also noted that this year also marks the 80th anniversary of the recovery of Taiwan. Taiwan has been an inalienable part of China’s territory since ancient times. The Chinese people and their armed forces will never allow Taiwan to be separated from China. Nor will they allow any external forces to undermine their efforts for complete reunification.
And in her speech, Major-General Feng Min said the PLA had made steady progress in its modernisation and combat capability. The PLA is firmly committed to defending national sovereignty, security and development interests, to putting people first, and to safeguarding peace. This year marks the 35th anniversary of the Chinese military's first participation in UN peacekeeping operations. China is the largest troop-contributing country among the permanent members of the UN Security Council and the second-largest financial contributor to UN peacekeeping assessments. Over the past 35 years, the Chinese military has undertaken 26 peacekeeping missions, dispatching more than 50,000 peacekeepers in total. Among them, 17 Chinese peacekeepers have made the ultimate sacrifice, dedicating their youth, passion, and lives to the cause of UN peacekeeping.

Nepalese communists at the Centre

Andy Brooks and Shankar Pokharel at the Centre 

by Theo Russell

NCP leader Andy Brooks met a large delegation from the Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist-Leninist) who visited the New Communist Party centre in London on 13th  June, led by general secretary Shankar Pokharel. It included leading members from Nepal and Germany who were visiting the UK for a CPN (UML) event in Britain.
Comrade Pokharel spoke about the years of underground struggle under the feudal Panchayat system under which all political parties were banned, and the Council of Ministers and the Federal Parliament were appointed  by the king. That system ended in 1990, and the monarchy was abolished in May 2008 .
Today the CPN(UML) has the largest share of the popular vote, and its chairman, K P Sharma Oli has been prime minister since July 2024 in coalition with the Nepali Congress and three other parties.
Pokharel said that if the CPN(UML) wins the 2027 elections it plans to start laying the basis for socialism and prioritising the needs of farmers and workers. he said that since 1990 the gap between rich and poor has reduced and the percentage living below the World Bank poverty line has fallen from 55 per cent to just two per cent.
The number of girls in school has advanced from very few to equal numbers today and it is now mandatory for a third of parliament members to be women. Many more women are now in positions of political influence.
Pokharel said that Nepal has a number of current border disputes with India, but none with China. The current government aims to maintain good relations with both countries without favouring one over the other.
NCP general secretary Andy Brooks said the party would strengthen solidarity with the CPN(UML), with the people of Nepal and the Nepali community in Britain. The bonds of friendship between the NCP and the CPN (UML) goes back many years and this meeting has been an excellent opportunity to renew and develop ties with our two parties.

Celebrating Red October!

Andy Brooks makes a point

by New Worker correspondent

Comrades and friends braved the weather on Saturday to mark the Russian revolution that was, undoubtedly, the greatest event in the 20th Century. Representatives from solidarity movements and members of the Chinese embassy gathered at the Party Centre to salute the Bolsheviks that established the first workers and peasants’ republic in November 1917.
Once again the New Worker print shop was transformed for a bar and buffet that paused only for the formal part of the social opened by Peter Hendy.
NCP leader Andy Brooks paid tribute to the achievements of the Soviet Union in the 20th Century. Other speakers included Keith Bennett from the Friends of Socialist China, Ian Donovan from the Consistent Democrats, British Posadist Marie Lynam and Theo Russell from the International Ukraine Anti-Fascist Solidarity movement, while Peter Hendy read out a message from Dermot Hudson of the Korean Friendship Association (KFA) who could not join us on the night.
Although the USSR and the people’s democracies of eastern Europe are no more, the spirit of 1917 lives on in China, Cuba, Democratic Korea, Vietnam and Laos, and in the hearts of communists throughout the world, a point stressed during the fighting fund appeal that raised £805 for the New Worker!

People’s China and the world we want

the CPB's Rob Griffiths and Andy Brooks

by Andy Brooks

New Communist Party leader Andy Brooks took part in a seminar on China’s diplomacy and building a community with a shared future for humanity at the Chinese embassy in London in February. This is his contribution to the discussion.

The key issue of the 21st century is what kind of world do we want and how are we going to build it. It revolves around peace. The struggle to abolish nuclear weapons is crucial for the survival of humanity and eliminating the causes of war is central to averting a Third World War. That is why communists have always understood that the struggles for peace and socialism are indivisible. The Chinese communists are striving to achieve lasting world peace, so that all countries can enjoy a peaceful and stable external environment and their people can live a happy life with their rights fully guaranteed to build a world that is free from fear and enjoys universal security. China’s perspective is based on the concept of ‘one country, two systems’ and the principle that ‘a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought’. But the most aggressive sections of the American ruling class now at the helm in Washington clearly believe in “one world, one system” and that nuclear war is, under certain circumstances, entirely winnable.
This is the era of the “global village” and “globalisation”. But what does that actually mean? It clearly means different things to different people.
For China and the other countries of the Global South it means working together to build a universally beneficial and inclusive economic global system that meets the common needs of all countries, especially the developing countries, and properly addresses the development imbalances between and within countries resulting from the global allocation of resources.
In America, however, globalisation simply means US hegemony. Some call it the “new world order” – others the “American dream in the 21st century” but there’s nothing new about the American dream of world domination. 
US imperialism and it lackeys destroyed the Yugoslav federation and the Libyan Jamahuriya. It fans the flames of war in Ukraine and the Middle East, blocks the return of Taiwan to its Chinese homeland and prolongs the unhappy partition of many countries including Cyprus, Kashmir and Korea. US imperialism has, indeed, established its hegemony over Western Europe – forcing British, French and German imperialism to accept the model of subservience imposed on Japan by US imperialism in 1945. 
This is what the Americans call the “free world” and “rules-based” order. But the “freedom” they recognise is that which allows the big corporations to exploit and plunder and the only rules are Rudyard Kipling’s rules of the jungle. But the dreams of the bourgeois elites who talked about the ‘end of history’ and a new golden age of capitalism that they said would inevitably follow the collapse of the Soviet Union died on the streets of Baghdad and the hills of Afghanistan.
  Wherever there is oppression, there is resistance and now imperialism is on the defensive. The Palestinian Arabs keep up the fight against Zionist aggression. Cuba, Iran and the DPR Korea stand firm in the face of the US blockade and the people of the Donbas remain steadfast in resisting the Nato-backed Ukrainian onslaught.
Capitalism is in the throes of a deep crisis. The slump that began in 2008 continues without any sign of real recovery while China and the Global South build an alternative economic and political system based on mutually advantageous terms and equal shares for all.
Some 85 per cent of the world’s population live in the Global South – the ‘developing’ world that is still largely excluded from the international institutions set up by US imperialism after the Second World War with the support of the weaker imperialist forces who rely on American might to defend their global interests now that their colonial empires have long gone. 
The people of the Global South are sick and tired of the fact that the Americans and their minions in Western Europe have economically dominated the world for decades, forcing and imposing transactions in dollars with the fear that failure to comply with US directives would result in economic and financial sanctions or even “regime change” à la Iraq and Libya.  
Now new structures like the BRICS bloc are challenging the old imperialist system of oppression and exploitation. The BRICS bloc, named after Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa who set it up some 15 years ago, has become a pivot for the Global South in the struggle to end the economic and political stranglehold of Anglo-American and Franco-German imperialism in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
BRICS is open to helping countries develop, as well as promoting investment and trade without strings or preconditions. BRICS is fighting against the concept of a new Cold War and opening the possibility of building a fairer and more equitable international economic order from which the world can benefit. The BRICS bloc is helping to build the multi-polar world that will put an end to the American dream of the “new world order” and world domination. No wonder Argentina, Egypt, Iran, Ethiopia, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia have applied to join the group. Many more will follow in the future.
A new world is indeed possible but it’s not the European Union or the hell-hole of the United States.  It’s the world being built now in People’s China and the new institutions of the Global South that offer an even playing field to all countries to trade and peacefully resolve disputes to build a better future for everyone on the planet.

Yoon not welcome here!

By New Worker correspondent

NCP leader Andy Brooks joined Korean solidarity campaigners protesting outside the south Korean embassy in London on Tuesday. Called by the Korean Friendship Association (KFA) the picketers were protesting at the presence of puppet south Korean president Yoon Suk Yeol who landed in Britain on Monday for talks with the British government.
Addressing the picket KFA Chairman Dermot Hudson said “Yoon is a cringeworthy puppet of the US who even sang the song American Pie to the senile US President 'Sleepy Joe' Biden!
“South Korea itself is not a real country but a puppet regime created by US bayonets in 1945 .Since the 1940s south Korea has been ruled by successive fascist dictators such as Syngham Rhee , Park Chung Hee , Chun Do Hwan and now Yoon Suk Yeol. Many massacres were carried out such as the Jeju Island massacre (1948) which saw the deaths of 70,000 or 80,000 , the Bodo League massacre 1950 in which 200,000 people were killed and the Kwangju massacre of 1980 which saw 5,000 people slaughtered.
“Today , south Korea has the longest working hours in the world and and one of the highest suicide rates . This is the grim reality of the so-called 'human rights paradise' praised by the Western mainstream media”.

Stepping stones to socialism

Dermot Hudson and Andy Brooks

by New Worker correspondent

Friends of Korea met in London last weekend to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the foundation of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea on 2nd September 1948. NCP leader Andy Brooks and Michael Chant from the RCPB (ML) were there along with other veteran campaigners and supporters of the Korean Friendship Association (KFA) event at the Marchmont Centre in Bloomsbury on Saturday.
Opening the meeting KFA UK Chair Dermot Hudson said that “from the first day of its foundation, the DPRK has advanced along the road of Juche, the road of self-reliance, independence and socialism. Juche Korea was not a copy of another country but a unique and original state”.
DPRK diplomat Kim Song Gi  brought greetings from DPRK’s London embassy and told the audience that under the leadership of  Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il the DPRK travelled the road of struggle, never giving up even though the moves of the hostile forces continue to this day. And today, led by Kim Jong Un, the Korean people march confidently into the future. 
Other speakers included Jef Bossyut of the Belgium KFA and Jeremy Bieringer (KFA Germany) while  Alejandro Cao De Benos joined us live on video link from Spain. The fact that the DPRK has withstood the test of time, disasters, sanctions and imperialist threats for 75 years, is evidence of the invincible validity of its system and the full support of the korean people in its future”. Alejandro, the  international president of the Korean Friendship Association cannot travel abroad as his passport was confiscated by the Spanish authorities some seven years ago. But they haven’t, as yet,  barred him from the social media.
Christer Lundgren, the Chair of the Swedish-Korean Friendship Association, also joined us on Zoom saying “during its 75 years of existence the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea has had extremely challenging difficulties to overcome, including the fierce Fatherland Liberation War, the postwar reconstruction and industrialization, continuous war threats and extreme economic difficulties caused by the imperialists’ manoeuvres to isolate and stifle People’s Korea as well as by the collapse of some other socialist countries”.
This hybrid meeting, spanned half the world. It was a first for the KFA. It certainly won’t be the last. 

China: Expanding horizons for peace

 by New Worker correspondent

Andy Brooks speaking

NEW COMMUNIST Party leader Andy Brooks took part in a seminar with other communists, academics and solidarity activists on the role of the Communist Party of China and the world today at the Chinese embassy in London this week.
The NCP delegation, that included national organiser Theo Russell, joined Robert Griffiths, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Britain and Ella Rule, the Chair of the CPGB (ML) in the discussion that looked at China’s new Global Security Initiative and its long-standing efforts to promote sustainable development in the Global South and throughout the rest of the world.
The symposium was opened by Ambassador Zheng Zeguang who said that the Chinese people are acting upon the goals set forth at the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of China and working hard to achieve the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation through a Chinese path of modernisation. “We are also taking concrete steps to promote high-quality development. Many British friends who have recently visited China are amazed by the prominent progress China has made over the past few years in green and low-carbon development and the digital economy. And they are full of confidence for China’s economic progress”.
People’s China has always upheld the principle that all countries, big or small, are equal. “We never engage in economic coercion, and we oppose bullying and coercion by others. It’s only when China’s core interests are undermined by certain countries that we take legitimate and reasonable counter-measures”. 
In his opening Andy Brooks said “imperialism fans the flames of war in Ukraine and the Middle East, blocks the return of Taiwan to its Chinese homeland and prolongs the unhappy partition of many countries including Cyprus, Ireland, Kashmir and Korea. China’s perspective, on the other hand, is based on the concept of ‘one country, two systems’ and the principle that ‘a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought’. But the most aggressive sections of the American ruling class now at the helm in Washington clearly believe in “one world, one system” and that nuclear war is, under certain circumstances, entirely winnable”. 
China is striving to achieve lasting world peace through the traditional United Nations framework and through other platforms for economic and diplomatic co-operation including BRICS, the Belt and Road Initiative and the Shanghai Co-operation Council.
This, the NCP leader said, “was a quantum jump from the post-war Soviet policies of “peaceful co-existence” and “detente” that failed to end the Cold War and probably accelerated the collapse of the USSR. Peaceful co-existence mistakenly believed that the capitalists could be economically beaten at their own game while detente was, in essence, a futile Soviet attempt at achieving nuclear parity with the Americans to divide the world into Soviet and American spheres of influence”. 
China, backed by many other countries, has repeatedly challenged the West to implement the entire non-proliferation treaty, signed in 1968, that not only called a halt to nuclear proliferation but also committed the signatories to work towards universal nuclear disarmament. 
The struggle to abolish nuclear weapons is crucial for the survival of humanity. But central to averting a Third World War is the need to eliminate the causes of war. And that is why communists have always understood that the struggles for peace and socialism are 
indivisible.

No Depleted Uranium to Ukraine!

by New Worker correspondent

NCP leader Andy Brooks joined demonstrators in Whitehall last week protesting against the British government’s decision to supply of depleted uranium shells to Ukraine. The shells are for the Challenger tanks Sunak is sending to Kiev to prop up the Zelensky regime’s fight against the Russians who intervened last year to defend the Donbas people’s republics and help the Ukrainian anti-fascist resistance.
    The picket opposite the prime minister’s residence in Downing Street that caught the attention of tourists and homeward bound commuters on Wednesday was called by the International Ukraine Anti-Fascist Solidarity campaign (IUAFS) and supported by the No2Nato and other anti-war movements. Theo Russell, the IUAFS campaign organiser, was interviewed by Russia Today (RT) through a live-broadcast link from Moscow to London. The protest was filmed by camera teams from the TASS Russian news agency and RUPTLY, an RT subsidiary, who later interviewed Theo Russell and Andy Brooks for other programmes.
    Depleted uranium (DU) is both chemically and radiologically toxic. Used in battle it is spread throughout the environment including the soil and water tables, and remains radioactive for more than 4.5 billion years. Significant increases in horrific birth defects, leukaemia and other cancers, kidney damage, and mental illness in children have been recorded in areas where DU munitions were used.

Honouring a great Korean revolutionary

Dermot Hudson and Theo Russell

by New Worker correspondent

Kim Il Sung was born on 15th April 1912 and his birthday has long been celebrated as the Day of the Sun in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and by everyone who stands by the DPRK. And on that day last week solidarity activists gathered at the Cock Tavern in London to recall the outstanding achievements of the leader of the Korean revolution.
    Speakers included Dermot Hudson, the chair of the Korean Friendship Association (KFA) that organised the meeting and NCP national organiser, Theo Russell. The Democratic Korean embassy in London sent a tribute that was read out at the meeting and messages were received from Korean friendship groups in Germany, Poland and Switzerland.
    In his tribute Dermot Hudson praised the successful test firing of the Democratic Korean ballistic missile as a great victory for Juche and self-reliance – the Korean-style socialism pioneered by Kim Il Sung that is followed by his successors in the people’s republic today.
    Kim Il Sung was a great anti-imperialist revolutionary who turned the DPRK into a fortress of militant anti-imperialism and totally opposed the line of compromise with imperialism. His life from beginning to end was one of principled and constant struggle against imperialism and for independence’.
    Theo Russell praised the life of Kim Il Sung as that of a great revolutionary . He said that the achievements of the DPRK are great and are due to the Juche philosophy authored by the great leader of the Korean people who worked tirelessly throughout his life for the communist cause.
    Shaun Pickford, the head of Staffordshire KFA focused on the international dimension of the DPRK and the Juche Idea. The first Juche idea study group was formed in Mali , West Africa and since then many international seminars on the Juche Idea have followed.
    This was followed by a general discussion on Juche and life in the DPRK and ended with the traditional refreshments and informal chat amongst friends of Korea old and new.

Defending the rights of the unemployed!

 by New Worker correspondent

NCP campaign organiser Theo Russell joined demonstrators outside Caxton House, the headquarters of the Department for Work and Pensions, in London last week. Called by the Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group, the picketers were protesting against the radical overhaul of disability benefits that could see people with complex or invisible conditions left hundreds of pounds out of pocket.
    Under the changes, the deeply-flawed work capability assessment (WCA) for determining benefit payments will be replaced with the existing personal independence payment (PIP) system – which is used to decide what day-to-day help a disabled person might need.
    In its post-Budget analysis, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said the Government could face a choice of either widening the criteria or seeing hundreds of thousands of people no longer qualifying for benefits. Tom Waters, economist at the IFS, estimated one million people could be forced into work and some 600,000 could lose an estimated £350 per month in support.

For a better, shared future for the peoples of the world

by New Worker correspondent

NCP leader Andy Brooks, along with Robert Laurie and John Maryon from the Central Committee of the New Communist Party, joined hundreds of other representatives from political parties and movements from around the world last week at an online seminar organised by the Communist Party of China in Beijing.
`    The meeting was opened by Xi Jinping, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China and President of the People’s Republic of China. He was then followed by other leaders of the Global South including President Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro as well as the presidents of Serbia and South Sudan and senior government figures from Grenada, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Papua New Guinea, Russia, Timor Leste and Togo,
    Leaders of over 500 political parties and organisations from more than 150 countries attended the Communist Party of China in Dialogue with World Political Parties High-Level Meeting on 15th March. Together, they discussed the important theme of the Path Towards Modernisation: the Responsibility of Political Parties.
    The initiative calls for respect for the diversity of civilisations, upholding the common values of humanity in pursuing peace, development, equity, justice, democracy and freedom, and promoting robust international people-to-people exchanges and cooperation.
    In his opening remarks Comrade Xi Jinping gave Chinese answers to a series of thought-provoking questions such as "what kind of modernisation do we need and how can we achieve it”.
    "As our own future is closely connected with that of other countries and peoples, we will strive to provide new opportunities for world development, add new impetus to humanity's exploration of paths towards modernisation and make new contributions to the theory and practice of humanity's modernisation as we make new progress in Chinese modernisation", Xi said.
    Noting that the history of human development is full of twists and turns and that the path to modernisation is also arduous, Xi said that “in today’s world, multiple challenges and crises are intertwined. The global economic recovery remains sluggish, the development gap is widening, ecological environment is deteriorating, and the Cold War mentality is lingering,” meaning that we are once again at a crossroads of history.
    We must put the people first and ensure modernisation is people-centred. The ultimate goal of modernisation is the people’s free and well-rounded development. “Modernisation is not only about indicators and statistics on the paper but more about the delivery of a happy and stable life for the people.”
    We must uphold the principle of independence and explore diversified paths towards modernisation. Each country must consider its own national conditions and unique features. “It is the people of a country that are in the best position to tell what kind of modernisation best suits them. Developing countries have the right and ability to independently explore the modernisation path with their distinctive features based on their national realities.”
    We must uphold fundamental principles and break new ground. “We should work together to reform and develop the global governance system and make the international order more just and equitable as we advance humanity’s modernization in an environment of equal rights, equal opportunities and fair rules for all.” Xi added that we must help others to succeed while seeking our own success. “We stand firmly opposed to the practice of preserving one’s own development privilege by suppressing and containing other countries’ endeavour to achieve modernisation”.
    The Chinese leader noted that “the journey of over 100 years that the Party has traversed to unite and lead the Chinese people in pursuing national rejuvenation is also an exploration of a path towards modernisation.
    “Chinese modernisation is one of a huge population, of common prosperity for all, of material and cultural-ethical advancement, of harmony between humanity and nature, and of peaceful development,” adding: “We will stay committed to the right direction, right theories and the right path. We will not veer off course by changing our nature or abandoning our system...
    “China will neither tread the old path of colonisation and plunder, nor the crooked path taken by some countries to seek hegemony once they grow strong… we firmly oppose hegemony and power politics in all their forms…
    “The world does not need a new Cold War. The practice of stoking division and confrontation in the name of democracy is in itself a violation of the spirit of democracy…
    “no matter what level of development China achieves, it will never seek hegemony or expansion...there are bound to be setbacks on humanity’s journey to modernisation, but the future is bright”.
    In the history of humanity, over thousands of years, various civilisations have come into being, developed, and have in return promoted the overall development of human society. Diversity has been a prominent feature of civilisations.
    In spite of differences in histories, cultures, political systems and development phases, countries around the world share the common aspiration for peace, development, equity, justice, democracy and freedom – the common values of humanity.
    People need to keep an open mind in appreciating how different civilisations perceive values, and refrain from imposing their own values or models on others, and from stoking ideological confrontation.
    As the world is facing old and new challenges, there are more reasons for us to promote dialogue and consultation when addressing international issues, and to let cultural exchanges transcend estrangement, mutual learning transcend clashes, and coexistence transcend feelings of superiority.
    Spanning thousands of miles, the ancient Silk Road embodied the spirit of cooperation, mutual learning and mutual benefit. The year 2023 marks the 10th anniversary of a new “Silk Road” – China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), another project for the benefit of the masses which has brought tangible benefits to the people of the participating countries and promoted people-to-people exchanges.
    The diversity of civilisations is in nature a source of vitality and momentum in human development. Promoting people-to-people exchanges and mutual learning is of great value in summoning the enormous wisdom and energy needed to advance the progress and development of human civilisations.
    The BRI has delivered fruitful outcomes and won widespread support and participation. It has created jobs, improved infrastructure and promoted common development, especially in the developing countries.
    Security is the precondition for development. The Global Security Initiative calls for peacefully resolving differences and disputes between countries through dialogue and consultation, and supporting all efforts conducive to the peaceful settlement of crises.
    The recent Saudi Arabia-Iran dialogue in Beijing is a successful case of the practice of the Global Security Initiative, leading to the resumption of diplomatic ties between the two countries.
    The future of all countries are closely and increasingly connected. And tolerance, coexistence, exchanges and mutual learning among different civilisations play an irreplaceable role in advancing humanity's modernisation process.
    To realise a world with lasting peace and ever-improving welfare, we should embrace the Global Civilisation Initiative and draw on it to jointly create a better, shared future for humanity.
    Or as Xi Jinping says “a single flower does not make spring, while one hundred flowers in full blossom bring spring to the garden. Together, we can make the garden of world civilisations full of colours and life”.

His name will endure through the ages

Theo Russell with Italian comrades

by New Worker correspondent

Communists and progressives gathered alongside representatives of the embassies of the socialist countries beside the grave of Karl Marx last Sunday to commemorate his death on 14th March 1883.
    The event was led by Communist Party of Britain (CPB) central committee member Alex Gordon, who said: "People have gathered at this spo for many years to mark Karl Marx's death. Marx spent the longest period of his life in London. At his funeral his life-long friend and comrade Frederick Engels gave the oration, on 17th March 1883, saying “at quarter to three in the afternoon the greatest living thinker ceased to think”.
    To commemorate his passing the Marx Memorial Library has for many decades held an annual graveside oration at his burial place in Highgate Cemetery with leading members of the working class movement paying tribute to Marx's enduring legacy to today's class struggles.
    This year Fran Heathcote, national president of the Public and Commercial Services union, and CPB International Secretary Kevan Nelson, spoke about the current strike wave and the issues confronting trade unions in Britain.
    Representatives of communist parties and the socialist countries were called on to lay flowers on Marx's grave, including the Cuban Ambassador, Barbara Montalvo Alvarez, Guo Yuliang of the embassy of the People's Republic of China, and representatives of the Laotian and Vietnamese embassies.
    Flowers were also laid by members of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE), the French Communist Party, the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Frente Communista (Italy), the Communist Party of Italy, the Communist Party of Spain, the Tudeh Party of Iran, the Iraqi Communist Party, and Theo Russell of the New Communist Party of Britain.
    Although only a handful of people attended Marx's burial in 1883, the words of Frederick Engels were to become reality: "His name will endure through the ages, and so also will his work."

Down with the puppet regime

 

by New Worker correspondent 

NCP leader Andy Brooks joined London comrades protesting outside the south Korean embassy in London last weekend. The picket called by the Korean Friendship Association (KFA) was to protest against the forthcoming war exercises and the current wave of repression unleashed in south Korea against the people by the US puppet regime. KFA Chair Dermot Hudson in his address exposed the fascist and repressive nature of south Korea citing the recent raid on the HQ of the south Korean Confederation of Trade Unions as well as arrests of leftist and progressive activists . He stressed that south Korea is a puppet regime with no legitimacy, a creation of the US imperialists and that south Korea is simply the occupied southern half of the DPRK.

Free all Ukrainian political prisoners!

by Theo Russell

London comrades returned to Whitehall on Saturday to bring the crimes of the Ukrainian government to the attention of the British people. Some 30 protesters joined the picket opposite Downing Street organised by the International Ukraine Anti-Fascist Solidarity (IUAFS) campaign, to let the people “know that the regime in Ukraine, to which the British Government has given billions of pounds in financial and military support, has been committing horrific crimes against its own people, including Russian speakers, opposition activists and campaigners, journalists and Roma people, under the cover of accusing them of treason”.
    A IUAFS spokesman said: “Several mayors in eastern Ukraine have been summarily executed as well as local elected civilian officials for "crimes" such as negotiating humanitarian corridors with the Russian military. They should have been entitled to a due process of law, instead of being tortured, shot, and then dumped in the street.
    “Hundreds of journalists, bloggers, politicians, elected representatives, activists, priests, sportspeople, and even Ukrainian negotiators and military officers have been arrested and beaten, and some tortured or murdered. Most were charged with treason simply for opposing Kiev's policies, and not brought to trial after many months.
    “Alexander Matyuschenko, one of dozens of leftists arrested in Dnipro, central Ukraine, was an activist with the Livizta (Left) organisation, which campaigned against social spending cuts and right-wing propaganda. He was arrested by SBU (Ukrainian intelligence) and Azov members, tortured and forced to shout the nationalist salute, Slava Ukraini!, while his wife's hair was cut off with a knife.

NCP leader Andy Brooks

    "One of Ukraine’s most prominent human rights activists is Elena Berezhnaya, Director of the Institute of Legal Policy and Social Protection, who has spoken before the UN Security Council. She was arrested in March 2022 in Kiev. There has been no news of her since.
    "We know about these crimes because Ukrainian ultra-rightists and even regular soldiers have bragged about them in social media posts, including one of a Russian soldier who had one of his eyes gouged before he was killed, with the caption 'One-eyed captured Russian pig'.
    "We think it is essential to speak out about the actions of a government for whom the British government seems to have unlimited resources to support, at a time when millions here in Britain are facing a grim and uncertain future and our basic public services are chronically underfunded and understaffed”.
    During the protest a woman waiving the flag of the Donetsk people’s republic was attacked by a reactionary, believed to be from the Caucasian republic of Georgia. But he was dragged away by a policewoman supported by an Iranian who left a nearby protest to chivalrously intervene on the picketer’s behalf.
    Towards the end of the protest the demonstrators came under a torrent of abuse from a small group of Ukrainian and English supporters of the Nazi-infested regime in Kiev. They were, however, speedily warned off by the police.
    The protest was supported by the Consistent Democrats, CPGB (ML), New Communist Party, Socialist Labour Party, Socialist Fight and the Posadists in Britain. Solidarity messages were received from former Labour MP Chris Williamson who is now a leading member of the Socialist Labour Party, Phil Wilayto of the Odessa Solidarity Campaign in the United States, and Leonid Ilderkin from the Union of Political Refugees and Political Prisoners of Ukraine, who has recently moved back to Ukraine.

• Skwarkbox report
• La Lucha (USA) report

Salute the Red Army heroes

by New Worker correspondent

NCP leader Andy Brooks and NCP London organiser Theo Russell joined Italian comrades over the remembrance weekend to pay tribute to the Soviet people who fought and died to defeat the Nazis in the Second World War. Called by the supporters of the Communist Front of Italy in Britain, comrades laid flowers during the small ceremony at the Soviet War Memorial in the shadow of the Imperial War Museum in Southwark on Saturday.
    In the past Russian diplomats and those from other former Soviet republics would have joined local dignitaries, members of the Russian community in London and representatives of the Armed Forces and veterans’ associations in honouring the fallen at an annual Remembrance Day ceremony organised by the Soviet War Memorial Trust. This has now all ended because of the Ukraine war.
    Soon after the fighting began Sir Simon Hughes, the former constituency Liberal-Democrat MP who was once a frequent attender at these events, said that the Victory Day event at the Soviet War Memorial should not include Russia and Belarus unless Russian troops withdrew from Ukraine by 1st May. To avoid the memorial becoming a focus for protests and possible vandalism, the Trust has now sadly suspended all commemorations at the monument. But individuals and small groups continue to pay their respects at the Soviet war memorial.
    Fresh red carnations were already lying the foot of the sombre bronze statue when the London and Italian comrades arrived. They weren’t the first. They certainly won’t be the last…

Picketing Broadcasting House!

by New Worker correspondent

NCP leader Andy Brooks joined other Korean solidarity activists protesting against the BBC bias at a picket outside Broadcasting House in central London on Saturday. The Korean Friendship Association (KFA) had called the protest to highlight the appalling bias of the BBC in its coverage of news from Korea that invariably reflects the lies of the American lie-machine and those of its south Korean puppets.
    Discussions were held with passers-by and the media during the 90-minute protest that also called on people to stop funding the state broadcasting network by cancelling their BBC licence fees.
    Dermot Hudson, KFA chair, said: “Recently there was an incident in the West Sea of Korea in which a south Korean puppet warship intruded into the territorial waters of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) basically invading the DPRK and violating its sovereignty but the BBC falsely reported that the DPRK had infiltrated south Korean waters and fired at south Korea…
    “The BBC not only pumps out false propaganda against the DPRK but it is also a regime change agency. We should never forget the role of the BBC World Service in the past in undermining and destroying socialism in the USSR and former socialist countries. Now the BBC is trying to do the same with the DPRK and beaming its lies into the country. We must defend People's Korea from regime change, from all attempts to force 'reform' or 'opening-up' on People's Korea.
    “We, the Korean Friendship Association of the UK, believe in defending People's Korea with No Ifs or Buts.
    “We believe the BBC should stop lying about the DPRK and instead produce fair, accurate and objective material about People's Korea.
    “We say don't pay your licence fee because if you do you are funding the BBC's lies about People's Korea."

Make the rich pay!

​by New Worker correspondent

London comrades joined tens of thousands of front-line workers over the weekend marching through the heart of the capital to a TUC rally demanding social justice and higher wages.
    Trade unionists and campaigners from across the country marched from Portland Place to for a TUC rally in Parliament Square. Some comrades carried the NCP national banner while others joined Donbas solidarity campaigners leafleting the crowd with the latest hand-out from the International Ukraine Anti-Fascist Solidarity campaign.
    Real wages are down by £68 a month compared to a year ago but bonuses for the City executives have risen exponentially. Energy bills have gone up by 45 per cent in recent months and though the Government has offered an energy bill rebate of £150 a household that will barely make a dent in rising costs. Inflation now stands at nine per cent – a 40-year-high.
    The Johnson government bleats on about the impact of the global energy crisis and the conflict in Ukraine. But the cost of everything from food, fuel and rent is soaring because the Government wants to put even more of the burden of the slump on the backs of working people who are only just recovering from the Covid crisis. The price hikes are the worst in half a century. Many people are now having to choose between heating their homes and eating.
    At the rally TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady backed the rail workers whose pay campaign began with national strikes this week.
    “Transport Secretary Grant Shapps has threatened rail workers that they will strike themselves out of a job.“Well you are wrong, Mr Shapps: if you keep stirring, come the next election, you will be out of a job,” she said. “It is time to raise taxes on wealth, not workers”.

China’s communists through the eyes of others

by Andy Brooks
Last week a video seminar was held as part of the events organised by the Communist Party of China in the run-up to its 20th National Congress this year. NCP leader Andy Brooks joined Rob Griffiths of the CPB, Ella Rule from the CPGB-ML, Keith Bennett from Friends of Socialist China, Carlos Martinez from the No Cold War movement and a representative of the CPB’s YCL to talk on the theme of the Communist Party of China in My Eyes. This is Andy Brooks’ contribution...

First of all I would like to thank our hosts for allowing me to say a few words about my impressions of the Communist Party of China which began when I first set foot in the people’s republic as part of a New Communist Party delegation that went to study economic reforms in the new enterprise zones in China back in April 1993.
    During the course of that visit we met a veteran Chinese communist who had fought the Japanese invaders and the reactionary forces during the civil war that ended in victory in 1949. He shared his memories of Harry Pollitt, who he had met when the British communist leader went to China in 1955, and he told us about the first steps taken by the communists along the road of socialist construction following the establishment of the people’s government in 1949.
    The Chinese comrade also spoke about the great changes in the countryside that had begun in 1979 and the development of the special zones that paved the way for the economic reforms that built the socialist market economy which is now the second largest in the world. He knew that dogmatists in some parts of the international communist movement didn’t understand the reform movement. But he said “what is the purpose of the Communist Party if it can’t raise the living standards of working people”.
    I have never forgotten that point. Sadly many European communists, east and west, did – leading to the fall of the Soviet Union and its allies in 1991 in the east and the collapse of communist and workers’ parties millions strong in western Europe.
    I don’t know whether that old Chinese communist lived to see the immense changes that have transform the towns and cities of China but we certainly have in subsequent visits to China over the past thirty-odd years.
    China has become a major force for peace. It has become a beacon of hope for all oppressed people.
It offers economic assistance to poor countries and has played an important role in helping the international efforts to combat the Covid pandemic.
    Cities have been modernised beyond recognition. Absolute poverty has been abolished Vast investments have created new industries to face the challenge of the 21st century and China is, once again, the work-shop of the world.
    Of course great cities are not unique to China. Monumental designs and towering blocks can be seen throughout the Western world. Modern cities house the banks and investment houses of capitalist speculation. Huge factories build the technology and the weapons needed to maintain the global system of oppression while the power of oil has transformed small fishing ports in the Persian Gulf into millionaires’ playgrounds. But this has not benefited the workers in the heartlands of imperialism while oil riches have not helped free the Palestinians or raised living standards on the Arab street.
    The immense wealth of the Western world remains in the hands of a tiny minority of capitalists and feudal lords.
    In the West millions of people scrabble to earn a living just to keep a roof over their heads, while a tiny elite live lives beyond the reach and often beyond the imagination of most workers.
    In the Third World millions upon millions live in poverty while their resources are plundered by the big Western corporations.
    We, on the other hand, see a different picture in China. Vast cities with modern offices and factories and equally modern housing for the workers who live there.
    Chinese astronauts circle the globe. A high-speed rail network spans the country. Container trains travel to Europe packed with the goods that fill our shops and markets. International airports link China to the four corners of the world. A growing network of domestic airline services and modern ports serve the seaborne trade that fires the global economy. And a state run education system and a dedicated health service that battled to contain the Covid plague is available to all.
    China’s wealth is being used to raise the standard of living of everyone in the people’s republic and help the development of the Third World through genuine fair trade and economic assistance.
    Though the social changes that inevitably followed the establishment of a mixed economy did lead to a rise in street crime it remains remarkably low compared to the norm in Europe and nothing like US or Latin American levels.
    There are no shanty-towns and slums in People’s China and the last vestiges of colonial rule, the shameful hovels in Hong Kong, will soon be swept away by the new government of the special administrative region.
    Big city pollution is being tackled by the people’s government in a meaningful way. The smog and acrid air has gone and blue skies have returned to Beijing following the national “war against pollution”, huge investments into a new regulations and an air pollution action plan that has transformed the capital and many other cities across the country.
    Over the years exchanges of views with the representatives of the Communist Party of China have deepened our understanding of the immense problems in organising the communist movement in such a vast country with such a huge population. We have also seen the immense achievements that China has made under the leadership of the Communist Party of China in overcoming poverty, providing the basic needs of all the people and tackling the population problem to give everyone a better life and a standard of living that is constantly rising.
    This year China’s communists will gather for their national Congress to chart the way forward for the Party and the country in the immediate future. Back in 2014 Communist Party of China (CPC) leader Xi Jinping said: "The very purpose of the CPC's leadership of the people in developing people's democracy is to guarantee and support the people’s position as masters of the country.”
    We are confident that the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of China will set the agenda for the people of China for many years to come. We wish the comrades success in their work and look forward to studying their conclusions in the future.

May Day in London

by New Worker correspondent

London May Day returned to the street with its traditional celebration of international workers' day and NCP leader Andy Brooks joined London comrades outside the Marx Memorial Library in Clerkenwell Green on Sunday for the march and rally in Trafalgar Square. There they joined other supporters of the anti-fascist resistance in Ukraine to give out leaflets from the International Ukraine Anti-Fascist Solidarity campaign. Numbers were down, not surprisingly after a two year break due to the Covid lockdowns, but this was more than off-set by the enthusiasm of the crowd and the bands that joined in the lively march through the heart of the capital.

Joint Statement: Victory to the anti-fascist forces of Donbass and their allies!

Victory to the anti-fascist forces of Donbass and their allies! U.S./NATO hands off Russia!

The NATO-funded Ukrainian Neo-Nazi Azov Battalion and other far right Ukrainian nationalists have slaughtered many thousands in Donbass in last 8 years.

On February 24, the anti-fascist Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, together with the Russian Federation, launched a military action with the goal of “demilitarization and denazification” of Ukraine. It is in the interest of poor and working people, anti-war and anti-imperialist forces in the U.S. and other NATO countries, to take an unambiguous position in solidarity with the anti-fascist forces. The real war danger comes from US and NATO forces surrounding Russia. The government in Kiev is their proxy, with no regard for the people of Ukraine.

In March 2014 British foreign secretary William Hague lied to the House of Commons when he said that the removal of Viktor Yanukovych was in accordance with the Ukrainian constitution, saying “It is wrong to question the legitimacy of the new authorities.

In fact, Yanukovych’s removal met none of the Ukrainian constitution’s provisions: there was no special commission of the Rada, no review by the Constitutional Court, and the Rada passed a bill removing Yanukovych from office with a simple majority of 328 votes, 10 short of the two-thirds majority laid out in the Ukrainian constitution. No doubt Hague was “badly advised” by his Foreign Office advisors!

Over the past 8 years Ukrainian military and US-backed fascist battalions incorporated into the National Guard killed 5,059 people in the Donetsk People’s Republic, including 91 children (figures obtained from Donetsk last week), so the figure for both the anti-fascist republics is probably around 8-9,000 people including well over 100 children.

This war began in 2014 when Ukraine launched the “Anti-Terrorist Operation” (ATO), just over a week after the CIA Director John Brennan visited Kiev to meet senior Ukrainian intelligence officials to “foster mutually beneficial security cooperation”. This was an all-out modern military offensive with tanks, artillery, missiles and aircraft. The ATO was still ongoing when the Russian intervention began last week, in fact it was being rapidly stepped up.

Millions of Ukrainians have been driven into political or economic exile since 2014, over two million now living in the Russian Federation alone. Many fled as a result of fascist death threats.

Up to 100 anti-fascists were murdered by fascists and nationalists at the Odessa Trade Union House Fire on May 2, 2014. No-one knows exactly how many, since there has never been any investigation.

Where was the media hysteria, and the calls for peace from the left and the peace movement, when men, women, children and the elderly were being bombed and shot by snipers in the Donbass for the past eight years?

Since November, the U.S. has pushed Kiev to a new murderous invasion of Donbass, while claiming that the real threat was from Russia. The U.S. rejected Moscow’s just demands to guarantee Ukraine’s neutrality. Russia recognized the independence of Lugansk and Donetsk on Feb. 21 –eight years after the people of Donbass overwhelmingly chose independence in a referendum, rejecting the pro-Western/neo-fascist coup government in Ukraine.

Washington and NATO deliberately and methodically pushed the Donbass republics and Russia into a corner, from which there were only two options: submit or fight back.

The People’s Militias of Donetsk and Lugansk are fighting to drive back the Ukrainian Armed Forces, including neo-Nazi battalions armed and trained by the U.S., Canada and NATO, that constantly threaten the lives of their residents. The anti-fascist military action, forced on Donbass and Russia by the Western imperialist powers – principally President Joe Biden and the U.S. government – has exposed confusion and equivocation in the anti-war movement, even among socialists and communists.

Modern capitalist Russia is not an imperialist country. It had no means to become one after the counter-revolution in the USSR. It is a regional power akin to India or Brazil, primarily an exporter of commodities, not capital. To maintain its independence, Russia had to ally with other countries in opposition to imperialism. Ukraine’s coup regime, by contrast, is a pawn of U.S. imperialism that has been waging a brutal war on its neighbours for eight years and offered itself as a base for NATO aggression against Russia.

Our responsibility is to stop U.S. imperialism and its wars in all forms, and to stand in solidarity with those who fight against U.S. domination.

· Victory to the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics and their allies!

· Justice for those murdered in the Odessa Trade Union House Massacre!

· Solidarity with the anti-fascist underground and exiles of Ukraine!

· U.S./NATO: Hands off Russia! Get out of Ukraine and Eastern Europe!

· Dismantle the imperialist NATO war machine – bring all the troops home now!

This statement is endorsed by: Communist Party of the Donetsk People's Republic, Consistent Democrats, Cumpanis (Italian communist journal), International Ukraine Anti-Fascist Solidarity, Movement for People's Democracy (USA) New Communist Party, Party of Communists USA (PCUSA), Posadists Today, Socialist Fight, US Friends of the Soviet People and the Zimbabwe Communist Party. It is adapted from a fine statement by the Socialist Unity Party / Partido de Socialismo Unido (USA).