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1 week ago | 
morningstaronline.co.uk | Ben Chacko
THE CRISIS at Scunthorpe steelworks, rightly if belatedly being addressed in the immediate term by state intervention, is the consequence of privatising critical national infrastructure so decisions on its future rest on the profit-and-loss calculations of private companies. Right-wing media and parliamentarians, who are pro-privatisation and pro-war, want to avoid this conclusion. So we are seeing a propaganda campaign to blame it on other causes, each of which advances the right’s agenda.
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1 week ago | 
morningstaronline.co.uk | Ben Chacko
MPs ON the home affairs committee have struck a welcome blow against propaganda alleging “two-tier policing” of protest in Britain. This accusation, common on the lips of right-wing rabble-rousers in and beyond the Tory Party, serves two intertwined purposes.
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1 week ago | 
morningstaronline.co.uk | Ben Chacko
EMERGENCY legislation to give ministers the power to keep the Scunthorpe steel plant running is necessary and welcome. But this is not yet even nationalisation of Scunthorpe, let alone the wider steel industry.
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1 week ago | 
morningstaronline.co.uk | Ben Chacko
ISRAEL bombed the al-Ahli hospital in Gaza City yesterday, the last major hospital providing critical healthcare in northern Gaza. The bombing was part of a wave of air raids that killed at least 21 people. The hospital was hurriedly evacuated following a warning, with one girl dying because during the evacuation medics were unable to provide her with urgent care. Critically ill patients were wheeled out onto the street in their beds.
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1 week ago | 
morningstaronline.co.uk | Ben Chacko
NEGOTIATIONS between the United States and Iran on the latter’s nuclear programme were “very productive and constructive,” the White House said at the weekend. Further talks are scheduled for next weekend. Iranian TV reported that Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi “briefly” spoke directly to US President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff, the first face-to-face conversation between US and Iranian officials since the Barack Obama presidency. The talks took place in Oman.
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1 week ago | 
morningstaronline.co.uk | Ben Chacko
OVER 50,000 people rallied in support of Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic on Saturday in central Belgrade, following months of protests against him. The demonstration, though not as large as the largest anti-government demos, illustrates how polarised Serbian politics has become. Protests exploded in response to the collapse of a train station canopy in Novi Sad that killed 16 people on November 1 last year.
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1 week ago | 
morningstaronline.co.uk | Ben Chacko
OVER 30 people were killed in the Ukrainian city of Sumy today by a Russian missile strike. Two ballistic missiles hit the city centre at 10.15am, as many residents were gathering for traditional Palm Sunday processions. Firefighters scrambled to put out fires while video footage showed lines of body bags on the streets. The death toll was reported at 32 when the Morning Star went to press. “On this bright Palm Sunday, our community has suffered a terrible tragedy,” acting Mayor Artem Kobzar said.
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1 week ago | 
morningstaronline.co.uk | Ben Chacko
A PANAMANIAN opposition leader denounced the government for allowing “an invasion without firing a shot” at the weekend, after it agreed to allow US troops to deploy in the country.
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1 week ago | 
morningstaronline.co.uk | Ben Chacko
MORE than 50 people were killed in and around Goma in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo over the weekend, authorities say. The Interior Ministry said 52 people were killed, one of them in a hospital, by the Rwanda-backed M23 rebel group, which controls the city of nearly a million people. M23 spokesman Lawrence Kanyuka blamed government troops for the killings, while residents who spoke to journalists said they had seen corpses on the streets but were unaware who the dead were.
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1 week ago | 
morningstaronline.co.uk | Ben Chacko
INTERNATIONAL observers raised the alarm over a sudden state of emergency declared in Ecuador ahead of today’s election, warning it could be designed to help incumbent President Daniel Noboa rig the vote. Mr Noboa, son of the country’s richest man, and socialist challenger Luisa Gonzalez of the Citizen Revolution Movement (RC) were neck and neck in the first round with 44 per cent each.
