As Colombia approaches presidential elections next year, the US decision to decertify the country in the war on drugs plays into the hands of its allies on the political right, writes NICK MacWILLIAM
Josu Urrutikoetxea: punishing the peacemaker
The lead negotiator who brought the long armed struggle of the Basque separatist group ETA to an end now faces criminal charges from the French state. BOB NEWLAND raises the alarm on a dangerous precedent
NEGOTIATOR: ETA delegate Josu Urrutikoetxea
The move against alleged PKK members that sparked outrage as a community centre in north London was raided last year has now come to trial, writes TONY BURKE, but in the meantime, the peace process abroad has changed the situation almost entirely
A new report points a way to overcome complacent framing of climate issues, ‘by sparking a wider public reckoning with climate realities,’ and reconnecting with working-class people. IAN SINCLAIR reports
We cannot understand today’s world without understanding the rise of China – and we cannot understand China without understanding how it was shaped by the second world war, writes JENNY CLEGG
NICK WRIGHT reports from Italy, where 80 cities saw Gaza strikes as unions paralysed transport and massive crowds clashed with police in Milan — but France is also kicking off, and Westminster, in a very different way, is facing a crisis of legitimacy too
Escalating anti-China rhetoric from the West has a clear purpose – to manufacture consent for the new cold war, and potentially a hot one, argues CARLOS MARTINEZ
NOBEL Peace and Literature Prize winners, leading diplomats, experts in conflict resolution, stateswomen and statesmen, more than 70 parliamentarians as well as magistrates, intellectuals and artists from all over the world joined forces to call on France for the protection of Josu Urrutikoetxea just a few days before his trial before the Criminal Chamber of the Paris Judicial Court on June 16.
He is accused of “criminal conspiracy with terrorist intent,” even though the acts covered by these proceedings are directly linked to the preparation of the negotiations in Geneva, from 2002 to 2005 and to the negotiation in 2010 of the roadmap for the resolution of the conflict between Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA) and the Spanish government in which he was one of the main players.
International pressure has already contributed to the release of Josu on bail pending his trial but he now faces the possibility of a return to prison. Extraordinarily, it is the French government, not the Spanish, which is pursuing these charges.
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