The General Strike exposed the power of the working class — and the limits of its leadership, writes Dr DYLAN MURPHY
THE results of the elections to Italy’s parliament and senate make grim reading.
The right-wing alliance took a majority of the votes with Giorgia Meloni’s Fratelli d’Italia (FdI) on 26.1 per cent, having cannibalised much of its allies’ support. Lega, Matteo Salvini’s outfit, took just 8.9 per cent – down from 17 per cent – while former premier Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia limped in on 8.3 per cent, down from 14 per cent.
This new architecture on the right sets the scene for an internal challenge to Salvini’s leadership, while for Silvio Berlusconi mother nature’s clock is ticking away behind the Botox.
Italians reject controversial judiciary reforms in a referendum that boosts the left, reports NICK WRIGHT
NICK WRIGHT returns to Berlin and finds a city in darkness and political turmoil
From Reform UK to Trump, Orban and beyond, the far right is organised across borders and growing. Waiting for it to collapse is a fatal error – building an international, locally rooted left alternative is now an urgent necessity., argues ROGER McKENZIE
US tariffs have had Von der Leyen bowing in submission, while comments from the former European Central Bank leader call for more European political integration and less individual state sovereignty. All this adds up to more pain and austerity ahead, argues NICK WRIGHT



