A November 15 protest in Mexico – driven by a right-wing social-media operation – has been miscast as a mass uprising against President Sheinbaum. In reality, the march was small, elite-backed and part of a wider attempt to sow unrest, argues DAVID RABY
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Japan’s servility to US policy raises tensions in the region
With military tensions focued on the Korean peninsula little attention has been paid to the militarisation of Japan by right-wing premier Shinzo Abe. KENNY COYLE reports
A Japanese soldier stands guard by a missile battery
Despite new European arrests, the evidence presented so far fails to explain the sabotage of the undersea pipelines – and veteran investigative journalist Seymour Hersh’s allegations of US responsibility cannot be easily dismissed, writes ROGER McKENZIE
Groups are urging the US government to secure the 16-year old’s release as his mental and physical health decline dramatically after nine months inside Ofer prison, writes LINDA PENTZ GUNTER
MAT COWARD tells the story of the eccentric founder of a short-lived but striking experiment in ‘vital democracy,’ who became best known for giving away his estate to the nation
As figures from Tucker Carlson to Nigel Farage flirt with neofascist rhetoric and mainstream leaders edge toward authoritarianism through war and repression, the conditions that once nurtured Hitlerism re-emerge — yet anti-war and anti-imperialist sentiments are also burgeoning anew, writes ANDREW MURRAY
As President Javier Milei is set to unveil a radical rollback of Argentina’s labour laws, unions warn of an unprecedented assault on workers’ rights, says BERT SCHOUWENBURG
At a time when East Asian military tensions have focused on the Korean peninsula, very little attention has been paid to the continuing militarisation of Japan by right-wing premier Shinzo Abe.
Japan is a key military player in north-east Asia both as a base for US military forces and for the much less well-known role played by its own Self-Defence Forces (SDF).
The SDF is in essence Japan’s military, although, according to Article 9 of the country’s constitution, which states that “land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained,” military forces are in fact illegal. Nonetheless, the SDF has around 310,00 personnel both regular and reserve and is equipped with thousands of aircraft, tanks, ships and artillery.
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