Africa
Libya destabilised by factional and military infighting
By Jean Shaoul, 14 June 2013
The massacre of 31 people by the Libya Shield Force, an Islamist militia, was the worst single death toll since the end of the 2011 NATO-led civil war.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
7 June 2013
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Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
31 May 2013
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Kenyan president moves to slash wages, continue war in Somalia
By Thomas Gaist, 30 May 2013
The Kenyan president is advancing an agenda of wage cuts and continuing Kenya’s role in the imperialist proxy war in neighboring Somalia.
Libya’s General National Council passes Political Isolation Law
By Jean Shaoul, 24 May 2013
Armed Islamist militias forced parliament to pass the Political Isolation Law, outlawing officials who had worked for Gaddafi from holding office.
Security forces fire rubber bullets at striking South African miners
By Thomas Gaist, 24 May 2013
Police fired volleys of rubber bullets at striking South African miners at a mine owned by Lanxess Chrome Mining Ltd on Tuesday, near the city of Rustenburg.
Britain’s victims during Kenya’s Mau Mau uprising expect compensation
By Jean Shaoul, 22 May 2013
Thousands of Kenyans are expecting to receive reparations for the abuses they suffered at the hands of British imperialism during the suppression of the Mau Mau resistance movement.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
17 May 2013
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Suid-Afrika se Marikana mynwerkers hou wildcat staking
By Patrick O’Connor, 14 May 2013
Duisende Lonmin platinum mynwerkers in Marikana, Suid-Afrika het vandeesweek begin staak om protes aan te teken teen die uitvoering-styl moord op die organiseerder van die Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU).
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
10 May 2013
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Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
26 April 2013
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Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
19 April 2013
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Britain’s involvement in assassination of Congo’s Lumumba confirmed
By Jean Shaoul, 18 April 2013
A senior British politician has revealed Britain’s involvement in the 1961 assassination of Patrice Lumumba, the Congo’s first prime minister.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
29 March 2013
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Agang offers no alternative for South African working class to ANC
By Mike Jones, 26 March 2013
Agang, the new political formation established by former anti-apartheid activist Mamphela Ramphele, offers no alternative for the South African masses to the parties of big business.
Seleka rebels seize capital of Central African Republic
By Thomas Gaist, 26 March 2013
A coalition of rebel militias took the capital city, Bangui, over the weekend, with tacit support from France and the US.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
22 March 2013
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Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
15 March 2013
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Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
8 March 2013
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Washington steps up Africa intervention
By Bill Van Auken, 5 March 2013
The Obama administration is “markedly widening its role” in the French-led neo-colonial war in Mali.
South African police murder Mozambican taxi driver
By Mike Jones, 5 March 2013
Opposition grows to the killing of 27-year-old taxi driver, Mido Macia, by South African police on February 27.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
1 March 2013
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US troops to Niger: A new stage in the scramble for Africa
By Bill Van Auken, 26 February 2013
With the deployment of US troops and drones to Niger, a new stage in the imperialist recolonization of Africa is now in progress.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
22 February 2013
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Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
15 February 2013
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The role of Germany in the war in Mali
By Wolfgang Weber, 12 February 2013
Germany is expanding its participation in the French colonial war in Mali from week to week.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
8 February 2013
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Britain makes its own military push into Africa
By Jean Shaoul, 2 February 2013
Britain is to send at least 350 military personnel to Mali and West Africa in a direct challenge to French efforts to dominate the region.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
1 February 2013
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Britain, US escalate war aid as France advances into northern Mali
By Alex Lantier, 29 January 2013
Britain has pledged to deploy troops to Mali and the US is planning a base for drones as the imperialist intervention in the Sahara escalates.
Workers Struggles: Europe & Africa
25 January 2013
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Reports of atrocities emerge as France escalates Mali war
By Ernst Wolff, 24 January 2013
Thirteen days after starting a war in Mali, France is boosting its military presence amid reports of civilian and ethnic-based killings by French and allied forces.
Imperialist powers escalate war in Mali
By Ernst Wolff, 22 January 2013
Amid the French offensive in Mali, the imperialist powers are laying out plans for a lasting neo-colonial intervention in all of Western Africa.
French Left Front promotes war in Mali
By Kumaran Ira, 22 January 2013
France’s Left Front is supporting President François Hollande’s decision to launch a war in Mali, while issuing tactical criticisms of his policies.
Standoff continues in Algerian hostage crisis
By Alex Lantier, 19 January 2013
The standoff at the Tinguentourine natural gas site in Algeria has continued amid mounting international tensions over France’s war in Mali.
France escalates Mali war amid Algerian hostage crisis
By Kumaran Ira, 18 January 2013
France has increased its troop deployment in Mali to 1,400, amid a hostage crisis after Islamist militants seized an Algerian natural gas complex to protest the war.
2013 and the new Scramble for Africa
By Chris Marsden, 17 January 2013
US aims in Africa centre on securing hegemony over the entire continent, a conflict in which its chief rival is now China.
France launches ground offensive in Mali
By Ernst Wolff, 17 January 2013
French ground troops have attacked rebel forces holding the small town of Diabaly, near the border with rebel-held northern Mali.
South African police fire on striking farm workers
By Joshua Lumet, 11 January 2013
Confrontations between striking farm workers and South African police and private security guards have left several people wounded and some 50 arrested.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
4 January 2013
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US retools terror war in scramble for Africa
By Bill Van Auken, 27 December 2012
The Pentagon’s announcement that it is forming a new Africa brigade is a clear indication that US imperialism is escalating its interventions on the continent.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
21 December 2012
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Junta forces Malian prime minister to resign
By Ernst Wolff, 15 December 2012
Mali’s Prime Minister Cheick Modibo Diarra was arrested and forced to resign by the country’s military junta on Monday night.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
14 December 2012
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Mass protests against referendum on new Egyptian constitution
By Chris Marsden, 12 December 2012
Over a hundred thousand people demonstrated in Cairo yesterday against a referendum scheduled for December 15 on an Islamist constitution that enshrines the authority of the military.
Mursi calls on military in Egypt crisis
By Patrick Martin, 10 December 2012
Army officers have been given the power to arrest civilians to maintain “public order.”
Tunisian UGTT union calls one-day national strike
By Antoine Lerougetel, 10 December 2012
The UGTT union has called a one-day national strike for December 13, amid rising working class protests and clashes with right-wing Islamist groups.
Protests spread throughout Egypt against Islamist dictatorship
By Johannes Stern, 8 December 2012
Mass protests against the US-backed Islamist government of President Mohamed Mursi spread throughout Egypt yesterday.
Trade unions shut down South African farm workers strike
By Iqra Qalam and Jashua Lumet, 8 December 2012
The Congress of South African Trade Unions has called off a strike in the Western Cape Province in a bid to contain growing anger and resistance among farm workers.
Egypt’s US-backed president Mursi deploys army, prepares massive repression
By Johannes Stern, 7 December 2012
Fearing mass protests, the Mursi regime deployed the army around the Presidential Palace in Cairo.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
7 December 2012
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US-backed Muslim Brotherhood unleashes bloody crackdown in Cairo
By Johannes Stern, 6 December 2012
With Washington’s tacit support, the Islamists are seeking to crush strikes and protests and re-establish untrammeled dictatorial rule in Egypt.
The failure of land reform in South Africa
By Iqra Qalam and Joshua Lumet, 6 December 2012
The failure of the agrarian reform policies of the African National Congress has exposed the bourgeois nationalist liberation movement’s inability to resolve the land question.
Mursi’s crackdown exposes counter-revolutionary role of Egyptian Revolutionary Socialists
By Johannes Stern, 6 December 2012
Mursi’s bloody crackdown against protesters opposing his power grab exposes the counterrevolutionary character of the Revolutionary Socialists’ support for him.
Mass anti-Mursi protests, clashes with police in Cairo
By Chris Marsden, 5 December 2012
Protests Tuesday against the dictatorial powers assumed by Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi and his efforts to ram through a new constitution culminated in a massive march on the presidential palace.
Mass opposition to Tunisian repression of anti-poverty protests
By Antoine Lerougetel, 4 December 2012
Police have brutally repressed protests against the scrapping of programmes against poverty and unemployment in the town of Siliana in Tunisia.
Mass protests as Egyptian government seeks to push through constitution
By Joseph Kishore, 1 December 2012
The new constitution enshrines the domination of the military over Egyptian society.
Egypt’s proposed constitution enshrines dictatorial powers and military rule
By Chris Marsden, 30 November 2012
The rushing through yesterday of Egypt’s new constitution by the Constituent Assembly is an aggressive move by the Muslim Brotherhood and President Mohammed Mursi.
Mass protests against Egyptian President Mursi
By Johannes Stern, 28 November 2012
Hundreds of thousands protested in Cairo'’s Tahrir Square and throughout Egypt against Islamist president Mohamed Mursi and the Muslim Brotherhood (MB).
Mass protest against Mursi set for Egypt’s Tahrir Square
By Chris Marsden, 27 November 2012
Rival mass protest will be staged today, provoked by President Mohamed Mursi’s decree granting himself virtually dictatorial powers.
Rebel soldiers advance in Congo
By Ernst Wolff, 27 November 2012
Rebel soldiers attached to the Movement M 23 are continuing to advance in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
South African farmworkers speak on issues in strike
By Joshua Lumet and Iqra Qalam, 26 November 2012
The trade unions and the political establishment are seeking to demobilize the farmworkers’ struggle, which follows and has been motivated by the eruption of strikes in the mining industries.
Mass protests erupt in Egypt against Mursi’s antidemocratic decrees
By Johannes Stern, 24 November 2012
Mass protests against Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi and the ruling Muslim Brotherhood erupted throughout the country on Friday.
US spy agencies edited Benghazi “talking points”
By Patrick Martin, 24 November 2012
Their purpose was to conceal the connections between the US intelligence apparatus and gunmen linked to Al Qaeda.
Egypt’s President Mursi claims vast new executive powers
By Johannes Stern, 23 November 2012
The main target of the declaration is working class opposition to Mursi and the ruling Muslim Brotherhood.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
23 November 2012
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South African farm workers’ strike spreads
By Joshua Lumet and Iqra Qalam, 21 November 2012
The three-week-long strike by farm workers in the fertile farmlands of the Boland in South Africa has now spread to 24 different areas and has led to further violent clashes with police.
West African states prepare intervention in Mali
By Ernst Wolff, 17 November 2012
The Economic Community of West African States has reiterated its readiness to deploy 3,300 soldiers to the north of Mali before the start of the rainy season.
South African farm workers’ strikes inspired by events at Marikana
By Joshua Lumet and Iqra Qalam, 16 November 2012
Militant struggles among South Africa’s impoverished workers have spread to the Western Cape province’s farms, following on months of upheavals in the mining industry.
Charges of evidence tampering at South African mine massacre inquiry
By Julie Hyland, 12 November 2012
The inquiry into the South African police massacre of striking miners at Marikana heard evidence that police tampered with the scene to justify the killings.
Mau-Mau verdict exposes crimes of British imperialism in Kenya
By Jean Shaoul, 12 November 2012
It is estimated that more than 150,000 Kenyans were killed in the suppression of the Mau-Mau uprising that involved ethnic cleansing, concentration camps and widespread torture and murder.
Unions collude in repression as South Africa’s strike wave ebbs
By Chris Marsden, 5 November 2012
The South African Police Service is waging a brutal campaign of intimidation facilitated by the suffocation of strikes in the mining sector by the COSATU.
Clinton visit to Algeria prepares war in Mali
By Kumaran Ira, 3 November 2012
Hillary Clinton visited Algiers Monday to secure Algerian support for an imperialist intervention in Mali, as a conference to plan for war opened in Bamako.
South African miners shot dead by security
By Bill Van Auken, 1 November 2012
Mine security guards shot and killed two striking coal miners in KwaZulu-Natal on Wednesday, amid continuing tensions and clashes in South Africa’s mining sector.
US employs former child soldiers as mercenaries
By Sybille Fuchs, 31 October 2012
The US is increasingly using private security forces to wage its wars and maintain its occupation of countries after the withdrawal of regular troops.
Egyptian Revolutionary Socialists ally with Sawiris tycoon, ex-Mubarak officials
By Johannes Stern, 30 October 2012
The misnamed Revolutionary Socialists have established a de facto alliance with members of Egypt’s financial aristocracy and elements of the old Mubarak-regime.
Striking South African miners oppose rally called by official unions
By Julie Hyland, 29 October 2012
Saturday’s rally by South Africa’s COSATU union federation and the National Union of Mineworkers only exposed the hostility of broad masses of workers toward the official unions.
South Africa's unions use mass sackings and murder to suppress miners
By Chris Marsden, 26 October 2012
Mass sackings, police intimidation and brutality are being employed in an effort to bring the wave of strikes in South Africa’s mines to a close.
Strike leaders arrested following testimony before Marikana massacre inquiry
By Chris Marsden, 26 October 2012
Four miners who testified Tuesday before the Farlam Commission into the Marikana massacre were immediately arrested by police. They are to be charged with murder.
Sudan accuses Israel of bombing military factory in Khartoum
By Johannes Stern, 26 October 2012
Early Wednesday morning, an explosion hit the Yarmouk Military Industrial Complex in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum.
EU and the US prepare military intervention in Mali
By Ernst Wolff, 26 October 2012
European and US diplomats and military experts are preparing for a military intervention in Mali.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
26 October 2012
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Largest tainted meat recall in Canadian history
By Vic Neufeld, 24 October 2012
E. coli bacterial contamination originating at an XL Foods’ meat processing plant in Brooks, Alberta has seriously sickened sixteen people and prompted the largest meat product recall in Canadian history.
Egyptian liberal, pseudo-left groups demonstrate against Mursi
By Johannes Stern, 23 October 2012
Last Friday various liberal and pseudo-left groups protested against the ruling Muslim Brotherhood and Egypt's Islamist president, Mohamed Mursi, on Tahrir Square in Cairo.
South African miners defy repression
By Chris Marsden, 20 October 2012
Tens of thousands of South African workers remain in struggle and a new strike by platinum miners at Lonmin’s operation in Marikana delivered a blow to efforts to stem the working class upsurge.
President Zuma calls on trade unions, state forces to end South Africa’s strike wave
By Chris Marsden, 20 October 2012
The main instruments of Zuma and the African National Congress for suppressing the mass strike movement are the Congress of South African Trade Unions and its affiliate, the National Union of Mineworkers.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
19 October 2012
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US prepares military strikes as Libya crisis deepens
By Bill Van Auken, 17 October 2012
The White House is considering drone strikes and Special Forces raids in retaliation for the fatal September 11 attack on US facilities in Benghazi, Libya.
Strikes continue in South Africa amid deepening repression
By Robert Stevens, 15 October 2012
Tens of thousands of South Africa miners remain on strike in wildcat action, following a breakdown in talks between trade unions and management.
Egyptian Islamists clash with liberals and pseudo-left groups on Tahrir Square
By Johannes Stern, 15 October 2012
Clashes erupted between followers of the ruling Islamist Muslim Brotherhood and the pseudo-left opposition on Tahrir Square in Cairo on Friday.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
12 October 2012
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Strikes spread across South Africa despite mass sackings
By Robert Stevens, 11 October 2012
In the face of a growing wave of walkouts by workers across South Africa, mining companies are announcing mass layoffs of striking employees.
Silicosis rampant in South Africa’s mines
By Eric Graham, 9 October 2012
South Africa’s miners are among the workers worst affected by silicosis in the world.
Egyptian pseudo-left parties form new anti-working class alliance
By Johannes Stern, 8 October 2012
The formation of the DRC is the latest maneuver by the Egyptian pseudo-left parties to tie the Egyptian working class politically to the bourgeoisie.
South African unions, government seek to quell spreading wildcat strikes
By Joseph Kishore, 8 October 2012
The state and the unions are attempting to gain control of a spreading wave of strikes that have erupted across South Africa.
12,000 miners fired as South African strike wave grows
By Bill Van Auken, 6 October 2012
Anglo American Platinum fired 12,000 striking South African miners Friday as the transnational corporations, the ANC government and the COSATU union federation sought to quell a growing wave of wildcat strikes.
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
5 October 2012
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COSATU federation leader expresses fear of social explosion in South Africa
By Eric Graham, 2 October 2012
In the midst of an escalating wave of wildcat strike action by miners, South Africa’s biggest trade union federation, COSATU, convened its 11th national congress.
France, US step up pressure for military intervention in Mali
By Kumaran Ira, 2 October 2012
France and the United States are urging UN Security Council to approve a West African-manned military intervention in Northern Mali.
South Africa’s strike wave hits whole mining sector, spreads to transport
By Chris Marsden, 28 September 2012
The strike wave that began at Lonmin’s Marikana platinum mine is now engulfing South Africa’s platinum, gold and coal mining industries and has spread to transport and other sectors.
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