Massive fire at 1 of Australia’s 2 remaining oil refineries
Around 50 workers on site when the blaze erupted escaped without injury, but some were forced to literally run for their lives.
•Martin Scott
Latest articles
Australian state Labor government defends unconstitutional anti-protest law
The NSW Labor government is defiantly proceeding with arrests and charges under its invalid anti-protest legislation.
•Mike Head
IMF spells it out: Workers must pay for the cost of war
The Fiscal Monitor report insisted that governments must not undertake measures to alleviate the intensifying cost-of-living pressures on workers around the world.
•Nick Beams
New IMF agreement requires Sri Lankan government to complete austerity program
The government has announced a package of paltry relief measures in a desperate attempt to contain rising social tensions, while meeting all of the IMF’s demands.
•Saman Gunadasa
Milei opens up Argentina’s glaciers to destruction by mining companies
The fascistic administration of President Javier Milei rammed through a bill modifying legal protections to glaciers to increase mining activity in the Andes.
•Rafael Azul
Wall Street Journal announces the era of the “mega layoff”
The cost of their attempts to sustain massive debt, while also financing the massive cost to society of the corporate oligarchy itself, can only be carved out of the backs of the working class under capitalism.
•Tom Hall
6 films from Iran that should be seen by workers in the US and around the world
These films provide some insight into the problems of Iranian society and help transform the Iranian “devils” into humans very much like ourselves.
•Zac Corrigan
Trump administration continues torment of El Gamal family as detained mother remains in severe pain
Hayam El Gamal, mother of five children, was taken to the emergency room earlier this month after repeated medical complaints were ignored at the Dilley detention camp.
•Jacob Crosse
Iran reports reopening Strait of Hormuz as Paris summit plans European intervention
The flurry of announcements, while they produced a sharp fall in oil prices, has neither produced a lasting peace nor resolved any of the fundamental conflicts underlying the war.
•Alex Lantier
Workers Struggles: Asia, Australia and the Pacific
South Korea: Hyundai workers demand negotiations; India: Uttar Pradesh police attack workers protesting for minimum wage; Australia: Aurizon Coal train drivers strike for pay rise and better conditions; Northern Territory iron ore mine workers stood down without pay.
•
New York home care workers wage second hunger strike in 2 years
These highly exploited workers are risking their health to end torturous 24-hour shifts, but previous experience shows that protests and moral appeals must give way to class struggle.
•Erik Schreiber
Harvard clerical, technical union leaders push through sellout deal as grad workers prepare to strike
The contract is only one year long and is designed to prevent a fight over central issues: healthcare costs, job security and wage adequacy.
•Mike Ingram
The way forward for postal workers: A rank-and-file rebellion against the Carney government’s “transformation” of Canada Post and CUPW’s complicity
The Postal Workers Rank-and-File Committee urges postal workers to vote “No” to the union-backed tentative agreements and “Yes” to authorizing strike action.
•Postal Workers Rank-and-File Committee
“Loud and proud”: Strikes against Lufthansa continue
For days, pilots and flight attendants have been striking against Lufthansa's brutal restructuring course. On Wednesday, 15 April, a strike by over 19,000 stewards and stewardesses from Lufthansa and LH-CityLine began again.
•Marianne Arens
Amid Hormuz blockade, US Treasury threatens to sanction Chinese banks trading with Iran
Trump’s self-declared “cease-fire” in his war of aggression against Iran is rapidly proving to be the prelude to another vast escalation of what is in reality a global conflict, now involving China.
•Alex Lantier
Starmer premiership threatened as Mandelson/Epstein crisis re-erupts
Mandelson, the main architect with Tony Blair of the New Labour project, was appointed by Starmer as US ambassador in December 2024, with the prime minister fully aware of his intimate connections with the billionaire child sex trafficker.
•Robert Stevens
Australia’s National Defence Strategy outlines military build-up for war against China
The document is a statement of the Labor government’s complete commitment to US-led wars globally, and above all to preparations for a catastrophic conflict in the Indo-Pacific targeting China.
•Oscar Grenfell
Reject the Writers Guild of America sellout contract!
The contract contains huge givebacks on healthcare, sub-inflation pay increases and no meaningful AI protections.
•Marc Wells
After 2 votes in favor, UAW bureaucracy denies strike approval to student workers at Columbia University
The UAW bureaucracy has twice now rejected their democratic vote; students must organize to impose their decision, with or without the approval of corrupt and unaccountable bureaucrats.
•Tim Avery
Iran war brings massive price and profit gouging
Global oil companies are raking in additional profits at the rate of $30 million per hour as the result of the price hikes induced by the war.
•Nick Beams
US blockade of Strait of Hormuz deepens conflicts between major powers
US Vice President Vance’s remarks Tuesday that Washington is seeking a “grand bargain” with Tehran underscores that US imperialism wants nothing less than the complete reorganisation of the Middle East in its interests, at the expense of all its rivals.
•Jordan Shilton
Research demonstrates that enhanced instruction in genetics can reduce racist conceptions among students
A groundbreaking study in genetics education examines the relationship between the quality of genetics education and the development of racist ideas among young people and the dire consequences for a researcher’s career.
•Philip Guelpa
Pentagon drafts plans for military assault on Cuba
The Trump administration has ordered preparations for a military attack on Cuba as part of its broader campaign for hemispheric dominance.
•Andrea Lobo
Thailand’s right-wing government formally takes power
The new cabinet, in which the Bhumjaithai Party holds 31 posts and its junior partner Pheu Thai holds nine, is unmistakably pro-business and pro-military.
•Robert Campion
US war on Iran exposes bankruptcy of Mélenchon's France Unbowed party
Mélenchon organised no significant mobilisation of workers against the war in Iran, while remaining silent about the intrigues Trump used to prepare it.
•Alex Lantier
German government prepares frontal attack on healthcare
The German government is planning the most comprehensive attack on public healthcare since Reich Chancellor Otto von Bismarck introduced statutory health insurance in 1883.
•Peter Schwarz
April 1776: When America opened its ports to the world
As the Trump administration imposes a military closure of Iranian ports, it is notable that 250 years ago this month, on April 6, 1776, the Continental Congress announced that American ports would be open to world.
•Tom Mackaman
Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
Government employees in Netherlands hold one-day national strike over pay; strikes across London involving academic staff at London Metropolitan University, passenger support staff at a London Stansted airport, bus drivers at Stagecoach and teachers at Great Ormond Street Hospital; strike by judiciary workers in Abia State, Nigeria continues into fourth week
•
The socialist answer to the housing crisis in Britain
Land and property have become asset vehicles for funnelling billions of pounds from the working class—those who produce society’s wealth—to the billionaires.
•Statement by the Socialist Equality Party (UK)
Australia: Labor intensifies assault on disability funding ahead of May budget
The cuts to the National Disability Insurance Scheme target those with so-called “mild” or “moderate” needs, who will be stripped of supports or face drastic reductions.
•Max Boddy
War powers resolution blocked in the Senate as 10,000 more US troops head to the Middle East
The Senate voted 52-47 on Wednesday to reject a motion to move a Democratic Party-sponsored joint resolution to the floor that would mandate the removal of US troops, “from hostilities within or against the Islamic Republic of Iran that have not been authorized by Congress.”
•Kevin Reed
After shutting down JBS strike in Greeley, Colorado, UFCW pushes through contract 30 cents better than management’s initial offer
The agreement addresses none of the workers’ demands which led to a powerful three-week strike, the largest in the US meatpacking industry in more than 60 years.
•Dan Conway
After Amazon worker dies at Troutdale, Oregon warehouse, management ordered employees to work around the body
The death went unreported for a week before the online investigative outlet, the Western Edge, broke the story on April 13.
•Bryan Dyne
Democratic Congressman Eric Swalwell resigns amid #MeToo-style sex scandal
In less than 100 hours, Swalwell went from frontrunning candidate for governor of California to political oblivion.
•Barry Grey
Rohingya refugees among 250 feared dead in boat capsize
A trawler carrying hundreds of Rohingya refugees and Bangladeshi migrants has sunk in the Andaman Sea, with about 250 people missing, presumed dead in the absence of any serious search-and-rescue effort.
•Peter Symonds
Trump DOJ seeks to erase January 6 convictions of Proud Boys, Oath Keepers ringleaders ahead of 2026 elections
Trump’s commutations and pardons last year freed militia members charged with the most serious January 6 crimes but left their convictions intact. This new motion seeks to vacate those convictions and dismiss the indictments, helping clear the way for the fascist militia forces to legally rearm.
•Jacob Crosse
Coalition leader’s speech: Australian ruling elite turns to anti-immigrant poison
The Coalition leader called for the reversal of the nominally non-discriminatory immigration program that has existed since the formal end of the blatantly racist White Australia regime in the 1960s.
•Mike Head
Censorship of artist Basma al-Sharif continues: Germany’s foreign ministry reprimands Goethe-Institut for showcasing her work
State censorship efforts are once again being directed against an artist with Palestinian roots. Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul’s (Christian Democratic Union, CDU) department has reprimanded the Goethe-Institut for allowing a work by Basma al-Sharif to be shown in an exhibition in Lithuania.
•Sybille Fuchs
Venezuelan workers protest persistent poverty amid privatizations and US corporate deals
Mass protests are growing in Venezuela as workers face deepening poverty and repression, even while the government opens the country’s oil and mineral wealth to US corporate exploitation.
•Andrea Lobo
Democrat Abdul El-Sayed seeks to contain anti-war opposition during Michigan university campaign tour
Rallies at the University of Michigan and Michigan State University sought to divert youth and students into El-Sayed’s Senate campaign, which is backed by the DSA, as well as Twitch streamer and political commentator Hasan Piker.
•Luke Galvin
European states refuse to join in US blockade of Strait of Hormuz targeting Iran
At the same time, European governments refused to clearly denounce or oppose a US blockade that threatens to cut off their access to energy supplies on which their economies depend.
•Alex Lantier
Ukraine’s Zelensky in Berlin: Germany escalates its war offensive against Russia
With the escalation of the conflict in the Middle East and Donald Trump’s open threats of annihilation against Iran, all pretences are now being dropped in the war in Ukraine as well. Merz and Zelensky visited arms factories together and agreed on measures to return fit-for-service Ukrainian men in Germany to the front line.
•Johannes Stern
The political lessons of Mamdani’s first 100 days
The mayor of New York’s alliance with Trump under conditions of expanding war and attacks on democratic rights is a damning exposure of Mamdani’s political bankruptcy
•Daniel de Vries
Labour peer George Robertson demands UK welfare spending cull to fund “warfighting readiness”, accusing Treasury of “vandalism”
“We cannot defend Britain with an ever-expanding welfare budget,” Robertson said.
•Robert Stevens
Workers at Cummins turbo components plant in Huddersfield reject insulting pay offer
The Unite union received a mandate for strike action at the start of April, but no dates have been confirmed.
•Tony Robson
Turkish coal miners march to Ankara for their unpaid wages
Following the arrest of Independent Miners’ Union leader Başaran Aksu, miners have launched their march to the capital.
•Barış Demir
Union bureaucrats, Democrats cancel strike of 77,000 Los Angeles educators
What took place was not a genuine negotiation but an operation to stop a strike that threatened the union bureaucracy and the Democratic Party.
•Nakai Beltran, Marc Wells, Renae Cassimeda
Massachusetts postal workers form rank-and-file committee: “USPS is a public service, not a profit-making enterprise”
“Our mission is to unite postal workers worldwide to build collective power, protect our rights, and improve wages, benefits and working conditions through solidarity, transparency and democratic action to actively counter the efforts of the 1 percent.”
•Springfield NDC Workers Rank-and-File Committee
Big realtors in New York City demand massive concessions from residential building workers
Tens of thousands of residential building workers in the largest American city are prepared to strike against concessions.
•M. Gómez
Cancellation of Los Angeles schools strike latest in string of union betrayals
The last-minute deal demonstrates the ruling class’s extreme sensitivity to and fear of the class struggle and its reliance on the union bureaucracy to suppress it.
•Tom Hall
Union-initiated Australian parliamentary report covers up Labor’s university restructuring agenda
Another official inquiry makes no mention of Labor’s Universities Accord, which is driving the further corporate transformation of Australia’s public universities.
•Mike Head
Whistleblower who exposed Australia’s war crimes in Afghanistan still behind bars
David McBride remains the only person convicted and jailed for Australia’s war crimes in Afghanistan, not for committing them but for exposing them.
•Oscar Grenfell
IMF warns of major downturn in global growth
Under what it called a “severe scenario” the IMF said global growth could fall to as low as 2 percent close to the development of a world recession.
•Nick Beams
Trump’s NLRB rules against Henry Ford Genesys Hospital nurses as strike enters 8th month
The struggle against the hospital’s strike-breaking and refusal to address staffing issues requires a fight against management and the Teamsters union bureaucracy, which has isolated and diverted the fight into the dead end of appeals to the NLRB and the Democratic Party in Lansing.
•Kevin Reed
UAW President Shawn Fain unveils “Stand Up Slate” for 2026 election: New label, same bureaucracy
Far from representing a break with the corrupt, pro-corporate apparatus, the slate is a merger of the same bureaucratic factions that have spent decades collaborating with management to impose concessions.
•Jerry White
Art and the Influence of Revolution
No serious understanding of 20th-century cultural life is possible without considering the impact of the socialist movement and its decades-long struggle to raise the thinking and activity of the working class, culminating in the 1917 Revolution.
•
Right-wing think tank presses UK Starmer government to abandon “peacetime” agenda and move to “warfighting readiness”
A core theme of the Civitas report is that war cannot be fought by armies alone and is a “whole of society” effort: "This is the essence of the distinction we need to make between 'our armed forces learning to fight battles' and 'our country learning to fight war'", the authors declare.
•Robert Stevens
Netanyahu government brutally represses opposition to wars against Iran and Lebanon
These authoritarian measures are the domestic requirement for pursuing a Greater Israel policy, as part of US imperialism’s broader political and military agenda to reorganise and control the resource-rich Middle East in preparation for wider wars against China and Russia.
•Jean Shaoul
Pseudo-left “Marxism” conference in Australia suppresses any discussion of Iran war
Any attendees seeking a socialist perspective to fight the massive US-led assault left empty-handed. Over four days, not a single one of the conference's nearly 150 panels was dedicated to the war on Iran.
•Owen Howell, Oscar Grenfell
With strike deadline approaching, Los Angeles officials and unions move to block walkout of 80,000 school workers
With hours to go before a potential strike by 80,000 Los Angeles school workers, negotiations between SEIU Local 99 and the Los Angeles Unified School District are continuing under intense pressure from city and political officials, including Mayor Karen Bass, who is reportedly directly involved in talks tonight.
•Tom Hall, Marc Wells, Ivan Cardenas
The Iran war, oil and the crisis of American imperialism
The US war on Iran will be remembered as a turning point in the decline of American imperialism, exposing in concentrated form Washington’s diminishing ability to impose its will on the Persian Gulf and the global capitalist system.
•Gabriel Black
Australia: Fair Work Commission orders partial end to punitive “junior rates”
While workers aged 18–21 in the retail, fast food and pharmacy sectors will eventually receive full adult wages, the ruling still allows junior rates as low as 40 percent for younger workers.
•Leonard Johns
IMF meets as war brings greater global economic and financial disruption
Setting the stage for this week’s discussions and reports, IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva made clear there would be a downward shift in global growth even in the event of an end to the war.
•Nick Beams
Kremlin declares Memorial an “extremist” organization, shuts down data base of victims of the Great Terror
The assault on Memorial is a blow against the ability of workers and youth the world over to come to grips with the crimes of Stalinism.
•Clara Weiss
Trump’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz: The next phase in the Iran war
The blockade is an act of war and an act of international piracy. The World Socialist Web Site condemns this criminal action, directed against Iran and against the working class of the entire world.
•Andre Damon
After massive no vote, UAW extends Nexteer contract behind backs of rank and file
United Auto Workers officials in Saginaw, Michigan, have kept 1,300 Nexteer Automotive workers on the job nearly two weeks after they rejected a UAW-backed contract by 96 percent.
•Sheila Brehm
New York rally by Sanders, Mamdani and union officials covers up US war drive against Iran
Beneath rhetoric about “union density,” Sunday’s New York rally served to police opposition to war, inequality and dictatorship within the framework of the Democratic Party.
•Jacob Crosse
Workers Struggles: The Americas
Healthcare workers across Bolivia to protest lack of medications and medical equipment while 2,200 Nova Scotia long term care aids walked out after months of government stonewalling.
•
United Auto Workers rally in Three Rivers, Michigan aims to contain growing anger as American Axle workers face looming contract expiration
As a May 31 contract deadline approaches for 1,000 American Axle workers in Three Rivers, Michigan UAW President Fain spoke at a “kickoff” rally aimed to channel anger over declining living standards behind the union apparatus and the Democratic Party.
•George Kirby
California Supreme Court freezes Riverside ballot seizure as warrants reveal reliance on fascist election deniers
California’s high court intervened to stop Riverside Sheriff Chad Bianco’s ballot seizure after warrants revealed the probe relied on debunked election denial claims and false quotes generated from Artificial Intelligence.
•Isaac de Vries
“The agencies have been pummeled down”: A conversation with Dorit Reiss on the state of American public health
Under assault by Trump and Robert F. Kennedy, his Secretary of Health and Human Services, the public health infrastructure of the United States is being destroyed.
•Benjamin Mateus
Hungary: Which way forward after Orban’s electoral defeat?
The fact that only a conservative, an authoritarian and a fascist party are represented in parliament shows just how right-wing Hungarian politics is after Orban’s defeat.
•Peter Schwarz
Peru: Far right to dominate runoff for ninth president in a decade
Peru’s elections, marked by disenfranchisement and the collapse of all establishment parties, are set to deliver a far-right-dominated runoff amid a deepening crisis of bourgeois rule.
•Our reporters
University of Michigan subreddit censors WSWS articles on suicide of Chinese researcher
Following the suicide of Chinese scientist Danhao Wang, U-M subreddit moderators removed highly viewed posts demanding an investigation into the federal witch-hunt of Chinese researchers and the complicity of the university administration.
•Stephen St. Clair
Dearborn residents oppose bombing of Lebanon at candlelight vigil
The vigil was organized by community members with family ties to Lebanon.
•Kathleen Martin, Usman Khan
Doncaster bus drivers at First South Yorkshire extend strike over pay parity
The struggle cannot be left to a Unite union apparatus that has tolerated gagging orders, intimidation, and repeatedly isolated disputes. The leadership must be taken into the hands of democratically elected rank-and-file committees.
•Harvey Thompson, Tony Robson
“Everyone dies”: Grenfell Tower, regulation, and what the ruling class want from Reform UK
Simon Dudley, less than a month after his appointment as Reform’s housing spokesman, said that the 2017 inferno that claimed 72 lives, was a “tragedy” but “everyone dies in the end.”
•Paul Bond
Freedom for Başaran Aksu and all working-class prisoners in Türkiye!
Ulaş Sevinç, leader of the Sosyalist Eşitlik Partisi – Dördüncü Enternasyonal in Türkiye, released a video statement condemning the arrest of independent union leader Başaran Aksu.
•Ulaş Sevinç
New strikes at German airline Lufthansa: “We’re seen as nothing but a cost factor”
A new strike by Lufthansa pilots today and on Tuesday demonstrates the flight crew’s strong determination to fight. The strike is part of the growing mobilisation of the European and international working class.
•Marianne Arens
US-EU tensions erupt over Iran war as France holds back-channel talks with China
Trump’s denunciations of the Macron government reveal the irreconcilable conflicts between the major imperialist powers underlying US imperialism’s war of aggression against Iran.
•Alex Lantier
Los Angeles teachers unions announce sellout in bid to sabotage district-wide strike
The moves by UTLA and the administrators union are aimed at blocking unified strike action with 30,000 school support staff in SEIU Local 99.
•Marc Wells, Tom Hall
War-driven fuel crisis threatens recession in Australia
The Albanese Labor government is presiding over the increasingly devastating impact on working-class living conditions and the prospect of crippling fuel shortages, particularly of diesel.
•Mike Head
Will Lehman, candidate for UAW president, calls for support for Harvard academic workers’ strike
The Harvard Graduate Students Union (HGSU-UAW) has set a strike deadline of 12:01 am on April 21, 2026, for 4,000 Teaching Fellows, Research Assistants, and other academic workers
•Mike Ingram
US deploys warships to Strait of Hormuz, announces Iran blockade
U.S. Central Command announced Sunday that American warships will begin blockading all maritime traffic entering or exiting Iranian ports on Monday at 10:00 a.m. Eastern Time.
•Andre Damon
University of Washington graduate student and his son deported, as immigration arrests surge statewide
Kennedy Orwa, a PhD student at the University of Washington, was detained at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on April 7 and deported with his 13-year-old son the following day.
•Bryan Dyne
EU adopts far-right agenda in migration policy
The European Union is once again tightening its migration and asylum policy. Far-right parties are setting the pace.
•Lena Sokoll
The New York Times, the Democratic Party and the preparation of Phase 2 of the war against Iran
The Times, speaking for the Democratic Party, proceeds from a premise it considers too self-evident to require argument: that the failure to achieve the war's objectives would constitute a strategic catastrophe of the first order.
•David North
United Auto Workers financial report shows 2025 another bumper year for union apparatus as assets rise to $1.25 billion
The UAW’s net assets and bureaucrats’ salaries rose last year while strike activity fell to near zero.
•Shannon Jones
This week in history: April 13-19
Massacre of students in Ethiopia; India, China resume official ties; European Coal and Steel Community formed; First dance premiere for Martha Graham
•
Democrat Eric Swalwell ends campaign for California governor over sexual misconduct charges
The congressman was leading in the polls for the Democratic nomination for governor of California when he was hit with allegations of sexual misconduct.
•Patrick Martin
SEP/IYSSE public meeting in Sri Lanka: Stop the US–Israel War Against Iran!
The meeting in Hatton on April 26 will discuss the real aims of US imperialism, the complicity of Sri Lanka's ruling elite in the widening war, and the socialist strategy that must be adopted to fight against war.
•Socialist Equality Party (Sri Lanka)
New Zealand protests against war on Iran, Lebanon and Gaza
Thousands of people joined protests to denounce New Zealand’s alliance with the US and government silence on US and Israeli war crimes. The organisers, however, promoted illusions in Labour and the Greens.
•Tom Peters
Romania approves US military surge for war against Iran amid deepening domestic crisis
Romania is playing an increasingly central role in the war offensives of US imperialism in the Middle East and of NATO against Russia in Ukraine.
•Andrei Tudora
The consequences of extreme exploitation – Enjoy Your Stay and I Understand Your Displeasure
Both films underscore a central truth: under capitalism, personal decisions can be so severely restricted that they become almost irrelevant.
•Bernd Reinhardt, Stefan Steinberg
Five hundred more pro-Palestine protesters arrested in UK despite High Court ruling
Over 3,300 people have now been arrested on these charges since Palestine Action was outlawed by the Labour government in June-July last year.
•Thomas Scripps
UK secondary school's sweeping censorship of library books
Librarian instructed to remove up to 200 books from school library deemed inappropriate by school with Christian ethos
•Margot Miller
USPS moves to suspend pension payments amid deepening financial crisis
The United States Postal Service could potentially run out of money by next year, setting the stage for massive cuts.
•Brian Green
Teamsters and UPS reach settlement over driver buyouts, while company continues plans to slash 30,000 more jobs
By claiming a victory over the buyouts, the Teamsters apparatus is signaling to UPS that, as long as the bureaucracy is included, the destruction of UPS workers' livelihoods can proceed.
•Leon Gutierrez
Trump says the US is “loading up the ships” with weapons during ceasefire talks
President Trump renewed his fascist threat to destroy Iran on Friday in a post on Truth Social in which he bemoaned Tehran’s ongoing control of the Strait of Hormuz and wrote that Tehran has “no cards,” and “The only reason they are alive today is to negotiate!”
•Kevin Reed
Artemis II mission concludes after astronauts travel to the Moon and safely return to Earth
The mission unfolded in the shadow of the Trump administration's war against Iran and his genocidal threat that “a whole civilization will die tonight.”
•Bryan Dyne
- Latest articles
- Browse by month: