PCS general secretary FRAN HEATHCOTE explains why opposing war is inseparable from defending jobs, wages and public services – and why readers should come to the London Peace Conference on Saturday June 20

As protests erupt over Henry Nowak’s murder, ANDREW MURRAY argues that anger is being exploited to advance a wider racist and anti-immigration agenda

CARLOS MARTINEZ explains the sound case for car manufacturing co-operation with China

Claudia Webbe pays tribute tribute to KANYA KING CBE, February 12 1964 to June 3 2026

The National Emergency Briefing outlines the need for urgent action to address environmental crisis, says PAUL DONOVAN, warning that there’s no time to indulge the arguments of the fossil-fuel-funded climate-change deniers

The Committee for the Defence of Iranian People’s Rights warns of escalation danger in Iran war

Campaigners say criticism of Labour MP Stephen Morgan’s position on Gaza has been met with police intervention and cancelled opportunities for debate. HESTER WOLFE reports

Trade unionists from Liverpool and Greater Manchester travelled to Bologna and the Monte Sole region to find out about the struggle against fascism and Nazi occupation. ROB MacDONALD reports

Behind the headlines on immigration lies a workforce delivering vital care across Scotland and beyond. FAVOUR DAVIDKING explains why reform of the sponsorship system is urgently needed

Campaigners from across the continent will gather in Brussels on June 14 to oppose Europe’s accelerating militarisation and cuts to public services, write MAGGIE SIMPSON and BOB ORAM of No Cold War Britain

The Milburn review presents itself as a plan to help young people into work, but Dr DYLAN MURPHY argues it is laying the groundwork for a harsher benefits regime

The ITUC has warned that a decline in labour rights is threatening democracy, writes MARK GRUENBERG

Statement from the Communist Party of Britain

Carrots often seen as a tricky vegetable to grow, but a few simple strategies can make all the difference, says MAT COWARD

The Ivors Academy’s hike in entry fees could turn this respected peer-assessed event into an exclusive preserve for those wealthy enough to compete, warns BEN LUNN

National co-ordinator for General Strike 100, HENRY FOWLER, continues his nationwide tour of partner organisations by visiting the Modern Records Centre at Warwick University

While recent trade union growth figures are welcome, in order to sustain and deepen this trend, we need a return class-conscious organising, argues NATHAN HENNEBRY

Peter Murrell’s weakness for the allure of prestige goods is symptomatic of modern consumer culture, says MATT KERR

GEOFF BOTTOMS recalls meeting Fidel Castro in the ’90s after joining a Pastors for Peace caravan to Cuba, and reflects on how international support is still vital to help the island withstand economic warfare

ANGUS REID explains the significance of Cuba’s egalitarian in letter and spirit Family Code and the pertinent lessons it holds for democracies anywhere in the world

Fownhope’s Heart of Oak Society traces its roots to the age of friendly societies, when communities provided their own safety net. Its anniversary celebrations reveal a tradition still very much alive, says MARK SEDDON

Special report by PEOPLE’S WORLD

CARLOS MARTINEZ says Cuba’s achievements in the face of a criminal blockade are startling, but the island’s future if the United States succeeds in crushing it looks bleak

AMNON BROWNFIELD STEIN reports that far-right MPs who mobbed the event organised by Hadash may have helped raise awareness of the brutality of the Israeli right

NICK WRIGHT considers how the isolation of Israel and a new film on the controversial Italian communist leader are creating new reference points for Italy’s left

VIJAY PRASHAD examines the desperate actions and violent actions of Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir

RAMZY BAROUD decries the rats of Gaza, the rodent and human type. Both abound as profiteering from tragedy reaches obscene levels

When gas company bosses gorged on assets, the GMB union fought back with the help of a 20-stone saddleback sow. MAT COWARD tells the story

Born on this day in 1931, the heroic revolutionary faces a dangerous new wave of White House aggression. We must treat his birthday as a rallying cry to resist the illegal siege of Cuba, writes ROGER McKENZIE

New workplace rights are welcome, but the survival of the trade union movement will be determined not in Westminster but in workplaces across the country, argues JOHN CARSON

ROGER McKENZIE highlights how health workers in DRC are struggling to contain a deadly Ebola outbreak in a region already suffering conflict, aid cuts and a legacy of imperialist degradation

Associate Professor BUI QUANG TUAN explains how modernisation and growth are helping to unlock new foreign investment in the Vietnamese economy

JOHN REES looks at why the June 20 international anti-war conference is such a vital initiative

A remarkable excavation in the Netherlands has raised hopes of locating the grave of Louis XIV’s famed captain of the King’s Musketeers. JOHN CALLOW introduces the real figure behind the hero of Dumas’s novels

Even after the disaster of the Iraq war, Blair remains a persistent voice for military intervention, says STEPHEN ARNELL

By helping drive through a historic reduction in working hours, Brazil’s president has reconnected with organised labour in a way that the European left would do well to note, says SARA VIVACQUA

KENNY MacASKILL looks at the depth of the corruption tolerated within the Scottish National Party and the efforts to keep it from public scrutiny

Esmond Romilly horrified Britain’s Establishment by turning from privileged schoolboy to anti-fascist fighter, writes MAT COWARD

The Morning Star’s AGM tour comes at a critical moment for both the British left and the newspaper itself, as it battles political fragmentation and media industry upheaval. Editor BEN CHACKO issues a clarion call to readers to play their part in the coming period

Nearly two decades after leaving office, the former PM is still trumpeting the same futile militarism and failed free market dogmas. The question naturally arises: why does anyone still listen to him, says ANDREW MURRAY

DIANE ABBOTT debunks claims made politicians drumming up support for an enhanced militarisation of the British economy

Very modest growth in membership serves to underline the need for a change of recruiting strategies, posits NIGEL FLANAGAN

The growing argument that welfare must be sacrificed for ‘security’ is built on nothing but myth, argues MICHAEL BURKE

FRANCISCO DOMINGUEZ and ROGER D HARRIS highlight how the priority for internationalists should be defending Venezuela’s government against external aggression

The Greater Manchester mayor has shifted left over the years — but his record still shows a tendency to wobble when pressure comes from the right, says SOLOMON HUGHES

DAVID RABY charts the ever increasing US attempts at intervention in Mexico’s internal affairs

RAMZY BAROUD explains why Israel’s political collapse cannot be separated from its war crimes

The real ‘humanitarian threat’ isn’t Cuba but the United States, where poverty, lack of healthcare and illiteracy abound, writes LINDA PENTZ GUNTER

ROGER McKENZIE draws attention to the much-neglected oral traditions of the global South that define the identity – and therefore the liberation – of its custodians

Established as a landmark victory for the climate movement, the CCC promised to hold governments to account. Today, it is understating the danger of climate chaos and impeding the radical action needed, says IAN SINCLAIR

Labour movement history in Britain shows workers secured reforms through collective pressure and political representation, rather than being gifted from above, writes KEITH FLETT

CLAUDIA WEBBE looks at how Britain’s Nato ally has upped the stakes in its effort to silence domestic dissenting voices

The US president’s adventurism in Iran began as a display of overwhelming force but has swiftly become a lesson in over-reach, says ANDREW MURRAY

Cuban ambassador to Britain ISMARA VARGAS WALTER speaks to Morning Star editor Ben Chacko about the desperate situation caused by the US siege and the growing risk of war

CAMERON HARRISON reports on the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists convention in Atlanta

MIKE SCOTT says we would be happier, healthier and richer as a country if we cut military spending and stopped cleaving to Washington

NATHAN HENNEBRY says the Scottish TUC rightly recognises the extreme disparities of wealth and power built into the system, but hasn’t linked austerity to the war drive causing it

The racist Republican tactic of redistricting to keep Trump and his base in power is turning the clock back to the 1950s, writes LINDA PENTZ GUNTER

Marx and Engels incorporated in their writings a critique of the way that capitalism destroys the environment but it is only in the last half century that environmental concerns have become an integral part of the fight for socialism, writes the Marx Memorial Library and Workers’ School

ROGER D HARRIS and SARA FLOUNDERS challenge propaganda against the blockaded socialist island

The HS2 debacle exposes what happens when public infrastructure is handed to private contractors – especially when set against China’s state-led high-speed rail success, says CARLOS MARTINEZ

With a political crisis engulfing the Labour Party, the case for PR is back on the agenda. TONY BURKE argues trade unions must now engage on changes to our voting system

YVETTE WILLIAMS and JOE DELANEY dissect the institutional dawdling that rubbed salt into the Grenfell open wounds prolonging the agony of survivors

A lifelong communist and community organiser, Pinder helped shape anti-racist and anti-colonial activism in Britain while dedicating himself to youth work and collective struggle, writes David Horsley

After battling hills, rain and injury in a three-day cycle ride ending at the CWU conference, MATT KERR reflects on why class unity remains the answer to injustice

Through marches, music, schools and political debate, campaigners in Tower Hamlets are using the 90th anniversary of Cable Street to inspire resistance to modern racism. GLYN ROBBINS explains

Decommissioned railway tracks have been ‘repossessed’ by nature with wild birds the prominent protagonists, writes MARK SEDDON

Ignorance of working-class history leaves working people open to deceptive narratives, demagogy and political manipulation, writes SAN SENIK

ROGER MCKENZIE recalls the one-in-a-generation communist leader murdered at the dawn of a new South Africa 33 years ago last April 10

HAZEL PRING and MAX DICKINSON introduce The Angry Summer Project, a fringe for the TUC Cymru Congress

Delegates rejected calls to disaffiliate after a passionate three-hour debate, while warning the Labour leadership that working-class members demand change

TUC Cymru’s programme offers a potential roadmap for co-operation between Labour and Plaid Cymru on jobs, services and economic democracy, says DAI MORGAN

Western accounts portray the Stasi as an agent of repression, but behind the stereotype, many East German security officers saw themselves as defenders of an anti-fascist socialist project under constant attack from the West, argues NICK WRIGHT

JENNY CLEGG looks at the key points that defined the China-US relationship, for now

HOLLY TURNER, DR EMMA RUNSWICK, JORDAN RIVERA and PAULA DUNNE reflect on their joint union fringe meeting at this week’s Royal College of Nursing Congress in Liverpool

This week the Welsh trade union movement comes together in Llandudno for TUC Cymru congress to debate motions and consider priorities for the next two years. JESS TURNER sets the stage

Blocked fertiliser exports and an extreme climate fluctuation may spell disaster for global food production, write ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and MIRIAM GAUNTLETT

The 1797 slaughter of protesters and bystanders in Tranent exposed the brutality of the British state during a period of democratic repression, says KENNY MacASKILL

Trump’s drive for ‘regime change’ in Cuba has deepened the crisis across the island – while Venezuela has reaffirmed its commitment to Bolivarian solidarity, says FRANCISCO DOMINGUEZ

Unity and solidarity remain the key to defending workers, strengthening democracy and shaping a fairer Wales, write JULIE COOK and LINSEY IMMS

The ghosts of Custer’s doomed campaign haunt a modern America still devoted to waging imperialist war, says STEPHEN ARNELL

The Employment Rights Act marks a major victory for workers, but without stronger enforcement and collective organisation, its promises may fall short, says ALICE BOWMAN

Election of a new leadership at Hadash’s convention signals a renewed effort to forge a broad Arab-Jewish alliance in Israel, says AMNON BROWNFIELD STEIN

DAVE CALFE, general secretary of Aslef, the train drivers’ trade union, writes exclusively for the Morning Star as the union’s five-day annual conference opens in Birmingham

HENRY FOWLER, national co-ordinator for General Strike 100, continued his nationwide tour of partner organisations by joining campaigners and trade unionists in Brighton for the unveiling of a new blue plaque and a full day of commemorative events marking the centenary of the ‘Battle of Lewes Road’

If Labour continues to abandon the promise of economic hope and security, Reform will keep filling the vacuum in communities once considered its heartlands, argues IAN LAVERY MP

The FBU leader speaks to Ben Chacko about cuts, collapsing Starmerism and confronting the far right

The collapse of Streeting’s leadership challenge and an opening for Burnham’s potential path back to Parliament have accelerated the battle over what – if anything – Labour still stands for, writes ANDREW MURRAY

Salty fingers are a MAT COWARD staple and he believes they might be yours too

ANSELM ELDERGILL examines the relationship between law and the humanities

Beijing’s latest response to Washington’s economic coercion suggests major powers are no longer willing to play by Western rules, says CARLOS MARTINEZ

As debate grows inside the labour movement over how to respond to Reform UK, DIANE ABBOTT argues that silence on racism is politically disastrous

ANDREW DRAPER reports on the deliberate targeting and torture of Palestinian journalists by the Israeli state

Transparency records reveal senior trade officials held dinners and strategy meetings with the notorious lobbying firm even as controversy over its Epstein links deepened, says SOLOMON HUGHES

KEITH FLETT looks at a post-election London