A truly capitalist donation

The G7’s pledge to donate 1 billion vaccine doses isn’t as generous as the media is painting it. Truthfully, it makes me sick. The G7 countries have been actively blocking efforts to suspend vaccine patents for months! Had they been lifted, far more facilities could have been producing far more vaccines across the world months ago.

The G7 put the wishes of pharma giants first, risking so many lives especially in poorer areas of the world. Millions of preventable illnesses and deaths were not prevented. This vaccine donation is too little too late, a truly capitalist donation.

Adam Harmsworth, Coventry

Iraq war crimes

A military patrol in Mosul, Iraq, photo Mstyslav Chernov/CC

A military patrol in Mosul, Iraq, photo Mstyslav Chernov/CC   (Click to enlarge: opens in new window)

I am pleased mass-murderer Ratko Mladic has been sent to jail. Such a pity the USA and its allies are exempt from any punishment. Blair, Mandelson and Alistair Campbell walk free and are fawned on by the BBC.

The civilian death toll of the Iraq war has been estimated at a minimum of 110,000 and is probably much higher.

The fake story of ‘weapons of mass destruction’ was used to convince members of the Parliamentary Labour Party to vote for war.

Blairites still crow about Blair’s election victory, but 110,000 deaths was not in his manifesto.

Derek McMillan, West Sussex

Crony NHS Chief?

I read that the NHS needs a new top person as the present one is resigning. Who has declared she would like the job?

None other than Baroness Dido Harding, wife of a Tory MP. But that is not her only qualification. She ran the test-and-trace system that managed to spend £35 billion with absolutely no discernible effect! She also lead the telecommunications giant TalkTalk when it accidentally gave out the details of many thousands of its customers to scammers and spammers across the known world.

Boris Johnson, apparently, is strongly minded to accept her gracious offer!

Mike Cleverley, Waltham Forest

Long live the Colombia strike

Thousands of people have united to try to find the key to open a new door to lead us away from poverty and suffering, to let us care for the unconsidered, and to have the bravery to demand what is just.

The trigger to our strike was a tax reform that imposed extreme changes to our community, specifically to the lower class of our country, evidenced in the implementation of new rent payments and an increase in VAT. Taxes are also being added to agricultural supplies, household supplies and petrol, as well as an increase in transport prices and new toll collections on routes into the big cities. All of this is done without any improvements in the living conditions of the majority of the population.

Health reforms attempt to convert the whole system into an exclusively private service, leaving people standing on the edge of an abyss, while the Covid health emergency continues.

The indignation is huge. There are no guarantees of work, education, or health. The only guarantees are the ones that include extra obligations from the citizens. So, even though the tax reforms have been withdrawn, the movement continues.

The government has militarized the country. To gain control they have planted the seed of fear and look to manufacture confrontations with protesters, including a series of violent attacks against peaceful civilians translated into murders, destruction of personal property, and disappearances.

Today our heroes are not the same as yesterday. Today our heroes are the civilians, students, professors, doctors, indigenous groups, farmers, people displaced by violence, truckers and everyone else that has been affected for the crisis.

We want guarantees in education, a job, a plan to eradicate poverty, and an end to the internal gang wars that haven’t already stopped.

Long live the national strike!

David, Colombia