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A Case History of Vaccine Nationalism

Deconstructing the Astra-Zeneca Story


12/04/2021

In the wake of the COVID pandemic, a search for a vaccine was unleashed. It has been far from an impeccable victory for science. This article makes three points: first, that Astra-Zeneca made an evident series of scientific errors; secondly, a myriad of potential for conflicts of interest exists between prominent scientists, giant drug companies, and regulatory agencies meant to monitor safety and government; and thirdly, that scientists are vulnerable to pressures of fame, greed and nationalism – just like anybody else. This case history of Astra-Zeneca (AZ) again exposes why private profit drives cannot give the people a safe and rational drugs industry.

Introduction

Many critiques of the drugs industry under capitalism have laid out the socialist case before [1, 2]. I will not repeat these, but here summarise them: under capitalism, the drugs industry is purely motivated by a chase for profits. It ensures profits by strategies which include the following:

(1) molecular rouletting to evade patents rather than making true innovations;

(2) minimizing safety concerns and evading true scientific assessments of effectiveness – achieved by a conflict of interest within the regulatory agencies (eg the Food and Drug Agency (FDA) in the USA). Such conflicts have often led to sharp calls for reform; [3]

(3) massive over-pricing as compared to real costs of production;

(4) relying on public sector contracts for added ‘sweet pricing’; and finally

(5) relying on public sector research funding for any real innovation.

I turn to AZ’s conduct in regards to the COVID vaccine, asking should we agree with the notoriously self-serving Kate Bingham, when she says:

“I do feel sorry for AstraZeneca. They’ve been caught up in geopolitics. But, hopefully, history will look back and treat them kindly and say, actually, they stepped up to provide a safe, effective drug that is easy to deploy for the world.” [4]

What does the record show to date?

1. How did Astra-Zeneca unveil its vaccine? The saga of the trial deficiencies

Self-promotion flowed early on. This is unusual in science to begin with, and should have led objective observers to take pause. As Reuters points out:

“beginning even before the first human test subjects were injected with the experimental vaccine… On April 11 in Britain’s The Times newspaper, Sarah Gilbert, one of the vaccine’s chief researchers at Oxford, said she was 80% certain her team would be able to produce a successful vaccine, possibly as early as September. That was 12 days before a clinical trial to test its safety began.” [5]

On June 31 the then head of Britain’s vaccine procurement program, Kate Bingham, told a parliamentary committee: “Oxford is ahead of the world in that it is the most advanced vaccine anywhere.” [4]

Putting all this aside, scientists usually emphasise openess as a prerequisite in presenting data. If a mistake is made, it should be owned, and not glossed over, and changes to research protocols are supposed to be fully transparent. How did these scientists and AZ behave? The following details and quotes are drawn from a Reuters report. [5]

Firstly it appears there were errors by the scientists and AZ, on dosing, and a failure to test the most vulnerable elderly population in the first trial. By June 5, 2020, the researchers realized they had made a serious dosing mistake. They made a ‘confidential’ alteration to the research plan:

“Many of the United Kingdom trial subjects had inadvertently been given only about a half dose of the vaccine” changed details to the late-stage clinical trial of their COVID-19 vaccine – ‘In an amendment noted in a document marked CONFIDENTIAL’ they added a new group of participants.” [5]

On Nov. 23, Oxford and AZ delivered positive news, claiming that the regimen of a ‘half dose’ followed by a full dose booster appeared to be 90% effective in preventing COVID-19. But it seemed that two full doses scored only 62%. It was also becoming clear that the most vulnerable elderly were not represented in the AZ trial:

“The half-dose regimen wasn’t tested on anyone over 55 – the group considered at high risk from COVID-19. In contrast, a vaccine produced by Pfizer/BioNTech was tested on thousands of people over 65, with an efficacy of 94%.” [5]

The confusion was only later resolved by USA advisers to the ‘Warp Speed’ program. It emerged that the results were obtained by pooling from several differing studies. This is not generally done:

“In November, AstraZeneca became the third company to announce promising early results — declaring its vaccine efficacy ranged from 62 percent to 90 percent, depending on dosing, and the average was 70 percent. Scientists were left scratching their heads at the discrepancies, because a lower first dose seemed to work better. AstraZeneca had also pooled results from differently designed trials in Britain and Brazil, which is considered irregular….

And it was left to Moncef Slaoui, then chief advisor to Warp Speed (USA), to reveal in a call to US reporters that the group that achieved 90 percent efficacy did not include anyone aged over 55.” [6]

About the mistaken dosing, there were many – what can only be euphemistically called – ‘spins’. It was denied as a mistake: The firm’s chief executive officer, Pascal Soriot, told Bloomberg: “People call it a mistake — it was not a mistake”. [7]

Others such as AstraZeneca executive vice president Mene Pangalos admitted a mistake, but glossed it as ‘serendipitous’. The two scientists Sarah Gilbert and Adrian Hill – said it was normal for researchers to look at different dose levels. “It wasn’t a mix-up in dosing,” Gilbert told the Financial Times in an article published on November 27. A few days later, Hill told Reuters: “There had been some confusion suggesting that we didn’t know we were giving a half dose when we gave it — that is really not true,” he said. [5]

I agree with John Moore, a professor of microbiology and immunology at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York, who said: “When you get corporate and academic scientists saying different things, it doesn’t give you the impression of confidence in what they’re doing,” he told Reuters. “Was the dosing thing a mistake or not?” [5]

Hill’s hubris burned vividly on May 15, as he dumped on the new messenger RNA technology of the BioNTech vaccine, claiming the Oxford/AstraZeneca candidate is “almost certainly the best single dose rapid-response vaccine.” Hill dismissed Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna:

“Why would you take a vaccine technology that is new, unproven, maybe quick to manufacture, but expensive to manufacture – and has never been scaled up and has never been shown to protect against anything in humans, and prioritize that in a global emergency?” he asked. “It’s very odd.” [5]

In any case, on the strength of AZ’s prior claims, the USA both ordered shots and paid for them to the tune of $1.2 billion.

“The US ordered 300 million doses, far more than its initial orders for Moderna and Pfizer (100 million each), and gave the company $1.2 billion. Pfizer (100 million each), and gave the company $1.2 billion.” [6]

After such confusion about the trial deficiencies, to satisfy USA regulators, further trials were needed for FDA approval. However, quite astonishingly, the company ignored the independent trial Data Safety panel. The company misreported its findings. This was called out by the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID):

“AstraZeneca released its results from a trial carried in the US, Peru, and Chile that showed an efficacy of 79 percent at preventing symptomatic Covid, and 100 percent at preventing hospitalizations and death. Then came the NIAID statement, which said an independent board charged with monitoring the trial “was concerned” that AstraZeneca “may have included outdated information from that trial,” skewing the figures.” [6]

“The NIAID issued a highly-unusual statement saying that AstraZeneca may have used “outdated information” that “provided an incomplete view of the efficacy data.” It said it took this action after an independent panel of medical experts that works under the National Institutes of Health to help monitor the AstraZeneca trial informed the agency that it had problems with the numbers the company had used in its press release on Monday.

The language used by the independent panel, known as the Data and Safety Monitoring Board, was stark, according to a copy of the letter the board sent the company… “The point that is clear to the board is that the [vaccine efficacy number] . . . they chose to release was the most favorable for the study as opposed to the most recent and most complete. Decisions like this are what erode public trust in the scientific process,” the DSMB said…The letter indicated that the more up-to-date data showed an efficacy of between 69% and 74%, and that AstraZeneca knew this and yet chose to go with the older 79% figure.” [8]

This forced a partial retraction from AZ:

“The British-Swedish drugmaker was on the back foot Tuesday, vowing to release more data “within 48 hours” after the NIAID raised concerns that results reported from its US trial were outdated.” [9]

2. The complication of Cerebral Sinus venous Thrombosis (CVST)

How has the company and British regulatory agencies responded to an emerging picture of a serious complication with the AZ vaccine? Cerebral Sinus Venous thrombosis (CSVT), is not the same as just any old ‘thrombosis.” The latter is within the spectrum of an accepted disease in the general population. But for the longest time British authorities did not acknowledge the problem of CSVT was of an otherwise very rare and fatal or very disabling disease. You are likely to die from CVST, or have a disabling stroke. It is not a simple ‘clot’ in the leg that one gets from inactivity. The problem was identified first by European health authorities:

“On March 7, Austrian authorities announced an investigation of a death that was potentially vaccine-related. A few days later, the Danish Health Authority announced that it was investigating a death as well, and then the same thing happened in Norway. On March 15, Germany suspended use of the AstraZeneca vaccine pending the investigation of three deaths and four other incidents. According to the German vaccine authority, the sixth and seventh reports there “put the number of observed cases well above the expected number.” All seven cases involved previously healthy people between ages 20 and 50.” [9]

What was the response to these concerns by the UK Minister of Health Matt Hancock? It was a blanket denial:

“a number of European countries temporarily suspended the use of the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine due to reports of a small number of people who had been vaccinated suffering from blood clots. I want to reassure Sun readers — there is no evidence that vaccines caused these clots.” [10]

Perhaps this was not surprising from the British government. But did prominent British scientists, approach the concern with ‘objectivity?’ Actually they appear to have responded with the same abrupt denials:

“Writing in The New York Times on March 22, Heidi Larson, the director of the Vaccine Confidence Project at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, noted that just 25 Europeans had developed blood clots, out of 20 million who received the AstraZeneca vaccine. That rate, she said, was lower than what you’d normally see among unvaccinated people. According to the statistician David Spiegelhalter, the furor over blood clots showed our “basic and often creative urge to find patterns even where none exist.” [11]

British drugs regulators took the same views, this was a mistaken case of blame:

“The British vaccine regulator, the MHRA, has reported only four cases of cerebral venous sinuous thrombosis cases in people who have received an Oxford/AstraZeneca shot between the start of the year and 14 March, compared with two cases among those who have had the Pfizer/BioNTech jab. In a statement on 25 March, the MHRA said a rigorous scientific review did not suggest that blood clots in veins were caused by the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine, and that there had been less than one in a million cases of the disorder in the UK.” [12]

But as further ongoing reports across Europe were noted, the MHRA (UK) then found more than the ‘four cases’ so confidently reported above. The government website cited below announced this by 31 March, although with cautious wording:

“The MHRA’s scientific review of UK reports of extremely rare and unlikely to occur specific blood clots with lowered platelets has concluded that the evidence of a link with COVID-19 Vaccine AstraZeneca is stronger but more work is still needed. By 31 March 20.2 million doses of the COVID-19 Vaccine AstraZeneca had been given in the UK meaning the overall risk of these blood clots is approximately 4 people in a million who receive the vaccine.” [13]

News agencies seemed to spell out the implications of the U-turn more clearly:

“June Munro, CEO for the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency… said up to 31 March there had been 79 cases of this condition, with 19 deaths. Three of the 19 people who died were under the age of 30.” [14]

“The U.K.’s drug safety regulator has identified more cases of thrombosis related to the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine, bringing the total to 30 — though it says the benefits of the shot still far outweigh the risks. The country is mainly relying on the shot to carry out its vaccination program so far, where it is leading most of Europe. As of March 18, it had reported only five cases of thrombosis, …. But the latest report, published by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) late Thursday, said that as of March 24 it had received 22 reports of cerebral venous sinus thrombosis, as well as 8 reports of other thrombosis events, out of 18.1 million doses administered.” [15]

The scientific community is still divided on just how large the real risk is. However there has been a noticeable shift in acknowledging its importance:

“One scientist has told the BBC that evidence is growing that the blood clot events are “causally related,” although he stressed that the benefits of taking the AstraZeneca vaccine still far outweighed the risks of not getting the jab.

Prof Paul Hunter, a medical microbiologist at the University of East Anglia, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “It is not uncommon to get clusters of rare events purely by chance. “But, once you find that cluster in one population and it then crops up in another – such as previously in the German and now in the English – then I think the chances of that being a random association is very, very low.

“Clearly more work needs to be done, but I think the evidence is shifting more towards it being causally related at the moment.” [16]

Slowly the pendulum is being weighted by the truth. Even now however the attempt is being made to ‘gild’ the truth. Thus Matt Hancock reversing himself to some extent had this to say:

The risk of developing a blood clot from the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine is the same as getting one from a long-haul flight, Matt Hancock has said”; [17]

Yet ignoring the prior under-statements of the MHRA, Hancock went on to praise the ‘safety system’ that could pick up this rare risk. [18]

I do not wish to gloss over the very real public health dilemma: It is true that the risks of contracting COVID are currently higher than the risks of the AZ vaccine. That is exactly why all the regulatory agencies from Canada to Europe and Britain, have even now equivocated by playing around with recommended age ranges for those to get AZ. They all continue to recommend the AZ vaccine if there are no other options. However the dichotomy between no vaccination and an AZ vaccination is a false one. Firstly there are evidently now some alternatives that could be boosted for public availability, by combined international cooperation. Secondly, vaccination takes a previously healthy person and applies a medication that should be safe. To pose CSVT as an acceptable ‘low risk’ is patently misleading.

But there is another and systemic underlying issue. Namely this is a public health crisis that is not effectively addressed by competitive systems reliant on profits. What might have been the case had governments pooled resources and – for instance – developed a head to head comparison trial between the varying vaccines? But in a private profit climate, compounded by inter-governmental rivalry – vaccine rivalry was bound to mirror primitive nationalism. Here I will not even discuss the underlying issue of how capitalist society has precipitated this health crisis despite warnings. I discussed that in a quite early report on how the COVID crisis was precipitated by capitalism. [19]

3. Following the money trail.

So much for the scientific disputes. Even if all these are viewed as in favour of AZ’s interpretation, we need to ask how much do we know of the potentials for conflicts of interest around all this?

But firstly, it should be very clear that all the companies fervently making COVID vaccines – including Pfizer-BioNTech – are all also driven by the urge to make money. Moreover, BioNTech made its advances with state funding – EU research funding:

“Uğur Şahin, the chief executive of the Germany-headquartered healthcare company BioNTech, has said the development of the technology used in its Covid-19 vaccine was made possible in part by sustained support from EU R&D programmes. “We benefited from the fifth, sixth and seventh framework programmes and this helped us to mature our technology,” Şahin said at a virtual health conference on 13 January, referring to the EU’s successive multi-year R&D programmes. Among that funding was a 2018 European Research Council grant to explore the use of mRNA—a transient genetic signalling molecule—to develop cancer treatments tailored to a patient’s specific genetic mutations. BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine, which has been approved for use in the EU, uses an mRNA platform.” [20]

And in order to secure a stable pipeline of vaccines for the future, Germany is in the midst of ensuring more funding for BioNTech. As of February according to the German health minister Jens Spahn, of a further 400 Million Euros. [21]

What has been the result of all this for Pfizer-BioNTech? Well as of early this, year, Pfizer-BioNTech has made already some $15 billion. It expects more as the need for booster jabs will rise:

“Costs and profits are split 50/50 with BioNTech. Albert Bourla, Pfizer’s chief executive, said it was an “increasingly probable scenario” that people will require boosters, or different vaccine formulations to keep up with new variants of the virus. This would result in a “durable” revenue stream, he added.” [22]

Let us now return to the AZ saga. Firstly we focus on the scientists and their universities. These two often adopt an air of being above the sordid stench of money – they are in the ether somehow. Moreover, they are always expected to declare their conflicts of interests. What is the reality of the Oxford situation, how well do we know this?

It is frequently claimed by British vaccine nationalists that neither AZ, nor British scientists – make any profit – nor it is usually implied are they ever likely to do so. But this in reality seems to be not so. Actually the scientists and Oxford university are key players behind ‘Vaccitech’, a start up company that builds on the COVID story, for other diseases:

“The Oxford startup behind AstraZeneca AZN 0.4% PLC’s Covid-19 vaccine has raised $168 million in new funding, which it plans to use to adopt its vaccine technology for the treatment of other diseases. The move is a step in Vaccitech Ltd.’s preparations for going public as soon as this year…

It played an early role developing a Covid-19 vaccine alongside scientists at the University of Oxford. AstraZeneca then teamed up with the university, promising to produce and distribute the shot globally. Vaccitech’s co-founders are Oxford scientists leading the vaccine program…

The financing valued the company at around $425 million, according to investors. Backers are aiming for an IPO valuation of around $700 million, with expectations that Vaccitech could be a $1 billion company by year-end…

Vaccitech’s market-debut plans are shaping up as a test case for Oxford’s spinout process. The university has backed more than 200 startups since the late 1980s, including Vaccitech, but its record of fostering big moneymakers trails leading U.S. universities. New Vaccitech investors include pharmaceutical giant Gilead Sciences Inc. The financing was led by London-based asset manager M&G PLC. The funding also included Oxford Sciences Innovation PLC, a venture firm started by the university in 2015 and a Vaccitech investor since the company was launched in 2016.” [23]

This company is going to pay out very richly for Professors Gilbert and Hill. But also for Oxford University:

“The price tag would put Professor Gilbert and Professor Hill in line for payouts worth over £20m. The pair both own just over 5% of the business each, according to recent filings with Companies House.” [24]

“Oxford professors Sarah Gilbert and Adrian Hill – who helped develop the jab – stand to make millions of pounds through start-up Vaccitech, which created the experimental shot alongside experts at the university’s Jenner Institute. Vaccitech is a private firm which owns intellectual property used in the vaccine’s development. They together own about 10 per cent of the Oxford-based company, which will benefit both from royalties from the vaccine and ‘milestone’ payments. However the money can only be paid out once the pandemic is declared to have finished, according to the company’s royalty agreement with Oxford.The ‘milestone’ payments are negotiated amounts based on landmarks such as regulatory approval, according to the Wall Street Journal. The firm was valued at £65.8million last year before the pandemic hit. The pair will also be entitled to their share of revenue if the Covid-19 jab is sold for profit. Oxford University also stands to make hundreds of millions of pounds, after it secured a deal to give the institution 6 per cent of all profits.” [25]

It must be noted that Sir John Bell, the Regius Professor of Medicine at Oxford University, and a confidant of the British Conservative government – seems to be heavily backing the AZ vaccine. He stoutly defends AZ and again claims it makes no profits, and might rethink its approach if ‘they do not get due credit:’

“Sir John Bell, the Oxford University professor who helped drive the vaccine’s development, suggested morale at AstraZeneca is plummeting and that it had never received due credit for its decision to take no profit. Others are making fortunes – Moderna expects $18bn in revenue this year from the vaccine and Pfizer/BioNTech $15bn. Citing the attack from Macron and unfounded accusations over safety and efficacy, Bell said the company could re-think its philanthropic stance. “There’s a point at which AstraZeneca could just say, ‘you’ve got to be joking, we’re going to stop [charging cost price] now because we’re not getting any credit for what we’re doing.’ The share price has gone down, not up. We’re making more vaccines than everybody else. This is a safe and effective vaccine, but nobody seems to care,” he said this week.“ [26]

Yet as the British Medical Journal points out, his conflicts of interest are still secret:

“Since the Covid-19 outbreak began early last year, John Bell, Regius professor of medicine at Oxford University, has held high profile roles in the UK government’s epidemic response while also working with AstraZeneca on the vaccine. But both Oxford and the government have refused to disclose Bell’s financial interests.” [27]

The plot thickens further, since:

“The Daily Mail reported on Bell’s financial ties in September 2020, noting that he had £773 000 (€893 000; $1.1m) worth of shares in the pharmaceutical company Roche.The newspaper published the story after Roche sold the government £13.5m of antibody tests, which Public Health England later found to be unreliable. Bell had headed the National Covid Testing Scientific Advisory Panel and chaired the government’s test approvals group, but he told the Mail that he had no role in the purchase and that he had disclosed to the government “a long list of my interests.” [27; 28]

In fact, Bell’s biographical note on the Academy of Medical Sciences website points out that:

“(Bell) sat on the Scientific Advisory Board for AstraZeneca from 1997 to 2000 and has sat on the Scientific Advisory Board of the Roche Palo Alto facility since 1998.” [29]

As an anxious string of emails ferreted out by the BMJ revealed, there appeared to be no written statement from Bell to the Government revealing any conflicts.

So what is the actual truth of AZ’s benevolence and generosity and non-profiteering? I believe they are very good propagandists. They have carefully retained rights to declare when they can afford to be seen as to start charging an obvious profit:

“AstraZeneca, which has promised not to profit from its Covid-19 vaccine “during the pandemic,” has the right to declare an end to the pandemic as soon as July 2021, according to an agreement with a manufacturer. The UK pharmaceutical company.. has said it would provide doses on a cost basis for at least as long as the pandemic lasts. However a memorandum of understanding between AZ and a Brazilian manufacturer… defines the “Pandemic Period” as ending on July 1, 2021. The period could be extended but only if “AZ acting in good faith considers that the SARS-COV-2 Pandemic is not over.” [30]

The same article makes it clear that AZ received large swathes of public funding to develop the vaccine. As Ellen ‘t Hoen, director of Medicines Law & Policy, a non-profit campaigning for greater access to medicines says:

“More transparency was needed. “Despite all the talk about the Covid-19 vaccine needing to be a ‘global public good’ by political leaders who spend billions on Covid-19 R&D, it seems that it is the drug companies that determine, in secret deals, who will get access to the vaccine and when,” she said. [30]

Finally there is a far too-cosy relationship between the companies and the regulatory agencies. This has been evident in the British regulators. Indeed in 2005 the leaders of the British agency justified this as there was a ‘paucity’ of qualified people outside of industry.

“The pool of experts in regulating medicines in the United Kingdom is limited, and both industry and regulatory agencies compete for them. Thus it is unsurprising that many of the agency’s employees have worked in the pharmaceutical industry. “Other countries also use a fee based method of funding the regulation of medicines; user fees account for 100% of funding in the Netherlands, 95% in Sweden, 66% in Canada, and 52% in the United States. The European Medicines Agency also gets 67% of it income from fees.” [31]

Little surprise in my view, that the British regulators were slow to acknowledge the linkage between the complications and the AZ vaccine.

Conclusion

So – what are socialists to say about vaccine nationalism? We are unlikely to have agreed with Matt Hancock when he said at a press conference in April:

“Britain [is] “at the forefront of the global effort” to find a vaccine. [5]

Nor are we likely to agree that Bingham was not a beneficiary of the ‘chumocracy’ as she claims with a very compliant interviewer for the FT saying this:

“Bingham, who has a first class degree in biochemistry from Oxford, mentions several other temporary positions that have been filled without an open competition. “Then the next thing is: was I qualified to do the job? And I think that the results speak for themselves on that.” [33]

Blimey, is she talking about the enormous death toll in the UK? Perhaps she and Cookson should watch the ‘Peoples Covid enquiry’ series? [34]

Socialists are more likely to agree with the tone of Ian Jones, a professor of virology at Britain’s University of Reading, who told Reuters that the plethora of upbeat statements hasn’t benefited the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine candidate.

“reporting has always had a slightly nationalistic tone, which I don’t think has been helpful.” [5]

Having said that, there is a broader agenda for socialists. Namely the public control of research, funding for innovations in science, and an international collaboration of scientists; and lastly but not least – ensuring an equitable roll-out for the entire world – of effective and safe medications. Not just safe and effective for the privileged imperialist nations. This does not come easily. It will not be an agenda brought forward by social-democratic governments.

 

Footnotes

1 Joel Lexchin, The Pharmaceutical Industry in Contemporary Capitalism, March 1 2018; Monthly Review

2 Ben Goldacre, ‘Bad Pharma’; London 2012, Fourth Estate.

3 Joshua M. Sharfstein, ‘Editorial : Reform at the FDA—In Need of Reform’ January 14, 2020; JAMA. 2020;323(2):123-124.

4 Robin McKie, James trapper & Toby Helm; Blood clot cases ‘could dent faith of young women in AstraZeneca; 4 April 2021 ‘The Guardian’;

5 Steve Stecklow, Andrew MacAskill, Ludwig Burger, Kate Kelland, Emilio Parodi: Special Report-How a British COVID-19 vaccine went from pole position to troubled start Reuters for ‘Health News’; DECEMBER 24, 2020;

6 AFP, How AstraZeneca’s errors eroded US confidence in its Covid shot In Guardian 23 March 2021;

7 Suzi Ring and James Paton, Astra Eyes Extra Global Vaccine Trial as Questions Mount; November 26, 2020

8 Jeremy Kahn, AstraZeneca’s U.S. trial results debacle further widens its credibility gap; March 23, 2021; ‘Fortune’magazine

9 Issam Ahmed, How AstraZeneca’s errors eroded US confidence in its COVID shot March 23, 2021; Medical Express news

10 Matt Hancock, Keep getting the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab – there’s NO EVIDENCE it causes blood clots; The Sun; 16 March 2021; London;

11 Hilda Bastien, The Blood Clot Issue won’t go away; March 30, 2021, ‘The Atlantic’ magazine;

12 Philip Olterman, European commission says AstraZeneca not obliged to prioritise vaccines for UK; Guardian 30 March 2020;

13 https://www.gov.uk/government/news/mhra-issues-new-advice-concluding-a-possible-link-between-covid-19-vaccine-astrazeneca-and-extremely-rare-unlikely-to-occur-blood-clots

14 Saleha Riaz AstraZeneca vaccine’s causal link to blood clots not proven, says European Medicines Agency Wed, 7 April 2021;

15 Carlo Martuscelli UK regulator reports blood clots linked to Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine April 2, 2021; Politico

16 James Gallagher; Covid-19: Seven UK blood clot deaths after AstraZeneca vaccine; By, The BBC April 3rd;

17 Chris Smyth, Tom Whiplle, Steven Swinford, Henry Zeffman; “Astra-Zeneca jab no riskier than long-haul flight, says Matt Hancock”; April 8, The Times, London

18 Matt Hancock and scientists seek to reassure public over AstraZeneca jab Jane Kirby and Sam Blewett, 8 April, 2021;

19 Hari Kumar; How should Marxists view the COVID19 Pandemic of 2019-2020?’ March 17, 2020

20 BioNTech chief: EU R&D funds helped develop Covid-19 vaccine; Rearch Professional News; at: BioNTech chief: EU R&D funds helped develop Covid-19 vaccine

21 Reuters Agency Germany talking to BioNTech about funding for vaccine capacity; February 6,2021

22 Hannah Kuchler FT February 2, 2021. Pfizer Expects $15 bn in COVID vaccine this year.

23 Jenny Strasburg, Startup Behind AstraZeneca Covid-19 Vaccine Raises $168 Million in Step Toward IPO’; Wall St Journal; March 17, 2021

24 Oscar Williams-Grut; Oxford scientists behind COVID-19 vaccine set for multimillion pound payday; Thu, 8 April 2021

25 Luke Andrews; ‘How two professors behind Oxford’s Covid vaccine stand to make MILLIONS with the jab – after its troubled path to approval; 30 December 2020; Daily Mail;

26 Sarah Boseley, How the AstraZeneca vaccine became a political football – and a PR disaster 26 March 2021, Guardian,

27 Paul D. Thacker, Tracking down John Bell: how the case of the Oxford professor exposes a transparency crisis in government; BMJ 24 February 2021; at 2021;372:n490

28 Ennals E. Government test tsar has £770 000 shares in drugs firm that sold us £13million of “pointless” antibody screening kits—after it emerged that Sir Patrick Vallance has a financial interest in company racing to find vaccine. Daily Mail. 26 September 2020.

29 Professor Sir John Bell, Academy President from 2006-2011; Regius Professor of Medicine at Oxford University.
https://acmedsci.ac.uk/about/governance/academy-president/professor-sir-john-bell

30 Donato Paolo Mancini, Astra-Zeneca Vaccine Document Shows Limits of no-profit pledge; October 7, 2020; Financial times London;

31 Alasdair Breckenridge & Kent Woods, ‘Medicines Regulation And The Pharmaceutical Industry. BMJ: British Medical Journal, 2005, 331:834-836

32 Stecklow, MacAskill, Burher, Kelland and Paroldi, op cit

33 Clive Cookson, UK vaccine supremo Kate Bingham: The bickering needs to stop; April 3, 2021. Financial Times, London

34 Dr. John Puntis, Why we launched a People’s Covid Inquiry and how you can take part March 26, 2021;

Double Affiliation

How can non-German socialists combine local activism with the politics of their home country?


08/04/2021

I was born in Palencia in Spain almost 32 years ago and have lived in Berlin since 2016. I started to be active in Izquierda Unida (United Left – IU) at the end of 2015, at first as a sympathizer, then as a member, and currently I participate in the assembly of IU Berlin. In 2018 my situation in the German capital was stabilizing and every day it became clearer to me that I would stay here for a long time. That’s why I decided to join Die Linke in 2019 in my district, in Steglitz-Zehlendorf. Die Linke and IU are sister organizations, and both belong to the Party of the European Left and the Left Group in the European Parliament.

I am a double member because I have a double status, that of a Spanish emigrant and that of an immigrant and resident in Germany. As such, the decisions taken in Spain affect my rights (health care, voting rights) or, for example, the perspective of my possible return. Similarly, decisions taken in the Bundestag affect my material conditions (such as housing), my labor rights or my future prospects in Berlin. For this reason, dual affiliation becomes a mechanism to convey the demands of this dual condition.

The double affiliation in two political parties (beyond other types of membership in trade unions, associations, social movements, etc.) is enriching. You learn to participate in two organizations, each with its own mechanisms of functioning, with its own political communicative and strategic lines – which are similar yet distinct. This enables the accumulation of an enormous political-organizational know-how to add to one’s toolbox. You learn different ways of addressing the same issues, sometimes conditioned by the reality of the country itself, but often with a perspective that allows you to apply your experiences and knowledge from one organization to another.

We are internationalists and that is why the double affiliation becomes a condition in which fraternal ties are strengthened, in which we fight more closely side by side for social justice, for environmental protection, for socialism or for peace. We are militants who, as stated in the documents approved by a majority in the XII Asamblea Federal of IU (the twelfth federal assembly of the United Left), held in late March, “help us to build a network of solidarity and cooperation between left organizations”. Internationalism is also built every day by the base and, in this, migration plays a fundamental role.

The double affiliation is also an endurance test: meetings that overlap, schedules and ways of organizing the day that vary between countries and customs; meetings in different languages (Spanish, German, also in English), parallel organizations of events… This way of working cannot always fit into a 24 hour day and sometimes involves deciding which organization to give preference at a given time. This does not mean leaving the other affiliation (far from it), but trying to establish a scale of priorities according to the moment and the situation not only of the organization itself, but of the general social and political context.

There are days when consecutive meetings mean spending several hours in front of a screen. In many cases, like my own, this is after having spent many hours in front of that same screen working. This means both physical and mental fatigue, and also can sometimes prevent you from enjoying other forms of free time, the company of family, friends or partner, or simply the legitimate right to do absolutely nothing.

At this point you may wonder whether it is worth dedicating so much time to this task. The answer is yes. The pros outweigh the cons and, above all, the spirit of striving together in a broad and diverse community is very rewarding and breathes energy into the most exhausting days. Building bridges is what we do instead of putting up walls, as do the extreme right and the nationalist trends that shake Europe and the whole world, because

“Across the frontiers and seas the workers of all nations reach out to each other the hands for a brotherly union; against the international reactionary power of capitalism rises the international revolutionary power of the working class.

The capitalist exploitation unites the workers without difference of trade, sex, religion, and nationality, into the one revolutionary army, that is going to conquer a new world, where labour has all to win and nothing to lose but its chains.”

(Clara Zetkin).

This article first appeared in Spanish in la Region internacional

The Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism and its Potential

Despite some minor flaws, the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism offers a step forward in the fight against the instrumentalisation of antisemitism


06/04/2021

25 March 2021 saw the release of the ‘Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism’ (JDA), a document that emerged from a year-long collaboration between scholars in the fields of Holocaust history, Jewish studies and Middle East studies, and was signed by over 200 academics from these and related disciplines. After years of damage caused by the ‘working definition’ of antisemitism launched by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA), which has been circulating since 2016, there is finally a competing document with substantial intellectual weight behind it. Indeed, the JDA specifically states its aim of replacing the IHRA definition.

For years, activists and academics, and even one of the main contributors to the IHRA definition, Kenneth Stern, have complained that the document is being used as a universal standard and an instrument to restrict freedom of speech. It is ironic that something proposed as a working definition – ostensibly a work in progress, something subject to further modification and refinement over time – should have established itself as an incontestable yardstick, a document that lobby groups could pressure organisations and institutions in the fields of academia, culture, politics and even sport to adopt formally. For many in Europe and North America, its validity is so self-evident that to challenge it is to undermine the fight against antisemitism and insult the Jews who are at risk of such discrimination.

Far from being a primarily Jewish attitude, this view has established itself among many non-Jewish groups and individuals who wish to demonstrate their commitment to that worthy cause. Indeed, an important factor in their embrace of the definition – alongside lobbying pressure – is the fact that it appears to give them clarity on an issue that a surprising number of them seem to have difficulty understanding. This is because waters that should be quite clear have been muddied by the discursive dominance of the issue of Israel, its occupation of Palestinian land and its violence towards Palestinians.

Evidence-based criticism

Another contradiction in the IHRA definition is its combination of vagueness and restrictive specificity. While the definition itself, which is followed by eleven examples (of which seven deal with Israel), speaks nebulously of a ‘certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews’, the examples seek to proscribe such statements as ‘The state of Israel is a racist endeavour’. By failing to draw clear lines between racial prejudice and political positions, the IHRA makes it very easy to discredit the latter through accusations of the former. After a preamble, the JDA echoes this structure by providing a concise definition – ‘Antisemitism is discrimination, prejudice, hostility or violence against Jews as Jews (or Jewish institutions as Jewish)’ – and following this with guidelines and examples. One particularly important passage at the very end states:

Criticism that some may see as excessive or contentious, or as reflecting a ‘double standard,’ is not, in and of itself, antisemitic. In general, the line between antisemitic and non-antisemitic speech is different from the line between unreasonable and reasonable speech.

In other words, a political statement should be assessed first of all on the basis of its political content; this means that a statement about Israel should be viewed first of all as applying to the state, not to Jews, and the JDA also emphasises that ‘evidence-based’ criticism of the state is not inherently antisemitic.

As a result, the JDA makes previously unspeakable issues negotiable: support for boycotting Israel or the demand for a single Israeli-Palestinian state are not in themselves discriminatory, and the reader is reminded that boycotts are a time-honoured political tool. No doubt this will enrage pro-Israel actors whose argumentation rests on the assertion that these are, in fact, antisemitic – such as the 2019 anti-BDS resolution passed in the Bundestag. Thankfully, the text does not embark on any deliberations on supposedly troubling associations or undertones, such as the Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses, making clear that this is an optional debate that is unnecessary for purposes of definition. Such debates play into the hands of those who assert the centrality of coded expressions of antisemitism, antisemitic ‘tropes’, for almost any critical statement about Israel.

Just as years of debate about a definition of antisemitism have mainstreamed the notion that such a document is necessary, the endless discussions of codes and tropes has widely established the premise that the importance of coded references is unique to antisemitism and its history. Yet it should go without saying that any tradition of prejudice has its own tropes, some more obvious and some more coded, some more aggressive and some more subtle. The implication that Muslims are fanatics, that black people are inherently violent or uncontrolled, that homosexuals are deviants who spread disease and probably engage in pedophilia too, that Roma and Travellers are born thieves and liars, and so forth – all of these prejudices are encountered in daily life and studied by academics. Rich, hook-nosed Jews plotting to take over the world are just one more figure in this universe of discrimination and dehumanisation.

Recognising the importance of bringing disadvantaged groups together for the cause of anti-racism and anti-discrimination is crucial, and the JDA explicitly recognises this, asserting that ‘while antisemitism has certain distinctive features, the fight against it is inseparable from the overall fight against all forms of racial, ethnic, cultural, religious, and gender discrimination.’ Such an acknowledgement is sorely lacking in the IHRA definition.

The importance of context

By stating that certain views or formulations are not antisemitic ‘on the face of it’, the JDA emphasises the importance of context. In other words, it encourages thinking rather than blind obedience and knockdown arguments. The twisted logic that repeatedly leads to the defamation of pro-Palestine activists, including Jews, is done away with. In the FAQ section, which is helpful in discussing applications and interpretations of important points, the reply to a question about distinguishing between antisemitism and anti-Zionism clarifies:

The two concepts are categorically different. Nationalism, Jewish or otherwise, can take many forms, but it is always open to debate. Bigotry and discrimination, whether against Jews or anyone else, is never acceptable. This is an axiom of the JDA.

A central paradox in the discourse around what some (especially in Germany) call ‘Israel-related antisemitism’, mirrored in the IHRA definition, is that the conflation of Jews and Israel is condemned as antisemitic on the one hand, for example in the case of hostilities against Jewish people due to the violent acts of ‘their’ state, but on the other hand, this conflation is continued with positive connotations – a vicious circle. Similarly, one of the greatest absurdities of the IHRA document is that it decries the application of ‘double standards’ to Israel, a notion that is routinely used to challenge criticism that is considered normal when applied to other states with democratic deficits.

Only a separation of the two categories can curb such tendencies, and this separation is explicitly attempted by the JDA, as in its statement that anti-Zionism is not antisemitic. Moreover, pro-Israel individuals and organisations must now be confronted more strongly with the question of whether their own stance is not also characterised by antisemitic generalisation and conflation.

Some criticisms of the JDA

All this does not mean that there is no reason to criticise the JDA, and indeed, while its reception among progressive organisations (including various Jewish ones) has been largely positive, reservations have been expressed, not least on the Palestinian side. One is that the very name of the document immediately places the focus on the Israel-Palestine issue, which is thus immediately in play; antisemitism without reference to Israel is dealt with in the first points, but is automatically placed second by the naming. This framing is, of course, a reaction to the discourse poisoned by the IHRA definition, and the JDA emphasises several times that it sees itself as a correction of that. Still, one could criticise the JDA for engaging in this game and perpetuating the association.

There is also barely any reference to the most immediate antisemitic threat, which comes from the far right and white supremacism; there is merely one sentence in the FAQ stating that ‘The general guidelines (1-5) apply in all contexts, including the far right, where antisemitism is increasing.’ Moreover, while it emphasises that antisemitism and the understanding of it should not have special status, it potentially encourages this assumption by explicitly recommending itself as a ‘substitute’ for the IHRA definition. Although it states that it does not want to be a binding code either, it fails to point out that the very assumption that such a document is needed at all, and only for antisemitism, not for Islamophobia, anti-black racism, anti-queer discrimination and the like, is problematic in itself.

Also, the Palestinian perspective could be taken more into account – for example, a seemingly classically antisemitic statement about the excessive power of ‘the Jews’ or the unique evil of Israel would have a completely different meaning if made by traumatised residents of the blockaded and bombed Gaza Strip. The existence of such long-standing tropes as well-poisoning or child-murdering Jews is no reason to refrain from pointing out the genuine poisoning of wells in the West Bank, or the killing of some 500 children in the bombardment of Gaza in 2014. However, the document’s emphasis on discussion and context is not really compatible with such equations. Some of these questions and others are addressed in the FAQ appendix, which, in further contrast to the IHRA text, shows how the principles explained can help in evaluating statements and actions. This demonstrates how much the authors have also thought about the possible misuse of their document.

Why has the declaration been written?

Moreover, it is important to consider the purpose and target audience of the JDA. It was not written for Palestinians in order to tell them what they are allowed to say; it was written to counter those who instrumentalise antisemitism as a political weapon to attack solidarity with Palestinians, very often using the IHRA definition to do so. Many organisations that have felt the need to adopt the latter did so in order to demonstrate that they are on the side of Jews and because they were afraid of offending them; accordingly, some will feel that the JDA is not sufficiently clear and simple. The European Union even published a handbook for the application of the IHRA, further entrenching its failings. The JDA makes suggestions rather than presenting a checklist. But if it can achieve anything, it is this: to undermine that simplistic concept. While accepting the importance of the Israel-Palestine issue for purposes of debate – it is difficult to rebut an argument without addressing it – it can perhaps be used to show those who would prevent any debate that the matter cannot be viewed in such a reductive way. Another definition recently launched, the Nexus Document, contributes to this by its very existence; the more definitions or interpretations that are circulating, the less convincing the idea of a single one will seem.

It remains to be seen whether the JDA can change the discourse and counteract the suppression and demonisation of pro-Palestine activism and views. This cannot happen overnight; the damage done by the IHRA definition over the last five years or more is immense, and those who seek to avoid or prevent debate will not want to accept the premises of the JDA. It will be the task of activists and the small number of like-minded politicians willing to stand up against that demonisation to exert pressure and keep the discussion going. And perhaps it will turn out that the most realistic prospect is not so much the acceptance of the JDA as sowing doubt and weakening faith in the universal validity of any fixed definition.

At any rate, the wording of each individual formulation should not be the point here. The potential usefulness and strengths of the JDA far outweigh its weaknesses or omissions, and in the absence of comparable instruments with which to oppose the IHRA definition, it must be put to the test.

Die Grünen: In Praise of Green Capitalism

The German Green Party embraces capitalism, avoids talking about Left and Right, and wants to increase investment in military spending


05/04/2021

Last month, regional elections were held in some German states. In Baden-Württenberg, the Greens won a strong victory with more than 30% of the votes. Immediately, several Spanish political leaders congratulated the Green party, as is the case of Ínigo Errejón, leader of Más País, with the following text: “Congratulations to the German Greens for their victory in Baden-Württenberg. The green forces are making their way in Europe, and from Spain we pick up the torch. Without ecological transition there is no future”.

These congratulations are not unusual. After all, Errejón and Más País added part of the Equo Party to their ranks, including Inés Sabanés. Moreover, Errejón forced the number two on the list for Congress, Marta Higueras, to resign her seat to be replaced by Inés Sabanés (from Equo) and, in this way, to align with the Greens at the European level. Therefore, congratulating the Baden-Württemberg Greens would be considered normal.

But what does it mean to congratulate the Baden-Württenberg Greens? One might imagine that it would be to congratulate green or anti-capitalist policies. However, nothing could be further from the truth. The Greens in Baden-Württenberg have governed the federal state for 10 years with Winfried Kretschmann at their head. The first thing that would draw attention to his presidency is that since 2016 he has governed in a pact with Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic CDU. A priori, it is often thought that the Greens would swing more to the left. However, this is not necessarily the case in Germany, not only because of their pacts, but also because of their policies.

Kretschmann has maintained an ambiguous policy on asylum issues: while he advocated helping refugees in the Moria camps, he was skeptical about welcoming them to Germany and has even taken up the discourse that criminalizes refugees. He went as far as to propose that those who were problematic should be moved away from the big cities and distributed in the countryside, something he has of course never said about the German population, but neither has he said about white, Christian or European migrants.

Kretschmann even seems to have forgotten Green policy flagship programs, such as the reduction of the automobiles as a means of transportation. It is for this reason that even Greenpeace blacklisted him in 2016. The reason for this was that he made his election spot aboard a Daimler limousine, an Automotive multinational that donated €40,000 to The Greens for their electoral campaigns.

It could be thought that Kretschmann is a loose figure in the Greens, and while this is partly true, it is the logical deformation of an evolution of the German Greens that went from its initial ecosocialism towards a green capitalism, a contradiction in terminis that consists of not touching the production, while eating organic products transported in paper bags instead of plastic. But it even seems that nature is no longer so important. The Hessen Greens, who co-govern as a minority partner also with the Christian Democratic CDU, have supported the construction of the A-49 highway, which involves the destruction of large parts of the Dannenroeder Forst, which has led to numerous clashes with environmental activists.

In any case, the trend has been going on for a long time. The Greens define themselves as critics of capitalism, but no longer as anti-capitalists, as they were in their origins, but neither do they define themselves as anti-militarist or anti-imperialist. The former co-chair of The Greens between 2008 and 2018, Cem Oezdemir, considered that Germany has to “deploy the military abroad from a green optic,” whatever that is. Perhaps he is referring to when Joschka Fischer, foreign minister under Schroeder between 1998 and 2005, unambiguously pushed for and justified the interventions of the Bundeswehr (the German military) in Kosovo and Afghanistan, the first deployment of German troops abroad since 1945. What is more, the new co-president of the Greens, Annalena Baerbock, has clearly defended the increase in military spending and the deployment of German troops (“from a green point of view” one must assume) in foreign missions, without renouncing the imperialist umbrella of NATO.

The Greens manage to break electoral barriers with a policy that does not disturb capital and with significant support among the young and urban middle classes. The Green policy does not threaten the system, while it eases the conscience of its voters with ecological products bought in ecological and unaffordable supermarkets such as Biomarkt or Alnatura.

So, repeating the initial question, what does it mean to support The Greens of Germany by politicians like Errejón? A slogan of the Greens was “neither left nor right, forward.” Perhaps this concept sounds a little more familiar and “forward” sounds like that transversality that ends up supporting in Madrid the “Operación Chamartín” and looking at the construction cranes while eating organic mangoes brought from Brazil.

Jaime Martínez Porro is an activist and member of Izquierda Unida (IU) Berlin. This article first appeared in Spanish on the tercera Información Website.

The Dictator Against Survivors

What is Erdoğan’s Problem with Women? On the Turkish withdrawal from the 2011 Istanbul Convention protecting women’s rights


04/04/2021

On 19th of March, with a midnight Presidential decree, Turkey was pulled out of Istanbul convention, of which the country was the first signatory state. After its signing in 2011, the AKP government used the Convention for publicity and avoiding critiques for their politician’s misogynist conducts. Read from this angle, the decision is also a last sign of Erdoğan’s giving up on political legitimacy completely.

Since the withdrawal was announced on the Official Gazette [1], everybody in Turkey and abroad tried to make sense of Erdoğan’s decision. Why he did what he did and why he did it now? Indeed, the AKP government made at least five highly controversial decisions within these three days. Some of these came directly from Erdoğan and some from other state institutions completely captured by Erdoğan’s party (as in the case of HDP closure case, which was issued by the Chief Public Prosecutor).

Let us make sense of why now and why all of them at once. Let me remind you that this decision came only one day after the US and EU’s decision of no sanction over the crisis in Mediterranean see with Greece. Moreover, this decision was unpopular even in his own party, and came after he consolidated the nationalist-religious block with HDP’s closure case. Therefore, it is not completely surprising and illogical.

However, we should keep in mind that there is a lot of arbitrariness that does not allow us to find an overarching agenda Erdoğan has in mind. In fact, many of Erdoğan’s actions stems from his and his parties’ awareness that they swiftly lose legitimacy and support. These attempts sometimes result with contradictory moves. Yet, such contradictions sometime lead the opposition to claim that actions such as withdrawing from the Convention have no purpose at all and are only short-term tactical moves to win elections [2]. But I believe Erdoğan’s and his supporters’ misogyny has more long-lasting aims and consequences than simply winning elections as I show below.

Why Istanbul Convention?

Erdoğan and his allies’ misogyny is nothing new. Since the first days of the AKP power, they came under fire for their misogynist and homophobic language and deeds. So much so that, Erdoğan stated several times that he did not believe men and women were equal. His former Deputy Prime Minister Büent Arınç compared unveiled women with peeled tangerine: ‘Who would like to buy a peeled tangerine at the supermarket’ he rhetorically asked. And didn’t they signal the withdrawal before? AKP claims that the Convention wasn’t even effective since violence against women has increased since its ratification. So why are we outraged about this decision? What makes the Istanbul Convention so precious for women in Turkey?

As we know, Istanbul Convention is not under attack only in Turkey but in Hungary and Poland too. Feminist activists point out that the Convention is one of the most progressive international text on combating violence against women and other sexual minorities. It defines violence in a broader way to include violence within family and its broader spectrum: sexual, economic, emotional and physical. Moreover, it obliges the signatory states to take preventive actions. When this was not achieved, it requires them to protect the victims and bring justice by effective punishment. It recognizes non-binary sexual identities and LGBTQI+, equally requires state action in case of violence against them. In doing so, it puts the gender roles into question and recognizes violence as a political and social problem; not an anomaly conducted only by outlaws.

This, in return, puts the Convention in a direct contradiction with Erdoğan and similar leaders (of for eg Hungary) ideological and political standpoints. Indeed, he and his fellows were quite open about this: Several religious “civil society leaders” and politicians stated that their priority is to protect family – as opposed to the Convention’s emphasis on protecting individuals. This is especially problematic for them, because the individuals that are being protected are considered as the outcasts. The outcasts are ones that society needs to be cleared from.

This is why the governing party pointed the LGBTQI+ out when they explained their opposition to the Convention. According to them (and they are right), the Convention requires Turkey to recognize non-binary sexual identities and takes action to create an egalitarian society. Erdoğan plays with his supporters’ conservative religious “sensitivities” by saying that they cannot keep Turkey in a convention that requires the country to allow same-sex marriage. These are the same people who think LGBTQI+ is an acronym for a terrorist organization and asks protesting students whether they are members!

But make no mistake: They are equally hostile to women. For religious nationalists3, women are only worth “protecting” when they are in line with their conservative family values and when they ‘know their place’. That is why, they can be so reckless to withdraw from an international convention that combats violence against women when women are killed by their exes, husbands, family members every day! The protection that the AKP is willing to provide is a selective one – only “family women” are worthy and this is a chastening process. This is why specifically feminists, and the protesting women are targeted. This is why women that are visible and vocal in public are so much hated by Erdoğan and his allies. And this is why even women in his own party who saw the gravity of withdrawal and opposed it were terrorized and punished by men in higher places of their clerical rule [4].

Indeed, these very same people and groups call also for withdrawal from Lanzarote and CEDAW. The first is another Convention brought about by Council of Europe which aims to protect children from sexual abuse and misconducts. In their language, this is against Turkish family structure and corrupts Turkish society. You might wonder how. But let me remind you: Three years ago, the head of Directorate of Religious Affairs announced that girls as young as nine can marry according to religious law. On top of that, one of third of women in Turkey get married under the age of eighteen. Therefore, I believe this is a full-fledged war to build their masculine tyranny. It goes much beyond a simple populist action to win elections. On the contrary, when taking into account that at least sixty percent of Turkish population opposes the decision of withdrawal, it is hard to understand why this decision will help them to win elections. All it can do is to consolidate this tyrannical rule and only satisfy Erdoğan’s most radical supporters.

With all this in mind, I believe the decision is also a message to the opposition. For years now, feminist and LGBT struggle has been at the core of the social movements that opposes Erdoğan’s Turkish-Islamic rule. Struggles against male violence and sexual abuse are the main pillars of this movement. Such international conventions and the gains we had, thanks to nothing but our international feminist struggle, provide solid ground for our demands. By taking this action, Erdoğan and Co, aim to deprive us from our rights and moreover crush the movement.

However, these lasts actions to consolidate his base are likely to blow back on his face, especially when his decisions aren’t backed by a strong economy. Moreover, despite setbacks and losses we faced, and despite an incredible level of violence, the women’s struggle in Turkey has become one of the most inspiring movement in our history. As a young movement that only flourished as an independent movement (as opposed to earlier movements that were part of socialist organizations) in ‘90s, we already acquired many gains, Istanbul Convention is being one of them. Hence, it is unlikely that Erdoğan will succeed in erasing the hard-won gains.

Zozan Baran is an activist and currently independent scholar from Turkey of Kurdish descent. She obtained her BA from Boğaziçi University Political Science department and MA from Freie Universitaet Berlin Sociology department. She currently resides in Berlin and continues to write on political regimes and movements from a comparative perspective.

Footnotes

1 An official gazette is the legal newspaper of a country, or of an administrative part of a country, which publishes the text of new laws, decrees, regulations, treaties, legal notices, and court decisions. The laws published in official gazettes are primary law in the official source; publication in the gazette, in many cases, initiates jurisdiction. The text published is the authoritative version, and commonly, the only published version. (https://www.crl.edu/collections/topics/official-gazettes)

2 There are rumors that Erdoğan will announce early elections.

3 And of course, it isn’t limited to them and shared by a wider segment of the society.

4 A notorious Islamist writer from a newspaper that can be compared to Bild in Germany, Abdurrahman Dilipak called members of KADEM (a religious women organization that mostly defended very conservative policies but opposed withdrawal) whores. The newly appointed Imam of Hagia Sophia similarly demonized Özlem Zengin, the AKP Group Deputy Chair Woman.