Displaying items by tag: Politics

British MPs from all parties called for the Labour leader to state his current position with regard to supporting Venezuela’s leadership. International censure of Venezuela’s Mr Maduro grew following two opposition leaders being seized from their homes in the middle of the night after the sham election. (see this week’s Prayer-Alert Venezuela article, below). Mr Corbyn has previously praised Venezuela as a ‘better way of doing things’ under Mr Maduro’s predecessor and mentor, Hugo Chávez, and welcomed Chávez to London in 2006. Mr Maduro has described Mr Corbyn as a ‘friend of Venezuela’. The Labour leader lauded Mr Maduro’s regime in June 2015, saying that its achievements in housing, health, education and jobs were ‘a cause for celebration’.  However, Venezuela has failed its citizens. There are food shortages, hyperinflation, citizens locked up, disappeared or murdered and there is a flow of cocaine from the country to Britain.

It is now time to pray for the many ‘transition arrangements’ that are currently being talked about by government ministers ahead of the UK’s transition from EU control to British sovereignty. Financiers, bankers and investors believe transition arrangements will become the battleground of Brexit, and could become as controversial as the subject of membership itself. Different aspects of the UK’s departure from the EU will progress at different speeds. Some negotiations will take months to complete, some may take years. The Department for Exiting the EU estimates that 57 policy areas are affected by Brexit, producing potentially 57 Brexit varieties. Pray for God to establish strong, clear, negotiations for the break from EU control in each of the legislations and policies for agriculture, fisheries, customs, repatriation, immigration and justice. All very comprehensive with many dimensions, may God be in the new details and implementation at every step towards completion on 31 March 2019. (Linda Digby Prayer-Alert Team)

Holiday venues: pray for God to pour out his blessings on all the Christian summer camps for youth and adults during the next few weeks. Pray for protection from terror attacks wherever people gather this season. French politics: may God give grace to President Macron, who secured a majority in the National Assembly last month. He must seize a small window of opportunity for radical economic change, while not falling into the same trap as President Sarkozy, who faced a wave of paralyzing strikes after unveiling his first radical proposals. Pray for Macron to reverse France’s decline through wise management of the National Assembly. Migration crisis: pray for European and African ministers trying to regularise the flow of refugees from Africa to Europe, coupled with a much tougher strategy to deport illegal migrants from Italy and break up smuggling rings. See:

The limits of the EU’s integrationist ambitions are being exposed by a fight between Poland’s hard-line conservative government and the European Commission, because Poland is failing to maintain the ‘rule of law’. There has long been a simmering east-west split over migration, and fundamental values have burst into open warfare. Many believe this constitutional crisis could pull Europe apart. Poland is accused of reneging on the commitment it made to maintain ‘stable institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law and human rights’. An Article 7 sanction procedure will be triggered against Poland if it fails to address concerns over judicial reforms or starts firing Supreme Court judges. On 26 July the European Commission set a one-month deadline for the Warsaw government to ‘solve all the problems identified’ in its judicial overhaul. The commission also set a red line for Poland, ‘if it decides to fire any of the Supreme Court judges’. Poland criticised the threats from the EU to halt their voting rights in the bloc as ‘blackmail’.

For centuries the social and political organisation of many Iraqis has centred on the tribe. Socially, tribes were divided into related sub-tribes, which further divided into clans, and then into extended families. Today 75% of Iraq’s people are members of a tribe with a strict honour code. Despite the liberation of most of IS-occupied areas, political differences and a struggle for power remain. There have been clashes between the Popular Mobilisation Units and the Kurdish Peshmerga forces near Kirkuk. Also, on 20 July clashes between the Sunni Nineveh Guards and the Shi’ite faction of Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada took place in Mosul. There are fears that these clashes might expand into open warfare amid deep differences over the disputed tribal areas extending from the Iranian border, through Kirkuk province and into Yazidi areas near the Syrian border. Terrorists have also been exploiting tribal differences for years. For historical roots, see:

The Brexit teams meet this week after a delayed negotiation start. Pray for both Davis and Barnier as they compare their respective positions; may they make good progress, identifying differences and recognising similarities that can be reinforced. The Centre for European Policy Studies believes the delay is indicative of UK politicians’ division and infighting. Pray for a healing of rifts  during the summer break between chancellor Philip Hammond and his colleagues, and  for harmony when parliament resumes in September. Also many believe that, whether through arrogance or incompetence, the reputation of the Foreign Office has been undermined under Boris Johnson. His comment that ‘the EU could go whistle for its money in the Brexit negotiations’ opened a potential no-deal scenario which could dismantle the economy. Pray that Mr Johnson, a man of high intelligence, may reveal the more serious and credible side of his personality.

Europe will tackle the deep problems that drove Britons to vote Leave. The European Commission’s chief strategists say they now realise that they must change fundamentally to remain relevant to people's lives. Jean-Claude Juncker’s top officials argue that the EU is becoming more open and democratic, and that the future ‘must not be fudged or decided behind closed doors’. They directed their message to the British people, after some member states signalled that the door is still open if the UK wishes to be a part of the new future. Steve Baker, UK’s minister negotiating Brexit, said he wants the EU torn down, adding, ‘They realise that disintegration, illiberal democracy and populism are profoundly dangerous to our democratic traditions - the freedom and tolerance painstakingly built over decades, which has at times been taken for granted.’ The Archbishop of Canterbury called for a cross-party Brexit commission, saying that working together could draw much of the poison from Brexit debates.

It is over two weeks since the Grenfell Tower fire disaster, and people are still very angry. Many believe that people need not have died that night. Successive governments presided over a progressive weakening of regulation and inspection systems that would one day lead to tragedy. They had been warned again and again, by fire officers, buildings inspectors, MPs, insurers - everyone who knew anything at all about fire safety. In Scotland, after a man died in a 1999 tower block fire, the rules on permissible building materials were changed and the inspection regime tightened. The same was not done in England. In 2013, after six people died in a London tower block fire, a coroner recommended a review of fire safety regulations ‘with particular regard to the spread of fire over the external envelope of a building’. The review was never carried out. May health and safety rules never again be mocked.

The march from Ankara to Istanbul, from 15 June to 9 July, is a response to spreading injustice and judicial system abuse by President Erdogan’s ruling party (AKP) after last year’s coup. The 450km march and rally by the opposition party CHP offered another way of engaging in politics, not filled with divisive and hate-filled rhetoric (the default mode of AKP). Not once did Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the CHP leader, and his supporters respond negatively to pro-government followers targeting them along the route. Instead, they responded with applause. Mr Kilicdaroglu said they had gathered to break down the ‘walls of fear’ erected by the ruling party.

India's politics are complicated by caste, racial and religious prejudices, and cultural identity. The constitution outlawed the caste system, but it is very much alive. It also guarantees religious freedom, but increasing persecution threatens that liberty. On 17 July Indians will elect a new president. The leading candidates, Mr Ram Nath Kovind and Mrs Meira Kumar, are Dalits (formerly known as ‘untouchables’). Mr Kovind is anti-Christian and anti-Muslim. Mrs Meira is said to ‘represent the values that bind India as a nation.’ Prime minister Modi wants a Hindu nation. There is a very real danger that Christians could be marginalised by the outcome of this election. An Indian Christian pastor is urging Christians reading this prayer alert to pray, ‘binding demonic spirits that are forcing through anti-conversion laws and trying to wipe out the Christian presence in India. Bind the spirit of confusion and pray for truth to reign, for God's perfect plan for India to prevail.’