Will May end in June?

This past week has been another weird one in UK politics.

Let’s start with looking at the upcoming European Parliamentary elections and what’s happening with Brexit. The latest polling shows that Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party is likely to gain the most votes in the UK as establishment parties are squeezed across the UK. Opinium finds that the Brexit Party is polling at 34% of the vote ahead of the 23rd May election, with Labour in second place on 20% and Prime Minister Theresa May’s Conservatives in fourth place on 12%. It’s important to remember that the UK is only participating in these elections as it failed to leave the EU as planned at the end of March. So, you might be thinking – even if polling isn’t in Theresa May’s favour, surely Brexit talks are going well?

Well, think again.

In the past week, after weeks of long discussions and little progress, cross-party talks between the government and the Labour party collapsed. The Prime Minister is now committed to giving MPs a vote on her Withdrawal Agreement Bil in the first week of June, having promised to set a timetable for leaving Downing Street following this vote. Theresa May has already promised to resign if she loses; and it’s important to note that the Withdrawal Agreement has already been rejected three times in the House of Commons. However, May has stated that the “new and improved” Brexit deal that MPs will vote on will be a “bold offer” they haven’t seen before.

Several Conservative MPs, including Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, have already announced their intentions to run for Tory leader. Other leadership contenders include the new Defence Secretary Penny Mordaunt; current Foreign Minister Jeremy Hunt; Home Secretary Sajid Javid; and previous Secretary of State for Northern Ireland James – ‘four ovens’ – Brokenshire.

Meanwhile, Change UK hasn’t had the best week either. The party’s lead candidate for the European elections in Scotland, David Macdonald, quit the race and is now endorsing the Liberal Democrats instead. Macdonald said that he believed Change UK was splitting the Remain vote, especially in Scotland where there is a “much more diluted remain vote.” Chuka Umunna, Change UK’s spokesman, described Macdonald’s decision as regrettable.

This is the pro-remain party’s most embarrassing setback yet – possibly even more Joan Ryan’s ‘look at your hands’ speech in Bath:

Currently just 3% of voters say that they would back Change UK in a future general election, according to Opinium.

 

Tensions increase between Iran and… basically everyone

There has been an escalation in tensions between Iran and the US over the last week in the midst of Iran’s statement that it will stop complying with parts of its 2015 nuclear deal, one year after the US pulled out of the agreement.

As regional tensions increased, Washington stated that it would send a US aircraft carrier and other forces in to the Middle East to respond to what it said were Iranian threats. Sources in Washington have also claimed that the intelligence that caused the US to escalate its warnings about Iranian threats came from photographs of missiles on small boats in the Persian Gulf that were put on board by Iranian paramilitary forces. However, other officials have stated that Iran’s moves are likely to be defensive against what Tehran believes are provocative acts by Washington. Iran is claiming that ‘Iran hawks’ in the Trump administration – such as National Security Advisor John Bolton, or Secretary of State Mike Pompeo – sense an opportunity to change the regime in Tehran, resorting to military action if maximum economic pressure does not work. Iran’s economy has been suffering from the re-imposition of US sanctions that were previously revoked under the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), as well as the depreciation of their rial currency.

Fears of war between Iran and the US rose during the week after the US deployed warships and planes to the Gulf and withdrew diplomatic staff from Iraq. Germany and the Netherlands are also suspending military programmes in the country. Iraq’s government is currently allied with both countries in this increasingly contentious confrontation as it currently hosts more than 5,000 US troops and is home to powerful Iranian-backed militias –  some of whom want those US forces to leave. In addition, Norway, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates wrote to the UN Security Council about “sabotage operations” on four commercial vessels near the territorial waters of the UAE. A Norwegian-registered oil products tanker was among the vessels hit, along with a UAE fuel bunker barge. Iran has denied it was behind the attacks, while the UAE has stated that it is committed to de-escalation during this “difficult situation.”

Despite the escalation of both action and rhetoric by both sides, President Trump has stated that he does not want war with Iran, while his senior diplomats begin searching for alternative ways to defuse tensions. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also asked European officials for help in persuading Iran to ‘des-escalate’ tensions. However, the past week hasn’t been the best for UK-Iranian tensions either. In fact, the UK Foreign Office has hardened its travel advice for Iran, advising British-Iranian dual-nationals not to travel there. This change came after the dual-national British Council worker Aras Amiri was jailed for spying and sentenced to 10 years in prison in Iran after travelling to the country to visit her ill grandmother. In an official statement the UK Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said that “dual nationals face an intolerable risk of mistreatment if they visit Iran,” making specific reference to the case of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a dual British-Iranian national, who is currently serving five years in an Iranian prison for spying. Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe and her family deny the charge, with her husband Richard Ratcliffe writing in this past week that the arrest of his wife and Ms Amiri is “part of a new wave of hostage diplomacy.”

Despite Iran‘s foreign minister stating that “there will be no war” with the US, all eyes will continue to be on the region as US diplomats have warned commercial airliners flying over the Persian Gulf that they faced a risk of being “misidentified.” In the background of all of this, the clock is continuing to count down the 60 day-deadline that Iran has given Europe to protect Iran from US sanctions in order to save the JCPOA.

 

Moves in the US to ban abortion

The state of Alabama made the headlines this week when it passed the strictest abortion bill in the US.

Alabama’s GOP-dominated Senate voted 25-6 to ban abortions at every stage of pregnancy and criminalise the procedure for doctors, who could be charged with felonies and face up to 99 years in prison for carrying out the procedure. It includes an exception for cases when the mother’s life is at serious risk. Senators rejected an attempt to add an exception for rape and incest, with the amendment being voted down 21-11. The law was purposefully crafted to persuade the US Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 46-year-old ruling that recognized a constitutional right for a woman to end a pregnancy.

The passing of this bill prompted international outrage, with parallels being drawn by activists between the new law in Alabama and current legislation in Northern Ireland. As the Offences Against the Persons Act 1861 remains in place in Northern Ireland, those who seek an abortion in Northern Ireland can face jail sentences up to life. The UK’s Abortion Act 1967, which now allows for lawful abortions across Great Britain up to 24 weeks into pregnancy and beyond that in certain circumstances, was never applied in Northern Ireland. In the wake of the ruling in Alabama there has been a surge in pressure to change Northern Ireland abortion laws, with a campaign calling on pro-choice supporters to email their MPs to demand action seeing 200 emails sent to politicians every hour since its launch. Stars of the hit Channel 4 show Derry Girls have promoted the #NowForNI campaign on social media.

Since the beginning of 2019 eight states in the US have passed bills to limit abortion, with Missouri being the latest state to pass a bill to ban abortions after a foetal heartbeat is detected, known as a ‘heartbeat bill’. Each of these bill is likely to see a legal challenge by groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) – something that pro-life supporters welcome in their attempts to challenge and overturn Roe v. Wade. 

 

Australia, not to be confused with Austria

Australia’s conservative Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, secured a surprise election victory in this past week.

Morrison’s Liberal-National Coalition defied expectations, with the Labor Party widely thought to have been on course to enter government for the first time in six years. Its leader Bill Shorten has resigned in the wake of his party’s defeat, stating that “it is obvious that Labor will not be able to form the next government.” High-profile New South Wales left-winger Anthony Albanese is already looking at the Labor leadership position.

In his victory speech Morrison told his supporters that he “always believed in miracles,” paying tribute to “the quiet Australians” who voted for the Liberal-National Coalition. Morrison is expected to reconvene parliament immediately so that he can pass promised tax cuts.

Separately, in Austria a snap election has been called by Chancellor Sebastian Kurz following the collapse of the country’s coalition government (we’ve all been there, amirite?). Vice-Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache resigned after secret footage emerged showing him talking to an alleged Russian investor. This footage showed Strache, of the far-right Freedom Party, promising government contracts to a woman posing as a Russian backer in return for help in his election campaign. Strache told a press conference that he was the victim of a “targeted political assassination” aimed at breaking apart the coalition government and insisted he had done nothing illegal. He resigned a day after the footage emerged, stating that he did so in order to avoid further damage to the government.    

Kurz’s centre-right People’s Party has been in government with Strache’s far-right Freedom Party for 17 months. Such a coalition is not conventional in Austrian politics and was regarded as an experiment in the viability of alliances between mainstream and populist parties. In his statement announcing the snap election Kurz, who sees himself as the future of European conservativism, said he believed that “The Freedom Party has damaged the country’s image,” adding that he didn’t have the impression the party was willing to change.

Some European mainstream politicians see the downfall of Strache as a far-right leader as an opportunity before the European Parliament elections coming up next week, calling Strache “the first domino” in the downfall of populist leaders in Europe. Whether this optimistic take is true will be revealed in the European election results.

 

Breaking new ground in Taiwan

This week Taiwan became the first country in Asia to vote to legalise same-sex marriage. Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, who campaigned on a platform of marriage equality, tweeted after the vote: “We took a big step towards true equality, and made Taiwan a better country.”

However, this campaign was not without its challenges. In 2018 voters in Taiwan rejected the legalisation of same-sex marriage in a series of referendums, instead backing the definition of marriage as the union of a man and a woman. This was despite the fact that in 2017 Taiwan’s top judges ruled in favour of same-sex marriage, with its parliament being given a two-year deadline to revise the law defining marriage as exclusively between a man and a woman. It was decided in this past week that instead of amending this existing law, a new law has been created under which same-sex marriages will be regulated.

Human rights activists hope that this vote will influence other places in Asia to legalise same-sex marriage.