Soaring food prices threaten workers with food insecurity and starvation
Around the world, in developing and so-called advanced countries alike, millions are facing food insecurity and hunger amid soaring prices and shortages of food.
•Jacob Crosse
Latest articles
Australian Greens beg for power-sharing arrangement with right-wing Labor government
The Greens have dispensed with any pretense of opposition to the major parties. In practice, they have abandoned most of their policies on climate change, the party’s stated raison d’etre.
•Oscar Grenfell, Socialist Equality Party Senate candidate for New South Wales
Oppose military deployment in Sri Lanka’s free trade zones
The Apparel Workers’ Action Committee warns that this repressive move could be extended to other centres of the working class in both the private and public sectors.
•Apparel Workers’ Action Committee
SEP candidates for Australian election discuss socialist program on podcast
The discussion, which lasted over an hour, covered many topics, including the threat of war, the disastrous consequences the official “let it rip” pandemic policies and the burning need to build a socialist movement of the working class.
•Our reporters
Finnish parliament approves proposal to join NATO
The same day that Finland and Sweden formally submitted their NATO membership applications, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs declared it was ending the country's participation in the Council of the Baltic Sea States.
•Andrea Peters
Teachers in Brookline, Massachusetts, end one-day strike after union agrees to below-inflation, six-year contract
The BEU has kept workers on the job for nearly three years without a contract. Like many teachers, including those in the Boston Public Schools system who have been working without a contract for eight months, Brookline educators are demanding “reasonable compensation as well as working conditions that meet the realities of a modern, comprehensive education.”
•Andrew Timon
The 2022 Australian election and the bipartisan assault on refugees
While the Labor party and Coalition whip up xenophobic sentiment, only the SEP fights in this election to end the persecution of refugees.
•Max Boddy, Socialist Equality Party candidate for New South Wales
LA County workers must reject sellout agreement!
Los Angeles County workers are being asked to approve a contract that would further erode their living standards.
•Rafael Azul
One week after decisive contract rejection, why aren’t workers at Detroit Diesel on strike?
These endless delays, which help only management not workers, must be brought to an end. Detroit Diesel workers should demand that UAW Local 163 immediately set a strike deadline for no later than May 24.
•WSWS Autoworker Newsletter
In Buffalo, Biden covers up role of Republican Party in promoting fascist “Replacement Theory”
In the course of his remarks, Biden managed to omit the words “Trump” and “Republican,” or name a single Republican official, media outlet or commentator who has promoted the racist and anti-Semitic themes of the “Great Replacement.”
•Barry Grey
Las Vegas sanitation workers vote to strike
Las Vegas sanitation workers must take the fight out of Teamsters hands by forming a Rank-and-File Committee to reach out to other workers in struggle—sanitation, truckers, teachers and health care workers.
•Rafael Azul
Pay packages for US CEOs hit record for sixth year in a row
The median pay package for the CEOs of the biggest US corporations set another record in 2021 of $14.7 million and included an increase of $1 million in cash compensation.
•Kevin Reed
Striking Iowa CNH worker speaks out, as UAW floats ending strike without a contract
The UAW is reportedly floating the possibility of suspending the strike and ordering a return to work without a contract, which would signify an abject surrender to the company’s intransigent demands for concessions.
•Marcus Day
Washington D.C. transit union calls off 3-day strike, agrees to below-inflation wages for 150 D.C. transit workers
D.C. Circulator drivers will see their wages eaten up by inflation as an even greater crisis in the region’s transit system looms.
•Leon Gutierrez, Nick Barrickman
What is behind the International Socialist League’s support to US/NATO war drive against Russia?
For revolutionary internationalists, the determining question is not “who fired the first shot,” but rather what is the general character of a given war and the social forces behind it.
•Tomas Castanheira, Ulaş Ateşçi
Canada’s official COVID-19 death toll surpasses 40,000 amid sixth wave of infections
In an article marking the grim milestone, Global News acknowledged that the “true death toll could be thousands higher,” since “two-thirds of all COVID-19 deaths may have been missed.” If this is the case, Canada’s real death toll amounts to a staggering 120,000 people.
•Dylan Lubao
WHO study reveals high excess mortality in Germany during the pandemic
The actual death toll resulting from the German government’s coronavirus policies is much higher than its official statistics show. This is proven by the latest study by the World Health Organisation on excess mortality in the first two years of the pandemic.
•Tamino Dreisam
Announcement on Assange’s extradition due any day as protest held in London
Britain’s Home Secretary Priti Patel can make the announcement any time from tomorrow, May 18 until May 31. Assange was put in this perilous situation by a series of rulings delivered by the British judiciary over the last year.
•Thomas Scripps
UK: Arriva Yorkshire bus workers ballot for strike action against pay offer less than half the rate of inflation
At Arriva Yorkshire, the starting hourly rate for bus drivers in the first year is £9.79 (just 29 pence more than the minimum wage). Drivers then graduate to £10.91 for two years, before reaching the top rate of £12.15.
•Tony Robson
Teacher denounces Australian Education Union censorship over new agreement
“Earlier some of us thought the union was on our side. After the agreement was announced I heard from school staff. Everyone thought the agreement was a joke.”
•Sue Phillips
Sri Lankan prime minister demands more sacrifice from working people
Wickremesinghe offered no relief for workers or the poor, millions of whom are struggling to put food on the table. Instead, he emphasised the depth of the economic crisis to justify the harsh measures that he intends to take.
•Peter Symonds
Finland and Sweden formally announce application for NATO membership
Helsinki and Stockholm’s formal applications to join the aggressive Western military alliance were prepared in close consultation with the major imperialist powers.
•Jordan Shilton
US hosts special ASEAN summit as conflict with China deepens
Even as Washington presses its war drive, divisions exist within the ASEAN member countries over US aggression towards China and Russia.
•Ben McGrath
Turkey threatens veto as Finland, Sweden to join NATO against Russia
Amid the US-led war against Russia in Ukraine, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has indicated his opposition to moves by Finland and Sweden to join NATO.
•Barış Demir
Workers Struggles: The Americas
Professors at the National University of Rosario in Argentina launched a one-day strike on May 13, while the city of Colón, Panama saw a one-day general strike over worsening social conditions.
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Why is nurse Michelle Heughins facing charges for the December 2019 prison death of John Neville?
Michelle Heughins is facing an involuntary manslaughter charge in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, for the brutal killing of John Neville by prison guards at the Forsyth County Jail, when she was the only one who tried to save his life.
•Kevin Reed
The Buffalo shooting and the fascistic transformation of the Republican Party
There is a clear overlap between the anti-Semitic manifesto of the Buffalo gunman and the embrace of the “replacement theory” by large sections of the Republican Party and its allied media.
•Patrick Martin
Last-ditch Australian Coalition and Labor campaign “rallies”: More desperate lies
Sunday’s party election campaign events underscored the deepening crisis of the increasingly detested two-party system of rule.
•Mike Head, Socialist Equality Party Senate candidate for Queensland
Strong response to SEP final election campaign meeting in Australia
Enthusiastic participants at Sunday’s meeting peppered SEP candidates with a broad range of questions about the party’s anti-war and revolutionary socialist program.
•Our reporter
Los Angeles teachers and support staff face June 30 contract expiration
Over 34,000 teachers and support staff in the nation's second largest school district are facing a battle over wages and school conditions.
•Hong Jian and Marc Wells
California wildfire season begins early with first months of 2022 the state’s driest on record
A wildfire in Orange County gained nationwide coverage last week as dozens of multi-million dollar mansions in the city of Laguna Niguel were burned to the ground by a fast-moving blaze.
•Dan Conway
Baby formula shortage leaves millions in need across United States
A shortage of baby formula has been exacerbated by the closing of a major plant in Michigan after it was exposed to have severe health violations.
•Alex Findijs
In the face of continuing COVID pandemic: Dangerous “science experiment” being carried out on music fans, musicians by industry officials
The central and overwhelming responsibility for the present state of unpreparedness lies with the government, media and corporate elite, who are engineering the “return to normal” for their own selfish economic and political reasons.
•David Walsh
Lawrence Tabak’s Foxconned: A valuable forensic analysis of a disastrous, politically motivated scam
Tabak crafts a commendable and thorough charting of the reckless Foxconn debacle in Racine, Wisconsin but political conclusions must be drawn.
•William Quartermaine
Ocasio-Cortez, Sanders and the DSA vote for war
Ocasio-Cortez and Sanders have risen to national prominence by promoting themselves as representatives of the “anti-war” and “left-wing” sentiments of masses of people, but their pro-war actions speak louder than words.
•Eric London
State election in North Rhine-Westphalia reveals growing class divisions in Germany
The working class stayed at home because workers did not see themselves represented by any of the establishment parties; for their part, the affluent urban middle classes turned to the Greens, the most belligerent of all parties.
•Peter Schwarz
Texas Supreme Court allows investigation against parents of transgender children
The Texas government’s assault on the democratic rights of transgender people follows similar attacks on democratic rights in Texas and throughout the country by the Republicans.
•Chase Lawrence
Germany: Two people killed by police in the city of Mannheim
Unlike many other countries, investigations in such cases in Germany are carried out by the police authorities themselves. There is no independent prosecution authority in Germany, despite the fact that the number of police killings is rising steadily.
•Gregor Link
Striking Ontario construction workers speak out: “What they’re offering is nothing. It’s a slap in the face. Corporate greed”
Asked what an acceptable offer would look like, a striker replied, “It should at least match inflation. If we’re going below that, we’re not making money. We can’t afford anything here. It’s hard. I pay rent. It’s hard for me to do rent and food. Gas is really expensive.”
•Dylan Lubao, Sterling Oliver
Imperialist powers back Israel’s assassination of Al-Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh
Thousands turned up to greet her coffin and help carry it through the West Bank cities of Jenin, Nablus and Ramallah, making this the biggest Palestinian funeral in decades, exceeding that of Yasser Arafat in Ramallah in 2004.
•Jean Shaoul
Thornton Heath bus drivers denounce latest offer from Arriva London South: “It’s a pay cut!”
A driver told the WSWS that support for a ‘no’ vote inside the garage was high, and that his colleagues “don’t want to accept it, and I won’t accept it.”
•Our reporters
Hundreds take to the streets to oppose police immigration raid in Hackney, London
As police attempted to arrest a delivery driver for “immigration offences” a group of local people moved in to stop them taking him away.
•Robert Stevens
Democrats attempt to channel abortion rights protests into a blind alley
Thousands of protesters in over 300 cities marched in opposition to the pending overturning of the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.
•Jacob Crosse
The mass shooting in Buffalo, New York: A political crime
It is necessary to state bluntly: The mass shooting on Sunday was a political crime. It was carried out by a racist and anti-Semite on the basis of a definite, fascist political ideology.
•Barry Grey
Cryptocurrency market in turmoil
The cryptocurrency market was thrown into turmoil last week as the market value of bitcoin, the most widely used cryptocurrency continued to fall, and a so-called “stablecoins” are collapsing.
•Nick Beams
SEP (Australia) campaign raises political issues in flood-devastated Lismore
“The money that the government is giving is not enough… It’s a bit of a kick in the guts when you see on the news that the governments are putting all this money into war, when we have a war zone right here.”
•Our correspondent
Canadian imperialism’s fascist friends: Ottawa’s decades-long alliance with the Ukrainian far-right and the NATO war on Russia: Part 1
The alliance between Canadian imperialism and Ukrainian fascism is most strikingly embodied in the person of Canada’s Deputy Prime Minister, Chrystia Freeland. The granddaughter of a prominent Ukrainian Nazi collaborator who was provided refuge in Canada following the Third Reich’s downfall, she is the leading anti-Russia war-hawk in the Trudeau Liberal government.
•James Clayton, Roger Jordan, Keith Jones
Pseudo-left Socialist Alliance seeks to chain workers and youth to Labor and the Greens in Australian elections
The Socialist Alliance campaign has nothing to do with socialism or the interests of the working class. Instead, its purpose is to subordinate workers and young people to Labor and the Greens, as both hurtle ever further to the right.
•Oscar Grenfell, Socialist Equality Party Senate candidate for New South Wales
NATO, G7 threaten military escalation against Russia and beyond
As Finland and Sweden prepare to join the NATO alliance against Russia, the NATO countries and Japan are planning a vast global intensification of imperialist militarism.
•Alex Lantier
German government extends combat mission in Mali and Sahel
Berlin, which is playing an increasingly aggressive role in NATO’s proxy war against Russia, is also pushing ahead with German imperialism’s offensive in Africa.
•Johannes Stern
Madrid doctors and nurses on indefinite strike against temp work, poor conditions
Around the world, health care strikes are erupting against conditions created by over two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, and decades of privatisations and subordination of health to profit.
•Alejandro López
ICE has created a “surveillance dragnet” for accessing the personal information of all US citizens
Georgetown Law has published a report that describes in detail how Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has created a surveillance infrastructure that is violating the democratic rights of American citizens without any government authorization or oversight.
•Kevin Reed
Aluminum workers furious over USW’s last minute deal with Arconic
The United Steelworkers union is trying to ram through another sellout contract covering 3,400 aluminum workers.
•Marcus Day
Cedars-Sinai Hospital workers speak out as union ends strike without agreement
Cedars-Sinai hospital workers in Los Angeles struck to win improved staffing and wages but their struggle was shut down by the SEIU-UHW.
•Our reporters
Profits over lives: The New York Times demands China end its Zero-COVID policy
The New York Times’ assault on Zero-COVID is odious and would lead to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Chinese, especially the most vulnerable. However, these are in line with attempts to scapegoat China for the deteriorating economic crisis plaguing the world.
•Benjamin Mateus
Texas travel nurse on the health care crisis: “The profits are going to the CEOs instead of trying to keep nurses and support staff”
The nurse is part of a growing movement of health care workers across the US fighting for better working conditions, pay and benefits, staffing, and resources.
•Zac Thorton
Andy Warhol 1964 painting sells for $195 million, breaking auction record
The exorbitant price for a trivial, empty work underscores the domination of the art world by a financial aristocracy that brushes aesthetic questions aside.
•Erik Schreiber
This week in history: May 16-22
This column profiles important historical events which took place during this week, 25 years ago, 50 years ago, 75 years ago and 100 years ago
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UK’s role confirms Sweden/Finland NATO membership planned for years
In 2014, the UK hosted a summit of NATO in Wales founding the Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF), consisting of seven NATO allies which would assemble military forces among the northern and high regions of Europe. Sweden and Finland joined in 2017.
•Robert Stevens
Arriva London South bus drivers denounce Unite’s sell-out pay deal: “It’s a load of rubbish”
A driver from Norwood told WSWS, “It’s a really difficult time. Mortgages are going up and we have to work overtime to make ends meet. Without overtime you can’t survive.”
•our reporters
Organize a fight against one-man crews and Hi Viz! Build rank-and-file committees at all Class I railroads!
Railroaders should establish a network of rank-and-file committees, building upon the establishment earlier this year of committees at BNSF and Canadian Pacific, to unite workers at all seven Class I railroads in the US, Canada and Mexico.
•World Socialist Web Site Logistics Workers Newsletter
Sweden to join NATO with Finland as US-led war on Russia escalates
NATO is moving to turn Scandinavia and the entire Baltic Sea into a second front in the war on Russia it has waged since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February.
•Alex Lantier
Indiana University Bloomington grad student workers vote to suspend their strike until the fall semester
Graduate students at IUB have voted to suspend their one-month strike and announced plans to resume the fight when classes resume on campus in September.
•Kevin Reed
The realities confronting Ukraine’s six million refugees
While the media portrays the situation as if Ukrainian refugees are walking into the arms of America and Europe’s governments, all the social and political problems of global capitalism are manifesting themselves in the crisis.
•Andrea Peters
The imaging of Sagittarius A*: A monumental scientific achievement
The imagery of the supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy is a brilliant demonstration of the possibilities engendered by human labor coordinated on an international and scientific basis.
•Bryan Dyne
As CNH strike concludes second week, workers voice growing frustration over UAW information blackout
The information blackout is being carried out in de facto coordination with the company and the national media, which has remained entirely silent on one of the largest strikes of industrial workers currently taking place in the US.
•Marcus Day
January 6 Select Committee subpoenas 5 of Trump’s congressional co-conspirators
All five Republicans targeted by the Select Committee were intimately involved in Trump’s coup plot. Yet none of them, like Trump himself, has been charged more than 16 months after the failed attack.
•Jacob Crosse
Victorian teachers to vote on Australian Education Union sell-out industrial agreement
The AEU-Labor government deal will, if ratified, significantly worsen teachers’ and school workers’ living standards, while also exacerbating the crisis within the public education system.
•Patrick Kelly
At least 450 children across 20 countries now suffering from acute hepatitis
The number of rare but serious acute liver failure among children is rising globally, and so far 12 children have died during the ongoing outbreak.
•Benjamin Mateus
The legal implications of the US Supreme Court’s draft anti-abortion decision
The draft decision would not only abolish the federal constitutional right to abortion, but would serve as a starting gun for a race to dismantle the entire edifice of democratic legal reforms in the US.
•Tom Carter
Mass mobilization of nurses keeps RaDonda Vaught out of jail, but the battle must continue!
Nurses throughout the country should be proud of their display of solidarity behind RaDonda Vaught. Thanks to their intervention, Vaught is not behind bars. However, this is only the beginning.
•WSWS Health Care Workers Newsletter
Newly appointed Sri Lankan PM pledges to implement brutal IMF program
The IMF program will translate into deep cuts to state sector jobs, wages and pensions, further increased prices of essentials, the slashing of public services including education and health care.
•Saman Gunadasa
10,000 New Zealand healthcare workers prepare to strike
Public healthcare workers are due to strike for 24 hours on Monday, over low wages and understaffing, after a previous strike scheduled for March was banned by the Employment Court.
•Tom Peters
Australia’s “teal independent” candidates backed by major corporate interests
Bankrolled by various “green” corporate interests, the candidates are seeking to promote the illusion that the necessary action on greenhouse gas emissions can be secured within the capitalist system by pressuring the major parties.
•Peter Byrne, SEP Victorian Senate candidate
11 die, dozens rescued from capsized migrant boat off coast of Puerto Rico
A spokesman for US Customs and Border Protection said 36 of those rescued are Haitian nationals, while the remaining two were from the Dominican Republic.
•Alex Johnson
Congressional report confirms meat processors made baseless claims of impending food shortage to keep plants open as pandemic spread
While COVID-19 ripped through processing plants and communities, food executives stoked phony claims of a food shortage to justify keeping plants operating at full production.
•Shannon Jones
Workers Struggles: Asia and Australia
India: Gujarat state government workers demand previous pension scheme; Ford auto workers in Tamil Nadu fight for job security; AMPOL oil refinery workers strike in Queensland.
•Our reporters
Master of Light, Ayoungman, Stay Awake, Riotsville, USA: Lives and struggles of the oppressed
A painter from the working class, a First Nations victim in Canada, a family struggling with opioids, the ruling elite prepares for upheaval.
•Joanne Laurier
West Virginia retiree speaks about life on a fixed income, war and the pandemic
“We’re all in this together in the working class. The choice is between barbarism and socialism. And I think that choice is really a no brainer.”
•Clement Daly
Nazi propaganda in Germany’s taz newspaper
On the anniversary of Germany's liberation from National Socialism (Nazism), the taz has published an article by Russian author Julia Latynina, which acquits Hitler of any responsibility for the Second World War.
•Peter Schwarz
Texas governor announces intent to bar undocumented immigrant children from attending public schools
The governor’s remarks are another example of the far right’s campaign to scapegoat and oppress immigrants and divide the working class.
•D. Lencho
Chile’s pseudo-left government sends police to break strike, arrest refinery workers
Chile’s president, ex-student radical Gabriel Boric, ordered Carabineros Special Forces to break up the picket line at a major oil refinery.
•Mauricio Saavedra
Reject Unite’s latest sell-out pay deal at Arriva London South bus company! Form rank-and-file strike committees!
Less than 24 hours after Wednesday’s one-day strike brought services at Arriva South to a near standstill, Unite scurried into talks with company executives. The deal they cobbled together is an insult.
•Statement by the London Bus Rank-and-File Committee
Northern Ireland elections deepen crisis of British imperialism
There is no solution to the problems facing the working class that does not challenge the capitalist profit system and the division of the world into hostile nation states
•Socialist Equality Party (Britain)
Let them bake cake: UK Conservative MP blames foodbank use on workers’ lack of budgeting and catering skills
The fact that the Johnson government feels no compulsion to make any concessions to alleviate the growth of inequality and absolute poverty—even from the standpoint of self-preservation—is the greatest indictment of the Labour Party and the trade unions.
•Tony Robson
UK mum Sarah Paxman given trial date for stand against COVID-19 infected schools
Sarah refused to send her 8-year-old son, Stanley, into school while no mitigations against COVID-19 are in place. She has defiantly pled not guilty, after being charged, despite the threat of a £2,500 fine and a possible jail sentence.
•Julie Hyland
Sri Lankan President Rajapakse installs Ranil Wickremesinghe as prime minister to enforce austerity dictates of the US and IMF
The president and his new government must go! The way forward for the working class is through building action committees, mobilising its industrial and political strength, and fighting for socialist policies.
•Statement of the Socialist Equality Party (Sri Lanka)
Finland’s decision to join NATO marks major escalation of US-led drive to war with Russia
The decision, which brings to an end more than seven decades of formal Finnish neutrality, marks a massive escalation in the drive by American and European imperialism towards all-out war with Russia.
•Jordan Shilton
Australia: Workers and youth support SEP election campaign
“I support what the SEP says. Workers need to organise to fight for what we need, and to unite internationally.” - Elizabeth, NSW Central Coast
•Our reporters
School Strike 4 Climate organisers turn Australian youth climate rallies into campaign for Labor-Greens
The transformation of the SS4C movement into an election campaign for parties responsible for the climate crisis is the culmination of years of attempts by the organisers to divert the masses of young people behind the political establishment.
•Martin Scott
Family of 75-year-old New Mexico woman fatally shot by police officer calls for murder charge
Amelia Baca was shot point-blank in the doorway of her Las Cruces home while suffering a mental health crisis.
•D. Lencho
Astronomers publish first imagery of Milky Way’s central supermassive black hole
The latest black hole image from the Event Horizon Telescope is further evidence that globally organized observational astronomy involving vast quantities of data and their coordination is becoming increasingly routine.
•Bryan Dyne
Biden marks 1 million US COVID deaths by preparing for the next million
US President Joe Biden finally acknowledged Thursday that over 1 million Americans have now died from COVID-19, issuing a perfunctory written statement and a pre-recorded video characterized by indifference to the lives of those lost and their loved ones still mourning.
•Evan Blake
Strike by Ontario construction workers for wage increases expands to include 43,000 workers
The workers’ struggle coincides with walkouts by other sections of workers across North America to demand wage increases that keep pace with inflation, including agricultural equipment workers in Iowa and Wisconsin, nurses in California, and grocery warehouse workers in Ontario.
•Sterling Oliver
Macron to dismantle last remaining anti-COVID health measures in France
Macron, like his counterparts in other European countries, has decided to allow an avoidable disease to become a constant feature of daily life.
•Jacques Valentin
Mixed results for Trump-endorsed candidates in Nebraska and West Virginia primary elections
Trump-backed Alex Mooney unseated the establishment candidate in West Virginia’s Second Congressional District primary, while the Trump-favored Charles Herbster failed to secure the nomination for the Republican candidate for governor in Nebraska.
•Alex Findijs
Wage suppression: The international strategy of finance capital
The eruption of the wages issue in the Australian election campaign is part of an international process as central banks, the representatives of finance capital, demand that wage increases be forcibly suppressed through the lifting of interest rates, inducing a recession if that proves necessary.
•Nick Beams
New South Korean president lines up behind US war drive
While the focus has been on North Korea, Seoul is preparing for US-led wars with Russia and China.
•Ben McGrath
Swiss-Russian virtuoso musician Alexander Boldachev excluded from Dutch Harp Festival
Bowing to the poisonous campaign against everyone and everything Russian, the 2022 Dutch Harp Festival “postponed” the appearance of virtuoso harpist Alexander Boldachev.
•David Walsh
Live updates: Tennessee Nurse RaDonda Vaught sentenced to three years probation, no jail time
Hundreds of nurses travelled to Nashville, Tennessee for the sentencing hearing of RaDonda Vaught.
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