Jimmy Burns's Blog, page 5
October 1, 2017
Catalan History & Choreography
Few sights in Catalonia claim to be as emblemic as La Seu Vella on a hill above the city of Lleida,the region’s second largest city .
The group of semi-ruined and restored buildings include the sight of a former conquered Moorish castle, a Cathedral and a military barracks whose last extended use as such was during the early years of the dictatorship of General Franco during the 1940’s.
In this “place of suffering” as some locals call it , there are remnants of plunders as a result of religious and civil wars, and dynastic struggles and more contemporary repression.
The visitor is told that at the height of its glory in medieval times, the Seu was an active administrative complex of noble secular and ecclesiastical buildings from a time when Catalonia enjoyed its first experience of autonomy as part of the Kingdom of Aragon.
Excluded from the official account is any reference to the fact that it was near here in Catalonia that the King of Aragon and the Queen of Castile decided to join forces, unifying Spain.
I was in Lleida yesterday and overnight . It was a local feast day. A Civil Guard helicopter circled during the day but there was no other sign of heightened security. At 10 pm some streets in the centre of town echoed to the sound of saucepans being banged as activist parents with their children gathered for a weekend ‘festival’ in a local school and seemed ready to defy the ban on voting tomorrow along with countless others although there seemed uncertainty as to how far police would go to enforce what the government calls “the rule of law”.
It is in part a mythologised and selective historical narrative of victimisation and heroic endurance that gets served up in the La Seu Vella , of a kind more starkly projected still a fourty minute drive away from Lleida in the town of Les Borges.. There the local museum celebrates the life and times of its one time political representative Francesc Macia, widely regarded as the father of the Catalan independence movement which is currently playing its boldest bid for power since the 1930’s .
It was Macia who in the run-up to the Spanish Civil War broke away from Catalan attempts to integrate with the Spanish state and channelled his energies into developing a left wing Republican independence party.
One of Macia’s failed ideas, after he was exiled to France during the earlier dictatorship of General Primo de Rivera, was to form a Catalan army financed by communist Russia made up of Italian mercenaries . The project failed though a mixture of poor organisation and a lack of popular support.
Macia later antagonised moderate Catalans by unilaterally declaring the Independent Republic of Catalonia , in defiance of the Spanish Republic launched in 1931, a move that contributed to the Spanish Civil War which he never lived to experience.
He died of an illness in 1933, destined to be forever venerated by radical independists. The museum , places him in a pantheon of other independence fighters, including Nehru, Michael Collins , and Kenyatta.
When I visited the museum today, the whole surrounding town was decked out in independence flags and those on a guided tour in Catalan talked about how determined they were to go and vote tomorrow. Ohers I talked to said they would not because they did not agree with independence although they were not prepared to go out and protest against it.
I spotted one Mosso de Esquadra car at the entrance to the town, keeping an eye on incoming and outgoing traffic. It was market day- a reminder of just how rich in olives, vegetables, and almonds this region of Spain is.But the talk was not of the harvest but of the vote.
Mythology and emotion has been much in evidence these last days as Catalonia prepares for quite what no one really knows will come next . Catalans are known for their creativity. The choreography of the pro-independence movement has so far been disciplined and in propaganda terms largely effective in projecting a sense of impassioned but peaceful civic protest against a heavy handed central government. –many Davids taking on Goliath. But unlawful tomorrow’s planned vote is the judges have dictated, and the votes that get through are likely to fall short of being seem as a representative majority support for independence.
In street terms the protests called by far right groups in Spanish cities in defence of the unity of Spain ’ today were much smaller in number than the pro-vote 80,000 rally in Barcelona yesterday but this does not mean that Catalan independence has any legitimate mandate as things stand.
The situation could enter a whole new dynamic if police take more active measures this Sunday to stop the vote, and radical elements among the protestors take them on. As it is more radical pro-independence supporters are determined to keep up the momentum regardless of the result on Sunday. It remains to be seen whether the movement can be contained or appeased
For now Spain generally is struggling to come to terms with the biggest political crisis the county has faced since the death of Franco with no sign of a consensus in Madrid and Barcelona as what might be the best political formula for defusing it.
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August 2, 2017
GoodBye, Buenos Aires Herald
Era por los años setenta y yo comenzaba a ejercer de principiante en la sede Londinense de agencia de noticias Interpress cuando entro en mi oficina un barbudo vestido de abrigo de trinchera y cara de luto.
Se me presentó como Andrew Graham-Yooll, periodista anglo-argentino , recién llegado de Buenos Aires, habiendo recibido una amenaza de muerta por parte del régimen militar.
A partir de ese momento me unio una amistad para la vida con Andrew, gran persona, y el desarrollo de una relación profesional con el diario para el cual trabajaba, el Buenos Aires Herald.
La noticia del cierre del Herald me ha llenado de un gran sentido de pésame por la desaparición de un icono de un periodismo ejemplar que durante los años de su mayor profesionalidad y entrega humana informo y denuncio con gran valentía la atroz violación de derechos humanos ocurridos en la Argentina de las juntas.
El mismo Graham-Yooll formó parte de un equipo editorial liderado por el legendario director Robert, mejor conocido como ‘Bob’ Cox que transformo el Herald en un importante medio de comunicación después de empezar como un joven miembro del plantel y transformarse en el gran visionario del periódico, responsable por un cambio radical y contenido y aumento en el número de lectores.
En un principio Cox estuvo a favor del golpe militar del 1976 , pensando como tantos otros Argentinos y la comunidad internacional que militares y tecnócratas traerían mayor estabilidad política y económica después del caos institucional del gobierno de Isabel Perón y la violencia del terrorismo peronista de derecha y izquierda.
Pero a poco tiempo Cox se fue dando cuenta de los métodos siniestros y el alcancé masivo de la represión del régimen militar y no dudo en hacer del Herald un acto permanente de investigación y denuncia que durante una época estuvo amparado por los buenos contactos que tenía Cox con diplomáticos de la administración demócrata del Presidente Estado Unidiense Jimmy Carter.
La profesionalidad de Cox llevaba a que insistiese que cada denuncia de abuso de derechos humanos que llegase a las oficinas del periódico fuese apoyada por el trámite legal habeus corpus. La idea era exponer los desaparecidos como casos concretos , con nombre y apellido de gente que había sido raptada por fuerzas militares o para militares, y averiguar su paradero.
Fue un manera de identificar los abusos, y presionar al régimen que llevo a que algunas vidas fuesen salvados. Aunque desgraciadamente muchas más terminaron ejecutados después de haber sido torturados, muchos de sus nombres aparecieron en las páginas del Herald .
Graham-Yooll fue unos de los periodistas más destacados formados por la cultura de esa época del Herald. El libro que escribio sobre esa epoca State of Fear fue su mejor obra literaria ademas de periodistica . Hubo otros menos conocidos en esos años como mi amigo John Fernandes, un fotógrafo emigrante la India, que empezó su carrera tomando imágenes de los víctimas de la represión, y otro amigo y colega John Carlin que llego a convertirse en un gran corresponsal fuera de la Argentina primero con The Independent del Reino Unido y después con el diario español El País.
Cox y su familia tuvieron que fugarse de la Argentina. despues de que el hubiese sido detenido y amenazado de muerte en 1977. Le sucedió su mano derecha, el escoces James Neilson que siguió jugandose la vida, contando al mundo las atrocidades que cometían los militares, algo que muchos Argentinos se negaban a creer .
Tuve la suerte de coincidir con Neilson cuando a finales de 1981, me enviaron de corresponsal del Financial Times y el Observer a Buenos Aires. Seguía le represión pero a los pocos meses se complicaron las cosas , tanto para el como para mí cuando la junta militar invadió Las Malvinas y estallo la Guerra entre Argentina y el Reino Unido.
Tanto el Herald como mi corresponsalía igual que muchos de mis colegas extranjeros desafiábamos la censura que restringía a los medios Argentinos, y contamos lo que se convirtió en un desastre militar para la junta y el comienzo del fin del régimen .
Durante las primeras semanas de la Guerra que duro entre abril y junio de 1982, el Herald recibió varias amenazas por parte del régimen, llevando a que el periódico no fuese distribuido durante dos semanas, y que Neilsen terminase, igual que Cox, teniendo que irse de Argentina con su familia.
A partir de su exilio, el Herald, dirigido por un periodista Norteamericano de menor rango que Neilson y Cox de nombre Dan Newland bajo el tono de su denuncia, adoptando una posición más neutral sobre la Guerra, a veces tirando hacia la complicidad cuando daba menos espacio a la información que contradecía los comuniques oficiales de la junta.
La Guerra llevo a una cierta crisis de identidad en la comunidad anglo-argentina y a una diminución de los lazos políticos, económicos, socialales, y culturales ente el Reino Unido y Argentina que impacto negativamente sobre el Herald que perdió muchos lectores.
Desde entonces, el Herald ha atravesado la la etapa más difícil de su historia aunque gozando de libertad de expresión.A pesar de seguir publicando en idioma inglés, una sucesión de dueños con diferentes intereses financieros y políticos, ha contribuido a que el Herald pierda sur rumbo editorial e influencia. Lo que fue en su gran momento una lectura necesario se convirtió en un medio sin relevancia, que ya para nada dignificaba su época de heroísmo editorial. Que en paz descanse.
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July 14, 2017
Brexit-the Banquet’s Uninvited guest
In an evening marked by customary tradition, hospitality, and good cheer, the comment by the London’s Lord Mayor Andrew Parmley that ” Britain, Spain, Europe are the essence of what we are” resonated across the banquet room of the Guildhall last night
It drew spontaneous applause from the more than 700 guests- City of London councillors and officials, businessmen , ambassadors , and a representative sample of the Spanish diaspora from journalists, actors and academics, to scientists, retailers, and bankers.
Noting that the magnificent hall where the guests were gathered had been entertaining Royalty for 600 years, Parmley was on firm ground, paying tribute not just to the King and Queen of Spain, but Britain’s European history, make it clear that majority opinion in the City of London was extremely unhappy with the prospect of Brexit.
Indeed to listen to King Felipe deliver in response, as he has done throughout his state visit, his own speech full of warm words of recognition of the strong commercial, cultural, educational, and royal bonds that link the British and Spanish people, was to retain some glimmer of hope that Brexit might not happen at all.
And yet Brexit remained the dark shadow looming over an otherwise uplifting and highly successful three day state visit , that has confirmed King Felipe as a modern monarch, with statesman like qualities as well as diplomatic charm, as well as the extent to which UK-Spanish relations have been forged thanks to Europe not in spite of it.
The uncertainly provoked by Brexit was a recurrent theme of conversation last night , with guests noting the real problems that awaited the UK economy outside a customs union and a single market, and the extent to which the UK risked diminishing her role in the global community, and squandering Spain’s goodwill.
As guests emerged from their dinner, several remarked that at least they had felt for an evening to be part of a new reinvigorated EU, a pocket of necessary resistance to the hard Brexiteers in the heart of the City, that daily becomes more vocal.
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July 12, 2017
Diary of a Royal Love In-Day One
It’s coming up to midday and a stationary Guards band along the Mall is playing the James Bond 007 tune, presumably to remind the world that however diminished the UK may seem, no one does it better than the MI6 legend, the world’s most popular spy.
The film music is a sufficiently familiar theme for nearby tourists to break into applause. Such recognition does not initially appear to extend to the State visit to the UK of the King Felipe and Queen Letizia Spain. The most public part of the day’s programme seems to have most tourists, who came from all corners of the world, but on this morning seem mostly French and Japanese and Indian, unsure as to whether they are witnessing an extended changing of the guard or a repeat performance of the Queen’s birthday.
Only a minority of tourists –all of them speaking Spanish -seem to have taken time off from shopping in Oxford street out of a sense of patriotic duty- and they are excited.
They take a load of photographs , but their cheers are downed by the clutter of the lifeguard horses, the buzzing of a police helicopter overhead, and the barking sounds of the guards officers and sergeants.
No one has handed out Spanish flags- or Union Jacks or EU ones for that matter. I see one person clutching a Cross of St George, patron of the English and the Catalans . I move among the Spaniards saying Bienvenidos a Londres and handing out free copies of the BrtishSpanish Society magazine La Revista before King Felipe and Queen Elizabeth pass by, looking happy enough in each other’s company as they move towards Buckingham Palace in the lead Royal carriage where are to study some priceless letters written by Queen Ena, granddaughter of Queen Victoria and wife to Alfonso X111.
The whole procession and accompanying military pomp is impeccably choreographed because the British have long turned a State visit, like spying, into an art form, even producing a sun through the leaden London sky to remind us of Spain.
It all seems to work like clockwork, all the pomp and majesty, and the weather, and the crowds, as does King Felipe’s speech later in the afternoon to a packed hall in the Houses of Parliament.
The young Spanish monarch reads in upper crust foreign English a speech that has been previously discussed, debated and finally finessed by diplomats on both sides who want this to be the best news story of the day. After all most people are fed up with the uncertainly of Brexit, and Nadal and now Andy Murray knocked out of Wimbledon, although the fascinating possibility of a rare British-Spanish ladies tennis final beckons. And yes, as we are reminded by the Commons speaker John Bercow, King Felipe is keen on tennis and has also been in his country’s Olympic sailing team, in 1992. Just as well Bercow didn’t mention Barcelona.
As it turns out King Felipe’s speech makes no mention of Catalonia or Scotland or Ireland but touches all the right buttons on everything else. He praises the oldest parliament in Europe, the wartime resilience of the UK people , the heroism of the victims of terrorism- among them Box Cox MP, the policeman Keith Palmer, the Spaniard Ignacio Echeverría.
From Shakespeare and Cervantes to tourists, trade, investments, historians and residents, the UK and Spain have much in common and everything to gain from forging an even stronger bilateral relationship-the nations and people ‘profoundly entwined “, King Felipe tells us. The question of quite how one can stay profoundly entwined, when Spain is staying in the EU, and hard Brexiteers are looking to separate, was left for another day.
It was not the only set aside. For all that gossip mischievously circulated twenty-fours earlier that a group of Tory MP’s would walk out no sooner did the King mention the dreaded G-word , the prediction came to nothing .
Gibraltar was mentioned but in a paragraph so delicately crafted by diplomats as to make a future agreement sound achievable but without saying anything of substance that might risk drawing venom from any one side in the dispute.
It still did not please some people in Gibraltar but it was enough to please his hosts. It began with John Bercow paying tribute to King Felipe’s ‘sporting prowess’ and ended with the Lords speaker Lord Fowler expressing loudly ‘that was a very good speech, your Majesty’ before exclaiming Viva el Rey to which the hall responded Viva and a prolonged standing ovation. Ahead lay a royal banquet at Buckingham Palace. Not bad for Day One.
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July 10, 2017
A Vital European Bridge
A true story I owe to my late Spanish mother, a post-war immigrant to the UK , involves a state visit of the the Emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie, to the UK in October 1954.
I was a young child then and with one my first life-time passions that of watching the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace. The precision of the proud British soldiers in red coats and the uplifting music of their band stirred my imagination, making me feel one of them, as if I’ve stepped into a Winnie-the-Pooh fairy tale with Christopher Robin. So it was huge excitement to be told by my mother one morning that we were not only going to Buckingham Palace but we were also going to see an Emperor.
A large crowd had already gathered along the main avenue leading to the palace when we got there but somehow my mother managed to steer my push-chair into a front row position. We found ourselves in a line of rather stern looking elderly English nannies standing to attention with their young upper-crust charges. They looked at us – my dark Latino mother and her son-as if flying ants had descended on them, but my mother thought nothing more of it- at least until the Emperor passed by in the Royal carriage. At that point, my mother and I broke into spontaneous applause, to the nannies’ apparent horror. “Oh, she must be one of them!’, my mother heard one say to the other. The comment evidently was based on the similarity in skin colour between her and the Emperor, and the Spanish she spoke to me in , the two foreigners in their midst.
Thankfully the days when Spaniards like other immigrants were looked down on in this way has ceased to be usual practice in the UK- although Brexit has, as a cross-party group of MEPs warns in today’s Guardian, “cast a dark shadow of vagueness and uncertainty over millions of Europeans”.
Hopefully the state visit of King Felipe and Queen Letizia to the UK this week will serve as a reminder not just of how Spain owes its democracy to Europe, but how the strong bilateral relationship between the two countries has been made possible by their membership of the EU.
Freedom of movement is enjoyed by millions of tourists every year, with more British visiting Spain than any other nationality, and many British have Spanish homes and investments. The UK’s economy has been similarly strengthened by the investment of major Spanish companies, like Santander, Iberdrola, Ferrovial, and Telefonica, all major international players in their sectors.
Meanwhile Spanish students and workers have helped make British society a better place , cooperating in research, working as doctors and nurses in the NHS, and enriching cultural life, with a growing cross-fertilisation of the English and Spanish language.
Hopefully this State visit will help contribute to reinforcing a European bridge that best serves the interests not just of both countries but the democratic world, in a spirit of openness, without prejudice.
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July 7, 2017
Anglo-Spanish Royals
The Spanish Royal visit to the UK
An Enduring Relationship Revived
Ask your average English schoolboy what he knows about the relations between the Spanish and British Royal families, and the likelihood is that he will mention Spain’s Philip 11nd, and the heroic defeat of his Armada by Queen Elizabeth Ist.
A less selective and superficial history will show that relations between British and Spanish royals have been mutually respectful, if not immune to occasional crisis, for over five centuries.
As the recent biography of Spain’s great Queen Isabella of Castile by Giles Tremlett reminds us , intermarriage and mutual deference between the respective royal courts was an important legacy of her reign.
The royal relationship was destined to recover from the Reformation and the Armada. Despite her divorce by King Henry V111, Isabella’s daughter Catherine of Aragon remained popular with the English people because of her nobility of spirit and care for the poor. Her venerated tomb lies in Peterborough Cathedral, while that of an earlier medieval Spanish Queen , Eleanor of Castile, first wife of King Edward , lies in Westminster Abbey.
In more modern times, as Europe moved into the 20th century, Queen Victoria Eugenie, known as Ena, granddaughter off the British Empress Victoria, married Alfonso X111. The Spanish King was a great anglophile, developing a friendship with Winston Churchill-they were both keen polo players in their youth-and encouraging his son Don Juan to train with the British Royal navy.
Lest the English forget the Royal connection, Alfonso X111’s Royal Standard is preserved in one of London’s most distinguished Catholic Churches, that of St James’s Spanish Place,. The location traces its origins back to the days when an earlier Church building’s main benefactor was the Spanish embassy. Meanwhile in Exeter College, Oxford the professorial chair of Hispanic Studies is named in his memory since it was established in the late 1920’s.
Alfonso X111 was forced to abdicate in 1931 with the proclamation of the Republic. He lived out his final years in exile in Rome, as did his son Juan, , after the end of the Spanish Civil War, in Portugal. It was not until after the death of the dictator Franco in 1975, that the monarchy in Spain was restored, under Alfonso X111’s grandson, King Juan Carlos Ist,,with his Greek royal princess Sofia becoming Queen of Spain.
Spain’s first monarchs of the modern era soon personified the country’s new democratic spirit while their personal and institutional links with the House of Windsor, helped strengthen UK-Spanish bilateral relations within Europe, despite the competing sovereignty claims over Gibraltar.
The decision by Prince Charles and Princess Diana to start their honeymoon in 1981 on the Royal Yacht in Gibraltar did not go down well in Spain. But the ice was subsequently broken when Queen Elizabeth invited the Spanish monarchs to London in an official capacity in 1986. Juan Carlos returned the favour by organizing a private break for the Prince of Wales and the Princess of Wales and their two young sons William and Harry. There were housed in the Spanish royal residence of Marivent . They also went for a cruise on the King of Spain’s yacht ‘Fortuna’, to watch a Royal regatta, and visit some of the islands popular sites, including the Ses Iletes beach, and Marineland waterpark where Wllliam and Harry enjoyed themselves.
Photographs taken at the time of the Royal families together show a warm gathering with no sign of the strain that the marriage of the Prince and Princess of Wales was already under. Island residents recall Diana spent much of her time swimming in the waters of Mallorca’s southern beaches, while Charles painted watercolours of the picturesque landscapes around Valldemosa, where the Polish composer Chopin and his French lover Amantine-Lucile-Aurore Dupin, better known by her pseudonym George Sand, once stayed.
The Windsors returned to Mallorca in the summers of of 1987, 1988 and 1990. Diana, who had already spent some time before her marriage in Port d’Amdratx returned one more time in 1996, as a divorcee , and stayed at a luxury hotel La Residencia in Deia, as a guest of the billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson.
Diana’s death in August 1997 in a car crash in Paris in the midst of an increasingly visceral public rift with her ex-husband fuelled a simmering crisis in the House of Windsor. It tested royal protocol and friendship not least among the Spanish Royal family, and overshadowed a state visit by the Queen Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh made to Spain the following year.
With the memory of Diana generating enormous sympathy in the Spanish media for several years after her death, it was not until 2011 that Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall , judged that the time was ripe to restore the link and make an official visit to Spain.
Since then relations between the Royals of the two countries have been generally on a more discreet basis, with King Juan Carlos making private visits to the UK to go shooting with friends, and Queen Sofia separately visiting London on cultural and shopping outings, with her own close friends.
Since 2014 , when King Juan Carlos abdicated in favour of his son Felipe V1, he and Queen Sofia have reduced their official duties, although she came to London last year as guest of honour, together withe Prince Andrew the Duke of York, at the Gala dinner, marking the centenary of the charity the BritishSpanishSociety. While in the capital she had a private meeting with the Queen , where the foundation was laid for a rescheduling of a State visit by King Felipe and Queen Letizia, which was postponed last year because the formation of a new Spanish government was still the subject of ongoing political discussions.
The programme of the latest State visit to the UK includes, as is traditional, an official welcome by Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip and a dinner hosted by them at Buckingham Palace .
But this visit will also involve the heir to the Crown, Prince Charles, his second wife the Duchess of Cornwall, and Prince Harry..The youngest son of Prince Charles and the late Diana will accompany King Felipe, a fellow trained military officer, to lay a wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier in Westminster Abbey. The occasion will underline not only a professional bond, but also the seamless passing of the baton for sustaining the bilateral royal relationship to a younger generation.
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June 9, 2017
Time for Uk to win back hearts and minds
The United Kingdom has hardly found the world at its feet this last year. The Brexit vote last summer, which was supported by over half of the population, but not by me and the rest of the population, left not only the UK’s European partners, but most of its democratic and accountable allies wondering just what kind of madness had gripped the English and Welsh (for the Scots voted against) who by a slim majority had voted to leave the European Union without really thinking how this could be done in the interest of a better world.
And during more recent weeks the UK has fuelled increasing criticism from abroad, with an increasingly unaccountable prime-minister trying to rally the nation around a still unspecified policy and strategy on Europe, and an opposition seemingly unable to come up with a coherent and credible alternative-or so she claimed.
And yet the result of the British election has shown that British democracy far from being in a state of terminal decline, is alive and well, having escaped, like Alice, from the lunacy of Wonderland and landed with a bump on more familiar political terrain which nonetheless has a capacity for renewal.
With two successive leaders and prime-ministers-David Cameron and Theresa May-making catastrophic political miscalculations within a year of each other, the Tories-ostensibly still part of government but now without a majority- are as divided over Europe as they were when they brought down Mrs Thatcher- and Mrs May has been shown up to be a mere caricature of that ‘iron lady’, disastrously failing the first real test of her leadership..
By contrast the Labour Party has experienced a resurgence. Despite having a huge media bandwagon overwhelmingly rubbishing him since his own election as party leader, Jeremy Corbyn , always man of firm principle in my view, has matured as a serious politician during the campaign, and won over many of his critics inside his own party including some Blairite sceptics like myself. He has achieved a popular appeal while more often than not sounding statesmanlike, delivering a credible anti-austerity plan based on greater social justice and pro-European message . This has resonated with voters that have swung a back towards his party and many young voters who cast their vote for the first time.
What the election result showed is:
that a majority of British voters want a negotiated agreement with the European Union that would retain the integrity of the United Kingdom, and benefit both the UK and the EU, not a collision of trains, or a break away Scotland or Northern Ireland;
that UKIP the hard right party that provoked Brexit in the first place has had no one elected to parliament and has thus lost , at last, all political legitimacy
that British politics has energised young people, many first time voters, to get involved and they have done so against austerity and a Hard Brexit;
that the UK now once again has a viable opposition which is not enough in MP numbers to form a majority government, but which can demand and expects changes and is prepared if necessary to drive a more conciliatory government policy on the EU.
This , as yet a disparate coalition of forces –Labour, Liberal Democrats, and Scottish Nationalists-could well find common ground with some ‘soft’ Tories whose priorities include getting more cash to the National Health Servcce while finding as many areas as possible of agreement with EU partners, icluding single market, customs union, and the rights of EU citizens.
Meanwhile I would like to make special mention , given that it has do with an area of London where I live and work, of one of several new entrants to the British parliament.
She is called Marsha de Cordova, and she is the new Labour MP for the south London constuency of Battersea. She has won back the Conservative-held seat. Marsha’s decision to transition from local councillor to parliamentary candidate stems from her experiences as a disabled woman, as she is registered blind. She has spoken of her view that in order to make a difference and bring about real change, it is important to be a part of that process and get involved in politics. As a candidate, she feels that she can represent local people in parliament and ‘be a voice to the voiceless.’
Marsha has previously commented on the challenges that she has faced as a disabled woman working in politics. One of her main declared objectives , is to break down barriers for people with disabilities and to give people more guidance on the kinds of adjustments that need to be made. She said,’All I can do is keep pushing and keep fighting so that anyone coming behind me won’t have to face the same barriers I have.’
Where there is a will there is a way.
The UK has a new parliament with more MPs wishing to bridges than walls. If she survives for now (and that is a big if) , the woman I did not vote for-Mrs May- will need to open up and listen better than she has until now if she is to win back the respect of her people, and be part of a process that wins back for the UK the respect of the world.
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June 8, 2017
A Spanish hero in London: Ignacio Echeverria
A Spanish hero in London: Ignacio Echeverria
As part of a former imperial power that has punched above its weight for most of its history, there are some British who do not easily look outside their own people for heroes. Ask your average Anglo-Saxon English primary school pupil about iconic heroes they have heard about and they are likely to mention two warrior Queens-Boadicea and Elizabeth I -, two warrior prime-ministers Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher, among an assortment of military icons from Wellington and Nelson to Montgomery, and James Bond.
And when it comes to lesser mortals, there will be explorers, ordinary soldiers, policemen, and health workers all of which are considered the best in the world although when it comes to the National Health Service, the issue begins to get more complex, for there are a lot of foreign staff without which the NHS would collapse.
In this partial history of this island race-as Churchill defined himself and his fellow countrymen-foreigners , led by Spaniards, have all too often been on the receiving end of a cultural bias, more ridiculed than admired for their alleged incompetence and poor command of the English language as caricatured in the popular comedy series Faulty Towers by Manuel the Spanish waiter, and more recently exemplified by the visceral almost racist demonising in the Daily Mail of Alex Cruz, the Spanish CEO of British Airways over the airline’s systems collapse. By contrast in modern times if there have been Spanish heroes who have most easily won popular British plaudits it’s been footballers and Rafa Nadal, not ordinary mortals.
Which is why the example of 39-year-old Ignacio Echeverria is one worth pondering. He was a Spaniard of no celebrity status who like so many other Spaniards had been living and working in the UK as a EU national, part of a diaspora that has contributed for the better to the economy and cultural and social vibrancy of London, in his case working as a lawyer for a major bank, when not enjoying the freedom of the city, among men and women of all races and faiths, on his beloved skateboard.
Echeverria was with friends in the popular Borough Market near London Bridge -where pubs and fish and chips and English artists share community space with tapas bars and French patisseries and Asan and Middle Eastern restaurants , and visitors and local workers, including my colleagues from the nearby Financial Times-the world most international newspaper- buy food and share conversation from all around the globe.
It was Saturday evening and the market was full of Londoners and tourists enjoying the weekend when Echeverria saw a woman being assaulted by a man with a knife, and, without hesitating, came to her defence, hitting out at her assailant with his skateboard. As he did so, Echeverria himself was stabbed, fatally-thus becoming one of the victims of the terrorist attack that left eight people dead and dozens injured.
This is not the time to blame UK authorities or London hospitals for the delayed identification of Echeverria in the midst of an ongoing investigation into the attack. These are challenging times for the security and emergency services and they are trying best to protect lives, bring those responsible to justice and prevent further attacks.
But our hearts and prayers naturally go out to Echeverria’s family and friends, as we honour this Spaniard, who died so heroically on British soil, sacrificing his life in the face of intolerance and terror and in defence of a civilised multicultural democratic society he deserved, quite rightly, to be part of.
May he rest in peace. `
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May 9, 2017
Remembering Hugh Thomas
Hugh Thomas, who has died aged 85,was a historian with an enduring interest in and passion for the Hispanic world straddling epochs, continents and empires. He also played an active part as a policy adviser to Margaret Thatcher, and in his later years served in the House of Lords as a life peer, never seeing this as place of patronage let alone retirement but as an integral part of an effective and accountable parliamentary democracy. ..
He had developed an interest in Spain after a first visit in the 1950’s when he set himself the task of writing the first comprehensive history of the Spanish Civil War. The result was a ground-breaking account, detailed and innovative in its research, highly readable, and above all balanced in a way that contrasted with the poorly sourced, prejudiced and often crudely propagandist accounts that had emerged until then from each side of the conflict , both in Spain and the UK.
An international best-seller, the seminal The Spanish Civil War set a hard to beat high standard for other researchers to surpass while encouraging an increasingly prolific bibliography and evolving academic courses on the subject.
Several of Thomas’s subsequent works of history came to be characterised by a similar sense of perspective and literary power unrivalled by any other academics in his field, although his ventures into fiction proved less successful .
He didn’t easily suffer historians he considered unworthy competitors, but was generous in his moral support for much lesser known and underpaid younger writers he respected .
Thomas was a true liberal, in his openness to and willingness to engage with alternative views, while unyielding in core principles , and never succumbing to those on the extreme of the political spectrum.
He showed little patience with fellow historians whose subjectivity distorted and manipulated the material they had accessed to justify their opinions. For example he took issue with the description of the Spanish Empire as cruel and rapacious by the Victorian Cambridge professor JR Seeley in his account of the British Empire . Thomas wrote that such an assessment made Seeley appear “ an ignorant and parochial ideologue.”
Thomas’s comment is to be found in World Without End (2014) , the third volume of his magnificent trilogy about the Spanish Empire published over the last fourteen years and which stand as a worthy bookend to his life as a historian.
Even in his advancing years, Thomas never shied away from the challenge of another ‘magnus opus’ while along the way writing novels and periodically delving into smaller scale projects like his biography of Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais, the 18th century French polymath.
Thomas was born into a comfortable middle-class family in Windsor in 1931-his father was a colonial commissioner- and was educated at one of Britan’s leading private boarding schools Sherborne . In 1953 he graduated from Cambridge where the wit and intellectual sharpness that stuck with him for most of his life , had him elected president of the Cambridge Union before he pursued further studies at the Sorbonne .
Thomas’s firs employment was at the Foreign Office, where he worked for two years in a department dealing with the United Nations, and was briefly a prospective Labour candidate. He was Professor of History at Reading University from 1966-1975. By then several years had gone since he had approached for the first time my parents the late Tom Burns and Mabel Marañón at their home in London.
My father had developed a life-time interest in Spain after serving in the British embassy in Madrid during World War 2 and marrying my Spanish mother, the youngest daughter of Gregorio Marañón a Spanish physician, scientist, historian, philosopher, humanist, and writer, considered one of the most brilliant Spanish intellectuals of the 20th century. My parents provided Thomas with an invaluable list of contacts straddling the Spanish political spectrum, from Franco ministers to former members of the Republican government who had fled to exile, among many others. .
Thereafter, Thomas pursued his research into the Spanish Civil War, and developed an enduring friendship with the Burns Mabel Marañón family, along with other members of the BritishSpanish community based in London grouped in cultural organizations like the British Spanish Society.
I count myself honored to have benefited in my early days as a writer from Thomas’s generosity, as he offered me invaluable confidential advice linked to separate books I wrote on the Falklands War (The Land that Lost its Heroes) and on British intelligence in Wartime Spain-(Papa Spy) apart from becoming an enduring point of reference on all matters relating to British-Spanish relations.
After his Spanish Civil War book, Thomas followed up with another large volume, this time on the history of Cuba, which took a critical view of Castro’s submission to Soviet influence and his curbing of human rights.
By the time of its publication in the mid 1970’s Thomas’s political allegiances had shifted away from the Labour party to the Conservative Party because of what he saw as Labour’s less than enthusiastic attitude to Britain’s membership of the European Common Market.
After Mrs Thatcher came to power in 1979, Thomas developed a personal friendship as well as an advisory role , heading up the centre-right think-tank Center For Policy Studies. He was then honored as Lord Thomas of Swynnerton of Notting Hill, the London neighborhood where he lived .
Thomas allowed some years to elapse before sharing details of the interesting part he played in trying to win over some of the so-called Notting Hill ‘ set’ to the Thatcher ‘revolution’ at a private dinner he organized in his large Georgian House in Ladbroke Grove with her as the guest of honor.
It was late 1982, a few months after the British victory in the Falklands War when despite her popularity among a majority of voters, Thatcher had yet to win hearts and minds ,among her enduring enemies, not least certain writers, and academics. Thomas was seen as a potential bridge between Number 10 and their world . By then he knew Thatcher well because he ran her favourite thinktank,the Centre for Policy Studies.
Those invited to the dinner with Thatcher at Thomas’s house included the poets Stephen Spender and Philip Larkin, , hispanist writer VS Pritchett, the writer Anthony Powell, the playwright Tom Stoppard, and the Peruvian novelist Mario Vargas Llosa, who had taught Hispanic studies at King’s College London and was pursuing his international literary and political career.
The meal was cooked by the artist Lady Thomas (formally Vanessa Jebb, the daughter of Gladwyn Jebb, first acting secretary-general of the United Nations), with their daughter Bella and one of her friends, Maggie Evans, acting as waitresses. The guests dined on pheasant and drank Rioja, a wine that at the time had yet to enter the British supermarket shelves on a major scale.
The Thomas’s were always convivial hosts, and Vanessa’s home cooking delicious, as I can attest having attended one such ‘intellectual’ dinner with the late Harold Pinter and his wife Antonia Fraser some five years later after I was awarded the Somerset Maugham prize for my book on the Falklands war, a similar prize given to Thomas after he published the first edition of the Spanish Civil War in 1962. By then it was evident that any attempt to reconcile Thatcher’s personality and politics with the liberal tendencies of the north London literati was doomed to failure.
Thomas’s politics were individualistic, radical, and pragmatic-very English traits according to his Spanish admirers who read his books and articles in translation with huge interest and who have produced an outpouring of generous obituaries on the news of his death.
As I came to know him, Thomas was outspoken when he felt it necessary to the point of brashness, and enjoyed flattery, while never allowing himself to be seduced by power or pigeonholed by ideology.
In 1997 he quit what he saw as the increasing anti-Europeanism in the Conservative Party and joined the Liberal Democrats. He later became a cross-bencher in the House of Lords rather than openly support any one party.
Like many of his compatriots who voted to remain in the European Union, he was deeply shocked by the result of the British referendum and the government’s subsequent push for Brexit. Sadly, the referendum coincided with a period of declining health that had left Thomas increasingly fragile and with less energy to take on big challenges as in the past.
His love of Spain and Latin America endured however, and just months before he died made the effort to attend the inauguration of the new offices of the Institute of Cervantes in London, where he conversed, with the Spanish and Cuban ambassadors, among other friends and contacts, handing out copies of one of his books.
His committed Europeanism , as expressed through his love of Spain, was not only political but also cultural as he made clear in an interview he gave just over a year ago to Luis Ventoso of the Spanish newspaper ABC. “ I have always strongly defended Spain, I have done everything I can in this respect. “
On Gibraltar he was aware of the potential minefield he was treading but never shied away from his firmly held view that the best possible future for all sides involved, if negotiated skillfully, was shared sovereignty.
Thomas received several honors in the UK, France, Latin America, and Spain, including the prestigious Spanish orders Isabel la Católica y Alfonso X el Sabio- testament to the cultural bridges he helped build in defiance of the forces of intolerance and division.
He is survived by his wife Vanessa, and their three children Inigo, Isambad, and Bella. (Hugh Thomas: 21st October 1931-6 May 2017)
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April 26, 2017
Messi’s Number 10
Of the several images of a memorable El Clasico last Sunday few will endure with such iconographic intensity as that of Lionel Messi, holding up his number 10 Barca shirt to the Bernabeu stadium after scoring the defining goal against Real Madrid in the last minute of extra time.
Real Madrid fans who occupied the bulk of the stadium are an exacting crowd. They expect and demand the best from their star players as they do in the city’s nearby bullring of the country’s best matadors, not least in the encounter with its historic rival. They are excitable, polarised, visceral, tribally obsessive, and yet capable of showing respect when it is due, even to the enemy- like the bullfight crowd can rise to applaud a brave bull.
Not even Messi knows what really moved him to that act. A man not known for his articulation of feelings said afterwards he had done is a tribute to the few hundred Barca fans who had endured up in the Gods. But it was a cathartic moment with a whole range of feelings detonated consciously and unconsciously across time and space.
Conjured up in the moment were the heroic ghosts of Real Madrid legends past, who had worn the Number 10- Puskas, Gento, Juanito, Butrageño, Sanchez, Santillana, -and one in particular who had previously worn it for Barca- Diego Armando Maradona.
But it was a clear statement of the present, personified in the genius of Messi, the unrivalled main protagonist and man of the match, of one of the most exciting El Clasicos in many years. For it was Messi who had waved his magic wand amidst his lackluster team mates and cast a similar spell on his overwhelmed opponents.
Hi first goal had him swerving in and out of the Real Madrid defence, ball perfectly controlled, small frame almost brushing the ground, before finding the net with a perfectly timed and positioned strike with the inside of his left foot. Later, just when Real Madrid thought it was game over with a 2-2 draw, he clinched the fifth.
Just before the start of the game, Cristiano Ronaldo followed his team out, bouncing like a pogo stick, as if to remind the world of his ability like Muhamad Ali to fly like a butterfly and sting like a bee, such his self-belief and pronounced athleticism.
By contrast Messi, came out as he usually head bowed, shoulders hunched, only briefly looking up and surveying the crowd expressionless, giving nothing away behind a black eye and beard after a week of speculation he was reaching the end of the season battered worn out by Barca’s game against Juventus and unable to lift a Barca in urgent need of regeneration.
It was Cristiano who had got off to the most dynamic start, within two minutes of the opening whistle claiming theatrically a penalty (without success) after being tackled by Umiti in front of the Barca then following it up ten minutes later with a failed strike at goal which was comfortably received by Ter Stegen. It went from bad to worse after that, five attempts at goal-all easily stopped or way off target, and a largely anonymous second half.
The match ended with Cristiano grimacing and lifting his arms to the sky with a look that was balanced between frustration and disillusion, and Messi holding his shirt like a standard, unique in victory and the manner of achieving it.
His magic, and willpower prevailed in a declared war zone where he was the enemy’s main target. His runs interrupted six times by deliberate fouls, one a red card offence by Ramos. He emerged from a collision with Marcelo with a torrent of blood flowing from his cut lip. Despite it all he went on to score 100th goal for Barca-the first scored against Albacete in May2005, off a pass from Ronaldinho, when the Brazilian was at his prime- and was then the one that wore the Number 10 shirt, like that other Brazilian Pele.
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