News from Berlin
Charité workers vote to strike
The Charité hopsital’s staff have voted with a strong 98% majority in favour of an unlimited pressure strike. The vote comes in the context of Verdi’s negotiations with the hospital concerning current contracts, which are set to expire. A key flashpoint is the hospital’s attempt to drop measures which ensure more nurses are hired, instead of overworking a small amount of staff. Staff are warning that conditions are already so dire that many nurses are considering leaving, but the hospital’s proposals would worsen the situation. The Charité is seen as a model hospital in Germany, giving the Verdi-led strike significance for hospitals across the country. Verdi has reported that it has 950 new members since the beginning of the negotiations. Source: junge Welt
Die Linke rows over antisemitism continue
In the latest news relating to the ongoing fights within the Berlin Die Linke, the influential party member Gregor Gysi has said that Vanessa Emde’s statements denying Israel’s right to exist are antisemitic. Gysi, who is himself Jewish, expressed a hope that she would be kicked out of the party. The party’s Berlin leadership has already stated that it does not see a basis for working with Emde in the future, but whether she will be kicked out of the party remains unclear. Source: Die Zeit
Protests against Berlin data center
On Friday, in the cold wind, around 20 people gathered in Tempelhof-Schöneberg to protest outside an industrial building carrying a banner saying “Rechenzentren nein Danke,” “No thank you to data centers.” The slogan harkens back to Germany’s older environmental movement and its fight against nuclear power, now, it is being used to argue against the construction of data centres like the one they were standing outside of as part of the Europe-wide action day “Stop Dirty Data Centres”. Protesters pointed to the high energy and water requirements of data centres, many of which are being built in Brandenburg where water supplies are already low. Source: nd
News from Germany
Support grows for Aigner to become President
Ilse Aigner (CSU) continues to get growing support for her run to replace Steinmeier as Germany’s President. After the CSU’s sister-party CDU announced they supported her candidacy, the SPD and the Grüne also backed her. On Monday, the CDU board officially announced her candidacy for the role. Considering the broad range of party support, the Bavarian appears practically guaranteed to become Germany’s first female President. Source: T-Online
Green party politician faces criticism over West Bank comments
Claudia Roth (Grüne) is the latest German politician to come under fire for comments she made about Israel. Roth called Israel’s rule in the West Bank an apartheid system, pointing to the separate roads for Palestinians as one example. Speaking to the podcast Jung & Naiv, many of her comments were explicitly walking back her own past statements from when she was the federal Culture Minister. At that time, she criticised the Israeli director Yuval Abraham for using the term apartheid. One comment which has led to critique, is when she said that foreign friends repeatedly ask her when she will “finally free yourself from this guilt of history [Schuld der Geschichte]?”. Source: Die Zeit
Die Linke want to increase tax on arms companies
Die Linke have proposed a new law to increase taxes on weapons companies. According to the proposal, if a company makes more than 5% profit margin, the excess profits would be taxed by 50%. This would be on top of other pre-existing taxes. Rheinmetall, Germany’s largest weapons company, has been making record profits in the past years with a profit margin of 16% – well over the 5% suggested by Die Linke as requiring extra taxation. It is considered unlikely that the government will support the proposed law. Source: Taz
Pahlavi awarded German “freedom prize”
Reza Pahlavi, son of the last shah of Iran, has been awarded a Freedom Prize in Frankfurt, as around 18,000 people rallied in support of him. The prize was awarded by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation, tied to the free market FDP party which failed to enter the Bundestag in the last German elections. Pahlavi has been criticised for supporting Israel, and for not distancing himself from his father’s brutal rule. Source: DW
MediaMarkt sale to Chinese firm approved by EU
The German company MediaMarktSaturn has a new owner after the Chinese company JD.com got approval from the EU Commission to purchase it. The Commission required that JD.com would not provide help to the company from Chinese subsidiaries as part of its approval, to ensure fair competition in the European market. The parent company will also be required to offer its logistical services to MediaMarktSaturn’s competition under the same conditions, since the parent receives support from the Chinese government. Source: tagesschau
