Articles

After the shock of the corona crisis and the shock of energy prices, the economy is facing a new shock: the interest rate shock. Central banks around the world hope to control inflation by raising their interest rates at lightning speed. Those high interest rates are a new financial policy that breaks with the recent past. How the global economy will respond is not yet clear. But what is certain is that, by doing so, central banks and governments are making ordinary people bear the consequences of inflation. What is going on and how can we avoid being the ones who are losing out again?

With his media platform WikiLeaks, Julian Assange exposed war crimes committed by US and European armies against Iraq and Afghanistan. Once grounds for a Nobel Peace Prize nomination, today his journalistic work is rewarded with a witch-hunt and imprisonment. On the outside, his wife Stella is fighting for his freedom.

"There are no second-class workers. Everyone has the right to decent housing and a quality job."

The PTB reacts to the announcement of the federal government banning the TikTok application on the phones and computers of federal employees. A discriminatory decision, according to Nabil Boukili, PTB-PVDA deputy in charge of data protection issues.

The management of the Delhaize retail company announced that it would turn its 128 stores in Belgium into franchises, leading to a broadly supported strike movement.

Given the refusal of former Presidents of the Chamber Siegfried Bracke (N-VA, Flemish nationalist) and Herman De Croo (Open Vld, neoliberal) to reimburse the pension supplements they have received for years, the PTB-PVDA is launching a petition « Every euro must be returned », to put pressure on them.

Preface by Peter Mertens to the 175th anniversary edition of ‘Het Communistisch Manifest’, EPO Publishers, Antwerp, Belgium, February 2023

More than 40 organisations of the Belgian platform ‘Europe for Peace & Solidarity" - among them trade unions (CSC-ACV and FGTB-ABVV), peace movements, youth organisations, NGOs and many associations - are organising a national demonstration on Sunday 26 February 2023 in Brussels. The Workers’ Party of Belgium (PTB-PVDA) and its youth organisations Comac and RedFox support the initiative.

Peter Mertens at the Havana International Conference For World Balance

Dear friends, dear comrades, I would like to start by wishing you all the best for 2023. All the best to you, your family, your children, your colleagues and your friends. This is the most important thing. Times are hard. And we're all doing the best we can.

Charlie Le Paige at the Youth Forum of the Havana International Conference For World Balance, January 25, 2023

"At work, at the school gates, at the bakery... everywhere, people say that we just go from one crisis to another," observes Raoul Hedebouw, president of the PTB-PVDA. While a small group of billionaires are getting rich, a whole generation of politicians are telling the population "just insulate your house and turn down the thermostat". In other words, "sort it out yourself". It is time to get rid of these old liberal recipes and make the switch." In a book that is out today in bookstores, Raoul Hedebouw calls on people to make the switch.