As food prices
soar world-wide it was reported recently on the BBC that ‘Ethiopia has launched an urgent
appeal to international donors for more than $300m (£154m) of emergency aid’.

According the news item, ‘a
total of 4.6 million people are now thought to need food aid, because of the
drought which struck most of the country in the early part of this year. In
some parts of the country, health centres and feeding clinics are already being
overwhelmed with large numbers of severely malnourished children. Existing
stocks of food aid will cover June, but the crunch will come in July.’

The following statements were
unanimously passed at the World Congress of the International Marxist Tendency. A detailed report about the congress will follow in the coming weeks.

In a television programme broadcasted to
the whole of the country on July 31st, President Chávez announced the nationalisation
of Banco de Venezuela, the Venezuelan bank owned by the Spanish banking
multinational Grupo Santander.