On 9th January, Martin McGuinness, Deputy First Minister of the Stormont Assembly in Belfast, resigned in protest against the ongoing “cash for ash” scandal. As the Assembly was unable to elect a new Deputy, new elections have been triggered, as required under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement, adding yet more fuel to the fire for the political establishment in Westminster and Belfast.

And so begins the Trump era: with worldwide protests, pessimism, and polarization – full of combustible material, to put it mildly. The most anti-worker administration in decades has formally taken possession of the White House, and an avalanche of austerity and attacks on the working class is on the order of the day. A turbulent period of class struggle lies ahead.

On Saturday 21st January, millions of demonstrators took part in women-led marches across the world, protesting Donald Trump’s inauguration and the threat to democratic rights that he represents. We publish here a collection of reports and pictures from the mass protests against the newly-inaugurated US President.