ALAN SIMPSON looks at the bigger issues behind Trump’s Venezuelan piracy

When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Western outrage was absolute. Yet today, the tone is markedly more subdued regarding US aggression against Venezuela. The manner in which the media and politicians frame this invasion exposes a profound ideological double standard, writes MARC VANDEPITTE

The US assault on Venezuela is brazen and unlawful – yet our PM claims uncertainty. By refusing to confront Trump’s naked imperialism, Starmer abandons international law, mortgages British policy to Washington, and clears the ground for war, argues ANDREW MURRAY

RAINER RUPP examines former CIA analyst Larry Johnson’s description of the US operation to kidnap Nicolas Maduro as a tactically successful but strategically disastrous move, with shades of Bush’s disastrous intervention in Iraq

SALLY LEWIS asks why Maduro’s legitimacy in Venezuela is contested, while Keir Starmer’s is not despite his mandate resting on a far smaller share of the vote

The attack on January 3 is part of the US war that began in 2001 and will continue long after the engines of the Chinook helicopters cool down, say TAROA ZUNIGA SILVA and VIJAY PRASHAD

Trump’s Venezuela “coup” along with his fake peace deals, including the latest in the Congo, are motivated by personal gain and self-aggrandisement, writes Linda Pentz Gunter

The Morning Star sorts the good eggs from the rotten scoundrels of the year just gone

As the dollar falters and US power turns predatory, Britain and Europe must abandon transatlantic illusions and build a collectivist alternative before the system implodes, writes ALAN SIMPSON

But the award has been met with near universal derision and disgust, writes LINDA PENTZ GUNTER

The US reprisal of global nuclear proliferation, threatening a new arms race, could push the world to the brink of annihilation, warns SOPHIE BOLT of CND

Colombia’s success in controlling the drug trade should be recognised and its sovereignty respected, argues Dr GLORY SAAVEDRA

Where normally only the US and its ally Israel vote to strangle Cuba economically, there have been special efforts to slander and isolate the besieged socialist island nation year — so we must redouble our solidarity, writes TARIQ ANDERSON

LINDA PENTZ GUNTER reports from the one of 2,700 protests against the Trump government’s power grabs, on a day when seven million people defied fear-mongering in a outpouring of joy and hope in what might be the biggest protest in US history

Climate, peace and Palestine activists condemn ‘war criminal’ Donald Trump's policies on his second state visit to Britain

The plot to build a lavish Dubai-style luxury development where the rich can sun themselves on top of the mass graves of thousands is one of the most bizarre and twisted ideas to come out of the genocide in Gaza, writes ROGER McKENZIE

by Roger D Harris and John Perry

Campaigners promise to welcome the US president to Scotland with a ‘festival of resistance’

Tehran has not been toppled, but a significant blow has been made against the last major state supporter of Palestinian resistance, allowing Israel to redouble its genocidal efforts on its doorstep, writes ANDREW MURRAY

MPs and campaigners warn Starmer not to join attack on Iran

The plan is to stigmatise and destabilise South Africa in preparation for breaking it up while creating a confused and highly racialised atmosphere around immigration in the US to aid in denying rights to non-white refugees, explains EMILE SCHEPERS

Cuba Solidarity Campaign secretary BERNARD REGAN says the inhuman blockade of Cuba not only continues, but the Donald Trump administration is ratcheting up aggression against both Havana and Latin America more widely

The Trump government is seizing overseas students from their homes and campuses and even off the streets, with no legal grounds and no due process, writes LINDA PENTZ GUNTER

The US president’s universal tariffs mirror the disastrous Smoot-Hawley Act that triggered retaliatory measures, collapsed international trade, fuelled political extremism — and led to world war, warns Dr DYLAN MURPHY

Building opposition into a political campaign

Ecuador’s election wasn’t free — and its people will pay the price under President Noboa

US president suggests he might visit the King in September