Press reports on January 14 revealed that the United States is already proceeding with the sale of Venezuelan oil and will control the money raised. This is an outrageous semi-colonial arrangement which gives Trump control over the resources of a formally sovereign country. What is the Venezuelan government’s response to this blackmail?

2026 is only a few weeks old, yet world events are already unfolding at breakneck speed. From Donald Trump’s kidnapping of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela, to the killing of Renee Good and the protests against ICE in Minneapolis, and now the growing mass movement and the prospect of US intervention in Iran, huge events are shaking up the world situation.

On 28 January, at 18:00 GMT, we will be streaming the official launch of volume three of the collected writings of the great Marxist revolutionary, Ted Grant. Rob Sewell, from the International Secretariat of the Revolutionary Communist International, will introduce this brand new collection, which brings together Ted’s work from 1945-46, the years following the end of the Second World War.

In the pantheon of great Russian writers, Anton Chekhov (1860-1904) stands out as a master of his craft, whose influence on modern literature endures to this day.

The Paris Commune of 1871 was the first workers’ state in history. For roughly six weeks, from 18 March to 28 May, the workers of Paris ran the city democratically, whilst heroically resisting the onslaught of the old order, based at Versailles.

Since 3 January and US imperialism’s criminal assault on Venezuela, comrades of the Revolutionary Communist International have been out on the streets and in the media, emphasising that only the organised resistance of the working class has the power to put an end to imperialism.

Towards the last days of the turbulent year 2025, the Inqalabi Communist Party (Revolutionary Communist Party, RCP) organised a three day ‘Central Communist School’ (Winter 2025) from 19 to 21 December, and a one day ‘Communist Festival’ on 18 December in Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city, in which more than 250 comrades participated.

The western imperialist vultures are circling the Iranian regime. Donald Trump has already threatened to intervene in Iran three times since the protests began. Meanwhile, the Israeli state has sent ominous messages through Mossad’s Farsi X account, including: “Let's come out to the streets together. The time has come. We are with you. Not just from afar and verbally. We are with you in the field as well”. 

Events in Venezuela are unfolding at breakneck speed following the attack on 3 January and the kidnapping of Nicolás Maduro and Cilia Flores. The US is moving very quickly to assert control over Venezuela and its natural resources, while the Venezuelan government seems unwilling or unable to push back. Naturally, there are many questions which are being asked.

The arrival of the year 2026 was greeted not by the popping of champagne bottles, but by the merry sound of high explosives and bright lights that lit up the sleeping streets of the Venezuelan capital that provided its lucky inhabitants with a spectacular, and absolutely free, fireworks display in the dead of night.

On January 7, Renee Nicole Good was murdered by an ICE agent in the streets of South Minneapolis. She was a mother of three and lived just a few blocks from where she was gunned down.

On Saturday 3 January 2026, Nicolás Maduro was kidnapped from Miraflores presidential palace by the United States. This is a clear act of western imperialist aggression, which communists oppose. But why is it happening? What does this mean for US imperialism, world capitalism and countries like Venezuela?

In January 2025, Italian writer Ezio Gavazzeni reopened a horrific cold case by filing a complaint with the Milan public prosecutor’s office. It concerned wealthy individuals who went to Bosnia during the siege of Sarajevo and paid large amounts of money to be allowed to shoot at innocent civilians. Just for ‘fun’.

On 29 December, the Iranian rial fell to a record low against the dollar, sparking a bazaar strike in Tehran with massive processions in the main streets chanting the slogans: “Close, close!”, “Death to the dictator!”, “Death to high prices!”, and, “This is the final message; the target is the entire regime.”

The kidnapping of Nicolás Maduro, and the subsequent press conference held by Donald Trump and Marco Rubio, represent a declaration of war against Latin America and a direct threat to the reformist governments elected in Colombia and Mexico.