Seumas Milne
Encyclopedia
Seumas Milne is a British journalist and writer known for his left-wing views. A columnist and associate editor at The Guardian
newspaper, he is author of a best-selling book about the 1984-5 British miners' strike, The Enemy Within: The Secret War Against the Miners, which focuses on the role of MI5
and Special Branch
in the dispute.
Director General Alasdair Milne
, Milne attended Winchester College
and read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Balliol College, Oxford
and Economics at Birkbeck College, London University
. His sister, Kirsty, was a visiting scholar at Harvard University
and as a journalist has worked on The Scotsman
, the New Statesman
, New Society and the BBC
.
.
Milne worked as a staff journalist for three years on The Economist
before joining The Guardian
, where he has been a news reporter, Labour Correspondent (Europe), Labour Editor, and Comment Editor (for six years, 2001-7).
Milne has reported for The Guardian
from the Middle East, Latin America, Russia, Eastern Europe and South Asia, and also written for Le Monde Diplomatique
and the London Review of Books
. He has been a long-term member of the Labour Party and served on the executive committee of the National Union of Journalists
for ten years. He was joint winner of the 1999 What the Papers Say Scoop of the Year award.
". Peter Popham argued that connecting Milne to the SWP was a "smear", but "there is no mistaking that Seumas is on the far left of the Labour Party, of which he has been a member for 20 years".
from the Muslim Council of Britain
, left-wing politician George Galloway
, Anas Al-Tikriti
from British Muslim Initiative, Labour party MP
Diane Abbott
, Ismail Patel
founder of Friends of Al-Aqsa, Lindsey German from Stop the War Coalition
and Abdulrahman Jafar from Muslim Safety Forum. In his speech, Milne argued that there is a basic process that can be seen across all of the British media:
Milne also attended the second conference titled "Stop Islamophobia: Defend the Muslim Community", which was held on 5 June 2010. The conference was organised by Stop the War Coalition and British Muslim Initiative and supported by various British Islamic organizations. Speakers in this conference included amongst others Tony Benn
, the president of Stop the War Coalition, Moazzam Begg
, a former Guantanamo Bay prisoner, Muhammad Habibur-Rahman from Islamic Forum of Europe and others.
Milne has argued:
Milne has also criticised the Council of Europe
and others for adopting "as fact the wildest estimates of those 'killed by communist regimes'". He has argued that, while "the numbers remain a focus of huge academic controversy", the real records of repression now available from the Soviet archives are horrific enough (799,455 people were recorded as executed between 1921 and 1953 and the labour camp population reached 2.5 million at its peak) without engaging in an ideologically-fuelled inflation game".
" and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Milne argued in 2001 that war in Afghanistan would fail to "stamp out anti-western terrorism" and if the US invaded Iraq, "it risks a catastrophe". In relation to Iraq, Milne has argued that:
Milne has argued for a "negotiated withdrawal" from Afghanistan based on a "political settlement, including the Taliban and regional powers".
Milne linked the attacks with the British involvement in the war in Iraq. Milne argued:
and its followers were motivated by "a hatred of western freedoms and way of life" and "that their Islamist ideology aims at global domination", rather than "the withdrawal of US and other western forces from the Arab and Muslim world" and an end to support for Israeli occupation of Palestinian land and despotic regimes in the region.
Victor J. Seidler, a Professor of Social Theory from the University of London, argued in relation to Milne's article that we have to be careful "not to dismiss and Islamist rejection of the freedoms of Western urban cultures". Seidler argued that contrary to Milne's claims, the 7/7 terrorists were "home grown" and that they were at least partly motivated by "Islamist religious doctrine". After quoting Milne's viewes about al-Qaida, seidler argued:
of Palestinians had been orchestrated by Israel months before the end of the British Mandate for Palestine.
(April 1–11, 2002) during Operation Defensive Shield
as an "unleashing of state terror" by the Israeli government whilst describing the fierce fighting of Palestinian militants as "desperate Palestinian resistance". Milne claimed during the fighting in Jenin that as "in other West Bank towns and camps, reports of beatings and executions of prisoners abound, and Israel appears to be preparing the ground for evidence of atrocities". Milne also stated that "Hundreds [of Palestinians] are reported killed, including many civilians. Milne echoed the massacre allegations made by Palestinian officials and residents of Jenin (The actual number of casualties in Jenin were 23 dead and 52 wounded Isareli soldiers and 53 dead, hundreds wounded and 200 captured on the Palestinians - 5 dead civilians and 48 militants according to the IDF
and 27 militants and 22 civilians according to HRW
).
Melanie Phillips
, in an article titled "The Guardian Goes to Pallywood
" on her Spectator
blog, highly criticized the factual truth of the research and the anti-Israeli stance of the Guardian, describing it as "an evil newspaper". At the end of this long article Phillips criticized Milne's commentary as:
Milne described the restoration of the sight of Mario Terán
, the former Bolivian sergeant who killed Che Guevara
, by Cuban doctors "paid for by revolutionary Venezuela in the radicalised Bolivia of Evo Morales", one of "1.4 million free eye operations carried out by Cuban doctors in 33 countries across Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa", as "an emblem both of the humanity of Fidel Castro and Guevara's legacy" and the transformation of Latin America.
Milne has also argued that Hugo Chávez
's presidency has been the target of "unfounded accusations of dictatorship" in the western media. Milne claimed that Chávez proposed referendum to eliminate term limits
(which passed on 15 February 2009 after previously rejected on August 2007), was "bring[ing] the country into line with the rules in France and Britain".
in her book The Shock Doctrine
as having turned the Guardians comment section into a "truly global debating forum".
Conservative MEP Daniel Hannan claimed that Milne's greatest achievement "was to take full advantage of the expansion of the Guardian’s comment pages, which he edited until last year, making them the most thought-provoking opinion section in Britain". Hannan also praised Milne as "a sincere, eloquent and uncomplicated Marxist".
as "a Stalinist Rip van Winkle" in a September 2001 article supporting the war on terrorism. The journalist Melanie Phillips portrayed Milne as a "Muslim Brotherhood/Hamas mouthpiece".
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
newspaper, he is author of a best-selling book about the 1984-5 British miners' strike, The Enemy Within: The Secret War Against the Miners, which focuses on the role of MI5
MI5
The Security Service, commonly known as MI5 , is the United Kingdom's internal counter-intelligence and security agency and is part of its core intelligence machinery alongside the Secret Intelligence Service focused on foreign threats, Government Communications Headquarters and the Defence...
and Special Branch
Special Branch
Special Branch is a label customarily used to identify units responsible for matters of national security in British and Commonwealth police forces, as well as in the Royal Thai Police...
in the dispute.
Early life
The younger son of the former BBCBBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
Director General Alasdair Milne
Alasdair Milne
Alasdair David Gordon Milne is a former BBC producer who became Controller of BBC Scotland, the BBC's Director of Programmes and then Director-General of the BBC in July 1982. His resignation was forced by the BBC Governors in January 1987, following pressure from the Thatcher government...
, Milne attended Winchester College
Winchester College
Winchester College is an independent school for boys in the British public school tradition, situated in Winchester, Hampshire, the former capital of England. It has existed in its present location for over 600 years and claims the longest unbroken history of any school in England...
and read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Balliol College, Oxford
Balliol College, Oxford
Balliol College , founded in 1263, is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England but founded by a family with strong Scottish connections....
and Economics at Birkbeck College, London University
Birkbeck, University of London
Birkbeck, University of London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It offers many Master's and Bachelor's degree programmes that can be studied either part-time or full-time, though nearly all teaching is...
. His sister, Kirsty, was a visiting scholar at Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
and as a journalist has worked on The Scotsman
The Scotsman
The Scotsman is a British newspaper, published in Edinburgh.As of August 2011 it had an audited circulation of 38,423, down from about 100,000 in the 1980s....
, the New Statesman
New Statesman
New Statesman is a British centre-left political and cultural magazine published weekly in London. Founded in 1913, and connected with leading members of the Fabian Society, the magazine reached a circulation peak in the late 1960s....
, New Society and the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
.
Career
Milne was the business manager of Straight Left, a monthly publication of an orthodox factional group within the Communist Party of Great BritainCommunist Party of Great Britain
The Communist Party of Great Britain was the largest communist party in Great Britain, although it never became a mass party like those in France and Italy. It existed from 1920 to 1991.-Formation:...
.
Milne worked as a staff journalist for three years on The Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
before joining The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, where he has been a news reporter, Labour Correspondent (Europe), Labour Editor, and Comment Editor (for six years, 2001-7).
Milne has reported for The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
from the Middle East, Latin America, Russia, Eastern Europe and South Asia, and also written for Le Monde Diplomatique
Le Monde diplomatique
Le Monde diplomatique is a monthly newspaper offering analysis and opinion on politics, culture, and current affairs. It was first created mainly for a diplomatic audience as its name implies...
and the London Review of Books
London Review of Books
The London Review of Books is a fortnightly British magazine of literary and intellectual essays.-History:The LRB was founded in 1979, during the year-long lock-out at The Times, by publisher A...
. He has been a long-term member of the Labour Party and served on the executive committee of the National Union of Journalists
National Union of Journalists
The National Union of Journalists is a trade union for journalists in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. It was founded in 1907 and has 38,000 members. It is a member of the International Federation of Journalists .-Structure:...
for ten years. He was joint winner of the 1999 What the Papers Say Scoop of the Year award.
Political orientation
Milne has been described as a "staunch socialist" in the Evening Standard. Following an article he published in September 1995 in the Guardian, Milne "became characterised as a 'far-left activist' and member of the Socialist Workers PartySocialist Workers Party (Britain)
The Socialist Workers Party is a far left party in Britain founded by Tony Cliff. The SWP's student section has groups at a number of universities...
". Peter Popham argued that connecting Milne to the SWP was a "smear", but "there is no mistaking that Seumas is on the far left of the Labour Party, of which he has been a member for 20 years".
On British politics
Milne has been a strong critic of New Labour, in particular over its support for foreign wars, privatisation and low taxes on the wealthy. He has argued that David Cameron's "makeover" of the Conservative Party is "skin deep" and attacked the party for its links with "rightwing fringe" parties in eastern Europe and support for "small state" public spending cuts.On the Muslim community in Britain
Milne was one of the speakers in a public meeting titled "Kafa - Enough: Stop attacks on the Muslim community", which was held on 26 June 2010. Other speakers beside Milne were Daud AbdullahDaud Abdullah
Daud A. Abdullah is the current Deputy Secretary General of the Muslim Council of Britain.-Life and career:Daud Abdullah was born in St. David's Grenada where he received his early education. He obtained his first degree from the University of Guyana in 1981 and was awarded a scholarship to study...
from the Muslim Council of Britain
Muslim Council of Britain
The Muslim Council of Britain is a self-appointed umbrella body for national, regional, local and specialist organisations and institutions from different ethnic and sectarian backgrounds within British Islamic society. It was established in 1997 to help Muslims, to increase education about the...
, left-wing politician George Galloway
George Galloway
George Galloway is a British politician, author, journalist and broadcaster who was a Member of Parliament from 1987 to 2010. He was formerly an MP for the Labour Party, first for Glasgow Hillhead and later for Glasgow Kelvin, before his expulsion from the party in October 2003, the same year...
, Anas Al-Tikriti
Anas Altikriti
Anas Altikriti is President and founder of the Cordoba Foundation. A leading figure in the British Anti-War movement , Altikriti also served as president of the Muslim Association of Britain between 2004 and 2005.Altikriti holds an MSc in Translation and Interpreting...
from British Muslim Initiative, Labour party MP
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
Diane Abbott
Diane Abbott
Diane Julie Abbott is a British Labour Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament for Hackney North and Stoke Newington since 1987, when she became the first black woman to be elected to the House of Commons...
, Ismail Patel
Ismail Patel
Ismail Patel is a British optician, and founder of Friends of Al-Aqsa, in Leicester, about 1995.He is an advisory board member of the Conflicts Forum, director of IslamExpo, and a member of the Special Advisory Board of Clear Conscience....
founder of Friends of Al-Aqsa, Lindsey German from Stop the War Coalition
Stop the War Coalition
The Stop the War Coalition is a United Kingdom group set up on 21 September 2001 that campaigns against what it believes are unjust wars....
and Abdulrahman Jafar from Muslim Safety Forum. In his speech, Milne argued that there is a basic process that can be seen across all of the British media:
A racist portrayal of Muslims and Islam in general, a tendency to hype all bogus terror plots into something utterly beyond the pale... A process which is verged on incitement, and has played a central role I think in isolating and intimidating the community, and as we seen in places like Luton and elsewhere, effectively fueling violence on the streets and attacks on Muslim institutions and mosques in particular.
Milne also attended the second conference titled "Stop Islamophobia: Defend the Muslim Community", which was held on 5 June 2010. The conference was organised by Stop the War Coalition and British Muslim Initiative and supported by various British Islamic organizations. Speakers in this conference included amongst others Tony Benn
Tony Benn
Anthony Neil Wedgwood "Tony" Benn, PC is a British Labour Party politician and a former MP and Cabinet Minister.His successful campaign to renounce his hereditary peerage was instrumental in the creation of the Peerage Act 1963...
, the president of Stop the War Coalition, Moazzam Begg
Moazzam Begg
Moazzam Begg , is a British Pakistani Muslim who was held in extrajudicial detention in the Bagram Theater Internment Facility and the Guantanamo Bay detainment camp, in Cuba, by the U.S...
, a former Guantanamo Bay prisoner, Muhammad Habibur-Rahman from Islamic Forum of Europe and others.
Capitalism
Milne has argued that the financial and economic crisis of 2007-9 has discredited the neoliberal model of capitalism "that dominated the world for a generation". He has argued for full public ownership of banks in Britain to support economic recovery and overcome the credit crisis.Communism
Milne has attacked what he calls "the creeping historical revisionism that tries to equate Nazism and communism", which he argues has tended to "relativise the unique crimes of Nazism, bury those of colonialism and feed the idea that any attempt at radical social change will always lead to suffering, killing and failure". He has written that communism's "crimes are now so well rehearsed that they are in danger of obliterating any understanding of its achievements, both of which have lessons for the future of progressive politics and the search for a social alternative to globalised capitalism".Milne has argued:
For all its brutalities and failures, communism in the Soviet Union, eastern Europe and elsewhere delivered rapid industrialisation, mass education, job security and huge advances in social and gender equality. It encompassed genuine idealism and commitment... Its existence helped to drive up welfare standards in the west, boosted the anticolonial movement and provided a powerful counterweight to western global domination.
Milne has also criticised the Council of Europe
Council of Europe
The Council of Europe is an international organisation promoting co-operation between all countries of Europe in the areas of legal standards, human rights, democratic development, the rule of law and cultural co-operation...
and others for adopting "as fact the wildest estimates of those 'killed by communist regimes'". He has argued that, while "the numbers remain a focus of huge academic controversy", the real records of repression now available from the Soviet archives are horrific enough (799,455 people were recorded as executed between 1921 and 1953 and the labour camp population reached 2.5 million at its peak) without engaging in an ideologically-fuelled inflation game".
September 11 attacks
Milne argued that the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on New York and Washington were the product of "longstanding grievances" over US intervention in the Middle East: "not only western indulgence of Israeli military occupation, but decades of oil-lubricated support for despots from Iran to Oman, Egypt to Saudi Arabia and routine military interventions to maintain US control". On 13 September 2001, Milne wrote that "most Americans simply don't get.. why the United States is hated with such bitterness, not only in Arab and Muslim countries, but across the developing world". Milne argued that in the aftermath of "such atrocities", only a minority were likely to "make the connection between what has been visited upon them and what their government has visited upon large parts of the world. But make that connection they must, if such tragedies are not to be repeated." He wrote that the US was "reaping a dragon's teeth harvest" it had itself sowed in Afghanistan in the 1980s.Afghanistan and Iraq wars
Seumas Milne has been a vocal critic of the "war on terrorWar on Terror
The War on Terror is a term commonly applied to an international military campaign led by the United States and the United Kingdom with the support of other North Atlantic Treaty Organisation as well as non-NATO countries...
" and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Milne argued in 2001 that war in Afghanistan would fail to "stamp out anti-western terrorism" and if the US invaded Iraq, "it risks a catastrophe". In relation to Iraq, Milne has argued that:
Given that the invasion of Iraq was regarded as illegal by the majority of the UN security council, its secretary general, and the overwhelming weight of international legal opinion, it must by the same token be seen as a war crime: what the Nuremberg tribunal deemed the "supreme international crime" of aggression. If it weren't for the fact that there is not the remotest prospect of any mechanism to apply international law to powerful states, Bush and Blair would be in the dock at the Hague.
Milne has argued for a "negotiated withdrawal" from Afghanistan based on a "political settlement, including the Taliban and regional powers".
7/7 London bombings
A week after the 7 July 2005 London bombings7 July 2005 London bombings
The 7 July 2005 London bombings were a series of co-ordinated suicide attacks in the United Kingdom, targeting civilians using London's public transport system during the morning rush hour....
Milne linked the attacks with the British involvement in the war in Iraq. Milne argued:
We can't of course be sure of the exact balance of motivations that drove four young suicide bombers to strike last Thursday, but we can be certain that the bloodbath unleashed by Bush and Blair in Iraq - where a 7/7 takes place every day - was at the very least one of them. What they did was not "home grown", but driven by a worldwide anger at US-led domination and occupation of Muslim countries.
Motivations of al-Qaeda
Milne argued after the London bombings that it was "an insult to the dead" and a "piece of disinformation long peddled by champions of the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan" to claim that al-QaedaAl-Qaeda
Al-Qaeda is a global broad-based militant Islamist terrorist organization founded by Osama bin Laden sometime between August 1988 and late 1989. It operates as a network comprising both a multinational, stateless army and a radical Sunni Muslim movement calling for global Jihad...
and its followers were motivated by "a hatred of western freedoms and way of life" and "that their Islamist ideology aims at global domination", rather than "the withdrawal of US and other western forces from the Arab and Muslim world" and an end to support for Israeli occupation of Palestinian land and despotic regimes in the region.
Victor J. Seidler, a Professor of Social Theory from the University of London, argued in relation to Milne's article that we have to be careful "not to dismiss and Islamist rejection of the freedoms of Western urban cultures". Seidler argued that contrary to Milne's claims, the 7/7 terrorists were "home grown" and that they were at least partly motivated by "Islamist religious doctrine". After quoting Milne's viewes about al-Qaida, seidler argued:
The questions we face are more complex and involve questioning a reductionist conception of ideology, often informed by an orthodox reading of Marx, that assumes it exists primarily as expressions of material inequalities and social injustices. al-Qaida's religious conservatism and dreams of restoring the medieval caliphate also have to be taken seriously as part of a rejection of what the West has to offer.
On Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Iran
Milne has stated that since the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, "Iran and its allies offer the only effective challenge to US domination of the Middle East and its resources". After the 2009 presidential election in Iran, Milne argued that the evidence suggested Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had in fact won the elections, despite allegations of fraud. Milne wrote that "it's hard to believe that rigging alone could account for the 11 million-vote gap between the main contenders". Milne has described Ahmadinejad's "toying with Holocaust denial" as "morally repugnant and factually absurd". But he argued that, while for the western media Ahmadinejad is "nothing but a Holocaust-denying fanatic... the other Ahmadinejad, who is seen to stand up for the country's independence, expose elite corruption on TV and use Iran's oil wealth to boost the incomes of the poor majority is largely invisible".Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
In the Middle East, Milne has argued that "commitment to Palestinian rights should first of all be a question of justice. But, given the toxicity this conflict brings to the entire relationship with the Muslim world, it is also a matter of obvious western self-interest". He has written that "far from supporting the Palestinian national unity necessary to make any peace agreement stick", the US and its allies "are doing everything possible to deepen the split between Hamas and Abbas's Fatah movement".1948 Arab–Israeli War
Milne has argued that "it is to Britain's historic shame that having played such a central role in the creation of the Israel-Palestine conflict and the dispossession of a people it had promised to protect". Milne claimed that ethnic cleansingEthnic cleansing
Ethnic cleansing is a purposeful policy designed by one ethnic or religious group to remove by violent and terror-inspiring means the civilian population of another ethnic orreligious group from certain geographic areas....
of Palestinians had been orchestrated by Israel months before the end of the British Mandate for Palestine.
Battle of Jenin
Milne described the Battle of JeninBattle of Jenin
The Battle of Jenin took place in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank. Israel Defense Forces entered the camp, and other areas under the administration of the Palestinian Authority, during the Second Intifada, as part of Operation Defensive Shield...
(April 1–11, 2002) during Operation Defensive Shield
Operation Defensive Shield
Operation Defensive Shield was a large-scale military operation conducted by the Israel Defense Forces in 2002, during the course of the Second Intifada. It was the largest military operation in the West Bank since the 1967 Six-Day War. The operation was an attempt by the Israeli army to stop the...
as an "unleashing of state terror" by the Israeli government whilst describing the fierce fighting of Palestinian militants as "desperate Palestinian resistance". Milne claimed during the fighting in Jenin that as "in other West Bank towns and camps, reports of beatings and executions of prisoners abound, and Israel appears to be preparing the ground for evidence of atrocities". Milne also stated that "Hundreds [of Palestinians] are reported killed, including many civilians. Milne echoed the massacre allegations made by Palestinian officials and residents of Jenin (The actual number of casualties in Jenin were 23 dead and 52 wounded Isareli soldiers and 53 dead, hundreds wounded and 200 captured on the Palestinians - 5 dead civilians and 48 militants according to the IDF
Israel Defense Forces
The Israel Defense Forces , commonly known in Israel by the Hebrew acronym Tzahal , are the military forces of the State of Israel. They consist of the ground forces, air force and navy. It is the sole military wing of the Israeli security forces, and has no civilian jurisdiction within Israel...
and 27 militants and 22 civilians according to HRW
Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...
).
Gaza War
In the aftermath of the Gaza War (27 December 2008-18 January 2009) Milne cited allegations of Israeli war crimes to argue: "With such powerful evidence of violations of the rules of war now emerging from the rubble of Gaza, the test must be this: is the developing system of international accountability for war crimes only going to apply to the west's enemies – or can the western powers and their closest allies also be brought to book?"Melanie Phillips
Melanie Phillips
Melanie Phillips is a British journalist and author. She began her career on the left of the political spectrum, writing for such publications as The Guardian and New Statesman. In the 1990s she moved to the right, and she now writes for the Daily Mail newspaper, covering political and social...
, in an article titled "The Guardian Goes to Pallywood
Pallywood
Pallywood, a portmanteau of "Palestinian" and "Hollywood", is a coinage that has been used by some pro-Israeli media watchdog advocates, among others, to describe alleged "media manipulation, distortion and outright fraud by the Palestinians and other Arabs .....
" on her Spectator
The Spectator
The Spectator is a weekly British magazine first published on 6 July 1828. It is currently owned by David and Frederick Barclay, who also owns The Daily Telegraph. Its principal subject areas are politics and culture...
blog, highly criticized the factual truth of the research and the anti-Israeli stance of the Guardian, describing it as "an evil newspaper". At the end of this long article Phillips criticized Milne's commentary as:
Lazy, malicious use of partisan, uncorroborated, thin, ambiguous and on occasion demonstrably absurd allegations, with the purpose and effect of demonising and delegitimising the Israeli victims of terrorism by painting them as the terrorists and their Palestinian attackers as their victims.
On Latin America
Milne has written in support of what he calls "the wave of progressive change in Latin America", which he has described as "the most hopeful development in global politics in the past two decades".Milne described the restoration of the sight of Mario Terán
Mario Terán
Mario Terán is the Bolivian Army sergeant who was chosen to carry out the execution of Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara as a young man on October 9, 1967.-Personal life:...
, the former Bolivian sergeant who killed Che Guevara
Che Guevara
Ernesto "Che" Guevara , commonly known as el Che or simply Che, was an Argentine Marxist revolutionary, physician, author, intellectual, guerrilla leader, diplomat and military theorist...
, by Cuban doctors "paid for by revolutionary Venezuela in the radicalised Bolivia of Evo Morales", one of "1.4 million free eye operations carried out by Cuban doctors in 33 countries across Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa", as "an emblem both of the humanity of Fidel Castro and Guevara's legacy" and the transformation of Latin America.
Milne has also argued that Hugo Chávez
Hugo Chávez
Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías is the 56th and current President of Venezuela, having held that position since 1999. He was formerly the leader of the Fifth Republic Movement political party from its foundation in 1997 until 2007, when he became the leader of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela...
's presidency has been the target of "unfounded accusations of dictatorship" in the western media. Milne claimed that Chávez proposed referendum to eliminate term limits
Venezuelan constitutional referendum, 2009
The 2009 referendum was a vote in which the citizens of Venezuela approved Amendment No. 1 of the Constitution of Venezuela; this abolished term limits for the offices of President, state governors, mayors and National Assembly deputies.The current constitution, enacted in 1999 by referendum,...
(which passed on 15 February 2009 after previously rejected on August 2007), was "bring[ing] the country into line with the rules in France and Britain".
Praise
Milne was described by the left-wing writer Naomi KleinNaomi Klein
Naomi Klein is a Canadian author and social activist known for her political analyses and criticism of corporate globalization.-Family:...
in her book The Shock Doctrine
The Shock Doctrine
The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism is a 2007 book by Canadian author Naomi Klein, and is the basis of a 2009 documentary by the same name....
as having turned the Guardians comment section into a "truly global debating forum".
Conservative MEP Daniel Hannan claimed that Milne's greatest achievement "was to take full advantage of the expansion of the Guardian’s comment pages, which he edited until last year, making them the most thought-provoking opinion section in Britain". Hannan also praised Milne as "a sincere, eloquent and uncomplicated Marxist".
Criticism
Milne was singled out by Tony Blair in a December 2001 dossier as one of ten media critics of the war in Afghanistan and the US-British response to the 9/11 attacks whose views he claimed had "proved to be wrong". He was described by the novelist Robert HarrisRobert Harris (novelist)
Robert Dennis Harris is an English novelist. He is a former journalist and BBC television reporter.-Early life:Born in Nottingham, Harris spent his childhood in a small rented house on a Nottingham council estate. His ambition to become a writer arose at an early age, from visits to the local...
as "a Stalinist Rip van Winkle" in a September 2001 article supporting the war on terrorism. The journalist Melanie Phillips portrayed Milne as a "Muslim Brotherhood/Hamas mouthpiece".
Publications
- The Enemy Within: the Secret War Against the Miners, 1994, 1995 and 2004, ISBN 0-86091-461-5, Verso BooksVerso BooksVerso Books is a publishing house based in London and New York City, founded in 1970 by the staff of New Left Review. The company claims "global sales approaching $3 million per year and over 350 titles in print," possibly making it "the largest radical publisher in the English-language...
/Macmillan PublishersMacmillan PublishersMacmillan Publishers Ltd, also known as The Macmillan Group, is a privately held international publishing company owned by Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group. It has offices in 41 countries worldwide and operates in more than thirty others.-History:... - Beyond the Casino Economy, with Nicholas Costello and Jonathan MichieJonathan MichieProfessor Jonathan Michie is a British economist and holds the joint post of Director of the Department for Continuing Education, and President of Kellogg College, University of Oxford, where he is Professor of Innovation & Knowledge Exchange...
, 1989, ISBN 0-86091-967-6 Verso BooksVerso BooksVerso Books is a publishing house based in London and New York City, founded in 1970 by the staff of New Left Review. The company claims "global sales approaching $3 million per year and over 350 titles in print," possibly making it "the largest radical publisher in the English-language...