LIBG is affiliated to Liberal International - the global federation of liberal parties. Its aims are to keep liberal values - human rights, social justice, democracy and rule of law - alive in the face of adversity. Working with like-minded parties across the globe, we want to keep Britain's pro-European, internationalist voice audible loud and clear across the globe.
LIBG holds regular events and produces a regular journal for members InterLib.
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LIBG event on April 14th 2025
Our meeting about the recent momentous changes in Bangladesh marked the first time a professional opera singer has spoken at a LIBG meeting. Monica Yunus, who was a soprano at the Metropolitan Opera in New York for years, is also the daughter of Nobel Peace Prize winner Professor Mohamad Yunus who now leads Bangladesh’s transitional government. Throughout 2024, Monica campaigned to keep her father from being imprisoned on trumped up charges by Bangladesh’s ruler, Sheikh Hasina. Monica was then at her father’s side as young people led a popular uprising that Hasina’s regime used disproportionate violence against. The protests continued until August 2024 when Hasina and her Awami League governing party were driven from power. During the LIBG meeting, Monica showed a short video about the uprising and the brutality of Hasina’s security services.
Professor Yunus now oversees the transitional government, including 11commissions drafting a new constitution, and examining the justice system, public administration, anti-corruption, police reform, electoral system reform, among other areas. Professor Farhana Sultana spoke of the challenges facing the transitional government, including a legacy of corruption and a relentless campaign of daily disinformation spread by the Awami League and its backers overseas. She said there was evidence that the Indian government spreads falsehoods about Muslim attacks on the Hindu minority.
Professor Sultana touched on Sheikh Hasina’s crimes, the UN investigation report on the unrest in 2024, and how justice is being denied as India refuses to extradite Hasina. There are also targeted attacks on Professor Yunus and the interim government, deliberately diverting social media attention from the injustices and corruption of the Hasina regime. This means the interim government is forced to constantly debunk disinformation and clarify false accusations, while trying to build democracy. It also creates tension with India, although Bangladesh has repeatedly stated it wants good relations with India. Professor Sultana believes India wants Bangladesh to be a vassal state it can control geopolitically, financially, resource-wise, and ideologically, all of which it lost with the fall of Hasina. China is taking advantage of this to open friendly relations with the interim government.
I recommend this article by Professor Sultana in which she reprises the talk she gave LIBG: https://www.laprogressive.com/foreign-policy/democracy-after-dictatorship
Maher Sattar is an award-winning journalist and senior editor at the Fuller project in the States. He has published research on the way in which the central role of women in the 2024 uprising has been downplayed, with women marginalized. He has also highlighted the treatment of women in Bangladesh’s massive garment industry – an industry that now faces crippling tariffs on its exports thanks to the Trump administration.
Mumtaz Hussain is the first British Bangladeshi to be elected to Birmingham City Council. She represents an area with a significant British Bangladeshi population, and where supporters of the Awami League remain active. She admitted she didn’t follow events in Bangladesh closely, busy as she is working for the people who she represents in Birmingham.
Many thanks to Rebecca Tinsley for organising this event.
A joint LIBG and LDEG event on 25 February 2025.
This joint LIBG and LDEG event was interesting, in-depth and well attended.The guest speakers were FDP MP Thomas Hacker, former MEP and founder of Women In Parliaments Silvana Koch- Mehrin, and LDEG chair (and resident of Germany) Rob Harrison. Sir Graham Watson chaired.
Initially each speaker spoke about the elections and their Liberal party, the Free Democratic Party which lost all seats, having been a junior coalition member. There was excellent analysis about how the party can improve itself as well as regret that they cannot help to influence the Bundestag at such an important time when Germany needs to be strong in Europe.
The far-right AfD achieved approximately 20% of the vote. They see themselves as the ‘nice face’ of the Nazis. The far-left party Die Linke also did well and these two extremist parties, which are both friendly with Putin, could vote together and prevent policies being adopted. So new Chancellor Merz will try to get a vote on some of the necessary changes BEFORE the new Bundestag comes in.
An analysis of voting patterns showed that AfD voters tend to be from East Germany and male voters from poorer regions in the West so integration is still an important issue for the new government.
Regarding defence and security, the new government should be stronger and play an important role in a more united Europe, possibly with French nuclear weapons stationed in Germany. On Ukraine, when the socialists were the strongest party, they managed to stop weapons to Ukraine. The Liberals succeeded in pushing for money to be given instead.
Thomas Hacker says, we have survived one month of Trump so only another 47 to go!
Trump, Harris and the Future of Transatlantic Relations
LIBG held a well-attended meeting on the first day of Liberal Democrat conference, discussing the future of NATO, Ukraine and American foreign policy. With an audience of over 130 people, LIBG was heartened by the show of interest in this crucial area of policy.
Mark Bergman, from the Democratic Party in Washington DC, refused to forecast the November 5th result. However, he left the meeting in no doubt that a Trump victory would have catastrophic consequences for Ukraine. He said that while Trump wants to withdraw the US from NATO, not all of his advisors shared this view, and that there was a chance that wiser heads might prevail. Phil Gordon, Kamala Harris’s likely national security advisor, has a track record suggesting not so much intervention (he was against the Iraq invasion and the hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan), but of fighting to uphold the liberal, democratic values of partner nations. Rather than isolationism or America first, a Harris administration would see America as one among partners, working collaboratively.
Yevheniia Kravchuk, deputy chair of Ukraine’s ruling Servant of the People party, spoke movingly about the existential fight facing her nation. The meeting was also an opportunity for members to listen to the new MP for South Devon, Caroline Voaden. It was chaired by LIBG chair Irina von Wiese.
The general discussion on Ukraine included concerns that Putin would not stop short of crushing and erasing Ukrainian identity if he is allowed to occupy the country. If the international community loses the will to support Ukraine, the result will be a repressive occupation in which thousands are imprisoned, tortured and killed.
When discussing the likelihood that Putin might respond to the use of Storm Shadow missiles on Russian soil, there was a view that a massive cyber attack on the UK could be more likely. This is concerning as the British public is in no way prepared for such an attack, and the UK government should be educating people to understand the scale of disruption that is possible, should the Kremlin decide to unleash its cyber capabilities.
More details will be included in the next edition of InterLib.
Many thanks to Rebecca Tinsley for organising this event.
Yesterday I attended a packed Global Strategy Forum event at the National Liberal Club, on the UK's future post-Brexit foreign policy. Malcolm Rifkind spoke for the Conservatives, Jack Straw for the Labour Party and Menzies Campbell for the Liberal Democrats. It is the largest lunchtime event I have ever attended at the NLC, over 40 years, and it was standing room only.
LIBG executive member Rebecca Tinsley has written a piece on the Open Democracy website in her own capacity on whether the UK's business links with dictatorships really open channels to raise human rights issues, as the Government claims.
Liberal International executive meeting Tblisi, Georgia, May 2016
The inaugural meeting of LIBG's north west England branch took place in Preston on 22 April.
Liberal International's 59th congress suffered perhaps from a rather odd choice of timing - a congress in Europe held only weeks before most of the continent would be caught up in European Parliament elections.
LIBG executive member Cllr Howard Henshaw (Fylde) and Kiron Reid (Liverpool) are looking to hold a meeting of any Liberal International and Liberal Democrat members and other Liberals interested in international affairs in the North West.
