Three members of Iraq聮s Olympic soccer team and one of the team聮s assistant coaches announced their intention to apply for asylum in Australia after an international game in Gosford on November 17. They are currently on three-month temporary visas as athletes, and as such are not being sought by the immigration department.
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Indonesian activists in the National Liberation Party of Unity (PAPERNAS) continue to face government-sponsored thuggery and have appealed for support from Australian activists to help them defend their democratic rights.
Two conferences of the English anti-war party, Respect 鈥 The Unity Coalition, were convened on November 17 in London. Both were attended by around 350 people. The 鈥淩espect Renewal鈥 forces were led by MP George Galloway and 19 other non-Socialist Workers Party members of Respect鈥檚 national council. The SWP convened its own conference across town.
On November 18, PM John Howard announced that the federal government would consider extending the welfare quarantine currently in place for all Aboriginals on welfare in the NT to all welfare recipients convicted of drug offences. 聯It聮s not right that people should have control of taxpayer money when they have been convicted of such offences聰, he told ABC News. 聯This will mean that they will not be able to spend the money on those sorts of drugs, or indeed, for that matter, on alcohol and tobacco.聰
The Wilderness Society (TWS) has lost its Federal Court appeal, in which it argued that then-federal environment minister Malcolm Turnbull鈥檚 assessment of the Tamar Valley pulp mill was inadequate. The appeal was dismissed by three judges on November 22, but TWS spokesperson Greg Ogle said the it would not give up campaigning. 鈥淭he pulp mill is no closer to being built today than it was yesterday鈥, he said.
Chickenhawk-in-chief
"I would say that we would always try diplomacy first. In other words, I've committed our troops into harm's way twice, and it's not a pleasant experience because I understand the consequences firsthand." 鈥 Emperor George
More than 200 prominent individuals from the arts and showbusiness in the United States have signed a letter addressed to President George Bush expressing their support for cultural relations between the US and Cuba.
This year there has been a series of drug-related scandals in Australia鈥檚 two major football codes, the Australian Football League (AFL) and the National Rugby League (NRL). The scandals have nothing to do with 鈥減erformance enhancing鈥 drug, or even anything to do with the game of football at all. These scandals have been beaten up by a media circus, which has itself fed a frenzy of moral hypocrisy, led by the (now-former) federal Coalition government, with the 鈥渕e-too鈥 Labor Party chiming in.
Members of grassroots climate change action group Rising Tide chained themselves to a coal train on November 19 to stop the train reaching the port of Newcastle, the world聮s largest coal export port, with a record 80.8 million tonnes being shipped in the 2006-07 financial year.
Rail workers from the German train drivers union, the Gewerkschaft Deutscher Lokomotivf眉hrer (GDL), have repeatedly brought the country to a standstill in recent weeks, with rolling strikes against the state-owned rail company Deutsche Bahn AG.
Brian Senewiratne: 聯I have been a strong supporter of the left in my native Sri Lanka since I was 16 years old. I am now 76, and remain convinced, even more so, that it is the capitalist policies, first under the colonial British and later the Brown Sahibs of my ethnic group, the Sinhalese, that have taken that country to its condition of failing state.
Despite the fact that the November 24 federal election was supposed to be a 鈥渃limate-change election鈥, the release on November 17 of the fourth and final report from the UN鈥檚 Intergovernental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) barely garnered manstream media attention.
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