Larrakia woman June Mills gives "welcome to country" to the Darwin rally for refugee rights on April 6, 2012 - the first day of the national convergence for refugee rights. Read . [Read more of .]
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Picture this scene 鈥 late April 1986, a group of a dozen builders labourers on a cold Melbourne morning. The time is about 7.30am. They were picketing a building site where they鈥檇 been sacked for refusing to resign from their union, the Builders Labourers Federation (BLF), which had recently been 鈥渄eregistered鈥 鈥 a nice term for outlawed under Bob Hawke鈥檚 ALP federal government. The ALP premiers of New South Wales and Victoria, Neville Wran and John Cain, joined Hawke鈥檚 drive to outlaw the BLF.
As a visitor, you quickly realise that New York City is unsentimental. New Yorkers are always looking forward.
It鈥檚 in the nature of Wall Street. No wonder the Occupy movement started here in downtown Manhattan, the financial district.
As in all other US cities, there is a dramatic contrast between rich and poor, a Third World within the First World.
Yet only 17% of the population thinks this is a problem: most have bought the American Dream that perhaps next year they too will become millionaires. But for many of the poor, it will remain bleak.
Citizens of the Union of Myanmar, formerly and more commonly known as Burma, went to the polls on April 1 for crucial by-elections that have generated much attention.
The by-elections, to fill a few dozen seats in the 664-member parliament, elected leading democracy figure Aung San Suu Kyi to the constituency of Kawhmu, sending the democracy activist into the lower house of parliament.
Kawhmu is a small, rural farming town with no paved roads, electricity or running water. It is just one of many impoverished towns that litter Myanmar.
Ismail Mirza Jan is a 27-year-old Hazara Afghan locked up in Sydney鈥檚 Villawood Detention Centre. After the Taliban killed his father in 1998, Jan fled to Britain and then Ireland in 2001.
Eventually refused asylum, Jan came to Sydney by plane in February 2010 in the hope he could find refuge. Instead, . He says this saved him from retaliation and probable death in Afghanistan.
Seven people from multiple Australian cities were arrested today while climbing a hill to make contact with refugees inside the Wickham Point detention centre outside Darwin.
About 35 refugee activists from Darwin, Sydney, Perth, Brisbane and Melbourne were at the centre as part of several actions that took place outside the city鈥檚 three detention centres over the Easter long weekend for the annual refugee convergence.
Far from taking the closure of the Heinz tomato factory sitting down, workers and community members from the 150-strong rural Victorian town of Girgarre are getting organised.
Behind the hype of Australia鈥檚 mining boom and 鈥渆conomic stability鈥 lies the very real crisis affecting rural Australia.
Indonesia has been rocked by an explosion of popular protest against fuel price rises right around the country.
Indonesian Police Watch says between March 23 and 26 alone, there were 1063 demonstrations, 16 police stations were damaged and 750 protesters were arrested.
91自拍论坛 Weekly's Peter Boyle spoke to Dominggus Oktavanius, secretary-general of the Peoples Democratic Party (PRD) of Indonesia on April 4 about the outbreak of mass unrest.
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