Thousands of people are expected to join the World Refugee Day rallies around Australia between June 19 and June 26. In Melbourne, the rally - to be held on Sunday June 20 - has the theme 鈥淣ot another Tampa election鈥. Patrick McGorry, Australian of the Year will speak at the Museum Square to refugees, asylum seekers, human rights agency staff and volunteers, refugee advocates and activists before the marchers move off to the EMERGE FESTIVAL at Fitzroy Town Hall.
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Brisbane, June 18, 2010 - 鈥淭he only way to find out the truth about the behavior of the Queensland police hierarchy in the cover-ups that followed the November 2004 killing of Mulrunji on Palm Island is to institute an independent commission of inquiry run by a respected interstate figure,鈥 Sam Watson, well-known Murri rights activist and lead Senate candidate for Queensland said today.
鈥淚n the meantime the Queensland Police Service (QPS) hierarchy, beginning with commissioner Robert Atkinson, must be sacked.鈥
June 15, 2010 - Thousands rallied and marched around Australia in support of Ark Tribe, a construction worker possibly facing jail for simply failing to attend an interrogation by the construction industry police 鈥淪tar Chamber鈥 - the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC).
Workers held an overnight vigil outside the ABCC offices in Melbourne, 500 rallied and marched in Sydney and up to 1,500 rallied outside the Adelaide Magistrate's court. Trade unionists from other parts of the country have gone to Adelaide to show their solidarity.
SYDNEY - Such is the groundswell of community anger against the Israeli commando attack on the peace flotilla to Gaza that the Campbelltown branch of the ALP passed a strongly-worded motion on June 7 including calling on the Rudd government to cut ties with Israel.
The motion also condemned the attack and the blockade of Gaza, and called for support for the solidarity protests being organised by the Palestinian community and their supporters.
The Secretariat of the World Federation of Trade Unions has today decided to call a strike for three days at all ports of the world against Israel commercial vessels to or from Israel.
By Rosamund Dallow-Smith and Pip Hinman
SYDNEY 鈥 Conservation and other groups are opposed to the NSW environment minister Frank Sartor鈥檚 National Park development bill, introduced into the NSW parliament on June 2. The plan will shift the focus of National Parks away from conservation toward development. It will also allow tourism to be formally recognised as a purpose of national parks, contravening the long-held principle that national parks were only for nature conservation and visitation.
Venezuelan trade unionist and community educator Alexis Adarfio Marin visited Australia last month, informing many audiences of the radical changes being carried out by Venezuela鈥檚 Bolivarian revolution.
Adarfio was a guest of the Search Foundation, which hosted a range of international guest speakers at its Australian Left Renewal Conference in Sydney over May 29-30.
Long ago, I was made to understand that Palestine was not Palestine;
I was also informed that Palestinians were not Palestinians;
They also explained to me that ethnic cleansing was not ethnic cleansing.
And when naive old me saw freedom fighters
they patiently showed me that they were not freedom fighters,
and that resistance was not resistance.
And when, stupidly, I noticed arrogance, oppression and humiliation
they benevolently enlightened me so I can see that arrogance was not arrogance,
oppression was not oppression, and humiliation was not humiliation.
The US's worst-ever environmental disaster took yet another bad turn after British Petroleum's (BP) latest efforts to stop the torrent of oil from the Deepwater Horizon well failed.
Public discontent is growing, with increasing calls for a government takeover of the operation and seizure of BP鈥檚 assets.
The Deepwater Horizon oilrig exploded on April 20, killing 11 workers and releasing between 19.7 million and 43 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico.
Workers at the BHP Billiton Mt Arthur coalmine went on strike for about 26 hours on May 26 and 27. It was the first strike at the mine (formerly known as the Bayswater pit) in its 23-year operational history.
A striking worker from the mine said the reliability of coal supplied by the mine was a big selling point and the strike would damage the mine鈥檚 reputation.
The worker, who did not want his name used for fear of retribution, told 91自拍论坛 Weekly the dispute started when another worker arrived on the afternoon of May 26 and was told she had been sacked.
It鈥檚 time the Israeli government鈥檚 PR team made the most of its talents, and became available for hire.
Then, whenever a nutcase marched into a shopping mall in somewhere like Wisconsin and gunned down a selection of passers-by, they could be on hand to tell the world鈥檚 press: 鈥淭he gunman regrets the loss of life but did all he could to avoid violence.鈥
Then various governments would issue statements saying: 鈥淎ll we know is a man went berserk with an AK47, and next to him there鈥檚 a pile of corpses, so until we know the facts we can鈥檛 pass judgement on what took place.鈥
The Idea of Communism
By Tariq Ali
Seagull Press 2009, 126 pages
This short book is the first in a series called 鈥淲hat Was Communism鈥, which aims to explore the practice of Communism in the 20th century.
Tariq Ali鈥檚 main thesis is that 鈥淭he failure of official Communism in the 20th century and the restoration of capitalism in Russia and China 鈥 far from negating some of the premises that underlined the project in the first place, emphasises their continuing importance鈥.
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