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Activists plan Sydney social forum

BY NICK EVERETT SYDNEY — Activists representing the Wilderness Society, the Palestine Human Rights Campaign, the Democratic Socialist Party, the International Socialist Organisation, the NSW Greens and the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union

GERMANY: 'Peace for the world - pretzels for Bush'

'Peace for the world - pretzels for Bush' A crowd of 50,000-70,000 rallied on May 21 in Berlin against George Bush's phony “war on terror”, preparing to give the US president a not so much warm as heated “welcome” to the city when he arrived

Tax workers want pay rise without strings

BY CHRIS SLEE The Australian Taxation Office's insistence that staff must meet "corporate indicators" before receiving a pay rise will likely be a hot issue in negotiations on a new certified agreement for the agency. At a May 16-19 meeting of

Socialist Alliance protests Tasmanian budget

BY DARREN JIGGENS HOBART — Praised by the establishment for handing down a "fiscally responsible" budget, the Labor government was criticised by the Socialist Alliance, which has just announced its candidates for the state election later this

EAST TIMOR: 'Your struggle is our struggle'

[The following is a slightly abridged version of a speech given by Sarah Stephen, a member of the Action in Solidarity with Asia and the Pacific brigade to East Timor, at a protest organised by a number of East Timorese groups in Dili on

Loose cannons

Frustration "It's a frustrating war. The reason it's so frustrating and aggravating is because the enemy is not fighting." — US Lieutenant-Colonel Patrick Fetterman in Afghanistan, quoted in the May 16 Washington Post. Deja vu "We're trying

Action Updates

Melbourne greets Tampa MELBOURNE — On May 16 the MV Tampa was greeted by a flotilla of boats organised by both the Refugee Action Collective-Victoria and the City of Port Phillip. Messages of support for Captain Arne Rinnan's rescuing of

AMWU leaders charged

BY SUE BULL MELBOURNE - The Victorian branch of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union has found itself under major attack from both its national office and the state government, in what many of the union's supporters believe is an

ANGOLA: The crisis you aren't hearing about

BY SEAN HEALY Out of sight of the world, a humanitarian crisis of enormous proportions is unfolding in Angola, as perhaps hundreds of thousands of people flee the “grey zones”, the 90% of the country which have until now been closed to

On the box

Actively Radical TV — Sydney community television's progressive current affairs producers tackle the hard issues from the activist's point of view. Features the 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ News. CTS Sydney (UHF 31), every Sunday, 9pm. Phone 9565 5522. Visit <

Ruddock continues persecution of Kayanis

BY PAUL OBOOHOV CANBERRA — Relatives of Shahraz Kayani, who died as a result of setting himself alight on the Parliament House forecourt on April 2, 2001, have been prevented from coming to Australia on the anniversary of his death. On May 27,

Nobody's Somebody's

BY SUE CAMPBELL-ROBERTS SYDNEY — How do 17 emerging artists respond to the Australian government's treatment of asylum seekers? With an exhibition of powerful new art works focussing on the individual and collective meaning of journey,