Issue 762

News

  • SA teachers stop work over pay and funding

    South Australian teachers undertook four days of rolling stoppages and community rallies across the state from August 4-7 in an attempt to force the state government to re-negotiate its pay and funding arrangement for public schools and TAFEs. Eighty-three per cent of teachers voted in favour of the stoppages in workplace ballots in late July.

  • Protesters call on PM to abolish ABCC

    聯Abolish the ABCC! Support rights of building workers!聰 was the message on protesters聮 placards outside PM Kevin Rudd聮s electorate office in Morningside on August 8.

  • Breaking Queensland's coal addiction

    聯Queensland is the biggest coal producing state in the biggest coal producing country in the world聰, John MacKenzie of Friends of the Earth told an August 6 Socialist Alliance forum.

  • Palestinian refugee deported to death

    Palestinian refugee Akram al Masri, 31, who was deported from Australia in 2002, has been shot dead in his homeland less than six months after Australian authorities allegedly refused him a visitor聮s visa.

  • Keep Australia nuclear free!

    聯If only 0.3% of the world聮s current nuclear armaments were used, it would create a nuclear winter, and the end of humanity on this planet聰, Dr Marianne Hanson, senior lecturer in international relations at the University of Queensland, told the Brisbane Hiroshima Day rally on August 3. The rally attracted 100 people.

  • Climate justice seminar calls for action

    With the impact of global warming already being felt, it can be hard to feel positive about the future. However, an August 2 聯climate justice聰 seminar at Melbourne University provided some positive directions for the 140 people who attended.

  • Hillsong's miracle make-up cure

    The conservative Christian group Hillsong has launched a controversial new youth program 聯Shine聰, aimed, it says, at 聯promoting self-esteem聰 in teenage girls considered to be 聯at risk聰, due to personal problems or behavioural issues.

  • Pope, sexuality and human rights

    Fifty people took part in a discussion around the topic 聯Sex, sexuality and the church聰 hosted by the Socialist Alliance on August 6.

Analysis

  • Write On: Letter to the editor

    Work Choices @letter =What rock was Nick Everett hiding under during last year's federal election? (Write On, GLW #761) You couldn't move without a Labor political hopeful promising to "tear-up" Work Choices through the campaign. Rudd promised it

  • An apology to the Tamil people

    There can be no peace, and certainly no peace with coexistence, in Sri Lanka 聴 divided or undivided 聴 until there is an apology from the Sinhalese to the Tamils for all the atrocities unleashed on them, not just in 1983, but all the way back to 1956, and increasingly so today.

  • Labour shortage or lack of well-paid jobs?

    On August 6, Victoria University of Technology (VUT) hosted a seminar, 鈥淧acific Islands Migration and Labour Mobility: Issues and Responses鈥, which discussed the potential for an unskilled guest worker scheme for Pacific Island workers. Some Pacific nations have called for such program to help alleviate high rates of unemployment.

  • Sewerage reform: concrete sustainability ideas

    Hydrologists such as professors Peter Cullen, Richard Kingsford and Derek Eamus, speaking at public forums in NSW earlier this year, warned that Australians are extracting water from stressed rivers and artesian systems faster than it is being replenished.

  • Can markets stop climate change?

    Internationally, as in Australia, governments forced to promise climate change action have generally promoted market-based carbon abatement schemes, mostly of the 聯cap and trade聰 variety. But can we trade our way out of our climate difficulties? Can market mechanisms deal with a problem of such scale and urgency?

  • Fanning the flames of climate change

    聯As near as we can tell looking at the historical record, there聮s been ice in the Arctic in the summer for at least 16 million years聰, Don Perovich, a geophysicist with the US army聮s Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, told the August 4 Four Corners program. Arctic ice melt over this year聮s northern summer has been at record levels, leaving the amount of ice remaining alarmingly low.

  • A tale of two meetings

    A flurry of public meetings followed the federal government聮s green paper on carbon emissions trading. I attended two quite different information sessions in Sydney.

  • Call for national emergency climate protests

    The following call for a national week of protest action, beginning September 21, was issued by the July 5 Climate Emergency Rally organising committee in Melbourne, and endorsed by the August 2 Climate Justice seminar.

World

  • Venezuela: Pro-revolution parties unite, unions split

    Speaking on his weekly program Alo Presidente on August 3, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced important steps towards unity of pro-revolution parties in the lead-up to the November 23 regional elections.

  • Pakistani peasants rally against frame-up

    More than 10,000 peasants rallied on August 4 in Okara, Punjab demanding the withdrawal of false charges of murder against the leaders of Tenant Association of Punjab (AMP).

  • South Korean unions call for solidarity

    Below is an abridged call for solidarity from the Korean Federation of Trade Unions against July 24 arrest warrants issued for the KCTU leadership by the government of President Lee Myung-bak, as part of a crackdown on the mass movement against the decision to allow US beef imports. The full statement can be read at . On August 6, police used water cannon and arrested 167 people to break up protests overnight against a visit by US President George Bush, according to an AFP report that day. The 10,000-strong, according to organisers, peaceful candle-lit vigil was protesting the US beef import decision.

  • Bolivia's struggle for justice, against right-wing offensive

    聯Given everything that is occurring in Tarija, Santa Cruz, Pando and Beni, we have to denounce 聟 that we are on the threshold of a real coup d聮etat against the constitutional order聰, announced Bolivian minister of the presidency, Ramon Quintana, on August 7.

  • Venezuela: Bank takeover, decrees signal 'new offensive'

    Announcing the nationalisation of Banco de Venezuela, which will now be 聯put at the service of the people聰, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez stated during a live televised broadcast on July 31 that it would be transformed into a 聯socialist bank聰.

  • Afghanistan: Open letter from a persecuted journalist

    Below is an open letter from Naser Fayaz, a journalist for ATN TV channel, which has been sent to human rights organisations. It is reprinted from . The Revolutionary Women of Afghanistan, , 聯requests all its supporters and well-wishers of Afghan people to defend the brave and freedom-loving journalist Naser Fayaz and register their protest to his harassment by sending letters to the following sources聰: President Hamid Karzai, president@afghanistangov.org; United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, spokesperson-unama@un.org; Supreme Court of Afghanistan aquddus@supremecourt.gov.af.

  • Inter-Palestinian strife as Israel continues attacks

    A bombing that killed five Hamas members and a five-year-old girl on July 25 in the Gaza Strip has escalated tensions in the Occupied Palestinian Territories between the Hamas government in Gaza and the Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority (PA), based in the West Bank.

  • West Papua: Thousands rally for justice

    聯At least 3,000 people mobilized by the Papuan Christian Communication Forum staged a rally in Jayapura聰 on August 4, a Jakarta Post article reported the following day.

  • Hypocrisy, human rights and the Beijing games

    The Beijing Olympic games, which began on August 8, are shaping up to be a perfect reflection of our times 鈥 taking place against a backdrop of human rights abuses, terrorism scares and under a blanket of chemical smog.

  • Schwarzenegger's wage cuts condemned

    Unionists protested on July 20 in San Francisco against the decision by Californian Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to cut the wages of more than 200,000 state workers to the federal minimum wage of US$6.55 per hour, alleging he must do so because the state legislature has not passed a budget.

  • Will Doha, like Dracula, come back from the dead?

    Like the good Count of Transylvania, the so-called Doha Round of trade negotiations of the World Trade Organization (WTO) collapsed twice 聴 in Cancun in 2003 and in Potsdam in 2007 聴 only to come back from the dead.

Culture

  • Monster Saturday against power sell-off

    On 聯Super Saturday聰 August 16, hundreds of activists across NSW will staff 聯Stop the Sell-Off聰 stalls in 50 NSW electorates. Part of the campaign to stop the state ALP government from privatising electricity, the stalls are expected to gather thousands of signatures on petitions, and promote the mass anti-privatisation rally planned for September 20, at Sydney Town Hall.

  • Venezuela: a revolution in motion

    Changing Venezuela by Taking Power: The History and Politics of the Chavez Government
    By Gregory Wilpert
    Verso, 2007
    352 pages, $49.95