On September 10 a British jury acquitted six Greenpeace protesters who were on trial for trying to shut down a coal-fired power station on the grounds that they were trying to stop global warming.
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The Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM) has condemned the arrest of an opposition member of parliament and two journalists (one an outspoken online political blogger) under the Internal Security Act (ISA) allowing indefinite detention after the governments biggest security clampdown since losing support in March elections.
The Victorian Abortion Law Reform bill was passed by the parliaments lower house on September 12 after more than 70 hours of debate. This may finally mean that abortion is removed from the states Crimes Act dating back to 1958. Until the bill is passed, abortion remains a crime.
Friends of Cuba held actions in Perth and Canberra on September 14, kicking off an international campaign to win the release of five Cuban anti-terrorists sentenced to long prison terms in the United States on September 12, 10 years ago.
The five
Until last months major party conventions, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obamas victory was looking the pretty likely. With his message of change, it isnt hard to see why.
In the lead-up to the release of a report from the federal government’s review into the Northern Territory intervention, the Australian Indigenous Doctors’ Association has blasted the policy. AIDA describes it as discriminatory, damaging to people’s health and completely unable to alter conditions of child abuse or neglect in remote Aboriginal communities.
Arriving at the Palacio Moneda in Santiago, Chile, on September 14, where close to 35 years ago to the day Chile’s left-wing president Salvador Allende was overthrow in a military coup, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez declared that “in Bolivia a conspiracy is underway, an international conspiracy, financed and directed by US imperialism, just like that which occurred in Chile in 1973’’.
The Greens were the major beneficiaries of the swing to the left in many councils across NSW at the September 13 elections, probably taking their representation to more than 70 for the first time. Independents and other progressive tickets, including the Socialist Alliance, also made gains.
My cows can’t swim!”, protested one farmer’s sign, with a marker to indicate just how high the water would rise. “Act now or be dammed!”, advised another, echoing the overall theme of the 500-strong Save the Mary River rally on September 6 at the Traveston Crossing bridge in south-east Queensland.
The decision to make public a presidential order in July authorising US strikes inside Pakistan without seeking the approval of the Pakistani government ends a long debate within, and on the periphery of, the Bush administration.
As I write this column the newspapers report that United States, Canadian, European and Japanese banks have combined to inject an extra US$180 billion (A$225 billion) into global financial markets. It is the latest desperate measure to try to stem the year-old global financial crisis commonly — and misleadingly — labelled the US subprime mortgage crisis.
Relative calm has returned to Bolivia following a three-week offensive of violence and terrorism launched by the US-backed right-wing opposition denounced by Bolivian President Evo Morales as a “civil coup”.
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