Prime Minister Julia Gillard's arguments in favour of uranium sales to India are dangerous and dishonest.
She fails to even acknowledge the crucial problem – India's refusal to sign the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT).
The NPT is the main international nuclear treaty and is routinely described by Australian political leaders as the "cornerstone" of the non-proliferation system. The NPT has its flaws, not least the failure of the nuclear weapons states to take their disarmament obligations seriously, but that is no reason to junk the treaty or to disregard it.
Australia
Occupy Adelaide's November 8 general assembly adopted the document below by consensus.
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We, Occupy Adelaide, are an open and evolving group engaged in the struggle for an equitable, inclusive and sustainable democratic society. We gather in solidarity with the world-wide movement opposing the power and greed of corporations which place profit over people, animals and the earth; self-interest over social justice; oppression over equality; and which control and corrupt our governments.
The Monash Refugee Action Collective released the statement below on November 14.
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Three student activists at Monash University are facing a disciplinary hearing for speaking out against mandatory detention.
The Northern Inland Council for the Environment and The Wilderness Society Newcastle released the statement below on November 14.
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Environment groups have responded to news that the NSW government plans to stop a single coal seam gas pilot production well on the Liverpool Plains with calls for a far more extensive moratorium.
Socialist Alliance Victoria released the statement below on November 14.
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Support nurses, teachers, and state public sector workers — reject the Baillieu government’s bullying tactics
Before Ted Baillieu’s Coalition state government was elected, Baillieu made many promises. He said he would not do anything extreme like the Kennett coalition government of the 1990s.
NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge gave the speech below in NSW Parliament on November 11. It is republished from his blog.
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The Occupy movement began with a single protest in New York on September 17, 2011, called “Occupy Wall Street”. This protest targets corporate greed and growing inequality across the globe. The protesters’ slogan “We are the 99%” refers to the vast disparity in wealth, particularly in the United States, between the wealthiest 1% and the rest of the country.
Open Letter from three prolonged Burmese detainees in Australian detention call for humanitarian intervention
Call for humanitarian intervention
We are recognised refugees of Burma. Our ethnic minority is unknown to the world, yet is one of the most oppressed minority group in Burma, the sole ethnic who has been declined any rights for an identity. We are de-facto stateless. Remember our race: we are Rohingyas.
Friends of Palestine WA protest action at the Seacret stall at Carousel in Perth, Australia.
In the lead up to the ALP National Conference next month, marriage equality is shaping up to be the biggest test yet to Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s leadership.
Gillard has moved from her position that she would override a pro-equality decision at the conference, to hinting she will allow Labor MPs a conscience vote.
However, she now also holds the dubious honour of being the only remaining Labor leader supporting the marriage ban.
Before the first Australian occupations following the example of Occupy Wall Street began on October 15, even some of the activists involved wondered if it would work. After all, this was the “lucky country” that escaped the global financial crisis.
But thousands of mostly young people rocked up to launch Occupy Melbourne in City Square, and a further 1000 launched Occupy Sydney in Martin Place in the heart of the city’s financial district. Hundreds launched Occupy Brisbane in Post Office Square.
Veteran Brisbane activist Gary McLennan spoke at an Occupy Brisbane rally on November 5. An abridged version of his speech is below.
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Friends, I want to thank you sincerely for the invitation to speak to you today. It remains for me a badge of honour, a great honour, that I’ve been asked twice to speak to the Occupy Brisbane movement.
I said when I first spoke to you that your movement represented the best hope for the kind of world that I wanted my grandchildren to grow up in.
I believed that then and I still believe it now.
The government has undermined the right to a fair trial of up to 350 mostly Indonesian people now facing charges of “people smuggling” in Australian courts. It has done so by introducing hastily drafted, retrospective amendments to the Migration Act.
The People Smuggling Deterrence Bill 2011 was passed in the lower house November 1, supported by Labor and the Coalition. If carried by the Senate, it will amend the migration act to make it an offence to bring a person to Australia with “no valid visa”.
Greens MP Adam Bandt and independent MP Rob Oakeshott spoke against the bill.
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