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Ahead of the climate talks in Paris in December, it is important that people mobilise and demand strong action on climate change. Without a clear message from ordinary people, the demands that business and polluting industries make of governments are more likely to dilute the outcomes. Remember Rio? Kyoto? Copenhagen? At the Conference of Parties (COP) 21 conference in Paris, our leaders need to do more, and fast.

After three years of campaigning, Tamil refugee Ranjini was suddenly released from Villawood detention centre on November 12. Even though she had been granted refugee status, Ranjini was whisked off the streets of Melbourne and locked up in 2012, due to a sudden ASIO decision to declare her a threat to national security. She was never allowed to find out why this had happened, see the evidence or challenge it in a court. More than 50 others suffered the same fate. Some have been released after six years in prison. Others are still there.

The United States National Security Agency (NSA) accessed the internal communications of Venezuela's state-owned oil company, PDVSA, and acquired sensitive data it planned to exploit to spy on the company's top officials, a highly classified NSA document has revealed. It shows the operation was carried out in concert with the US Embassy in Caracas. The March 2011 document, labelled “top secret” and leaked by former NSA contractor-turned-whistleblower Edward Snowden, was reported exclusively by a parternship between TeleSUR and The Intercept.

Washington, DC joined Manila and 10 other cities in protests on November 16 against the Pacific trade agreement that is expected to affect all aspects of ordinary life. Crowds shut down traffic in the US capital and occupied various offices that are implicated in the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, which is still to be voted on by legislatures of the 12 nations negotiating the deal. The Pacific rim nations involved, which represent 40% of world GDP, are the US, Australia, Singapore, New Zealand, Chile, Brunei, Canada, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru, Vietnam and Japan.

An Aboriginal man has died five days after attempting suicide at Casaurina prison, 35 kilometres south of Perth, just two months after another Aboriginal man killed himself at the same prison. He was found in his cell on October 28 and was taken to nearby Fiona Stanley Hospital, but died on November 2. His is the fourth Aboriginal death provisionally put down to be suicide by hanging at the prison since 2013. The families of each of those men are still waiting for the coroner to set the date for their respective inquests.