Venezuelans were taken by surprise with the announcement that opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez would serve out his jail term under house arrest. The move is an unprecedented concession that seeks to calm the waters in the lead up to the July 30 Constituent Assembly elections.
But the conflict in the country is showing it has multiple faces. On July 10, a day after the official election campaign began, a candidate was assassinated in the middle of a campaign event.
Far North Queensland Stop Adani groups mobilised when the Queensland government announced its latest "governing from the regions" exercise would be in Cairns over July 10–14.
They wanted their message that the massive Carmichael coalmine must be stopped to become the main issue and not the government’s pork-barrelling.
A conference on the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign for Palestinian justice will be held at the University of Sydney over July 28–29.
Free and open to the public, the conference will be the largest ever held on BDS in Australia, with three keynote lectures, four discussion panels and more than 30 separate talks on a wide array of topics.
The dispute between the Australian Greens and the NSW Greens, which erupted during the debate over the federal Coalition’s Gonski 2.0 funding bill, is puzzling to many.
This is because both Green parties agreed not to support the Gonski package on the basis that, even after amendments, it was still inequitable.
However, it appears that NSW Greens Senator Lee Rhiannon become the patsy for another, more significant, battle in the Greens — one which goes to heart of the type of party it aspires to be.
Peace activists are planning a court support solidarity action with Jim and Franz Dowling, Tim Webb, and Andy Paine as the group faces court on July 19.
They will appear before the Brisbane magistrate’s court on charges related to the March 1 action in which a sword was removed from a war memorial and shaped into a gardening tool. The group are members of the Catholic worker movement.
Activist singer-songwriter from Brisbane, Phil Monsour, has released a new song and video, “Voices Rising” which celebrates the work of teachers and the struggles of the Queensland Teachers’ Union.
A the same time, Monsour has released One Song One Union, an album of contemporary trade union and solidarity songs, which is available online.
In regard to the charges about US President Donald Trump’s collusion with Russia to throw the election his way, it is worth mentioning that going through the list of all the nations that Washington has meddled in is far too long for one article. The US is, without any doubt, the world’s meddler in chief.
Even the list of countries where the US conspired to overthrow elected governments when electoral meddling failed is lengthy.
But one angle to the Russian controversy that is underreported is this: scratch the Russian connection and US-German relations pop up.
Hundreds of Haiti's factory workers protested in Port-au-Prince on July 10 against the government’s proposed paltry rise in the minimum wage.
Currently paid US$4.75 a day, workers mainly from factories outsourced to foreign companies are demanding wages rise to US$12.75 dollars for eight hours of work.
However, the government has said the minimum wage should only rise by 55 cents.
Thousands of landless workers marched on July 12 through the streets of the Paraguayan capital, Asuncion, to demand the cancellation of debts contracted with the national bank.
The demonstrators have been blocking the centre of the capital since July 10, setting up their camp in front of the National Congress.
National secretary of the Finance Sector Union Julia Angrisano gave this speech at the CFMEU’s National Day of Action to Stop the Attacks on Workers on June 20. It was an inspiring speech that raiased some key issues affecting bank workers today.
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Superannuation should provide a comfortable retirement for the several million workers who signed up to the 1983–95 “superannuation revolution” by the ACTU and Hawke-Keating Labor governments. But what should be in a super account to provide a comfortable retirement for this “pioneer” generation?