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Pip Hinman Human rights activists have welcomed the US Supreme Court's decision, on June 29, declaring the military commissions for Guantanamo Bay prisoners illegal. Raul Bassi from the Cantebury-Bankstown Peace Group, which has campaigned to free
PERTH — On June 25, 50 people attended a rally organised by the Refugee Rights Action Network (RRAN) for World Refugee Day, to protest the Australian government's refugee policies and legislation that would send asylum seekers who arrive in
Tim Anderson "We did not expect that the elected leader of a party with an overwhelming mandate could be forced to stand down in this way in a democracy." — Fretilin press release, June 26, 2006. Backed by a foreign army, and with his country's
Eva Cheng On June 16, Nepal's governing Seven Party Alliance (SPA) and the rebel Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), which has been waging an anti-monarchy, anti-landlord guerrilla war since 1996, reached agreement to form an interim government that
Rohan Pearce Following Israel's missile attack on the office of Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh in Gaza City on July 2, the Israeli military issued a statement claiming it was intended to "secure the safe return" of Israeli soldier Gilad
Zoe Kenny The 20-year international moratorium on commercial whaling suffered a blow from the Japan-led campaign against it at this year's International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting, which was held on the Caribbean island of Saint Kitts on June
SYDNEY — Twenty unionists picketed the George Street Optus shop on June 29, to protest the sacking via text messages of 70 Optus technicians. The workers were told in a subsequent meeting that they could reapply for their jobs as individual
Jim Green The military and its civil arms have a history of forcing uranium mines, nuclear reactors, radioactive waste dumps and nuclear weapons tests on Indigenous peoples' lands. This history of radioactive racism is one of oppression, but also
In an earlier column, I wrote that capitalists, unlike earlier ruling classes, have no motive to preserve the environment because their exploitation is based on value rather than on physical products. Where the feudal lord sought grain or fine
Allen Myers, Phnom Penh Several hundred members and supporters of the Women's Network for Unity (WNU), the union of sex workers, gathered on June 28 to celebrate the organisation's sixth anniversary. The events began on the bank of the Tonle Sap
Emma Clancy The Howard government's Higher Education Support Amendment (Abolition of Compulsory Up-front Student Union Fees) Act 2005 — also known as the "voluntary student unionism" (VSU) law — came into effect on July 1. The most serious
People who know me will agree I'm an unassuming and moderate person who doesn't like bad language. So I was shocked to hear that at a meeting of teacher unionists in Kempsey on June 21, Andrew Stoner, leader of the NSW Nationals, had called Kevin