In Copenhagen, Sydney-based climate justice advocate Natasha Verco, as well as US activist Noah Weiss, faces charges under Denmark’s “terrorism” laws. Verco faces up to 12-and-a-half year jail for her role in organising protests against the United Nations Copemnhagen climate summit in December.
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“The free, sovereign and independent homeland of our dreams will only come true if we radicalise the process and speed up the transition to socialism”, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez wrote in his March 14 weekly column “Chavez Lines”.
On March 16, Yarra City Council amended the racist Local Law 8, which bans drinking in public places. The law was originally passed on October 20 with the ALP, Greens and independent councillors voting for it. Socialist Party councillor Stephen Jolly was the only councillor to oppose the law.
On March 15, opposition leader Tony Abbott said the shadow cabinet would support the federal ALP government’s extension of “income management” to more welfare recipients in the Northern Territory — not just those living in targeted Aboriginal communities.
Every week, dedicated Green Left Weekly supporters hit the streets to present the news and ideas excluded from the mainstream media. These ideas help us better understand the world around us and expose the lies and distortions of the corporate elite.
Victorian police have been rocked by allegations of racism, physical abuse and harassment of young Africans in inner-urban Melbourne.
Aboriginal services workers and community members from across the Illawarra and Shoalhaven regions held a “community issues workshop” on March 17.
“The feminist movement was one of the strongest parts of the radicalisation of the 1960s and 1970s”, said Carla Gorton, a pro-choice activist and Socialist Alliance member from Cairns. She addressed a March 16 forum called “Feminism: Theory and Action”, presented by Resistance and the Socialist Alliance.
Commonwealth
By Michael Hardt & Antonio Negri
Harvard University Press, $64.95, (hb)
In the Christmas Island detention centre's Alpha Compound — a maximum security-style section holding refugees from Afghanistan and Sri Lanka — Tamil refugees are desperately appealing to the Australian government not to send them back to Sri Lanka.
Thinking Outside The Square: A Retrospective (Photographs 1972-2010)
By Elaine Pelot-Syron
South Sydney Uniting Church
56a Raglan Street Waterloo
March 14 until May 20
Tues-Thu, 4.30-6pm; Sun, 9am-noon
The inquest into the fatal boat explosion involving Afghan asylum seekers and the Australian navy in April 2009 has ended with appalling conclusions. Despite evidence suggesting the five deaths and extensive injuries could have been avoided if defence personnel had operated differently, the refugees received sole blame and may face criminal charges.
Green Left Weekly’s Niko Leka spoke with Professor Louise Newman Friday, chair of the Detention Expert Health Advisory Group (DEHAG) following her recent visit to immigration facilities on Christmas Island.
Victorian fuel supplies could be threatened if agreement is not reached in an industrial dispute between Shell and tanker drivers at its Newport depot.
On March 16, former Guantanamo Bay detainee Mamdouh Habib won his case for defamation against an article by Piers Akerman in February 2005 in the Daily Telegraph.
Three hundred climate activists participated in Australia’s second national Climate Action Summit in Canberra on March 13-15, marking an important step forward for the grassroots climate movement in this country.
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