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On June 27, 1985, four anti apartheid activists were brutally murdered on behalf of the South African government. Twenty five years later, their killers still walk free. The murders of these four men illustrate one of the darkest passages of South Africa’s history. South African filmmaker David Forbes has directed, edited and produced the film The Cradock Four to tell the story of these four extraordinary men.
The “Big Four” record companies, already responsible for more than 80% of album sales on the planet, may be on the verge of becoming the “Big Three”. On May 6, Warner Music Group was sold to Ukrainian-American tycoon Leonard Blavatnik. Warner is the world's third largest record company. Blavatnik ― the world's 80th richest man ― is also rumored to have his sights set on number four EMI. If that sale comes to pass, it will create the largest music label in history.
“EPA: Extreme Pollution A-OK” read a banner held up by protesters outside Victoria’s Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) as it announced on May 20 a partial approval for the HRL Dual Gas project, which will use brown coal for electricity generation. With a record 4000 submissions to the EPA opposing the project, the Stop HRL campaign group reacted with a spot protest outside the EPA during the announcement and a further protest of over 300 outside state parliament on May 24.
Sixty-two percent of Australians support equal marriage rights. This support has risen from the 33% who backed same-sex marriage in 2004 — the year gay marriage was banned. This rise in support has been a result of the grassroots campaign waged by activists with rallies, politician visits, media stunts, Mardi Gras floats, petitions and others mobilisations. In Sydney, Community Action Against Homophobia (CAAH) has organised rallies since June 2004.
What are some examples of highly offensive words that must be censored from radio? For British state broadcaster BBC, they are not all of the four-letter variety. The BBC appears to find not just the phrase “Free Palestine” but even the geographical entity of the Gaza Strip itself unutterable on a cultural show. A controversy has broken out over the BBC's anti-Palestinian bias after its digital radio channel BBC 1xtra, which largely plays hip hop, grime and other “urban music” genres, censored on air references to Palestine.
It took Arrow Energy more than 24 hours to cap a major gas well blow-out. The well sprayed water and methane up to 90 metres in the air on a farming property west of Dalby in Queensland. The leak took place on May 22 when the well was being prepared for production. The leak was not reported to authorities until two hours after it occurred, and it took the gas company a further four hours to inform property owner Tom O'Connor.

For 25 years, the gay youth of Adelaide have had just one place to find group support from people who understand. Each fortnight, the “Evolve” project for women and the “Inside Out” project for men at the state-run Second Story Youth Health Centre have provided safe, confidential drop-in groups for gay and queer young people. These projects have been free, well-attended and of great support for Adelaide’s young gay community. The effectiveness and popularity of these projects have meant that Adelaide has had no need for other drop-in groups for gay youth.

The Australian media, collectively, does a dismal job of telling the story of our silent apartheid, the space between black and white Australians. The new assimilation, well underway in the Northern Territory, has the same intent as government policies of past eras, still aiming to change Aboriginal people, restrict the importance of their law, language and cultural practice, and move many from their ancestral lands into new housing estates that, we are promised, will materialise magically in great little Aussie growth towns.
Emissions trading.

The worst thing about the Labor government’s proposed carbon price scheme is that it’s a diversion from real action on climate change.

Riz Wakil, an Afghan refugee, arrived on Ashmore Reef in 1999 and was held in Curtin detention centre for nine months. Now a permanent Australian resident, he runs a printery. In June 2010, GetUp! won a charity auction prize — a surfing lesson with opposition leader Tony Abbott — and donated it to Wakil. Abbott and Wakil finally met for the surf lesson on May 8. Green Left Weekly’s Rachel Evans spoke to Wakil about the encounter and Australia’s refugee system. What did Abbott say during the lesson?
When the Tasmanian state government forced a bridge through the kutalyana site as part of the Brighton bypass, the Aboriginal community responded by placing a ban on conducting Aboriginal heritage assessments. These bans are being upheld by all Aboriginal Heritage Officers and the archeologists who work with them. They are intended to remain in place until the legislation that protects Aboriginal heritage is improved. The first major project to be affected by this is the proposed asylum seeker detention centre at Pontville, near Brighton.

The Western Australia Liberal government recently said its lucrative prisoner transport contract with private security firm G4S would end in July. Another private company, the British-based conglomerate Serco, will take over. The move came after a long campaign against G4S and the WA department of corrective services over the death of Aboriginal man Mr Ward, who died of heat stroke in a G4S van during a 360 kilometre trip in January 2008. The state coroner said G4S was directly responsible for Mr Ward’s awful death.