The Women's World Cup proved to be a sparkling oasis amid the most arid section of the sports calendar.
The football tournament provided a series of non-stop thrills, culminating with Japan's heart-palpitating final victory against the US, winning 3-1 on penalty kicks after extra time finished with the game tied at 2-2.
Star US player Abby Wambach is no doubt hurting, but I hope the forward with the skull of steel realizes that she was absolutely correct when she said before the final: "It's gonna be awesome."
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The six Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM) members detained under the Malaysian government's emergency ordinance since June 25, have been deprived of all creature comforts.
They are locked up in 2-by-2.5 metre cells, in solitary confinement. The lights are on in the cells day and night and one-way mirrors ensure there is no privacy.
Stieg Larsson’s hard-hitting novel, titled Man som hatar kvinnor ("Men who hate women") in Swedish, was titled The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo<.em> in English translation — possibly a subtle indication of the publisher’s discomfort with the strong women’s liberation message contained in it.
It was a Palestinian legislator who made the most telling comment to the Israeli parliament last week as it passed the boycott law, which outlaws calls to boycott Israel or its settlements in the occupied territories.
Ahmed Tibi asked: “What is a peace activist or Palestinian allowed to do to oppose the occupation? Is there anything you agree to?”
The Grammy awards have long been the kind of thing that one simply has to deal with if you're going to approach music under capitalism.
It comes wrapped in all the elitism, commerce and segregation that necessarily has to accompany the music industry, but it's still something of a great salt lake for any artist — even those who are the most socially conscious — if they want to navigate the most treacherous waters of their craft.
Like any money-making venture, it can be just as susceptible to public pressure as it is to the forces of the market.
The Cage
By Gordon Weiss
Picador, 2011
The Cage tells the horrifying story of the final months of the war in Sri Lanka, which ended with the defeat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in May 2009.
Gordon Weiss, the former United Nations spokesperson in Sri Lanka, says the war ended in a "bloodbath", including the "wholesale bombardment by government forces of unarmed civilians".
Despite growing international outrage over the Sri Lankan military’s mass killings of over 40,000 Tamil civilians in 2009, the Sri Lankan government is defiantly refusing to heed international demands for an independent investigation into the atrocities. Instead it is escalating a range of discriminatory and repressive policies towards the Tamil people.
Australia’s cricketers should take a principled stand in defence of human rights and justice, and boycott playing with Sri Lanka until the government there conducts itself according to the rules of international society.
Asylum seekers in Scherger detention centre in north Queensland launched a hunger strike on the morning of July 21.
By the afternoon of July 22, 67 asylum seekers had joined the hunger strike. Most of the protesters are ethnic Hazaras from Afghanistan.
The asylum seekers released the statement below on July 22.
* * *
In the Name of Merciful God,
This hunger strike is a response to the continued pressure exercised by the Australian Immigration Department on us.
Media mogul Rupert Murdoch described his appearance before the British parliamentary hearing into the News Of The World’s phone hacking scandal as the “most humble day” of his life.
His son, James, added: “It’s a matter of great regret … these actions do not live up to the standards that our company aspires to around the round.”
On July 15, former NSW Greens MP Sylvia Hale and I used the freedom from deportation awarded us by an Israeli court to good effect. We joined the largest rally for some years in support of a Palestinian state ahead of the expected United Nations vote in September.
We carried a green and yellow banner saying, “Aussies say end blockade of Palestine”. The rally and march, with drumming circles and flowers was organized by a coalition of groups called Sheikh Jarrah Solidarity.
More than 5000 Construction Forestry Mining Energy Union (CFMEU) members and delegates packed meetings at Festival Hall in Melbourne and Trades Hall in Geelong to vote on the latest Enterprise Bargaining Agreement for the building industry.
Under the agreement, wages will rise by 20% over four years with increases in superannuation contributions and other allowances. One significant feature of the agreement is that shop stewards will be recognised and be given the time and facilities they need to represent union members.
Footprints for Peace, an international grassroots group that organises walks, bike rides and runs around the world, invites families and people of all ages, background and cultures to come and support traditional owners in their opposition to uranium mining in Western Australia by taking part in the “Walk away from uranium mining” that begins in Wiluna on August 19 and finishes in Perth on October 28.
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