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This statement was released by the West Papua Freedom Flotilla on June 1. *** A historical ceremony was held outside the Victorian Trades Hall on June 1 for the issuing of “Original Nations” passports and West Papuan visas in conjunction with the Freedom Flotilla from Lake Eyre to West Papua. In solidarity with the passport ceremony in Melbourne, a peaceful rally was also held in Manokwari, West Papua.
When the humble “Occupy Gezi” (Occupy Promenade Park) protest in Istanbul’s Taksim Square was brutally attacked by police on May 31, protests spread like wildfire throughout other cities and the Turkish left was in the thick of it. In the early days of the protest, Sirri Sureyya Onder -- national MP for the umbrella organistion of the Turkish-Kurdish left, the Peoples’ Democratic Congress (HDK) -- lay his body, with others, in front of bulldozers to stop them destroying the park’s 70 year old trees.
There is a rising tide of worrying economic news in this country and it highlights once more the need to cut back on unnecessary spending, like allowing single mothers to eat.
As asylum seekers face years of detention in the Nauru and Manus Island detention camps, where not a single claim has been assessed, the Australian government refuses to answer to scrutiny or calls for human rights oversight. The ABC’s Four Corners and SBS’s Dateline have now tried to investigate the conditions inside each “regional processing centre”. The camps are believed to be abysmal, inadequate and places of widespread physical and psychological breakdown among detainees.
Members of the Shop Distributive and Allied Employees union (SDA) rallied outside its Brisbane offices on May 30. The rally was in response to SDA Brisbane branch secretary Chris Ketter sacking organiser Allan Swetman, the day before Swetman was set to challenge for the secretary position. Swetman had questioned the fact Brisbane SDA organisers had attended lectures held by religious organisations against same-sex marriage and abortion rights, and alleged the union is supporting these lectures.
Liah Lazarou, 28, is standing as a youth candidate for the Socialist Alliance in the South Australian seat of Adelaide, currently held by Labor MP Kate Ellis. She was interviewed by Resistance member Liam Conlon about why she is standing in the election and what she is trying to achieve. How did you get involved in political activism? I grew up in a very working class background and was raised by a single father. He took me to my first rally, which was against Pauline Hanson in 1996. I was eleven years old.
It is time for us to rise up and reclaim our power. As citizens of the world, as people of this planet. If we want a fair, just, harmonious, equitable, peaceful world, we need to create it. We need to take action. Show our politicians we care about our planet and the destruction being wreaked on it by unaccountable, tax-avoiding, profit-driven corporations who are polluting and poisoning the planet for profit. If we analyse the genetically modified (GM) industry's “humanitarian” claims, we see they are nonsense. They trot out the line that GM food will solve the world's hunger.
Coalmining company Coalpac Pty Ltd lodged a development proposal with the NSW government in July 2011 to expand its open-cut and high-wall coalmines in central western NSW. The sites are in a proposed extension to the Gardens of Stone National Park and surround the small town of Cullen Bullen. Coalpac’s “consolidation project” involves expanding its Invincible and Cullen Valley coalmines, and building a new quarry in the Ben Bullen State Forest near Lithgow.
The statement below was released by Melbourne’s 3CR Community Radio on May 1. *** In this federal election year, 3CR Community Radio is asking its listeners and supporters of independent media to make a political donation by giving money to the station during our annual Radiothon. As the two big political parties slug it out in Canberra, the choice is clear — vote for 3CR’s progressive, alternative coverage of social, cultural and political issues.
Australian Workers Union (AWU) leader Paul Howes has taken the offensive to bolster what he sees as a faltering unconventional gas industry. He wants the industry to step up its campaign to stop the federal Coalition and the NSW Labor opposition from “buying the arguments” of an “extremist fringe” on coal seam gas (CSG).
Thousands of people rallied in cities across Australia on May 25 to protest genetically modified organisms (GMO) developed by Monsanto and being used in food products worldwide. This was part of the March Again Monsanto global day of action that saw demonstrations take place in more than 40 countries around the world. In Australia, these rallies were significantly larger than previous rallies on the issue of GMO. More than 1000 people rallied in Melbourne and a crowd of 500 rallied in Sydney’s Hyde Park.
The NSW Liberal government passed a bill on May 30 that severely cuts compensation to victims of crime, domestic violence and abuse. Under the old law, the 1996 Victims Support Rehabilitation Act, the maximum compensation to victims had been up to $50,000. The new Victims Rights and Support Bill has cut the maximum amount of compensation to $15,000 and only for victims who are financial dependents of murder victims.