Issue 217

News

By Peter Boyle SYDNEY — Democratic Socialist election team leader Max Lane has called on union militants and social movement activists to help get the "People before profits" message out during the federal election campaign. Lane — a leading
By Tully Bates MELBOURNE — The United Firefighters Union (UFU) pay campaign has escalated, almost 20 unions having agreed to impose bans on the Country Fire Authority (CFA) and the Metropolitan Fire Brigade (MFB). Unions covering local government,
By Jennifer Thompson The January 23 Australian Industrial Relations Commission's decision on the dispute between Comalco and award workers at its bauxite mine and kaolin plant at Weipa received mixed reviews from workers and big business pundits.
PARIS — The French government confirmed on January 23 that it knew about, but did not release information concerning, radioactive contamination from its 1995 nuclear testing program in the South Pacific, according to Greenpeace. Greenpeace has
By Susan Price MELBOURNE — More than 150 members of the National Tertiary Education Industry Union (NTEU) and their supporters gathered outside federal treasurer Ralph Willis' office in Footscray on January 25 to protest against the federal
By Jeremy Smith MELBOURNE — Upping the tempo of its campaign against the Kennett government, Save Albert Park (SAP) declared January 20 a "Day of Defiance". New regulations introduced in December further restrict both public access to the park and
By Janet Parker SYDNEY — Activists campaigning for the No Aircraft Noise Party in the federal seat of Sydney hosted a meeting on January 21 to forge links with other community groups in the Sydney electorate. In his opening address, NAN President
By Bill Mason BRISBANE — A Townsville woman who was sacked as a casual hotel receptionist because she was pregnant won a landmark award in the Queensland Anti-Discrimination Tribunal on January 22. Kerri Skellern was awarded nearly $14,000 and a
By Bill Mason BRISBANE — "The overlap between the by- election for the Queensland state seat of Mundingburra, due on February 3, and the federal election campaign, makes the by-election result even more crucial to the fate of ALP governments in
By Mick White BRISBANE — Thousands of Aboriginal people and their supporters gathered to commemorate Invasion Day at concerts and rallies in cities around Australia on January 26. The activities marked the 208th anniversary of white invasion and
By Tim E. Stewart DARWIN — The NT Greens have announced their candidates for the federal elections. Margie Friel and Ilana Eldridge are standing for the Senate. Friel is director of the Aboriginal Youth Law Centre at the Northern Territory
By Marina Carman CANBERRA — The Australian Education Union (AEU) in Canberra is embarking on an industrial campaign to highlight the steady decline in ACT government funding to public education after the latest round of cutbacks. Teachers will stop
By Chris Slee Members of the tax office division of the Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) held a national strike on January 24, following the breakdown of negotiations on a new industrial agreement. Russell Pickering reports from Wollongong
By Tom Flanagan DARWIN — East Timor activists believe that the charging of five protesters over the burning of Indonesian flags is politically motivated. The summonses were issued last week, more than a month after activists burned 20 Indonesian

World

By Norm Dixon A general strike by the Congress of South African Trade Unions was narrowly averted after talks with African National Congress government ministers. The 24-hour strike, scheduled for January 16, was suspended by COSATU's leaders after
Pervomayskoye: Yeltsin wrote off hostages' lives By Renfrey Clarke MOSCOW — In his ghost-written autobiography, Russian President Boris Yeltsin recounts how as a child he lost two fingers from his left hand. Finding a grenade in the forest, he
Canadian businesses to ignore Cuba blockade The Canadian government has stepped up measures to prevent Washington from interfering in its trade with Cuba. On January 18, Canadian foreign minister Andre Ouellet ordered Canadian firms, including US
André Brie is a National Executive member of Germany's Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), formed from the ashes of the former ruling party of the German Democratic Republic (GDR). During a January visit to Australia, he addressed public
By Yacov Sen Efrat The shock over Israeli Prime Minister Rabin's assassination did not last long. Flags were still at half-mast as acting Prime Minister Shimon Peres began the search for new ways to prevent mounting Israeli internal tension from
Five hundred garment workers in Bangladesh have been sacked, five women raped and three women killed because of their campaign for the right to one day's holiday each week. Since July 25, 1995, the National Garment Workers' Federation of Bangladesh
By Jennifer Thompson NATO took control of Western "peacekeeping" operations in Bosnia from the UN on December 20 in Sarajevo. NATO has been charged with enforcing a peace based on the ethnic partition of Bosnia-Hercegovina between the "entities" of
By Norm Dixon The Pan Africanist Congress has been thrown into turmoil by the resignation of general secretary Maxwell Nemadzivhanani. The PAC, long considered South Africa's second most significant liberation movement after the African National

Culture

The Asbestos Time BombBy George WraggCatalyst Press, 1995, 81 pp., $12 (pb)Reviewed by Kim Linden Publicity about the harmful effects of asbestos reached its peak during the 1980s. Since then, the issue has slipped from public view. Asbestos-related
Sustainability and Policy: Limits to EconomicsBy Michael CommonCambridge University Press,1995. 348pp.,$29.95 (pb)Reviewed by Dot Tumney This is a mathematical and academic treatment of issues of sustainability. Current economics is rigidly
EclipseWritten and directed by Jeremy PodeswaOpens February 15, George Cinemas, St Kilda, Melbourne and Verona Cinema, Paddington, SydneyReviewed by Margaret Allan Canadian film makers have produced some good films in recent years with successes like
By Lucifer Skycrawler What do the stars hold for you this year? If 1995 is any guide, you don't really want to know, do you? And yet, you can't resist looking up your star sign and reading what awaits you in 1996 (it's in the stars). WALLOPER
Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis PresleyBy Peter GuralnickAbacus, London, 1995. 578pp., $17.95 (pb)Reviewed by Norm Dixon Elvis Aaron Presley has had a rather rough time at the hands of some left-wing cultural critics understandably piqued by
intro = Out of the Past: Gay and Lesbian History from 1869 to the presentBy Neil MillerVintage, 1995, 657 pp., $17.95 (pb)Reviewed by Kath Gelber To write a gay and lesbian history from 1869 to the present is no small task, but Miller has put
Programs of interest on Sydney Community TV (UHF 31) — Perleeka, indigenous Australians' program, nightly, 7pm. Art Experimenta, Mondays, 8pm and 11.30pm, and Tuesdays, 3am and 6.30am. Bent TV, gay and lesbian program, Thursdays, 10.30pm and
KidsDirected by Larry ClarkScreening at Hoyts CinemasReviewed by Bernard Wunsch and Nick Everett "Vicious, anti-woman, child-sex film", was how Phillip Young, coordinator of the Project Family Group, branded this debut by film maker Larry Clark in
The Redundancy of CourageBy Timothy MoVintage, 1991. 408pp., $14.95Reviewed by Sean Lennon The Redundancy of Courage is a novel about ordinary people forced to do abnormal things by abnormal circumstances. It is about East Timor, in the guise of the
I think I understand The minds of men Who construct a political system Based on Exploitation, inequality, brutality Prejudice and fear. The tear gas, rubber bullets, truncheon swinging Of the obscenity — Apartheid. I think I understand What made
All You Can Eatkd langWarner MusicReviewed by Jen Crothers I approached the latest offering from kd lang with a great deal of scepticism. The hype about the kd phenomenon was just a bit too much. By the time I heard the album twice, I was getting
Every second is a comrade in disguise Floating unmade before us, Broken behind us Set in memory, conceived by those millennia before it. Every breath fermented in time keeps me here, to receive the next, to choose, to make to dream, and to scream
The Splendid Master Gnawa Musicians of MoroccoVerve through PolygramReviewed by Jenny Long This album, recorded in the La Mamounia Hotel in Marrakesh, explores the musical aspect of the Gnawa brotherhood of Islam, and the Gnawa's links with their

Editorial

What, realistically, could we have expected to hear from a group of pro-nuclear has-beens besides a lot of hypocritical posturing? This was the upshot of last week's meeting of the 16-member Canberra Commission on the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons,