Feigned concern for the environment has long been one of the arguments used by the far right to argue against immigration. But calls for zero population growth or reduced population levels, and for reduced or zero immigration, have
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Refugees rights meeting PERTH On February 27, more than 30 students and staff attended the first meeting at Curtin University called to support the rights of asylum seekers and refugees. The forum was organised by Resistance and the
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Palm Sunday Nick Everett's reported expulsion (GLW #480) and the continued exclusion of DSP members from the organising committee of the Sydney Palm Sunday rally represents an unnecessary distraction for genuine left forces in Sydney. As a
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The decision of the Sydney Palm Sunday 2002 peace rally organising committee to exclude participation by members of the Democratic Socialist Party has provoked widespread protest, including from the NSW Greens. Dave Bell, secretary
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DARWIN — Imagine regular and cheap public transport networks; vibrant community centres offering meeting space and education programs; other centres run by, and for, young people; and community gardens with individual and
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SYDNEY — Federal workplace relations minister Tony Abbott has established a royal commission into the building industry. The intention of the federal government is to destroy the Construction, Mining, Forestry and Energy
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Federal environment minister David Kemp announced on February 27 the establishment of a Climate Action Partnership between Australia and the United States. The partnership is designed to protect the interests of oil, gas and coal
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Museworthy: The Veil Between 3 and 4 ameven singularly we wage warand die from its effectsCorpses litter the nightwith beautywith loveSee the distance purple uswith its flowersits brokennessHow slowly should we leavethe decaying house?When is
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The decision of the Sydney Palm Sunday 2002 organising committee to ban participation by members of the Democratic Socialist Party sets a dangerous precedent. Parties and other political organisations obviously have a right to
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Actively Radical TV — Sydney community television's progressive current affairs producers tackle the hard issues from the activist's point of view. CTS Sydney (UHF 31), every Sunday, 9pm. Phone 9565 5522. Visit <http://www.channel31.org>
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"You have sought to excuse your failure to check the accuracy of the reference ... on the grounds that you were merely retelling what a third person had said and not yourself making the claim. With respect, this excuse is
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MELBOURNE — Construction workers have been poring over the sordid details emerging from the royal commission into the construction industry. No worker in the industry could have missed the sensational allegations by a supposed former
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and ain't i a woman?: Cosmetic deceptions Want "enhanced self-esteem, a more satisfying body image and personal gratification"? According to Sydney's L'Image Cosmetic Surgery clinic, all this can be achieved simply by undergoing breast
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ROCKHAMPTON — Women have been at the forefront of the battle against Consolidated Meat Group, since CMG's announcement on January 12 that its Rockhampton plant was closing, putting 1350 employees out of work. The workers,
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On October 7, a fishing boat overloaded with desperate asylum seekers encountered the HMAS Adelaide north of Christmas Island. The warship fired warning shots to stop the boat from moving into Australian waters. Frightened by the
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Although I am a committed socialist, I must admit there are times when sheer visceral hatred just wells up inside and I just wish one could press a button and the whole grubby, greedy, thieving, lying, vile, shameless lot of them
News
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BY JIM McILROY & NICK EVERETT Three hundred people greeted the arrival of the refugee "Freedom Bus" in Brisbane on February 17, while 100 people packed into Sydney Trades Hall on February 25 to hear participants on the Freedom Bus describe their
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"Wow!" was the first word that journalist John Pilger said as he stood before the 2100 people who had filled Sydney Town Hall on March 1 to hear him speak. Titled "Breaking the silence: war, propaganda and the new empire",
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GLW #481 incorrectly credited a photo of the Tasmanian Weld picket to Neil Cremasco. The photographer was Steve Lucas. From Green Left Weekly, March 6, 2002. Visit the Green Left Weekly home page.
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CANBERRA — Feminist organisations and individuals in the ACT have gathered under the banner "Options for Women" to campaign for women's right to choose abortion. This challenges the renewed offensive by the anti-choice Right to
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SYDNEY - The owners' plan for the Grand Midnight Star would have been nothing like it. Rather than becoming just another block of flats, the enormous Heritage-listed art deco theatre on Parramatta Road in Homebush has become a "social
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DARWIN The NT Labor government's zero tolerance policies towards illicit drug users look set to be harsher than those of the former Country Liberal Party (CLP) government. On February 21, the government announced its
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PERTH — Four hundred people marched through Perth city centre on March 2 demanding the closure of all refugee detention centres. Organised by a broad organising committee initiated by the Refugee Rights Action Network, the
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In the week before the March 2 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, refugees; rights groups released a statement from refugees' rights groups, aimed at CHOGM delegates, titled "Time to end inhuman refugee policies". The
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BY OWAIN LEWIS-JONES& RUTH RATCLIFFE DARWIN — At a public meeting on February 5, addressed by activists from the Refugee Freedom Bus, a range of groups and individuals decided to form a Refugee Action Network (RAN). The first meeting was
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The Australia-Indonesia sponsored Ministerial Conference on People Smuggling, Trafficking in Persons and Related Transnational Crime held in Bali, February 27-28, failed to provide any real answers to the problems it was ostensibly
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SYDNEY — Police arrested four student activists on February 28 during the University of Sydney's orientation week. The four arrested had joined around a dozen others in an anti-Liberal sing-along next to the Liberal student club
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COOLUM — "Wouldn't it be fantastic if the police went over to the Hyatt and arrested the people who are the real criminals — who are responsible for injustice around the world?", human rights activist Ross Daniels asked the
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Just behaves like one "I do not feel like a dill." — Australian Defence Force chief Admiral Chris Barrie, speaking at a February 27 press conference at which he finally acknowledged what all his subordinates had been telling him for more than
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Pilger film screened DARWIN — Thirty people attended a screening of John Pilger's documentary film New Rulers of the World, which deals with the impact of the international financial institutions on the Third World. The screening was organised
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ROCKHAMPTON On February 27, 500 anxious workers gathered to discuss the campaign to save their jobs, with pay and conditions intact, at Consolidated Meat Groups Rockhampton plant. More than 1300 workers are yet to
Analysis
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The solution to airline crisis The February 27 collapse of the Tesna bid from millionaires Lindsay Fox and Solomon Lew for Ansett will almost certainly mark the final end of that airline. As a result, Australians can look forward to
World
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CHICAGO — If the congressional committees investigating Enron really want to get to the bottom of the scandal, they could begin by hauling in George Bush to testify. The entire Bush dynasty has been up to its eyeballs in Enron
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The ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) has intensified its violent campaign against the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in a desperate attempt to save President Robert Mugabe's hold on
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On February 26, Australian defence minister Robert Hill told reporters at the Asian Aerospace 2002 conference in Singapore that Canberra wanted to encourage the Indonesian authorities to "combat terrorist groupings within Indonesia more
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[On February 19, Mauritius' interim president, Supreme Court Chief Justice Arianga Pillay, signed into law anti-terrorism legislation over which his two predecessors had resigned. Twice passed by parliament, the Prevention of Terrorism Bill, deemed
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In 1972, US President Richard Nixon suggested that Washington drop nuclear bombs on North Vietnam, just-released tapes of conversations between Nixon and then US secretary of state Henry Kissinger have revealed. Nixon's suggestion was found in 500
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Towards the end of Bill Clinton's presidency in 2000, the moaning and groaning of US "defence" contractors reached new heights — their profits were drying up as US military budgets shrank to a post-Cold War low. Following the
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LONDON — The conditions in which prisoners are being held, brutally and illegally, in an American concentration camp on Cuba go to the heart of the "war on terrorism", and mark the Blair government for its betrayal of the basic
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CHICAGO — Enron isn't the half of it. Revelations of more colossal financial scams in corporate America swept into the news last week amid the bankruptcy of telecommunications company Global Crossing. As in Enron's case, company
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It is feared that five women and an unknown number of children may have died in the fire which broke out on February 14 at England's Yarl's Wood detention centre. As of February 27, 25 detainees were still unaccounted for.
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[The following is a slightly abridged version of a speech given at an anti-war forum at Columbia University in New YorkIII, one of the actors in the movie Black Hawk Down.] When I first read the script to
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On February 25, the presidential candidate for Zimbabwe's opposition Movement for Democratic Change, Morgan Tsvangirai, was formally charged with "high treason", a crime that can carry a death sentence. Tsvangirai was allowed to
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On February 28 the International Federation of Iranian Refugees (IFIR) and the International Federation of Iraqi Refugees began a joint international campaign against the lack of rights for asylum seekers in Turkey. Currently,
Culture
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REVIEW BY ALEX BAINBRIDGE In Sleepy Scotland Alistair Hulett The Cold Grey Light of Dawn Alistair Hulett and Dave Swarbrick Saturday Johnny and Jimmy the Rat Alistair Hulett and Dave Swarbrick Order at
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Moving Mountains: Communities confront mining and globalisation Edited by Geoff Evans, James Goodman and Nina Lansbury The Mineral Policy Institute and Contemporary Otford Series Sydney, 2001 301 pages $34 REVIEW BY SEAN HEALY
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REVIEW BY ANGELA LUVERA Made in Indonesia: Indonesian workers since SuhartoBy Dan La BotzSouth End Press, 2001395 pages, US$18Order at <http://www.southendpress.org> Radical US writer Dan La Botz creates scenes of Indonesia in Made in