Alex Bainbridge, Hobart
The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) released a controversial report on the Tasmanian forest industry on August 3 which has been roundly criticised by most Tasmanian-based environmental groups.
The report calls for the
-
-
Doug Lorimer On August 7, 43 former Australian military chiefs and top diplomats issued a statement attacking Prime Minister John Howard's government for joining the US-led invasion of Iraq "on the basis of false assumptions and the deception of
-
In 2000, 29% of people in the US failed to fill a prescription because they couldn't afford to. In 2001, the nine largest pharmaceutical companies raked in US$30.6 billion in profits. The five most highly paid drug company executives pocketed
-
Lalitha Chelliah The decision of ABC TV's Compass program to screen the British film on abortion, My Foetus, has prompted a renewed debate on abortion in Australia. Health minister Tony Abbott encouraged the debate after prominent feminists Wendy
-
The wages share of the country's wealth has fallen from 61% to 53.5% since 1983. If Australia's 11 million workers had been able to maintain that 1983 share in 2004, we would have had $56 billion more in our pockets for 2003 alone. Workers are being
-
Rohan Pearce Michael Moore's blockbuster documentary Fahrenheit 9/11 isn't just an assault on the Bush regime and the "war on terror" — it indicts the corporate vultures who rushed to cash-in on the warmongers' post-9/11 crusade. "This is an
-
Sam Wainwright On July 28, federal transport minister John Anderson announced a $100 million package of new maritime "security measures", which included background checks on workers in the industry to be carried out by the Australian Security
-
University of Western Sydney (UWS) students have returned to their campuses after the semester break to discover significant course cuts and other changes and restrictions to their degrees. The Bankstown UWS campus has been especially hard hit. Green
-
Brainwashed It's great to see that John Howard hasn't let his long tenure as prime minister change him in any way. He's still as slimy and as slippery as an eel. According to him, the debate before invading Iraq was about whether old Saddam would
-
I have just spent three months living in Venezuela, an oil-rich Third World country with a population of 26 million, of whom 80% live on or below the poverty line. But there are exciting events taking place in this country. In 1998, left-wing
-
One of the most famous writings in the history of socialism is the Junius Pamphlet, written by German socialist Rosa Luxemburg in 1915 while she was in prison for opposing the first world war. Obviously, many things have changed in the world
News
-
Lizzie Nagy& Kylie Moon The Senate sat an extra day on August 13 to enable the passage of the Marriage Amendment Act, which declares that marriages between same-sex couples in other countries will not be legally recognised as such in Australia.
-
2 Films by and for workers SYDNEY — One-hundred people gathered on August 12 to mark the first anniversary of Oz Dox, the Australian documentary forum. The event heard from John Hughes and Norma Disher, who worked in the Waterside Workers
-
Nick Everett, Canberra "We got it wrong" on refugees, Kel Watt, the Labor candidate for the federal seat of Eden-Monaro, told an August 12 public forum in the south-east NSW town of Braidwood, organised by the local branch of Rural Australians for
-
Vannessa Hearman Kirsty Sword-Gusmao, the Melbourne-born wife of East Timorese President Xanana Gusmao and chairperson of the Alola Foundation for women and children of East Timor, has condemned the stance taken by the Howard government on the
-
Chris Slee, Melbourne Forty people attended a public forum on August 10 on casualisation organised by Unite, an organisation campaigning for the rights of casual workers. Unite has organised campaigns exposing illegal and oppressive practices by
-
Luke Fomiatti, Sydney UWS students declared victory after the University of Western Sydney Board of Trustees voted against increasing HECS fees on August 12. With only two days' notice, 100 students blockaded the secret meeting, which was called
-
Ben Cavalli& Fred Fuentes, Perth The highest decision making body of academics at University of Western Australia (UWA), the academic board, narrowly voted on August 11 to recommend that the UWA senate reject the current proposal to introduce
-
Pip Hinman, Sydney "The August 8 statement by 43 former service chiefs and diplomats, accusing PM John Howard of lying about the reasons for Australia going to war on Iraq, underlines what most Australians already know", Anna Samson from Sydney's
-
Vannessa Hearman On August 11, East Timorese foreign minister Jose Ramos Horta and Australian foreign minister Alexander Downer agreed on a "framework" for a Timor Sea agreement. According to Downer, an agreement could be reached by Christmas.
-
SYDNEY — Thirty people attended a protest outside the South Korean consulate on August 14 in opposition to Korean troops in Iraq, organised by the Sydney Korean Progressive Alliance. Speakers included representatives of the Stop the War Coalition,
-
Had the royal touch "He came across very arrogant, like a total pompous git." — Comment made about Richard Butler, the recently resigned Queen's representative in Tasmania, quoted in the August 11 Sydney Daily Telegraph. Selfless "I was
-
Green Left Weekly is the most popular Australian political website, and has been on top for each of the last four quarterly surveys, according to a Hitwise report in the August 10 Australian Financial Review. The chief marketing officer at web
-
Sarah Stephen On August 6, the High Court ruled that the federal government has the legal power to detain failed asylum seekers indefinitely — potentially for the rest of their lives. In making its decision, the High Court considered the
-
1 Labor uses Howard's anti-worker laws MELBOURNE — The Victorian state council of the Ambulance Employees Association voted on August 11 for paramedics' work bans to remain suspended while conciliation talks with the government continued.
Analysis
-
On the last day of the NSW government inquiry into building products firm James Hardie's asbestos compensation fund, the barrister representing the company at the inquiry made an anouncement implying that James Hardie would pay full compensation to
World
-
Jenny Francis, Kabul Washington has a dream: following a large turnout at the polls in Afghanistan on October 9, US-backed interim president Hamid Karzai will win free and fair elections, and US President George Bush will claim credit for bringing
-
Norm Dixon Despite their public "resolve" and "care" for the people of western Sudan, Western governments are allowing more than 2000 hungry and sick Darfuris to die every single day for want of urgently needed food, medicines and shelter. The
-
James Vassilopoulos Is this the way to "celebrate humanity": to evict Roma families from where they have been living for 30 years in order to build car parks? To allow poor safety to claim the lives of 13 workers? To launch a major attack on civil
-
Doug Lorimer Since August 5, fierce gunbattles have been fought in the south-central Iraqi city of Najaf between US occupation troops and rebel Iraqi Shiite leader Sayed Moqtada al Sadr's Mahdi Army militia. The heaviest fighting has been around
-
Jon Lamb On August 5, the ad hoc human rights court in Indonesia accepted an appeal, and acquitted four generals of any involvement in the killing of at least 1500 East Timorese during the 1999 terror campaign that was orchestrated by the
-
PALESTINE: Israeli soldiers fire on ambulance On August 10, Palestinian Medical Relief Society ambulance staff, including five doctors and two nurses, were attacked while they distributed first aid kits to homeless residents of Rafah. According to
-
John Gauci Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange have lodged the first ever lawsuit of its kind in a US court. Six victims initially filed the lawsuit against a consortium of petrochemical companies on January 30, however, the Viet Nam Society for
-
Roberto Jorquera On August 15, the people of Venezuela begin to vote on whether to recall their president, Hugo Chavez. The overwhelming majority of polls show that Chavez will defeat the recall bid. The opposition has in fact refused to publish
-
Eva Cheng Although only a small fraction of China's numerous protests in the last decade have been documented by media, from those reports we have, the willingness of aged pensioners to defend their rights stands out. According to a 2002 China
Culture
-
Control RoomDirected by Jehane Noujaim83 minutes Distributed in Australia by Rialto Entertainment REVIEWED BY VANNESSA HEARMAN Control Room is a moving account of life inside the Qatar-based Aljazeera satellite television station, during the
-
Art Under OccupationBy Nicholas Rowe & Maysoun Rafeedie387 Guildford Road, GuildfordAugust 22-25 Phone Reeda Kassis on 0404 070 755 or Alissar Chidiac on 9217 0409 or email <alissarc@phm.gov.au> for more information or bookings. Two
-
If you try to recall the Coalition government's most outrageous attacks on asylum seekers, chances are you would recall the Tampa Affair, the children overboard incident, and the isolated, madness-inducing, detention centres. But
-
Been brown so long Been Brown So Long it Looked Green to Me: The Politics of NatureBy Jeffrey St ClairCommon Courage Press, Monroe, 2004410 pages, US$13Order from <http://www.commoncouragepress.com>. REVIEW BY OWEN RICHARDS
-
At 8pm on August 25 at Sydney's Annandale Hotel, a line-up of Australian bands will take to the stage to showcase what may be under threat if the Australia-US Free Trade Agreement proceeds. Ten per cent of the $8 ticket price will be donated to
-
REVIEW BY JESS MELVIN The CorporationDirected by Mark Achbar and Jennifer Abbott.Written by Joel Bakan, with narration written by Harold Crooks and Mark Achbar.Produced by Big Picture Media CorporationReleased by Zeitgeist Films.145 minutes. The
-
The Battle of AlgiersDirected by Gillo PontecorvoWritten by Gillo Pontecorvo and Franco SolinasWith Brahim Haggiag, Jean Martin & Saadi YacefNow showing at tMelbourne's Lumiere and Sydney's Valhalla and Chauvel cinemas. REVIEWED BY VANNESSA
-
When The World Said No To War is a project to organise a photographic exhibition, education forum and book about the anti-war protests that took place around the world in February 2003. The project was conceived as a tribute to the spirit of the 30