The following statement was written by Bree Blakeman (Djawulanganing) on behalf of the Gumatj clan nation, MataMata Homeland, North-East Arnhem Land.
Analysis
On October 24, Palm Island community leader Lex Wotton was found guilty of “riot with destruction” in a trial where police were accused by the defence counsel of “lying through their teeth”. Wotton is due to be sentenced on November 7.
On September 29, Harry Nelson, former Yuendumu (Northern Territory) council president, presented Indigenous affairs minister Jenny Macklin with a statement, written in Warlpiri and English, signed by 236 residents. Macklin was in the community to officially open a new pool, the funding of which predates the NT intervention. An abridged version of the statement is reprinted below.
The Climate Emergency – No More Business as Usual conference, held in Adelaide on October 10-11, included 18 workshops canvassing many issues around the politics of the environment: from food production and peak oil, to theories of political change and educational programming. The following article is based on discussion arising from one of these workshops titled “Sustainable solutions”. The presenters in the workshop were Bev Hall from the Australia Cuba Friendship Society, Andrew Hall from the Australia Venezuela Solidarity Network and Margaret Rhode, a member of Urban Ecology and resident of the Christie Walk EcoCity development in Adelaide.
A new documentary, A Well-Founded Fear, to be broadcast on SBS on November 19, documents the deaths of nine Afghan refugees who were returned to Afghanistan after having their asylum applications rejected.
In early September, residents of the Brookland Greens estate, about 50 kilometres south-east of Melbourne, were advised by the Country Fire Authority that methane from the landfill nearby had reached potentially explosive levels and they should get out of there as soon as they could. No emergency housing was offered to them.
The world is going through difficult times and right now there seems no end to the downward spiral of the global economy. Fears of economic depression on the scale of the 1930s are widespread.
Turan Ertekin, an activist in the Turkish community and Socialist Alliance member, came to Australia in 1980.
The October 23 acquittal of Jack Thomas from a terrorism charge highlights what is wrong with Australia’s anti-terror laws and the way they are being applied.
With its banks secured in the warmth of the southern spring, Australia is not news internationally. It ought to be. An epic scandal of racism, injustice and brutality is being covered up in the manner of apartheid South Africa.
Teachers in New South Wales public schools are committed to an ongoing campaign of legal, political and industrial action to secure salary justice and maintain rights and conditions that have been achieved through past struggles.
Financial journalists are earning their bread and butter speculating on the depth of the recession that awaits the world economy.
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