Analysis

Prime Minister Julia Gillard met Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa on October 26 to discuss allegations of human rights abuses. The meeting took place just hours after a young Tamil refugee killed himself inside Sydney’s Villawood Immigration Detention Centre.

Warren Smith, assistant secretary of the Maritime Union of Australia, addressed Occupy Sydney at Martin Place on October 22.

Justice for West Papua I write to express my deep distress at the recent brutal attacks and killings by the Indonesian military in West Papua. While the Australian government and people should strive for good relations with Indonesia, this should not at the expense of Australia covering up, excusing, condoning or abetting human rights violations and repression in West Papua. The Indonesian army has a long, sordid history of abuses and other appalling actions in East Timor and elsewhere and is still pursuing these same brutal, oppressive policies in West Papua.

See all of Green Left's extensive Occupy coverage here The global Occupy movement has inspired huge numbers of Australians who have grown chronically disengaged with the political game-playing of the two big parties and an economic system that puts profit before people and the planet.

Jess Moore from Stop CSG Illawarra addressed Occupy Sydney at Martin Place on October 22. Moore, who is also a member of the Socialist Alliance, was awared the NSW Nature Conservation Council's Rising Star award for "the most outstanding environmental effort of an individual under 30".

Australian police in two cities now have decided to follow in the footsteps of their counterparts in the US and Europe and forcibly break up peaceful Occupy protests. But rather than deter this broad non-partisan movement of the 99%, it is helping it grow and re-occupy.

Annie Leonard is the creator of the Story of Stuff project, a series of animated films that discuss our pressing social, environmental and economic concerns and the effort to build a more sustainable and just world.

Newly-elected Wollongong Mayor Gordon Bradbery gave this speech at a October 16 rally against coal seam gas, organised by Stop CSG Illawarra. More than 3000 people attended the rally.

Simon Butler, co-editor of the independent media project Green Left Weekly and an activist in #OccupySydney speaks about the global Occupy movment and the climate change emergency.

Many commentators and politicians have argued that the global movement of occupations that followed the Wall Street occupation against the rule of the richest 1% will not take root and grow in Australia, which has so far escaped the current global recession. Simon Butler, an activist in #OccupySydney and co-editor of www.greenleft.org, disagrees.

Stuart Munckton, co-editor of Green Left Weekly/Green Left Online, speaks on a new flowering of independent media and activist journalism in the global movement of occupations against the tyranny of the world's richest 1%.

The Socialist Alliance released this statement on the morning of October 23. * * * Socialist Alliance condemns violent police attacks on Melbourne and Sydney occupations Socialist Alliance condemns the violent police dispersal of peaceful protesters at Occupy Melbourne (October 21) and Occupy Sydney (dawn, October 23) and pledges its full support for the re-establishment of these occupations against the tyranny of the world's richest 1%.