News

Dale Mills, Sydney The renewal of the Terrorism (Police Powers) Act 2002 by the NSW parliament looks certain after a review. The law allows a senior police officer to give special powers to police that will suspend civil liberties. This

Katie Cherrington & Megan Connor, Sydney On January 20, students demonstrated outside ANZ branches in Sydney and Brisbane to protest the bank's involvement in an international consortium, the Trade Bank of Iraq, which facilitates corporate

Kathy Newnam, Darwin In the quest for the truth about her husband's death, Letty Scott has amassed evidence of the murder of Douglas Scott at the hands of prison guards in Berrimah prison on July 5, 1985 and the subsequent cover-up. New evidence

Jim McIlroy, Brisbane The Stolen Wages Campaign Working Group has criticised the Queensland government's limitation on resources to pursue claims for "stolen wages" for Aboriginal workers, who had wages withheld or absorbed into state revenue for

Josephine Hunt, Canberra More than two years after their claim for a wage increase first went before the Industrial Relations Commission, qualified childcare workers in Victoria and the ACT were delivered a pay rise of up to $82.20 per week in a

Kate Howard & Simon Butler, Newcastle After a week of intense campaigning and local media interest, anti-racists in Newcastle organised two major events in opposition to the activities of the small fascist group the Patriotic Youth League. A

Alex Bainbridge, Hobart Eighteen members of the "Gunns 20", accompanied by 200 supporters, crowded onto a narrow footpath outside the William Street courthouse in Melbourne on January 14, to officially declare their intention to contest Gunns'

SYDNEY — On January 12, the Stop the War Coalition web team awoke to find that its website had fallen prey to a malicious hack attack. More than 100 news articles, reports and interviews and details of upcoming events were erased and replaced with

Pyrrhic victory "Last November's operation in Falluja, most analysts agree, succeeded less in breaking 'the back' of the insurgency — as Marine Gen. John Sattler optimistically declared at the time — than in spreading it out." — Newsweek,

Sarah Stephen On January 14, the same day that he received a letter rejecting his s417 appeal for ministerial intervention, Iranian asylum seeker Ardeshir Gholipour took an overdose of sleeping tablets. He was admitted to Port Augusta hospital and

Alison Dellit More than 200 people attended the 2005 Marxist Summer School held by the Democratic Socialist Perspective in Sydney on January 8-11. Participants discussed a wide range of topics relevant to Marxists today, from an analysis of the

Kathy Newnan"> SYDNEY — People imprisoned in Villawood detention centre responded generously to the tsunami crisis, despite many having little money. Some have cash from their working days before they were detained. Together they raised