World

  • AFGHANISTAN: Enduring American 'freedom'

    The US military campaign in Afghanistan was called Operation Enduring Freedom. In January, US President George Bush said in his State of the Union address, "The last time we met in this chamber, the mothers and daughters of

  • IRAQ: US prepares for war

    Ignoring the fact that Iraq is fully cooperating with United Nations weapons inspectors, Washington continues to prepare for war. The November 19 New York Times reported that the US "has quietly doubled the number of its troops in

  • Action alert! McCulloch trial adjourned

    McCulloch trial adjourned On November 27, the trial in Aceh of Australian resident and academic Lesley McCulloch and US nurse Joy-Lee Sadler was adjourned for three weeks at the insistence of the prosecution. The women fear the trial may drag

  • CANADA: Stop Greenpeace's union busting!

    TORONTO — Greenpeace door canvassers are used to pounding the pavements. Every evening, they walk kilometres to spread the Greenpeace message of environmental care. However, the organisations' canvass workers never expected

  • EL SALVADOR: Mass movement defeats privatisation

    Following weeks of massive demonstrations, El Salvador's National Assembly voted on November 14 to ratify a decree that prohibits the privatisation in any form of the national health care system (known as the Salvadoran Social Security Institute,

  • HONG KONG: Pro-democracy protesters defy rally ban

    HONG KONG — Seventy pro-democracy protesters staged a rally outside in the Chater Garden Square next to the local Legislative Council building on November 17, defying a police warning that the gathering was illegal

  • ITALY: Firenze Assediata (Florence under siege)

    FLORENCE — “Non ho mai visto Firenze cosi bella. Che bello vederla cosi piena di gente; di solito ci sono solo le bancarelle d'oro e le cartoline. E che palle!” (“I've never seen Florence looking so beautiful. How

  • LEBANON: Israel threatens war over water

    The Middle East is in the grip of severe drought. Israel's farmers are so highly dependant on irrigation that they require more than half of the 1.55 billion cubic metres of water that is used annually within Israel's

  • INDONESIA: State terrorism and the Bali bombings

    "What passing bells for these who die as cattle?", asked the great WWI poet Wilfred Owen. His famous line might have been written for those who perish in today's secret wars and terrorist outrages. Owen's generation never used the

  • TURKEY: Why 'Islamists' trounced the ruling parties

    "Politics has never seen such a widespread liquidation operation", declared the Turkish daily Sabah following the crushing victory of the "Islamist" Justice and Development Party (AKP) in Turkey's November 3 general election.

  • GERMANY: Nuclear waste train sparks protests

    The largest shipment of high-level nuclear waste between France and Germany — 1300 tonnes of it — was trained and trucked from La Hague in France to Wendland in northern Germany. on November 11-14. The waste was taken to a