World

FRANKFURT, Germany — Twenty-six years ago, a young theology student, Manuel Campos, fled Portugal one step ahead of the secret police. Campos suddenly found himself in Germany, a young man with no prospects, few skills, and a head filled with

US blocks global warming treaty deadline Environment ministers from the industrialised capitalist powers on April 9 failed to agree to a deadline for the ratification of the agreement on global warming reached in Kyoto three years ago. Ministers

Martial law was declared in Bolivia in the early hours of April 8 by President Hugo Banzer. The drastic move came at the end of a week of protests, general strikes and transportation blockades that brought large parts of the Latin American country to

INDONESIA: May Day win for strikers JAKARTA — A three-day strike by 1800 workers employed at the PT Isanti shoe factory in Semarang, Central Java, forced the company to grant 23 out of their 25 demands on April 11. The strike was organised by the

Mining company won't compensate PNG villagersDome Resources, the Australian mining company responsible for a spill of 100 to 150 kilograms of sodium cyanide in Papua New Guinea on March 21, says it does not plan to pay compensation

RUSSIA: Trade unionist bashed The following urgent appeal was issued by Konstantin Prasolov, from the independent Russian trade union Zaschita. The authorities in Bashkiria, Bashkortostan Republic, Russia, have again used brute force against

UNITED STATES: 16 years for pinching a chocolate According to an April 5 report on ABC radio, mandatory sentencing laws in the US state of Texas resulted in a man being jailed for 16 years for stealing a Snickers chocolate bar. Listeners to the AM

Just after midnight on April 5, weary government and civic representatives inked a deal that put a halt to three weeks of sometimes violent national strikes in Costa Rica. The strikes were the largest mass protests seen in this Central American

Democrats back white privilege, IMF austerity in Zimbabwe On April 4, Australian Democrat senator for Western Australia Andrew Murray successfully moved a notice of motion asking the Senate to "support the British government's strongly expressed

INDONESIA: General faces US lawsuit Activists in the United States have launched a lawsuit against General Johnny Lumintang, the former deputy chief of staff of the Indonesian army. On March 31, Lumintang was served with a subpoena at Washington's

BOUGAINVILLE: Help needed now Bougainville's struggle for self-determination has reached a critical point. A full political settlement hangs on just one crucial concession from the government of Papua New Guinea. The alternative is renewed war. The

ENGLAND: British Nuclear fooled again The problems facing British Nuclear Fuels Ltd (BNFL) continue to mount. On April 2 it was revealed that four workers at BNFL's Sellafield plant in north-west England were sacked for forging entry passes. The