World

  • Worries over Yeltsin's 'anti-gangster' decree

    MOSCOW — Responding to pleas from terrified business people and urgent demands from Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, Russian President Boris Yeltsin on June 14 issued a decree permitting tough action against Russia's vast and

  • Timorese jailed for raising flag

    Two East Timorese were sentenced to prison for three years on June 27 for raising the flag of Fretilin in Dili on July 17 of last year. The peaceful protest marked the date that Suharto signed a bill declaring East Timor part of

  • Belarus election a warning to Moscow

    If a presidential election were held in Russia in the near future, the winner would very likely be a populist candidate pledging strong action against corruption and crime; opposing privatisation and promising a

  • 'No interest in ethnic politics': Rwandan rebels

    JOHANNESBURG — The Rwandan Patriotic Front's assistant director of international relations for Asia and Africa, Dr Ben Rugangazi, firmly rejected the international media's "simplistic" claims that the RPF represents the Tutsi

  • Filipinos oppose new tax

    Filipinos oppose new taxTwo thousand people protested outside the Malacanang Palace in Manila on June 28 over the introduction of a new value-added tax (VAT). Organised by a coalition called KOMVAT, the action was part of a

  • South Africa - in brief

    UN accepts South Africa For the first time in 20 years, the credentials of South Africa's delegation to the United Nations have been accepted. The decision was made by a UN committee on June 17. South Africa's return to the General Assembly

  • Can soccer survive US capitalism?

    As a commercial enterprise, the success of World Cup 1994 appears assured. Stands will be packed to capacity or very nearly so. Even more important is the extraction of maximum revenues from World Cup corporate sponsorships,

  • Campaign starts against crackdown on Indonesian press

    JAKARTA — Journalists, students and democracy activists have held demonstrations in several Indonesian cities protesting against the Suharto regime's closure of the country's three weekly news magazines, Tempo, Detik and Editor. The closures were announced by the Ministry of Information on June 21.

  • Economic, military links with Jakarta strengthened

    Australia's biggest trade and business promotion ever held overseas was opened by foreign affairs and trade minister Gareth Evans in Jakarta on June 14. The $8 million project has displays by some 500 businesses. During the

  • Squatters' eviction highlights housing crisis

    JOHANNESBURG — It was like a scene out of an old news reel from the dimmest, darkest days of apartheid: big, burly, white city council security officers — armed with bulldozers and sledge hammers, mouthing racist and derogatory

  • Issues facing the US left

    TIM MARSHALL, an activist in the United States socialist organisation Solidarity, will be attending the Resistance National Conference at Sydney University July 8-10 and the Campus Activist Forum on July 16. ROBERTO JORQUERA, a Resistance national

  • Rwandan rebels oppose French invasion

    JOHANNESBURG — The Rwandan Patriotic Front, on the verge of taking power in the traumatised central African country of Rwanda, says it will "do all that can be done" to resist a French military intervention. Speaking here on June