World

  • Accidents in Russia: the cost mounts

    MOSCOW — When a country stops renewing its industry and infrastructure, production does not simply wind down in uneventful fashion. Owners and managers who cannot afford to replace worn-out machinery often cannot afford to

  • GATTzilla versus Flipper

    The eighth General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), signed earlier this year, promises to deliver more on free trade than any of its predecessors. Within its 20,000 pages are agreements reducing restrictions on trade in

  • Timorese guerillas stand firm

    Timorese guerillas stand firmClaims by the Indonesian military that it is scaling down operations in East Timor and that the armed wing of the East Timorese resistance, FALINTIL (Armed Forces for the National Liberation of East

  • Mexican election results raise fears of repression

    In the August 21 national elections in Mexico, Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de Leon, presidential candidate of the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), won the ballot with 50% of the vote. The conservative National Action

  • Middle East process takes another step

    The August 29 signing of an agreement between the Palestine Liberation Organisation and Israel on education, health, taxation, social welfare and other issues is another step in the peace process. This agreement was preceded

  • Cease-fire proposed on Bougainville

    Cease-fire proposed on BougainvilleTalks involving PNG's new prime minister, Julius Chan, and Sam Kauona, leader of the Bougainville Revolutionary Army, have strengthened the prospects for peace on Bougainville. Negotiations

  • Britain: opposition to criminal injustice bill

    LONDON — Some 60,000 young people, environmentalists, hunt saboteurs, unionists, socialists, squatters, travellers and civil rights activists, joined the rally and march here on July 24 against the criminal justice bill,

  • Mother-to-child HIV cases increasing in Thailand

    Mother-to-child HIV cases increasing in Thailand HIV infection from mother to child is increasing at a dangerous rate, especially among pregnant women in Bangkok according to a study presented at Bangkok's 12th National Epidemiology Seminar on

  • South Africa: business pushes labour accord

    JOHANNESBURG — There is a none-too-subtle campaign under way here to convince black workers that they are overpaid, unproductive and too ready to take industrial action. These factors make South Africa "uncompetitive" say a

  • Test of strength in South Africa's car industry

    JOHANNESBURG, August 20 — The national strike by car assembly workers entered its third week with no end in sight. The struggle has become a test of strength as the employers steadfastly refuse to offer more than a 10% increase

  • Rwanda: rebuilding a 'traumatised' country

    JOHANNESBURG — The Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) faces a formidable challenge, Dr Ben Rugangazi, the RPF's assistant director for international relations, told Green Left Weekly. The new government must convince millions of

  • Russian nuclear workers fight for wage pay-out

    MOSCOW — Workers in Russia's nuclear power plants appeared close to forcing important concessions from the government in mid-August following weeks of struggle for the payment of back wages and of debts owed to the industry.