World

Sikhosiphi “Bazooka” Rhadebe, chairperson of the Amadiba Crisis Committee and a leading campaigner against the Australian-owned Xolobeni mineral sands mine in South Africa was shot dead in his home on March 22.

It is very hard to find words that can even begin to describe how progressive people all over Europe are viewing the “pact of shame” over refugees reached between the European Union and Turkey on March 18. For €6 billion, the promise of accelerated EU access and a conditional end to Turkish citizens requiring visas to enter the EU, the agreement makes the repressive Turkish government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan the main cop controlling the flow of refugees towards Europe.

Eritrea, a small country in the horn of Africa, generally receives little attention in the international media. But in recent years there have been occasional reports of mass drownings of Eritrean refugees in the Mediterranean. As of June 2015, there were 383,869 refugees from Eritrea registered with the UNHCR. There were also 60,157 asylum seekers who had applied for refugee status.

Teachers protest outside the front of the Chicago Public Schools headquarters. Chicago teachers staged a one-day strike on April 1 in a bid to get lawmakers to adequately fund education and other programs in the United States' third-largest school district.

Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders scored resounding caucus victories in Alaska, Hawaii, Idaho, Utah and Washington in recent days, TeleSUR English said on March 30. Recent polls show the self-proclaimed socialist has gained significant ground on Democrat establishment favourite Hillary Clinton, who pundits expected to have the nomination all but sewn up by now.

At Hillary Clinton's urging, and with American logistical support, NATO launched 9700 "strike sorties" against Libya of which more than a third were aimed at civilian targets.

The government of Argentina is seeking to take pan-American TV station TeleSUR off the air, in a move the broadcaster said on March 28 amounts to censorship. Latin American social movements have already condemned the move by the South American nation's new right-wing President Mauricio Macri.

Ian Angus is a Canadian ecosocialist activist and author. The editor of Climateandcapitalism.com, Angus is also the co-author of Too Many People? Population, Immigration, and the Environmental Crisis with former Green Left Weekly editor Simon Butler (Haymarket, 2011).

Protesters have demanded the reinstatement of the United States’ Voting Rights Act of 1965, a complete count of provisional ballots in Arizona’s March 22 presidential primaries and a public random recount of unsorted mail ballots in the state, Alternet.org said on March 28.

A series of suicide bombings in Brussels on March 22 killed 35 people, including 3 suicide bombers. Less than a week later, on March 27, a similar attack in Lahore, Pakistan, killed more than twice as many people — at least 75.

Hundreds of thousands of French workers and students joined a general strike on March 31 against their government's attacks on hard-won workers' rights, Morning Star Online said the next day. Protests erupted across France against proposed sweeping attacks on workers' rights, shutting down dozens of schools, transportation and the Eiffel Tower.

Democrat voters in Utah, Idaho, and Arizona have turned out in unprecedented numbers or March 22 caucuses, with self-proclaimed socialist Bernie Sanders winning big in Utah and Idaho, TeleSUR English said that day.