World

Uruguayan author Eduardo Galeano once stated about US domination of Latin America: “Marines shouldered bats next to their rifles when they imposed imperial order in a region by blood and fire. Baseball then became for the people of the Caribbean what baseball is to [them].”

While the Venezuelan government of socialist President Hugo Chavez has made headlines for its battle with ExxonMobil, Venezuela is not the only country under attack by the world’s largest oil corporation for refusing to submit to its dictates.

Below is a statement on repression of pro-Palestinian solidarity activists at McMaster University, in Hamilton, Ontorio, entitled “Defend the rights of student organisers! Our movement will not be silenced!”, by the Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid (CAIA) on February 19.

In recent weeks, external and internal pressure against Venezuela’s Bolivarian revolution, as the process of change led by socialist President Hugo Chavez is known, has intensified dramatically.

On the morning of February 19, without fanfare, Cuban media released a statement from President Fidel Castro stating that he would decline to stand for re-election to the presidency.

ExxonMobil, the world’s largest oil corporation, has launched an attack on the government of socialist President Hugo Chavez and the process of social change, known as the Bolivarian revolution, that aims to eradicate poverty and develop Venezuela’s economy along pro-people lines.

On February 1 the Bolivian government introduced its “dignity pension” — a pension payment for those over 60 years-old that is a first of its kind in Bolivia.

On February 12 Imad Fayez Mughniyeh, a leader of Hezbollah — which led the successful resistance to Israel’s July-August 2006 war on Lebanon — was assassinated in Syria.

It is tragic but understandable that South African society ranks — with the United States and China — at the bottom of a recent worldwide climate-consciousness survey by polling firm Global Scan: only 45% of us believe global warming is a “serious problem”.

Kosova declared independence on February 17, greeted by massive celebrations involving thousands of people.

The Zimbabwe People’s Convention met in mid-February, attended by nearly 4000 delegates from civic groups, trade unions, the Zimbabwe Social Forum and the left.

“Four million Iraqis cannot guarantee they’re going to have food on their table tomorrow”, the United Nations humanitarian coordinator for Iraq, David Shearer, told Reuters news agency on February 12, adding that “humanitarian needs in Iraq have risen sharply over the last two years”.