News aggregator
Rally: Burgeroff! No Maccas in Tecoma.
Come along, and learn more about our campaign to protect Tecoma and the Dandenong Ranges from this development- and help spread the word! MC Rod Quantock. 12pm. Federation Square, cnr Swanston & Flinders Sts, City.
Event date: Sat, 14/09/2013 - 12:00pmConference: Chile 40 years.
Saturday, September 14
The Chile Solidarity Melbourne together with different unions, solidarity organisations, democratic and progressive groups are organising several activities to honour our fallen comrades and our president, on this very important date for the Chilean people. Also we will be paying tribute to all the workers, students, Mapuche indigenous people that stand up today to fight for their rights. 11am-5pm. La Trobe University City Campus, 215 Franklin St., City. Organised by LASNET.
Event date: Sat, 14/09/2013 - 11:00am - 5:00pmSeminar: Failures of US self-scrutiny for war crimes under Obama.
Friday, September 13
Speaker: Richard Falk (UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in the Palestinian Territories Occupied Since 1967). 5:30pm. Room 102, Level 1, Melbourne Law School, 185 Pelham St, Carlton. RSVP: email Anna Hood. Presented by the Iraq War Inquiry Group & the Asia Pacific Centre for Military Law.
Event date: Fri, 13/09/2013 - 5:30pm Email: achood@unimelb.edu.auFilm screening: World premiere of 'The Chikukwa Project'.
Fifty-minute doco tells the story of an amazing permaculture project which has been working in Zimbabwe for 22 years: Where once the 7000 people of the Chikukwa villages suffered hunger and malnutrition, this community has turned its fortunes around using permaculture farming techniques. 7pm (for 7:30pm start). $20/$15. 7pm. Ceres Environmental Park, cnr Roberts & Stewart Sts, Brunswick East.
Event date: Thu, 12/09/2013 - 7:00pm Website: The Chikukwa Project Phone: 0410 370 632Public meeting: Dennis Altman: The end of the homosexual?
Thursday, September 12
Homosexuality has become a faultline for debates about western influence and human rights. In his new book The End of the Homosexual? — part memoir, part politics — Dennis Altman connects what has happened within the changing queer world over the past 40 years to larger social, political and cultural trends. Entry free (bookings not required). 12:45-1:15pm. The Wheeler Centre, 176 Little Lonsdale St, City.
Event date: Thu, 12/09/2013 - 12:45pmVanunu -- Israel's whistleblowing political prisoner
?In 1986, Israeli scientist Mordechai Vanunu took a courageous moral stand against nuclear weapons.
Vanunu exposed Israel’s secret nuclear weapons arsenal to the world after becoming disillusioned with his work as a technician at Dimona Nuclear Research Centre in Israel.
Vanunu revealed Israel had hundreds of advanced nuclear warheads ? the sixth largest stockpile in the world. Under a policy of nuclear ambiguity, Israel still officially denies it has nuclear weapons, despite Vanunu’s revelations and other widespread evidence to the contrary.
Chile: Forty years on from US-imposed terror
September 11 is a date forever associated with mass murder of civilians — and this was the case nearly three decades before the 2001 terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers in New York.
This year, September 11 marks the 40th anniversary of the US-organised military coup that overthrew the elected left-wing government of Salvador Allende and installed a brutal dictatorship headed by General Augusto Pinochet.
The day was the start of a nightmare for Chileans, as a reign of terror crushed left-wing groups, trade unions and popular organisations.
Blind Workers Union rally
Blind people from all over Australia are sending their white canes to the Victorian Blind Workers Union, to help them form a “white cane chain” around the workplace that Vision Australia plans to close down, sacking 50 blind people in Melbourne within a few weeks.
Join the protest at Vision Australia Enterprises, corner Stubbs and Macaulay Road Kensington, at 12 noon on Sunday September 15.
For further information and to offer support to blind workers please contact Martin Stewart at nariwill@icloud.com.
Event date: Sun, 15/09/2013 - 12:00pmFilm screening: 'Cultural Flows'
Cultural Flows première
The Mutthi Mutthi and Wadi Wadi Indigenous nations and Friends of the Earth Sydney would like to invite you to the Sydney premiere of Cultural Flows, two beautifully shot new documentaries that explore the intricate connections between rivers, community, country and culture.
The premiere will take place on Wednesday 11 September 6.30 pm at the University of Sydney, Education Faculty Building (building A35) Lecture Theatre 351 (next to the Manning Bar). For a map of the venue: http://sydney.edu.au/education_social_work/about/location/
Event date: Wed, 11/09/2013 - 6:30pm'Festival with a conscience' shines light on LA struggles
From Mexican revolutionaries to Argentine street kids, Pinochet’s Chile to Mayan eco-warriors, the Eighth Sydney Latin American Film Festival shines the light on Latin America’s dark past as well as its ongoing struggle against corporate imperialism and environmental destruction.
From September 4 to 15, the festival screens 22 new-release feature films and documentaries from Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Peru, Uruguay, Venezuela, the US and Australia.
Philippines: Mass protest breaks out against 'pork barrelling'
The Philippines’ Million People March, against the so-called pork barrel system of corruption, is the latest in a series of huge protests worldwide, which exploded with the United States’ Occupy Movement and the Arab Spring of 2011.
The Luneta rally was attended by at least 200,000 people (according to government estimates). However, aerial footage of the event showed attendance was almost certainly higher.
The Luneta rally was part of nationwide and global protests, involving a further 500,000 people in major cities in the Philippines and by Filipino communities worldwide.
Venezuela, Palestine conclude solidarity oil deal
Venezuela has agreed to sell oil to the Palestinian Authority (PA) at a “fair price” as part of new energy agreements with the Middle Eastern government.
The deals, made during a meeting between Venezuelan foreign minister Elias Jaua and his PA counterpart Riyah al-Malki in Caracas on August 24, include the training of Palestinians in the handling and distribution of oil.
Jaua referred to the deal as “an agreement of cooperation and solidarity … the sale of fuel at a fair price”.
Colombia: Rural uprising breaks out for fair prices, against 'free trade'
An uprising of the rural poor (campesinos) in Colombia entered its 11th day on August 29. An estimated 250,000 people took part in strikes and highway blockades across the South American country's highlands, where most of Colombia’s population of 42 million is concentrated.
The central objective of the uprising is to guarantee minimum prices for agricultural products, and to annul Colombia’s free trade agreements (FTAs) with the United States and the European Union.
US threatens Syria amid threat of fresh Western war in Mid-East
In response to a chemical weapons attack by unknown perpetrators on August 21, US President Barack Obama, in a “coalition of the willing” with the governments of Britain and France, has made escalating threats for a military attack on Syria.
With the likelihood of Russia and China opposition in the UN Security Council, Obama has indicated that his coalition, calling itself the “international community”, may strike Syria unilaterally.
The nuclear 'No Future' Fund
Future Fund CEO Mark Burgess was met by protesters when he spoke in Sydney on August 20. Members of Uranium Free NSW dressed as nuclear missiles to highlight the fund's investment in nuclear weapons manufacturing.
The Future Fund, an Australian government investment fund established in 2006, has $227 million invested in 16 nuclear weapons companies. These companies make nuclear weapons and related infrastructure for France, Britain, the United States, India and Israel.
Gippsland unionist stands as independent in MacMillan
Gippsland Trades and Labour Council secretary John Parker is standing as an independent candidate in the seat of MacMillan. Green Left Weekly’s Susan Price spoke to Parker about his campaign.
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What prompted you to stand as a candidate?
Sydney students defend academics over Israel boycott
About 50 people joined a rally at Sydney University on August 28 to show solidarity with academics Jake Lynch and Stuart Rees, who have been threatened with legal action over their strong backing for the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign against apartheid Israel.
Lynch, Rees and the Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies (CPACS) at Sydney university are facing a legal suit by Shurat HaDin, an Israeli Law Centre.
NSW closer to CSG ban in water catchments
Stop CSG Illawarra released this statement on August 26.
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NSW Labor has adopted a policy to ban coal seam gas (CSG) development in the Sydney drinking water catchment. This is the first commitment from a major party to support exclusion zones to protect our water.
Stop CSG Illawarra spokesperson Jess Moore said: "This is a welcome announcement and a win for the campaign. We set out to have policies from all parties reflect a safe approach to CSG, and we congratulate NSW Labor on this decision.
GLW issue number 980
Refugees not to blame for Australia’s problems
The two big parties have long considered refugees’ rights forfeit. This election year has been a time of unprecedented sacrifice of refugees, as each “policy” idea from Labor and the Liberals becomes more extreme than the last.
After signing up Papua New Guinea and Nauru to bogus resettlement deals, PM Kevin Rudd has most recently sent families to Nauru and continues to oversee legally dubious deportations.
