“Aborigines from across the country will fight nuclear dumping”

Media Release

Goodooga, northwest NSW, 24 February 10 – Aboriginal people will be called from all over Australia to protest in the Northern Territory against any movement of nuclear waste across their traditional lands, an Aboriginal activist says.

Michael Anderson, chairman of an Aboriginal Summit Task Force recently elected in Canberra (pictured at right), says in a media release: “Nothing will move down the former American Vice-President Dick Cheney’s Halliburton railway line from Darwin to Alice Springs.”

Mr. Anderson was responding on behalf of a majority of traditional land owners to an announcement by Resources and Energy Minister, Martin Ferguson, that the Federal Government will pursue the first Australian radioactive waste repository at Muckaty Station, about 120 kilometres north of Tennant Creek.

Mr. Anderson condemned the Bureau of Northern Land Council for “ignoring the majority of the traditional land owners who do not want their country, Muckaty Station, used for nuclear waste dumping”.

He said the general Australian public fails to understand how much influence the federal government has over organisations such as the Northern Land Council, whose CEO is appointed by government.

“Aboriginal people are under siege from the tyranny of a Labor government who have no consideration whatsoever for our rights,” Mr. Anderson charges.

“What we have here is a repeat of the Ranger uranium mine agreement fiasco. The arrangements that are being made are illegal and the government and the Northern Land Council know full well that the traditional owners have little to no chance of fighting against this dictatorship.

“But don’t underestimate our resolve as a resistance group. It is time the Australian government woke up and understands that they are pushing us into a corner and we will come out fighting with all that we have.

“Our communications thus far with the traditional owners suggest that a fight is looming, and maybe then the Australian public will get the picture.”

Mr Anderson, the last survivor of the four Black Power activists who set up the Aboriginal Embassy in Canberra in 1972, says he is pleased that the unions are offering support.

“The New Way Summit Task Force has been asked for their support to bring this matter to the attention of the public. The Task Force puts the Australian government on notice that like Noonkanber in Western Australia in 1979, we will call upon Aboriginal people to come from every part of this country and protest any movement of nuclear waste across our people’s traditional lands.”

“If the Europeans, Americans and China along with the rest of the world want to use nuclear power, then dump your rubbish on your own soil. You take it from us against our will and you now want to return it against our wishes.”

Muckaty Station is the country of the mother of Barbara Shaw (pictured left), Alice Springs camps activist and a member of the Summit Task Force. Ms Shaw commented on uranium mining in the Northern Territory at the Canberra summit from 30 January to 1 February.

She said only some people agreed to the dump “because they saw the dollar sign”. Although Elders had long warned that the radiation is dangerous, a lot more awareness needed to be created in the area. Listen to the extract at http://www.4shared. com/file/ 228500371/ e1144837/ Barbara_Shaw_ MINING.html.

The Taskforce can be contacted through Michael Anderson at 02 68296355 landline, 04272 92 492 mobile, 02 68296375 fax, ngurampaa@bigpond. com.au

-o-o-o-o-o-o- o-o-o-o-o- o-o-o-o-o- o-o-o-o-o- o-o-

Mr Anderson’s release in full:

As Chairman of the recently elected Aboriginal Summit Task Force, I condemn the Bureau of Northern Land Council for ignoring the majority of the traditional land owners who do not want their country, Muckaty Station, used for nuclear waste dumping.

What the general Australian public fails to understand is how much influence the Federal Government has over organizations such as the Northern Land Council. In the first instance the CEO of the Northern Land Council is a Government-appointe d person as per the Federal Northern Territory Land Rights Act. This does not fare very well for its perceived independence. Aboriginal people are under siege from the tyranny of a Labor Government who have no consideration whatsoever for our rights.

What we have here is a repeat of the Ranger uranium mine agreement fiasco. The arrangements that are being made are illegal and the Government and the Northern Land Council know full well that the traditional owners have little to no chance of fighting against this dictatorship. But don’t underestimate our resolve as a resistance group.

The public must now realize what this Labor Government are doing to Aboriginal people, blackmailing them to sign over their lands for infra-structure development and housing, but the real issues are now coming to a head and this is just one example of what is coming.

We do have rights and freedoms and it is time the Australian Government woke up and understands that they are pushing us into a corner and we will come out fighting with all that we have.

It is pleasing to see that the unions are offering support and our communications thus far with the traditional owners suggest that a fight is looming and maybe then the Australian public will get the picture.

The New Way Summit Task Force has been asked for their support to bring this matter to the attention of the public. The task force puts the Australian Government on notice that like Noonkanber in Western Australia in 1979, we will call upon Aboriginal people to come from every part of this country and protest any movement of nuclear waste across our people’s traditional lands. Nothing will move down the former American Vice-President Dick Cheney’s Halliburton railway line from Darwin to Alice Springs.

“If the Europeans, Americans and China along with the rest of the world want to use nuclear power, then dump your rubbish on your own soil. You take it from us against our will and you now want to return it against our wishes. No, the energy-hungry consumers need to look to a better way of doing business, and in this case bury your own nuclear waste in your own back yards; if you believe what you are told by your leaders that it is safe then you have no fears.

Stop the harassment to solidarity activists in Australia

PEACE AND JUSTICE STATEMENT

4 February 2010

Take Action: Oppose to the attempts to criminalise International Solidarity

Peace and Justice for Colombia (PJFC) is deeply concerned about the recent questioning and interrogations of activists in Australia that for years have been working in solidarity with Colombia.

On 3 February 2010, a member of our organisation Mr. Alejandro Rodriguez was interviewed by the Australian Federal Police in an attempt to obtain information on individuals, the Agricultural Workers Union of Colombia (FENSUAGRO) and about the activities of our organisation.

Peace and Justice for Colombia is a solidarity organisation that promotes the respect of human rights of all Colombians and in doing so, we have been denouncing the violations of labour and human rights in that country under the regimen of Alvaro Uribe.

It is very shameful that Australian Federal Police is aiding Uribe’s regime that has been engaged in the systematic persecution of human rights defenders, journalists, labour leaders and the opposition. Still worse, there is evidence that Uribe’s regime has been involved in drug trade and paramilitarism.

Peace and Justice for Colombia believes that the actions of the AFP in this particular matter, violates the rights of Mr Rodriguez who for years have been involved in solidarity work with Colombia and with Latin America, but also the AFP action supports the Uribe regime’s campaign against international solidarity expressed by Australian trade unionists, individuals and political organizations.

PJFC requests that you and your organisation write to the Australian authorities to

• Protest for the AFP cooperation with the Uribe administration
• Condemn any attempts of Uribe to criminalise international solidarity with Colombia.
• Demand that the Australian Government suspends its involvement with the Uribe regime until such time human and trade union rights are protected in Colombia.

Post or fax your messages and letters to:

Hon Brendan O’Connor MP

Minister for Home Affairs

PO Box 6022

Parliament House

Canberra ACT 2601

Tel: (02) 6277 7290 or

Fax: (02) 6273 7098

Tony Negus APM

Commissioner of the AFP

PO Box 401

Canberra City ACT 2601

Tel: (02) 6223 3000

Copy your letters to:

Peace & Justice for Colombia,

Email: pjfcolombia@gmail.com

Yours in solidarity,

Peace & Justice for Colombia, PJFC-Australia

www.colombiasolidarity.net

www.freeliliany.net

For the respect of Labour and Human Rights!

Australia: New era of left unity as DSP votes to merge with the Socialist Alliance

Made with Slideshow Embed Tool

[The following speech, to the opening rally of the seventh national conference of the Socialist Alliance on January 2, 2010, was delivered by Peter Boyle, former national secretary of the Democratic Socialist Perspective.]

Comrades,

My job tonight is to make the unusual – if not unexpected – announcement that the Democratic Socialist Perspective (DSP) decided today at its 24th congress to effectively dissolve into the Socialist Alliance and to transfer all that it has built up, over some four decades of its existence, to the Socialist Alliance.

Sadly, it is an unusual and rare thing for socialist groups, like the DSP, to break from the idea that they are the “true” party of socialism, with the sole correct political program, and seriously embrace left unity.

I say this not to boast but more by way of an apology and excuse for the DSP taking so long to take this step. After all, the Socialist Alliance was launched in 2001 and now it is 2010! I want to thank Comrades Bea Bleile, Dave Kerin, Sam Watson, Pat Eatock, and our many other partners in the Socialist Alliance for their patience and encouragement.

We may have taken a long time to take this step, but at least we can say that when the decision was taken by the DSP today, it had overwhelming support from the DSP members. And this support was also so enthusiastic that we can anticipate that this enthusiasm will be felt in the seventh national conference of the Socialist Alliance over the next three days.

Energy

There's a lot of energy unleashed by this historic decision of the DSP – energy that will give the Socialist Alliance a big boost in the year ahead.

This was the right thing for the DSP to do.

The Socialist Alliance presents an historic opening for the left in Australia because it is an opportunity to unite in a new socialist party socialists from different political traditions, some from pre-existing socialist groups and others who are not members of those groups. And, among those proud members of the Socialist Alliance are some important leaders of the working class and other oppressed groups: people like Comrade Craig Johnston, who went to jail for fighting for workers' rights; and veteran Indigenous activists like Comrade Sam Watson and Pat Eatock ...

Indeed, in the Socialist Alliance today, thanks to our Indigenous comrades, we have an historic opportunity to restore the powerful collaboration between the socialist and the Aboriginal movement, a collaboration that made its mark on the history of Australia, through epic struggles like the Pilbara Aboriginal stock workers strike in the 1940s and the Gurindji walk-offs in the 1960s.

Campaign to link up with working-class leaders

If socialism is not just to be a good idea then it has to become a movement of the working class and other oppressed groups. And it flows from this that to build the socialist movement we have to wage a permanent campaign to link up with the activists and leaders of the working class and oppressed groups who are fighting capitalist oppression.

Of course socialist groups can and do link up with other activists in movement campaigns, in various “united fronts” around specific issues, such as the campaigns against “Work Choices” or Work Choices Lite, or for Aboriginal people's rights. But when the activists and leaders of such movements want to join us in the broader and ongoing struggle against the capitalist system itself then what is our duty? Surely it is to unite with them in a party to wage such a struggle, a socialist party.

To build such a socialist party we must be prepared to look for agreement before disagreement. That's just commonsense. And if we find – as we have in the Socialist Alliance – that we have 80-90% political agreement, then, it is a “no-brainer”: we need to be in a common political party!

But what about those outstanding differences among socialists? What about the 10% (or perhaps even less) that we don't agree on? Surely, the sensible thing is to not let this stand in the way of us working in a common party for real change. Surely, we have a better chance of resolving the differences that need to be resolved after we have gone through a period of collective struggle to advance what we agree on. Surely, in the process of that struggle we'll draw some lessons collectively that will deepen our political unity.

Blind Freddy can see that there is still a lot of work ahead of us before we unite the notoriously fractious left. If you roll up to any protest action in any major city, you will still be confronted with a smorgasbord of socialist groups, each harbouring the illusion that it is the true party of socialism with the correct socialist political program. What a sad sight!

DSP decision to merge

However, we've made a start in uniting more of the left in the Socialist Alliance. And today, another significant step towards unifying the left has been made with the decision of the DSP to merge into the Socialist Alliance.

In the wake of this decision, we can anticipate that more more people will join the Socialist Alliance or step up their commitment to the project. As Comrade Dave Kerin said tonight, the DSP's decision opens the way for others like him to take a further step in commitment to the Socialist Alliance.

Earlier today, the members of the DSP ended a stage in our political organisation and embarked on a new stage. This was both a break from our past as well as a change that grew out of our collective political experience. We said good bye to a party to which we have devoted a tremendous amount of loyalty, energy, sacrifice and indeed the life-long commitment of many comrades over many years. However, we are not mourning this end. Rather we are celebrating. We are celebrating our transfer of that same commitment and energy to the Socialist Alliance.

In his greetings to the DSP congress, Comrade Abelardo Cueda, the ambassador of revolutionary Cuba to Australia, summed up the broad political situation today in one poetic sentence: “Today the capitalists cannot sleep and they cannot dream ...” But we, he added, have a dream of a radically different world.

We embrace that profound reality. We have a dream of a radically different world, a world based on solidarity and sustainability. And at this seventh national conference of the Socialist Alliance, we have greater means to plan and organise the struggle to advance the transformation of that dream into a reality.

Long live the Socialist Alliance! Long live left unity! Long live the power of the people!

'Foro Social Latinamericano', Green Left Weekly's Spanish-language supplement launched

Green Left Weekly editorial

November 25, 2009 -- For environmentalists, Indigenous rights activists, feminists, socialists and all progressive people, Latin America is a source of hope and inspiration today. The people of Venezuela, Cuba, Bolivia, Ecuador and El Salvador, among others, are showing that radical social change is possible and a better, more just society can be imagined and built.

The tide of rebellion and revolution now sweeping Latin America is posing a serious challenge to imperialism’s brutal global rule. For anyone who wants an end to war, exploitation and oppression, Latin America’s struggles to create alternatives are crucially important.

Australia's leading socialist newspaper Green Left Weekly is strongly committed to supporting the growing “people’s power” movement in Latin America. We are proud of the fact that GLW is the only Australian newspaper to have a permanent bureau in Latin America, based in Caracas, Venezuela. Through our weekly articles on developments in the region, GLW strives to counter the corporate media’s many lies about Latin America’s revolutions, and to give a voice in English to the people’s movements for change.

The continent-wide rebellion is weakening imperialism’s power. As a result, it is taking increasingly threatening steps to push back the power of the people. Our solidarity, to help the people of Latin America defend and extend their tremendous achievements, is vital.

Through providing facts and analysis, and publicising and organising Latin America solidarity activities in Australia, GLW has sought to promote greater understanding and solidarity between the people of Australia and Latin America.

We are therefore delighted to publish the first edition of Latin America Social Forum (Foro Social Latinamericano), a Spanish-language supplement to be produced regularly by the Latin America Social Forum in Sydney.

We hope the supplement will help build stronger links and solidarity between the Spanish-speaking communities in Australia and all those involved in the urgent struggles for the people and the planet. In the words of Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez: “Time is short. If we don’t change the world now, there may be no 22nd century.”

GLW congratulates the Latin America Social Forum for launching this important publication, and looks forward to continuing to help build solidarity in Australia, and around the world, with Latin America’s movements for freedom, democracy, sustainability and justice.

* * *

Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal is proud to make Foro Social Latinamericano available to readers around the world. You can read the first edition (November 25, 2009) on screen below, or directly download it in PDF version by clicking HERE.

forosociallatinamericanoNovember09

MEDIA RELEASE: Shooting leaves "Indonesian solution" in tatters, but pressure mounts on asylum seekers in Merak

“The Australian government did not pull the trigger, but it provided the bullets and loaded the guns that were turned on Afghan asylum seekers on the weekend,” said Ian Rintoul, spokesperson for the Refugee Action Coalition.

“How ironic that in the same month there were celebrations of the fall of the Berlin Wall, Indonesian border guards have shot asylum seekers trying to get to Australia. But the stark reality is that the opportunity, the bullets, the guns, the patrol, boat and the training are provided by Australia. Asylum seekers are now fleeing persecution in Indonesia, sponsored by the Australian government.

“Kevin Rudd’s policy has made vulnerable people even more vulnerable. The demand for bribes is a common experience of asylum seekers in Indonesia.

“But the shooting of two Afghan asylum seekers has blown a gaping hole in Kevin Rudd’s Indonesia Solution and his claim for a humane asylum policy. No-one is going to accept that people fleeing the bullets of the Taliban should be shot in Indonesia by Australian-funded guards.

“Until there is adequate accommodation, reliable processing and a guarantee of re-settlement in Australia, there is no possibility of an Indonesian solution,” said Ian Rintoul.

Meanwhile, Indonesia authorities are steeping up pressure on the 250 asylum seekers in Merak. In what may the first steps to forcibly removing the asylum seekers, Indonesian authorities have restricted access to the port.

On the weekend, the Indonesia navy evacuated a woman who had fainted after the International Organsation for Migration (IOM) refused to call an ambulance and a doctor refused to board the boat to attend to the woman.

The IOM which has been providing assistance to the asylum seekers has now abandoned the group at Merak. There is now no direct medical support for the group.

“The IOM has been pressuring us to leave the boat since it arrived deserted us, and now they have left completely. We are urgently calling for the Red Cross to take responsibility for us,” said “Alex” the representative of the Merak asylum seekers.

On Saturday, a man claiming to be an Indonesian policeman called for “Alex”, to leave the boat, then threatened to shoot him.

“Australia should bring the asylum seekers at Merak and the Oceanic Viking to Australia. Rudd is prolonging the agony to save face, but he has already guaranteed that those with UNHCR refugee cards will come to Australia. One hundred and nine people on the boat at Merak also have UNHCR refugee cards.

“Reports that Indonesia may be considering deporting some of the Merak asylum seekers makes it more urgent that Kevin Rudd intervenes to ensure the safety of these people,” Ian Rintoul.

For more information contact Refugee Action Coalition, Ian Rintoul 047 275 713

The bloody price of playing with prejudice

By Peter Boyle, October 28, 2009

Every time the capitalist politicians play with racist prejudice against asylum seekers there are violent consequences. I'm not just referring to the threatened forceful disembarkation of the Tamil refugees from the Oceanic Viking, which is outrageous; the bi-partisan anti-asylum seeker rhetoric in Canberra is very likely provoking more racist violence across Australia.

“Next time an Indian student is bashed up, Rudd and Turnbull, should be charged as accessories to the crime”, Sue Bolton, a respected Melbourne grassroots political activist told Green Left Weekly.

PM Kevin Rudd's I-make-no-apology stance was pinched from the hated former Liberal PM John Howard, who used it to advance a raft of reactionary positions. Howard used this rhetorical technique to steal Pauline Hanson's appeal to established reactionary prejudices.

Now Rudd is doing the same and it is having a very nasty and widespread effect. Rudd has repeated over and over again that he makes “no apology” for being “tough” on refugees, raising racist anti-refugee prejudice to a new high. But that is not all Rudd is unapologetic about, as Sydney Morning Herald columnist Annabel Crabb noted on October 27:

“In May this year, he declared himself an 'unapologetic optimist about this region's future'.

“By July, he was also an 'unapologetic supporter of the United States'.”

When politicians play with prejudice there are always violent real-life consequences. But even Crabb, a young and general socially progressive columnist, has so far ignored the real-life price of this latest bi-partisan exploitation of racist prejudice. If you can still bear to watch the ABC TV's Q & A, there is the same inescapable message that it is “civilised” politics-as-usual in Parliament House, Canberra. The nasty bipartisan campaign to fan racist hysteria is being treated as just some political game of pass-the wedge.

A similar thing is happening with the public debate on climate change. Political wordplay has displaced serious discussion about how to deal with this global emergency. Truth has become a casualty, as politicians and right-wing commentators fulminate against “climate alarmists” and rally behind the denialist' ideological leader (and mining company mouthpiece) Ian Plimer’s declaration that environmentalism is just another belief system.

David Spratt, the co-author of Climate Code Red notes in a message of support for Green Left Weekly's Spring Offensive fund appeal.

“In a world where politics and the media are the triumph of form over content, Green Left Weekly stands in contrast as a paper dedicated to publishing the news, analysis and ideas at the core of today's community, labour and social movement concerns. Whether it be the banking crisis, what is really happening in Afghanistan or environment and climate issues, GLW plays a unique role in digging and prodding and cajoling and stirring and pushing debates and actions.”

A final burst to finish off Green Left Weekly's Spring Offensive is needed. Our supporters have raised $192,042 so far this year. That's 77% of our $250,000 target for the year. Please reach for your wallet, credit card or cheque book now and help us get there!

ABORIGINAL ACTING LEGEND JACK CHARLES DENIED ENTRY TO UK

Via Gary Foley:

PRESS RELEASE

23rd OCTOBER 2009

LEGENDARY ABORIGINAL ACTOR AND CULTURAL LEADER DENIED ACCESS THE UK

Photos taken 20 years apart. From an exhibition by Fitzroy artist Rod McNicoll.

Aboriginal elder and film, television and theatre icon, Jack Charles is a national treasure.

Since founding the first Aboriginal theatre company in the 1970’s, Jack has performed with Australia’s most renowned actors (Geoffrey Rush, David Gulpilil, Bill Hunter) and directors in feature films (The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith, Bedevil and Blackfellas) TV series and hundreds of plays.

The feature documentary Bastardy charts Jack Charles’ amazing life story as he has also overcome the adversity of heroin addiction and a life in and out of jail. At age 66, Jack is now a Koori community leader and a tireless believer in grass roots reconciliation.

Jack was recently invited to speak before a series of screenings of Bastardy at the Sheffield International Documentary Festival - one of the most prestigious documentary festivals in the world.

On the 22nd of October Jack was denied entry to the United Kingdom because of his previous criminal record.

Jack was meant to depart for the UK on the 1st of November and friends and supporters of Jack are now desperately seeking anyone who can leverage intervention on a federal government level (The Hon Peter Garrett AM MP Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts) to give Jack this incredibly important cultural opportunity to speak at this international forum.

CONTACT:

Amiel Courtin-Wilson (the director of of Bastardy) at
amiel@amielcourtin-wilson.com

Australia must act for democracy in Honduras!

Below is an open letter from the Socialist Alliance to Australia's foreign affairs minister, Stephen Smith, calling on the Australian government to act for the immediate and unconditional reinstatement of President Manuel Zelaya, and the restoration of democracy in Honduras.

Please assist the Honduran people's struggle for justice by inserting your own contact details and signing it, then emailing or faxing it to the minister as soon as possible.

Download this letter as a PDF or Word document, or read on ...

Australia must act for democracy in Honduras

An open letter to the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs

To: Stephen Smith
Minister for Foreign Affairs
PO Box 6022, Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600
Tel: (02) 6277 7500 Fax: (02) 6273 4112
Email: Stephen.Smith.MP@aph.gov.au

Cc: Electorate office
953A Beaufort St
Inglewood WA 6932
Tel: (08) 9272 3411 Fax: (08) 9272 3477

September 24, 2009

Dear Minister Smith,

The people and nation of Honduras urgently need the support of democratic governments and peoples around the world.

The current military dictatorship in Honduras, which on June 28 overthrew the elected government of President Manuel Zelaya Rosales in a coup d’etat, has unleashed a wave of repression against tens of thousands of people who have taken to the streets demanding Zelaya’s immediate restoration as president.

Zelaya re-entered Honduras on foot on September 21 and was given asylum by the Brazilian government in its embassy in Tegucigalpa. However, on September 22, as thousands of people assembled outside the embassy to welcome Zelaya home, the coup regime headed by Roberto Micheletti cut electricity and water to the embassy and tear-gassed, pepper-sprayed and fired on the president’s supporters, seriously injuring some.

With Zelaya’s return, the incessant violations of human rights and fundamental liberties perpetrated by the dictatorship over the last 85 days have significantly increased. Hundreds more civilians have been arrested and images have emerged of large numbers of protesters being rounded up and detained in a sports stadium in Tegucigalpa. The military has now imposed a total curfew in the country – an attempt to prevent the Honduran people from expressing their wish for the restoration of democracy in their country.

Speaking to international media on September 21, Zelaya called on Honduras’ armed forces to “respect the human rights of the Honduran people … To the commander general of the armed forces ... I peacefully make a call for sanity, so that there is no violence on the streets. The people here are unarmed, shouting for joy.”

It is a fundamental human right of all peoples to determine their own government and political future and during the last three months the people of Honduras have made very clear what they want with peaceful protests, strikes and road blockades, on a daily basis. On September 15, three million people rallied in more than 20 cities and towns across Honduras demanding an end to the coup.

We join with the nine governments of Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America, the Organisation of American States, the UN General Assembly and the Rio Group in their call for Zelaya to be immediately reinstated as the legitimate president of Honduras and for the democratically elected government to be able to resume its duties. We note also that the European Union and almost every government in the world have officially condemned the coup, and call on the Australian government to urgently:

• Demand that the coup leaders respect the integrity of the Brazilian embassy and immediately stop the repression against civilians;
• Actively support the reinstatement of democratically-elected President Manuel Zelaya, including supporting all calls for his reinstatement made at the 64th meeting of the United Nations General Assembly this week;
• Demand the immediate release of all political and social movement activists who have been detained by the military;
• Support President Zelaya’s and the Honduran people’s rejection of the terms of the “Arias agreement”, which would legitimise the coup leaders’ actions, and work for the reinstatement of Zelaya to the presidency without conditions of any kind, in accordance with the will of the people of Honduras.
• Not recognise the results of Honduran elections in November if those elections are carried out while the coup government remains in power, the position of the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR).
• Support the calls of the Honduran people for the coup leaders to be arrested and tried for their crimes.
• Pressure the United States administration to end its training of the Honduran military.

We applaud the millions of courageous Hondurans who have peacefully protested for three months to defend democracy, despite severe intimidation and assault by the military, and pledge our active solidarity with them until the coup is overturned and democratic rights are assured in Honduras.
Yours in support of the democratic rights of all peoples,

Bea Bleile, Margarita Windisch, Dick Nichols

National Conveners, Socialist Alliance

Cricket & Class Struggle?

The wombats, having grown up in the thick of rural Australian cricket, have long been considering a foray into the question of cricket and class struggle. However, having neither the time nor total dedication (nor, perhaps, the skill) of C.L.R. James, we have failed to produce such a piece.

The game is afoot, however. John Passant has written a small piece post-Ashes, declaring England's defeat of Australia victory for the class struggle, and a defeat of "cricket's imperialist masters" (ie Australia), and the right-wing troglodyte Andrew Bolt has picked up on John Passant's piece, applying the usual finesse (equvialent to passing a nuclear weapon through a key-hole) that passes for "analysis" in his work. So, perhaps now is the time...

Firstly, the wombats disagree with John Passant's proposition, and we believe it to be a fundamentally flawed approach to the question of class and cricket (although we assume John's eye was primarily on the ball of racism in cricket, and there are valuable points to be made there).

In fact, however, cricket and class struggle, cricket and national liberation (sometimes called "liberation cricket"), cricket and racism, and cricket and the development of capitalism, its grave-diggers and its silly-mid-off have a far more interesting connectivity.

While we are no James, the wombats have decided that - after the disaster of the recent Ashes tour - we'll have a go, over a number of posts, at sketching a brief "People's History of Cricket".

'We can phase out coal and create jobs': Graham Brown

Graham Brown, a retired coalminer from Australia's Hunter Valley, is on a national speaking tour to call for a serious program to create green jobs and phase out coal. The tour is being organised by Resistance, a socialist youth organisation. Details of the tour here.

A call to protest at the ALP National Conference

Via the Socialist Alliance

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The Rudd Labor government has betrayed the expectations of millions who voted for progressive change in the last federal elections in Australia.

Workers and unionists are now working under a "Fair Work Act" that restricts basic rights and violates International Labor Organisation conventions. In the words of Dean Mighell, secretary of the Southern States' branch of the Electrical Trades Union: "'Mr Rudd and Ms Gillard were elected on the back of working people and the Your Rights at Work campaign. Now they are in parliament, they have blatantly disregarded their promises to Aussie workers." For more see http://www.etu.asn.au/newsandevents/news/fair-work-for-whom The incrementalism of Rudd's Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme is, in the words of Greens' senator Christine Milne, "worse than useless in the face of the climate crisis. Just as you can't be a little bit pregnant, you can't stop climate change by doing 5% of what is necessary. Or even 25%." For more see http://www.carbonequity.info The "intervention" into Northern Territory Indigenous communities is a disaster, provoking the resignation of long-standing NT Indigenous ALP minister Marion Scrymgeour. The latest news is that a group of 30 Indigenous leaders from Ampilatwaja have set up a protest camp three kilometres from their township, about 300km north-east of Alice Springs. According to their spokesperson Richard Downs: "Our people are demoralised, hurt, embarrassed, outcast on their own community. We no longer have any rights to exist as humans in our own country..." For more see http://stoptheintervention.org Then there's environment minister Peter Garrett, approver of uranium mines. He used to say: Just four powerful reasons to join the protests outside the Australian Labor Party's 2009 national conference in Sydney Darling Harbour Convention Centre, July 30 - August 1. Here are some more:

UWS Open Forum: 'Is Australia giving refugees a fair go'

We extend a warm invitation for you to attend the 2009 Open Forum “Is Australia Giving Refugees a Fair Go?” The forum guest speakers, Denis O’Brien, Principal Member, Migration & Refugee Review Tribunals and Jacqueline Everitt, author of the book “The Bitter Shore”, will address the issue of the effects of the government’s policy of mandatory detention on children.

The Forum will be held on Wednesday 12 August at Building EZ, Female Orphan School , Parramatta campus, arriving at 5.30pm for a 6.00pm start. Full details of the venue are attached.

This forum is a continuation of the series which started in 2008 and will continue to deal with topical and contemporary social issues and aim to bring academia and the Greater Western Sydney Community together.

We would greatly appreciate it if you could distribute this invitation through your networks.

We look forward to seeing you there.

Best Regards

Sev

Dr Sev Ozdowski OAM FAICD
Director, Equity and Diversity
University of Western Sydney
Locked Bag 1797,
Penrith South DC, NSW 1797, Australia
Website: www.uws.edu.au
E-mail: s.ozdowski@uws.edu.au
Phone: +61 2 9678 7378
Fax: +61 2 9678 7373
Mobile: +61 413 474744
Werrington Campus, Building AK.G.07

"Stolen" - the truth on Western Sahara?

Below are two documents on the recent spat over the film "Stolen", claiming to report on slavery in Western Sahara. The first is a press release from Kamal Fadel, Western Sahara Representative and its Ambassador to East Timor. The second article - also by Fadel - is reprinted from Links - International Journal of Socialist Renewal. There is a long and involved debate taking place on the veracity of the film on the Links website which readers are encouraged to visit.

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**PRESS RELEASE**
**13 July 2009**
*Government is urged to remove its name from discredited film*
*Melbourne** Film Festival should withhold screening*

Government backing for the controversial Australian film “Stolen” must be withdrawn until a thorough investigation of its backing is conducted, say those working for the film's subjects.

The film has been backed by Screen Australia, using federal government money, to the tune of around $300,000. The imprimatur of Screen Australia and of the Australian Government are prominently displayed on the film's opening credits.

“We urge the Government to remove its name from this controversial film” said Kamal Fadel, Western Sahara Representative to Australia and its Ambassador to East Timor.

The film makes claims of widespread slavery in the refugee camps of the disputed territory of Western Sahara. The camps, which are self-run with the support of the Frente Polisario, have existed since the mid-1970's when many fled the illegal invasion of the area by Moroccan forces.

The claims have been attacked as being false by those in film who are said to be slaves and the film-makers have been accused of manufacturing fiction to appear as facts.

Fadel says the case against the film's veracity is mounting.

“Already we have seen a letter from the a high level official of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees who has said the film-makers completely misrepresent the situation and that important facts have been at best misunderstood and at worst completely manufactured to back the claims the film makes.”(1)

“Now, as the report in today's Sydney Morning Herald reveals, the film's official translator has sought to distance himself from the film. He says his corrections were ignored and that he did not approve the final cut of the film.”(2)

“This should be a very serious blow to the credibility of the film” says Mr. Fadel.

Yet, the film, which was controversially launched at the Sydney Film Festival in June, is scheduled to screen in the documentary section of the Melbourne International Film Festival in early August.

Polisario and a range of other bodies believe this has been in contravention of Screen Australia's own terms of engagement.

“We believe this should be the subject of an investigation and we call on the federal Arts Minister, the Hon, Peter Garrett to initiate such a process immediately,” adds Mr. Fadel.

“We have no problem with this film being seen by the Australian public,” notes Mr Fadel.

“But we object to it being seen as a depiction of reality when it clearly is not, and we believe, as a result, the film should be withdrawn as a government-backed project.” Mr. Fadel adds “we call on the Melbourne Film Festival to reconsider the screening of the film until its translation is independently verified by a native speaker of Hassania from Western Sahara. The film as its now does not also fit the category of a documentary”.
* *
*For further inquiries:*
Kamal Fadel, Western Sahara Representative and its Ambassador to East Timor

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Australia: Damage on many fronts in false charge of slavery in Western Sahara

Fetim Sallem.

A documentary on Western Sahara refugees marks a low point, Kamal Fadel writes.

July 1, 2009 -- Last month in Sydney, the notion of democracy took a pounding. The launch of the documentary Stolen at the Sydney Film Festival marked a low point in local film culture, and signified the tenuous grip on truth we now have in contemporary society. That such a film should be financed with about A$350,000 of public money –- through Screen Australia -– and accepted by the prestigious festival raises questions about the nature of reality and on how it is depicted in mainstream media, such as through the medium of the film documentary.

The film purports, in a sensationalistic way, to reveal widespread evidence of racially based slavery in the Saharawi refugee camps on the Western Sahara-Algeria border. Central to the apparent scoop is an interview with Fetim Sallem, a 36-year-old mother of four. She was in Australia to explain her story, which is significantly at odds with the film's take on it (so much so that Fetim requested unsuccessfully to have her interviews removed from the film).

Rather than verifying shaky claims of slavery and then seeking out the source of this possible ill (say in the repressive environment the Saharawi people have endured since the illegal invasion by Moroccan forces in 1975, an event that sent many into the camps that still exist today), the filmmakers of Stolen chose to conflate a few ill-gotten and misunderstood accusations into a tabloid expose. The approach of the film-makers challenges the very basis of the documentary genre and undermines its value as a means of serious scrutiny. In an age when reality TV is nothing of the sort and when celebrity gossip is considered hard news, this is perhaps not surprising. But it is disappointing and very distressing for those who, like Fetim, are vilified in the process.

There are fundamental flaws in the film-makers' storyboard. Fetim is not a slave and widespread slavery simply does not exist in the Saharawi refugee camps. This fact has been confirmed by numerous visits by independent journalists and human rights reporters over the years.

A member of a delegation sent by Human Rights Watch to investigate the film-makers' claims said the delegation ‘‘did not find evidence of forced labour, certainly not of slavery of the kind’’ in 19th century America.

The Saharawi live under great strain and considerable duress, brought about by decades of foreign occupation. A generation has grown up in a refugee environment. Our society is not perfect, our situation not Utopian. None is.

But, slavery is something Polisario abhors and is on the record as opposing. The practice is an unacceptable cultural anachronism and we have outlawed it completely since the inception of our independence movement in 1973.

Polisario has worked hard to address whatever human rights issues we find in our midst and we continue to undermine all forms of abuse and restrictions on liberty. This year, Polisario openly lobbied hard for the United Nations mandate to include a human rights monitoring process in its mission in Western Sahara. This was quashed by France, an erstwhile supporter of the Moroccan occupiers in Western Sahara, using its veto power in the Security Council.

The biggest threat to human rights in Western Sahara is the illegal Moroccan occupation and the failure of the international system –- epitomised by France's blocking actions. These weaknesses ensure the Saharawi remain trapped in a nightmare of Realpolitik, driven to some extent by Morocco's vast propaganda machine. The simple desire, backed by UN resolutions, to allow the Saharawi the right to decide their fate (independence or autonomy under Moroccan administration) in a free and fair referendum remains, inexplicably, unrealised.

Reality is clearly a fungible commodity in the eyes of the makers of this film, for its backers and for the festival organisers. They are reflective of a wider crisis in the ability to discern truth from fiction. They are not alone. There has been a negative impact on the life of Fetim Sallem by the actions of the film-makers and also on the cause of independence in Western Sahara. That’s a reality no one can challenge.

[Kamal Fadel is the Australian representative of Polisario, the Western Sahara independence movement. This arricle first appeared in the Canberra Times and has been post at Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal with Kamal Fadel's permission.]

VIDEO: Justice for Iranian Workers. Protest outside of Iranian Embassy in Australia.

The MUA calls on the Iranian Government to release its political prisoners.

...Surely That's Not Racist?

Jon Stratton and Suvendrini Perera write over at New Matilda:

There is a direct link between the 'harmless' little gag which we often let slide and the appalling racist violence which we quickly condemn, write Suvendrini Perera and Jon Stratton

It was probably a year or two ago that one of us — the one who looks Indian but isn't — heard her first call-centre joke from a fellow academic. Registering that she was somewhat taken aback, the joker protested, "Oh, come on, you know that's not racist. People just get annoyed about all the jobs going to India. Nothing personal." Right. Nothing personal.

This colleague's bad joke has come to mind as we have watched the burgeoning catalogue of acts of violence against Indian students on the news: stabbings, bashings, beatings, muggings, burnings.

It's not racist. It's just that they work late at night. It's just that they travel by train. It's just that they have iPods. It's just that they look vulnerable. It's just that they act different — not like the good Indians who are such marvellous contributors to our multicultural society. It's just that they stand out. Right.

The violent attacks on international students in Australia have apparently been happening for a number of years. Commonwealth and state politicians, as well as the media, have sprung to attention recently thanks to a series of increasingly public interventions by the Indian Government. Students from India, however, are by no means the sole targets of the violence nor have the attacks been limited to men. International students from China have been raped. Young Chinese women students in Sydney and Perth were murdered, including the awful case of Jiao Dan who was raped and murdered in Perth in 2007.

A couple of years ago one of us visited the library of another university. In the men's toilet he was astounded to find a large scrawled graffito that read: "I raped an Asian and she loved it." Even more shocking, it was still there when he returned a few days later. He complained to the librarian that, while toilet walls are frequently the site for graffiti of questionable taste, this was completely beyond the bounds of acceptability. The next time he went there, the graffito had been painted over.

How long had it been there? Why had no other man complained about it?

Part of the answer is that racist jokes and comments have become normalised as unremarkable aspects of daily life in Australia. It's "everyday racism", the kind of unthinking racism that is so accepted that we don't consider it racism. It prevents us from seeing the racialised discriminations that happen all the time in Australia. The question is, can it inure us even to the extreme forms of violence that are enacted before our eyes?

This outbreak of violence against international — read Asian — students needs to be placed in a wider landscape that takes in a whole raft of changes to immigration policy that have accompanied the increasing neoliberalisation of Australia. These changes have everything to do with race.

Read the full article here.

The Industrial Workers of the World in Australia: achievements and limitations

The IWW's newspaper Direct Action campaigned opposed capitalist war in 1914.

[This talk was presented at the Laborism and the radical alternative: Lessons for today conference, held in Melbourne, Australia, on May 30, 2009. It was organised by Socialist Alliance and sponsored by Green Left Weekly, Australia’s leading socialist newspaper.

• To read the full talk, visit LINKS - International Journal of Socialist Renewal.
  

• To read other talks presented at the conference, click HERE.]

* * * * * * *

By Verity Burgmann

The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) was established in Australia first in Sydney in October 1907, two years after the founding of the IWW in the United States in June 1905 in Chicago. Known as the ``Wobblies’’, the IWW was a revolutionary industrial unionist organisation. It preferred this terminology to ``syndicalist’’: while it acknowledged much in common with European revolutionary syndicalism, it proposed a less decentralised industrial organisation. It maintained that: workers should be organised on the basis of the industries in which they worked rather than on the basis of their particular craft or trade skills; ultimately all workers should come together in One Big Union, which would take over control of production, distribution and exchange from the employers; and this process, while revolutionary could be non-violent, because if all workers were already in One Big Union, its power would be so great that the change to a new socialist society could be achieved peaceably.

The IWW had developed due to dissatisfaction with craft unionism, which was seen to pit workers against each other and make it easier for employers to control and exploit all workers. Its emergence was an intelligent response from within the labour movement to the increasing centralisation of capital and industry; it aspired to present a concentration of labour power to meet a concentration of ownership of capital.

However, strictly speaking, only waged workers could join, so there was a serious limitation from the outset: it was a very ``blokey’’ organisation. Female paid workers were very welcome, but working-class homemakers could not officially join. Female industrial militants were applauded—but patronised—in the IWW song ``Rebel Girl’’. ``To the working class she’s a precious pearl. She brings courage, pride and joy, to the fighting Rebel Boy.’’ Far more impressive was the IWW’s principled hostility to racism as an ideology and practice that divided workers at the point of production that must be combated at all cost. Within a labour movement seriously implicated in endorsement of the White Australia Policy, the Australian Wobblies stood out for their persistent opposition to racism.

In 1908 the IWW movement in the USA split: those most contemptuous of political parties packed the convention. Debate centred on the Preamble, which stated:

The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace as long as hunger and want are found among millions of working people and the few, who make up the employing class, have all the good things of life.

Between these two classes a struggle must go on until all the toilers come together on the political as well as on the industrial field, and take and hold that which they produce by their labor through an economic organization of the working class without affiliation with any political party.

The rapid gathering of wealth and the centering of the management of industry into fewer and fewer hands makes trades unions unable to cope with the ever-growing power of the employing class because the trades unions foster a state of things which allows one set of workers to be pitted against another set of workers in the same industry, thereby helping to defeat one another in wage wars. The trade unions aid the employing class to mislead the workers into the belief that the working class have interests in common with their employers.

These sad conditions can be changed and the interests of the working class upheld only by an organization formed in such a way that all its members in any one industry, or in all industries, if necessary, cease work whenever a strike or lockout is on in any department thereof, thus making an injury to one an injury to all.

The ``non-politicals’’ successfully moved a resolution that deleted from the Preamble the sentence commencing ``until all the toilers come together on the political as well as on the industrial field’’ and substituted in its place ``until the workers of the world organise as a class, take possession of the earth and the machinery of production, and abolish the wage system’’. The minority group still supporting political action, associated with the Socialist Labor Party under Daniel De Leon, withdrew and established separate headquarters in Detroit. The larger ``non­-political’’ section remained based in Chicago and became the more successful movement.

This split was replicated in Australia. In May 1911, the Chicago IWW was established, first in Adelaide, but the Sydney branch, or Local as it was called, became the largest and most significant. As in the United States, it was the Chicago non-political IWW that was the more famous in Australia. It became what is generally known as ``the IWW’’, though the political IWW minority remained organised in the IWW Clubs, closely aligned with the Socialist Labor Party of Australia.

There were many links between the American and Australian Wobblies, helped particularly by the movements of workers between these continents, especially maritime workers. Not just seafarers, but many radicals roamed around the world quite freely at this stage. Unlike today, there were few restrictions on movement. There were no passports. It was quite common for agitators and activists to spend several years working and agitating for better pay and conditions for workers in one country then to move on to another country. Sometimes these agitators moved on because their efforts to improve conditions for workers brought them into trouble with local authorities. Often the radical labour movement in the country in which they arrived would know about them before they appeared, because of the newspapers produced by each movement, which reported on the movements in other countries.

One example of someone who moved around the Pacific area was John Benjamin King. King, born in Canada in the 1870s, worked as a miner, a teamster, and a stoker. There were many baseless rumours about King, for example, that during his time in Chicago he had blown up a newspaper office. During1910-1911, he worked as an IWW organiser for Vancouver. After the August 1911 Vancouver strike was broken, he worked his way to New Zealand as a stoker. In Auckland, his economics class had an enrolment of 30 miners and achieved notoriety. It was rumoured they studied the techniques of industrial sabotage. ``The less you work’’, he told one meeting, ``the longer you will live’’. But no member would testify when interviewed by police. However, with questions being asked about him in parliament, King fled to Australia in 1912, where he became a leading figure in the Australian IWW. Because of this, in October 1916, he was given ten years jail for printing and distributing 25,000 pounds worth of forged five pound notes—along with my grandfather’s first cousin, the process engraver who made the plates. The idea was to debase the currency to help bring down capitalism and finance Wobbly propaganda in the meantime. King’s sentence was reduced to two years, because he was less involved than my relative.

King was representative of the many personal links between the radical labour movements in countries on the Pacific rim, which helped the process of transplantation of the IWW from its country of origin. These transplants adapted to local circumstances. The Australian IWW was therefore different in significant ways from the American IWW. It did not slavishly follow all the American trends, debates, and schisms, as American IWW historiography has tended to assume of the IWW Locals that appeared in other countries. In fact, intriguing contrasts emerged between the IWWs on the two sides of the Pacific Ocean, which merit separate attention.

1. Opposition to political action

In the USA and Canada, political action was not so much a practice to be rejected as a matter of principle but an irrelevancy, because those to whom the IWW appealed were largely estranged from the electoral process. The American IWW, while rejecting control by political parties, never expressly condemned political action and many American Wobblies were active members of parties such as the Socialist Party.

It was very different situation here, where there was universal manhood suffrage (including indigenous Australians) from 1856 and payment for politicians from 1871, and then universal adult suffrage by the end of the 1890s in most States and federally from 1902 (excluding indigenous Australians until 1962). All adults, except Aboriginal Australians, could vote in elections in every part of Australia from the beginning of the twentieth century. Australia a white democracy, with Labor parties viable because of this democratic status, many years before the USA with a significantly better-developed economy. Moreover, electoral registration was compulsory in Australia. Not only was it relatively easy for itinerant workers to secure electoral registration; they were fined if they did not.

These democratic features caused the early existence of Labor parties in Australia, and Labor parties that were politically precocious. During the most successful years of the Australian IWW, the Labor Party was in government federally in 1908-09, 1910-1913 and 1914-1917. It was also in government for much of this period in most of the six States. In Australia, therefore, the IWW not just abstractly anti-political as in the United States and Canada but empirically so. It argued from experience that Labor parties did not help workers much.

The behaviour of Labor governments seemed to confirm IWW warnings against political action. Direct Action, the Australian IWW newspaper, had a running commentary on the futility of political action, sell-outs and betrayals by Labor MPs, their huge salaries and perks, and so on. For example, on May 1, 1914, Direct Action announced: ``Workers of Australia, you have raised up unto yourselves gods, in the shape of Labor politicians, and behold events have proved that their feet are but of clay.’’ On June 15, 1915, Direct Action claimed that the actions of the NSW McGowen Labor government, such as strike-breaking, should ``serve as a warning to the working-class, not alone of this country but of the whole world’’.

To read the full talk, visit LINKS - International Journal of Socialist Renewal.

Uniting the Socialist Left: the Australian Experience

An interview with Peter Boyle. Peter Boyle (pictured right) is National Secretary of the Democratic Socialist Perspective (DSP), a Marxist tendency in the Socialist Alliance in Australia. He was interviewed by Socialist Voice co-editor Roger Annis.

SV: The Australian left founded a project of left unity and activism in 2001. Can you describe the early years of that project and what it achieved?

PB: The Socialist Alliance was formed in 2001 on the back of great optimism about the prospects for left revival in the wake of the rise of a movement at that time against capitalist globalization. Some 20,000 people had participated in a three-day long blockade of a summit of the World Economic Forum in Melbourne the previous year. That was Australia’s “Seattle” [1] and it was followed up on May 1, 2001 with mass blockades of the stock exchanges in all the capital cities of the country.

The formation of the Socialist Alliance was just one of a number of initiatives at the time to take this political momentum forward. While it has not had a smooth road since then, the Socialist Alliance is the only one of these initiatives surviving today in Australia. Regroupment projects inspired by anarchist ideology and attempts to create local social forums all proved short-lived.

The Socialist Alliance experience has been shaped by the ebbs and flows of the social movements. It became clear after the forward momentum of the post-Seattle anti-capitalist movement was cut off - after the failure of the global mass movements to stop the 2003 invasion of Iraq - that we were overoptimistic in 2001. We have seen movement retreats since then. But there have been some advances, too.

We should also see the connections between the global wave of anti-capitalist sentiment a decade ago and the new rise of anti-capitalist sentiment today: one builds on the other.

SV: What political forces initiated Socialist Alliance, and what new forces have been won to it?

Read the rest of the interview at Socialist Voice.