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IRAQ: No blood for oil!

BY ROHAN PEARCE On September 12, US President George Bush addressed the United Nations General Assembly to set out the US regime's case for a bloody war on Iraq. Bush declared that the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein since 1998 had

Erskineville public housing estate saved

BY PIP HINMAN SYDNEY — A concerted campaign for several months by residents and Erskineville Housing Estate tenants forced the NSW state government on November 19 to reject a housing department redevelopment proposal which would have adversely

Write On: Letters to Green Left Weekly

Embryonic research As the Senate debates embryonic research, it is important to reject the notion that humans have rights simply by virtue of being human. The point of rights is to promote the interests of rights-holders. A never-sentient embryo

UNITED STATES: Why Washington is hungry for oil

BY EVA CHENG "America in the year 2001 faces the most serious energy shortages since the oil embargoes of the 1970s", proclaimed US vice president Dick Cheney's May 2001 national energy policy report to President George Bush. The Cheney report

GERMANY: Nuclear waste train sparks protests

BY JIM GREEN The largest shipment of high-level nuclear waste between France and Germany — 1300 tonnes of it — was trained and trucked from La Hague in France to Wendland in northern Germany. on November 11-14. The waste was taken to a

Pressure grows to allow East Timorese to stay

BY JON LAND Pressure is mounting against the federal government's moves to deport 1600-1800 East Timorese asylum seekers, some of whom have been seeking refugee status for up to 10 years. At least 84 may be forced to leave by the end of

EL SALVADOR: Mass movement defeats privatisation

Following weeks of massive demonstrations, El Salvador's National Assembly voted on November 14 to ratify a decree that prohibits the privatisation in any form of the national health care system (known as the Salvadoran Social Security Institute,

Crean and Carr's cop frenzy

NSW Premier Bob Carr's enthusiasm for vilifying protesters, police patrols with sniffer dogs and cooperating with Australia's secret police service is not an aberration for the ALP. Federal Labor is also bending over backwards to increase police

Iraqi asylum seekers offered 'voluntary deportation'

BY TERRICA STRUDWICK & SARAH STEPHEN At the end of September, Abdur Wahab Najim, an Iraqi asylum seeker in Villawood detention centre, was approached by an immigration department official who offered him a passport and claimed that the

Feast Festival refugees' rights forum

BY LUKE SMITH ADELAIDE — Around 100 people gathered at the Queens Theatre on November 17 for a refugees' rights forum. The event, part of the Feast Festival 2002, focused on the plight of refugees fleeing persecution because of their sexuality.

Opposing Bracks' privatisation

BY ANNE O’CASEY MELBOURNE — Arun Pradhan, the Socialist Alliance candidate for Melbourne district in the November 30 Victorian elections, has called for mass civil disobedience to stop the controversial Commonwealth Games village planned

The killing of Angelo Tsakos

SYDNEY — On November 11, a book was launched in the outer Sydney suburb of Blacktown. It coincided with the 17th anniversary of the killing by police of 16-year-old Angelo Tsakos. The book, A Mother's Story, details the agony of those 17 years