546

BY THIAGO OPPERMANN All of Australia's politicians — from Prime Minister John Howard to Greens senator Bob Brown — agree that the Solomon Islands is ripe for some tutelage. That state "failed" and "anarchy" reigns as "warlords terrorise"
BY JEFF SHANTZ MONTREAL — On July 5, under a withering sun, a tent city was erected in Montreal's Parc Lafontaine by hundreds of poor residents, anti-poverty activists and homeless people. Tents and tarps were put up to protect people from the
BY SUE BULL GEELONG — On July 8, Tim Gooden was elected assistant secretary of the Geelong Trades and Labor Council for the next five years. Socialist Alliance member Gooden was nominated by the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union,
BY ALEX BAINBRIDGE HOBART — "One last chance" was the headline of the July 11 Hobart Mercury. The newspaper reported that 17-year-old Ruth Cruz had asked federal immigration minister Philip Ruddock to personally intervene before a July 29

Major Douglas Rokke joined the US Army in 1967 and served in Vietnam. In 1986. he became a nuclear, biological and chemical warfare instructor. After 1990, Rokke worked extensively with depleted-uranium (uranium-238) weapons, becoming one of the Pentagon's foremost experts in the field.

[The following statement was issued in Sydney on July 18 by Action in Solidarity with Asia and the Pacific (ASAP).] Plans to "interdict" North Korean shipping and the Pentagon's Operations Plan 5030 (brought to light in the July 21 US News and
Bus drivers resist split shifts PERTH — Drivers employed by Southern Coast Transit (SCT) walked of the job for six days beginning July 9. The drivers, members of the Transport Workers Union (TWU), were resisting attempts by management to force
BY NORM DIXON The Nigeria Labour Congress, the country's peak council of blue-collar trade unions, early on July 8 "suspended" a general strike as it entered its ninth day. The strike had been called in response to massive petrol and kerosene price
BY STEPH MAWSON& KAROL FLOREK SYDNEY — On July 7, student activists picketed and disrupted a Sydney University Senate meeting. The meeting was to vote on a motion to support the federal government's tertiary education "reforms", and to

"This man is, to me, a prophet!", declared Taos Pueblo recording artist Robert Mirabal on June 29 in welcoming legendary performer Harry Belafonte to the stage of the 2003 annual Taos Solar Music Festival.

BY DEIRDRE GRISWOLD LOS ANGELES — US President George Bush flew into California on June 27 to raise millions of dollars from wealthy Republicans. He got the money, but he also got booed by thousands of protesters in Los Angeles and in Burlingame,
BY CARLENE WILSON On December 5, 1996, an armed group of paramilitary thugs walked into a Coca-Cola bottling plant in Colombia. They shot union negotiator Isidro Gil seven times, killing him. Later that day, another unionist was kidnapped from his