Activists from the Indonesian National Student League for Democracy (LMND) and the National Liberation Party of Unity (Papernas) in the East Kalimantan city of Balikpapan have been the targets of harassment by the local government officials, police and the military (TNI).
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World Refugee Day was marked with a loud protest by the Sudanese community and friends on June 20 in Hyde Park, to call for urgent action over the crisis in Darfur that has left more than 400,000 people dead. Eighty people participated in the rally organised by the Darfur Action Network (DAN) and Caritas International including leaders of the Sudanese community in Melbourne.
Twenty people gathered on June 22 in defence of civil liberties and in solidarity with Joanne Ball, who was facing trial. This was the first trial of an activist arrested during February protests against visiting US Vice-President Dick Cheney. By the end of the day, the prosecution’s case had collapsed and charges were dismissed.
The Queensland Police Union (QPU) has launched a series of radio advertisements that accuse the state Labor government of political interference in the case of Senior Sergeant Chris Hurley. A jury returned a verdict of not guilty for Hurley on June 20 in the Townsville Supreme Court. Hurley had been charged with the assault and manslaughter of Mulrunji Doomadgee, a 36-year-old aboriginal man, at the Palm Island police watch-house in November 2004.
Ker-ching! $2.5 million from the Business Council of Australia. Ker-ching! $3 million from the Australian Chamber of Commerce. Ker-ching! $1-2 million from the Minerals Council (theyve got a few billion in spare change). Ker-ching! $3 million from the Master Builders (they swear they dont swear like those thuggish unionists in the building industry). Ker-ching! $1 million from the National Farmers Federation (Sorry John, were still bleeding from the Patricks fiasco and theres the drought
). Ker-ching!
The following is abridged from a speech given by Nathan Fenelon or Natty Fen to the June 22 Justice for Mulrunji rally in Melbourne.
Prime Minister John Howard announced on June 21 a plan to take control of some 60 Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory, supposedly to tackle a child sex abuse crisis in those communities. It is a plan that severely limits and in some instances eradicates the democratic and land rights of all Aboriginal people in remote NT communities.
The Tasmanian state Labor government has rejected a claim by public sector nurses to bring their pay and conditions in line with their mainland counterparts.
Im taking control, said Johnny Howard, with a contrived quiver of righteousness in his voice. His face was set into a familiar pastiche of horror and disgust at the degraded behaviour of lesser beings. He also conveyed a weariness the weariness of shouldering the white mans burden.
More than 4000 teachers, school support staff, parents and students rallied outside the South Australian parliament on June 14. The rally, called by the Australian Education Union (AEU), protested the efficiency dividends announced in the recent state budget, which will result in funding cuts of $50,000-$100,000 to most schools.
Proposed laws introduced into the NSW parliament mean that the greater Sydney area will become a police state for two weeks around the APEC summit. The APEC Meeting (Policing Powers) Bill 2007 is expected to be passed without significant amendments.
In a June 19 joint press conference in Washington with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, US President George Bush said: Its interesting that extremists attack democracies around the Middle East, whether it be the Iraq democracy, the Lebanese democracy, or a potential Palestinian democracy. He was referring specifically to the popularly elected Hamas-led government of the Palestinian people taking action in Gaza to prevent a bloody coup by their defeated rivals, Fatah, which since the January 2006 elections has been armed, funded and trained by Israel and the US.
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