When the US and its allies invaded Afghanistan in 2001, they brought a president with them — Hamid Karzai.
Unlike some powerful (and brutal) warlords in his government, Karzai has no private army. But like the warlords, he is loathed by the people.
Even in the capital, Kabul, Karzai cannot venture out without a large contingent of US bodyguards. Soldiers from the US/NATO occupation force guard his palace.
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The following open letter was sent to Dr Michael Spence, the vice-chancellor of Sydney university, by renowned journalist and film-maker John Pilger. The letter, one of many sent to Spence by activists and academics, is in response to a decision by the university to ban two left-wing activists from being on campus (see GLW#831).
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Dear Dr Spence,
I have a number of reasons to feel affection for Sydney University: my mother's distinction there, and the 2009 Sydney Peace Prize, which was presented to me at the University by a University Foundation.
Barkly Shire dumped 3000 litres of raw sewage at the local tip at the Northern Territory Aboriginal Ampilatwatja township on April 6. The township is a “prescribed community” under the Northern Territory Intervention.
Here is news of the Third World War. The United States has invaded Africa. US troops have entered Somalia, extending their war front from Afghanistan and Pakistan to Yemen and now the Horn of Africa.
Once again the Thai non-government organisations have sided with the military-installed royalist government against the demands of hundreds of thousands of pro-democracy “Red Shirts”.
When word started spreading that the far right wanted to relive the 2005 racist Cronulla riot organised an April 9 “mass rally against migrants and Islam” in Melbourne, anti-racist groups started organising a counter rally, to show that migrants were welcome and racism was not.
Professional engineers at Qantas, members of the Association of Professional Engineers, Scientists and Managers, Australia (APESMA), remain locked in combat with the airline after almost a year of negotiations over a new work agreement.
Internet giant Google Inc. has cut off Cuban writer and essayist Henry Ubieta’s access to his “La Isla Desconocida” (“The unknown Island”) blog, hosted on Blogger, and blocked his access to his gmail account.
Palestine solidarity activists protested outside a Max Brenner outlet in Newtown on March 31 and April 8 to alert customers and passers-by about the Israeli company's support for war crimes against Palestinians.
In December, a delegation of British MPs visiting Colombia reported that a mass grave had been discovered in La Macarena, a small town in the Meta region, 250 kilometres south of Bogota.
Although final figures will not be known until April 24, the results of Bolivia’s April 4 regional elections have ratified the continued advance of the “democratic and cultural revolution” led by the country’s first indigenous President Evo Morales.
The current federal inquiry into the over-representation of Indigenous youth and young people in the criminal justice system, which began in late March, has brought attention to issues surrounding incarceration in Australian jails and detention centres.
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