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Around the world
While students on strike for a week were holding a peaceful protest on Dec. 20
at one of the entrances to the University of Puerto Rico campus at Rio Piedras,
police holding batons and tear-gas canisters charged....
Posted Dec 23, 2010
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After the George Bush-Dick Cheney ticket stole the 2000 presidential elections,
Halliburton Corporation became a household word in the United States....
Posted Dec 23, 2010
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The dangerous military crisis on the Korean peninsula has been defused for the
moment....
Posted Dec 23, 2010
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Excerpts from a talk given Nov. 13 by Lila Natalie
Goldstein, a Workers World Party member and Fight Imperialism, Stand Together
(FIST) organizer in Boston....
Posted Dec 20, 2010
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Members of MECAWI from Detroit joined forces to demonstrate in Ann
Arbor, Mich., on Dec. 11 against the U.S. military threats directed at the
Democratic People’s Republic of Korea....
Posted Dec 20, 2010
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In a call to action for a mass national demonstration and march
in Dublin, Jack O’Connor, president of the Irish Congress of Trade
Unions, called on union members and all the poor and working people in Ireland,
not to stand idly by “allowing speculators, bankers and developers to run
riot, pillaging and ruining our economy.”...
Posted Dec 20, 2010
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A mass movement of protest and anger has erupted in Haiti against the
oppression, extreme poverty and desperation experienced by the vast majority of
people....
Posted Dec 20, 2010
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The U.S. government’s attempts to shut down WikiLeaks after the
group’s release of a quarter-million secret military and U.S. State
Department documents, which have exposed and embarrassed Washington and other
governments around the world, have aroused a strong and widespread resistance.
People around the world are standing up for the right to expose government and
corporate crimes....
Posted Dec 18, 2010
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WikiLeaks release of U.S. State Department diplomatic cables continues to
expose Washington’s Africa policy for its imperialistic designs....
Posted Dec 18, 2010
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Letter from Women Against Rape based in Britain published
Dec. 9 in the Guardian newspaper puts into political perspective the charges
brought against WikiLeaks spokesperson Julian Assange....
Posted Dec 18, 2010
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In busy midtown Manhattan on Dec. 11, a diverse group of around 30 solidarity
activists — from Colombia, Ecuador, the Dominican Republic, Honduras,
Puerto Rico and Venezuela, along with others from the New York metropolitan
area — took the message of “Justice for Colombian Sen. Piedad
Córdoba” to the Consulate General of Colombia....
Posted Dec 18, 2010
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It read like the start of a request to give generously. “Earthquakes in
Haiti and Chile, floods in Pakistan, a drought in China, storms in Australia, a
volcano in Iceland ... an ever increasing stream of natural disasters leaving
millions of people dead, sick, starving or homeless and billions of dollars in
lost global economic activity.”...
Posted Dec 18, 2010
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In south Korea, according to the International Metalworkers Federation,
“Union repression is among the worst in the world.”...
Posted Dec 16, 2010
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Some 15,000 people marched through the streets of San Juan, Puerto Rico, on
Dec. 12, ending at La Fortaleza, the governor’s residence. They demanded
the elimination of the $800 special quota the University of Puerto Rico
administration imposed that would increase student’s tuition starting
January 2011. Red balloons throughout the march symbolized the 10,000 students
who would have to abandon their studies if the quota takes effect....
Posted Dec 15, 2010
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Last installment of “The media and Gaza,” a chapter from an upcoming book on the heroic struggle of the Palestinian people of Gaza who are fighting
for self-determination....
Posted Dec 12, 2010
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Following 82 years of a life filled with adventure and intimately entwined with
tumultuous events concerning humanity, Max Watts died in his bed on Nov. 23 in
Sydney, Australia, surrounded by friends and comrades....
Posted Dec 11, 2010
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Hundreds of thousands of Haitians still live under tarps and tents because
their houses were destroyed in the Jan. 12 earthquake. Hundreds are dying every
week from an epidemic of cholera caused by lack of access to clean water. Haiti
is still occupied by Minustah, the U.N.’s armed force for the
“stabilization” of this impoverished country....
Posted Dec 9, 2010
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Imperialist diplomacy is constructed on lies and secrets. No one is surprised
by the secrets. Few are surprised by the lies. Still, a sudden exposure of the
lies and secrets can arouse a strong political reaction....
Posted Dec 8, 2010
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Documents released by the WikiLeaks website under the direction of Australian
national Julian Assange provide insight into U.S. political maneuvers on the
African continent. Although more attention was paid to diplomatic cables on
events in Saudi Arabia, Britain, Iran, etc., there are significant leaks
related to the frustrations of the U.S. State Department in influencing
developments in South Africa, Zimbabwe, Kenya, Morocco and Algeria....
Posted Dec 8, 2010
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For the seventh consecutive year, union leaders, social movement activists and
socialists from many countries in the Western Hemisphere came together in Tijuana, Mexico, for intense discussions.
They focused on the global crisis of the imperialist system, its increasing
belligerence and its devastating attacks on the living conditions of the
international working class....
Posted Dec 8, 2010
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The latest conflict in Central America is a dispute between Costa Rica and
Nicaragua. It has hardly been covered in the U.S. media. Still it could
increase U.S. military intervention and have dangerous consequences for the
region’s stability....
Posted Dec 5, 2010
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The strike issues were similar to those workers have been facing throughout
Europe, especially in the poorer countries. Through the European Union, the
European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund, European big capital
has been attacking workers’ wages and government benefits with the
pretext of cutting state budget deficits....
Posted Dec 5, 2010
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A new study on Zimbabwe’s last decade of land redistribution revealed
that millions of Africans have made significant gains in agricultural
production and income generation in this former British settler colony.
Zimbabwe won its independence in 1980....
Posted Dec 5, 2010
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On Nov. 27 there were demonstrations of more than 100,000 people in
Dublin, Ireland, protesting the government’s austerity program and about
the same number of students and youth in Rome, Italy, protesting cutbacks in
the education budget....
Posted Dec 4, 2010
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What has the military-industrial-media complex meant for reporting?...
Posted Dec 4, 2010
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Scores of U.S. warships and fighter jets, carrying more than 6,000 crew members
and reinforced by ships, planes and 70,000 soldiers of the armed forces of
south Korea, began carrying out joint military “exercises” in the
sea west of Korea on Nov. 28. They have brought the divided peninsula to the
brink of war....
Posted Dec 1, 2010
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Workers World Party stands in complete solidarity with the
Democratic People’s Republic of Korea at this critical moment,
as U.S. imperialism and its client regime in south Korea are threatening
war....
Posted Dec 1, 2010
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Statement by Professor Jose Maria
Sison, chairperson of the International League of Peoples’
Struggle....
Posted Dec 1, 2010
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Statement by Manik Mukherjee, Vice
President of the All India Anti-imperialist Forum and General Secretary of the
International Anti-imperialist and People’s Solidarity Coordinating
Committee....
Posted Dec 1, 2010
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Scores of U.S. warships and fighter jets, carrying more than 6,000 crew members
and reinforced by ships, planes and 70,000 soldiers of the armed forces of
south Korea, began carrying out joint military “exercises” in the
sea west of Korea on Nov. 28. They have brought the divided peninsula to the
brink of war....
Posted Nov 29, 2010
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People packed the lecture auditorium at Hunter College in New York on Nov. 20
to take part in a celebration of the life of Puerto Rican independence heroine
Lolita Lebrón, who died earlier this year at the age of 90....
Posted Nov 28, 2010
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Helicopter gunships patrolled the skies, missile launcher ships were anchored
in the Tagus estuary, and police with heavy machine guns and armored cars were
deployed on the main streets. Heads of state and government of the 28 NATO
member countries were cloistered in the Parque das Nações, a part of
Lisbon that had been turned into a top-security area similar to Baghdad’s
“Green Zone.”...
Posted Nov 28, 2010
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Over the past two years, the Bill T. Jones and Jim Lewis award-winning Broadway
production FELA! has been captivating audiences in New York City....
Posted Nov 28, 2010
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In 1944, when the U.S. was becoming the dominant power in the Middle East, the
U.S. State Department described Middle Eastern oil as “a stupendous
source of strategic power, and one of the greatest material prizes in world
history.”...
Posted Nov 28, 2010
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Some 30,000 people marched through central Lisbon on Nov. 20 to protest
the NATO Summit in the Portuguese capital....
Posted Nov 28, 2010
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For more than a week, mass protests against the U.N.’s occupation have
broken out throughout Haiti, especially in Cap-Haïtien on its northern
coast and Port-au-Prince, the country’s capital. Protests have also taken
place in southern cities like Cayes and in the center of the country in
Gonaïve....
Posted Nov 24, 2010
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When a “crisis” regarding Korea suddenly appears in the U.S.
corporate media, their take is always that the Democratic People’s
Republic of Korea (socialist north Korea) has done something totally irrational
to cause it. They totally disregard the facts of what happened and, of equal importance,
what led up to it....
Posted Nov 23, 2010
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Who is Liu Xiaobo and why was he given this year’s Nobel Peace Prize? To
understand this, it’s necessary to know the history of the prize and how
it came about....
Posted Nov 23, 2010
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Thousands of people demonstrated in Madrid, Spain, on Nov. 13 in response to a
Nov. 8 massacre carried out by Moroccan security forces in a displaced
person’s camp at Laayoune, Western Sahara, in northwest Africa. Dozens of
Sahawari people were killed, and up to 4,500 injured in the massacre....
Posted Nov 21, 2010
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Omar Khadr is a Canadian citizen, born in Scarborough, Ontario, into an Afghan
family. Just 24 years old, Khadr has spent the last eight years in U.S.
custody, mostly in Guantánamo....
Posted Nov 21, 2010
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In an affront to peace-loving people across the United States and around the
world, Washington is walking away from a promise to begin withdrawing U.S.
troops from Afghanistan in July 2011. According to the McClatchy Report, the
White House has decided to postpone the withdrawal until 2014....
Posted Nov 20, 2010
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A United Nations Human Rights Council gathering in Switzerland heard testimony
from oppressed groups inside the United States who exposed Washington’s
official state policy of gross violations against peoples of color and workers
in general....
Posted Nov 20, 2010
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In Cap-Haïtien, Limbé and other Haitian cities, the people clashed
with U.N. occupation troops on Nov. 15 and 16. One group liberated food in a
United Nations’ warehouse....
Posted Nov 17, 2010
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Sixty-one years after the Chinese Revolution’s triumph, the
People’s Republic of China has created the world’s fastest
supercomputer....
Posted Nov 14, 2010
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What has the U.S. government done? The U.S. made a big show of preparing to
help Haiti as the hurricane approached and announced it was sending a
helicopter-equipped Marine aircraft carrier with medical personnel and
supplies. After the January earthquake, Washington sent 22,000 troops —
and little concrete aid....
Posted Nov 14, 2010
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The second installment of “The media and
Gaza,” a chapter from an upcoming book on the heroic struggle of the Palestinian
people of Gaza who are fighting for self-determination....
Posted Nov 14, 2010
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It was the third in a series of international meetings in Serpa, Portugal, entitled
“Civilization or Barbarism: Challenges of Today’s World.”...
Posted Nov 14, 2010
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On Oct. 28, the day after the French parliament passed a final version of
pension “reform,” the unions brought 2 million people out into the
streets in 268 marches throughout the country, according to the General
Confederation of Labor (CGT)....
Posted Nov 11, 2010
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From Dec. 3 to 5 in Tijuana, Mexico — just minutes from the San Diego,
Calif., airport — a cross-section of workers from Latin America who are
confronting the global crisis will meet with U.S. workers grappling with
devastating challenges. Building on six previous conferences, the
meeting’s aim is to grow the unity of the working class in the Americas
and increase its influence — from the tip of Chile to Alaska — by
sharing problems but also examining strategies to fight and win....
Posted Nov 10, 2010
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Workers World Party sends condolences to the families and loved ones of the 68
people who died Nov. 4 in a plane crash in Sancti Spiritus province....
Posted Nov 10, 2010
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Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, the main U.S. media-watch organization,
charges that the country’s two top newspapers, after this year’s
attack by Israel on ships bringing aid to Gaza, suddenly
“misremembered” what had happened in the 2008-2009 Gaza war. FAIR
says the New York Times and the Washington Post “propagated an inaccurate
historical context that serves to bolster Israel’s claims.”...
Posted Nov 7, 2010
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Huwaida Arraf was a witness to Israel’s May 31 attack on the Freedom
Flotilla ship, the Mavi Marmara, when Israeli naval commandos killed nine
Turkish activists. She gave a first-hand account on Oct. 27 to a
standing-room-only meeting at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia
sponsored by Penn for Palestine....
Posted Nov 7, 2010
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A 10-day joint military exercise involving the European Union, the U.S. Africa
Command (AFRICOM) and the African Union headquarters based in Addis Ababa,
Ethiopia, was recently uncovered in a series of press releases from the
Pentagon and other sources....
Posted Nov 3, 2010
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Ever since it took over the occupation of Haiti from a U.S., French and
Canadian coalition in June 2004, the United Nations has spent billions of
dollars on repressing the Haitian people. The U.N. has not addressed the huge,
pressing needs of the Haitian people, basic needs like jobs, education and
health care....
Posted Nov 3, 2010
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Since Sept. 11, 2001, the U.S. government has used the fear-mongering
“terrorist” label against socialist and other independent
countries....
Posted Oct 28, 2010
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What prompted the Wall Street Journal, a pre-eminent publication of the highest
summits of the big business and banking ruling class in the United States, to
run the Oct. 14 article, “Capitalism Saved the Miners”? Is this true?...
Posted Oct 28, 2010
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For the first time in 100 years, cholera is raging in Haiti....
Posted Oct 28, 2010
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The stage and steps of Frank Ogawa Plaza in downtown Oakland shook and trembled
with the strong unifying cry of “We are all Oscar Grant!” as over
1,000 people — Black, Brown, Native, Asian and white — came out
despite rain to attend a rally that followed the dramatic shutdown of Bay Area
ports by workers of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union.
Clarence Thomas, long-time ILWU Local 10 member and labor activist who
co-chaired the rally with Jack Heyman, another ILWU dockworker, proudly
announced, “All of the Bay Area ports are shut down today in honor of the
fight for justice for Oscar Grant.”...
Posted Oct 27, 2010
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The U.N. General Assembly on Oct. 26 voted 187 to 2 against the 48-year
economic blockade of Cuba. Only the U.S. and Israel voted for it. Palau,
Micronesia and the Marshall Islands abstained.
This international repudiation, the strongest yet, is the 19th consecutive
resolution condemning the U.S.’s criminal and cruel strangulation policy....
Posted Oct 27, 2010
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Since the beginning of September the unions in France have
called six different days of mass mobilizations. When they took place on
workdays, the large demonstrations were complemented by general strikes.
Protests were held in almost every region of France, from big cities like
Paris, Bordeaux, Marseilles and Lyons to smaller cities like Lille and Grenoble
and rural villages like Dignes-les-Bains....
Posted Oct 27, 2010
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A prisoner was kneeling on the ground, blindfolded and handcuffed, when an
Iraqi soldier kicked him in the neck. A U.S. marine sergeant was watching and
reported the incident, which was duly recorded and deemed “valid.”
The outcome: “No investigation required.”
This is only one incident covered in the almost 400,000 leaked secret war
documents published by WikiLeaks on Oct. 22....
Posted Oct 27, 2010
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A military and political crisis for the U.S.-backed Transitional Federal
Government in Somalia has prompted calls for additional troop deployments under
the ostensible command of the United Nations Security Council....
Posted Oct 27, 2010
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A people-to-people delegation that included two members of the International
Action Center arrived in Tehran, Iran, Oct. 9 to increase solidarity with the
people of Iran, defend Iran’s sovereignty and stop the accelerated U.S.
push for war against Iran....
Posted Oct 24, 2010
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The message was as grim and clear as a KKK cross burning. “Mosques, we
burn,” said a warning scribbled at the door of the smoke-smudged mosque
of Beit Fajjar, south of Bethlehem in Palestine’s West Bank....
Posted Oct 24, 2010
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With the close of the most recent round of climate talks in Tianjin, China,
which took place during the first week of October, the world is gearing up for
the next major talks in Cancún, Mexico, to begin in late November....
Posted Oct 24, 2010
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The Obama administration has announced it will investigate China for
subsidizing its clean-energy industries, which produce wind and solar energy
products, advanced batteries and energy-efficient vehicles. This is supposed to
be a move for “free trade” and to help U.S. workers, the logic
being that if China is forced to give up these subsidies, that will somehow
create jobs here....
Posted Oct 21, 2010
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Representatives from the United States, Britain, Canada, France, Germany,
Italy, Japan and Russia gathered in the capital of the West African country of
Mali — Bamako — on Oct. 13-14 to discuss the coordination of
intelligence and military operations in North and West Africa....
Posted Oct 21, 2010
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Thirty-three miners from the San José copper and gold mine in the Atacama
Desert of northern Chile were rescued on Oct. 13. They had been buried in the
mine’s refuge more than half a kilometer underground since Aug. 5, when a
mine collapse blocked the only exit route to the surface....
Posted Oct 20, 2010
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French workers took to the streets again on Oct. 19. It was their ninth day of
action since September and their fourth general strike in a month; these
strikes have involved as many as 3 million workers at a time....
Posted Oct 20, 2010
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A critical hearing is scheduled Nov. 9 in the nearly three-decade-old case of
journalist and activist Mumia Abu-Jamal, who sits on death row in Pennsylvania.
Mumia was severely wounded and arrested on Dec. 9, 1981, in Philadelphia and
was later charged, tried and convicted of the murder of police officer Daniel
Faulkner.
After a grossly unjust prosecution was carried out in 1982, Mumia, a former
Black Panther Party leader and MOVE organization supporter, was given the death
penalty. Although Mumia’s death sentence was subsequently overturned, the
prosecution has repeatedly attempted to reinstate the penalty and carry out his
execution....
Posted Oct 17, 2010
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On Oct. 5, 2000, a coup engineered by U.S. imperialist agencies and
supported by Western European imperialist governments overthrew the Socialist
Party government in Yugoslavia led by Slobodan Milosevic. At the time —
only 16 months after a vicious 79-day U.S.-led NATO air war against the people
of Yugoslavia — there was much confusion even among progressive and
anti-war forces in the imperialist countries due to the overwhelming
anti-Milosevic propaganda in the corporate media. The following interview by
Cathrin Schütz with former Milosevic aide Vladimir Krsljanin throws light
on those events and the developments in Serbia in the last 10 years....
Posted Oct 17, 2010
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There is much to be learned from the indisputable fact that the U.S. military,
despite all its high-tech weaponry and the billions of dollars at its disposal,
has lost control of the situation in Afghanistan and has forced even the
corrupt Pakistani government to denounce Pentagon attacks as
“intolerable” and close parts of its border with Afghanistan....
Posted Oct 15, 2010
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Hungary has arrested Zoltan Bakonyi, managing director of MAL Aluminium, the
privately owned company responsible for the country’s worst environmental
disaster. Bakonyi is son of the company’s owner, Arlep Bakonyi, “a
businessman who played a central role in the privatization of the
country’s aluminum industry and is the largest shareholder of the
company.”...
Posted Oct 15, 2010
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On Oct. 8 Evo Morales, president of the Plurinational State of Bolivia, signed
into law a new bill that prohibits racism and all forms of discrimination. This
is a significant step forward for Bolivia’s majority Indigenous
population and for the Afro-Bolivian community as well, both of which have
suffered 500 years of oppression....
Posted Oct 15, 2010
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The counterrevolution in the USSR has allowed a few people the
“freedom” to exploit workers in order to become millionaires, but
has diminished workers’ rights, as we can see from this appeal
from Ukrainian workers for solidarity from abroad....
Posted Oct 14, 2010
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Since 1948, the year of the founding of the Democratic People’s Republic
of Korea, there have been only three national conferences of the Workers’
Party of Korea. These events, under the party’s charter, can take place
between national party congresses in order to debate and decide the
party’s direction, policy and personnel changes....
Posted Oct 14, 2010
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Excerpts from a journal of e-mails sent out by
International Action Center member Ralph Loeffler, who is on the fifth Viva
Palestina aid convoy to beleaguered and blockaded Gaza....
Posted Oct 14, 2010
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U.S. efforts to supply its troops and the puppet regime in Afghanistan came to
a standstill on Sept. 30. Convoys of trucks bearing fuel and other supplies
were backed up for hundreds of miles on the long supply route that runs from
Karachi, the main port of Pakistan, to the mountain passes leading into
Afghanistan....
Posted Oct 11, 2010
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Sept. 29 was a day of worker protests throughout Europe. Thirty countries had
some sort of protest over their respective government’s attempts to cut
wages, benefits, pensions — and other gains that workers have won in a
century of struggle — in order to solve the economic crisis....
Posted Oct 11, 2010
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The Ecuadorean people came into the streets by the thousands to confront the
national police and prevent a coup and possible assassination of President
Rafael Correa on Sept. 30. A section of about 800 of these police had kept the
president captive for 14 hours at the Police Hospital in Quito before military
units brought him back to the presidential palace....
Posted Oct 6, 2010
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This year, countries throughout Latin America have been commemorating 200 years
of freedom from Spanish colonialism....
Posted Oct 3, 2010
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Three million French workers walked out in a one-day general strike Sept.
23 to keep retirement at age 60 and marched in 237 demonstrations throughout
the country. On Sept. 24, the day after the French strike, Greek truck drivers attacked
trucks crossing a picket line at the main Greek port of Piraeus and fought with
the cops protecting the scabs....
Posted Oct 3, 2010
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More than 130 countries of the United Nations met Sept. 20-22 to review
progress toward the Millennium Development Goals....
Posted Oct 3, 2010
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Israeli naval commandoes intercepted and attacked the humanitarian Freedom
Flotilla, aimed at breaking the blockade of Gaza, on May 31. Eight Turkish
activists and one Turkish-American were killed on board the Mavi Marmara, a
Turkish ship, which was in international waters....
Posted Oct 1, 2010
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For the seventh consecutive year, workers, union leaders, and immigrant
rights and social movement activists will gather in Tijuana, Mexico, for a
U.S./Cuba/Venezuela/North America/Latin America/Caribbean Conference at the
Hotel Palacio Azteca on Dec. 3, 4 and 5....
Posted Sep 30, 2010
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On Sept. 22, Jorge Briceño, better known as “Mono Jojoy,” was
assassinated along with another 20 guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces
of Colombia-People’s Army (FARC-EP). Colombian government forces,
financed and trained by the U.S., conducted a bombing raid on a FARC camp in an
area known as La Macarena, in the Meta department south of Bogotá, in
Colombia....
Posted Sep 29, 2010
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The situation for the homeless in Port-au-Prince is so grim that a 10-minute
rain storm with high winds on Sept. 24 left at least five people dead, hundreds
injured and thousands of shelters — tents, tarps and sheets —
destroyed. ...
Posted Sep 29, 2010
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Beginning in 2008 and greatly intensifying in June of this year, growing
resistance in the Indian-occupied part of Kashmir has created a major political
crisis for the ruling class of India....
Posted Sep 26, 2010
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From British Columbia to Quebec, from Canada to the United States to the United
Kingdom, a movement inspired by the resistance of the Unist’ot’en
of the Wet’suwet’en First Nation people to an oil pipeline proposed
by the pipeline giant Enbridge is gaining momentum....
Posted Sep 26, 2010
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When Boricua revolutionary Juan Mari Bras died on Sept. 10 from lung cancer, he
left behind a life dedicated to the struggle for Puerto Rican independence and
socialism, including many contributions that propelled the progressive movement
on the island. Many in Puerto Rico describe him as the key figure of the
“new pro-independence struggle” in the 1960s that included unions,
students and community activism....
Posted Sep 24, 2010
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The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit issued a stunning decision in
the Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum case on Sept. 17. The judges ruled 2-1 that
transnational corporations could not be held liable for human rights
violations....
Posted Sep 24, 2010
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On Sept. 9 U.S. Marines seized the German-owned M/V Magellan Star vessel off
the coast of Somalia. The Antiguan-flagged, 8,000-ton container ship had been
taken over by Somalis the day before....
Posted Sep 19, 2010
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On July 15, as part of their ballyhooed “withdrawal” from Iraq,
U.S. officials under the command of Lt. Gen. Ray Odierno handed over an
infamous U.S. prison, Camp Cropper, to the Iraqi puppet government. Although
they ceremoniously gave a large wooden key to the Iraqi military, about 200 of
the 1,500 inmates remained under U.S. control, guarded by U.S. soldiers. The
200 include former members of Saddam Hussein’s government and senior
foreign and Iraqi insurgents....
Posted Sep 19, 2010
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The plight of the Cuban Five is never far from the minds of progressive people
around the world. This Sept. 12, exactly 12 years since their arrest in the
United States for defending Cuba from terrorist attacks, organizations and
individuals intensified demands for their release through petitions,
demonstrations and ad campaigns....
Posted Sep 19, 2010
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Two major struggles are currently underway in France. To solve its financial problems on the workers’ backs, the Sarkozy government wants to increase the retirement age and make it harder to get a full pension.
To distract attention from its attacks on workers’ gains and point the
blame at some scapegoats, it is also carrying out large-scale expulsions of
Romas (formerly called “Gypsies”), even though they have the right
to stay in France as citizens of another European Union country....
Posted Sep 17, 2010
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Juan Mari Bras, founder of the Pro-Independence Movement (MPI) and later
the Puerto Rican Socialist Party, died on Sept. 10 at the age of 82....
Posted Sep 17, 2010
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India and China were both impoverished countries at the end of World War
II. In both India and China, foreign corporations dominated the economy. In
both countries there was mass starvation and poverty. In both countries there
was extreme repression of women and various ethnic minorities.
After World War II, both countries had mass movements. However, their outcome
was very different....
Posted Sep 17, 2010
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The U.S. corporate press was silent when thousands of Hondurans poured into the
streets of Tegucigalpa on Sept. 7 to join the 12-hour national strike called by
the National Front of Popular Resistance (FNRP). It affected all 18 provinces
and paralyzed the streets of 11 Honduran cities. Traffic was stopped on roads
and bridges....
Posted Sep 16, 2010
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The threat to burn the Qur’an at a small church in Gainesville, Fla., on
the ninth anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center stirred up
worldwide outrage, especially in Muslim countries in Central and South
Asia....
Posted Sep 15, 2010
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August was a month of fierce struggle in Honduras. The National Popular
Resistance Front (FNRP) has engaged in strikes, marches and sit-ins, while the
government of Honduras has responded with ruthless repression....
Posted Sep 12, 2010
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Iraq | France | Basque country | Chile...
Posted Sep 10, 2010
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On Aug. 31, USA Today reported 1,985 NATO coalition deaths in Afghanistan, with
1,248 of them U.S. troops. More than 7,000 have been seriously wounded.
July and August were the most costly months to NATO forces in almost a decade
of war and invasion. ...
Posted Sep 9, 2010
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Recent WikiLeaks disclosures reveal just how low the U.S. government and its
media mouthpieces will stoop to revive support for its occupation of
Afghanistan....
Posted Sep 9, 2010
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Leaders of the unions involved in the public sector strike in the Republic of
South Africa have called for the suspension of the work stoppage in order to
discuss the government’s latest offer. An estimated 1.3 million workers
have been on strike since Aug. 18 demanding a 8.6 percent pay increase and a
1,000 rand (U.S. $138) monthly housing allowance. The strike has crippled the
educational and health care sectors....
Posted Sep 9, 2010
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Seven people were killed and 280 suffered injuries in the Southern African
nation of Mozambique in early September, when crowds rebelled after a 30
percent increase in food prices. The unrest in Mozambique has prompted concerns
that other African states as well as countries internationally will face
similar problems related to escalating food prices....
Posted Sep 8, 2010
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Hundreds of thousands of Haitians have been living in misery for more than
seven months — without houses, jobs, sanitation, potable water or
electricity....
Posted Sep 6, 2010
|
Tens of thousands of teachers in Puerto Rico held a one-day work stoppage Aug.
26 to protest the neoliberal Gov. Luis Fortuño’s offensive, which
has left the island’s education system in shambles. ...
Posted Sep 1, 2010
|
Some 1.3 million workers in the Republic of South Africa walked off the job on
Aug. 18 after talks with the government collapsed. The government failed to
meet their demands for an 8.6 percent increase in wages and a housing allowance
of $170 per month....
Posted Sep 1, 2010
|
The International Action Center has announced the formation of the Latin
America-Caribbean Solidarity Committee. The committee has already begun
planning a number of events in solidarity with the National Popular Resistance
Front (FNRP) of Honduras....
Posted Sep 1, 2010
|
In recent weeks, Bangladeshi garment workers have been waging a militant
struggle. Police have arrested more than 20 of their labor leaders. The police
claim the arrests are for “violent” clashes in July by garment
workers who were rallying for a living wage....
Posted Aug 29, 2010
|
“We won! It’s over — America!” A young man whoops and
hollers in what could be a cry from the crowd at a sports game. In fact, it was
the ill-judged, hubristic “victory’” shout of a soldier
rolling over the Kuwaiti border in his armored truck, as supposedly the last
U.S. combat brigade left Iraq after seven grueling years....
Posted Aug 29, 2010
|
Uniting under the theme, “Moving forward the militant global
women’s movement in the 21st century,” more than 350 women from 32
countries participated in the Montreal International Women’s Conference,
held Aug. 13-16. The conference resulted in the formation of an International
Women’s Alliance. The IWA will hold its first assembly in 2011 to adopt a
constitution of principles of unity and an action proposal....
Posted Aug 29, 2010
|
The French government of Nicolas Sarkozy is attacking the country’s large
and diverse immigrant and foreign communities....
Posted Aug 29, 2010
|
The Aug. 9 Time magazine featured a shocking cover photo: a portrait of an
Afghan woman named Aisha whose nose had been cut off, allegedly by the Taliban,
for resisting abusive in-laws. Time used this picture to build support for U.S.
troops as a “last line of defense” that will not
“abandon” Afghan women against an advancing Taliban. None of this was true....
Posted Aug 26, 2010
|
To test the U.S. government’s “concern” for the women of
Afghanistan, it is useful to examine Washington’s record on helping women
in other Muslim countries. Take Saudi Arabia, for example....
Posted Aug 26, 2010
|
A new generation of “Plumbers” seems to be at work, trying to
discredit the leak of secret government war documents. Their first attempt has
failed. An arrest warrant on a rape charge filed in Sweden on Aug. 21 against Julian
Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, was withdrawn within hours....
Posted Aug 25, 2010
|
Constantly in the U.S. we are told that the solution for the people of
Africa, who overwhelmingly live in extreme poverty, is for U.S. corporations
and oil companies to invest there.
For a long time Marxists have struggled to expose this bit of supposed
“common knowledge.” Walter Rodney wrote a ground-breaking work
called “How Europe Underdeveloped Africa” that showed how Africa
was impoverished and destroyed by Western domination and colonialism....
Posted Aug 22, 2010
|
The Communist Youth Union (KSM) sharply rejects the intention of the Czech
Republic’s government to place on our territory a U.S. early-warning
system component — a center to collect and process the system’s
data....
Posted Aug 19, 2010
|
Even in a time of global climate change, the immense suffering of the Pakistani
people due to vast floods did not have to happen. Investment in infrastructure
and a timely emergency response program could have minimized what has become
one of the world's worst disasters. But decades of U.S. intervention to
keep corrupt and reactionary military regimes in power against the will of the
people have left this country one of the poorest and least developed in the
region....
Posted Aug 18, 2010
|
Following a protracted political struggle waged by Zimbabwe and its allies
against U.S., British and European Union imperialist efforts to ban its sale of
diamonds, Zimbabwe sold the first group of diamonds from the Chiadzwa mines
— 900,000 carats — on Aug. 11. The sales earned $72 million in one
day....
Posted Aug 18, 2010
|
Sixty-five years ago the entire world watched in horror as the United States
dropped atomic bombs over Japan....
Posted Aug 15, 2010
|
When the Soviet Union dissolved and the socialist countries of Eastern Europe
experienced counterrevolutions, the press proclaimed that the “free
market” would bring prosperity to the people there....
Posted Aug 15, 2010
|
A historic women’s conference will take place in Montreal from Aug. 13 to
16. Called by the Committee of Women of Diverse Origins, the first Montreal
International Women’s Conference will bring together an estimated 200
women and male supporters from at least 19 countries under the main theme of
“Building a Global Militant Women’s Movement in the 21st
Century.”...
Posted Aug 13, 2010
|
An international campaign has been launched demanding the repatriation of Dr.
Aafia Siddiqui to her homeland of Pakistan. Siddiqui is being held in a federal
prison in New York City awaiting sentencing, which is currently scheduled for
Sept. 23....
Posted Aug 13, 2010
|
Many articles have been written reflecting on five decades of historical
experience — referred to as the 50th anniversary of the “Year of
Africa” — since 17 African nations gained political independence.
Yet few pay adequate attention to the indispensable role of women in the
campaigns for national liberation and their continuing efforts in the present
century....
Posted Aug 13, 2010
|
Expressing the sounds of her beloved Puerto Rico, hundreds of people singing
plenas and chanting about her valiant character accompanied independence
fighter Lolita Lebrón to her final resting place in the Old San Juan
Cemetery. She was buried close to her dear Maestro, Don Pedro Albizu Campos. As
she had requested, the burial took place just over 24 hours after her
death....
Posted Aug 13, 2010
|
Lyrics of a song written by Phil Wilayto nearly 30 years ago, which he dedicated to the struggle of the Puerto Rican people for independence....
Posted Aug 13, 2010
|
It is shocking and disturbing. Time magazine’s cover has a picture of a
young Afghan woman whose nose has been cut off. The headline reads, “What
happens if we leave Afghanistan.” Time’s goal? Answering WikiLeaks. The recent WikiLeaks publications showed that a U.S. special forces death squad killed hundreds of civilians in unreported incidents....
Posted Aug 13, 2010
|
A top secret unit of U.S. Special Forces called Task Force 373 set out on June
17, 2007, in the Patika province of Aghanistan to purposely commit a war crime.
Task force 373 is a death squad organized by the NATO coalition in Afghanistan
to hunt down targets for death or detention without trial. Details of more than
2,000 alleged leaders of the Taliban and al-Qaida are held on a “kill or
capture” list, known as Jpel for Joint Prioritized Effects List....
Posted Aug 13, 2010
|
The race is already on in commodities markets worldwide to wring new fortunes
out of the climate catastrophe now raging in Russia. It’s a chilling
example of how capitalism works in a time of crisis....
Posted Aug 11, 2010
|
Corporate media coverage in early August of British model Naomi
Campbell’s testimony at the Special War Crimes Court on Sierra Leone
doesn’t provide a clue to the background of this trial against former
Liberian President Charles Taylor....
Posted Aug 11, 2010
|
Using the same old pretext of fighting drug trafficking and terrorism,
Washington is pitting one Latin American country against another in an attempt
to regain its former uncontested dominance of the region. This time, as several
times before, it is using Colombia against the Bolivarian Republic of
Venezuela....
Posted Aug 8, 2010
|
While the newly elected president of the Philippines, Benigno
“Noynoy” Aquino III, was delivering his State of the Nation address
on July 26, a spirited group of demonstrators from BAYAN-USA were demonstrating
outside the Philippine Consulate nearly 8,000 miles away in San Francisco....
Posted Aug 8, 2010
|
The United Nations’ International Court of Justice ruled that a 2008
declaration of separation by the parliament of Serbia’s Kosovo province
was legal under international law....
Posted Aug 8, 2010
|
The Central Intelligence Agency, a ruthless enforcer of Wall Street’s
drive for profits, publishes “The World Factbook.” It gives updated
statistics for every country, some of which measure quality of life and
societal health, such as life expectancy, infant mortality, literacy,
unemployment and industrial production....
Posted Aug 6, 2010
|
Two Korean groups in the United States — the pro-reunification,
community-based, grassroots organization Nodutdol and the National Campaign to
End the Korean War — held a joint cultural event in Washington, D.C., on
July 25 to call for a peace treaty between the U.S. and the Democratic
People’s Republic of Korea, often referred to by the U.S. media as north
Korea....
Posted Aug 6, 2010
|
Revered Puerto Rican
independence fighter Lolita Lebrón died on the morning of Aug. 1....
Posted Aug 4, 2010
|
On the morning of Aug. 3, Gerardo
Hernández was freed from “the hole” due to mass pressure
— individual, diplomatic and legal. He has been returned to his former
incarceration status. It is time for the U.S. government to free the Cuban Five
and send them home....
Posted Aug 4, 2010
|
This year’s African Union summit, which was held in the East African
state of Uganda on July 25-27, came under tremendous pressure from the
U.S.-supported government of Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni. The head of
state sought to turn the entire continent’s attention toward implementing
Washington’s foreign policy objectives in Somalia....
Posted Aug 1, 2010
|
After a wave of strikes at foreign-opened firms in China — strikes that
were supported by the government and gained significant wage increases for the
workers — the business media in the United States and other imperialist
countries are complaining that China is taking an economic turn harmful to
their interests....
Posted Aug 1, 2010
|
Conditions are worsening daily for the 1.5 million people in Haiti living in
tents or under oilcloth tarps on the streets of Port-au-Prince, Leôgane or
Jacmel....
Posted Aug 1, 2010
|
The Pastors for Peace 21st Friendshipment Caravan to Cuba arrived in
Havana on July 22....
Posted Jul 30, 2010
|
The media explosion following the publication of reports of some 90,000
classified cables between U.S. officials may accelerate the struggle to end the
imperialist occupation of Afghanistan....
Posted Jul 28, 2010
|
The U.S. and south Korean militaries are staging their largest joint war
exercises in years off the coast of the Democratic People’s Republic of
Korea....
Posted Jul 28, 2010
|
Puerto Rico | Panama | Costa Rica...
Posted Jul 26, 2010
|
As in past years, we invite you to join us on July 22. That day was established
as the World Day against Coca-Cola during the Social Forum in Porto Alegre,
Brazil, in 2003....
Posted Jul 21, 2010
|
An Israeli military veteran, with help from Polish activists from the Palestine
solidarity organization Kampania Palestyna, on June 27 tagged a remnant of the
wall that surrounded the Jewish ghetto in Warsaw with “Liberate All
Ghettos” in Hebrew and “Free Gaza and Palestine” in English.
A Palestinian flag was hung from the top of the wall after the tagging was
completed....
Posted Jul 19, 2010
|
This year marks the 20th anniversary of the annual U.S.-Cuba
Friendshipment Caravan, sponsored by IFCO/Pastors for Peace....
Posted Jul 18, 2010
|
Bomb blasts in and around the Ugandan capital of Kampala on July 11 killed at
least 74 people who were gathered at a rugby club and an Ethiopian restaurant
watching the finals of the 2010 World Cup....
Posted Jul 16, 2010
|
Five decades after the independence of the former Belgian Congo, the genuine
emancipation of this Central African state is yet to be realized....
Posted Jul 15, 2010
|
Panama’s right-wing government of President Roberto Martinelli is ending
its first year in office by passing reactionary anti-labor laws on behalf of
the oligarchy and transnational corporations and killing six Indigenous
protesters. The Panamanian working class is resisting with a July 13 general
strike....
Posted Jul 14, 2010
|
Several hundred people picketed in front of the
Israeli Consulate in San Francisco on July 6 to protest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu’s meeting in Washington with President Barack Obama....
Posted Jul 14, 2010
|
Strikes at foreign-owned companies in China continue to proliferate....
Posted Jul 11, 2010
|
Interview with Iraqi author and activist Haifa Zangana....
Posted Jul 11, 2010
|
There are no vacations yet for the students who won a two-month strike at the
University of Puerto Rico. Instead, they have continued organizing and
demanding that the administration fulfills the agreement....
Posted Jul 9, 2010
|
Workers across Europe — specifically in Greece, Portugal, France, Spain
and Italy in the West and Romania in the East — have begun to resist the
capitalists’ relentless assault on their wages, benefits, social services
and secure existence....
Posted Jul 8, 2010
|
Western imperialist states are continuing their efforts to undermine
Zimbabwe’s sovereignty. The most egregious campaign recently has been the
attempt to block the southern African nation from selling its diamonds on the
international market....
Posted Jul 8, 2010
|
On June 18, a U.S. carrier group quietly slipped through the Suez Canal into
the Red Sea, headed toward the Persian Gulf. The Harry S. Truman Carrier Strike
Force included an aircraft carrier, a guided missile cruiser and nearly a dozen
Aegis-class destroyers. Also included were the German frigate GGS Hessen and at
least one Israeli vessel...
Posted Jul 7, 2010
|
Canadian labor unions, the parliamentary New Democratic Party, and civil
rights, community and religious groups have all joined in demonstrations to
condemn police attacks on protesters at the June 26-27 G20 summit in Toronto
and to express solidarity with those arrested....
Posted Jul 7, 2010
|
Class-conscious workers and Marxists around the world have looked at the rapid
economic growth of People’s China over the past two decades with both
admiration and anxiety....
Posted Jul 5, 2010
|
A major impediment to economic development in Africa and other former colonial
territories in the world has been the legacy of imperialism and its stronghold
on the productive forces within these states. The phenomenon of neocolonialism
has hampered so-called Third World countries from exercising their independence
irrespective of the political and class character of the leadership within the
developing nations....
Posted Jul 5, 2010
|
The people of Honduras are again in the
streets. This time they are celebrating the consolidation of the resistance to
the military coup of June 28, 2009 — a coup that removed the
democratically elected government of Manuel Zelaya Rosales from office....
Posted Jul 5, 2010
|
June 28 marked the first year since the military coup in Honduras —
the worst political, social and economic disaster in Honduran history....
Posted Jul 5, 2010
|
From a June 13 audio column by Mumia Abu-Jamal on death row....
Posted Jul 2, 2010
|
On the streets of downtown Toronto on June 26-27, police arrested more than 900
people protesting the capitalist economic policies of the imperialist states
meeting under the banner of the G-8 and the G-20....
Posted Jun 30, 2010
|
On June 25 Tony León, Secretary-General of Venezuela’s National
Workers Union of the Ministry of People’s Power for Energy and Petroleum,
met with U.S. workers and union leaders during the U.S. Social Forum in
Detroit....
Posted Jun 30, 2010
|
Soccer’s World Cup every four years is the world’s most watched and
followed sporting event. It consists of a first round, where the 32 teams
selected are divided into eight groups and each plays the other members of the
group. The best two teams from each group get to advance to the next round....
Posted Jun 30, 2010
|
The country of Kyrgyzstan in Central Asia has been shaken by what was at first
reported by the Western media as a campaign of “ethnic cleansing”
by the current government....
Posted Jun 28, 2010
|
The government of the Spanish state has sabotaged an international conference
in the Asturias autonomous region of Spain. By doing so, Spain joined the U.S.
in supporting the occupation regime in Baghdad....
Posted Jun 25, 2010
|
Jubilantly chanting, “Victory, victory, victory for history!” and
“Eleven campuses, one UPR!” students at the University of Puerto
Rico on the 58th day of their strike emerged from a final negotiating session
with the Board of Trustees having won an agreement. It still has to be ratified
at an assembly of the students as a whole.<...
Posted Jun 23, 2010
|
The U.S. government launched the Korean War 60 years ago on June 25, 1950.
During three years of massive air attacks and a huge land invasion, more than
three million Korean civilians were killed, including hundreds of thousands
burned to death by napalm....
Posted Jun 23, 2010
|
Excerpts from talks given by Teresa Gutierrez and Jen Waller at a Workers World Party/Fight Imperialism, Stand Together forum on June 11 in New York. Both Gutierrez and Waller attended the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth, held from April 20-22 in Cochabamba, Bolivia....
Posted Jun 21, 2010
|
The struggle to save the environment must end up as a class struggle.
The BP oil company, which has just unleashed the worst environmental disaster
in U.S. history, is part of the oil lobby that defeated all attempts to stop
climate change in Copenhagen this past spring....
Posted Jun 21, 2010
|
Agribusiness giant Monsanto’s profits have been slipping recently, so it
saw the recent earthquake in Haiti as a chance to expand its market for the
seed-fertilizer-herbicide package it sells....
Posted Jun 17, 2010
|
Twenty-six years ago, the worst industrial catastrophe in history occurred in
Bhopal, India.
When 40 tons of methyl isocyanate, a poisonous gas, leaked from a tank in a
U.S.-owned Union Carbide plant on Dec. 3, 1984, 3,000 people died instantly,
mostly children and the elderly. ...
Posted Jun 17, 2010
|
The heroes and heroines of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, so brutally attacked by
Israeli commandos on May 31, have transformed the struggle to break the siege
of Gaza and raised it to a higher level. They are the new Freedom Riders.
Freedom Riders were Civil Rights activists who rode interstate buses into the
southern United States 50 years ago to defy racist segregation practices. Like
the Palestinians, the African-American population of the South lived under a
separate, apartheid system, called “Jim Crow.”...
Posted Jun 16, 2010
|
Israel and its apologists bristle when Israel is called an apartheid state.
Most loudly shouting, “Israeli apartheid,” however, are those who
know the best — the workers of South Africa, who suffered the most under
South African apartheid. South African trade unions have denounced the siege of
Gaza and the apartheid wall on the West Bank, and have urged forward the
boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign (BDS)....
Posted Jun 16, 2010
|
On the 52nd day of a strike against privatization and tuition increases, the
students of the University of Puerto Rico celebrated a symbolic yet very
genuine act of commencement right on Ponce de León Avenue, in front of the
Río Piedras campus. Accentuating one of the strike’s main slogans
— “Eleven campuses, one UPR” — it was the first time a
graduation was held of all 11 campuses and the UPR High School together. This
was a graduation that rewarded the most essential education — the
commitment to a just society shown by these students, who are aware of their
historic role and loyal to their people, particularly the poorest on the
island. Dressed in a variety of ways, from graduation gowns to jeans, the
students wore ribbons that read, “UPR 2010 Dignity.”...
Posted Jun 16, 2010
|
International outrage and determined actions continue to demand an end to the
blockade of Gaza, as autopsy reports confirm the utter brutality of
Israel’s May 31 attack on a flotilla of humanitarian aid....
Posted Jun 10, 2010
|
To write a history of the political, military and economic alliance between
Israel and apartheid South Africa, which began in earnest with the Yom Kippur
War of 1973 and lasted until the collapse of the apartheid state in 1994, the
author of “The Unspoken Alliance,” Sasha Polakow-Suransky, spent
six years interviewing more than 60 people in South Africa, Israel and
Washington....
Posted Jun 10, 2010
|
The hawkish regime of South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, with
Washington’s backing, has moved to take the case of the Cheonan warship
disaster to the U.N. Security Council, charging that the ship was sunk by a
submarine from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea....
Posted Jun 10, 2010
|
Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama had promised before taking office last
year that he would make the Pentagon close a U.S. Marine base on Okinawa called
the Futenma Air Station. It got him a lot of votes, especially in Okinawa, a
group of islands occupied by the U.S. after World War II but
“reverted” to Japan in 1972....
Posted Jun 10, 2010
|
Two strikes of autoworkers, one in China and one in Mexico, have ended with the
workers making gains....
Posted Jun 10, 2010
|
In West Africa’s Sahel region the threat of famine has caused dislocation
and suffering for millions in Niger, Mali, Chad, eastern Cameroun, Burkina
Faso, Mauritania and other states. This region, located south of the Sahara
Desert, has been hit by drought and crop failures over the last several
months....
Posted Jun 10, 2010
|
If you scan the
progressive and Marxist press on websites from this country and abroad, you
will often find Workers World articles....
Posted Jun 10, 2010
|
Inspired by the courageous example workers are setting in Greece, workers
throughout Europe are beginning to respond with strikes and street
demonstrations to the capitalist offensive that is minimizing their wages,
eliminating vital social benefits and contracting the job market....
Posted Jun 7, 2010
|
Recent international press reports indicate that the U.S. military has started
a renewed covert action plan to send special operations commandos into areas of
the Horn of Africa, the Middle East and Asia. The objective of this policy is
in part to carry out targeted assassinations against people considered U.S.
enemies....
Posted Jun 7, 2010
|
Emem Okon traveled halfway around the world from Nigeria to Houston to attend
the annual stockholders meeting of Chevron Oil Company on May 27. But she and
13 others were denied entry despite having legal proxy credentials....
Posted Jun 7, 2010
|
Carlos Alberto Torres, 57, has spent most of his life in U.S. prisons. He
organized and fought for the independence of Puerto Rico. For this, he was
found guilty by a U.S. court of conspiracy to overthrow the U.S.
government....
Posted Jun 7, 2010
|
Groups opposing the U.S. occupation of Iraq say they will go on with a
conference set for mid-June despite the Spanish government’s reversal of
earlier promises to issue visas to Iraqi participants....
Posted Jun 7, 2010
|
Workers World Party links arms with the heroic members of the Freedom Flotilla
who risked their lives trying to break Israel’s genocidal siege of Gaza.
We mourn for those who were cut down by the racist settler state of Israel
while on a humanitarian mission and will redouble our militant support for the
movement to end the blockade....
Posted Jun 2, 2010
|
A firestorm of condemnation and protest has followed
Israel’s latest brutality — the massacre of at least 9 unarmed
activists by the Israeli navy in international waters north of Gaza. The
activists were part of a 750-member delegation on a six-boat flotilla
attempting to bring humanitarian aid to the besieged people of Gaza....
Posted Jun 2, 2010
|
Israeli troops’ criminal actions aboard the Turkish Mavi Marmara, killing
at least nine of the anti-blockade activists and wounding dozens, in turn
released a storm of sympathy worldwide for those on the Freedom Flotilla and
for the Palestinians caught in Gaza behind the Israeli blockade....
Posted Jun 2, 2010
|
As a student strike at the University of Puerto Rico heads into its second
month and has become a focus of class struggle on the island, Workers
World/Mundo Obrero Editor Berta Joubert-Ceci is sending us daily reports from
San Juan. This article covers events from May 27 to 31....
Posted Jun 2, 2010
|
An imperialist politician was forced to resign May 31, not for a scandal, not
even for getting caught lying to the public. This time German President Horst
Köhler, a Christian Democrat (CDU), was forced to resign for giving
everyone a moment of truth about Germany’s role in the war in
Afghanistan....
Posted Jun 2, 2010
|
Both before and after the Jan. 12 earthquake, Cuban doctors and nurses
have provided free and greatly appreciated medical care to the Haitian people
at the invitation of the Haitian government....
Posted Jun 2, 2010
|
May is the rainy season in Haiti and the hundreds of thousands of Haitians
still living in tents or under tarps have to cope with water and mud flooding
their sleeping spaces. That many practice what they call “domi
pandeye,” or sleeping while balancing upright, shows how serious the
problem is....
Posted Jun 2, 2010
|
Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva kept one promise. The military-backed
Thai regime unleashed tanks and soldiers against thousands of “Red
Shirts” occupying a posh business district of central Bangkok to clear
the area of thousands of anti-dictatorship demonstrators. By May 20, the army
had killed another 57 protesters in its offensive, more than 80 in total since
March, and wounded 1,800....
Posted Jun 2, 2010
|
University of Panama professor and general
secretary of the Popular Alternative Party, Olmedo Beluche, received a letter
from three of his compatriots imprisoned in the U.S. after they read an article
by him in Workers World entitled, “The last Yankee invasion: Dec. 20,
1989.”...
Posted Jun 2, 2010
|
Workers World spoke on May 24 with an exiled member of the leadership of the
National Popular Front of Resistance to the June 28, 2009, coup that removed
the legitimate president, Manuel Zelaya, from office. Ríos, who has been
living in Nicaragua for five months, is one of the 200 Hondurans currently
forced into exile by political persecution, including death threats. Zelaya
himself has been granted residence in the Dominican Republic....
Posted Jun 2, 2010
|
One month of striking has only encouraged the resolve of the students from the
University of Puerto Rico to defend at all cost public education for the
masses. Their energy and creativity seem to thrive on confronting the
intransigent position of the university’s Board of Trustees. Their
determination has grown following the stepped-up police repression unleashed by
pro-statehood Gov. Luis Fortuño....
Posted May 26, 2010
|
It was a full-court press, concocted by the U.S. government and the rightist
regime in South Korea and eagerly magnified by the corporate media.
Back on March 26 a South Korean Navy warship, the Cheonan, sank near the
maritime border with the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Of the
104 crew members aboard, 46 perished.
Almost immediately, the government of Lee Myung-bak in the south accused the
DPRK of having torpedoed the vessel....
Posted May 26, 2010
|
The Organization of African Unity was formed on May 25, 1963, in Addis Ababa.
Thus this May 25 is the 47th anniversary of Africa Liberation Day, since the
OAU’s founding took place in the framework of the overall struggle for
national independence on the continent and in the Caribbean, as well as the
African-American freedom movement inside the United States....
Posted May 23, 2010
|
The student strike and sit-in at the University of Puerto Rico, almost four
weeks old as of May 18, has become the main political and class struggle issue
on the island since UPR management stepped up its repressive tactics. Several
unions have called for a 24-hour work stoppage on May 18. Many unions and other
organizations are joining the call....
Posted May 19, 2010
|
The rural and urban poor of Thailand have entered the political
arena in unprecedented numbers. Even a threatened bloodbath by the
military-backed regime may not be able to reverse the impact of this awakening.
Whatever the immediate outcome of the confrontation of urban and rural poor
with the Thai military in Bangkok, this struggle will change the political
climate and weaken U.S. imperialism’s role in Thailand....
Posted May 19, 2010
|
I had the opportunity to attend the April 20-22 World People’s Conference
on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth in Cochabamba, Bolivia, where
people from all over the world initiated a discussion about finding real
solutions to the climate crisis. During this conference, I attended an April 21
workshop called “Taking action against corporations that damage the
climate,” which brought up the Water Wars against Bechtel
Corporation....
Posted May 16, 2010
|
A month-long meeting, involving 189 countries, is underway at the United
Nations. It’s the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review. ...
Posted May 15, 2010
|
Under a constant rain, more than 5,000 students from the 11 campuses of the
University of Puerto Rico marched to the offices of the president on May 7 to
show their unity and demand that management sit down and negotiate. ...
Posted May 13, 2010
|
The big message that the working class should take away from the latest
European bailout and the stock markets’ ups and downs is that capitalism
is failing as an economic system and the time for workers to open a struggle is
now....
Posted May 12, 2010
|
A combative and confident workers’ movement in Greece is throwing a
monkey wrench into the plans of Europe’s politicians, who are trying to
revive the capitalist system by further grinding down workers’ wages and
benefits....
Posted May 12, 2010
|
Thousands of Puerto Rican students, sons and daughters of the working class and
some already workers themselves, anticipated May Day actions by defiantly
challenging the University of Puerto Rico’s board of administrators and
the island government in mid-April when they called a student strike to defend
affordable public higher education on the island....
Posted May 10, 2010
|
Vivaldo Moreira Araujo, president of the Metalworkers Union of
São José dos Campos, Brazil, spoke at a Global Auto Roundtable held
April 24 at the Labor Notes conference in Detroit. This report is based on his
remarks and an interview conducted by Martha Grevatt....
Posted May 10, 2010
|
In Nepal, Honduras, Greece and elsewhere around the world, this year’s
May Day actions went far beyond the traditional workers’ holiday by
opening major struggles over decisive policies and in some cases over questions
of power....
Posted May 5, 2010
|
The following military maxim, “Bad leadership leads to bad
behavior,” should condemn the Pentagon brass. On April 5, the
organization WikiLeaks released a horrific video that vividly exposed the true
character of the U.S.-led war of occupation in Iraq. Surreptitiously leaked
from the Pentagon, the video portrayed graphic details of a massacre which
killed at least 11 helpless civilians, including two Reuters journalists, and
severely wounded two children. Two former GIs from the ground unit shown in the video, Josh Siebert and
Ethan McCord, have stepped forward to take responsibility and apologize to the
victims of the massacre....
Posted May 2, 2010
|
This year’s May Day commemorations are taking place amid escalating
racist and xenophobic attacks against immigrant communities in the U.S. and
Western Europe. The passage of an Arizona law that legalizes racial profiling,
and the electoral campaigns by right-wing, anti-immigrant parties in Hungary,
France, Italy and the Netherlands, illustrate the need to intensify efforts at
building international solidarity among workers and the oppressed....
Posted May 1, 2010
|
Political activists and hip-hop enthusiasts eagerly filled a midtown Atlanta
club on April 16 to catch a dynamic performance by DAM, Palestine’s first
hip-hop crew. A previously scheduled concert was thwarted in 2009 by the
refusal of the U.S. State Department to grant visas for the internationally
recognized group....
Posted May 1, 2010
|
Thirty thousand people convened at the World People’s Conference on
Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth in Cochabamba, Bolivia. The
conference, which took place from April 19-22, hosted people from more than 135
countries and 90 official state representatives. Climate activists, community
organizers, artists, musicians, scholars and workers from around the world
joined forces over the common goal of finding an effective and practical
solution to the climate crisis — a task that the rich, ruling countries
of the world proved, at the Copenhagen Climate Summit, that they are incapable
of accomplishing....
Posted Apr 28, 2010
|
People here get insufficient and biased corporate media coverage of news south
of the border. Yet, the upcoming May Day that millions of immigrant people in
the U.S. resurrected in 2006 arouses reflection over the situation in the rest
of the Western Hemisphere — and why the U.S. government and corporate
media is so determined to hide it or, more often than not, present a completely
distorted picture of those countries’ reality....
Posted Apr 28, 2010
|
The year 2010 is the 50th anniversary of the Year of Africa, when 17 former
colonial territories gained their national independence during 1960.
The liberation movements in Africa had gained momentum after World War II, when
the European colonial powers were weakened by their mutual destruction from
1939 to 1945....
Posted Apr 25, 2010
|
In one remote region of Afghanistan, the Korengal Valley, the Pentagon has
decided to close down its embattled outpost, seeing that its efforts are
useless and that the people of this region will not submit to occupation....
Posted Apr 25, 2010
|
A fierce struggle has gripped the Catholic Church for the past 25 years as some
of the most oppressed survivors of childhood sexual abuse have increasingly
demanded an accounting against individual priests and ultimately against the
powerful church hierarchy, including bishops and cardinals who consistently
protected the abusers....
Posted Apr 25, 2010
|
For 50 years the U.S. government has tried to develop a counter-revolutionary
movement in Cuba. While it has been defeated at every turn, it is once again
pouring money into this campaign....
Posted Apr 24, 2010
|
Washington’s response to the earthquake that devastated Haiti in January
was to send 10,000 troops to occupy the country and repress its population.
Revolutionary Cuba’s response was to send more medical care workers. Now
the Cubans are helping Haiti remodel its national health care system to provide
care for the poorest three-fourths of the Haitian population....
Posted Apr 22, 2010
|
The French economy is the second largest in Europe, after Germany’s, and
Greece’s economy has been on the verge of default for some months.
Capitalists in both France and Greece are trying to solve their economic
problems by laying off workers, cutting their salaries and retirement benefits,
raising taxes and slashing social services....
Posted Apr 17, 2010
|
Acting Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan met with President Barack Obama on
April 11 at the White House as a prelude to the Nuclear Security Summit held in
Washington, D.C....
Posted Apr 15, 2010
|
For eight and a half years, the U.S. military has been at war in Afghanistan
— the longest war in U.S. history, against one of the poorest countries
in the world. The Pentagon has sent a growing force there — the number of
troops tripled after the Democratic Party won the presidency — and built
up bases in the region in order to keep the flow of warm bodies and materiel
moving from the U.S. to Afghanistan....
Posted Apr 14, 2010
|
Fight Imperialism, Stand Together (FIST), along with the All India Democratic
Students Organization and All Nepal National Independent Students Union
(Revolutionary), was invited to attend the end of the 25th anniversary
celebrations of the Socialist Students Front of Bangladesh....
Posted Apr 14, 2010
|
In southeastern Afghanistan on April 8, a United States Air Force V-22 Osprey
went down, killing three Air Force service members and a civilian contractor.
This was the first time the multimission, tilt-rotor aircraft has crashed in
military operations since being introduced in June 2007....
Posted Apr 14, 2010
|
Eight Honduran lawyers testified in Washington, D.C., at the Inter-American
Court of Human Rights of the Organization of American States. The eight hope
that the IACHR will expose and condemn the escalating human rights abuses
perpetrated in that country after the June 28 coup that removed democratically
elected President Manuel Zelaya Rosales from office. Above all, the lawyers
hope the IACHR will force the Honduran state to investigate and punish these
crimes....
Posted Apr 11, 2010
|
A Peoples’ World Conference on Climate Change and Mother Earth’s
Rights, scheduled for April 19-22 in Cochabamba, Bolivia, will present a
people’s alternative to the failed Copenhagen conference on climate
change that took place in December....
Posted Apr 11, 2010
|
Despite widely publicized claims that the opposition parties in Sudan will
boycott the elections scheduled for April 11-13, President Omar al-Bashir has
reiterated that the national poll will not be derailed....
Posted Apr 11, 2010
|
It is an absolutely chilling demonstration of cold-blooded murder. A U.S.
Apache gunship circles a Baghdad neighborhood looking for “targets”
— people to kill. A military video shows the intended targets through
superimposed crosshairs: a group of men dressed in civilian clothes, no masks,
no apparent weapons, casually sauntering along a street and into a small
square....
Posted Apr 8, 2010
|
The U.S.-NATO occupation of Afghanistan, begun in 2001 under President George
W. Bush’s leadership, continues nine years and hundreds of billions of
dollars later. Another episode typifying this criminal war recently took place
when German troops shot and killed a group of soldiers in the puppet Afghan
National Army who were delivering supplies to a German military base....
Posted Apr 8, 2010
|
On the eve of what is supposed to be a major U.S.-NATO offensive against the
resistance stronghold of Kandahar, the more than eight-year-old occupation is
crumbling...
Posted Apr 7, 2010
|
The headlines have proclaimed that Google has “quit” China in a
“battle over censorship.”
That’s what Google told the capitalist media, so that’s
what’s been reported.
There’s no fine print in these reports....
Posted Apr 2, 2010
|
It was only a one-day visit by participants in the Latin American Labor Leaders
tour, but March 26 was filled with activity and politics. Shortly after a
hurried breakfast, U.S./Cuba Labor Exchange representative Ignacio Meneses and
Ronald Quesada Zamora, a national directorate member of the National Union of
Social Security Fund Employees in Costa Rica, joined a picket line at the Bank
of America building in downtown San Diego, one in a series of nationwide
anti-bank actions called by the AFL-CIO. The featured speaker at the action was
Liz Shuler, the first woman ever elected national secretary treasurer of that
labor federation....
Posted Apr 2, 2010
|
What do workers need to know about the disagreement between the U.S. and
Israel?
Despite angry statements by U.S. officials and endless verbiage in the
establishment media about what it all means, this disagreement is about a
diplomatic embarrassment and is not substantial....
Posted Apr 2, 2010
|
Haitians protested the visit of former U.S. Presidents George W. Bush
and Bill Clinton to their country on March 22. The two were touring Haiti in
advance of a United Nations donors’ conference.
Many have not forgotten that both Bush and Clinton, during their tenures as
president, played major roles in attacks on the Haitian people....
Posted Mar 31, 2010
|
Contradicting all claims of having held a “fair election” in Iraq,
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is using the repressive state apparatus
constructed under the U.S. occupation regime to attempt to hold onto power by
force....
Posted Mar 31, 2010
|
In late August 1910, 100 women gathered at the Workers’ Assembly Hall in
Copenhagen, Denmark. Theirs was a historic meeting, the Second International
Socialist Women’s Conference....
Posted Mar 28, 2010
|
While the vultures are beginning to circle over the money that “donor
countries” are planning to pour into Haiti, hundreds of thousands of
homeless Haitians — estimates vary between 400,000 and 1.5 million
— are trying to survive heavy, violent, tropical downpours that are
turning their camps into pools of water and mud....
Posted Mar 28, 2010
|
|
Fifteen thousand people marched in protest in Panama City on March 18,
defying President Ricardo Martinelli’s attempts at intimidation. Police
actions blocking access stopped thousands more from taking part as the police
detained workers carrying construction union banners and stopped and searched
buses carrying demonstrators....
Posted Mar 28, 2010
|
Within a week after the March 5 mass demonstrations and general strike, tens of
thousands of angry Greek workers marched through Athens to protest austerity
measures enacted to reduce Greece’s debt. Riot police fired teargas as
demonstrators threw rocks and firebombs outside the Parliament building on
March 11....
Posted Mar 21, 2010
|
A lot of noise is being made over what happened recently in Israel when U.S.
Vice President Joseph Biden went there to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu. During Biden’s visit, which was supposed to promote the “peace
process” and lead to a renewal of discussions between the Palestinian
Authority and the Tel Aviv regime, the Interior Ministry announced that Israel
was going ahead with building 1,600 new housing units for Zionists in East
Jerusalem....
Posted Mar 19, 2010
|
On March 2, seven U.S. doctors gave a report on their month-long mission of
providing post-earthquake medical services in Haiti at a program at Judson
Memorial Church in New York City....
Posted Mar 19, 2010
|
The Women’s International Democratic Federation held a panel discussion
on “The Economic Crisis and Women’s Access to Work” at the
United Nations on March 10 as part of the 15th anniversary of the Beijing World
Conference on Women....
Posted Mar 19, 2010
|
One-fifth of the world’s population is so poor that it does not have
basic necessities such as shelter and food. Three-quarters of the poor are
women and their numbers at the bottom are increasing. Why is this so?...
Posted Mar 19, 2010
|
On March 11, using the pretext of a suicide of a prisoner in Cuba, European
Union politicians attacked socialist Cuba, once again falsely alleging
human-rights violations and demanding the release of a small number of paid
U.S. agents imprisoned there. By doing so the EU Parliament not only ignored
the overriding 50-year violation of Cuba’s democratic right to
self-determination, but joined in it....
Posted Mar 18, 2010
|
The centennial anniversary of International Women’s Day was
commemorated throughout the world by marches, rallies and meetings. Though
themes differed, the activities showed women expressing their rights,
protesting injustices and demonstrating solidarity with their sisters in
struggle....
Posted Mar 17, 2010
|
International Women’s Day is a holiday in revolutionary Cuba. At the Cuban
Interests Section in Washington, D.C., on March 8, a reception saluted the
accomplishments of Cuban women through the 51 years of socialist construction
and the women of Haiti struggling for reconstruction and independence. Just
returned from three weeks working in the Cuban medical brigades in Haiti, two
young African-American women doctors trained at the Cuban Latin American School
of Medicine spoke briefly and joined the celebration....
Posted Mar 17, 2010
|
A long-standing tactic that oppressors use to stop the struggle for liberation is
repression. It mainly backfires on them. As the age-old but accurate slogan
declares, “Repression breeds resistance.”
This is exactly how to describe the case of Melissa Roxas....
Posted Mar 17, 2010
|
It is often hard, even up to now, to talk about my experience. But the reason
why I tell my story is because it is also the story of many others, and it
reflects the experience of many Filipinos who have been abducted and tortured
in the Philippines. Not all of them have surfaced, not all of them have
survived, and those who did have been afforded very few opportunities to speak
about what happened to them....
Posted Mar 17, 2010
|
According to journalist Rick Rozoff, “The U.S. military has already been
involved in counterinsurgency operations in Mali and Niger against ethnic
Tuareg rebels, who have no conceivable ties to al-Qaeda, not that one would
know that from Levin’s comments.” Former U.S. diplomat Daniel
Simpson was quoted recently in regard to the Pentagon’s involvement in
Somalia as saying that the operation was designed to “test out AFRICOM
ground and air forces in Djibouti for direct military action on the
continent.”...
Posted Mar 17, 2010
|
A recent statement issued by the Obama administration indicates that it is
planning to carry out aerial bombardments in the Horn of Africa nation of
Somalia. The announcement comes amid intense fighting in the capital of
Mogadishu between the two Islamic resistance movements, Al Shabaab and Hizbul
Islam, and the U.S.-backed Transitional Federal Government that is ruling the
country....
Posted Mar 14, 2010
|
The Obama administration continues to support the ruthless Honduran oligarchy
in its war against a nonviolent political and social movement led by the Frente
Nacional de Resistencia Popular. The movement has united peasants, workers,
trade unionists and students; the Garifuna, Afro-Honduran and Indigenous
communities; and lesbian/gay/bi/trans/queer activists, women’s groups,
intellectuals and Christians guided by liberation theology....
Posted Mar 14, 2010
|
The Greek Parliament passed a very stringent set of austerity measures March 5
that will cut public-sector salaries and freeze pensions for both public- and
private-sector workers, cut services and raise taxes....
Posted Mar 14, 2010
|
Faced with a referendum to approve a deal that would have cost every person in
Iceland a quarter of their income for the next eight years, 63 percent of
Iceland’s registered voters ignored the light snow and came out to
massively reject the deal. With almost all the ballots counted, 94 percent were
“no,” with spoiled and blank votes outnumbering the 2 percent who
voted “yes.”...
Posted Mar 14, 2010
|
Four of every five public-sector workers in Portugal walked off their jobs on
March 4 to protest government plans to decrease pensions, eliminate and
outsource jobs and continue a freeze on wages. Trade unions representing more
than 500,000 such workers joined the strike....
Posted Mar 14, 2010
|
Against all odds the southern African nation of Zimbabwe is celebrating its
30th year of independence from British settler-colonialism....
Posted Mar 11, 2010
|
Statements issued in solidarity with the
March 4 National Day of Action to Defend Education....
Posted Mar 10, 2010
|
The Pentagon offensive against the Afghan city of Marjah was public-relations
media hype from the very first day. The sole purpose of the offensive in Marjah
was to convince the U.S. population and increasingly tepid NATO allies that
this imperialist war is winnable.
U.S. involvement in Afghanistan is now the longest foreign war in U.S. history,
on both the air and the ground....
Posted Mar 7, 2010
|
The latest effort in the process of regional integration of the Latin American
and Caribbean countries took place on Feb. 22-23 in Cancún, Mexico, with
the participation of 32 independent nations.
The new organization, called the Community of Latin American and Caribbean
States (CLACS), is an attempt to create a body that would not include the
United States or Canada, in order to establish an independent bloc that can
respond to and pursue the interests of the region....
Posted Mar 7, 2010
|
On Feb. 23, massive demonstrations took place across Spain; 70,000 took to the
streets in Madrid, 50,000 marched in Barcelona and tens of thousands more
joined in ten other cities. The country’s two leading unions organized
these actions to protest Prime Minister Jose Luis Zapatero’s proposed
labor law reforms, especially the plan to raise the retirement age from 65 to
67....
Posted Mar 7, 2010
|
Recently, a French head of state visited Haiti for the first time since 1803.
That’s when Napoleon’s army was decisively beaten at the Battle of
Vertières by an army of ex-slaves who displayed exceptional valor and
determination. Vertières was an especially humiliating defeat because the
racist and colonialist French ruling class did not believe an army of Black
people either kidnapped or born into subjugation, could defeat veteran French
soldiers in hand-to-hand combat....
Posted Mar 7, 2010
|
An international campaign is demanding the release of 43 health care workers
illegally arrested by the Armed Forces of the Philippines as they provided
medical care for poor people in Morong, Rizal. Known as the Morong 43, they are
being detained at Camp Capinpin, an army headquarters....
Posted Mar 5, 2010
|
A major initiative aimed at achieving gender equality in Africa is under way.
The African Women’s Decade — 2010-2020 — has been adopted by
the African Union, the continental organization that encompasses 53 member
states....
Posted Mar 4, 2010
|
Despite extensive media coverage of the recent Winter Olympics games in
Vancouver, British Columbia, most television viewers outside Canada did not
hear about the resistance to the games and the many protests that took place in
Vancouver and elsewhere....
Posted Mar 3, 2010
|
A second general strike in two weeks shows that Greek workers are standing up
to the bosses’ and bankers’ attempt to force them to pay the costs
of a problem the workers had no responsibility for creating: the capitalist
economic crisis. This determined resistance is what’s behind the
headlines on the financial pages about the euro’s stability and European
Union negotiations with the Greek regime....
Posted Mar 3, 2010
|
Excerpts from a declaration of
the Movement of the Revolutionary Left (MIR) in Chile. It explains how the
inequalities and injustices existing in Chile impact on the disaster, what the
people need now and how revolutionaries should act under these emergency
conditions....
Posted Mar 3, 2010
|
As the March 7 national election approaches in Iraq, the number of U.S. troops
occupying the country has slipped below 100,000 for the first time since the
U.S.-led invasion seven years ago. The Pentagon plans to change the name of its
Iraq effort on Sept. 1, from “Operation Iraqi Freedom” to
“Operation New Dawn” when 50,000 troops remain....
Posted Feb 28, 2010
|
More than 4,000 people from 70 different German cities came to Berlin Feb.
20 to demand that German troops be withdrawn from Afghanistan....
Posted Feb 28, 2010
|
The fraud and failure of microloans and micro-financing as the bankers’
solution to global poverty can most clearly be seen in Bangladesh today, where
microloans first gained international fame and support....
Posted Feb 24, 2010
|
The elected leaders of the 16 countries of the euro zone gathered in Brussels,
Belgium, on Feb. 11 and said they would work to prevent Greece from defaulting
on its debt. By Feb. 14, they made it clear that their intention is not so much
to bail out the Greek government but to pressure it into making a direct attack
on the Greek working class....
Posted Feb 22, 2010
|
The Union of South American Nations — UNASUR — held an emergency
meeting on Feb. 9 in Quito, Ecuador, to examine the situation in Haiti after
the earthquake and make plans for short- and long-term assistance to the
destroyed nation. Exterior ministers and special envoys from Argentina, Brazil,
Chile, Guyana, Surinam, Uruguay and Venezuela and the presidents of Colombia,
Paraguay and Peru joined current UNASUR President Rafael Correa from Ecuador
and Haitian President René Préval....
Posted Feb 22, 2010
|
Haiti remains a country devastated by the Jan. 12 earthquake. The disaster has
been successfully used by the United States as a pretext for reoccupying the
country with thousands of military troops....
Posted Feb 19, 2010
|
Viktor Yanukovych, who has declared his opposition to joining NATO, won the
recent presidential election in the Ukraine. He defeated Prime Minister Yuliya
Tymoshenko, who was a leader of Ukraine’s pro-Western “Orange
Revolution” in 2004....
Posted Feb 19, 2010
|
It is now several days since U.S. Marines stormed into the town of
Marjah in Afghanistan, backed up by helicopter gunships, fighter jets and
drones. Some 9,000 U.S. troops are taking part in Operation Moshtarak, which
means “together” in the Dari dialect — a bright idea from
some psyops genius meant to beguile the local population....
Posted Feb 17, 2010
|
On Jan. 27 Jose “Pepe” Lobo was inaugurated as the new president of
Honduras. His inauguration was the product of illegitimate elections held under
a coup d’état, with pervasive repression of the opposition forces
and with only 30 percent of eligible voters participating in the elections....
Posted Feb 17, 2010
|
Progressive residents of Germany won a victory as 12,000 people used their
bodies and their organization to blockade a neo-Nazi march in Dresden, a major
city in Saxony, located on the Elbe River in the southeast of the country near
the Czech border. It was a welcome triumph not only over the fascists but over
the German government which was prepared to defend the neo-Nazi marchers....
Posted Feb 17, 2010
|
As the people of Haiti continue heroic efforts to recover from the Jan. 12
devastating earthquake that has claimed at least 200,000 lives, they are facing
a new challenge — an occupation of 13,000 U.S. troops and advanced
weaponry. This new occupation was sanctioned by the United Nations on Jan. 22
without any say from the Haitians themselves....
Posted Feb 12, 2010
|
Are the global problems of grinding poverty, illiteracy and hunger faced by a
majority of the world’s population a mere accident of history? Is the
enormous inequality and underdevelopment of the formerly colonized countries of
Africa and Asia due solely to the crimes of conquest by European colonial
powers 100 and 200 years ago?...
Posted Feb 12, 2010
|
As in the U.S., autoworkers in Europe are confronted with a capitalist
restructuring agenda that involves plant closings and mass layoffs. Workers are
fighting back on more than one front....
Posted Feb 11, 2010
|
Contagion and uncertainty worry the capitalists worldwide after the European
Commission accepted Greece’s economic recovery plan. Whether this plan
will resolve the Greek government’s huge deficit, which is about 12.7
percent of the total production of Greece’s economy, is unclear....
Posted Feb 11, 2010
|
Statements from both the U.S.-NATO occupation command and the spokespeople of
the Afghan resistance indicate that a military showdown looms in Helmand
province of Afghanistan, specifically in the Marjah area. At the same time, the
deaths of three U.S. operatives in Pakistan — either Special Forces or
mercenary “contractors” — exposes the growing U.S. military
involvement in that nuclear-armed country of 170 million people....
Posted Feb 10, 2010
|
Militant organized demonstrations of outrage and anger took place throughout
Pakistan when news of a guilty verdict for Dr. Aafia Siddiqui was announced on
Feb. 3. A jury in a New York federal court found Siddiqui guilty of seven
counts, including attempted murder and armed assault without premeditation....
Posted Feb 10, 2010
|
More than 10,000 people gathered under a sea of red flags to open the First
Convention of the Socialist Party of Bangladesh, and then held a militant mass
march through Dhaka’s crowded streets. Hundreds of nationally elected
delegates and many thousands of participants attended the Dec. 30-31 Convention
of the SPB, which was formed in 1980. They presented a powerful challenge to
the Western corporate media’s view of Bangladesh....
Posted Feb 7, 2010
|
Local labor union members and officers, along with members of the San
Francisco Labor Council, the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement and
community supporters, picketed and spoke outside the Mexican Consulate at
noontime Jan. 29 in downtown San Francisco....
Posted Feb 7, 2010
|
The 20 U.S. Navy and Coast Guard ships, 63 helicopters, 204 joint operations
vehicles and approximately 13,000 military personnel — 10,000 afloat and
3,000 ashore — occupying Haiti, were sanctioned by the U.N. as of Jan.
22. No request from Haiti was needed — the U.S. wanted to send troops and
it did. The occupation and the U.N. approval have no legal basis....
Posted Feb 7, 2010
|
Some 2,752 people were killed on Sept. 11, 2001, in the airplane attacks in the
U.S. Their deaths have been marked and mourned. Today just the words
“World Trade Center,” “9/11” and “al-Qaida”
bring to mind attacks on civilians and fear of other such attacks....
Posted Feb 7, 2010
|
The people of Haiti are undergoing incalculably great suffering. We, the
International League of Peoples’ Struggle, convey our deepest sympathies
to the Haitian people for their loss and express our most heartfelt recognition
of their plight. We join the people of the world in lending our wholehearted
support to help ease their suffering and call on our member organizations and
allies to extend immediate rescue and relief support to the victims in
Haiti. At the same time, we direct our strongest
denunciation against the U.S. government for deploying military forces in Haiti
instead of the personnel of U.S. civilian agencies who are trained and equipped
for rescue and relief aid....
Posted Feb 4, 2010
|
It is useful in understanding the current situation in Haiti to examine
its roots — in particular why Haiti should be regarded as a country with
an African culture and how U.S. and other imperialist interventions in Haiti
met a stubborn and tenacious resistance....
Posted Feb 3, 2010
|
Has Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared a U.S. cyber cold war on
China? Clinto’ speech targetting China is filled with aggressive cold war references to the Berlin Wall and
an “Information Iron Curtain” as well as other cold war rhetoric,
like a speech from the U.S. State Department during the Reagan years....
Posted Jan 31, 2010
|
Various organizations and governments throughout Africa are working to provide
relief to the people of Haiti in the aftermath of the Jan. 12 earthquake and
subsequent aftershocks. In South Africa, churches, mass organizations and the
government are encouraging the people to immediately come to the aid of
Haiti....
Posted Jan 31, 2010
|
On Jan. 4, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton claimed
“instability” in Yemen posed “a global threat.” Why is
Yemen unstable? Where does the “threat” really come from? Why are
U.S. cruise missiles killing civilians in Yemen?...
Posted Jan 30, 2010
|
From a letter was written by Iranian progressives:
Today the big question facing the peace and justice movement is whether
Washington is planning a military attack against Iran. Shocking as such a
thought might be, this is exactly what is being debated and contemplated at the
highest levels of American politics....
Posted Jan 28, 2010
|
Dr. Aafia Siddiqui’s trial for alleged attempted murder of FBI
agents and U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan entered its second week Jan. 25 in New
York City....
Posted Jan 28, 2010
|
The U.S. secured its occupation of Haiti when the Pentagon
placed 13,000 troops in the country around the capital and on nearby ships,
with at least 4,000 more scheduled to arrive. It’s now two weeks after a
magnitude 7.0 earthquake leveled the capital city and nearby towns, wreaking
havoc on the population, and in doing so eliminated the Haitian government
bureaucracy, police and the United Nations military mission....
Posted Jan 27, 2010
|
The relief effort in Haiti is happening despite a lack of any real
mobilization on the part of the U.S. on the ground there. The U.S.’s
main priority was not to rescue those trapped under rubble nor to provide
relief to survivors of the quake....
Posted Jan 27, 2010
|
Where to donate for Haiti....
Posted Jan 27, 2010
|
Using the pretext of fighting terror, the U.S. government has expanded its war
into the poor Arab country of Yemen....
Posted Jan 24, 2010
|
Haiti had been the most prosperous of all the French colonies during the period of slavery. After the proclamation of independence on Jan. 1, 1804, France and the United
States both blockaded Haiti....
Posted Jan 20, 2010
|
‘We should be there in Haiti — to help rebuild the country’'...
Posted Jan 20, 2010
|
Boston school bus drivers host meeting to organize relief....
Posted Jan 20, 2010
|
$100 million = 1% of Goldman Sachs’' bonuses...
Posted Jan 20, 2010
|
While U.S. focuses on troops and control of airport....
Posted Jan 20, 2010
|
‘Food, water, medical aid, not military occupation’...
Posted Jan 20, 2010
|
Party of deposed President Aristide barred from election....
Posted Jan 20, 2010
|
From Fox to New York Times, blaming the victims....
Posted Jan 20, 2010
|
Not a traditional history book or textbook, but a
people's history....
Posted Jan 20, 2010
|
After a brief holiday interlude, the Honduran resistance went back to the
streets with renewed energy and commitment. On Jan. 7, 15,000 people marched
from the Polytechnic University to the National Congress in Tegucigalpa....
Posted Jan 17, 2010
|
This year’s economic plans in the Democratic People’s Republic of
Korea will put greater emphasis on the development of light industry and
agriculture, promising a surge in the living standards of the people....
Posted Jan 17, 2010
|
The murderous mercenary outfit formerly known as Blackwater and now called Xe
has been making headlines all January, with most stories showing how deeply
committed the CIA and Pentagon are to outsourcing a portion of the task of
re-conquering the former colonial world....
Posted Jan 17, 2010
|
Despite the Pentagon’s unmatched high-tech weapons and firepower, the
U.S. military is bogged down by glaring weaknesses rooted in the capitalist
system it operates to defend. The resistance fighters, with far less firepower,
have shown the ability to innovate and adapt their tactics to the needs of
their war to liberate Afghanistan....
Posted Jan 17, 2010
|
The new year began with the U.S. government announcing new intensive airport
screening for anyone traveling from or through 14 countries — the four
unilaterally designated by the U.S. as “states sponsoring
terrorism” and ten others allegedly “of interest.” One of the
most obvious indications that this arbitrary list has nothing to do with
protecting air travel or residents within the U.S. is the listing of socialist
Cuba as one of the 14....
Posted Jan 15, 2010
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For the third time in a year, Viva Palestina, the international relief effort
led by British Member of Parliament George Galloway, has broken the siege of
Gaza....
Posted Jan 15, 2010
|
Dennis Brutus died at age 85 on Dec. 26, battling cancer,
climate change and capitalism....
Posted Jan 15, 2010
|
On Jan. 7, African migrants, including some from Nigeria and Togo, rebelled
against racist attacks by white Italians and the police in Italy. Many of these workers, who are both documented and undocumented, work in the citrus groves in the poorly developed southern part of the Italian peninsula....
Posted Jan 14, 2010
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The earthquake that flattened Haiti’s capital and brought a new
calamity to millions of people in that heroic but impoverished country has
awakened calls for solidarity and aid from the vast majority of the
world’s people. ...
Posted Jan 14, 2010
|
Fight Imperialism Stand
Together extends its solidarity to Haiti, its people and the
peoples’ movements....
Posted Jan 14, 2010
|
The corporate media in the imperialist countries have much to say about the
Arab countries and developments in the Middle East. Rarely, however, do these
media permit people from the Middle Eastern countries to speak for
themselves. Recently Workers World interviewed Dr. Adel Samara, a Palestinian Marxist from the West Bank city of Ramallah....
Posted Jan 10, 2010
|
“Reflections” by Fidel Castro: The youth are more interested than anyone else in the
future. Until very recently, the discussion revolved around the kind of society
we would have. Today, the discussion centers on whether human society will
survive....
Posted Jan 10, 2010
|
A bomb explosion in a Central Intelligence Agency camp in Khost Province of
Afghanistan on Dec. 30 resulted in the deaths of seven experienced operatives,
including the base commander. The attack struck a heavy blow against the
U.S.-led occupation....
Posted Jan 7, 2010
|
In December a two-day strike halted production at the FIAT automobile assembly
plant in Termini Imerese, near Palermo, in Sicily. Workers were protesting
FIAT’s plans to shut down the plant, which employs 1,400 workers, this
year. As of Jan. 3 the Termini Imarese workers are on temporary layoff until
Jan. 7....
Posted Jan 7, 2010
|
Thousands of Greek workers took to the streets in 63 cities on Dec. 17, called
out by unions protesting a government austerity program. The All-Workers
Militant Front (PAME), which is close to the Greek Communist Party, and Syriza,
the Coalition of the Radical Left, supported the action....
Posted Jan 7, 2010
|
Viva Palestina has entered Gaza! A Jan. 6 post on the Viva Palestina Web site reports, "One month,
thousands of miles, ten countries, one ship and four flights later, Viva
Palestina has begun to enter the besieged Gaza Strip." The entry of the caravan into Palestine follows days of negotiations with
the Egyptian government, who on Jan. 5 withdrew its negotiators and sent some
2,000 riot police to the VP camp at the port of Al-Arish. ...
Posted Jan 6, 2010
|
Demonstrators around the world marched in solidarity with the people of Gaza on
the one-year anniversary of Israel’s massacre there and to demand an end
to the Israeli blockade of Gaza....
Posted Jan 6, 2010
|
It appears from statements by Obama administration officials and U.S.
intelligence sources that further military attacks are being planned against
Yemen. This impoverished country on the Arabian Peninsula has been bombed
several times in recent weeks. Reports indicate that the U.S. is behind these
actions, in which dozens of people are reported to have been killed....
Posted Jan 6, 2010
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