NOTE: New connection testing: After our little drama, we've upgraded to a larger connection. We are still on DSL tho, so we welcome donations towards power and bandwidth. Its not super fast, but it might be ok. Let us know what you think...

CALLING ALL NATIONS

From the newswire: Susan Charles Rankin writes: "We have a law system and it is bunjil-mummu-wommuloo munghus law and we cannot keep running to this other law system because we are actually committing treason against our own beautiful bunjil=god and we think we are going to that spirit world in peace we are dreamers... "There is not much time left to act this is why we are starting the "Sacred lifewalk 2007-mother earth is crying" from Adelaide to Uluru next year uniting all the 500 first nations peoples and all nations peoples formulating one document or declaration of independance based upon our law system - as our law is also our religion, and land is all part and parcel of that religion then we register through the united nations as a non government organisation getting our law and our religion recognised in the U.N. "...how long has it been since the whole 500 nations had come together at Uluru when we used to meet through ceremony and law and marriage business? So come on aren't all you mob tired of doing it on your own we are all family. We are a collective people we cannot keep making decisions that are affecting us all in different ways and this government is not going to give us any thing that they cannot take away from us again. "This a journey for the future lives of all who live in this country this journey is about mother earth and the climatic shifts and changes that are going to take place and the things that we need to do to survive the climatic shifts and changes and sea levels rising animals mutating and all this has absolutely nothing at all to do with politics or governments as politics and governments cannot save the human race against mother earth and creator spirits wrath from being poured out upon us wiping most of the human race of the face of the earth. "This is a big wake up call you know many are called but few are chosen. SO I AM CALLING ON ALL PEOPLE to unite at Uluru the choice is yours. "If our own mobs dont come and unite, at least send representatives from each clan group or nation and if people choose to ignore uniting all the nations then it will go to show that we are not about a collective of the whole 500 nations and that we want to keep struggling on in our own strength..." READ MORE/Comment...

Cover-up claim after Lucas Heights leak

From the newswire: Radioactive gases escape reactor June 15, 2006: An accident at Sydney's Lucas Heights nuclear reactor has stopped production of radioactive material. A spokesman for the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, Craig Pierce, says a pipe in a radioactive hot cell ruptured last week, halting production of an isotope used in medical procedures. Secret emails made public by the Labor Party today show that last Thursday various gases, including krypton, escaped into the atmosphere at the Lucas Heights reactor in southern Sydney. One staff member was forced to wash off contamination from the leak, and had to undergo a full body examination to ensure he was safe from radiation exposure. The accident at Australia's only nuclear reactor that led to radioactive gases escaping into the atmosphere has prompted claims of a cover-up... READ MORE/Comment...

Three years since Swan Valley Nyungah Community eviction

From the newswire Swan Valley Nyungah Community "the claims of abuse presented to the Parliamentarians were false, the land has not been returned." Letter sent to all WA politicians. We are asking - please help and support in any way you can. Our Federal Court case against the State Government will start on Monday 4 September 2006... It is now three years to the day since the Community has been evicted. We are homeless. Our women and children are constantly at risk trying to survive in the white suburbs. Our sister died homeless, leaving 5 children motherless. While Robert Bropho was in Queensland at Neville Bonner's funeral, a Darwin-born teenager, who lived in Herne Hill with her grandmother, paid a visit to the Swan Valley Nyungah Community. She had spent all day at Success Hill on the Swan River in Bassendean sniffing solvents and then was observed by the Pyrton Grounds Manager standing in the hot sun talking to the sky and slowly weaving her way across Pyrton to the Community. It was a 40 degree day. Within 2 hours of her arrival she was found dead with a garden hose around her neck in the ablution block. When Robert Bropho was told of the death of Susan Taylor he said: "We shall get the blame for this." We want our land and houses back The Swan Valley had struggled for 20 years to obtain title to the land they had camped on in Caversham. They obtained legal tenure to the land in 1994 from the Court Government. With members of the community working on the community plan and building design, and consulting with their chosen architects on cultural and environmental concerns, building began by their own hands with their registered builder in 1997 and was completed in 2001. At the Coronial inquiry into Susan Taylor's death in 2001 a number of hearsay allegations were made about sexual abuse in the community and the $1.5 million Gordon Inquiry was set up to address the issue. Despite the Gordon Inquiry making no findings or allegations about sexual abuse in the Swan Valley Nyungah Community - only in Aboriginal communities in general - the Gallop Government proceeded with legislation to evict the families from their homes. Despite the Foss Inquiry finding that the claims of abuse presented to the Parliamentarians were false, the land has not been returned. Bella Bropho - Vice-Chairperson of Swan Valley Nyungah Community READ MORE/Comment... [ Listen: Interview with Bella Bropho - Perth Indymedia, December 2004 - MP3 ] [ Refutations to claims about Swan Valley Nyungah Camp - 2003 ] [ Nyungah elder fights on despite charges. ] [ Homeless Swan Valley Community under full-scale attack ]

Chile, Germany, Greece - Students on the barricades

10 Jun 2006: Students are protesting in countries all around the globe to demand free education for everyone. IMC Athens reports that 320 academic departments (75% of all departments) are occupied by students in Greece. Certain clauses in the Greek Constitution (stating, among others, that education has to be public and free for all and that no police forces are allowed to enter university grounds) have made the enforcement of a neo-liberal agenda to the country's higher education institutions particularly difficult. However, the Conservative government is now attempting to push forward crucial changes in the functioning and role of the country's Higher Education institutions. A so-called "committee of experts", appointed by the government itself, has released a list of proposed changes. In Germany students are in the second year of fighting the introduction of fees. They are combining the fight against fees with the struggle against neo-liberal 'reforms' of the Christian-Democrat/Social-Democrat government. Chilean students want reforms in the education system a free public transport. Over one million people participated in huge demonstrations. Protesters and riot police clashed in the streets and hundreds of students were arrested. Read the full article at Aotearoa Indymedia

The Last Street of Old Chengdu

From the newswire: Submitted by Ray G (Perth Indymedia correspondent in China) In one of the only remaining hutongs - an ancient city alley or lane, in Chengdu, Sichuan province, China I met a man by the name of Wang Jian... Wang Jian has never left Sichuan, as a young man he only completed middle school an then worked in the country and then later in a factory. Since then he has lived his entire life around the streets of Chengdu. The hutong that I met him on is one of the last in Chengdu, all others have been demolished to make way for the so called modernization sweeping China. This is the beginning of Wang Jian's story, a story not just about one Hutong in Chengdu but about the complete transformation of China from the perspective of someone who is, as he says, well and truly "grass roots". "Kuan Xiang Zi", a name known all over the world now, just because there is a youth hostel called "Dragon Town". People are coming and going from both mainland and abroad, watching a wreckage, rubbles of broken road and the remains of torn down houses, the result of the war of "land claiming". As if paying last respect to a last old street, people convene to Kuan Xiang Zi in the evening and some during the day, making quite a clamour here. They are taking photos, drinking tea and beer and talking about the anti-demolition resistance movement. I have no comments on the reform and image changing of a city but there is something irreplaceable, the fundamental Chinese culture, not globalisation vs localisation. And it raises the question, who will benefit from such a desperate demolition...? Wang Jian has devised a plan to create an "open space" where all people, locals and tourists alike, can meet and interact with one another. READ MORE - Part one | Part two

More features: [ | Previous page ]

Global Features Continúa la ola represiva en México. Ayer Atenco, hoy Oaxaca Los Angeles Police Forcibly Evict and Bulldoze the South Central Farm Seruan Solidaritas : Gempa bumi di Jawa 75% of Academic Departments Occupied by Students in Greece Próba zabicia antyfaszysty

Oceania Features