Feature Articles |
Create or login to a User account? |
Local News and Commentary |
|
News :: Civil Liberties & Human Rights : Law & Justice : Politics & Elections : Trade & International Relations : War & Peace |
The pursuit of justice for David Hicks |
by ke |
14 Apr 2006
Modified: 12:19:21 PM |
Adelaide-born David Hicks has been incarcerated in the United States' notorious military prison at Guantanamo Bay for over 4 years. Unlike other countries such as Britain which have successfully negotiated the return of their nationals, the Australian Government has consistently refused to negotiate for a fair deal for Hicks, who now faces trial under the controversial military commision system. Hicks, who has a claim to British citizenship, achieved a victory on 12 April 2006 when the British Court of Appeals dismissed the UK Government's attempt to overturn his citizen's rights. In Adelaide on the same day a public meeting was organised by Fair Go for David, bringing together Hicks' legal counsels and his father to update the large audience on the progress of the campaign to bring him home.
Read the legal updates at the public meeting
Fair Go For David |
|
News :: Civil Liberties & Human Rights : Law & Justice : Police & Thieves |
Willful neglect by DFAT of Australian imprisoned in Argentina |
by karin eliot Email: karineliot (nospam) gmail.com |
03 Nov 2005
|
On 4 February 2003 Australian man Stephen Sutton was arrested in a joint Australian Federal Police/Argentine police operation in Buenos Aires.
After being held for two an a half years without charge, he was finally convicted of drug trafficking, and sentenced to 11 years in an Argentine prison. This conviction was despite ANY drugs being found on Stephen or in his hotel at the time of the raid.
Moreover, when Stephen was 15 he had a rare type of scalp tumour removed, and according to his family 'was never the same ... and seemed to stay in this age bracket'. This fact alone suggests it is more likely that, if indeed there is ANY connection between Stephen Sutton and the drug trade, Stephen was exploited by unscrupulous others, tricked into being an unwitting drug mule in what has been described as a 'transnational organised crime syndicate'.
Now Stephen Sutton is seriously ill in prison with tuberculosis, and being denied basic health care. His concerned family have been consistently fobbed off by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and even threatened with imprisonment themselves under the Privacy Act for discussing their own frustrations with the system.
Stephen's older sister Ann Cluse, from Salisbury Downs discusses her experiences dealing with government bureaucracies that appear completely uninterested in offering basic protection to an Australian citizen abroad in dire trouble.
Does being in prison mean you have lost all human rights?
Are there are other Australians imprisoned overseas enduring similar neglect from Australian Consular agencies?
Is this a systemic problem?
Read more....
background to Stephen Sutton's situation
Interview with Stephen Sutton's sister
Stephen Sutton support website
Letter from Stephen Sutton
Photo caption: Stephen Sutton with his niece Dee, in Australia |
|
News :: Nuclear issues |
Green-Black Alliance reborn in Quorn |
by Rig Email: sievx01 (nospam) yahoo.com.au |
28 Sep 2005
|
As Australia’s uranium industry looks to expansion and the nuclear power debate ricochets around parliaments across the nation, Indigenous groups and environmental organisations concerned about the nuclear industry’s destructive impacts met in Quorn, in South Australia’s southern Flinders Ranges . |
Read the full article... (22 comments) |
Everything is Not Fine and Dandy in Port Augusta |
by Rig Email: sievx01 (nospam) yahoo.com.au |
09 Jun 2005
|
The Baxter immigration detention centre is an obvious blight on the image of this town, however there is a more deep-seated conflict. This is the intensification of policing operations aimed at the town’s Aboriginal population and the underlying racist sentiment that drives it.
In February of this year a STAR force team was used against Aboriginal people congregating on an area of foreshore. The STAR force team was deployed at the request of the Local Council and police. The Council cited serious public order issues as the reason for this aggressive action, however in the context of Port Augusta’s history of white settlement and Aboriginal dispossession, this seemed like yet another act in a long line of racially motivated abuses by the white land-owning establishment |
Read the full article... (18 comments) |
News :: Civil Liberties & Human Rights : Refugees & Asylum seekers |
Notorious isolation unit re-opened at Baxter |
by adele indy |
25 May 2005
Modified: 04:19:15 AM |
Just in case you were thinking that the release last night of 3 year old Naomi Leong from the Villawood immigration prison marks a change for the better in Australia's brutal and unyielding treatment of refugees, think again. The ghosts of Tampa and SIEV-X are not so easily dispelled. The notorious 'Red 1' isolation compound in Baxter Detention Centre is being used again, after being closed since the February release of Australian Cornelia Rau who had been wrongfully held there for over two months. Ask any asylum seeker who has been locked up in "Management" at Baxter about their individual experience and you will hear reports of humiliation, physical and mental cruelty, and deprivation of basic human rights. An African asylum seeker was forcibly taken to Red 1 compound last Saturday (21 May). He has not been able to make any phone calls since being placed in the compound. Baxter refugees staged a protest on May 23 to highlight the situation of the man placed in Red 1. Mira Wroblewski, National Rural Australians for Refugees (RAR) spokesperson, said her organisation is extremely concerned about this development. "Detainees who are psychologically fragile after years of detention, are again being punished by being placed in isolation units." RAR is concerned that detainees who are put into Red 1 compound have no right of appeal, and their placement in this compound is under the control of individual employees of GSL, the company contracted by the Australian Government to run detention centres. "GSL is able to operate with secrecy and its actions lack accountability", said Ms Wroblewski.
Meanwhile Attorney-General Philip Ruddock has used the controversial and illegal deportation of Australian citizen Vivian Alvarez to the Philippines 4 years ago to again push the barrow of the necessity of a universal identification system, claiming that its lack made it difficult to identify people who did not provide correct information to authorities. This is a highly spurious argument given the existence of extensive inter-linked government databases such as the Movements and Reporting System that contains details of ALL individuals' movements in and out of Australia, holding data from 1980.
LINKS:
Notorious isolation unit re-opened at Baxter
freed from life in detention
Cornelia Rau's first press conference (video)
more Rau digest from mainstream wires
Ruddock 'in dark' on Alvarez
Personal Information Digest-Border Control and Compliance Division |
|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | Next Page |
Regional features from Oceania |
oceania :: features | :: perth |
Have the Philippines Communist party been Assasinating Left Activists? |
| 9 Jan 2008 |
It is essential to understand the real scope of the assassination policy of Left activists pursued, after the 1992 crisis, by the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), its military arm, the New People's Army (NPA) and its politico-diplomatic arm, the National Democratic Front (NDF). Presented here is data on people who have been killed since 1992; on people who are presently hunted down, who received death threats or have escaped murder attempts; and on people being accused to be "counter-revolutionaries","agents" and "criminals" (such accusations may lead to death sentences if the CPP |
more... |
oceania :: features | :: perth |
Underwood Ave Bushland needs your help urgently |
| 24 Dec 2007 |
From the newswire: Help save Underwood Ave Bushland - This is our last chance to stop the destruction of the Underwood Avenue Bushland, and the urgency could not be greater. We need your help... Underwood Avenue Bushland consists of 32 hectares of unique Banksia, Tuart and Jarrah bushland located on the corner of Underwood Avenue and Selby Street, in Shenton Park, Perth. The Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) has recommended approval for UWA to sell the Underwood Avenue Bushland for residential purposes. This would result in an important urban bushland area being cleared, fragmented, and |
more... |
oceania :: features |
Ngati Aukiwa is fighting for their land |
by Anonymous
|
24 Dec 2007 |
The Crown and Kahukuraariki Trust Board have signed an Agreement in Principle to settle the historical Treaty of Waitangi claims of Ngatikahu ki Whangaroa. The settlement offer includes acknowledgments of, and a Crown apology for, the Crown's historical breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi and its principles, and the return of eleven Crown-owned sites of cultural and historical significance, including Stony Creek Station and the adjacent Thomson and Clarke Blocks, and the Stony Creek stock and plant. [ Government Press Release ] When Michael Cullen, the Minister in Charge of Treaty of |
more... |
oceania :: features |
Lakota Sioux Indians Declare Sovereign Nation Status |
by Anonymous
|
22 Dec 2007 |
Lakota Sioux Indian representatives declared sovereign nation status on Wednesday, December 19th in Washington D.C. following Monday’s withdrawal from all previously signed treaties with the United States Government. The withdrawal, hand delivered to Daniel Turner, Deputy Director of Public Liaison at the State Department, immediately and irrevocably ends all agreements between the Lakota Sioux Nation of Indians and the United States Government outlined in the 1851 and 1868 Treaties at Fort Laramie, Wyoming. “This is an historic day for our Lakota people,” declared Russell Means, |
more... |
oceania :: features |
Climate Change Road map Agreement Reached in Bali Meeting |
by Jakarta IMC
|
20 Dec 2007 |
Climate Talks concluded in Bali with the United States caving in under pressure of the European Union and the developing world and agreeing to a compromise text in the preamble of "Deep cuts in global emissions will be required" to avoid dangerous climate change. The guideline that rich countries should cut emissions by 25-40 per cent below 1990 levels by 2020 as recommended by the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was moved to a footnote at the US delegation's insistence.
Photos: Transnational Institute | Oxfam | Greenpeace - Link: Bali Media Center | Indonesia CIvil
|
more... |
oceania :: features |
Maritime workers take fight to gates of Port of Napier |
by Anonymous
|
16 Dec 2007 |
Update: Maritime workers are celebrating after a successful resolution of the Port of Napier dispute in mediation yesterday. “We wanted shipping companies to be able to use stevedores where secure local jobs could be achieved. Shipping companies wanted a solution, we supplied one, and the port is back in action as of now.” [ More ] 140 workers gathered outside the gates of the Port of Napier on Saturday (15th Dec.) morning to protest the loss of 85 secure jobs. Mediation between the Maritime Union (MUNZ) and Port Company is still going on but no agreement has been reached. Moves by |
more... |
oceania :: features | :: perth |
Forest defenders halt log truck in Bridgetown |
| 14 Dec 2007 |
From the newswire - December 13, 2007: Concerned south west citizens held up a Jarrah log truck in Bridgetown in WA's South West to highlight the continual destruction of native forests. Six people were arrested and media devices were confiscated by Police. See Video Industrial scale logging and burning of native forests is a major contributor to carbon emissions in Australia. "By keeping the carbon in the forest and protecting native forests is one of the easiest and simplest solutions to reduce Australia's greenhouse gas emissions," said spokesperson Brett Thompson. "Native forests are the |
more... |
oceania :: features | :: manila |
Letter to the Manila Indymedia Editor |
| 4 Dec 2007 |
To us members of the Progresibong Alyansa ng mga Mangingisda sa Pilipinas (PANGISDA), the curfew imposed by Malacanang last Friday was a stark reminder of Martial Law. In Central and Southern Luzon, the curfew prevented fishermen living in interior villages from going to the sea to fish and thus violated their constitutional right to travel freely. [ Read More ] Related Stories: [ Rise Up And Be Counted | Condemn Detention of Journalists | Workers Vow To Continue The Struggle ] |
more... |
oceania :: features |
Kyoto Now: Aksi 8 Desember 2007 |
by Jakarta IMC
|
4 Dec 2007 |
Rally Around the Earth for Climate Justice and a Safer, Healthier Planet! On December 8, Rally Around the Earth for Climate Justice and a Safer, Healthier Planet! WATCH THE KYOTO NOW VIDEO: http://youtube.com/watch?v=o1ykJKKolx8 Indymedia Climate | Peserta Global Day Action Padati Lapangan Puputan Anda mempunyai kekuasaan anda mungkin tidak mengenali - kekuasaan untuk menghentikan kekacauan iklim. Menurut World Health Organization, perubahan iklim telah membunuh 150.000 orang setiap tahunnya, dan itu bisa berlipat hingga 300.000 kematian per tahun menjelang 2030. Seluruh pergolakan permukaan |
more... |
oceania :: features |
Awas! Perda Ketertiban Umum Jakarta Mengancam Kehidupan Kita Semua |
by Jakarta IMC
|
28 Nov 2007 |
Siapa bilang Peraturan Daerah No 8/Tahun 2007 tentang Ketertiban Umum (Perda Tibum) di Wilayah DKI Jakarta hanya mengenai warga miskin kota saja? Perda Tibum sangat mungkin mengenai anda juga. Apa saja yang tidak boleh di Jakarta menurut Perda Tibum? + Berciuman dengan kekasih? Jangan sekali-kal i melakukan itu lagi di Jakarta. Di kota ini berciuman adalah tindak asusila dan akan dipidana ! (Pasal 42 dan 43, Penjelasan)
+ Jakarta sekarang kota "halal" loh. Temen-temen kalau mau makan babi, porkribs, wonton, saksang, silahkan cari di kota lain. Lapo atau restoran cina? Pecenongan? |
more... |
oceania :: features | :: manila |
Nine Filipinos Staged Mutiny In the High Seas |
| 14 Nov 2007 |
Roderick Sumang, Delter Algay, Edwin Lee, Jesus Manaqued, Sherilo Moraleja, Socrates Silan Jr., Dennis Tolentino, Noel Cusi and Jose Menpin -- all undocumented workers -- flew to Mauritius a month ago to work as crew members on the fishing vessel Ruei Thih Fa. With their Taiwanese captain Jui-yin Huang and nine other Chinese crewmen, they set sail from Mauritius' capital, Port Louis, on Oct. 31 and began work on Nov. 2, unaware that they were to fill 22-hour work days. On Nov. 5, their fourth day at work, they took action. Jolted awake by the captain's buzzer after only two hours of sleep, |
more... |
oceania :: features | :: manila |
Lumad farmers from Sumilao to march on foot for 60 days to reclaim land |
| 20 Oct 2007 |
QUEZON CITY, Philippines- As a non-violent way of protesting more than 10 years of injustice they have gone through in trying to reclaim their ancestral land, 50 lumad farmers belonging to the Mapalad Multi-purpose Cooperative (MPC) will march on foot from their hometown of Sumilao, Bukidnon in the south to the capital city of Manila in the north from October 10 to December 10. (Lumad is the term given to the indigenous peoples in the southern island of Mindanao.)[ Read More ] PLDT Mass Lay-off and Subsequent Arrests MANILA, Philippines- PLDT workers who were just about to hold a hunger strike |
more... |
oceania :: features |
Melbourne Indymedia Suspends Publishing |
by Melbourne Indymedia
|
9 Oct 2007 |
Open publishing has been suspended on Melbourne Indymedia as numbers in our editorial collective are insufficient to manage the site effectively and responsibly. We realise that MIM has played a vital role in reporting activist news from Melbourne, around Australia and internationally. To this end the present collective will be assessing options for how best to provide an activist news service in the future. If you wish to get involved, please contact us, or subscribe to our mailing list. |
more... |
oceania :: features |
Thousands Blockade G8 |
by Melbourne Indymedia
|
14 Jul 2007 |
"The global social justice movement is alive and kicking and giving hell to the assembled criminals of the G8. In an atmosphere reminiscent of the our S11 demonstration ten thousand peaceful protestors have used non-violent civil disobedience to blockade the G8 in Germany." said Davey. |
more... |
oceania :: features |
Indigenous Elder wins Environment Award |
by Melbourne Indymedia
|
10 Jun 2007 |
The Australian Conservation Foundation's (ACF) Peter Rawlinson Award was given to 'Uncle' Kevin Buzzacott, an Arabunna elder, on World Environment Day in 2007 for two decades of work highlighting the impacts of uranium mining and promoting a nuclear free Australia. Uncle Kev has been a tireless campaigner for indigenous rights including reclaiming the kangaroo and emu sacred totems from the Coat of Arms from Parliament House in Canberra and accusing the Federal Government of genocide. [Full Story] |
more... |
|
|
|