Monthly Archives: May 2017

On the 50th anniversary of the 1967 Referendum recognising the ongoing existence of Indigenous people in Australia’s Constitution, and the 20th anniversary of the Bringing Them Home report, which exposed the extent of forced child removals, a major Aboriginal convention was held at Uluru, near Alice Springs. The Constitutional recognition […]

The hunger strike by 1,500 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, has ended after marathon talks on the weekend between Palestinian leaders in jail and Israeli officials. The deal struck saw the prisoners win many of their demands. In the last week, the health of many prisoners had deteriorated markedly with […]

The industrial dispute at the huge Grasberg copper and gold mine that started earlier this month, has continued to escalate with the company, Freeport-McMoran now having terminated the contracts of over 2,000 workers. The mine has always been controversial because of its massive size, its environmental impact on the region […]

Following his successful constitutional referendum on gaining more powers for the post of President, President Erdogan, last Sunday wasted no time in promising to fight mercilessly against all his enemies. With the situation for workers already very serious such calls only promise more hard times. This week, two teachers who […]

This week, thousands of members of the Korean Metal Workers Union took to the streets against proposed amendments to the Labour Act and for secure jobs. They also staged a solidarity rally in support of two of their comrades, Jeon Yeong-soo and Lee Seong-ho, who are now into their second […]

Jenny Marcos was a leading activist for the Peninsula Employees Union, the union representing workers at the luxury Manila Peninsula Hotel, when in January of this year she was sacked and two of her colleagues suspended. Their ‘crime’ was to negotiate for better working conditions, like the use of a […]

Last Monday 15 May, Palestinians in Israel and the Occupied Lands commemorated the 69th anniversary of Al Nakba – the ‘catastrophe’. This day marks the founding of Israel through the expulsion of 750,000 Palestinians from their lands. As with many other years, Palestinians marking this event were fired upon by […]

It took almost a week for rescue workers to pull out all the bodies of the miners that were killed by an explosion at the coal mine in Golestan Province in early May. The final death toll now stands at 43, with many others injured. The President of Iran, Hassan […]

In the first ten days of May, two workers were killed in separate incidents in the huge shipbreaking beaches of Chittagong, Bangladesh. Ishaq was killed when a steel wire smashed into his face while the second worker, Shahinoor, was killed after falling off the ship he was working on. As […]

Around 90 manufacturing workers at Fletcher Insulation, in the south eastern suburbs of Melbourne, have been on strike since the 17 February.  After 96 days, the workers won their fight and returned to work. The issues were around a proposed new enterprise agreement where the company wanted to increase hours […]