So apparently there is a crisis in Iraq. Really, who could have predicted this? Who among us could possibly have guessed a full-scale invasion and occupation of the country, destruction of its infrastructure and society leading directly to the could have actually led to such problems?
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More than half a million Iraqis have been displaced and hundreds killed after the fall of Iraq's second largest city of Mosul to Islamic fundamentalists. But even as the crisis in Iraq dramatically worsens, Australia is refusing to offer any reprieve for the thousands of Iraqi refugees in its care.
General Prayuth Chan-ocha's vile military junta, which seized power in Thailand last month, is playing the nationalistic and racist card.
Hundreds of thousands of workers from Cambodia and Burma are being persecuted and driven out of the country. As usual the junta claims it is 鈥渃racking down鈥 on 鈥渋llegal鈥 workers. But the Thai ruling class has long used a hypocritical and repressive policy towards workers from neighbouring countries.
NSW Greens MP Dr Mehreen Faruqi has initiated the first abortion decriminalisation bill in New South Wales. This long overdue reform aims to remove abortion from the NSW Crimes Act of 1900.
Faruqi gave notice of a motion she will move when NSW parliament resumes in the second week of August after its winter recess.
鈥淭asmania, the ACT and Victoria have taken courageous and difficult steps to moving towards ensuring women鈥檚 reproductive rights. It is now time for New South Wales,鈥 Faruqi said on June 19.
The Collaboration: Hollywood鈥檚 Pact with Hitler
Ben Urwand
Belknap, 2013
327 pages, $39.95 (hb)
Throughout the 1930s, movie-goers all over the world got to see the German Nazi鈥檚 cut of every Hollywood film. Any movie touching on Germany contained no mention of Nazism or Jews.
Both these silences, as Harvard University鈥檚 Ben Urwand unearths in The Collaboration, were the result of a remarkable agreement allowing the Nazis to dictate Hollywood movie content in return for Hollywood studios keeping their access to the lucrative German market.
About 5000 people protested outside Parliament House in Hobart on June 14 to call for the protection of Tasmania鈥檚 World Heritage forests.
The World Heritage Committee unanimously approved the extension of 120,000 hectares of new reserves to the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage property at a meeting in June last year. The forests were judged to have met all four natural heritage criteria.
Members of the Hazara community held a vigil in Melbourne on June 15 for the victims of the Taftan bombing in Pakistan.The bombing was part of ongoing attacks on Hazara people and Shia Muslims in Pakistan.
Ali Haider, a member of the Hazara community in Melbourne, said: "A bombing took place [on June 8] in which 30 people were killed and more than 50 injured. These were poor people on pilgrimage."
Colleen Hartland from the Greens called for the Australian government to accept refugees from Pakistan.
Argentinian President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner refused point blank to go along with a US judge鈥檚 ruling requiring a US$1.5 billion repayment of defaulted bonds on June 16.
Earlier that day, the US supreme court had backed vulture capitalist hedge fund NML Capital in its quest to extort full-value repayment for junk bonds for which it paid only fractions of their face value.
But in a national address, Fernandez said she would not submit to 鈥渆xtortion鈥 and was working on ways to keep Argentina鈥檚 commitments to other creditors.
Barney Gardner, spokesperson for the Save Millers Point residents action group, told a Sydney forum of more than 100 people on June 14: 鈥淭he Baird Coalition government is continuing with the policies of [former premier] Barry O'Farrell and [former housing minister] Pru Goward.鈥
The New South Wales government is pushing ahead with its plan to sell off 393 public houses in the historic Millers Point neighbourhood of inner-city Sydney and force public housing tenants to move.
Before returning to the favela (local neighbourhood) Vila Autodromo for the first time since 2012, I had already been told that the community would not look the same. As a friend said to me, 鈥淚t will resemble a perfect smile with several teeth knocked out.鈥
Vila Autodromo is just yards away from the site of the 2016 Rio Olympic village. Olympic planners, as well as building interests, have long targeted this close-knit community for demolition.
When Muckaty traditional owners first heard about a proposed waste dump on their land seven years ago, it didn鈥檛 seem like such a bad idea.
Many thought it was a general rubbish tip that would recycle, sell reclaimed materials and provide work opportunities for people living in the remote area of the Northern Territory.
Millions of dollars were promised for roads and scholarships. In an area with few employment prospects or education opportunities, it is little wonder the offer seemed attractive.
Many people were shocked in January when non-profit development organisation Oxfam released a report that showed that the richest 85 people in the world owned more wealth than half of the world's population.
Within the space of a few months, that number has dropped to just 66.
Oxfam's latest report, , produced in preparation for the G20 summit in Brisbane in November, explodes the myth of an egalitarian Australia.
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