Anti-poisons campaign
HOBART — A campaign is underway in Tasmania against the use of the chemicals 1080 and the triazines. These chemicals are used by logging corporations after clear-felling native forest and planting pine or eucalypt trees to stop wildlife from browsing on the infant plantation trees. The slow-acting poisons are not only cruel, but allow wildlife to travel far from the baited area before dying, exposing scavengers and predators over wide areas. A number of farmers and rural residents have joined the campaign after their dogs have been poisoned.
Public meetings will be held at Huonville Town Hall on May 12 and in Campbell Town on May 17. Phone 6223 3566 or 6297 1161 for details or to get involved.
Picket against former ambassador
SYDNEY — A lecture by a former Australian ambassador to Indonesia, Richard Woolcott, was picketed by Indonesia and East Timor solidarity activists on April 8. Woolcott is currently chairperson of the Australia Indonesia Institute and director of the AustralAsia Centre.
In secret cables to Canberra in early 1976, Woolcott urged the Fraser Liberal government to adopt a "pragmatic" rather than a "principled" stand on Indonesia's invasion of East Timor. Speakers from Action in Solidarity with Indonesia and East Timor and the Australian East Timor Association pointed out that Australia's economic interests have determined the federal government's foreign policy ever since.
The picket demanded that the Australian government withdraw its de jure recognition of Indonesia's invasion of East Timor, break all military ties with the Suharto regime, pressure Suharto to release all political prisoners, and grant asylum to East Timorese refugees in Australia.
For free education
HOBART — Around 20 people attended a forum at Tasmania University last week to hear Australian Greens Senator Bob Brown defend the principle of free education.
Brown pointed out the hypocrisy of the government's claim to not have enough money for education while giving $800 million to big business in the form of a diesel fuel rebate.
He said that the only reason the government can get away with its attack on education funding is the absence of sustained, organised resistance to it. He added that students here could take inspiration from students in Indonesia who are fighting a brutal dictatorship, and aim to build a radical activist base on the campuses which could challenge the Howard government's profits-first agenda.