Democratic Left pulled its ministers out of Greece's ruling coalition cabinet on June 21 after talks to resume state television broadcasts collapsed.
MPs from the party, which makes up the third part of the ruling coalition, were angered by the abrupt shutdown of broadcaster ERT on June 11 and met to decide whether to continue backing Prime Minister Antonis Samaras.
970
About 100 people attended a public meeting jointly organised by Socialist Alliance and Socialist Alternative in Sydney on June 25.
The meeting discussed how a united left would be in a stronger position to campaign against a conservative Coalition government. Speakers from both organisations, Pip Hinman and Dianne Fields, raised ideas about how a possible united socialist party could organise.
Brazil is in revolt. What started as a protest about a R$0.20 rise (about $0.10) in bus fares has turned into a mass nationwide movement against corruption, the rising cost of living, starved public services and money squandered on sporting mega-events.
Events are moving fast with protests growing and spreading to new cities each day, and it is far from clear when or how it will end.
A selection of this week's politically-relevant entertainment news...
Rapper LL Cool J explains his song 'Accidental Racist' with country music singer Brad Paisley. http://youtu.be/GG676KRXH9A + Full Song Lyrics http://tinyurl.com/c6hwtnw
2013 Cannes Film Festival Fake Gunman Sentenced to 18 Months in Jail for Firing Blanks http://eonli.ne/10QNl5U
Domestic abuser and singer Chris Brown Accused of Assaulting Woman in Nightclub. http://eonli.ne/1cgkNT9
The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) recognised Venezuela on June 16 as one of 18 countries that had achieved exceptional progress toward reducing the prevalence of malnutrition.
Measuring progress from 1990-1992 until 2010-2012, the FAO determined that 20 countries had cut the proportion of hungry people by half, satisfying the first of the United Nations鈥 Millennium Development Goals (MDG) originally set for 2015.
The protests and demonstrations over the announced closing of the whole Greek Public Television and Radio Network (ERT) by the Greek government on June 11, are not only about the proposed firing of 2650 workers, nor are they simply a protest about the severe blow to quality broadcasting and entertainment.
Following the implementation of measures to tackle shortages in some basic food and household items, both private Venezuelan media and the government report that the level of shortages is now decreasing.
Shortages hit their highest level in five years in April, provoking a flurry of international media criticism of the government and affecting the popularity of president Nicolas Maduro in the lead-up to the 14 April election.
In an atmosphere of festive social mobilisation, the National Assembly of Ecuador adopted the Organic Communications Law on June 14, mandated by the 2008 Constitution. It has taken more than four years for the law to come to light.
The law is part of a new democratising trend with respect to communications that is taking shape across Latin America. The most significant antecedent for this is Argentina鈥檚 Audiovisual Media Law.
This is a speech by Peter Boyle, the Socialist Alliance candidate for the seat of Sydney, at a picket outside an ANZ bank in Sydney on June 21.
***
We called this demonstration following news of more job cuts by the ANZ bank despite its recent rise in profits.
In April this year, ANZ announced a record half-year profit of $3.18 billion. This is 10% up on last year.
ANZ is reaping massive profits at the expense of its workers.
And to add insult to injury, ANZ boss Mike Smith has become the highest paid corporate CEO in Australia 鈥 his pay packet was $10.1 million last year.
The Refugee Action Coalition released this statement on June 21.
***
Asylum seekers are angry and upset at the death of an Afghan asylum seeker in the Villawood detention centre on June 20.
According to witnesses inside the detention centre, Serco guards left the man, named Ali, on the ground for almost an hour before calling an ambulance.
He was taken from the centre around 7.30pm and died later that night.
It took 76 years and one day since his abduction on the orders of Stalin during the Spanish Civil War (1936-39), but on June 17 all parties of the Catalan left came together in Barcelona to recognise the contribution to the Catalan and Spanish working people of revolutionary fighter Andreu Nin.
At midnight on June 16, 1937, Nin, the general secretary of the Workers Party of Marxist Unification (POUM), was abducted by Stalinist agents outside the POUM鈥檚 headquarters.
Prominent human rights advocate, Julian Burnside, QC, was scathing in his assessment of both the major parties and mainstream media鈥檚 approach to asylum seekers in a public address at the invitation of the Townsville branch of Amnesty International on Jun 14.
Burnside told the audience that 鈥渂oth parties are trading in human misery in order to win or retain power鈥 and mainstream media have to stop spreading the message that asylum seekers are illegal.
- Page 1
- Next page