THE ATMOSPHERE in Venezuela today is very much like what it must have been in Chile in the middle of 1973. That was when General Pinochet, backed by the US, organised a coup to crush a democratically elected left wing government.
IN THE week before the bombing of Gaza City, a delegation of health workers, students and academics from Britain visited the West Bank and Gaza to show solidarity with the Palestinians. Nothing quite prepared our delegation for the everyday oppression. The bombing of civilians and children in Gaza was a consequence of the collective punishment Israel metes out to Palestinians in the Occupied Territories.
OVER 150,000 anti-capitalists rallied in Genoa in Italy last Saturday, marking a year since the protests against the G8 summit when Carlo Giuliani was killed by the police
Council workers in South Africa have won big concessions over pay after a national strike lasting almost three weeks. The Samwu municipal workers' union won a £14 a month increase in the minimum wage and a 9 percent increase for most of its members. The employers' body had earlier refused to budge from 8 percent.
AROUND 150,000 people marched through the Italian city of Genoa last weekend to mark the first anniversary of the anti-capitalist protests against world leaders at the G8 summit. In a moving show of defiance and solidarity, protesters commemorated the police killing of protester Carlo Giuliani last year. "Carlo is alive and fighting through us," was one of the march's slogans. Students occupied the Diaz school, where police viciously attacked sleeping protesters last year, for three days before the protest.
THE HEAD of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) sensationally admitted last week that international bankers had forced a desperately poor African country to sell grain just as a famine began. They demanded that the life-saving grain was sold in order to repay debts.
OVER 100,000 South African council workers started their second week on all-out strike on Tuesday. They are fighting for a minimum wage of £150 a month. At present the minimum wage is £125 a month.
THE GOVERNMENT of Turkey, a key US ally, stands on the brink of collapse. A string of cabinet ministers and leading MPs have resigned from the Democratic Left-the party of Turkey's prime minister, Bulent Ecevit-over the last two weeks. Now a group of nine dissident party members are demanding radical change and the removal of Ecevit, its veteran leader.
THE DEBATE at a Tower Hamlets council meeting in east London last week took an unusual turn. Campaigners took advantage of a little used procedure to table a motion calling for the council to officially "twin" with the Palestinian town of Jenin.
IN RECENT months metal workers, postal workers, print workers, construction workers, bank workers, telecoms workers and others have been on strike. It is amazing that these strikes are happening just months before a general election, with an SPD (Labour-type) government in office and the Tories ahead in the polls.
WE ARE going to help the US arm Israel. That was the message from the government this week. New Labour caused outrage by admitting it is bypassing its own arms embargo on Israel by selling military equipment via the US. Vital component parts for US F-16 fighter jets, which are used against the Palestinian people, are made in Britain.
TWO YOUNG protesters were shot dead in the Argentinian capital, Buenos Aires, on Wednesday of last week. Dario Santillan and Maximiliano Kosteki were part of a demonstration of unemployed workers protesting at the effects of the huge economic crisis gripping the country.
