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Gold mining in Greece: stories of resistance and repressionRead the full article HERE:
Under the pretext of a severe financial crisis Greece is reasserting its investor-friendly profile by opening up all goldmines across the country without regard to the threats that mining poses to the environment and to people’s livelihoods. Foreign investors are particularly welcome: fast track processes; tax relief; exception from damages; easy money; no royalties; no problems.
But the true picture is not so rosy! Sham public consultations, questionable deals designed to advance specific corporate interests and the slow but steady destruction of the environment have been met with resistance. The struggle to oppose Eldorado Gold’s plans to create an enormous open pit mine on Mount Kakavos and within the ancient forest of Skouries has succeeded in capturing people’s imagination and inspiring waves of solidarity across the country.
By Leila Shrooms for Tahrir-ICN
One of the most worrying developments during the trajectory of Syria’s revolution has been the rise of militant Jihadi groups. The danger that the increasing strength of such groups poses to both Syria and the region should not be underestimated. Yet a lot of misunderstandings exist about the nature and dominance of such groups which this article attempts to address. Only when fact is separated from mythology are we able to move forward collectively towards a strategy that addresses the threat of counter-revolutionary forces and have a better understanding of who is working for the original goals of the revolution so that they can be given the solidarity they deserve.---Read the full article HERE:
Nevertheless, the email addressed by Mr Kontolemis to the Greek government contradicts the Justice Minister’s claims: it not only requests that “revisions” be made to the proposed bill, an issue of domestic policy, but it also reminds the government that they have already committed to making these changes in July, and it also demands the legislature’s swift actions, under the threat that the October payment will be withheld.Read the full article HERE:
The story is all over the news – days ago, Rawan, an 8-year-old Yemeni girl was sold by her parents, forced to marry a man five times her age and on her “wedding night”, her fragile young body sustained fatal injuries.Right now, the collective horror of the world is focused on the devastating death of an 8-year-old girl. We’ve seen thousands of emails, Facebook posts and tweets from our community calling for action. We know that ending Forced Child Marriage everywhere poses big obstacles and yet, this may be one of few fleeting moments when millions of at-risk girls are counting on the support of a global movement of activists. We’re not going to let them down.Forced Child Marriage is a form of modern slavery, and in Yemen there is no law that makes it illegal. It’s common for girls as young as 8 to be forced to marry to settle debts. In fact, 50% of girls in Yemen are married before they reach the age of 18.The Yemeni Government has the power to bring an end to Forced Child Marriage forever; the first step is to ban the marriage of anyone under the age of 18, protecting children from a life of domestic and sexual slavery. The Yemeni government needs to know that the eyes of the world are watching and expect their swift response. Will you help?Rawan’s story has struck a chord with people everywhere. As well as depriving girls of their right to a childhood, Forced Child Marriage leaves victims vulnerable to sexual, emotional and physical abuse at the hands of their so-called husbands and extended families.Now is the time to act. The Walk Free community is over 3.7 million strong and growing rapidly. Our collective voice is powerful – we can urge the government of Yemen to pass crucial legislation protecting children and young girls from the brutalities of forced marriage.Forced Marriage is modern slavery and can be stopped. Call on the government of Yemen to ban Forced Child Marriage.The idea of being sold into a life of domestic and sexual slavery seems unbelievable, and it’s sad that only extreme cases like Rawan’s gain attention. How amazing would it be if these cases never made the media – not because they were unreported, but because Forced Child Marriage no longer existed?Thank you in advance for your support. If you have a moment, please forward this email to 3 of your friends so we can become one step closer to building a world free of this form of modern slavery.
Violent riots have been an aspect of capitalism and class struggle against it throughout history. Eric Hobsbawn described the Luddites or machine breakers’ actions as collective bargaining by riot. (11) In contemporary history there are many examples. In Los Angeles’ Watts district in 1965 and in Detroit in 1967 there was mass looting on an industrial scale : Buildings were burnt to the ground. In the student riots in Paris in 1968, which sparked one of the greatest general strikes in history, many cars were torched for barricades. In Bristol in 1980 and Toxteth and Brixton in 1981, bricks and bottles were thrown at police, sometimes inadvertently injuring bystanders. There was also the famous Poll Tax riot which helped to bring down Thatcher and her tax. Now that was a positive result.Read the full article HERE:
Militant trade unionism has seen violence on the picket line and rioting during strikes. In the great unrest in Britain 1910-14 there was violence, looting and burning. (12) In Llanelli in 1911, rank and file miners trying to make their strike effective, in the face of scabbing organised by the pit owners, police and government, stoned scabs from railway embankments and placed obstacles on the railway line to stop the transport of black legs. Troops were dispatched to Llanelli,and two young men were shot dead. In the riot that followed, 96 Railway wagons were torched, and three tons of bacon and other things disappeared, as goods wagons were looted. A building was blown up, and four people were left dead. (13) In Tonypandy in 1910, striking miners driven away from a pit by the police and army, attacked shops in the village. One man Samuel Rays was shot dead by troops. Trade union officials and government ministers denounced the strikers as mindless hooligans. (14)
In spite of an economic crisis that has lasted more than five years, and the constantly escalating attack on the public sector, the Left in England and Scotland remains in the doldrums. There is a pervasive sense of despair, a widespread belief that there is nothing that can be done other than to continuously readjust downward our expectations for the future.Read the full article HERE:
Projects such as the People’s Assembly can not provide the organizational framework for a revitalized resistance. This is yet another top-down initiative controlled by the union bureaucracy, in particular UNITE. Furthermore, the social democratic perspective that underlies such projects have totally failed. These projects start with the belief that capitalism can be reformed, and that all that is required to reverse the corporate onslaught is the creation of a broad Left coalition to effectively exert pressure on the state. This broad Left coalition, it is claimed, will be able to exert its influence primarily through the electoral arena, either through the Labour Party or by forming a new progressive party, such as Left Unity.
There is an alternative model, one that starts with the belief that capitalism can not be reformed, but must be changed through a revolutionary transformation of society. From this perspective, fundamental social change does not occur through legislation, but rather as a result of militant, grass-roots movements engaging in non-violent direct action.
More than a year ago, Iran warned the US: The Syrian interventionists possess chemical weapons. [1] And, there is report that the interventionists plan chemical attack on Israel. [2]Citing leaked diplomatic correspondence a Christian Science Monitor report said:Iran has been warning Washington since July 2012 that Sunni rebel fighters have acquired chemical weapons, and called on the US to send “an immediate and serious warning” to rebel groups not to use them.The report headlined “Leaked Iranian letter warned US that Syrian rebels have chemical weapons” said: Iran said it has warned the US about chemical weapons in rebel hands for more than a year.The report by Scott Peterson, Staff writer, said:In a letter acquired by The Christian Science Monitor that was sent sometime in the spring, Iran told American officials that, as a "supporter" of the rebels, the US would be held responsible for any rebel use of chemical weapons.The September 9, 2013, Istanbul datelined report said:Iran amplified those year-old warnings over the weekend in its strongest public comments to date linking the rebels with chemical weapons.
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Read the full report HERE:The Obama administration has selectively used intelligence to justify military strikes on Syria, former military officers with access to the original intelligence reports say, in a manner that goes far beyond what critics charged the Bush administration of doing in the run-up to the 2003 Iraq war.According to these officers, who served in top positions in the United States, Britain, France, Israel, and Jordan, a Syrian military communication intercepted by Israel’s famed Unit 8200 electronic intelligence outfit has been doctored so that it leads a reader to just the opposite conclusion reached by the original report.The doctored report was picked up on Israel’s Channel 2 TV on Aug. 24, then by Focus magazine in Germany, the Times of Israel, and eventually by The Cable in Washington, DC.According to the doctored report, the chemical attack was carried out by the 155th Brigade of the 4th Armored Division of the Syrian Army, an elite unit commanded by Maher al-Assad, the president’s brother.However, the original communication intercepted by Unit 8200 between a major in command of the rocket troops assigned to the 155th Brigade of the 4th Armored Division, and the general staff, shows just the opposite.The general staff officer asked the major if he was responsible for the chemical weapons attack. From the tone of the conversation, it was clear that “the Syrian general staff were out of their minds with panic that an unauthorized strike had been launched by the 155th Brigade in express defiance of their instructions,” the former officers say.According to the transcript of the original Unit 8200 report, the major “hotly denied firing any of his missiles” and invited the general staff to come and verify that all his weapons were present.The report contains a note at the end that the major was interrogated by Syrian intelligence for three days, then returned to command of his unit. “All of his weapons were accounted for,” the report stated.
