Tag Archives | Statement

“[M]en stand again, just as unified, ready to sacrifice their bodies, health, and life to achieve what has already been hard fought for and accomplished. Why must California prisoners continue to sacrifice health and life, involve lawyers and courts, in order to be treated like human beings? We will continue to remind CDCR officials they will be held accountable for this type of treatment.”

It’s one of the universals of organizing — first you make a list.

Elementary teacher Alix Gonzalez Guevara remembers staying up late transferring data about each school from a district-published book into an Excel spreadsheet: region, address, how many teachers, how many students.

This became a Google document, an online spreadsheet available to everyone working on the campaign. The schools were grouped by regions. Within each, a couple of lead activists took responsibility to find people to do outreach at each school.

  In the lead-up to the international day of action against fascism on 22 March, Thanasis Kampagiannis, writing in the latest issue of Σοσιαλισμός από Κάτω (Socialism From Below), the theoretical journal of the Greek Socialist Workers Party (SEK), looks at the danger of a major far Right breakthrough in May’s European Parliament elections and […]

The leader of al-Nahda movement, Rachid Ghannouchi, made his first visit to a foreign country after the first post-revolution Tunisian elections. His choice was the State of Qatar. Analysts see many messages in this gesture but some Tunisians are troubled by the invitation he had extended to the Emir of Qatar. Although many do not want any foreign leader present during the opening session of the constituent assembly, some Tunisians are singling out the ruler of Qatar, Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, as a persona non grata. They see him as a bully who is using Al Jazeera and his huge wealth to push an agenda that is not necessarily in the interest of their country.

  Bahraini and GCC security forces continue their systematic suppression of popular protests against the regime.  Feelings of tension mount in Manama, as signs of renewed protest become more evident. Manama — At the airport in Manama, there are fewer passengers than usual.  Most of the flights are operated by airlines from the Gulf — […]

  “These NGOs funded by the World Bank, Ford, and so on — why are they participating, mediating what public policy should be? . . .  The World Bank runs 600 anti-corruption programs just in places like Sub-Saharan Africa.  Why is the World Bank that interested in anti-corruption?  I looked at five of the major […]

On behalf of the American University Anthropology department, I am deeply honored to welcome you all to AU, and to the Latin American Solidarity Coalition’s “Conference to Build a Stronger Movement to End US Militarism and the Militarization of Latin America.” It’s exciting personally to be involved in such an important event — after all, demilitarization of the Americas is now more important than ever — and I sincerely hope that we can continue this relationship and work to increase AU’s involvement with the event in the years to come, not only because it would save us money on the facility fees, but more importantly, because there is a deep thirst among AU students to become more engaged in this kind of solidarity work and because, I believe, the AU community can contribute to it in important ways. This conference is a perfect fit with all of the best aspects of this university, and those aspects — the dedication to community involvement, to social action and public intellectualism — always need reinforcing.

  “Syria hosts the largest number of Iraqi refugees who have fled their home since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.  Estimates as to how many refugees are huddled in Syria vary, but most organizations estimate that roughly 1.2-1.5 million Iraqis have staked a temporary claim on neighboring soil.  ‘Temporary,’ however, is a relative time-frame for the […]

  In Bahrain as well as in the rest of the Gulf states, the Tunisian and Egyptian method just doesn’t work to attain even the minimum goal of the majority.  Calling for negotiation as the ITUC does below, needless to say, is no solution in this case since the Bahraini ruling class has full support […]

  The West should not arm the Libyan opposition, says Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. This video was released by Press TV on 30 March 2011.  Cf. “Moscow absolutely disagrees with statements by certain participants in the operation in Libya and their intentions to arm rebels who resisted Muammar Gaddafi’s troops” (“Russia, Austria Reveal Close […]

1. The General Union of Tunisian Workers is a national organization necessarily interested in political affairs, given its history of struggle during the colonial epoch and the period of the construction of the modern state, considering the dialectical links among economy, society, politics, and culture in the process of development, but out task has become more urgent than ever.

  December 22, 2010 The Committee to Stop FBI Repression is circulating the following statement from Palestine solidarity activist Maureen Murphy.  Maureen is the managing editor of the popular online publication, Electronic Intifada, and she is also the co-chair of the Chicago Committee Against Political Repression, which has been leading work in Chicago to oppose […]

  Video by Ricardo Stuckert President Lula offered solidarity on Thursday (9 December) to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who was arrested this week after his group published cables written by American diplomats, and he criticized the Brazilian media for not defending the Australian activist and the freedom of expression.  “The guy was arrested, and yet […]

11 October 2010 — The daughter of the celebrated revolutionary Che Guevara, who is currently visiting Lebanon, met on Sunday the number two leader of Hezbollah after visiting southern Lebanon where she received a plaque in homage to her father and the martyr Imad Mughniyeh.

  “Zionism has nothing to do with the teachings of Judaism.  Zionism is a political ideology and quite different from Judaism.  Therefore we as Jewish people condemn Zionists.” — Rahmatollah Rafiei, head of the Jewish community in Iran This video was released by Press TV on 3 September 2010. | Print  

  * * * Excerpt from Tony Bunyan, “Intensive Surveillance of ‘Violent Radicalisation’ Extended to Embrace Suspected ‘Radicals’ from across the Political Spectrum; Targets Include: ‘Extreme Right/Left, Islamist, Nationalist, Anti-Globalisation Etc’,” Statewatch: The document which the Council Conclusions are based is entitled: “Instrument for compiling data and information on violent radicalisation processes” (EU doc no: […]

  The Israeli Knesset’s House Committee met Monday (7 June) to recommend revoking the privileges of MK Hanin Zoabi.  The revocation would serve as punishment for Zoabi’s participation in last week’s Freedom Flotilla aid mission to Gaza, an act some in the Knesset are calling treason. Zoabi made history in February 2009, becoming the first […]

  Robert Aldrich.  Colonialism and Homosexuality.  London and New York: Routledge, 2003.  xii + 436 pp.  Maps, notes, bibliography, and index.  $104.95 US (cl.).  ISBN 0-415-19615-9.  $32.95 (pb.).  ISBN 0-415-19616-7. It is generally seen as a sign of maturity when gay scholarship moves beyond a mere self-affirmative search for “ancestry” and develops a critical and […]

  College student Nick George was handcuffed, interrogated, and jailed for hours at the airport when he tried to bring English-Arabic flash cards on the plane to study on his flight back to school.  Now he is an ACLU plaintiff. “First she asked me about how I felt about 911. . . . I thought […]

  Last night, President Obama said he wanted ideas on health care reform. Obama put it this way: “If anyone from either party has a better approach that will bring down premiums, bring down the deficit, cover the uninsured, strengthen Medicare for seniors and stop insurance company abuses, let me know.  Let me know.  Let […]