Month: June 2003

ARIEL SHARON appears to be biting the hand that feeds him. The assassination of another leading Hamas activist by an Israeli hit squad has further undermined George Bush’s efforts to put a lid on the […]

ON JUNE 12 the two central leaders of the French trade union movement came down to Marseille to address a mass rally at the end of a 260,000-strong demonstration. Bernard Thibault, leader of the Confederation […]

THE WORLDWIDE CAPITALIST ideological offensive of the 1990s, in the wake of the collapse of Stalinism in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, meant that for most of that decade the workers’ movement was on […]

Just when George Bush and Tony Blair have been having difficulty proving that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), the government of North Korea has been making open declarations that it is proceeding to […]

On Saturday morning there was a meeting of the Greek Social Forum against war and imperialism.

Around 100,000 people demonstrated in Thessaloniki, Greece, on Saturday 21 June to show their opposition to the EU summit.

ON 15 June 1953, about 60 building workers on the Friedrichshaim hospital building site in East Berlin stopped work to draw up a letter protesting at a 10% increase in the work norms imposed by […]

We in the Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM) strongly condemn the callous, provocative, entirely insensitive and anti-poor fuel price increase just announced by the Obasanjo regime.

Just before the demonstrations against the EU summit started, the Greek Social Forum (GSF) organised a number of meetings. Xekinima, an active part of the GSF, organised a meeting on the need for a political […]

The Peace process remains in deep crisis. Despite desperate efforts by the British and Irish governments over the last few months, it has not proved possible to re-establish the Executive, and the Assembly elections have […]

During the first months of this year, city centres across Europe reverberated to the chants of the millions who took part in what was the biggest anti war movement in history. More recently the streets […]

During the Greek EU summit thousands will join the protests in the city of Thessaloniki. Nikei De Pooter (a member of Linkse Socialistiche Partij [LSP]/ Mouvement pour une Alternative Socialiste [MAS], Belgian affiliate of the […]

"THE CLERICAL regime is nearing its end. Vigilantes commit crimes, the leader supports them," chanted defiant student protesters at Tehran university, Iran.

The road map to ’peace’ in the Middle East is becoming soaked in blood. Since the Israeli army attempted to assassinate the deputy leader of the Islamic Palestinian organisation, Hamas, on 10 June, the number […]

The ‘SME’ case now running in the Milan courts, which includes il Presidente del Consiglio, Silvio Berlusconi, among the defendants, may never get to the stage where it sentences him to prison, as happened with […]

THE FIRST anniversary of the Fianna Fail/Progressive Democrat government was marked by the publication of an opinion poll, that showed support for the government at a record low. Their satisfaction rating of just 28% is […]

A RECENT opinion poll demonstrates that a significant minority of voters in Northern Ireland are sick of the sectarian parties and are looking for an alternative. Up to seventeen per cent declared their intention to […]

THE US-led coalition forces occupying Iraq can’t get the country’s power supply going regularly nor can they create health and education services for local people.

GORDON BROWN’S Commons statement on the euro, the world’s biggest currency union, deliberately faced both ways. The government said it would try to "break down anti-euro prejudice", but it would not hold a referendum on […]

WHEN CIA experts wrote a report in September 1978 on the political health of the pro-western monarchist regime in Iran, they concluded that despite his autocratic rule, the Shah presided over a stable dynasty that […]

The majority of the members of the delegations to the G8 summit in Evian had accommodation in Lausanne, in the French-speaking part of Switzerland. In Lausanne, as well as in Geneva and on the French […]

Strikes and protest actions are continuing across France on a daily basis, against the Raffarin government’s pension ‘reform’ plans.

Peruvian workers have challenged the ‘state of emergency’ imposed by President Toledo.

"A smooth transition" to the euro for Sweden is predicted by the Financial Times of June 6, if the ‘yes’ vote wins in the referendum on 14 September. But the deepening crisis of the Eurozone […]

A SOLDIER from Warwickshire, Fusilier Bartlam aged 18, is being questioned following pictures of Iraqi POWs allegedly being mistreated.

THE RECENT decision by the United Nations (UN) to send troops to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is the latest in a series of interventions on the continent of Africa, ostensibly to quell […]

AS TONY Blair jetted his way through the Gulf area, meeting Kuwaiti sheikhs, lecturing to British squaddies and kissing Iraqi children in one big photo-opportunity, evidence was growing that he and US president Bush lied […]

Across France in countless villages, towns and cities, French workers from both the private and public sector, students and young people demonstrated in their hundreds of thousands and took strike action on Tuesday 3 June, […]

More than 1 million workers in 18,000 workplaces all over Austria, a third of the entire Austrian workforce, took industrial action on 3 June – the country’s biggest strike since World War Two.

Mass strikes and demonstrations on Tuesday, 3 June, show a hardening mood of combativity and solidarity in the battle against pension reform.

LOW-PAID hospital workers in east London, working for private contractors ISS Mediclean and Medirest have scored a victory in their fight for a living wage.

AS STRIKES and demonstrations against public sector cuts sweep France, Germany, and Austria, the mainstream British press’s most prominent mention of this mass movement is in the gossip columns – apparently Madonna is upset because […]

"THIS is not a happy decision," said Israel’s right-wing prime minister Ariel Sharon last Sunday in Jerusalem. After a six-hour cabinet meeting which divided his Likud and far-right coalition allies, Sharon announced his reluctant acceptance […]

An attack on workers’ pensions by French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin has combined with other issues, particularly education decentralisation, to fuel a massive response by workers the length and breadth of France.

Socialist Party (CWI in Ireland) member Carmel Gates has been elected President of NIPSA, Northern Ireland’s largest trade union and the main public sector union. The election took place at NIPSA’s conference last week and […]

Almost two million Peruvian workers and peasants are on indefinite strike, demanding higher wages and lower taxes.