Europe

ON 14 January an estimated 70,000 Turkish Cypriots – one-quarter of the northern Cypriot population – marched through divided Nicosia in support of a United Nations (UN) plan to re-unify the divided island.

MATTHEW RICHARDSON from Lincoln reports how, led by a fire tender and carrying a coffin to symbolise the demise of the fire service, 200 firefighters and supporters marched through the centre of Lincoln.

In January the Scottish Executive attempted to put an amendment – the abolition of Section 19 – through parliament which would have made it easier to to close fire stations in Scotland. It would have […]

"It was the only genuinely anti-war amendment. Both the SNP and the Liberal-Democrat amendments would have given the sanction to the UN Security Council to go to war. The Security Council is dominated by the […]

"This movement today, not Tony Blair, is speaking for the British people," declared Aslef member Andrew Murray, opening the Stop the War national conference. 800 activists came from local coalitions, political parties, trade unions and […]

Even over Christmas and on New Year’s Day, there have been demonstrations of protest, with blockades, in a number of factories of the Fiat group (like Termini Imerese and Mirafiori).

Only two months after the swearing in of the Red-Green government, that had been re-elected to office only by the narrowest of margins, Chancellor Gerhard Schröder (SPD) threatened his resignation. Speaking to the Executive of […]

The FIAT workers’ battle has taken on a European dimension. A two hour European strike of FIAT group workers has been called for 16/12, against the programme of group `restructuring’, already underway.

Copenhagen, the capital of Denmark, was a city of protests last weekend. The reason for this was that Denmark was the holder of the EU presidency and all the European Union leaders were in town. […]

No ai processi politici !Verità su Genova! Libertà per tutti gli arrestati !No al governo Berlusconi!

EU/EMU kan inte bli något annat än storföretagens och de rikas vapen mot arbetare och ungdomar. Inom EU är det direktörer som bestämmer och politikerna som verkställer. Toppmötet i Köpenhamn kommer att bli ännu en […]

The early general elections in Austria held on 24 November saw a huge victory for the conservative Peoples party (ÖVP) of chancellor Schüssel, getting 42,3 % and becoming the largest party for the first time […]

MANY FIREFIGHTERS and other workers will have looked on bewildered as the FBU (Fire Brigade Union) executive council called off the eight-day firefighters’ strike due to begin on 4 December.

"THE GOVERNMENT has completely lost control of the agenda. This is no longer just a dispute between the FBU and the government: it has descended into a fight between the government and the whole union […]

Eye-witness report from Henry Silke, with references to the Irish links of the local fascists.

Camera crews, reporters and members of the International Socialists (CWI) along with other Scottish Socialist Party members waited outside the Blackness Fire Station in Dundee for the 6 o’clock start to the first national fire […]

FORTY-THOUSAND PEOPLE from all over Europe flooded into Florence, Italy, for the European Social Forum, nearly double the number the organisers had been expecting.

The many hundreds of thousands of Italian protesters were joined by tens of thousands of foreign participants in the European Social Forum assembly and by others, like the French CGT union, who came to Italy […]

From 1-3 November, the national conference of the German section of the CWI took place. It was the biggest conference of the German section ever.

"IT SEEMS that every 25 years when the Queen has a jolly, we have a strike."

In Naples, as everywhere else in Italy on 18 October, the general strike called by the Cgil trade union federation got support from a wide range of other organisations like Cobas, Sin.Cobas, the unemployed movement, […]

Last week’s general strike in Florence was very successful, with many factories practically empty. Local transport was on strike in the afternoon, when nearly everything stopped.

As anticipated, the Dutch government consisting of the Christian Democrats, the CDA, the liberal VVD and the hard right LPF (List Pim Fortuyn, whose leader was shot dead last May), collapsed on the 16 October. […]

Yesterday’s general strike surpassed all expectations as literally hundreds of thousands of angry workers and youth took to the streets in 120 cities across Italy. This was the second general strike in defence of article […]

The Austrian section of the CWI (SLP) is standing in the 24 November general elections in Vienna and is in sixth place on the ‘voting list 6’. This is higher than the Liberals and a […]

VOTING TAKES place this month for the general secretary of NIPSA, Northern Ireland’s biggest trade union with a membership across all areas of the civil and public service. It can play a crucial role in […]

PEOPLE HAD been expecting this suspension and now fear that it could be permanent. We will now likely face a long drawn out political crisis with little hope of any agreement at the end.

The Summer months in Italy saw only a temporary suspension of the open warfare between the classes provoked by the hated Berlusconi government. Now, with the World Cup and the August holidays well and truly […]

Today (October 5) 10,000 people, mainly youth, took part in an anti war demonstration called by the Florence Social Forum. This was part of a national day of action which saw over sixty demonstrations and […]

A SEA of up to 400,000 protesters flooded into the Embankment, London on 28 September to say ’No’ to war against Iraq.

Joan Littlewood, the radical theatre innovator who transformed British drama in the 1950s and 1960s, died on 20 September, aged 87.

"Time for a change in Germany", was the title of last week’s right wing magazine, The Economist (London). This reflected the wish of the international and German capitalists for a new coalition government of the […]

Around 1,000 people gathered on 17 September at The Hague in the Netherlands to protest against the plans by the new coalition government (which includes the populist right wing Pim Fortuyn List) and to also […]

LAST FEBRUARY, 70,000 people went to the World Social Forum (WSF) in Porto Alegre, Brazil. It was set up in opposition to the World Economic Forum of government ministers that took place at the same […]

At least one quarter of the Czech Republic was flooded last week after flash floods. 14 people died because of the disaster (some of them did not leave flooded houses, and one died when a […]

New figures published last month by the Pesticides Residue Committee (PRC) for the British government have raised serious concerns over the safety of fresh fruit and vegetables, both imported and UK grown produce. The government […]

Months after the Dutch general elections, which saw dramatic gains for the populist right wing Lijst Pim Fortuyn (LPF), a new coalition government has finally been formed. The administration’s proposed policies are clearly to the […]

US PRESIDENT George Bush has rewarded his right-wing, anti-abortion Christian fundamentalist backers by blocking $34 million family planning aid to the United Nations Population Fund.

With a chant of  ’Genoa Libera’ 150,000 youth and young workers marched through the streets of Genova on Saturday. They marched to commemorate the year since the G8 summit which saw a police riot and […]

FIGHTING BROKE out at last weekend’s annual Orange Order parade at Drumcree. Demonstrators threw missiles at police, resulting in 24 injured as well as two civilians. However, Drumcree is not the issue it was. The […]

The signing last Friday afternoon of a deal with the government and employers by the leaders of the two smaller trade union federations in Italy – the Uil and Cisl – has sparked a new […]

The crisis surrounding Mirafiori car plant and the whole Fiat Empire is sending shockwaves through Italian society. In America they say, “What’s good for General Motors is good for the USA”. In Italy the same […]

International solidarity needed!

The BBC current affairs programme, Panorama, recently broadcast a two part investigation on Northern Ireland that revealed more details of the dirty undercover war carried out for decades by the ‘security forces’. Most of the […]

It has now become clear that the Austrian TUC is preparing for a de-mobilisation of the bus workers action. High up union officials have led the protests and a meeting of the TUC national body […]

"The sad statistics about African economic performance have become so familiar as almost to lose their ability to shock: that, for example, more than half the population lives on less than $1 a day, 250 […]

Hundreds of thousands took to the streets in Seville last Saturday in a massive anti-capitalist protest. The government and the police desperately tried to play down the turnout. The local police claimed up to 60,000 […]

In diesem Kampf gegen Studiengebühren geht es um mehr. Es geht um die Fragen: Wer hat in Zukunft noch Zugang zu Bildung? Zu wie viel Bildung? Und zu welchen Bedingungen?