Solidarity 034, 10 July 2003

Guantanamo: Oppose the torture! Oppose Kangaroo courts!

By Gerry Byrne Two British citizens Feroz Abbasi and Moazzam Begg, facing a secret US military tribunal in Guantanamo Bay will be given a choice: ‘confess or die’—plead guilty and accept a 20-year prison sentence, or be executed if found guilty. President George Bush made a formal ruling last week that the men would face trial before a military tribunal at which US military officers would serve as judge, jury and prosecution. More than 200 MPs have signed a parliamentary motion calling for them to be returned to Britain, amid fears they will not get a fair trial. David Blunkett is said to...

George Orwell: imagining the totalitarians

Chris Hickey concludes his feature on the politics and work of George Orwell. For the first part see Part 1 George Orwell: documenting the Spanish Civil War Written on the cusp of the Cold War Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four launched Orwell’s international reputation and made him the most politically fought over English writer of the 20th century. Written in the form of a fable, Animal Farm is a satirical demolition of the 1940s’ Soviet Union. In the book, the animals on Manor Farm (Czarist Russia) overthrow the humans (the capitalists) to set up Animal Farm (Soviet Russia). They are led...

Frontline POETRY: Fantasy of an African Boy

Fantasy of an African boy by James Berry Such a peculiar lot we are, we people without money, in daylong yearlong sunlight, knowing money is somewhere, somewhere. Everybody says it’s a big bigger brain bother now, money. Such millions and millions of us don’t manage at all without it, like war going on. And we can’t eat it. Yet without it our heads alone stay big, as lots and lots do, coming from nowhere joyful, going nowhere happy. We can’t drink it up. Yet without it we shrivel when small and stop for ever where we stopped, as lots and lots do. We can’t read money for books. Yet without it...

CWU: Vote Pete Keenlyside

By a postal worker While Post Office chairman Alan Leighton and his mates award themselves lottery win-sized bonuses, postal workers are being asked to help Royal Mail save money by losing jobs and extending their delivery rounds. The most disturbing thing about the so-called "Tailored Delivery System" (TDS) is that the deal is being pushed by union leaders like Dave Ward, the newly elected Deputy General Secretary (Postal). Though it is welcome that Ward has promised to lead a fight over basic pay, a wage rise would be no consolation to the 12,000 postal workers facing redundancy as a result...

Civil Service leadership vow to fight on pensions

By John Moloney, Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) executive, personal capacity A joint left/centre electoral slate has won the National Executive elections in the civil service union PCS. On a 14% turnout (down on last year) the slate won 34 seats to the right wing’s nine. The result sees the end of a long period of ultra-right control in the union and should open the way for a concerted fightback. The union — probably uniquely in the trade union movement — now has a left-wing General Secretary (Mark Serwotka) and President and a left/centre National Executive. All this is a far cry...

Aceh repression

Stop arms sales to Indonesia By Harry Glass Alarmed at Indonesia's bloody war in Aceh, its military campaign in West Papua and the brutality of its armed forces, human rights organisations, peace groups, and anti-arms trade campaigners are calling for an international military embargo on Indonesia. A statement signed by 100 organisations from Europe, America, Asia and Australasia urges governments to embargo the supply of military, security and police equipment to Indonesia. It also calls for an immediate end to the military operations in Aceh and West Papua. The Indonesian military gets Hawk...

Activist debate: Can we drink Coca Cola?

By Mark Osborn The Colombia Solidarity Campaign (CSC) has called a big protest in London, 22 July, to mark an international day of action against Coca Cola (6pm, Piccadilly Circus). The CSC says: “The World Social Forum has declared 22 July as the International Day of Action against Coca Cola and the start of a year-long boycott of their products, in solidarity with Sinaltrainal, the Colombian food and drink workers’ union. “The union has suffered the assassination of eight of their leaders, killed by death squads hired by Coca Cola’s management, since 1990. The union has also seen the...

A lady in trousers

Clive Bradley looks at the life and career of Katharine Hepburn Katharine Hepburn, who died at the beginning of July at the age of 96, was not alone among her generation of Hollywood aristocratic ladies in preferring to wear trousers. But the other two women most associated with such manly apparel-Greta Garbo and Marlene Dietrich-were European, so they probably didn't count. Hepburn, on the other hand, was from a patrician New England family, educated at an Ivy League university, and even spoke in that almost-British accent which marks out the American upper bourgeoisie. Nevertheless, her...

Iraq: still far from democracy

By Clive Bradley The American and British forces now occupying Iraq originally promised a quick move to government by the Iraqis themselves. Now a 25-member 'Governing Council' has been formed, meeting for the first time on 13 July. The chief US administrator in Iraq, L Paul Bremer III, has a veto over all its decisions. It inaugurated the new era by banning some Ba'thist public holidays. In a country where many workers have not been paid for weeks, where there is often no electricity or basic services, and where even the semblance of public order has yet to be restored, most Iraqis must have...

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