Tag: INTERNATIONAL

UP AND ATOM

IT’S A BAD time to be in the nuke biz. Remember that global recession that we’re apparently out of? Well, the con-alition government’s nuclear plans (for an extra 10 power stations by 2025) are currently showing the cracks, as three catchy-named nuclear engineering companies from both France and China – Areva, China National Nuclear Power Corporation and China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group – have pulled out of buying Horizon Nuclear Power (planning reactors in Wylfa and Oldbury), due to economic doubts. Iberdrola, Spanish owners of Scottish Power (with designs on Sellafield), are also having second thoughts.

Frenchies E.D.F. are also in financial straits, but that’s not all their problems, as anti-nuclear campaigners have recently finished their ‘Reclaim Hinkley’ weekend action camp. Hinkley Point in Bridgwater is to house two untried-and-tested brand nuke reactors, as well as a storage facility to hold radioactive waste for at least 160 years, assuming some other authority agrees to later take it off their hands. The camp lasted from 5th to 8th of October, and was set up on occupied land nearby, complete with catering, wooden H.Q., solar panels and between 70 and 120 eco-warriors at any time.

After the obligatory day of talks and action training, proceedings ended with a bang on the Monday, as they led a colourful march – complete with toxic yellow barrels rolled through the streets – to the power station’s gates and did a ‘die-in’ blockade. And then it was all on E.D.F.’s proposed Hinkley C site for a jolly mass trespass, where 50-plus surrounded the five mile perimeter, dodged G4S goons, hung massive banners, sang, waved placards, and lobbed 577 seedbombs (the number of days since the Fukushima Dai-chi disaster in Japan). While all that song and dance went on, 30 managed to scale or breach the 8′ high barbed wire-topped fence, and planted wildflowers; six were arrested, and one got a suspected broken arm for their troubles.

South West Against Nuclear say that the £60bn earmarked for ‘new nuclear’ needs instead to be diverted to energy reduction and renewables development, for a cleaner, greener future. Maybe the government will listen?

http://tinyurl.com/8zeqwyz

http://theoccupiedtimes.co.uk/?p=7265

http://tinyurl.com/9ejqr5h

http://www.thisissomerset.co.uk/pictures/Photos-Stop-Hinckley-Protest-pictures/pictures-17046040-detail/pictures.html

http://stopnewnuclear.org.uk/node/1500

http://www.thisissomerset.co.uk/Video-Anti-nuclear-campaigners-begin-Stop-Hinkley/story-17048137-detail/story.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/oct/03/british-nuclear-china-investors-pull-out?newsfeed=true

MINE, ALL MINE

OVER THE LAST couple of months, the news has been full of bloody stories from the mining communities of South Africa. We first of all heard of the tragic deaths of over 30 striking miners gunned down by cops, whose government bosses then tried to use Apartheid-era laws to place legal blame on the miners themselves. After that, the focus soon shifted to stories of ‘extremism’ from striking workers, threatening both bosses and scab workers (like they don’t deserve it) and holding the economy to ransom. Then the news went dead. What most people in this country will not know is that after all the suffering, the miners won a complete victory, securing the 22% pay increase they had been striking for.

In what seems to be corporate news policy, they are willing to show us stories of workers getting bravely beaten or being ‘unreasonable’ and violent themselves, but find it impossible to tell the public when ordinary working people organise themselves and win: it would set a bad example. But the good news does not stop at the miners’ victory. Following their example, protests and strikes have erupted across the country, with everyone from teachers to gold miners taking action to better their lives. Since Apartheid ended, wealth in South Africa has still been controlled by the same elite, now with a smattering of added colour, and the workers, overwhelmingly black, still find themselves in dire, increasing poverty. The victory of the miners, though won at a bloody cost, has sent shockwaves through the working class, which is now gearing up for a fight which could see some of the great wealth of their country ripped away from the rich few and taken back by those who work, sweat and die to create it. More to follow.

 

NO JUSTICE, NO PIECE

ACTIVISTS ACROSS THE southwest picketed Domino’s stores back in mid-September to show solidarity with striking pizza delivery workers in Australia. Pickets from Bristol to the South Coast were well received by the public, who were shocked to learn that greedy Domino’s bosses are slashing pay for Auzzie delivery drivers by 19%, adding up to a whole lot of lost dough, all with the collaboration of their boss-friendly union. In disgust, the workers set up their own union, affiliated to the anarchist International Workers Association and have since been striking, taking direct action and calling for solidarity actions all over the world. Bristol Domino’s workers, initially concerned about the demo, soon became more supportive when they learned that it was all to support their antipodean mates. Management on the other hand flew off the handle, angrily berating protesters and going to the top(ping) by bringing in a regional manager to the Bristol demo (brilliant news, as now the high-ups know what people think of their thin-crust pay and conditions). Meanwhile, solidarity protests cropped up in other parts of the U.K., as well as France, Germany, (home of the pizza) Italy and (home of the bastardised pizza) America. With every solidarity action reported to be boosting the morale of the Auzzie drivers, it can only be a matter of time before the Domino’s bosses get stuffed (crust) and the workers get a fair slice of the pizza-pie. Messages of solidarity and info about how to get stuck in can be left at: http://www.facebook.com/GeneralTransportWorkersAssociation

 

LETTERS BEGIN

Well, it’s our first issue, and we’ve already started receiving fanmail. Or is it hatemail? Either way, that’s progress. This month, Shaun from Bristol takes a strongly worded swipe at the rape apologists clamouring to dismiss serious sexual allegations against sinister-eyed Aussie empire-embarrasser Julian Assange:

DEAR F**KERS,

YOU may well be aware of the ongoing news story of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and allegations of a sexual assault in Sweden. It’s big news right now as the case has been somewhat complicated by concerns that if he faces questioning over the case in Sweden he may then be sent on to the U.S.A. regarding his website leaking a load of really important information that has pissed off America no end. On top of this, Assange has attempted to prove his innocence by trying to run away to Ecuador.

It seems every one who has (but probably shouldn’t be allowed) access to the internet has had their say on what should happen to Assange. This includes everyone’s least favourite Saddam Hussein-stroking, cat impressionist Big Brother evictee, M.P. George Galloway.

When referencing the situation, where allegedly Julian Assange had unprotected sex with a SLEEPING WOMAN, without her permission, saying this was not rape and instead referred to it as “bad sexual etiquette”, saying: “…even taken at its worst, if the allegations made by these two women were true, 100% true, and even if a camera in the room captured them, they don’t constitute rape.”

So I thought I would take this opportunity to speak to you all and say penetrating someone with your penis without express verbal permission IS rape. From the Sexual Offences Act, 2003: “A is guilty of rape when A intentionally penetrates the vagina, anus or mouth of B (the complainant) with his penis; B does not consent to the penetration; and A does not reasonably believe that B consents.”

It doesn’t matter if you have had sex before, or you were both drunk or they are your wife, girlfriend, partner, fuckbuddy or whatever. It doesn’t matter if they got naked or they “seemed up for it” or “it would ruin the mood”, just fucking ask. “Would you like to have sex with me?” It’s easy, and trust me, there is nothing hotter than when you partner replies “Oh Yes Please!”, so just do it. If you don’t, it’s rape.

And if she or he (yes, it works both ways) say “No”, then it’s no! In fact if they say anything other than “Yes”, then it’s no. Silence means no, “Maybe” means no, “I’m not sure” means no, “You’ve/I’ve been drinking” means no. No persuasion, no complaining, no coercion, no sulking, no forcing. Getting them to say “Yes” through coercion is not consent, it’s rape. So next time you want to have sex, just ask, after all, it’s polite.

Shaun Phillips – Bristol

 

OCCUPATIONAL HAZARDS

 WORKERS FROM THE threatened Remploy program occupied their manager’s office in protest to the planned closure of their workplaces. Remploy is a government-run group of workplaces, providing employment for people with a range of disabilities. By the end of the year, the Coalition plans to close more than half of Remploy’s 54 sites, resulting in the loss of over 1,700 jobs. As part of its brutal program of austerity, and in keeping with its passion for hitting the poorest and most vulnerable hardest, they insist that the workers should be able to find ‘normal’ jobs in private industry. The facts paint a different picture – following the last round of jobs cuts at Remploy two years back, 85% of workers are still unemployed. After the most recent round of factory closures, some bosses didn’t even have the guts to let the workers – some with learning difficulties – know face-to-face that they were being made redundant. The hypocrisy is doubly hard to bear when it comes from a government attempting to ride a wave of popularity off the back of the Paralympics, while tossing disabled workers – including Brian Davies, a Remploy worker who has won four Paralympic gold medals – on the scrapheap.

On August 23rd, having booked a meeting to talk with a senior Remploy boss in Leicester, Remploy workers decided it would be more productive to occupy his office, refusing to leave until the Disabilities Minister, Maria Miller, committed to further negotiations before the closing of any factories! The workers are determined to fight back, with five days of strike action planned for early this month. They have called for solidarity in their fight for dignified employment; if you would like to support the Remploy workers, check out their website at http://www.remployworkers.info.

On the other hand, what to do when strikes and occupations fail? Well, we hope Remploy won’t follow the burning example of the Maruti Suzuki carplant staff in India. On the 9th July, following over a year of wage disputes and a poorly-timed nasty comment from a supervisor, the workers kicked off, ransacked offices, and then apparently locked the execs in a room and lit them up! Nine police were injured in the battle, an H.R. Manager fried, and at least 99 arrests were made. But honestly, we’ve all dreamed bout torching the boss, right?

http://rt.com/news/india-suzuki-plant-clashes-567

 

THEORY CORNER: WHY DO THEY ONLY CALL IT CLASS WAR WHEN WE FIGHT BACK?

Each month, Theory Corner will look at and explain a different idea or action. This month, we will look at what is meant by the often misunderstood term ‘class war’.

EACH TIME A group of workers walk out on strike, or ordinary people target or criticise a boss or millionaire, right-wing rags such as the Sun and Daily Mail start screaming about ‘Class War’. To an extent, they’re right, but that’s only half the story.

Class war is not just about ordinary people attacking the rich and powerful: rather, it is a fact of everyday life that gets played out in hundreds of different ways, every day. We live in a society divided into classes. At its most basic, there are two broad classes – bosses and workers. It is rare that these two classes co-exist happily, as the power and wealth of one depends on the oppression and poverty of the other. When a boss increases his profits, he does so at the expense of the worker, through increased workload, pay reductions, redundancies or other cost-cutting measures. When a worker wins a strike for more pay, or against bullying, she does so at the expense of some of the wealth or power of the employer. ‘Class war’ simply describes the fact that there can be no real peace in the world while one class owns all the wealth and power and the other, far larger, class has none.

Class war is all around us all of the time. When the government allows big banks to get away with fraud and financial crimes, but bangs up ordinary people for the same thing, this is class war. When the rich send in police to break up a strike or demonstration, this is also class war. In this class war, most of us are fighting our corner. Sometimes, this involves large actions like strikes or workplace sabotage. Often, it is small things like pinching supplies from work or pulling a sickie. This may not sound like much, but would we need to do it if we were treated fairly at work?

So, class war is not just riots or strikes, it is a description of the tension that arises from the fact that the rich tries to maintain its power and privilege at our expense. Sometimes, we win, sometimes the boss class wins, but class war is something that is all around us all the time – not something that some of us have chosen to fight, but a struggle that is going on whether we like it or not. The question is, how can we, the ordinary people, win? As Warren Buffet, investment banker and one of the world’s 10 wealthiest men likes to say, “There’s class warfare all right, but it’s (often) my class, the rich class, that’s making war”.

 

NO NUKES IS GOOD NUKES

AS ENERGY SUCKRETARY Ed Davey is planning a new Energy Bill this Autumn, Somersettites are getting a little hot under the collar. The basis for the new Bill is ‘Contracts for Difference’, a form of fancy new subsidies for ‘low-carbon’ companies (read: nuclear power), where suppliers are guaranteed long-term contracts with a pre-agreed, artificially inflated price. Taxes, taxes! Not only are we going to be shaken down with £60 billion of extra taxes and higher bills, but, as we’re talking nuclear power, our kids and our kids’ kids will be sitting on a shitty legacy of radioactive waste.

But, we’re not all gonna take this lying down: in Japan, following Fukushima, between 75,000 and 170,000 are on the streets every Friday night calling for an end to nuclear power. Over here, back in March, 1,000 or so blockaded the entrance to Hinkley Point power station in opposition to E.D.F. Energy’s diabolical plans. The Stop New Nuclear Alliance is holding a non-violent weekend protest camp in Somerset from 5th to 9th October, with a demo in Bridgwater on the 6th, and a mass trespass of the proposed Hinkley C site on the 8th. Premature E.D.F. aren’t even waiting to receive planning permission before they Eagerly Destroy Fields in preparation, so trespassers will be sowing the seeds of resistance by planting wildflowers and other native species. If your dream Monday day-out involves yawning for hours in a police cell, this is the one for you!

26 years after the Chernobyl disaster, just 20% of Belarussian children are born healthy. For the first time in over half a century, Japan is nuclear-free, but the people are still footing the bill: the Tepco corporation was re-nationalised due to the cost of compensation and stabilising the reactors, people are still living in contaminated areas, and people are encouraged to eat radioactive food to support Fukushima farmers: the triple meltdown is still in full swing. Spiralling costs for new reactors in France and Finland are also causing a chain reaction of financial judders around the world. Over here, several Chinese companies are now considering building new stations at Wylfa in Anglesey and Oldbury in Gloucestershire. At Hinkley C, the toxic sludge will need to be stored on site for over 100 years: the dangers associated with flooding, accidental leakage and terrorist attack (real terrorists, not just the ones handing out leaflets) are apparently totally unacceptable.

But ecos say that a future without unclear power is not just a dream: Germany has set out a nuclear-free roadmap that is safe and affordable enough to reach its commitment of 80% carbon reduction by 2050; if they can do it, why not us? The way forward is through energy reduction and greater investment to make renewable energy fit for the 21st century. Further details of the protest weekend can be found at: http://stopnewnuclear.org.uk.

http://stopnewnuclear.org.uk
http://bristol.indymedia.org/article/710586

 

SPAIN IN THE ARSE

Spanish Unions Get All Robin Hood Against The Cuts

ACROSS EUROPE, MILLIONS of ordinary people have been fighting back against massive cuts to jobs, wages and welfare. There have been protests, occupations, strikes, direct actions and even the odd riot. But now, members of the Spanish field workers’ union, Sindicato Andaluz de Trabajadores, along with supporters, have stepped it up by raiding one supermarket and forcing another to ‘donate’ most of its produce, before distributing the looted groceries to impoverished families. Hundreds of union members entered supermarkets in the towns of Seville and Cadiz, filled up their trolleys and, after a tussle with security, left without paying. The food was distributed via locally co-ordinated food banks. The actions saw only two arrests, one being the mayor of Marinaleda, who stated “If I end up in jail because I highlighted the crisis, it will be an honour.” A second supermarket raider said “we are taking some food and giving it to families who are having a really hard time. If this is stealing, then I’m guilty.” These food runs follow in the footsteps of similar actions by Greek anarchists which have become increasingly widespread over the past five years.

The week after the supermarket sweep, hundreds of union members in hard-hit Andalusia (where unemployment has risen to 40%) broke down the fencing of an estate owned by the Duke of Segobore, occupied the land and set up a ‘communal agriculture project’. Diego Canamero, of the Andalusian Union of Workers, said: “We’re here to denounce a social class who leave such a place to waste”. The lavish well-kept gardens, house, and pool are left empty, as the Duke lives in Seville, more than 60 miles away. Commenting on this, an unemployed farm-worker taking part in the occupation said “Nobody lives here now, but the sprinklers are functioning and keeping the lawns beautifully green. Just imagine how many farmers’ wages you could pay instead of watering empty gardens.”

Mostly, the situation in Spain is dire, with the top 10% earning 12 times the average wage. Unemployment stands at 25%, higher amongst the youth, and 22% of families have plunged below the poverty line. And if planned cuts over the next decade go ahead, things look set to get much worse.

In light of this, the looters and occupiers have realised that, while protesting against cuts is important, if we are to survive, we need to start taking what we need from the rich, who would let us go homeless and starve rather than sharing the wealth. All we should care about is the fact that we need food, housing, healthcare and, hell, some entertainment once in a while, and we still live in a continent of plenty. Despite (or because of) the recession, whilst we’ve all been tightening our belts, the richest in our country – and all across Europe – have been hoarding even more wealth. Soon the time will come when we have to start taking some of it back for ourselves: trip to Tesco’s anyone?

 

PRAYERS UNANSWERED

WELL, IT’S BEEN all over the mainstream news, but you might have missed it. Since their sold-out performance at the Christ the Saviour Cathedral in Moscow on the 21st February, it-girls Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Alyokhina and Yekaterina Samutsevich from the feminist punk band Pussy Riot have received two years’ jail time each, charged with ‘hooliganism’. Well, we all know a screechy punk dirge can be a bit of an earful, but it wasn’t that bad! Their punk prayer implored the Virgin Mary to “rid us of Putin”, protesting the Russian Orthodox Church’s support for the Russian leader. The global media hinged upon the state’s disregard for legal process and breach of free speech, wherein the defendants were imprisoned, refused bail, denied food and sleep, and given just three days to prepare their defence. Amnesty International rightly express concern that these young women will now face labour camps, physical and sexual abuse.

But all over fundaMENTAList Russia, bloggers and other anti-Putin elements also face arrest, whilst the supporting church makes massive land-grabs. It’s a moot point whether Pussy Riot have been singled out for maltreatment or not – human rights violations are routine in Russian and former U.S.S.R. jails, where conditions are even shitter than it was during the Soviet era. In Kazakhstan, 12 oil workers were jailed after thousands demonstrated for better pay during a bitter seven month strike, and all their appeals for release were refused. Scores were killed and wounded in the town of Zhanaozen after security opened fire on demonstrators, and survivors are now being persecuted for allegedly ‘inciting social conflict’. The show-trial of the band came to symbolise repression in totalitarian Russia, but even outside of the warzones like Chechnya, Dagestan and Ingushetia torture, detention without trial and murder by the state are par for the course.

In the meantime, we express solidarity with the three imprisoned, as well as the two Pussy Rioters who have now successfully escaped Russia, and the 12 of the collective who remain to continue their work.

indymedia.org.uk/en/2012/07/498480.html
https://network23.org/aberdeenanarchists/we-are-all-pussy-riot
http://www.schnews.org.uk/stories/ShowTrial-Girls
www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-19385936