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Newsletter Jan-Feb 2005

Next General Meeting of APC (SA):

Saturday 19th February at 1pm -- all welcome
at FILEF, 15 Lowe Street, Adelaide [off Gouger St]
The video "A Space 4 Peace" will be shown, followed by general 'round-table' discussion. Tea/coffee & nibbles will be available.
Come along and join in discussion of the local/world situation and share ideas of actions which can be taken. Put the date in your diary now. Also put in the date of the March meeting which will be held on Sat.19th March. More details in March Newsletter.

Dr Shirley Randall AM Information about the Asia Pacific region.

Dr Shirley Randall AM: Information about the Asia Pacific region. 1 Feb 2005. The latest statistics from the Asian Tsunami are 230,000 confirmed dead, over five million have been displaced, and in need of ongoing assistance for survival. We may never be able to measure the full scale of the disaster: the precise numbers of dead, missing, and displaced and the utter decimation of lives, homes, economies, and communities. But it is painfully clear that this is one of the most devastating natural disasters in recent history. The tsunami recognized no distinctions of race, ethnicity, religion, class, gender, or age. It devastated poverty stricken coastal villages as well as luxurious beach resorts. It ripped through lands stricken by war as well as those rooted in peace. While the focus of the response has been rightly on saving lives and delivering immediate relief, long term comprehensive strategies for longer-term reconstruction and development, for the healing and rebuilding of shattered communities, economies, and capacities are needed.
Messages from my friends in India, Sri Lanka and Aceh tell of the local survival systems and mutual-aid networks established where women have been at the forefront in providing emotional, social, and economic recovery and at the heart of the relief efforts and the re-building of shattered communities. Women are also among the most vulnerable to rape, harassment and intimidation in rescue operations and temporary shelters. The outpouring of support for people in South Asia shows the kind of positive impact media coverage can have on efforts to bring relief to people in crisis. This needs to extend to the most underreported chronic conflicts today, in Chechnya, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Northern Uganda and the war on HIV/AIDS. Silence is the best ally of atrocities. Millions are living through catastrophes in places that are rarely mentioned.
In Vanuatu, cyclone Ivy in January 2004 was one of these underreported disasters, destroying dozens of schools among other buildings, and all the gardens in large areas. In central Vanuatu people were starving before the emergency aid arrived. It will take many years before the school infrastructure is at the same level as it was in 2003. In 2005 there is to be no recruitment of trainee teachers by the Institute of Teacher Education; instead all efforts are going into running in-service courses for the training of Year 7 and 8 teachers in the hope that the two year extension of basic education will indeed be introduced in 2006. In 2004 none of the Institute's graduates were employed by the Ministry of Education because of budget cuts, and the future of the 101 teachers who have just graduated seems equally uncertain. Meanwhile the Teachers' Union has threatened to call a national strike of teachers at the beginning of the new school year if action is not taken on a whole raft of claims on which no progress has been made. None of the recommendations in my European Union funded 2003 teacher salaries study report have been implemented.
Vanuatu politics have continued on their uncertain ways. Serge Vohor lasted only a short time as Prime Minister, coming unstuck by signing an extraordinary sole agreement with Taiwan despite a long standing One China policy. The deteriorating relationship between Australia and Vanuatu under Vohor's leadership has recovered under new Prime Minister Ham Lini. There are some competent new Ministers, including Sato Kilman in Foreign Affairs and Isabel Donald as Minister for the Comprehensive Reform Program, Women and Children.

Recent events throughout the Pacific region have certainly highlighted the large shadow that Australia now casts over the region. The region-sanctioned Australian, and to a lesser extent New Zealand and Fiji intervention, to restore law and order in the Solomon Islands by the use of troops and police, followed by activity in Nauru and Papua New Guinea, signified a substantial shift in the foreign policy of the Australian Government. Indeed, with Nauru and PNG on the brink of economic crisis, this activity appears to have been timely and necessary, particularly so in PNG, the region's second most populous country behind Australia, which will celebrate 30 years of independence in a bleak fashion with its economy in disarray, its resources dwindling and an exploding AIDS problem. A broad agreement reached on a draft constitution for PNG's province of Bougainville has raised hopes of an election for an autonomous province to end a decade of bloody conflict on the island, which has cost thousands of lives.
In Bangladesh, there is a continuing threat from terrorism. Attacks using explosive devices take place in locations throughout the country, with increasing frequency. Targets have included cinemas, festivals, shrines, markets and political gatherings. The largest incidents since 2002 occurred in August 2004, at the bombing of an opposition (Awami League) rally, which killed 18 people and injured hundreds. Examples of other incidents include an explosion on 7 August outside a hotel in Sylhet (where the Mayor of the City was attending a meeting) which killed one and injured at least 30; the President of the Khulna Press club was killed in a bomb attack at the entrance to his office and, in May, a bomb at the Hazrat Shahjalal shrine in Sylhet killed three and injured over 50 people including the British High Commissioner. The opposition calls frequent day-long strikes, and has recently staged demonstrations of hand-holding Bangladeshis in walls of protest from one end of the country to the other.
Considering what we are up against in the Bangladesh organizational culture, our team is making tremendous leaps forward in our gender mainstreaming project. My Bangladeshi colleagues are writing a Gender and Development Manual which I am editing and I have frequent opportunities for speaking and influencing staff and students at the four peak public service training institutions in the country. I have been invited by UNDP and the Government to stay for another year, my 65th, and then I may consider retiring again! Better to burn out than to rust out anyway I say. And I am fortunate to be enjoying some more interesting travel with two short advisory visits to The Gambia and a wonderful weekend attending the Kolkata Film Festival in India. I am in Vanuatu next week then in Australia for two weeks from 1 February . . . before leaving for Dhaka again on 13th February.
On the heath, Lear asks Gloucester: 'How do you see the world?' And Gloucester, who is blind, answers: 'I see it feelingly.'
The world news is not good these days but the news is never the end of the story. The news can be the truth that sets us free - not only to feel but to fight for the future we want. And the will to fight is an antidote to despair and a cure for cynicism. What we need is capacity to see, to feel, and then to act - as if the future depended on us. I think it does. Every blessing.
Dr Shirley Randell AM, Project Implementation Specialist, Capacity Building for Gender Mainstreaming Project, UNDP/Ministry of Women and Children Affairs, GPO Box 224, Dhaka 1207, Bangladesh Third Floor, 12 Gaznavi Road, College Gate, Mohammadpur, Dhaka 1207, Bangladesh 

Campaign Against Nuclear Dumping

We now meet each Monday, 5.30pm at Conservation Centre, 120 Wakefield St. Much of our work is focussed on the planned doubling or tripling of uranium production at Roxby. Contact: Jim - ph 8212 0182 0417 318368, jim.green@foe.org.au . On the web: www.geocities.com/olympicdam Keep in touch: subscribe to 'No Nukes News' (1-2 email newsletters monthly) by sending an email with NNN-subscribe in the subject to jim.green@foe.org.au

The Campaign Against Nuclear Dumping presents : The Motor Cycle Diaries 

A fundraiser through the Moonlight Cinema series to help stop the expansion of the Roxby Downs Uranium Mine. Friday 11th February, Botanic Park, Friends entrance via Hackney Rd. The film starts at sunset (9pm-ish) with pre-film supper and frisbee happening from 7pm. You will be able to find us easily from the Hackney Rd entrance - look for the anti-nuke banners. Tickets are $12 concession / $15 adults and must be pre-booked through Jeremy jsalad@senet.com.au or Beque ph 04 1983 1201. Deeelicious, wholesome snacks provided by CAND. Dress warm. The Motorcycle Diaries: This exquisitely shot movie traces the 8,000 kilometre journey of two friends from Buenos Aires to Peru in the year 1952. The plan of the pair is to travel on their unreliable motor-cycle for four months through Argentina, Chile and Peru. What they encounter along the way is the magnificent landscape of Southern America and the situation of the people living in the region. The experience will forever alter their view of the world. The movie is based on the journals of Alberto Granado, now a successful Biochemist living in Cuba and, Ernesto Guevara, who would later become known as 'Che Guevara' one of the figureheads of the 1959 Cuban Revolution.

Join the Nuclear Scumbags Tour on March 17 

Did you know that the Adelaide CBD hosts the offices of numerous companies and government organisations active in the nuclear industry? These include Heathgate (Beverely uranium mine); Southern Cross Resources (Honeymoon uranium mine), federal government offices; SA Parliament House & Primary Industries and Resources SA; PR firm Parsons Brinckerhoff; nuclear engineering firm Gutteridge, Haskins and Davey (involved in the botched 'clean-up of the Maralinga nuclear test site and in the push to build a nuclear dump in SA); and more! Visit, learn about and voice your opposition to these nuclear proponents at the Nuclear Scumbags Tour on March 17, 12 noon, meet at Victoria Square. Organised by Campaign Against Nuclear Dumping

Radioactive Exposure Tour 

The Campaign Against Nuclear Dumping and Friends of the Earth are at the early stages of planning a Radioactive Exposure Tour of South Australia in the second half of April, 2005. We hope to visit Indigenous communities affected by uranium mining and nuclear weapons testing; the Roxby and Beverley uranium mines; the Woomera rocket range; the mound springs; and Lake Eyre. For more information, contact Joel Catchlove: 0403 886 951, radtour05@yahoo.com.au . Or for Victorians, contact Michaela Stubbs: ph 03 9419 8700, 0437 757 362, michaela.stubbs@foe.org.au . 

Kyoto Protocol event

Parliament House steps, Wednesday February 16. On Wednesday 16 February the Kyoto Protocol becomes international law. The Conservation Council of SA in conjunction with Greenpeace is organising an event on the steps of Parliament House in recognition of this event. The theme of the event is 'Addressing the implications of Climate Change for SA'. We are asking leading figures, with an interest in climate change issues, to speak at this event. We are hoping to have Premier Rann, Sandra Kanck and others.. Accompanying the speakers will be banners highlighting a scenario in 2050 if there has been no effort to reduce emissions. We will be applauding Rann for his leadership on climate change issues and asking for some definite targets by the State Government beyond the Kyoto Protocol. Wednesday 16 February, 12.30pm -- Steps of Parliament House -- Catherine Way, Campaign Co-ordinator, Conservation Council of South Australia, Phone: (08) 8223 5155 email catherine.way@ccsa.asn.au 

Climate Change, Climate Justice & Environmental Refugees 

A Campaign CAAfé meeting organised by Friends of the Earth and Oxfam/Community Aid Abroad Thursday 24 February at 7.30pm -- Caos Cafe, 188 Hindley St Adelaide -- Coffee, drinks and meals available -- Cost: donation $5 / concession gold coin donation. Climate change is one of the most significant environmental justice issues ever encountered. While developed countries have historically been responsible for the most greenhouse gas pollution that has created human-induced climate change, the poor in developing countries are most vulnerable to climate change. In seeking climate justice we strive to add a human rights perspective to the climate change debate, a debate that to date has largely focused on science, consumption patterns and emission levels. Environmental catastrophes are one of the major reasons peoples are displaced, with more people forced to leave their homes because of environmental disaster than because of war. The Australian government must be brought under increased pressure to mitigate climate change, and to accept refugees on environmental grounds. Speakers: Stephanie Long is the national climate campaigner for Friends of the Earth, Aust. Steph recently organised the Climate Justice Tour in the eastern states, hosting community leaders and activists from several Pacific Island nations and Nigeria which highlighted the inequities of climate change impacts across the globe and gave voice to those most affected by climate change.
Cam Walker, national liaison officer for FoE Australia, will discuss climate change in the broader context of environ-mental politics and the growing likelihood of the creation of large numbers of climate refugees incoming years. Contact: Jim Green: ph 8212 0182, 0417 318368 jim.green@foe.org.au Friends of the Earth is a grassroots organisation working towards an ecologically sustainable and socially equitable future. For more information about Friends of the Earth Climate Justice Campaign see www.foe.org.au/climate 

Adelaide Opening of the Mike Leigh film "Vera Drake" (M)

 Thursday, 10th February -- Join members of the Coalition for Women's Right to Choose at an opening night screening for only $8. 6.30pm Palace Cinema, Rundle St East.  Vera Drake lives in a small flat with her husband Stan, and their grown-up son and daughter, Sid and Ethel. The family is not rich, but the Drakes have something money can't buy: they are a genuinely happy family. Vera has a secret - she performs abortions. Vera has never discussed this with her family. They are totally unaware of her activities, which are illegal in 1950s England. Her appointments are made through Lily, whom she has known since they were children together, and who now operates a black-market service for items such as tea and sugar. When the authorities finally find her out, Vera's world and family life rapidly unravel.

The 'Pro-Life' Lie -- People should be judged by the ideals they most loudly profess http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0202-20.htm

Feb 2, 2005 - CommonDreams.org - by Daniel C. Maguire
OK, 'Pro-Lifers,' here goes. Archbishop Tutu (would that we had even one bishop like him in the United States!) writes:
'Some 2 million children have died in dozens of wars during the past decade. This is more than three times the number of battlefield deaths of American soldiers in all their wars since 1776. Today, civilians account for more than 90 percent of war casualties.' Children are the prime casualties of modern war.
As Professor Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University writes:
'Children in urban war zones die in vast numbers, not just due to violence, but also from diarrhea, respiratory infections and other causes, owing to unsafe drinking water, lack of refrigerated foods, and acute shortages of blood and basic medicines in clinics and hospitals.' Pregnant women and their fetuses suffer from these same lethal deprivations and pregnant women and their fetuses are being bombed in their homes. If you who sanctimoniously wear the 'pro-life' banner were really pro-life-and pro-fetus, that would bother you and we would be hearing your voices raised powerfully in peace protests around the world. We don't. Therefore we must conclude that you are not 'pro-life' and that if you say you are, you are liars. American military leaders in Iraq have been quoted as saying 'we don't do body counts.'
The respected British journal The Lancet did a body-count of civilians killed in Iraq. They concluded that there are more than 100,000 civilians deaths, most due to U.S. Military action. President Bush is responsible for those murders because he entered this war without the Declaration of War that the constitution (Article one, Section 8) requires. A cowardly Congress in a week of infamy (October 3-10, 2002) limply handed over their war-declaring rights to him, giving the president open-ended authority to use unrestricted power, which could mean nuclear weapons whenever he alone deemed it appropriate. How did those who call them selves 'pro-life' respond to this appalling assault on the Constitution and on life. They voted en masse for George W. Bush, the slaughter-master of Iraq, the killer of civilian men, women and children, including pregnant women and their fetuses in a war that Pope John Paul called a 'defeat for humanity.' Mr. Bush said he saw their vote as an endorsement of his war. He was right. The election was a chance to vote against that war, but, overwhelmingly the so called 'pro-life' vote was for war.
Can you understand why we call you liars? Sister Joan Chittister writes of a front page, large four-color picture in The Irish Times of a small Iraqi girl. 'Her little body was a coil of steel. She sat knees up, cowering, screaming madly into the dark night. Her white clothes and spread hands and small tight face were blood-spattered. The blood was the blood of her father and mother, shot through the car window in Tal Afar by American soldiers while she sat beside her parents in the car, her four brothers and sisters in the back seat.' Indifference to this and to all those war crimes like it, on the part of anyone is criminal and sinful in the extreme. Indifference to it by those who canonize themselves with the 'pro-life' insignia shown by their recent vote for more of it, is even worse. Such hypocrisy should be called by its name. Its name is fraud. Its name is lying, lying under the very banner of 'life.'
-- Daniel C. Maguire is a Catholic Theologian and Professor of Moral Theology at Marquette University. He can be contacted at maguired@juno.com

Dear friends, As you can see from below Australia is increasingly being sucked into the US vortex. Now we have a very major military deployment just up the road from Byron Bay. The military have already begun their propaganda campaign in Qld; we have to counter it ASAP.
Brisbane anti-bases group has planned fortnightly vigils outside the Defence Force Recruitment Centre stating next Friday Feb11 from 4-6 (410 Ann St Brisbane) until June . We are also proposing a Peace Convergence - at Shoalwater Bay and a Peace Fleet.... [more details later]
--Gareth Smith & Maxine Caron, Byron Bay NSW 2481

Defence launches info campaign for communities near base

CANBERRA, Nov 30 AAP -AAP General News (Australia) The Australian Defence Force (ADF) will tell central Queensland residents what to expect during an upcoming major Australian -US exercise program. Australia and the United States have agreed to conduct joint exercises on three Australian bases in Queensland and the Northern Territory. Today Defence Minister Robert Hill said the Joint Combined Training Centre (JCTC) project was still being developed with specific projects still to be approved by both governments in coming months. Senator Hill said as the project developed more information would be made available to the central Queensland community in the lead up to Exercise Talisman Sabre at Shoal-water Bay in 2007. He said community information sessions to be held in central Queensland this week would be part of an ongoing community consultation process to be carried out by Defence. "I welcome today's release of the Central Queensland University economic report showing that Defence injects more than $52 million into the Central Queensland economy and generates 728 full time equivalent jobs," he said in a statement. "This is a great economic boost to the region which benefits in areas such as accommodation, retail and hospitality." Under the JCTC concept, Queensland's Shoalwater Bay Training Area and the Northern Territory's Bradshaw Field Training Area and Delamere Range facility would be upgraded and subsequently linked with compatible US training facilities. Senator Hill said the JCTC initiative would provide vital training experience for the ADF as well as providing a valuable boost to local Communities. "Talisman Sabre 2007 has been programmed for some time and will see Australian and US military personnel undertake land, sea, and air training in a variety of simulated scenarios," he said. "The Talisman Sabre series is a major exercise. Other training activities supported by JCTC facilities may be much smaller and include exercises by units such as Rockhampton's 42 RQR." Senator Hill said the government appreciated that Shoalwater Bay was an important heritage and environmental asset and Defence was aware of its responsibility to protect and manage this land.
---2004 AAP Information Services Pty Limited (AAP) or its Licensors.

Iraq's farmers shackled to US corporations

The Bush administration trumpets democracy and freedom while covertly locking-in Iraq's farmers to transgenic and terminator seed legislation promulgated by the Coalition Provisional Authority's order 81. This is a radical departure from patent law under Saddam Hussein which prohibited private ownership of biological resources. The new patent law restricts seed use to the biotech corporations' "protected" crop varieties; heirloom seeds, garnered after each harvest since Babylonian times, are banned. Widespread contamination with "depleted" uranium increases the likelihood that plant breeders will discover new crop varieties, protected for 20 years under order 81. While they celebrate their good fortune we should all be sickened by profiteering posing as democracy and Australia's uncritical part in it.
--Gareth Smith & Maxine Caron

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