V For Vendetta // A For Anarchy

Posted on March 24, 2006 by @ndy

[Oh yeah. The Prime Minister, John Howard, has finally come clean and delivered a disarmingly honest apology for his atrocious war-mongering — to a rather stunned audience. Read the transcript here.]


a for anarchy

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Jack, He’s Here to Help

Posted on March 23, 2006 by @ndy

‘Drop bomb counts or I stay on the run: racist’
The West Australian
Sean Cowan and Luke MorfesseWA’s most wanted man, racist Jack van Tongeren, has finally broken his silence by vowing to remain a fugitive from justice unless police drop three charges against him of plotting to bomb Chinese restaurants.

Despite having been on the run since mid-February, the racist leader sent The West Australian a handwritten statement, dated March 8, in which he claimed he feared police would kill him.

Mr van Tongeren, a Vietnam War veteran whose father was Eurasian said the entire case against him was fabricated in an attempt to keep him from winning a seat in Federal Parliament.

Now, on the run from justice, he could not lead his “Aussie people” into a better age.

“Make no mistake, my comrades and I now face possible death at the hands of Stalinist-like armed TRG and their ilk or, at the best, spend the rest of our lives in State-run Gulags,” he said.

Mr van Tongeren made a mockery of the justice system [?!?] and sparked a nationwide police alert when he absconded with co-accused Matthew Peter Billing just weeks after a judge ordered he be released from Hakea Prison on bail.

In his statement, he said the pair had followed their bail conditions but were set up by a prosecution witness who approached them at a court hearing.

Under their bail conditions the pair could not talk to the witness and, as a result, police planned to rearrest them, he said.

“Drop all charges against my comrades and I that were levelled against us just before the 2004CE Federal election,” the statement said.

“Only then will we present ourselves publicly to the WA people, safe from threats of death or jailing by the WA police, and then lead our Aussie people into a far better, freer age.”

Det-Sgt Dario Bolzonella, of the State security investigation group, said police were almost certain the letter was written by Mr van Tongeren.

“It’s in a similar style to his previous writing but obviously that needs to be authenticated,” he said.

“It’s being treated forensically and also being analysed . . . to see if it is consistent with something that Mr van Tongeren would have written.”

Sgt Bolzonella said the charges against the two men would not be dropped.

He also said Mr van Tongeren’s claim that he and Mr Billing had been set up to breach their bail conditions after a contrived confrontation at the Central Law Courts was wrong.

“Mr van Tongeren is not wanted for (anything) stemming out of the incident at the Central Law Courts,” he said. “What he is wanted for is breaching his bail (by not meeting daily reporting conditions).”

Investigators also believe the different dates on the letter, March 8, and postmark, March 22, indicate that the fugitives are being helped by family or friends.

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mum reckons they were set up

Posted on March 23, 2006 by @ndy

While authorities chase the families of ‘missing’ white supremacists Matthew Billing and Jack van Tongeren for $40,000 in forfeited bail, Billing’s mother has stated that she’s relieved at learning of the existence of a letter, purportedly written by the missing men on ANM letterhead and dated March 8, and sent to the media:

“I was relieved that we had heard from them because, up until then, we were really quite frightened that something serious had happened to them, so it was good to hear that at least they’re still alive… I haven’t read totally the contents [of the letter] but I agree with what Jack is saying, they were set up.”

[Billing and van Tongeren] were due to go on trial with a third co-accused, John van Blitterswyk, for allegedly plotting to firebomb four Chinese restaurants in 2004.All three men have pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Mr Van Blitterswyk appeared for the scheduled court appearance on Monday but the trial was adjourned until a status conference on June 20 to give prosecutors time to decide how they will proceed.

Mr Van Tongeren’s failure to appear in court leaves his elderly mother facing a $30,000 bail forfeiture.

Mr Billing’s father will have to pay $10,000.

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more loose ends

Posted on March 22, 2006 by @ndy

anarchist people of color have a site. it’s not illegal. (yet.)

There is no original or primary Bitch that Bitch imitates, but Bitch is a kind of imitation for which there is no original.

b o r d e r l a n d s e-journal’s latest issue is dedicated to examining the work of a French bloke what strangled his wife.

Rowan Cahill has written an interesting rejoinder to corporate flak Gerard Henderson on the subject of ‘Australian Fascism’: “The [New] Guard was a well-financed, well-armed, organization, the creation of an elite of Australia’s wealthy, powerful, socially exclusive men.” (Unlike say, this mob.)

‘Teach Me if You Can: An Interview with David Graeber’. “David Graeber is a professor of anthropology at Yale University. After becoming an activist for the anarchist cause, Graeber received disdain from a few colleagues and was soon informed that his teaching contract would not be renewed. On November 2nd, 2005, Steven Durel had lunch with Graeber at Yale.” Isn’t that nice? (See, anarchists can be civil.)

Alain Gresh reckons that “Hamas’ landslide win at the Palestinian elections on 25 January has been greeted with indignant warnings and commentaries from the United States and the European Union, including France. We need to put this event in context.”

John Holloway wants to change the world without taking power (and by making only two passing references to anarchism in his book on the same subject… sigh).

George Katsiaficas has some interesting things to say. (I reckon.)

Tasneem Khalil is “a journalist from Dhaka, Bangladesh. Endorses and advocates Libertarian Socialism and Free/Open Software & Publication”.

Ken McLeod is weird. According to some, he’s a Trotskyist libertarian cyberpunk. He hatesss filthy anarchistsss. He has a blog.

proletariawhat?

Stay Human is an album by Michael Franti & Spearhead. (Quite a good one too.) It’s also the name of “a melbourne based business, that produces a range of ethically made merchandise, like badges, keyrings, stickers, candy and screen printed garments for bands and other groups. Our main aim is to make getting non-sweatshop merchandise as easy as possible, thus encouraging more people to do it”.

As for Jeff Vail… best let him speak for himself:

What to say? My name is Jeff Vail. Born & raised in California, I was fortunate enough to have been dragged (happily) all over the world by my parents. I attended the US Air Force Academy in Colorado, graduating in 1999. I keep hearing about people being “radicalized” in madrasas, or religious schools, in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. Well, I have USAFA to thank for that…in a manner of speaking. After graduation I went to Intelligence Officer school. As an Intelligence Officer I did a number of things: Targeted bombs and cruise missiles for the American invasion of Afghanistan with the 36th Intelligence Squadron, was Chief of Intelligence with the 41st Electronic Combat Squadron (EC-130H COMPASS CALL, for those who care), and also Chief of Intelligence for the 41st Expeditionary Electronic Warfare Squadron deployed to the Middle East during the war in Iraq.

While bored, sitting in a tent in the desert, I decided to write a book, “A Theory of Power”, which resulted in this web site, and is hopefully why you’re reading this bio. I separated from the Air Force in June of 2004. At present I am attending school and working as an intelligence analyst. I live in Colorado with my wife, Julie. I don’t know what the next few years will hold, but hopefully there will be more thinking and writing, both on this blog and elsewhere. Please feel free to contact me.

David Wearing wonders whether Muslims are from Mars & Europeans are from Venus.

“The World Social Forum: Challenging Empires is a committed but critical anthology of essays on the theory and practice of the Forum, with essays by wo/men from many parts of the world, with many different points of view. This online version is abbreviated from the printed original, published by Viveka, New Delhi.”

Posted in Anarchism, Cats, Media, Music, State / Politics, War on Terror | Leave a comment

The Turgid Miasma of Existence

Posted on March 21, 2006 by @ndy

i shoulda been a contender
i shoulda followed the rules
i shoulda married the girl next door
i shoulda not been a fool
i shoulda paid more attention
i shoulda listened in school

got to re-prioritise
get that corporate style
do an anthony robbins seminar
and meet my inner child
then i’ll unleash the power within
and get that winning smile

i shoulda exercised daily
i shoulda brushed after meals
i shoulda gone to church sunday
i shoulda learnt some ideals
i shoulda counted my blessings
i shoulda lodged an appeal

got to re-prioritise
get that corporate style
get the new ikea catalogue
and some really bitchin’ tiles
then i’ll unleash the power within
and get that winning smile

i shoulda reached my potential
i shoulda kicked some real ass
i shoulda gone into business
i shoulda been middle class

The Manly Environment Centre is celebrating its 15th birthday this week at Manly Cove.

Festivities include a performance from The Rifles, speeches from Peter Garrett and others and a special art exhibition at nearby Oceanworld.

It all kicks off at 5:30pm.

My favourite band. Are playing. This Thursday… in Sydney.

In other news… my bookmarks are overloaded. So I’m gonna dump some of ’em here:

Marx Myths & Legends
Introduction

A critical reading of the work of Karl Marx now requires us to lay to one side the myths and legends which have obscured his ideas over the past one hundred and twenty years- distortions and misinterpretations to which perhaps no thinker has been more prone. In one sense, this is not difficult, because there is enough of his writing preserved, albeit in translation, for any of us to read Marx in his own words. Most however have been unwilling or unable to do this. The fifty volumes of the Marx-Engels Collected Works are forbidding, and when beginning as one almost inevitably does, with the received wisdom surrounding Marx’s name, there is much to discourage a reader from seriously taking on the task of understanding Marx. The aim of this project is thus to begin to challenge some of those myths in order to clear the way for a fresh reading of Marx that will hopefully be less prone to the distortions, misunderstandings and blatant falsehoods that have so far surrounded Marx. We believe that what Marx had to say remains of considerable relevance to an understanding of problems we face today, but that a reading of Marx now must maintain a critical caution which does not merely reproduce received ideas- positive or negative- about Marx’s work.

This is a local blog, for global people.

Another source of understanding (as well as right-wing confusion) is ‘Noam Chomsky v. Alan Dershowitz: A Debate on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict’.

Signature is co-edited by Eve Vincent and Marni Cordell, former editors of Spinach7 Magazine. Having suspended publication of the magazine, we want to keep making high quality independent media that is critical and thought provoking. We are interested in ideas, stories and voices that are overlooked by the dominant media, and in contributing to a more diverse and diffuse public culture.

Signature is about putting your name to your ideas. It’s about having the guts to stand behind your convictions. As the media becomes more anonymous, distant, and PR-driven Signature brings you writers who aren’t afraid to make their mark. Distinctive voices, fresh perspectives, quality writing.

Julian Stallabras writes about ‘Spectacle & Terror’ in the New Left Review:

After Gopal Balakrishnan’s engagement with Afflicted Powers in NLR 36, Julian Stallabrass turns to the Retort collective’s conception of spectacle and its Islamist antagonists. Does a Debordian optic occlude the oppositional potential of modern technologies?

(And, moreover, what effects will it have on Collingwood’s chances of doing the cakewalk in 2006?)

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2006 Trot Guide Update #3.0

Posted on March 21, 2006 by @ndy

Following John Tattersall‘s ignominious defeat in the Victoria park by-election, there’s more bad news for the Socialist Alliance: on March 18 there was an election in South Australia, for the seat of Port Adelaide. At a time when disgust and rage with contemporary capitalism are profoundly felt and deeply rooted — and we are living through a period of many-sided struggle, conscious and unconscious, against the virulent disease that is the production-for-profit system — the SA contested it.

Here are the results:

Port Adelaide
Name // Party // Votes // % Swing
(Bold identifies the sitting MP)

Anne McMenamin // GRN // 980 // 6.3 // +2.5
James Troup // FFP // 838 // 5.4 // +5.4
Kevin Foley // ALP // 10,027 // 64.5 // +6.7
Anna Micheel // LIB // 2,903 // 18.7 // -4.9
Darren Fairweather // ONP // 234 // 1.5
Amy Van Oosten // DEM // 369 // 2.4 // -3.8
John McGill // [SA] // 205 // 1.3 // +1.3
[Informal // 802 // 4.2]

This could be considered a “bad” result. After all, for a socialist party to receive 29 votes less than a party on the far right isn’t exactly “good”… is it? Dunno, maybe March 18 was a time when disgust and rage with contemporary capitalism was only vaguely intuited, and the deeply rooted were in bed, fitfully sleeping through a period of many-sided struggle, almost always unconscious; dreaming, perhaps, of defeating the virulent disease that is the production-for-profit system… later.

Oh yeah.

There were also elections in Tasmania over the weekend. Never ones to set the media ablaze, the SA in Tasmania battled it out with the elusive ‘Tasmania First Party’ and those-who-choose-to-dress-casually for last place. Here are the results from the two seats — Denison and Franklin — in which the SA stood candidates.

Let’s see who won, shall we?

Denison
Party // Votes // % Quotas // Swing
Labor Party // 25,665 // 47.4 // 2.90 // -3.6
Liberal Party // 14,333 // 26.4 // 1.50 // +3.4
Greens // 12,981 // 23.9 // 1.30 // -0.6
Tasmania First // 283 // 0.5 // 0.00 // +0.5
Socialist Alliance // 216 // 0.4 // 0.00 // -0.3 [Linda Seaborn]
Group F // 401 // 0.7 // 0.00 // +0.7
Ungrouped // 437 // 0.8 // 0.00 // +0.8

Franklin
Party // Votes // % Quotas // Swing
Labor Party // 26,794 // 47.2 // 2.90 // -4.5
Liberal Party // 17,858 // 31.4 // 1.90 // +7.8
Greens // 10,888 // 19.2 // 1.10 // -1.2
Socialist Alliance // 232 // 0.4 // 0.00 // +0.1 [Matthew Holloway]
Ungrouped // 962 // 1.7 // 0.10 // +1.7

Hmmm… not exactly a doubleplusgood result there either comrades.

(I give it twelve more months, tops.)

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Dude, where’s my student union?

Posted on March 20, 2006 by @ndy

It’s interesting times for the Australian student movement. Following a spectacularly unsuccessful campaign to prevent the Federal Government (with the critical support of Family First Senator Steve Fielding) from introducing Voluntary Student Unionism (VSU) legislation, student unions, from the peak body the National Union of Students (NUS) to its dozens of affiliates, are facing a grim future. In summary:

On 9 December 2005, the Higher Education Support Amendment (Abolition of Compulsory Up-front Student Union Fees) Bill 2005 was passed in the Senate, and received the Royal Assent on 19 December 2005. From July 1 2006, [Australian] universities will not be able to compel union membership or fees.

The general effects of this on campus life will vary, but as the legislation mandates the winding back or removal of a range of social services previously available to students for free or at minimal cost, it’s likely to result in a severe curtailment of what was once thought to characterise ‘campus life’. The legislation places additional pressures on University administrations to replace lost services, as well as placing many student unions in an impossible situation in relation to staffing and wages (see, for example, ‘Swinburne student union nears collapse’, Adam Morton, The Age, March 11, 2006).

One of the other effects of VSU will be the removal of the student union from its status as being the most important and lucrative resource for (student) political activists. Long regarded as a cash cow by the student left (and the various parties which feed on the student body), removal of funding will severely, and quite consciously, curtail — at least in the short- to medium-term — left student activism.

Well, maybe.

The NUS is obviously a dead duck as far as student activism is concerned, and with a small number of exceptions, always has been. Its principal function has been to provide a publically-subsidised training ground for future politicians. (In this, the NUS has functioned in a manner remarkably similar to that of many of its affiliates; providing income, resources and training to ambitious young student politicians.) In fact, the guaranteed income stream compulsory membership of student unions’ has generated for student politicians has placed both student unions and (other) opponents of VSU in a particularly difficult situation: the political reservoir from which a militant response to VSU might be drawn — one comprising a large number of students and young workers — simply doesn’t exist. Facing no requirement to convince students of the desirability of joining ‘their’ unions, student unions have, by default, been able to treat students with indifference, while ‘corruption’ in some student unions has even resulted in their forced liquidation (see also the highly amusing documentary film The State of the Union).

Where these developments leave the student left is an intriguiging question. Below is an account of the development of the largest left tendency within student politics. I’ll return to it later, as well as to the question of how anarchists should respond, both to VSU and to the student left.

National Broadleft (1999-2005)

The National Broadleft (NBL) was formed in 1999. Kate Carr, the first ‘national convenor’ of the faction, provides the following account of its origins:

Student left unites
By Kate Carr

After discussions at the four major student conferences this year, a new student group, the National Broad Left (NBL), was established in Melbourne on July 21.

The group will initiate national campaigns, intervene in student unions and operate as a united faction within the National Union of Students (NUS). The new group brings together progressive individuals and a range of left organisations within the student movement, including Left Alliance (LA), Resistance, parts of the Non-Aligned Left (NAL) and Love and Rage…

More than 200 people participated in discussions held throughout the country before NBL’s formation. The significance of the creation of a nationally unified left within NUS cannot be overestimated.

Until now the left has been divided into two major factions (LA and NAL) at NUS national conferences, resulting in poor collaboration and communication within the left around policy for NUS and the election of office bearers.

The NBL explicitly advocates challenging the ALP-dominated leadership of NUS and changing NUS’s campaign strategy from one of lobbying the ALP to sparking broad campaigns which involve and inspire students to fight for progressive social change.

It is hoped that the formation of NBL signals a period of constructive collaboration between left activists around the country and will facilitate healthy debate around priorities for the student movement.

Two years later, Resistance left the NBL. Grant Coleman explains:

When it became clear that the majority of those involved in the NBL were not willing to place political pressure on NOLS to support the left office-bearer candidates over the right-wing of the ALP, Resistance left the NBL.

During the NUS conference, the NBL changed its original position and began arguing for NOLS to form a left bloc.

However, Resistance did not decide to leave the NBL based on one incident alone. For some time now, the NBL has been moving away from its original aim of challenging the ALP leadership of NUS. In July 2000 the NBL voted to remove the reference to challenging the ALP’s conservative leadership of NUS from its declaration of aims.

Even more importantly however, most independent left activists have left the NBL and it is not attracting new student activists. Nor will it do so if it continues to capitulate to the ALP left, rather than challenge it.

The task for left activists in NUS is to work together to provide a political challenge to the ALP. With the recent events at S11 and with M1 ahead of us, the left should be able to inspire a new layer of students to struggle against the corporatisation of higher education. But we will not convince these students to take up the fight in student organisations if we simply play games with the Labor student bureaucracy.

Instead we should be drawing these people into a united left faction that seriously aims to win control of NUS away from the ALP and transform it into a left-wing led, democratic, accountable and activist-based national student union.

Here’s another account of the disintegration of the NBL. Interestingly, events at Woomera2002 (late March — early April) are considered pivotal.

In 2002, after the events at Woomera, it was fairly clear that it wasn’t desirable to work with Socialist Alternative. Further, a number of students had had enough of the prevailing fixation on the pointless antics of NUS, and for activist purposes wanted to extricate themselves from the whole schamozzle, while at the same time maintaining cross-campus connections. In essence, what was wanted was an organisation something like what segments of NBL became immediately after S11.

The biggest hurdle was the unofficial leadership (the ‘numbers’ people). While making sympathetic noises, they were neck-deep in factionalism. In response, some anarchists, a group of younger students from Sydney and a few greens started having their own, independently-organised meetings. These took place during the pre-caucus leading up to NUS national conference. (The Trots, predictably enough, reacted especially badly at news that a meeting had been called for people interested in ‘anti-authoritarian ideas’ and ways of ‘subverting NUS’.) Some of the rebels even made some ‘Rebel Alliance’ patches: a sign of dissent at the existing orientation of the NBL towards competing for office in the Galactic Empire.

As opposed to changing things.

In a fairly cunning move, the ‘unofficial leadership’ started regularly attending these meetings, and with some bullshit here (and some bullshit there), devolved the ‘Rebel Alliance’ into just another sub-faction of the NBL, complete with nominees for office bearing positions. The original network of people who’d formed the Alliance proved unable to stop this devolution, either thinking themselves outnumbered (and therefore powerless to protest) or simply being too naive to do so… until it was too late.

So, the ‘Rebel Alliance’ became little more than a non-Trot faction, and the basis for working together little less than a shared antipathy toward Socialist Alternative. Predictably, this lead to some fairly bizarre behaviour, including alliances with parts of the ALP, and pointless red-baiting. In the absence of some more rigorous ideological framework from which to structure its activity, such a lame, reactionary approach to factional organising simply wasn’t sustainable, and its disintegration meant that the collapse of the NBL as a whole was merely a matter of time.

Posted in Anarchism, Student movement, Trot Guide | Leave a comment

Weerheym’s website ‘under investigation’

Posted on March 19, 2006 by @ndy

Racist Perth web site under investigation
The West Australian
Fran Spencer
March 18, 2006WA Police and the Director of Public Prosecutions are investigating a racist website run by a Perth-based white supremacist amid claims it openly threatens individuals and breaks racial vilification laws.

Two blogs operating under the names Patriot Alliance Down-under and Leftywatch, published by former Australian Nationalist Movement recruit Benjamin Weerheym, have been the subject of complaints to State and Federal authorities.

Mr Weerheym was convicted [in 2004] of spraypainting racist slogans on Perth buildings, and received a six month suspended jail term.

While posts on the Patriot Alliance Down-under blog have included references to “oily dune coons”, “sandniggers” and “the Asian invasion”, the Leftywatch blog focuses on publishing pictures and personal details of individuals it claims oppose patriotic activists.

Yesterday, the site contained personal details on four Perth individuals including home suburbs, email addresses and places of work along with calls for further information or photos for publication.

Perth-based human rights lawyer Mark Cox said he had been contacted by several individuals targeted by the blogs, and had written to the WA and Federal police and attorneys-general.

DPP Robert Cock yesterday confirmed his office was examining the site, but no action had been taken.

“It has been referred to a lawyer in my office and I’m awaiting her report… I expect that within a week,” he said.

State Security Investigation Group head Det-Sen. Sgt Ray Butler said police had been monitoring the blogs, and were liaising with the DPP.

“It’s well known to our area and has been for the last six to eight months.”

“We have put up a proposal to the DPP in relation to all the evidence… the initial verbal notification from them is there isn’t enough there at the moment but we are continuing to monitor that and any information that comes in from the public we will pass on,” he said.

Both blogs were recently altered to remove Mr Weerheym’s photo and personal details. The profile section now attributes the blog to Patriot Alliance Down-under, a self-described “number of patriots and nationalists alike from New Zealand and Australia.”

Mr Cox said he had contacted US-based internet giant Google, owner of the company [Blogger] which hosts the blogs, and warned of potentially illegal content.

Google has since posted a content warning on the blogs, but appears to have taken no further action.

Posted in Anti-fascism, Media, State / Politics | Leave a comment

Where’s Wally?

Posted on March 18, 2006 by @ndy


Above : an unidentified flying white supremacist nicknamed ‘Wally’ sits on a park bench observing peaceful protest at the Botanical Gardens, Melbourne.

Is our lone Scumfronter dreaming of a White Christmas? Or is he perhaps dreaming of being an Indonesian soldier and engaging in some state-sponsored terrorism against the indigenous peoples of West Papua?

‘Top Indonesian Generals Take Control of Restive City’
The New York Times
By JANE PERLEZ
Published: March 18, 2006

JAKARTA, Indonesia, March 17 — Indonesia’s top military and police generals took control of the provincial capital of Jayapura in Papua on Friday, ordering the arrest of university students and directing the riot police to fire into the air as they patrolled the streets.

Nearly 60 people, many of them students, have been arrested after a violent demonstration on Thursday that left three policemen and an air force officer dead, said a police spokesman, Gen. Anton Bachrul.

The protest was directed at the American mining company Freeport-McMoRan, which operates a huge gold and copper mine in the province. It turned violent when the police, armed with shields, batons and tear gas, clashed with several hundred students near the campus of Cenderawasih University.

In an unusual display of strength and in a reflection of the seriousness of the violence, Indonesia’s army chief, Gen. Djoko Suyanto; the head of the police, General Sutanto; and the head of the domestic intelligence service, Syamsir Siregar, all arrived in Papua on Thursday night.

The sudden show of military brass in Papua, the country’s easternmost and poorest province, was meant to protect not only the valuable mining company, but also the nation’s hold on the province itself. A low-level insurgency has rumbled for decades against the central government, and Thursday’s student protesters openly sympathize with it.

The sounds of shooting reverberated Friday from the area of Adepura, around the university, and schools and markets were closed, residents of Jayapura said.

The riot police from Brimob, the most feared of Indonesia’s police units, were still going door to door at the university dormitories Friday, said Hans Magal, secretary general of the Highland Students Association.

The violence directed against Freeport, which has operated in the area since the 1960’s, is the most severe since Papuans armed with bows and arrows rioted at the mine site 10 years ago and closed down operations for three days.

To quiet the local antagonism then, the company began directly paying individual police and military officers to protect its mining operations, which stretch from 13,000-foot glacier-capped mountains to coastal lowlands, where the mine waste covers 90 square miles.

The New York Times reported in December that Freeport had granted far greater financial support to the Indonesian Army and police in Papua than the company had publicly reported, in some cases giving individual commanders tens of thousands of dollars.

The United States Justice Department has said it is investigating whether the payments violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which forbids bribery. As well, the Securities and Exchange Commission says it is investigating whether Freeport failed to disclose fully the payments to shareholders.

After the 1996 riots, the company also paid for new social programs for the local residents, assigning 1 percent of annual revenues for medical services, schools and roads.

Whether, or how, the company, which is based in New Orleans, and the Indonesian government can tame the current surge of anger is an open question.

The senior Papuan at Freeport, Thom Beanal, who is a leader of one of Papua’s biggest tribal groups, the Amungme, and a director of the Indonesian unit of Freeport, said the company was concerned about maintaining its daily operations in the current atmosphere.

Mr. Beanal said in a telephone interview from his home in Timika, near the mine, that he advised Freeport this week that to reduce hostilities, the company needed to deal more effectively with the more than 700,000 tons of mine waste that is generated every day.

Much of it hurtles directly down the Aghawagon River, and protests began last month when villagers were told by the security forces that they could no longer pan in the waste for scraps of gold. “I suggested they put the waste in a pipe and put it far away,” Mr. Beanal said.

Environmentalists and some mining engineers have made similar suggestions, but the company has rejected them, saying they would be too expensive to carry out.

Free West Papua!

Posted in Anti-fascism, State / Politics | Leave a comment

2006 Ex-Trot Guide: Not. Funny. Luke.

Posted on March 17, 2006 by @ndy

Recently, Luke Fomiatti has gotten himself into a spot of bother over a botched attempt at ‘humour’: Uni newspaper calls Jews ‘bloodsuckers’.

Ooops.

THE University of Western Sydney has been enveloped in a race row over a student newspaper article which refers to Jewish people as “bloodsuckers”.

An outraged Jewish community has demanded an apology for the “anti-semitic” comments published by student and UWS board member Luke Fomiatti.

Vice Chancellor Janice Reid has been forced to write to almost 40,000 students and staff stating the article – in the university newspaper The Western Onion – was unacceptable.

Intended as a send-up of the Muslim cartoon issue, the front page spread includes anti-Jewish drawings and refers to “a vampire with a Star of David tattoo drinking the blood of a young boy labelled Europe”…

Mr Fomiatti said yesterday he had received hate mail and been threatened with physical harm, which had been referred to police.

“I wanted to make a point in a strong way… but some students haven’t understood it,” he said. “I am using the experience of the Nazi Party’s anti-semitism to condemn racism and bigotry.

“There will be an explanation in the next edition and I will say sorry to have offended people.”

Mr Fomiatti received a letter from the university administration seeking an explanation for the article and hinting he could face misconduct proceedings.

In her letter Professor Reid said the article would “upset many people” and was not funny.

A fifth-year Arts/Law student at the University of Western Sydney, Fomiatti was expelled from Resistance in late August 2004. According to one account, this was because of Fomiatti’s inability to ‘toe the party line’… while simultaneously maintaining his support for a leftist student grouping called “NBL Rebel”. Although details are murky, it appears that Luke intended “NBL Rebel” to be a broader socialist front than the leadership of the Resistance/DSP desired; worse yet, it would comprise elements hostile to Leninism. But what was “NBL Rebel” anyway?

As the name suggests, “NBL Rebel” was purported by Fomiatti’s critics to be a break-away faction from the broader student National Broad Left:

…a political grouping within the National Union of Students of Australia from 1999 to 2005… [NBL] was a loose conglomeration of various feminist, environmentalist, ‘autonomist’ [Marxist], Trotskyist and ‘independent’ left activists.

(Incidentally, I was temporarily banned from the national_broadleft list in December 2000 by another Marxist law student named Nicholas Salzburg.) Reports of the life of “NBL Rebel” appear to have been exaggerated, however, and instead it seems to have simply mutated over the course of the following year into the Grassroots (‘Swampy’) Left. What’s the Grassroots Left? According to Wikipedia, the Grassroots Left ‘sat’ as part of the NBL up until the 2004 NUS National Conference, while the “final breakdown” of the NBL took place shortly thereafter. In essence, it appears that the NBL split into three smaller groupings: the first consisting of members of Socialist Alternative; the second members of Solidarity and the Socialist Action Group; and the third consisting of members of the non-aligned, anti-authoritarian left. It’s this third group from which the Grassroots Left is drawn.

…more commentary on the Australian student movement to follow…

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