Aotearoa Independent Media Centre

Update: All defendants entered NOT GUILTY pleas in the High Court this morning. The non-association order has finally been dropped, reporting reduced to three times a year and the travel restriction to Ruatoki has also been dropped! [ More ]

The October 15th defendants will be appearing in the High court on May 15th where they will once again have to plead guilty or not guilty. The court case has been moved to the high court as the police are charging several of the defendants with "participating in an organised criminal group". The police are doing this in an attempt to salvage some credibility after the original terrorism charges were not allowed to go forward.

This will also be exactly one and half years since the state's 'terror' raids and invasion of the defendant's homes and the community of Ruatoki in 2007. The October 15th Solidarity Group in Tamaki-Makaurau are calling for a morning solidarity picket. This is will the only time (as far as we know) when all the defendants will be up in Auckland this year.

Solidarity in the Kulin Nations, Occupied Australia!

October 15th solidarity picket in the Kulin Nations
Friday May 15th
1pm
NZ Settler Consulate
Melbourne

Download issue in .pdf format (1.23MB)

The third issue of Solidarity, free monthly newssheet of the Aotearoa Workers Solidarity Movement. Download the .pdf above, or click below to read the contents online. This issue has a special feature on May Day, international workers day.

Contents:

• Locked out Zeal workers stand strong!
• Zeal 320 Interview
• What is May Day?
• May Day 2009 Report: Auckland
• May Day 2009 Report: Wellington
• May Day 2009 Report: Blackball
• The curator of Baghdad: a story from Guantanamo

It took five years for Mussolini to crush the Italian working class and get away with incarcerating its leaders. At Gramsci's show trial in 1926, the fascist judge sentenced him to 20 years gaol. In a reference to the tremendous impact Gramsci had had on the engineering workers while editing L'Ordine Nuovo and his subsequent leadership of the Communist Party in the 1920s, the judge declared: "we must stop this brain working for 20 years". Gramsci spent the last 11 years of his life in Mussolini's gaol.

Socialist Aotearoa hosts a series of meetings on Marxist revolutionaries- this week we look at the great Italian revolutionary Antonio Gramsci and the ideas of Cultural Hegemony.

Thursday, May 14, 2009
7:00pm - 9:00pm
Room (short name): 105-029 Room (long name): ClockT029
University of Auckland Clock Tower Building off Princes Street

Socialist Aotearoa

The first of two videos from the last 4 days of industrial action by Zeal 320 workers. The 240 workers, flight attendants on trans-Tasman and Pacific routes for Air New Zealand, were locked out from Thursday – Sunday. Pickets were held in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch.

We stand at a crossroads. The facts are clear. Global climate change, caused by human activities, is happening, threatening the lives and livelihoods of billions of people and the existence of millions of species. Social movements, environmental groups, and scientists from all over the world are calling for urgent and radical action on climate change.

Between 7th and 18th December 2009, the governments of the world will come to Copenhagen (Denmark) for the fifteenth UN Climate Conference (COP-15). This will be the biggest summit on climate change ever to have taken place. Yet, previous meetings have produced nothing more than business as usual.

We call on all peoples around the planet to mobilise and take action against the root causes of climate change and the key agents responsible both in Copenhagen and around the world.

Links: ClimateCamp.org.nz | klimax2009.org | Global Climate Campaign | 350.org.nz | Save Happy Valley! | withoutyourwalls.wordpress.com | Earth Liberation Front Press Office

A "low-risk drug raid" has turned into a "siege" in Napier. The Armed Offender Squad, the Special Tactics Group and two of the army's light armoured vehicles have closed off a whole suburb and are trying to "get" 51-year old Jan Molenaar - alive or dead.

The Registrar of Private Investigators and Security Guards (PISG), Gary Harrison, is the defendant in judicial review proceedings as a result of the manner in which he dismissed a complaint made by Bruce Stuart-Menteath about Provision Security Ltd (PSL).

Stuart-Menteath's original 2007 complaint arose as a result of PSL employees conducting covert surveillance for Solid Energy Ltd on Department of Conservation land at Mt Augustus, north east of Westport, without authority. He alleges that they refused to provide identification, claimed they had authority that in law they did not have and operated without the required certificates of approval.

Links: Save Happy Valley Coalition | Solidarity for Happy Valley in Tauranga | SE dismantle Happy Camp - so we're relocating to SE front lawn

At the heart of Tasmania's Southern Forests, wild rivers flow through valleys containing forests which evolved from the ancient continent of Gondwanaland. In the valleys of the Styx, UpperFlorentine, Middle Huon, Weld, and Upper Derwent flourish some of the world's oldest and mostspectacular ecosystems. - Still Wild, Still Threatened Campaign Site

7 May: The Sydney Morning Herald is talking about the "battle on two fronts to remove protesters", and warning of activists leaving booby traps in the forest. Two weeks ago an arson attack destroyed $1.2 million worth of forestry equipment [ Article ]

6 May: Two activists are being charged with assault despite claiming that they were assaulted by a member of forestry Tasmania. [ Upper Florentine newsblog ]

5 May: At 2:30 this afternoon a 26 year old female forest defender was removed from a 45 metre high tree sit by Police Rescue. Police continue to climb trees to remove more tree sits in the area. Logging machinery is expected to arrive tomorrow and stop work protests are expected to take place. [ Media Release ]

4 May: 60 Police have raided camp Florentine this morning to remove road blockades so that logging of the contentious area can begin. An Exclusion Zone has been declared by Forestry Tasmania, to prevent public access to the area. A Hobart man has already been arrested for being in the exclusion zone. More arrests are expected today. [ Report | Video ]

The Wilderness Society has placed an advertisement in Britain's Financial Times warning European banks they will be "pulping their profits'' if they finance the controversial mill proposed for Tasmania's Tamar Valley. The Tasmanian Forest Industries Association has described the society's action as "tantamount to economic sabotage''. Insiders have told GetUp! that the full-page ad in The Australian on Wednesday has scared banks off the Gunns pulp mill and sparked crisis meetings to discuss the ad’s effect.
[ Wilderness Society campaign Site | SydneyIndy: Ad scared banks ]

This weekend Air New Zealand, (75% publicly owned), is locking out EPMU members who are employed by a subsidiary at lower rates of pay than directly employed Flight Attendants. Workers are asking for pay parity with directly employed Flight Attendants. Air New Zealand CEO Rob Fyfe (Salary = $1.6 million), is the lead scab.

"[T]here are crew in more hardship than me, one lady I have heard about is living in her garage and renting out her house to meet the mortgage payments, not trying to single out fellow crew but her story does give you a realistic picture of what we at Zeal are being faced with everyday, this particular woman is on admin duties due to injury so she is having to live on just over $1000 a month after tax." - ZealGirl

PICKET SCHEDULE - Thursday, May 7
Auckland
0700 – 1000 at Victoria Park Market, opposite Air NZ Head Office, 185 Fanshawe Street.
1200 – 1500 at Auckland International Airport, main drop off area.
Wellington
Rally on Lambton Quay from 1100 to 1300. Meet outside Air NZ Holidays shop, corner Grey Street and Lambton Quay.
Christchurch
1100 – 1200 at Air NZ Holidays shop. South City Mall, 549 Colombo Street.
>>>>>Full Picket Schedule - Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday>>>>>

Background | Youtube | Zeal Girl (Worker Blog)