World Social Struggles Newswire Archive

Report of Sunday's demo against the new "Caricole" prison outside Brussels, and the ongoing campaign of direct action and practical solidarity.

As the world economy falters the power elite holds on to capitalism with tooth and nail, even though around them, the house of cards is wavering. The people who suffer from this listen to the money-grabbing power elite without calling into question the orders the elite hands out just to save their own hinds.

Activists believe that up to 5 people have died in Cairo today following clashes between troops and protesters. Hundreds are reported to be injured after pro-SCAF thugs hurled rocks onto the protestors from the roofs of neighbouring buildings. According to Joseph Mayton:

The violence began around two in the morning after an Ultra – a hardcore football fan – was allegedly abducted by security near the nearly three-week old sit-in in front of the Egyptian cabinet building.

The man was reportedly beaten up and tortured by his captors.

Today, at Kazakhstan’s independence day, more than 3000 people assembled peacefully in Zhanaozen, to promote the demands of the oil workers who have been on strike since May. Police and special forces attacked the meeting and opened fire on the strikers and their families.

Short clips from the day spliced into 6 mins with accompanying track by Riot in London. In solidarity with all those who took part in the occupy and strike action on the day

If the catastrophe that is coming is to be avoided and humanity is to have another chance, it will be because the others, from below and to the left, have not only resisted, but are already sketching the outline of something else.

As part of the National Month of Festive Action Against Atos we are calling for a rolling mass telephone complaint to poverty pimps Atos in the run up to Christmas.

The 99 percent movement, which has been evicted from many of their encampments across the country, is finding common cause with thousands of homeowners who are also being evicted from their homes.

Even though the movement has often been criticized for a lack of defined goals, Tuesday’s “Occupy Our Homes” action in at least 20 cities makes it clear that they are standing up to banks to reverse foreclosures.

“We’re in the neighborhood in New York City that had the highest number of foreclosure filings in 2010 to send a message that the economy is failing the 99 percent,” Vocal New York organizer Sean Barry told Raw Story from a Brooklyn neighborhood as about 200 protesters chanted in the background.

Yesterday, Four female activists entered and occupied the Egyptian Embassy in solidarity with the Tahrir Square movement. The activists were subsequently arrested and taken to West End Central Police Station.

2012 The Mayan Word
December 17th 2011 6pm

Everyone is talking about the Mayan Prophecies of 2012.
But who is listening to the Maya?

“As a social forum, a thousand things happen at the same time and this is how thing flow. The square is beginning to fill up. Having a thousand things and a thousand different ways is a path towards no turning back!” Rodrigo Bertame at Occupy Rio.

Reparations in Action!
Sunday, 13:00 to 14:00 (2011-12-04)
Host: Penny Hess
This Week: Anniversary of the assassination of African revolutionary leader Fred Hampton

A report launched this week by the World Development Movement reveals that UK climate aid is being used to produce cheap electricity for the US multinational Walmart, through a project that violates the rights of indigenous people in Mexico.

A solidarity demo in Embassy Quarter, London, began dramatically with the imperialist tri-colour being removed from the Mexican embassy, set on fire, and replaced with the Zapatista red star.

The Egyptian revolution will not be settled in 18 days or months. It’ll take “years” for the dust to settle, may be four or five, I don’t know. There will be waves, ebbs and flows, battles to be won and others lost.

This November uprising is only one chapter in the Egyptian revolution, but not the final one.

We have come a long way. We can all recall the mood in February when you could have been lynched in a protest by the people if you had chanted against the army. Now there is wide disillusionment with SCAF, and the majority of the public can clearly see today they are nothing but Mubarak’s army generals who are in effect leading the counterrevolution.

On Saturday, December 3, in Liberty Plaza, we—THE OWS HUNGER STRIKERS—began a hunger strike. We are striking to demand outdoor space for a new occupation. We are holding our strike at Duarte Square on Sixth Avenue and Canal Street in Manhattan as part of a continued effort seeking sanctuary on Trinity Church’s unused land.

This is a call for escalation, in response to the escalated levels of government-enacted violence and repression The Occupy Movement has endured over the last few weeks. In dozens of cities across the nation, Mayors chose to stifle freedom of speech and the right to assemble by evicting peaceful occupations using illegal and and unconstitutional force. Here in New York, on the night of November 14, the City—under orders from Mayor Bloomberg—violently evicted our community from Liberty Square.

Marxists have been predicting the disintegration of capitalism for so long that most people - including most Marxists - stopped believing it would ever happen. But today anyone who reads the financial press knows that the system is in an unprecedented crisis with no clear way out. The following articles offer a variety of ways of understanding the crisis so we can begin to create a world beyond capitalism:

Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed spent the first half of the post 2001 decade analysing the West's Ties With Terror: Western-Al-Qaeda Relations in the Post-Cold War Period (2005), The Secret History of International Terrorism (2006) and the role of the West in Creating Terror (2006). Following this he moved on to analysing the The Hidden Holocaust - Our Civilizational Crisis (2008) and the Food Crisis & Peak Oil (2008). His latest book is A User’s Guide to the Crisis of Civilization: And How to Save It (2010), has now been adapted into a documentary feature film, The Crisis of Civilization (2011) and it had it's first UK screening in Leeds, in November. Read on for an analysis of the multiple global crisis's facing humanity and the hope that a movement to change the course the 1% have society set on can be changed by the 99%, Occupy Planet Earth: Resisting the Militarisation of State Power by Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed.

On Wednesday November 30th, we witnessed one of the biggest public sector strikes to take place in the UK since the 1970s, and the people of Cambridge came out in force to support it.

Some estimates place the figure at around 4,000 local people in attendance, although there is no way to confirm (or deny) this.

Thousands of public sector workers brought central Birmingham to a standstill as they called for the Government to back down on pension reform.