Solidarity 237, 7 March 2012

The Organisation of Women's Freedom in Iraq has issued this protest statement jointly with Iraqi LGBT . "New barbaric attacks started against the Iraqi LGBT in many cities like Baghdad and Basra while using inhumane methods such as hitting the head and body parts of gay victims with building concrete blocks repeatedly till death or by pushing them over high building roof which took place in Basra city. The actions of killings, torture, and dismembering against those who were described as “adulterous” by Islamic Shia militias, besides hanging lists on the walls of several sections in Al-Sadr...

Forty activists demonstrated outside the "Winning Business in the New NHS" conference at the King's Fund in central London on 29 February. This included health workers, student nurses, community campaigners, student activists and trade unionists from other sectors. We kept up a lively presence from 8am, chanting and adorning the outside of the King's Fund with banners. Some demonstrators made a point of engaging people going into the conference; responses varied from "I agree with you, but I have to go in; it's my job" (this included conference participants, as well as the many health workers...

For a printable broadsheet of this article, download the link at the bottom. Workers’ Liberty believes that, for Israeli and Palestinian workers, uniting around a democratic settlement to the national conflict between the two peoples is essential if they are to successfully fight for socialism. Both Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs are distinct national groups. Both have the right to self-determination. We advocate two independent states as the most immediately democratic settlement to the national oppression of the Palestinians that is consistent with Israeli Jews’ national rights. Only a...

A "misdemeanour court" in Helwan, near Cairo, has sentenced Kamal Abbas, general coordinator of the Centre for Trade Union and Workers' Services (CTUWS), to six months in prison for "insulting a public officer". That would be bad enough. But the public officer in question is one of the leaders of Egypt's pre-revolutionary, government-controlled "unions"! At a session of the International Labour Organisation last June, representatives of the CTUWS and the new independent unions clashed with representatives of the state-run "Egyptian Trade Union Federation". Abbas is supposed to have "insulted"...