CounterPunch December 11, 2006

Johannesburg, South Africa.

On Friday evening, October 20, a traveling academic confronted a regular ugly occurrence at JFK airport. He was stopped at immigration by Homeland Security, shuttled off without explanation into a stark waiting room, left there for six hours with no food or water with other similarly trapped travellers (including a little child who cried inconsolably), was asked a few template questions - “have you ever been a member of a terrorist organization?” - and finally was marched away by two armed officers and put on a plane back to South Africa, his 10-year visa summarily revoked. No explanation. By the time he realized what was afoot and called the South African embassy, at about 3 a.m., it was too late for them to do anything. He arrived back in South Africa tired, tousled, and very pissed off. (Keep reading…)

Benjamin Ajak was five years old when, two decades ago, the Sudanese government-backed Murahiliin forces attacked his village and gunned down his mother and father. (Keep reading…)

http://kavkazcenter.com/eng/content/2006/06/06/4743.shtml

June 6, 2006

What is fueling the campaign now sweeping the U.S. to “Stop Genocide in Darfur”? Campus organizations have suddenly begun organizing petitions, meetings and calls for divestment. A demonstration was held April 30 on the Mall in Washington, D.C., to “Save Darfur.” (Keep reading…)

from Socialist Review, April 2006 http://www.socialistreview.org.uk/article.php?articlenumber=9712 (Keep reading…)

Ottawa Citizen October 22, 2005

In his book released today, the UN’s special envoy also lashes the world body for its mediocrity (Keep reading…)

(The Guardian)

I began to realise how much trouble we were in when Hilary Benn, the secretary of state for international development, announced that he would be joining the Make Poverty History march on Saturday. What would he be chanting, I wondered? “Down with me and all I stand for”? Benn is the man in charge of using British aid to persuade African countries to privatise public services; wasn’t the march supposed to be a protest against policies like his? But its aims were either expressed or interpreted so loosely that anyone could join. This was its strength and its weakness. The Daily Mail ran pictures of Gordon Brown and Bob Geldof on its front page, with the headline “Let’s Roll”, showing that nothing either Live 8 or Make Poverty History has done so far represents a threat to power. (Keep reading…)

September/October 2004 Issue

Campaigning on a platform of “A People’s Contract to Create Work and Fight Poverty,” the ruling African National Congress (ANC) received nearly 70 per cent of the popular vote in South Africa’s third democratic election in March, 2004. (Keep reading…)