Global Peace And Justice Auckland Newsletter #75, November 24, 2004

Website http://www.gpja.pl.net/ Contact details: Forums - John Minto, (09) 846 3173, jbminto@xtra.co.nz; Newsletter Editor - Mike Treen 027 5254744 / 3616989 miket@pl.net Web page - bobo@enzyme.org.nz Donations can be sent to GPJA, Private Bag 68905, Newton, Auckland. All communication regarding the GPJA mailing list (email or snail) should be addressed to gpja@xtra.co.nz

Dear friends,

Help is urgently needed to publicise a major "Free Ahmed Zaoui Now" public rally on December 4. Leaflets are being distributed and a mass paste-up is planned for Saturday, November 27. Please check out the activities below to see if you can help. A book detailing the facts around the case is available for only $15 (see below). It can make a good Xmas present. If you missed the Kim Hill interview with Helen Clark we have a link to the transcript below. Also note the next GPJA Forum on December 5 has a guest speaker from Wellington - Tony Ellis (who won the recent case against the Corrections Dept for abuse of prisoners) speaking.

WHAT'S ON IN AUCKLAND

Wednesday-Friday, 12 noon, Outside IMAX Centre, Queen St, City LEAFLETTING FOR THE "FREE ZAOUI NOW" RALLY. To help phone Karyn 3584104, or 0274417209

Saturday, November 27, 10am, Unite office, Trades Hall, 147 Great North Rd, Grey Lynn MASS POSTER PASTEUP TO ADVERTISE THE DECEMBER 4 FREE ZAOUI RALLY

Saturday, November 27, 12 noon, Potters Park, cnr Dominion Rd and Balmoral Rd Bring your family, friends, food and instruments and join the AUCKLAND GE FREE CARNIVAL at Potters Park and tell KFC to say no to GE and help us win the next step in the GE Free campaign! Carnival protest against KFCs failure to commit to a permanent GE Free policy and thereby their willingness to threaten our health and the environment and to support the social injustices of biotechnology in third world countries... etc etc. Please download and distribute the flyer and put up the posters if you live in Auckland! (flyers and poster available at http://www.stop-inghams-ge.org/carnival Get involved with Auckland Genetix Action Email aga@agean.org or phone 027 4411709

Monday, November 29, 6pm, Unite Office, Trades Hall, 147 Great North Rd, Grey Lynn FREE ZAOUI RALLY ORGANISING GROUP

Saturday, December 4, 12 noon, Mt Eden Remand Prison "TWO YEARS TOO LONG - FREE ZAOUI NOW" - PUBLIC RALLY http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/PO0411/S00124.htm

Monday 6th December, 7.30pm, Trades Hall, 147 Great North Road Grey Lynn. GPJA FORUM: Wellington lawyer Tony Ellis will deliver a presentation on "SOLITARY CONFINEMENT IN NZ: FINDINGS OF THE HIGH COURT AND THE UN COMMITTEE AGAINST TORTURE". Tony has recently been successful in challenging the abuse of prisoners in New Zealand jails - much to the embarrassment of the government and prison authorities. His address will cover both his recent court victories and the continuous law changes in recent years which have been progressively chipping away at our legal rights under the "law and order" or "fighting terrorism" banners.

Friday, December 10, 5.30pm, Trades hall, 147 Great North Rd, Grey Lynn "Think and Drink": Guest speaker VIVIENNE PORZSOLT, from JEWS AGAINST THE OCCUPATION, will give an eye witness report (with slides) on a international human rights march of women in Palestine/Israel earlier this year.

FREE ZAOUI CAMPAIGN

"I ALMOST FORGOT ABOUT THE MOON" - the disinformation campaign against Ahmed Zaoui - is now available from GPJA at the UNITE office - $15 with all proceeds to go to the Zaoui family. This book is a brilliant expose by Scoop Media editor Selwyn Manning of the campaign to discredit Zaoui by Algeria and France and the complicity of New Zealand officials in this as our country has tried to paint itself as a loyal foot soldier in the war on terror. Get in early for XMAS - no I'm not joking - and help make the Zaoui XMAS a bit happier! John Minto, Phone 0064 9 8463173, Fax: 0064 9 8463 176

KIM HILL DEBATES ZAOUI WITH PM - TRANSCRIPT http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0411/S00265.htm

Scoop Images: The Zaoui Concert!!! http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0408/S00002.htm

BEST OF THE WEB

STRIKERS MASSACRED IN THE PHILIPPINES - YOUR HELP NEEDED NOW Three days ago, on 16 November, fourteen people were killed by army and police in the Philippines. Those people were strikers, trade unionists like yourselves. They worked on sugar farms in sugar mills, and had been on strike for ten days. Two of those killed were children, aged two and five, who died from suffocation as a result of the tear gas used. Some 35 people suffered gunshot wounds, 133 were arrested, hundreds more were wounded. The trade union movement in the Philippines has called for a massive international protest condemning the murders, demanding a full investigation of what happened. They are demanding that hundreds of workers illegally dismissed be rehired, and that criminal charges against the strikers be dropped. Please send on your message of protest by going here: http://www.labourstart.org/cgi-bin/solidarityforever/show_campaign.cgi?c=39

Seize the Time! David Barsamian interviews Arundhati Roy http://www.isreview.org/issues/38/Arundhati_roy.shtml

Starving children pay the price of disorder http://207.44.245.159/article7340.htm

The World Social Forum in 2005 will take place in Porto Alegre. http://www.spectrezine.org/global/WSF2.htm

Afghanistan: a nation abandoned to drugs: Country produces 87% of global opium. One in ten Afghans works in opium trade http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/story.jsp?story=584408

Mike

© Scoop Media

Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>