LESBIAN AND GAY SOLIDARITY NEWSLETTER NUMBER 66

          LESBIAN AND GAY SOLIDARITY

                    N E W S L E T T E R

PO Box 1675, PRESTON SOUTH, VIC. 3072, AUSTRALIA. Phone (03) 9471 4878

Formerly: Gay Solidarity Group (GSG), Est. 1978.  email: josken_at_zipworld_com_au

ISSUE 2, 2007                         NUMBER 66                      JUNE – OCTOBER 2007   

 

1) FEDERAL ELECTION ISSUES TO TAKE TO THE BALLOT BOX!!!

After more than a decade of the Coalition we need to make sure that the Senate does what it is there for –to act as a House of Review. When one party has a majority in both houses, rubber-stamping is inevitable. It’s why there are so many issues in this election that cause concern for workers just starting out to those retiring or retired from the workplace. Howard’s anti-union workplace laws to climate change and the environment, and so much in between, issues that need to be weighed up before a vote is cast. Here are some that concern us.  

       In 2006 a group of young people of different political views, backgrounds, nationalities and attitudes took a trip together to the BAXTER IMMIGRATION DETENTION CENTRE at Port Augusta in South Australia. A filmed documentary, We Will Be Remembered For This –A film about Australia, unfolds their journey along with the asylum seekers they visited behind the razor wire and how they were challenged by what they learned from the stories of these people. The film is now available on DVD. After seeing this documentary you will want to CHALLENGE ANY FEDERAL CANDIDATE to take a stand against the use of immigration detention centres, particularly off-shore, for people seeking asylum here. It’s a Glowworm DVD, directed by David Schmidt. Website:- http://www.wewillberemembered.wordpress.com

 

       Without warning, the Howard Government is proposing to provide Federal Police with powers to censor the internet. In the Senate on 20 September 2007, Communications Minister Senator Helen Coonan introduced an Amendment Bill to expand the “black list” of the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA). It already possesses the power to act against “websites that contain porn or offensive content” but this amendment would FORCE SERVICE PROVIDERS (ISPs) to PREVENT USERS ACCESSING any sites FEDERAL POLICE label as TERRORISM or CYBER CRIME SITES. Roger Clarke, chair of the Australian Privacy Foundation, has expressed disbelief that “the government of any country in the free world could table a bill of this kind.” The second reading was due to be bulldozed through Parliament on October 15 but the election date was announced prior to parliament resuming, putting paid to the amendment. Federal Police will try again in a new parliament.   

 

      If ever a minister was proving to be unsuitable for his portfolio, the current Australian Minister for Immigration, Kevin Andrews, is that one. After his treatment of Dr Haneef in the wake of the dropping of the terrorism-related charges, he has now fuelled the highly flammable race issue by publicly stating refugees from Africa are to be cut because they don’t fit the Australian way of life. Of course he means black Africans. White African farmers from Zimbabwe won’t be affected that’s for sure. You would hardly call him sensitive when he was the Minister for Employment & Workplace Relations either. 

 

      The present Minister for Workplace Relations, Joe Hockey, is little better. The Melbourne Age reported  (3.10.07) that the largest-ever survey of workers in Australia, the research report Australia@Work, found that employees on individual contracts, introduced under the Howard Government’s WorkChoices scheme, worked longer hours for $100 less weekly pay than those on collectively negotiated agreements. The next day Minister Hockey attacked the authors, from the Workplace Research Centre in Sydney. He said the authors were “former trade union officials parading as academics” and that “I am not sure that this institution is known for academic rigour.” The study was half-funded by the Commonwealth Government’s Research Council. The federal treasurer Peter Costello bought into it saying that the study was “contaminated” because it was half-funded by Unions NSW. The centre director Dr John Buchanan was outraged by the comments. Apparently, other data findings echo those in Australia@Work.                       

 

      In October ’07, John Howard as Prime Minister announced that if re-elected his Coalition Government would conduct A REFERENDUM WITHIN 18 MONTHS to RECOGNISE INDIGENOUS AUSTRALIANS in the preamble to Australia’s Constitution. But this time (remember his unacceptable and abortive effort with poet Les Murray a few years ago) he says his approach must be acceptable to “traditional Australia,” to “people who think this country has basically done the right thing.” That last quote is obviously why he refuses to say “sorry.” In other words these people are those who believe a war was never fought on this land with the traditional owners who had a far better democratic system than our Eureka rebellion over “a thirty shillings a month tax.” We need a better approach. Remember too, Labor’s Rudd agrees with the Howard approach! The new government needs to look hard at why the traditional owners managed to conserve and live on this continent for more than 40 thousand years without any conquering heroes, military generals or leaders with “core promises.”

 

      AND THOSE ANTI-TERROR LAWS; The Melbourne Age in August reported that Justice Michael Kirby had launched a scathing attack on his own court saying fellow judges have caved in to demands of governments seeking sweeping counter-terrorism powers that breached the constitution. The unprecedented attack was prompted by the court’s ruling on August 2^nd in the Jack Thomas case, in which the judges found by a 5-2 majority that the law used to impose an interim control order restricting Thomas’s movements was constitutional. They ruled that the anti-terror laws relating to control orders were supported by defence powers in the constitution to protect the public from terrorist acts.  Federal Attorney-General Philip Ruddock said the decision put the validity of the anti-terror laws beyond doubt. However, Justice Kirby in his dissenting judgement said the anti-terror law under which the control orders were imposed was “an unbalanced and unequal departure from the constitution’s guarantee of equal justice for all.”

 

      In Victoria’s supermax Acacia Unit of Barwon Prison are 13 men awaiting trial under Australia’s draconian terror laws. Ten of them have been there since the end of 2005. In August 07 Civil Rights Defence, a Melbourne-based group, held a public meeting to hear the brother of one of the accused tell of the situation of the men who have been charged with an unspecified conspiracy: being terrorists. Even the prosecutor has admitted the legal case against the 13 is “largely circumstantial” yet they are still in prison. And not just prison! The conditions in the “supermax” units are unprecedented for unconvicted remand prisoners –solitary confinement for up to 18 hours a day, with only a tiny room for exercise; extremely limited contact with family and lawyers, regular use of “ restraints”(leg irons and manacles) and frequent strip searches. The punitive detention regime of all those months and months since 2005 has had an enormous emotional and economic impact on the detainees and their families. These injustices happen here and Philip Ruddock tells us they are necessary  --to protect us!

 

      As baby boomers get older, many will be in danger of losing everything, so writes Max Newnham in The Age business section (31 August and again in a much more in-depth article on Saturday 13 October ’07). Enticed to deposit large amounts into superannuation, baby boomers are potentially the biggest losers. If they or their partner need to go into aged care, they stand to lose all their super as an accommodation bond. The Coalition Government despite having enticed people to put their trust and money in super, has no interest in the threat that aged-care bonds pose. The minister responsible did not even answer questions about it. The Labor Party also shows little interest. Voters can tackle the aged care accommodation bond problem with local federal candidates. Ask if they have even any knowledge of the bonds problem or have read either article. Make a big noise while you can.

 

2) ANTI-GAY HATE CRIMES REMAIN WIDESPREAD –REPORT FROM USA:

Nearly four in ten gay men and about one in eight lesbians and bisexuals in the United States have been the target of violence or a property crime because of their sexual orientation, according to a new study by UC Davis psychology professor Gregory Herek. “This is the most reliable estimate to date of the prevalence of anti-gay victimisation in the United States,” Herek said. “The data demonstrate that crimes against sexual minority adults, especially gay men, are disturbingly widespread.” Herek’s findings were based on a survey he conducted in the fall of 2005 with a nationally representative sample of 662 self-identified gay men, lesbians and bisexuals. The study will be published in a future issue of the Journal of Interpersonal Violence –Daily Democrat, 29 June 2007.

 

3) DISCRIMINATION AGAINST PEOPLE IN SAME-SEX RELATIONSHIPS:

In 2006, the federal government had its Human Rights & Equal Opportunity Commission conduct a national inquiry to discover if discrimination really existed against same-sex couples in Australia. There are after all, a raft of federal laws which deny basic financial and work-related entitlements to gay and lesbian couples and their children. The 2001 Australian census suggests that there are approximately 20 thousand same-sex couples living together in the same home. Of those 20 thousand couples, approx. 20% of lesbian couples, and 5% of gay male couples are living with children.

In May 2007, the Commission issued its Report, entitled Same-Sex: Same Entitlements.

The Inquiry found that 58 Federal laws do actively discriminate against same-sex couples and their children. The report recommends simple amendments to those laws; just change the definition describing de facto relationships to include same-sex couples. It also recommends changes to federal, state and territory laws to recognise the relationship between a child and both parents in a same-sex couple. This would better protect the best interests of the child.

Is this all too hard? The Howard Government apparently thinks so; why? And what about the present Labor Opposition? Now is the time to ask your local federal candidates where they and their parties stand on the recommendations of the Same-Sex: Same Entitlements Report.

The Community Guide to the Report is an EYE-OPENER and you should show it to all your friends, especially your hetero friends and relatives. Check out the website: http://www.humanrights.gov.au/samesex/index.html

 

4) PARTNERS OF GAYS & LESBIANS GET RIGHT OF SILENCE IN NSW:

The gay partner of an accused person will have her or his rights protected during a criminal trial under changes to state laws to come into effect early next year. At present, a “de facto spouse” of an accused is permitted by the Evidence Act to decline to testify against his or her partner. But the NSW Government plans to change the title in the act to “de facto partner.” This was intended “to be more gender neutral,” a spokesperson for the NSW Premier Morris Iemma said. The change means that the only jurisdiction in Australia “that refuses to recognise same-sex partners in the definition of de facto is the Commonwealth,” Mr Iemma’s spokesperson, Justin Kelly, said. “Philip Ruddock (Federal Attorney-General) is refusing to incorporate this definition into the Commonwealth version of the Uniform Evidence Act.” 

 However, another change to the Evidence Act proposed by the NSW Government is proving more contentious. After the NSW Government announced it would change the act to allow judges to stop some children and sexual assault victims being cross-examined, the Bar Association warned of the risk that trials would not be fair. The Government said it would allow some victims and witnesses to give their accounts in “narrative form” instead of under questioning. The warning came from the head of the Bar Association, Michael Slattery SC. Restricting defence lawyers from cross-examining would not result in a fair trial as society understood it. Such rulings might also lead to more appeals, resulting in more retrials and greater anguish for witnesses and victims, he said. The NSW Government will also seek to abolish the so-called Longman ruling, which provides that juries be cautioned that a child’s evidence may be less reliable than an adult’s by virtue of their age. For the full story, go to website, http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2007/10/07/1191695739437.html 

 

5): SPAIDS REPORT ON THE 33^rd TREE PLANTING IN SYDNEY PARK:

On Sunday, 29 July 2007, the Sydney Park AIDS Memorial Groves had its annual tree planting event when the gay male nuns of the Order of Perpetual Indulgence, this year led by lesbian Cardinal Titi, blessed the new young trees. A day of beautiful Sydney weather for the 33^rd planting saw around 70 people planting trees to commemorate those who have died from AIDS, and to commemorate others who see the SPAIDS Groves as a means to remember loved ones. Sydney City Council provided, as usual, the trees, spades, tubs of water and a barbecue to help the day to be a success. SPAIDS extends thanks to all of you who attended and helped make this 33^rd planting a resounding success.   

 

6) VIGIL TO PROTEST INCREASE OF LESBIAN MURDERS in South Africa:

The International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) reported that on August 14^th 2007, members of the US-based Liberation 4 All Africans Committee held a vigil to protest against the increasing rate of hate crimes against lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transgender people and HIV/AIDS activists in South Africa and its prevalence throughout the African continent. The US-based group was enraged, then mobilised, by the unsolved brutal murders of lesbians Sizakele Sigasa and Salome Masooa to call for the vigil in solidarity with all LGBT organisations in Africa, pro-lgbt rights groups internationally and people of conscience around the world in condemning the impunity with which hate crimes against LGBT Africans are committed. It joins with the families and friends of all victims and survivors of hate crimes in demanding thorough and timely investigations of all reported cases, and the conviction of all perpetrators. Having been inspired in 1996, by the new South African Constitution’s Bill of Rights enshrining non-discrimination on the basis of gender and sexual orientation, the IGLHRC and the US-based group are deeply disappointed by the emerging trend of abstentions by South African UN delegations on critical votes concerning international LGBT human rights, most recently on July 20^th 2007 at the UN Economic and Social Council (see item 17).

 

7) CENSORSHIP OF LESBIAN FILM FOR A FRINGE FESTIVAL:

(Editor’s note: We received this item on September 25^th 2007 and note how censorship by the Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC) has exploded in the last few years. However, in terms of our federal leaders of either shade of major political party we should not be, and indeed ARE not, surprised!)

My name is Tony Comstop. I am an American documentary filmmaker. My latest film, Ashley and Kisha: Finding the Right Fit,” is due to be screened this Saturday, September 29^th, as part of the Melbourne Underground Film Festival but the OFLC has not seen fit to grant an exemption for the screening (exemptions are required for all unclassified foreign films). The film has received positive notices from the Australian press.

Ashley and Kisha is a documentary exploring the role of love and sexuality in the relationship between its principals, an African-American couple from the South. In the US, being out and proud is perhaps most difficult for Southern, African-American women, and Ashley and Kisha is touching, yet defiant testimony to the struggle and rewards of being true to one’s sexual self.

In its decision, the OFLC cited the sexual content of the film as the reason. Yet, on the same night ACMI in Melbourne will be screening with OFLC approval the film “Destricted,” infamous for very explicit sex, nearly all depicted outside the context of love or commitment. We believe the OFLC has erred in its decision, but there is no recourse within the OFLC structure for making an appeal.

  

8) MORE ART CENSORSHIP,THIS TIME by RUSSIA’s CULTURE MINISTER:

An intriguing image, shot among the birch trees and snow in a Siberian forest, of two policemen photographed kissing each other passionately. They also appear to be caressing each other’s buttocks. The work by a Russian art collective proved too much for the Russian Culture Minister. He banned the photograph, Kissing Policemen (An Epoch of Clemency) as political provocation from an exhibition of contemporary Russian art due to be exhibited at the Paris Maison Rouge. He also banned 16 other works including Blue Noses that shows Vladimir Putin, George Bush and Osama bin Laden cavorting on a double bed in their underpants (from The Age Melbourne 13.10.07). What! No John Howard?

  

9) INDONESIA’s HIV/AIDS EPIDEMIC FUELLED BY DRUG INJECTION:

There’s a general feeling that AIDS is under control in Australia, but look at our nearest neighbour, Indonesia, and you’ll find a more alarming picture –more than 1.69 million deaths a year and in some provinces more than seven percent of the population infected. About 48 percent of injecting drug users in Indonesia is infected with HIV because they are not using clean needles and syringes. Most of the drug users are young, relatively well educated and live with their families. Experts warn that if risk behaviour among drug users and sex workers and their clients does not change, the HIV epidemic will worsen. The imprisonment of drug injectors is a significant part of Indonesia’s epidemic. Condom use is rare. One UN report found that women are reluctant to carry condoms for fear of being arrested by police, who regard it as “proof ” that they are sex workers.

The Australian Federal Government has formed an HIV Cooperation Program to help Indonesia fight the spread of AIDS. A current tender from AusAid is calling for a contractor to manage a new Australia-Indonesia partnership to develop HIV prevention programs. The contract is scheduled to start in February 2008 and continue for at least 5 years. An anticipated three-year extension would make it an eight-year project. (Adapted from The Age Business Section, 15.9.07)  

 

10) CHANGES TO PASSPORTS FOR TRANSGENDER AUSTRALIANS:

In Melbourne’s MCV weekly (13.9.07), George Dunford reported that in Federal Parliament Greens Senator Kerry Nettle made sure Foreign Minister Downer wasn’t relaxed or comfortable about the government’s stance on transgender Australians when she posed questions to the minister about recent changes in passport legislation.

The changes mean that transgender Australians can no longer apply for passports with their identifying gender. Accordingly, they can only travel under a Document of Travel. Using this paperwork can create bureaucratic confusion, stress and unwanted attention at customs. In some countries the document may not even be recognised, placing transgender Australians at risk of being deported. “Transgender people who are travelling (overseas) will now be more vulnerable to abuse and discrimination,” Nettle told Downer. “The Greens want to know,” she said, “how the Government intends to ensure the safety of transgender Australians who wish to travel overseas.”  Senator Nettle went on to chastise the Howard Government for “creating more” discrimination and charged that: “It is the Government’s responsibility to protect all Australians.”

 

11) FEDERAL GREENS SENATOR NETTLE LASHES HEALTH MINISTER:

Senator Kerry Nettle is no stranger to stoushes with Liberal frontbenchers about the rights of the individual. Melbourne’s MCV also reminded readers that back in 2006, the Greens senator donned a T-shirt that read, “Mr Abbott get your rosaries off my ovaries,” in response to Health Minister Tony Abbott’s perceived Catholic condemnation of the abortion drug RU486. At the time, Prime Minister Howard dismissed her T-shirt statement as an “undergraduate stunt.” She responded by telling The Age newspaper, “It’s not the T-shirt that needs changing, it’s the Prime Minister’s attitude, which we are seeing increasingly and is about  bringing fundamentalist religious views into the Parliament.   

 

12) COLOMBIA COURT AFFIRMS SAME-SEX HEALTH BENEFITS!

Back in the LGS Newsletter No.40 (Nov-Dec 1998) we told you how Colombia in South America had legalised Same-Sex Unions. Obviously, same-sex couples since have had a tough time proving their right to benefits the court said they were entitled to. Now, almost ten years later, gays in Colombia may add their partners to health insurance plans, the nation’s highest court has ruled, building on an earlier decision granting inheritance rights to same-sex couples, according to Associated Press. The ruling by the Constitutional Court cannot be appealed. In February 2007, the court said gay couples need only prove they have been living together for two years to obtain the right to half their partner’s possessions and inheritance after death or separation. Colombia Diversa, which defends the rights of sexual minorities, says the country has 300,000 same-sex couples. (AP) –PlanetOut News 8.10.07.

 

13) GREENS CANDIDATE in Victoria BY-ELECTION has transgender partner:

Unlike most politicians Janet Rice, the unsuccessful candidate for ex-premier Steve Bracks’ seat of Williamstown, was willing to tell the electorate the truth about a personal life that is anything but conventional. The week before the by-election she told the Sunday Age (9.9.07) that for 16 years she lived with her husband, Peter Whetton, a high-profile climate change expert, in what she saw as a normal marriage. They had two boys, now aged 15 and 12. Four years ago, Peter broke the news that he was a cross-dresser and felt more woman than man. Peter had a sex-change operation and changed his name to Penny. She acknowledged that many marriages would not have withstood such a dramatic shift in roles and beliefs. The boys were terrific about it, too. Trying to hide the truth though, she said, would have been used against her, a former mayor. After the initial shock of the discovery, there was acceptance and a willingness to stay together. A marriage between a passionate local campaigner and a classic scientist, “we’re a good pair,” she said, “I still love Penny.”

 

14) BOOKS we recommend as good reads, absorbing history or rousing truths:

COERCIVE RECONCILIATION, editors: Jon Altman and Melinda Hinkson, Arena Publications. The Federal Government rushed through its legislation on child abuse in Aboriginal communities of the Northern Territory with insufficient debate and no consultation with the Elders. This collection of 30 essays provides detailed and scathing critique of the government’s action and condescension.  Available from Arena, PO Box 18, North Carlton Vic.3054, $27.50 plus postage.

CONVINCING GROUND, by Bruce Pascoe and published by Aboriginal Studies Press, Canberra. The author draws on the past through a critical examination of historical works and witness accounts and finds uncanny parallels between the techniques and language used there to the national political stage today. Pascoe has written Convincing Ground for all Australians as an antidote to the great Australian inability to deal respectfully with the nation’s constructed Indigenous past. $39.95 at good bookshops.

BORN TO BE GAY –a history of homosexuality, by William Naphy, published by Tempus, Gloucestershire UK. Probably the first global history of gay people, from the earliest civilisations until the present day. It takes a radical look at homosexuality from positive views in the Ancient world before they were contorted by Judeo-Christian morality. Available from most gay bookshops.

 

15) RETIRED ACADEMIC ATTEMPTS CITIZEN’S ARREST of Philip Ruddock:

In July 2007, as the Federal Attorney-General was about to address a Symposium on Law & Liberty in the War on Terror at UNSW, retired academic Peter McGregor from Newcastle who was attending the event, accused Ruddock of abandoning Habeas Corpus and being a war crimes offender. The anti-war activist produced a formal Citizen’s Arrest Warrant but was immediately apprehended and taken into custody. He was charged with Unlawful Entry under the Enclosed Lands Protection Act 1901 when his right to attend the event was withdrawn by the organisers. There has been a blanket of silence in the media, who were certainly present at the Symposium, over the whole incident and the subsequent appearance in court of the accused. He pleaded not guilty and goes to trial in November. Peter’s friends and colleagues have supported his right to challenge the Attorney-General as a matter of free speech.

 

16) GAY/LESBIAN FILMS FACE CENSORSHIP AS DVDs AT VIDEO STORES:

Current federal film classification laws undermine access to unique niche content films for different sections of the community. Out Video, a small St Kilda video store, markets films directed at the gay and lesbian communities. Many are produced overseas and never achieve general or selected release in Australia. Because of the prohibitively high cost of classification, they never get classified. The store has been told by the Attorney-General’s Department it must cease selling or renting out any of the unclassified titles which amount to “nearly half their stock.” The Age (1.10.07) says that removal of Out Video’s titles will do nothing to reduce their availability. All the “offending” titles are available from on line stores outside the country. Australians can buy them on line, avoiding scrutiny by the censors. It exposes the critical flaws in our film classification laws. Now a second Melbourne store stocking imported gay and lesbian films has been ordered to empty its shelves after being targeted by the federal attorney-general’s department. The Sydney Star Observer (4 .10.07) reported that the gay bookshop, Hares and Hyenas, has been ordered to remove 10 DVD titles including critically acclaimed documentaries. Titles like The Aggressives –a documentary about butch New York lesbians, BoyMeets Boy, Noah’s Arc and unbelievably the 1997 film Bent are on the list. The stage play about the suffering of gays in Nazi concentration camps was performed in Australia 20 years ago!  The cost to get the all-clear from the Office of Film and Literature Classification on a DVD film was quoted at $2500. That’s outrageous particularly when most imports have already been classified in the UK, Canada or USA. It does not only affect us. A lot of people living here still want to see films from their countries of origin. A spokesperson for A-G Philip Ruddock said the department was simply enforcing the law.

 

17) UNITED NATIONS GRANTS CONSULTATIVE STATUS TO GLBT groups:

The UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) on July 23, 2007 granted consultative status to two NGOs that address human rights violations based on sexual orientation and gender identity. The two groups, Coalition Gaie et Lesbienne du Quebec and the Swedish Federation of Lesbian, Gay and Transgender Rights, now at the United Nations will be able to work directly on human rights and other issues of importance to the GLBT community. It ensures them access to UN meetings, delivery of oral and written reports and the organising of events to facilitate understanding of the abuse and discrimination that GLBT people face around the world –IGLHR Commission release.

  

18) RARE FIRST EDITION OF OSCAR WILDE BOOK IN CHARITY SHOP:

Rather appropriately a copy of Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest was discovered inside a handbag in an Oxfam shop recently in Nantwich, South Cheshire, according to the BBC. The Oxfam shop’s staff had no idea who had donated the items. The copy dates back to 1898 and is marked number 349 of a total of 1000 printed copies. The manager of the branch said that the find was a one-in-a-million chance for our shop. “We’ve had it checked and verified” she added. (BBC, 19.10.07)

 

19) CATERPILLAR AND THE DEATH OF GAZA ACTIVIST:

The parents of a US peace activist, who was crushed to death when protesting against Israel’s demolition of Palestinian homes in Gaza four years ago, have been refused permission to sue the maker of the bulldozer that killed her. A US federal appeals court has ruled that Caterpillar, which supplied several bulldozers used by the Israeli Defence Force in house demolitions in the occupied territories, could not be sued as this would bring the judiciary into conflict with the executive branch of the US Government. A panel of three judges argued that the case could not go to trial “without implicitly questioning, and even condemning, United States foreign policy towards Israel.”

Rachel Corrie, 23, was killed on March 16^th, 2003, by a 60-tonne Caterpillar D9 bulldozer in Rafah, Gaza, as she tried to prevent the home of a Palestinian pharmacist being razed. She was wearing a fluorescent orange vest, and according to witnesses, was in full view of the bulldozer operator. Her parents and four Palestinian families began legal proceedings in 2005. In the lengthy court process their lawyers alleged that Caterpillar knew or should have known that the equipment was going to be used to demolish homes in violation of international law in incidents that at times led to the deaths of innocent people. Caterpillar, with supporting evidence from the US Government, argued the machines had been paid for by the Pentagon as part of the Government’s military aid to Israel –from The Age, 20.9.07.

 

20) PRESIDENT SLAMS TUTU’s ATTACK on South Africa’s AIDS POLICY:

South Africa’s President Mbeki has called critics of his embattled health minister “wild animals” in a remarkable display of support for a woman decried by AIDS activists for advocating beets and garlic as remedies for the disease. His defence of Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang came as Archbishop Desmond Tutu said in a speech on August 30^th 2007 that the Health Ministry has presided over “the vast deterioration in health standards of our land.”

Tshabalala-Msimang has been condemned at home and abroad for her unorthodox views on the AIDS virus which has infected an estimated 5.4 million South Africans –the highest number of any country in the world. She has made plain in news interviews her mistrust of antiretroviral medicines, repeatedly espousing a diet heavy on garlic, beetroot, lemon and olive oil as more effective in treating HIV/AIDS, earning her the nicknames “Dr Beetroot” and “Dr Garlic.” Prompted by South Africa’s stand which featured garlic and other foodstuffs at last year’s international AIDS conference in Canada, international scientists wrote an unprecedented joint letter of protest to President Mbeki. For years Mbeki has downplayed the AIDS crisis, steadfastly standing by his minister. But his support for her has reached new heights.

In his weekly ANC Today online newsletter, the president said that history would honour the minister as “one of the pioneer architects of a South African public health system constructed for all our people, and especially the poor.” He wrote, “We do not normally celebrate our heroes and heroines publicly until they have died. I have now written about Manto Tshabalala-Msimang as I have because some … have chosen to sit as judges.”

Mbeki then went on to slam The Sunday Times for intruding in her private life by reporting that she had jumped a waiting list when she underwent liver transplant surgery in March this year. The newspaper reported that she needed the transplant because of years of alcohol abuse. She denied the allegations and successfully sued to recover medical records that served as a source for some of the paper’s allegations.

In his online newsletter, Mbeki wrote that those who deliberately manufactured and peddled these lies obviously did so to argue that she should have been allowed to suffer and die. “Some in our society, and elsewhere in the world, seem determined to applaud this truly frightening behaviour, which in reality belongs to wild animals.” Desmond Tutu, in his speech, lamented that “too many died unnecessarily because of bizarre theories held on high,” in a thinly veiled reference to the president and his health minister, “heroes and heroines killed in the anti-apartheid struggle, if alive today, would be shocked by the devastation of HIV/AIDS. The disease kills 900 South Africans every day.”

AIDS activists say Tshabalala-Msimang’s promotion of untested remedies and her public pronouncements have led to confusion and undermined confidence in scientific medicine. Nathan Geffen, policy coordinator of the Treatment Action Campaign said the movement would press for the minister’s dismissal. He detailed her failings –the slow provision of drugs to prevent HIV-positive mothers passing on the virus to children; delays in giving treatment to people with AIDS; and her department’s failure to provide proper staffing and expertise. “The failure to manage the HIV crisis has had a knock-on effect on the management of the entire health system,” Geffen told Associated Press, citing the spread of drug-resistant tuberculosis, closely associated with AIDS, as an example.

The minister was sidelined for months this year with ill health. During that time deputy Health Minister Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge joined forces with private groups and AIDS activists to draw up an ambitious five-year plan to halve the number of new infections and provide care and treatment to 80% of those in need by 2011. But Mbeki sacked her last month, ostensibly because she went on an unauthorised trip to an AIDS conference in Spain and did not work as part of a team. AIDS activists said Madlala-Routledge was victim of a political vendetta orchestrated by her boss, the minister.

 

21) SINGAPORE RETAINS ITS DISCRIMINATORY BAN ON GAY SEX:

Singapore’s parliament has voted against a proposal to decriminalise sex between men, despite receiving a petition signed by thousands of people. So why is the ban so discriminatory? It passed a bill legalising oral and anal sex, but only between heterosexuals, all part of a wider plan to reform Singapore’s sex laws –many dating from the British colonial era half a century ago. Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said that the government did not consider gays to be a minority with minority rights. Singapore, he told parliament, was a conservative society, and he wanted to keep it so. Its anti-gay law 377A remains, although prosecutions are rare. The penalty for “gross indecency” between two men is jail for up to 2 years –from BBC News OnLine, 23.10.07.  

 

22) CONFESSIONS OF AN AUSTRALIAN DIPLOMAT:

Bruce Haigh was a diplomat for 25 years, serving in Pakistan, Iran, Afghanistan, South Africa, Saudi Arabia and Sri Lanka. He also served on the Refugee Review Tribunal for five years. What follows is a condensed version of his article which appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald (SMH) Sept 27, 2007.

According to the Howard Government I am a people smuggler and as such should be prosecuted and put in prison. As a young Australian diplomat posted to South Africa from 1976 to 1979, I was confronted by a ruthless police state enforcing white privilege over a black majority through the comprehensive system of race discrimination known as apartheid.

Black activists, friends and bystanders were taken into custody, tortured and sometimes murdered. This is what happened in September 1977 to Steve Biko, the exceptional leader of the Black Consciousness Movement and a friend of mine.

Using my diplomatic immunity I was able to assist victims of apartheid. I took black activists across the border to safety and shuttled others from one place to another to avoid the security police. I put some up at home until the security police grew tired of looking for them and I took others, who were banned, to clandestine meetings.

I also took some students from Soweto to Swaziland. They wanted to apply for refugee status in Australia but were knocked back by officials at the Australian embassy in Pretoria. I couldn’t say or do much because my border activities were not known in the embassy.

What prompts this confession is the tragic story of Ali Al Jenabi, an Iraqi convicted of people smuggling and who is seeking refugee status in Australia. For sometime I have been aware of his detention in Villawood. However, as I read an account of his case in the Herald, I felt an injustice had been done to him.

There seems to be no one in the Howard Government able to comprehend the fear and danger of living in a police state which can drive some to flee from all that is familiar. The compelling needs of a refugee often find a positive response in the marketplace.

It is inconsistent and contradictory for the Government to take the moral high ground, accusing people smugglers of base motives, in the light of its own actions over Tampa, the children overboard incident and the prolonged detention of refugees, including children.

According to the Government, I am a people smuggler. I provided a service outside the marketplace, although one existed. I like to believe that the people I helped escaped injury, or perhaps death, and were able to lead a better life. Ali Al Jenabi has done no more or less.

 

23) SAUDI ARABIA ONCE AGAIN SHOWS ITS HOMOPHOBIA to the world:

Two men in Saudi Arabia have been sentenced to 7,000 lashes each after being convicted of sodomy and have received their first round of punishment in public. The men, who were not identified, were meted out an unspecified number of lashes in public in the southwestern city of Al-Bahah, the Al-Okaz daily newspaper reported. They were then returned to prison where they are to be held until the full punishment is completed, the newspaper added without saying how many sessions this would involve. Homosexual acts are illegal in Saudi Arabia, which metes out strict punishment based on sharia, or Islamic law. Rape, murder, armed robbery, apostasy (abandonment of religious faith) and drug trafficking can all carry the death penalty in the Saudi kingdom, with public beheading the common form of execution (SMH, 5.10.07).

 

24) CONTINUING VIOLENCE AGAINST GAY MEN in OXFORD St. SYDNEY:

A spate of violent assaults related to “sexual preference prejudice” and targeting gay men in Oxford Street prompted Sydney’s Lord Mayor Clover Moore and the NSW Police Minister David Campbell to take a walk down the main clubs strip and the side alleys after midnight on Friday, October 5^th. According to drag queen Maxi Shield, who walked with them, “Of a sudden every constable is out on the street! Friday night was so quiet.” Incidents of homophobic violence along Oxford Street have been widely reported in recent months, with one August weekend ending with three separate attacks (SSO, 11.10.07). Maxi Shield wanted to know where the increased police were the following night, Saturday, when the street was as bad as ever. They needed to gauge the impact of homophobic violence then, not Friday when the police were everywhere.

The weekend before the VIP’s walk, the Sun-Herald revealed that a community group, GenQ Street Angels, were appealing for volunteers with policing, military, security or medical experience to join so that they could begin patrolling the strip as early as the first weekend in November.

We took a look at the Gay Solidarity archive of an earlier period. We discovered two 1986 circulars indicating that gay groups in August and September 1986 were alarmed by the increase in violence and even murders that had been occurring in the area. A violent attack on the AIDS Information Bus and its workers was cited as a recent ugly example. The community back then was suggesting its own  violence-monitoring group to cope with the attacks, not unlike Generation Q’s. Prejudice lives on!

 

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