Maverick US historian and pacifist Howard Zinn died suddenly in January, aged 87. He was an inspiring, indefatigable human rights activist best known as author of A People's History of the United States. (His endorsement graces the cover of New Internationalist's No-Nonsense Guides.)
When asked in a recent interview, Zinn said he would like to […]
To quote a press release issued today on behalf of those presently involved in this anti-war protest in northern Australia:
Christian Activists enter restricted military area during live-fire exercises
Four nonviolent Christian activists have entered the Shoalwater Bay Training Area this morning to stop the Talisman Saber exercises. Calling themselves 'the Bonhoeffer 4' after Kevin Rudd’s […]
Australia has a human rights defender on a par with Raoul Wallenberg and Oskar Schindler for his stance against Nazi Germany, yet William Cooper is little known in Australia today.
Appalled by the vicious carnage of Kristallnacht, the watershed pogrom of November 1938, Aboriginal leader Bill Cooper (right) led a protest walk from his home […]
The awarding of the highest US civilian honour, the Medal of Freedom, to former Australian Prime Minister John Howard this month (left) was staggering to human rights activists familiar with his record.
Even more galling was the same award given to Colombia's President Álvaro Uribe.
The Presidential Medal is intended to recognise an "especially meritorious contribution" to […]
A short documentary has appeared on the internet about Scott Parkin, the nonviolent US peace activist who in 2005 was detained in Australia for 5 days and then deported for being a 'direct or indirect risk to Australian national security.' Greenpeace Australia's communications director, Dan Cass, is depicted describing Parkin as Australia's first political […]
The trail of the 'Raytheon 9' enters its likely final week. These nine men occupied the Derry offices of an arms manufacturer for 8 hours back in August 2006 with the purpose of preventing war crimes. Claims Eamonn McCann, due to take the stand this week:
"Israel had dropped so many bombs over southern Lebanon, south […]
It’s a bumper year for 40th anniversaries, especially for the United States: assassinations, moonwalks, war, protest. Elsewhere there were coups, decolonisation, nuclear tests. 1968 was also the year of the Prague Spring and the invasion of Czechoslovakia, student riots in Paris, violence and starvation on a mass scale in Biafra (Nigeria).
Last week was the 40th […]
Writes Nobel Peace Prize nominee, John Dear, SJ:
"On May 1, the Catholic Worker [movement] celebrates its 75th birthday, and to mark the occasion, Marquette University Press will publish Dorothy Day’s diaries, The Duty of Delight.
Meanwhile, a beautiful new DVD documentary, Don’t Call Me a Saint, has been released, offering rare interviews and footage of the […]
Amnesty International called it "shocking and preventable." On 27 January 2008, Australian indigenous leader and land rights activist Ian Ward — "one of the last nomads born in the Gibson Desert" — died in custody.
The Warburton man was being driven 915km from Laverton in the Western Desert to Kalgoorlie for a mention in relation to […]
Forty-five years ago, this is how Martin Luther King spent Easter (an excerpt from his autobiography):
[O]n April 10 . . . the city government obtained a court injunction directing us to cease our activities . . . [W]e did an audacious thing, something we had never done in any other crusade. We disobeyed a court […]