National News
Bloody Sunday families welcome report release
FAMILIES of the victims of the Bloody Sunday massacre welcomed a Government change of heart to allow family members to read the Saville Inquiry report before its official release. It was being delayed to allow Ministry of Defence scrutiny — and possible vetting of the document before the public get to see it.
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Plymouth council dumps disabled workers
PLYMOUTH Council has thrown disabled workers on the scrapheap says Community Union (formerly known as the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation).
The transfer of the contract for Community Integrated Services from PLUSS to Milbrook Health Care will not only compromise levels of service but will see the private supplier slash numbers of disabled staff.
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Defend state education!
THE MAIN teaching unions traditionally hold their annual conferences at Easter and both the NUT and NASUWT are getting ready to defend the state education system from cuts and privatisation as well as their jobs and pensions from whatever government is elected on 6th May.
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Anger over Jarvis rail job cuts
RMT and the general union Unite last week both condemned an announcement by the firm Jarvis that has gone into liquidation with the loss of 1,200 rail maintenance jobs.
RMT called on the Government to launch a last-ditch rescue package to save the 1200 skilled jobs.
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Campaigning in Colchester
from New Worker correspondent
THE COLCHESTER Unite, New Worker Supporters’ Group, Trades Council and Labour Party will be jointly campaigning for the return of a Labour government and will be collecting petition signatures for an end to the war in Afghanistan.
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RMT ballots again
THE RMT rail union is to run its national strike ballot again after a strike planned for four days this week was halted by a High Court injunction.
The national strike, to be run in conjunction with a TSSA strike, would have involved signallers and rail maintenance workers in a fight against drastic maintenance job cuts that threaten the safety of rail workers and passengers as well as putting extra work on signallers.
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English Defence League out of Dudley!
THE MIDLANDS TUC last Saturday issued a statement condemning the English Defence League for holding a rally in the centre of Dudley.
Cheryl Pidgeon, Regional Secretary of the Midlands TUC said: “We know that this group includes football hooligans and racist thugs who are intent on causing trouble.
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Fighting for public sector pensions
THE PUBLIC sector union Unison last week hit back angrily at CBI scaremongering, after they claimed that public sector pensions have created a “black hole” in Government finances.
The union called on the CBI to focus on the private companies, that, despite making profits are closing their pension schemes, forcing staff into poverty in their retirement.
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International News
Carnage continues in Iraq
by our Arab Affairs correspondent
OCCUPIED Iraq has been rocked by a new wave of partisan attacks and bombings in Baghdad. The Green Zone came under mortar fire on Saturday; scores of people were killed and hundreds more injured in multiple and co-ordinated attacks on embassies.
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Cuba: youth for the revolution!
Radio Havana Cuba
ENTHUSIASTIC representatives of Cuban youth pledged their commitment to preserving the work and achievements of the revolution and defending the sovereignty and independence of Cuba, a nation that for over 50 years has been the victim of numerous media-driven campaigns and hostile actions orchestrated by the United States and its European allies. These countries simply cannot tolerate the fact that Cuba has the right to freely choose its political system.
The declaration was made by the participants at the ninth Congress of the Young Communist League of Cuba. They said that the new generations are ready to give everything they have to the revolution. One of the highlights of the congress was the analysis they did on the main problems affecting the Cuban society and the necessity to improve Young Communist League work in every workplace and school.
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Lights at the end of the tunnel
by Gong Yidong in Xiangning
THE MOMENT a mass of miners’ cap lamps flicked on in front of him, Meng Quanfu burst into tears. He knew he was a part of a miracle: after eight days trapped in pitch black underground, more than 100 miners had been saved.
As 115 miners were lifted out of the Wangjialing coal mine in north China’s Shanxi province on Monday morning, rescuers like Meng found it was the miners’ perseverance, wit, and optimism, together with an unbreakable belief in their rescuers, that carried them through the endless darkness.
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Russia boosts Venezuelan science and defence
Radio Havana Cuba
VISITING Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has offered to help develop Venezuela’s defence and space industry in his first visit to the South American nation, aimed at deepening military, energy and financial ties between Moscow and Caracas.
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Kim Il Sung and his old home
The Sacred Place of the Korean Revolution
by Sim Chol Yong
ABOUT 12 km south-west of central Pyongyang there rises a hill with the Taedong River skirting round its foot. Ancient people called the hill Mangyong-bong (Hill with Kaleidoscopic Views), and the village at its foot Mangyongdae.
There is a small straw-thatched house in the village, where President Kim Il Sung was born on 15th April 1912 (Juche 1). At the time Korea was under the Japanese imperialists’ military occupation (1905-1945), ruled by the Emperor of Japan.
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Google on an anti-communist crusade?
Or maybe they’re just sore losers
by Gary Wilson
THE HEADLINES have proclaimed that Google has “quit” China in a “battle over censorship”.
That’s what Google told the capitalist media, so that’s what’s been reported.
There’s no fine print in these reports. For example, only the search part of Google’s operations is involved. Other Google business operations in China are continuing. And Google didn’t quit China; the search operation was moved to Hong Kong, which is part of China.
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Features
Communist women in conference
Report on the seminar of Communist and Workers’ Parties on the 100th Celebration of International Women’s Day: The Role of Communists in the Struggle for the Parity and Emancipation of Women.
by Daphne Liddle
New Communist Party of Britain delegate at the seminar
HOW CAN communists work most effectively to achieve parity and freedom for women? That is the question that delegates from some 27 communist and workers’ parties debated in a chamber in the European Parliament building in Brussels on 27th March, at the same time as a debate in the main chamber debated what help would, or would not, be given to Greece to resolve that country’s economic plight.
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