Newsletter date: 29 Mar 2011
Contents:
* Urgent UN Petition to restore Human Rights to NT Aboriginal People
* Northern Territory (NT) Intervention
* Background to the Northern Territory (NT) Intervention
* Other Aboriginal Articles
URGENT UN PETITION TO RESTORE HUMAN RIGHTS TO NT ABORIGINAL PEOPLE:
- Petition
'concerned Australians':
Restore Human Rights to NT Aboriginal People
http://www.concernedaustralians.com.au/
"Letter to the Human Rights Commissioner, Navi Pillay, who will visit Australia in May. Your signature is needed by 7 May.
Background information (PDF): http://www.concernedaustralians.com.au/media/Background-info-N-Pillay.pdf
Letter to Navi Pillay (PDF): http://www.concernedaustralians.com.au/media/Letter-to-Navi-Pillay.pdf
Electronic petition / letter: http://www.gopetition.com/petition/44188.html "
GoPetition: Restore Human Rights to the Northern Territory Aboriginal People
Published by 'concerned Australians'
http://www.gopetition.com/petition/44188.html
26 Mar 11: "Target: Navi Pillay UN Human Rights Commissioner ...
Web site: http://www.concernedaustralians.com.au
Background (Preamble):
Navi Pillay, a former South Africa High Court Judge, is the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. She will visit Australia in May.
This follows several years of criticism regarding Australia’s poor human rights record and last year’s visit to Geneva by Aboriginal elders who raised the Northern Territory Intervention with the Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.
The Northern Territory Intervention imposed in June 2007, without consultation or the consent of Aboriginal people, continues to be a source of grave injustice. It has overridden the rights of the people, placed their culture and languages in jeopardy while removing their control over their land and communities. ... "
Rollback the Intervention:
Urgent United Nations Petition
http://rollbacktheintervention.wordpress.com/
"Navi Pillay, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, will visit Australia in May. The Australian Government is due to respond to the United Nations in August on the complaint laid by Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory to the Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. Jenny Macklin is already campaigning widely to convince the Australian public that the Racial Discrimination Act has been fully reinstated whereas in fact the Special Measures are still in place after nearly four years. These measures continue to demonise and demoralise many Aboriginal people and not just those living in prescribed areas. ...
http://www.gopetition.com/petition/44188.html "
Stop the Intervention:
Restore Human Rights to NT Aboriginal People
[scroll down page] http://stoptheintervention.org/
NORTHERN TERRITORY (NT) INTERVENTION:
- Audio
Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association:
CAAMA Radio News 28-03-2011
http://caama.com.au/caama-radio-news-28-03-2011
28 Mar 11: "A leading Australian Aboriginal Rights campaigner has challenged the Gillard Labor Governments claim that the Racial Discrimination Act has been fully reinstated in the Northern Territory."
- News
Solidarity: Speaking tour a boost for Jobs with Justice campaign
http://www.solidarity.net.au/33/speaking-tour-a-boost-for-jobs-with-just...
Mar 11: "John Leemans, a Gurindji man and LHMU delegate from Kalkarindji, Northern Territory, travelled to Sydney and Brisbane to speak at worksites, union and community meetings in March. John is an outspoken activist and campaigner against the Northern Territory Intervention. Last year he helped organise a workers’ strike in Kalkarindji to protest the quarantining of Aboriginal workers’ wages. Some workers in Kalkarindji are paid only the equivalent of Newstart Allowance with half quarantined onto a BasicsCard that can only be spent in certain stores. ...
Get involved in the campaign: http://jobswithjustice.wordpress.com/ " Emma Torzillo
Green Left: Refugees put on income management
http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/47142
27 Mar 11: "In June 2010, the federal government passed legislation allowing the extension of welfare quarantining beyond the 73 Northern Territory remote communities that were its first target. ... The ALP government said it extended the policy so that it could to apply to all welfare recipients in the NT and therefore make it non-discriminatory. But a March 10 Senate estimates committee revealed that after more than six months of the new, improved “non-racist” income management scheme, over 92.4% of those who have been forced onto income management are Aboriginal."
Koori Mail: PM urged to accept Abbott invitation
[scroll down page] http://www.koorimail.com/index.php
27 Mar 11: "ABORIGINAL MP Adam Giles has joined calls for Prime Minister Julia Gillard to accept Opposition leader Tony Abbott's invitation to tour the Alice Springs town camps together. Mr Abbott has called for a 'new intervention' to combat crime and other social problems in the town but Ms Gillard says he is merely politicking. Mr Giles says the problems in Alice Springs need a coordinated, bipartisan approach and the Government's response to date falls well short."
BACKGROUND TO THE NORTHERN TERRITORY (NT) INTERVENTION:
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
Northern Territory National Emergency Response: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Territory_intervention
Creative Spirits: Northern Territory Emergence Response (NTER)—"The Intervention": http://www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/politics/northern-terr...
STICS (Stop the Intervention Collective Sydney): http://stoptheintervention.org/
IRAG (Intervention Rollback Action Group): http://rollbacktheintervention.wordpress.com/
'concerned Australians': http://www.concernedaustralians.com.au/
Melbourne Anti-Intervention Collective: http://maicollective.blogspot.com/
ANTaR (Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation) - NT intervention: http://www.antar.org.au/issues_and_campaigns/nt_intervention
Jobs with Justice: http://jobswithjustice.wordpress.com/
Defending Indigenous Rights: http://defendingindigenousrights.wordpress.com/
Intervention walk-off's Blog: http://interventionwalkoff.wordpress.com/
WGAR (Working Group for Aboriginal Rights): http://wgar.info/
OTHER ABORIGINAL ARTICLES:
- Media Releases
NACCHO - National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation
Community Support & Aboriginal Community Control the Lynchpin of Closing the Gap
http://www.naccho.org.au/Files/Documents/2011-3-24-NACCHO_Close-the%20Ga...
24 Mar 11: "NACCHO Chair Justin Mohamed congratulated everyone involved the over 880 events around Australia today expressing support for Closing the Gap and Aboriginal community control of health.
People held diverse events in schools, offices, parks, medical services and hospitals.
Mr Mohamed said, “In addition to the support from community events, the Close the Gap breakfast in Parliament House Canberra demonstrated the bipartisan political support for the campaign”. ...
“I was especially pleased to be able to highlight the Aboriginal Health Workers in the frontline of our services. They make the care we provide so much more effective in reaching out to the community and often they don’t receive the recognition they are due,” Mr Mohamed said."
Rachel Siewert: Senate backs Greens’ Motion on Deaths in Custody
http://rachel-siewert.greensmps.org.au/content/media-release/senate-back...
24 Mar 11: "The Senate today formally acknowledged that this year marks twenty years since of the release of the Report of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, supporting a motion put by Senator Rachel Siewert, Australian Greens spokesperson on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Issues.
Senator Siewert said the Senate has drawn attention to the continuing high rate of incarceration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people – a rate that continues to rise in an alarming fashion.
“Twenty years after the Royal Commission we are still seeing disproportionately high rates of deaths in custody of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people,” Senator Siewert said.
“It is disappointing that the majority of the recommendations of the Royal Commission have not been fully implemented. ... "
- News
Green Left: Police break Aboriginal picket line
http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/47133
27 Mar 11: "Victorian police led government officials through a blockade set up by residents of the Lake Tyers Aboriginal Trust in eastern Victoria, the Age said on March 23. Aboriginal women from the community set up the peaceful blockade on March 8 — International Women’s Day. Organisers have vowed to keep the blockade until Victoria’s Indigenous affairs minister, Jeanette Powell, agrees to meet with the community."
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