By Gerry Georgatos
The Traditional Owners of the Arkaroola sanctuary in South Australia's northern Flinders ranges are now able to rest easy with a new law banning miners from the region. Late into the night on February 28 the South Australian Upper House passed legislation that will ensure protection of the environmentally sensitive lands.
by Gerry Georgatos Conservationists have been campaigning to save what they say is WA's largest numbat colony in Warrup. The Department of Environment and Conservation (DEC) had been denying such a colony existed.
The conservationists have called for a halt to logging in Warrup after finding what they say is irrefutable evidence of endangered numbats living near the logging in Warrup.
By Gerry Georgatos
The Office of the Prime Minister continues to deny any involvement in sparking the Lobby restaurant incident - and their official spokesperson claims that Tony Hodges went rogue and acted alone. Two separate well placed sources in government and who are close to the Office of the Prime Minister have said that Mr Hodges did not act alone and that indeed the Office of the Prime Minister was extensively involved.
Australia’s Lynas Rare Earth Plant made history in Malaysia today when a nationwide rally to stop the project occurred. An estimated 20,000 citizens together with Malaysian civil society organisations converged in Kuantan for a rally to protest against the Lynas project and to demand for a clean and safe future for Malaysia. The Stop Lynas campaign has escalated into the biggest ever environmental issue for the country. Participants arrived from all over the country including the east Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak.
Related: stoplynas.org -- Rally footage on Youtube -- Coverage in The Age
Kristy O'Brien ABC News February 15, 2012
A former chief justice of the Family Court of Australia, Alastair Nicholson, says transcripts of Federal Government consultations in Indigenous communities could be used to wage a High Court legal battle. The group Concerned Australians has released transcripts recorded in the Northern Territory as part of consultations about the Stronger Futures legislation, which will replace laws governing the Emergency Intervention in the Territory in August. Mr Nicholson is a member of the group.
Published by courtesy of Stephen Hagan, Editor of the National Indigenous Times
The story appeared in its 15 February edition
A nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory is a step closer to reality, after the ALP and the Federal Coalition parties revealed they had struck a deal on laws to allow a facility to be built. Despite calls from a local Aboriginal group at Muckaty Station and the Australian Greens for debate to be postponed, the Senate began debating the National Radioactive Waste Management Bill last week.
Locals and activists from Quit Coal stopped exploratory drilling in Bacchus Marsh today, 50km west of Melbourne. About 20 people occupied a drilling rig belonging to Mantle Mining on the side of Glenmore Road, near the corner of Daisybank Lane, Bacchus Marsh.
Two people locked themselves to the Mantle Mining exploratory drilling rig this morning: Paul Connor climbed to the top of the rig and unfurled a banner which read ‘No New Coal Bacchus Marsh’. Bacchus Marsh mother Natasha Mills, who is pregnant with her second child, locked herself to the bottom of the rig and told reporters "I felt a responsibility to stop drilling today because I’m determined to protect my family from a dangerous coal mine, and I don’t want my children’s future to be marked by run-away climate change."
Background: Our neighbour the coal mine? Bacchus Marsh | Quit Coal | Quit Coal Flickr Photostream | Moorabool Environment Group | Sourcewatch: Bacchus Marsh coal project
Not for as long as it takes to blink were Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott so much as threatened, even less endangered, on the 26th of January by demonstrators from the 40th anniversary Aboriginal Embassy camp in Canberra. Vision footage from activists and mainstream media almost inundating the internet makes irrefutably clear that it was police who were violent and caused the bedlam. At one point uniform was even roughing up plainclothes. For at least 10 minutes after Gillard/Abbott had been driven away, when there was nothing and no one left to “protect”, the police line kept pushing us back, some punching, shoving, throwing people on the ground and “f”- swearing at demonstrators.
Tent Embassy statements: Aboriginal Provisional Government statement | Declaration of Independence for a Sovereign Union of First Nations | Press conference | Comment: Embassy more relevant than ever | I see no riot or attack | Media paints black as white and might as right | Protest speaks for itself | A lesson in over-reaction and social context | No apologies are due to either politician, nor to anyone else |Forget the race card, they're playing the whole deck | Michael Anderson explained the importance of the Embassy on Radio Australia | First hand accounts: Chris Graham: fact v fiction, black v white | From field notes and footnotes | “You shoe’da come!” | Video | Photo essay by Green Left Weekly (what the media didn't show) | ABC’s Media Watch: An Australia Day beat up | AFP to review officers' conduct | Kim Sattler, Secretary, Unions ACT, to Barbara Shaw: "And Abbott's just made a statement to the press that the tent embassy should be pulled down ... he's over there." | Gerry Georgatos’ source: Multiple calls from Gillard’s office, awards ceremony not disturbed | Bob Carr: “The Tent Embassy in Canberra says nothing to anyone and should have been quietly packed up years ago.” | Solidarity actions: Solidarity billboard in Melbourne | Banner drop in Canberra
On January 20, 2012 about 150 people gathered in Melbourne to commemorate the lives of two indigenous Australian freedom fighters and push for a permanent monument to be erected in their honour. Speeches were made after a solemn welcome to country was given by Bunwurrung elder Caroline Briggs. The momentum for a permanent memorial is gathering: this year three councilors from Melbourne City Council attended and expressed their support.
Background story | Photos of Five years Commemorating Freedom Fighters Tunnerminnerwait and Maulboyheenner | Lest We Forget - The Tunnerminnerwait and Maulboyheenner Saga (PDF) | 2011 Commemoration | 2010 Commemoration | Callout for Aboriginal Tent Embassy Canberra | Treaty Republic
20 January 12 -- A northwest NSW Aboriginal leader, Michael Ghillar Anderson, has condemned proposals for writing Indigenous people into the constitution as a treasonous act and serious fraud against Aboriginal peoples, because it does not represent their interests across the nation.
The proposals, handed to the Gillard government by a panel, fail to deal with the central and substantive issue of sovereignty and true land rights, the leader of the Euahlayi nation writes in a media release.
