South Korean wartime slaves win right to compensation
Friday 25 May 2012
by Our Foreign Desk
Seoul Supreme Court ruled today in favour of nine South Koreans who demand that major Japanese firms cough up compensation for enslaving them during Japan‘s colonial rule of Korea.
The ruling overturned lower court decisions that had barred them from seeking unpaid wages and financial redress from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd and Nippon Steel Corp, which forced them to toil without pay from 1941-45.
The court said that it’s the first time a ruling has favoured South Koreans seeking such compensation from Japanese firms.
The matter will now be sent back to a lower court to determine compensation. A lawyer for the nine workers says property owned by the two firms in South Korea could be seized if they refuse to pay.
“Japanese courts previously ruled against forced Korean labourers, but the rulings were based on the assumption that Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean peninsula and the Korean people was legal,” the Supreme Court said.
“According to the constitution of the Republic of Korea, Japan’s colonial rule over the Korean peninsula was an illegal occupation,” it added.
“The present-day Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Nippon Steel are essentially the same companies they were in the 1940s and should be responsible for compensatory payments.”
During imperial Japan’s 1910-45 rule of Korea millions of people were drafted into the Japanese workforce and the military, while an estimated 200,000 women were forced into sexual enslavement at brothels for expeditionary forces in China, Myanmar, the Philippines and Singapore.
A trade union and anti-fascist activist who was targeted by the far-right got an ovation the PCS conference today.
PCS rep Phil Dickens … faced physical abuse on a picket line and then a personal attack on a social network from the fascist North West Infidels over the May 10 strike.
He got unanimous support from the 1,000 delegates at the Brighton Centre today, who condemned the “disgusting” attacks.
Mr Dickens told the Morning Star that he had been on a picket outside the HMRC offices in Bootle, which drew about 25 workers at its height.
After going home, he rushed back when he saw a Facebook post mentioning the pickets.
“There were about about six of them, one with a Rottweiler, and they started shouting off about the usual things. Everyone drew together in a block.”
Mr Dickens’s partner refused to move away from in front of him, which he said confused the fascists. He asked the Star not to print her name.
“There was shouting back and forth and the police arrived, and one of them was arrested. He was held for two hours and then released.”
He said that as “revenge” for that an abusive post was put up on Facebook. He reckons he was targeted because he is a well-known activist in the area.
“There have been idle threats but they have never materialised. I’m sure we haven’t seen the last of them but we will keep campaigning,” he vowed.
It took complaints and quite a while before Facebook pulled the abuse.
Delegates cheered and clapped and Mr Dickens said it was “absolutely brilliant” to get such support from his colleagues.
Wendy Turner (East Midlands) called the rise of the far-right “a plague across this country” that must be strongly opposed and underlined that Mr Dickens and his family were “at extreme risk” at the time.
NIIGATA, Japan (Kyodo) — A crested ibis chick left its nest on Sado Island in Niigata Prefecture on Friday, becoming the first wild ibis to do so in 38 years in Japan, the Environment Ministry said.
Ministry officials monitored the ibis chick flying to a nearby tree branch in late Friday morning on a live video feed available on the Internet since May 5, it said.
It is one of three wild crested ibis chicks born in late April to a 3-year-old male and a 2-year-old female released in March 2011. Five more chicks were born subsequently.
Welcoming the event, Environment Minister Goshi Hosono said in a statement, “The development … represents a great step forward for Japan’s reintroduction of crested ibises to the wild.”
Japan has been trying to reintroduce the endangered species to the wild since 2008, following successful artificial breeding with a pair of the birds presented by China in 1999. A total of 78 ibises have been released from the Sado ibis protection center.
Oldest Jewish Archaeological Evidence on the Iberian Peninsula
25 May 2012 Friedrich Schiller University Jena
Sensational Discovery by Archaeologists of Jena University at a Portuguese Excavation Site
Archaeologists of the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (Germany) found one of the oldest archaeological evidence so far of Jewish culture on the Iberian Peninsula at an excavation site in the south of Portugal, close to the city of Silves (Algarve). On a marble plate, measuring 40 by 60 centimetres, the name “Yehiel” can be read, followed by further letters which have not yet been deciphered. The Jena archaeologists believe that the new discovery might be a tomb slab. Antlers, which were found very close to the tomb slab in the rubble gave a clue to the age determination. “The organic material of the antlers could be dated by radiocarbon analysis with certainty to about 390 AD,” excavation leader Dr. Dennis Graen of the Jena University explains. “Therefore we have a so-called ‘terminus ante quem’ for the inscription, as it must have been created before it got mixed in with the rubble with the antlers.”
The earliest archaeological evidence of Jewish inhabitants in the region of modern-day Portugal has so far also been a tomb slab with a Latin inscription and an image of a menorah – a seven-armed chandelier – from 482 AD. The earliest Hebrew inscriptions known until now date from the 6th or 7th Century AD.
For three years the team of the University Jena has been excavating a Roman villa in Portugal, discovered some years ago by Jorge Correia, archaeologist of the Silves council, during an archaeological survey near the village of São Bartolomeu de Messines (Silves). The project was aiming at finding out how and what the inhabitants of the hinterland of the Roman province of Lusitania lived off. While the Portuguese coast region has been explored very well, there is very little knowledge about those regions. The new discovery poses further conundrums. “We were actually hoping for a Latin inscription when we turned round the excavated tomb slab,“ Henning Wabersich, a member of the excavation reports. After all, no inscriptions have been found so far and nothing was known about the identity of the inhabitants of the enclosure.
Only after long research the Jena archaeologists found out which language they were exactly dealing with, as the inscription was not cut with particular care. “While we were looking for experts who could help with deciphering the inscription between Jena and Jerusalem, the crucial clue came from Spain“ Dennis Graen says. “Jordi Casanovas Miró from the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya in Barcelona – a well-known expert for Hebrew inscriptions on the Iberian Peninsula – is sure that the Jewish name “Yehiel” can be read, – a name that is already mentioned in the Bible.“ Not only is the early date exceptional in this case, but also the place of the discovery: Never before have Jewish discoveries been made in a Roman villa, the Jena Archaelogist explains.
In the Roman Empire at that time Jews usually wrote in Latin, as they feared oppressive measures. Hebrew, as on the re-discovered marble plate, only came back into use after the decline of the Roman supremacy, respectively in the following time of migration of peoples from the 6th or 7th century AD. “We were also most surprised that we found traces of Romans – romanised Lusitanians in this case – and Jews living together in a rural area of all things,” Dennis Graen says. “We assumed that something like this would have been much more likely in a city.“
Information about the Jewish population in the region in general was mostly passed down by scriptures. “During the ecclesiastical council in the Spanish town Elvira about 300 AD rules of conduct between Jews and Christians were issued. This indicates that at this time there must have been a relatively large number of Jews on the Iberian Peninsula already”, Dennis Graen explains – but archaeological evidence had been missing so far. “We knew that there was a Jewish community in the Middle Ages not far from our excavation site in the town of Silves. It existed until the expulsion of the Jews in the year 1497.“
In the summer the Jena Archaeologists will take up their work again. Until now they have excavated 160 square metres of the villa, but after checking out the ground it already became clear that the greater part of the enclosure is still covered in soil. “We eventually want to find out more about the people who lived here,” Graen explains the venture. “And of course we want to solve the questions the Hebrew inscription has posed us.“
May 2012. The Socotra Archipelago, in the north-west Indian Ocean off the coast of Somalia, is considered to be one of the most biodiversity rich group of islands in the world, thanks to a very distinct fauna and flora with a high level of endemicity at both species and generic levels.
UNESCO World Heritage Site
For this reason, it has been designated as UNESCO World Heritage Natural site in 2008. Nevertheless, the natural history of most groups is still not clear, and their origin and evolution remain unknown.
A team of researchers from the Department of Animal Biology (Università di Pavia, Italy), the Institute of Evolutionary Biology (CSIC-UPF, Barcelona, Spain), the Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di Carmagnola (Italy) and the Museum of Science of Trento (Italy), have been investigating the herpetofauna of the archipelago since 2007, in the framework of the ‘Socotra Conservation and Development Project‘ funded by the Cooperazione Italiana and under the auspices of the United Nations Development Project (UNDP) to collect ecological data on the reptiles of the Socotra Archipelago in order to improve the sustainable development and conservation of the Socotra Archipelago’s biodiversity.
In a recent paper, the team presented some new highlights on the systematics, biogeography and evolution of Trachylepis socotrana, the only endemic reptile (a skink) supposed to live in all four islands (Socotra, Darsa, Samha and Abd Al Kuri). By comparing the skinks of the archipelago with representatives of the genus Trachylepis from Middle East, Africa and Madagascar plus some individuals from each of the other three genera of Mabuya skinks sensu lato (Chioninia, Eutropis and Mabuya), they have been able to trace back the history of the Socotran skinks.
Skink arrived on Socotra twice, 3 million years apart
Interestingly, the results of the phylogenetic analyses indicate that members of the genus Trachylepis arrived in the archipelago in two independent events, firstly colonizing Socotra, Samha and Darsa about 10 million years ago, and then, 3 million years ago, colonizing Abd Al Kuri Island, when all the islands had already drifted away from the mainland.
New species
Furthermore, the Abd Al Kuri skink has proved to be a distinct new species, named by the authors Trachylepis cristinae, to credit the herpetologist who found the holotype while the team was surveying the island. This finding also means that reptiles of Abd Al Kuri, the westernmost island of the archipelago, are, without exception, all endemic to the island.
Once again, the Socotra Archipelago proves to be one of the most unique places in the world to witness and investigate evolutionary processes, and indeed is worthy of its nickname of “Galapagos of the Indian Ocean”.
No extinctions in 20th century
And worthy of similar note, as Kay Van Damme remarks in Nature – Middle East, Socotra has lost none of its unique terrestrial bird, reptile or mollusc species in the last century, contrary to what happened in many other islands in the world. Though, the archipelago is not invulnerable.
Challenges include habitat fragmentation, over-exploitation and loss of traditional knowledge. Tourism, which exponentially increased in recent years, could also be a threat for the most protected -and thus visited- sanctuaries in the islands. But the main concern is nowadays represented by political instability that spreads across Middle East. As Van Damme underlines, political upheavals in Yemen will initiate changes in decision-making on long-term policies and conservation strategies that, in the end, will affect the Socotra Archipelago biodiversity for decades to come.
A walking cactus, a wandering leg sausage, a snub-nosed monkey that sneezes when it rains and a blue tarantula are among a list of the top 10 newly discovered species announced by Arizona State University today: here.
Buzzards, which are native to the UK, are being targeted by the UK Government because they eat non-native pheasant chicks
RSPB ‘stunned’ by DEFRA plan to ‘imprison’ wild buzzards to favour captive-reared pheasants
May 2012. The RSPB is stunned by Defra’s plan to allow the destruction of buzzard nests and to permit buzzards to be taken into captivity to remove them from shooting estates. The Society believes this intervention against one of England’s best-loved birds of prey will set a terrible precedent and prove to be a costly and unnecessary exercise.
The move by Defra followed lobbying by the pheasant shooting industry. Buzzards usually scavenge on animals which have already died, but they will sometimes take young pheasants which are released for sports shooting.
Buzzard persecution & recovery
The buzzard was eradicated from large swathes of Britain following decades of persecution. Legal protection and a general warming of attitudes towards buzzards and other birds of prey on the part of many lowland land managers, led to buzzards recovering across the UK: a fantastic conservation success story.
Martin Harper is the RSPB’s conservation director. Criticising Defra’s proposal, he said: “We are shocked by Defra’s plans to destroy buzzard nests and to take buzzards into captivity to protect a non-native game bird released in its millions. Buzzards play a minor role in pheasant losses, compared with other factors like collisions with vehicles.”
Questions for DEFRA
Will DEFRA ban cars in rural areas as they kill so many pheasants?
Or will DEFRA pay for the damage done to cars by pheasants? (Search Google and look through pages and pages of cars damaged by pheasants)
Will DEFRA pay for damage caused by pheasants to farmers’ crops?
How much grain is used to feed pheasants every year – Some estimate 20 tons for 1000 pheasants – Could we eliminate world hunger by banning pheasant shoots?
40 million non-native birds released every year
Pheasants are not native to the UK. Around 40 million birds are released every year for shooting. The impacts of this practice on wildlife have been poorly documented, but serious questions have been raised about the impact such a large injection of captive-reared birds might have on the predator-prey balance in our countryside.
Buzzards will take young pheasants from rearing pens, given the opportunity, but the RSPB believes the issue can be managed without destroying nests or moving buzzards. Measures include providing more cover for young pheasants in release pens, visual deterrents to discourage birds of prey and providing alternative food sources.
Mr Harper added: “There are options for addressing the relatively small number of pheasant poults lost to buzzards. Destroying nests is completely unjustified and catching and removing buzzards is unlikely to reduce predation levels, as another buzzard will quickly take its place. Both techniques would be illegal under current wildlife laws, and I think most people will agree with us that reaching for primitive measures, such as imprisoning buzzards or destroying their nests, when wildlife and economic interests collide is totally unacceptable.
Persecution of birds of prey
“At a time when funding for vital conservation work is so tight, and with another bird of prey, the hen harrier, facing extinction as a breeding bird in England, I can think of better ways of spending £400,000 of public funds. This money could work harder for wildlife, and I hope the Government will therefore put a stop to this project.”
Mick Carroll, of the Northern England Raptor Forum, said: “Given that buzzards are still recovering from past persecution and there is no evidence they are a significant cause of loss, this is a scandalous waste of public money.”
Nigel Middleton, Hawk and Owl Trust Conservation Officer for the Eastern Region, said: “We are totally against persecution of any birds of prey, and destroying the nests of buzzards is tantamount to this. We believe that alternatives should always be sought to lethal control where the commercial interests of humans come into conflict with birds of prey.”
Read the comments about this article and leave your own comment:
doesn`t suprise me that the lardy dars want to protect their posh birds to blow them out the sky in their hundreds later on in the year. more die on the roads in my village than are taken by buzzards. tory more like raving looney party. public school boys so out of touch. once again its all about the profit at the expense of the enviroment.
Top Tory Baroness Warsi came under fire last night for allegedly fiddling her parliamentary’s expenses by claiming for overnight accommodation while staying at a friend’s house rent-free: here.
Shell has deleted the campaign movie ‘Shell CEO, Uncensored’ by Dutch Friends of the Earth from YouTube. This appears from an e-mail which YouTube sent to the ‘Worse than Bad’ campaign of the environmental organization. In the successful satirical movie, Friends of the Earth in the Netherlands pokes fun at Shell CEO Peter Voser because of the oil spill caused by the company in Nigeria. The video was watched over 25,000 times and can now only be seen on Dumpert.nl. On May 4, they copied the video and put it here. Friends of the Earth in the Netherlands are considering a counterclaim against YouTube.
Movie
For some time, Friends of the Earth in the Netherlands have been demanding that Shell should clean up all its oil spills in the Niger delta. But the only thing which the corporation has removed is a critical YouTube video which is part of the ‘Worse than Bad’ campaign worsethanbad.org.
Also at the share owners’ meeting last Tuesday in the Circus Theatre in Scheveningen, Shell CEO Peter Voser dodged all requests by Friends of the Earth in the Netherlands to start with cleaning up the area affected by the company. Even about the urgent advice of the UNEP environmental agency of the UN to invest $ 1 billion into a fund to clean up Nigeria, Shell has been in denial by now for almost a year.
When I logged in at YouTube where the satirical Shell video used to be, I got the message “We are sorry. This video has been removed by the user [meaning Friends of the Earth in the Netherlands])”. That is untrue, as not Friends of the Earth in the Netherlands deleted that video there, but YouTube under pressure from Shell.
So, ‘Shell CEO, Uncensored’ has been censored.
At least, Shell this time did not use their Nigerian death squad gangsters against Friends of the Earth in the Netherlands; they pay those gangsters for violence against Nigerian farmers, environmentalists, etc.[sarcasm off]
Shell’s $4bn lobbying campaign cleared the way for Arctic oil drilling: here.
Shell Seeks to Weaken Air Rules for Arctic Drilling: here.
In Pollokshields on June 4th 2010 at a public meeting at which Labour Party Pakistan general secreary Farooq Tariq also spoke, SSP’s James Nesbitt spoke on the War on Terror in Pakistan and Afghanistan, how it’s not working and how the war in Pakistan is a secret war: it hasn’t even been declared!
So although the people of Pakistan are only too keenly aware of the bombs dropping on their villages in the drone attacks, the western public are largely ignorant of the fact, thinking that the attacks have been confined to Afghanistan.
He compared it with the Vietnam War where they also dropped thousands of tonnes of bombs on Cambodia and Laos. Laos became the most bombed country in history. Likewise with Pakistan, it has been reported that the “War on Terror” has involved pursuing some Taliban over the border of Afghanistan into Pakistan, but they fail to mention the drones carpet-bombing whole villages full of innocent civilians in that part of Pakistan, basically destroying any town where there is a mosque, in case it might be Taliban-controlled.
US drone attacks in northwest Pakistan killed at least 14 people in little more than 24 hours, including 10 who died in a Thursday morning missile strike on a mosque.
The escalation of the US drone war comes in the wake of the NATO summit in Chicago, where the Obama administration and the Pakistan Peoples Party government of President Asif Ali Zardari failed to reach an agreement on the reopening of a supply route for US-NATO occupation troops in Afghanistan. The route, which goes from the port of Karachi to the Afghan border, was closed by Islamabad in protest over US air strikes that killed two dozen Pakistani soldiers last November.
The new drone strikes are the most lethal manifestations of Washington’s displeasure at Pakistan’s failure to rapidly bow to US demands. The aftermath of the summit has also seen threats in Congress to cut off aid to Pakistan and a hysterical political and media campaign over a Pakistani court’s sentencing of a CIA informant who helped prepare the Navy Seal raid that ended in the assassination of Osama bin Laden.
Thursday’s missile strike by a pilotless US drone demolished a mosque in Mir Ai Bazar, a village in the North Waziristan tribal area bordering Afghanistan. Local officials reported that the unmanned plane fired two missiles demolishing the building and leaving 10 dead and several others wounded.
“Fear prevailed in the area as almost five drones were seen flying in the air after the incident,” local sources told the Pakistani daily Nation. The threat that the aircraft would fire more missiles prevented villagers from trying to rescue people from the rubble.
“The drone fired two missiles and hit the village mosque where a number of people were offering Fajr (morning) prayer,” Roashan Din, a local tribal leader, told NBC News. He confirmed that 10 bodies had been pulled from the wreckage of the mosque.
While US officials described the target of the attack as a “compound,” multiple Pakistani sources have confirmed that the building hit was a mosque.
Doctors at the Mir Ali hospital reported that six wounded had been admitted, with one dying there and four others remaining in critical condition.
The missile strike follows another attack on Wednesday in which four people were killed and several others injured. As in all such attacks, the victims were described as “suspected militants.” Wednesday’s strike targeted a house near Miranshah, the capital of North Waziristan.
These drone attacks are deeply unpopular in Pakistan, where it is estimated that they have killed as many as 3,000 people, most of them civilians. The report of the destruction of a mosque and more civilian casualties will no doubt fan growing anti-American sentiments, further complicating the attempts of the Zardari government and the Obama administration to reach a deal on reopening the Pakistan supply route.
Pakistan’s Foreign Office condemned the latest drone strikes, describing them as a “total violation” of Pakistani territory and sovereignty. Foreign Office spokesman Moazzam Khan characterized the US attacks as “illegal violations of international law and unacceptable.”
Drone Warfare: Killing Our Civil Liberties With a Joystick. Ed Kinane, Truthout: “Drone warfare is cowardly. A technician jiggles a joystick. Seconds later, thousands of miles away, a Reaper drone robot airplane fires a Hellfire missile, maiming or dismembering unsuspecting, unarmed, often unidentified human beings. That technician, along with his or her chain of command, plays god – a god who takes no risk in taking those human lives”: here.
USA: Drone Program Aims to “Accelerate” Use of Unmanned Aircraft by Police: here.
Medea Benjamin, OR Books: “Internationally renowned activist Medea Benjamin has written a compelling case against drones. One of the most fearful aspects is that drone technology is growing so rapidly in so many nations that soon the nations the US deems enemies will be using them against our forces and us. Furthermore, there is about to be an explosion of drone use domestically that will be used for surveillance and potentially for firing on perceived criminals or enemies of the state”: here.
Congress Should Ban Armed Drones Before Cops in Texas Deploy One: here.
An Interview With Medea Benjamin About the Life-and-Death Decisions of Drone Warfare. Mark Karlin, Truthout: “One poll shows that eight out of ten Americans support the use of lethal drones. That’s because drones have been posed as a cheap alternative for killing our enemies that puts no American lives at risk and only hits the ‘bad guys.’ In reality, they are not all that cheap (especially since they are constantly crashing), they kill lots of innocent people, and while they don’t put pilots at risk, they stir up anti-American sentiment and provoke new attacks against us”: here.
Nearly half a million Pakistanis are estimated to have fled fighting between soldiers and militia on the Afghan border with more than 264,000 registered for aid, officials said Monday: here.
A REPORT published yesterday by Stanford University and New York University warns that the CIA’s drone campaign ‘terrorises men, women and children’ in North-West Pakistan ‘twenty-four hours a day’: here.
Police arrested almost 700 protesters in Montreal and Quebec City Wednesday evening.
Quebec City Police arrested 176 people for demonstrating in violation of the sweeping new restrictions Bill 78 places on protests. Passed in less than 24 hours late last week, Bill 78 makes all demonstrations–whatever their cause—illegal unless organizers submit to the police in writing more than eight hours in advance the demonstration itinerary and duration, and abide by any changes demanded by the police.
In Montreal most of the arrests came when riot police suddenly turned on a peaceful three-hour protest, allegedly because demonstrators did not follow police instructions as to where they should proceed next. Having “kettled”—penned in and squeezed—the protesters, the police arrested all present, some 450 people. “The swift police action squeezed the mob together tighter and tighter as the officers advanced and some people begged to be let out,” reported the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. “One photographer was seen to be pushed to the ground and a piece of equipment was heard breaking.”
Those arrested in Montreal were not charged under Bill 78, which carries a minimum $1,000 fine for a first offense, but under a municipal bylaw imposing less drastic penalties.
Also Wednesday, Quebec Public Security Minister Robert Dutil indicated that charges under Bill 78 may soon be laid against the student organization CLASSE and its leaders. CLASSE (The Broader Coalition of the Association for Student-Union Solidarity), which represents about half of the over 150,000 striking students, has vowed not to submit to Bill 78. Shortly after Tuesday’s march began it led tens of thousands on a route different than that set by police.
Quebec’s Student Strike Turning Into a Citizens’ Revolt. Elizabeth Leier, Truthout: “The province of Quebec is no stranger to large and powerful social movements (the 1949 Asbestos Strike comes to mind, as does the Summit of the Americas in Quebec City, in 2001). However, the ongoing conflict between the provincial government and striking students and their supporters will go down in history as one of the province’s – indeed the country’s – biggest mass protests. On its 102nd day, the student movement is growing, as is the awareness of an ever more oppressive and corrupt government”: here.
One week after criminalizing Quebec’s 15-week-long student strike, the provincial Liberal government is apparently about to summon leaders of the student associations for talks: here.
From the Chilean Winter to the Maple Spring Solidarity: the Student Movements in Chile and Québec. Andrew Gavin Marshall, Andrew Gavin Marshall’s Blog: “For both of these movements to move forward, it is important to not only promote informal acts and statements of solidarity between the two movements, but to begin establishing direct and indirect ties between the movements … But first and foremost, it is important to educate the students in Québec about what is taking place in Chile, and the students in Chile about what is taking place in Québec. That is the basis for all other forms of cooperation”: here.
Montreal Pots And Pans Video Of Protest Against Bill 78 Goes Viral : here.
More than 1,200 people have been arrested in Quebec since the provincial Liberal government adopted emergency legislation May 19 that criminalizes the more than three-month-old student strike and places sweeping restrictions on the right to demonstrate: here.
“Pots and Pans” Protests for Freedom of Speech Spread Across Quebec Against Oppressive Government. Mark Karlin, BuzzFlash at Truthout: “Last week, BuzzFlash at Truthout wrote a commentary about the enduring and widespread student protest in Quebec – and the legal attempt to criminalize dissent that appears to be sweeping like an Iron Curtain across Western democracies. In short, to publicly protest in many cities of the so-called ‘free world’ is now a crime akin to committing an act of armed robbery. While not being a conspiratorialist, it would be hard to regard this as anything but a crackdown by global corporate/government institutions against any force that has the potential to expose the spoon-fed narrative of the status quo of the international 1 percent”: here.
Talks continue between Quebec government, student groups over tuition protests: here.
Quebec Premier Jean Charest suspended negotiations with university students aimed at ending weeks of protests over proposed tuition rises on Friday: here.
The Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper introduced back-to-work legislation Monday afternoon to illegalize a nation-wide strike by Canadian Pacific (CP) railway engineers and conductors: here. And here.
Dear Kitty. Some blog 