1981 (30 June): Forty years ago, 23,000 postal workers in the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) launched a 42-day strike for paid maternity leave and other just demands. They had already held wildcat strikes in 1965 against sexual harassment and for better pay. In fact, the wildcats of ’65 were the main reason why the Canadian government institutionalized collective bargaining for public servants in 1967.
Filed under Canada, History, Working Class
Politics of partition: “North and South will again clasp hands, again will it be demonstrated, as in ’98, that the pressure of a common exploitation can make enthusiastic rebels out of a Protestant working class, earnest champions of civil and religious liberty out of Catholics, and out of both a united social democracy.” (James Connolly, quoted in Peter Berresford Ellis, A History of the Irish Working Class, Pluto [1985] 1996, p.342; no source.)
Filed under Europe
No Celebration of Stolen Indigenous Land and Stolen Indigenous Lives
Idle No More has called for actions across Canada on July 1 under the banner of “Cancel Canada Day.” In the call, issued before the report by the Cowessess First Nation, they state “The recent discovery at Kamloops residential school has reminded us that Canada remains a country that has built its foundation on the erasure and genocide of Indigenous nations, including children.” They say further “We refuse to sit idle while Canada’s violent history is celebrated. We are once again calling on Indigenous land, water and sky protectors and allies to come together and disrupt the celebration.”
Filed under Canada, Indigenous Peoples
Eighty years ago, Nazi criminals and Nazi collaborators started the first pogroms and murders of Jews in the Baltic States. Baltic collaborators are hounored today as “freedom fighters”. This fascist glorification is enabled by Canada and the United States who present themselves as the greatest opponents of “anti-semitism”. Third in a series.
Rally in Riga, Latvia opposes the annual march to rehabilitate Latvian members of the Nazi’s Waffen SS, March 16, 2017.
BERLIN (german-foreign-policy.com) – In the shadow of the invading Wehrmacht, German Nazi criminals started the first pogroms and mass murders of the Soviet Union’s Jewish population exactly 80 years ago together with Central and Eastern European collaborators. On June 24, 80 years ago, for example, pogroms began in the Lithuanian city of Kaunas under the eyes of Wehrmacht soldiers, in which German and Lithuanian perpetrators fell victim to 3,800 Jews by June 29.
Chief Cadmus Delorme of the Cowessess First Nation announced on June 24 that 751 unmarked graves have been found at a cemetery near the former Marieval Indian Residential School. The Residential School operated from 1899 to 1997 in the area where Cowessess First Nation is now located. The colonial state and Catholic Church forced Indigenous children from across Saskatchewan and Manitoba to stay at the school. The RCMP and other police powers threatened Indigenous families with imprisonment if they did not hand over their children. Continue reading
Filed under Canada, Indigenous Peoples
U.S. police powers on June 22 seized and shut down 36 websites owned and controlled outside the United States. The attacked websites include the well-known media sites Press TV and Al-Alam held by the Iranian Islamic Radio and Television Union (IRTVU). Those two sites are Iran’s main English and Arabic language broadcasters. Press TV anchorwoman Marzieh Hashemi said the U.S. gave the company no reason for the seizure or any prior warning.
Filed under Media, Journalism & Disinformation, United States
All friends of Cuba in Canada and around the world congratulate the Cuban people and their government for the resounding vote at the United Nations General Assembly on June 23 to end the U.S. blockade on Cuba. This is the 29th time since 1992 that the General Assembly has passed a resolution to categorically demand the lifting of the blockade imposed 62 years ago by the U.S.
Filed under Americas
Trudeau appointed two Ontarians and a New Brunswicker to the Senate. Bernadette Clement, Hassan Yussuff and James Quinn fill three of 15 vacancies. The appointment of these three people as Senators brings the total number appointed by the Liberals in two terms of office to 55. This means the Liberal Party appointments now command a majority in the Chamber even though Liberal Senators are said to be independent. Twelve of the 105 Senate seats remain vacant.
Filed under Canada, Working Class
The celebration of Quebec National Day includes the celebration of our 19th century patriots who fought to establish an independent homeland and republic which vests sovereignty in the people. – Youth for Democratic Renewal
Democratic Renewal and a Modern Constitution Are an Urgent Need – The significance of the Meech Lake Accord today is that in this era the people want to be the arbiters and decision-makers. It is the work for democratic renewal which will open society’s path to progress.
On June 23, 1990, the Meech Lake Accord was defeated. It was a set of amendments to the Constitution of Canada negotiated behind closed doors in 1987 by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and the provincial premiers. The failure of the Meech Lake Accord marked a deepening of the constitutional crisis which has now become an existential crisis due to Canada’s all-sided integration into the U.S. war economy and state arrangements.
Ukraine honours Nazi-collaborators, who, 80 years ago today, participated in the invasion of the Soviet Union and carried out massacres of Jews. This fascist glorification is enabled by Canada, the United States and Germany who present themselves as the greatest opponents of “anti-semitism”.
BERLIN/KIEV (german-foreign-policy.com) – Whereas the German invasion of the Soviet Union 80 years ago is being internationally commemorated today, collaborators, who participated in the war of annihilation on the side of the Germans, are receiving state honours in Ukraine, in particular the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and its leader Stepan Bandera as well as the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) which originated from that milieu. Together with the German Wehrmacht and troops from several collaborating states, OUN militias advanced onto Soviet territory, where they committed countless massacres of the Jewish population alongside German units. In Lviv (formerly Lemberg), 4,000 Jews were assassinated within a very short period. The parliament in Kiev declared the OUN “combatants for Ukrainian independence.” A government decree calls for honouring their “patriotism” and “high morals” in Ukrainian schools. The UPA’s founding day has been a national holiday since 2015. The OUN salute adorns Ukraine’s football League’s jerseys.
80th anniversary of the invasion of the Soviet Union: No commemoration by the German government, and Bundestag, German President under attack because of his commemoration address in the Karlshorst Museum.
BERLIN/MOSCOW (german-foreign-policy.com) – The German invasion of the Soviet Union 80 years ago will be internationally commemorated on Tuesday – without any participation by the German government or the Bundestag. This invasion marked the beginning of the German war of annihilation’s key phase that had cost the lives of 27 million Soviet citizens, devastated large parts of the country and exposed the Jewish population to German crimes of extermination. The Bundestag should hold no special commemoration, but instead maintain an “undivided commemoration of the entire course of the Second World War,” explained Wolfgang Schäuble, President of the Bundestag. Several members of the Bundestag used a “debate” on the war of annihilation to demand that “German crimes” not lead to restraint regarding aggression against today’s Russia. Foreign Minister Heiko Maas has Soviet victims of the war of annihilation disappear among the victims of “Central and Eastern Europe” – a choice of terms that conflates Nazi victims and Nazi collaborators: Significant forces from “Central and Eastern Europe” played an active role in the German war of annihilation.
From the “Stop Ramstein Air Base” campaign, a new visualisation tool for global military bases is now available at the address https://visualbases.org. VisualBases contains an extensive database with currently already more than 300 military locations and regional military “hot spots” which are continuously updated. A special role is played by the identification of local resistance.
Filed under Uncategorized
Join Zoom meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82186266048
Workers from different sectors of the economy will speak on their experience of organizing to uphold the rights of migrant workers and the difficulties they face. Workers from different sectors will speak themselves from health care to seniors care, about how they arrived in Canada and on the conditions of their lives and work. Information will also be provided about the conditions faced by internal migrants forced to leave their homes to find work in the mines, on construction sites, in the tar sands, amongst other places
It is thanks to the workers who speak out and organize for the affirmation of the rights of all that the truth of what happens in Canada becomes known and together we can advance the fight for the rights of all.
Filed under Canada, Working Class
Filed under Canada, History, Indigenous Peoples
At the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) meeting on June 23, Cuba will bring its annual resolution on the necessity to end the United States blockade against Cuba. For 28 consecutive years, the UNGA has overwhelmingly voted in favour of ending this criminal and unjust U.S. policy towards Cuba.
People around the world will be mobilizing at this important time — we invite you to unite your voice with people around the world at a 24-hour global picket featuring speakers, cultural performances and more!
Sign the
Petition against U.S. Economic Blockade of Cuba and on Canada-Cuba Relations
Filed under Americas
Juneteenth is being celebrated by demanding that all the continuing remnants of slavery, in the form of broad inequality faced by African Americans on all fronts and police violence and mass incarceration be eliminated. People of all nationalities and backgrounds together continue to affirm their convictions for new arrangements and their own empowerment, through protests as well as other forms of resistance.
By Dougal MacDonald
June 19, 1865 or Juneteenth (also known as Freedom Day) is celebrated across the United States in appreciation of the vital contributions made by African Americans in emancipating the four million people enslaved by the system of slave labour and in carrying forward the fight for justice and equality before and since the U.S. Civil War. Recent actions across the U.S. salute the determined and undaunted resistance to police violence, government impunity, and demands for accountability and for change that favours the people.
Filed under Americas, History, United States
United Steelworkers (USW) informed that the Vale miners in Sudbury rejected Vale’s new offer on June 14. Turnout was 84 per cent and the offer was rejected by a majority of 87 per cent.
Filed under Canada, Working Class
(June 17) – Straight off the G7 and NATO summits where the self-appointed rulers of the so-called free world plotted against the rights and lives of peoples around the world, the Trudeau government is sanctimoniously putting on a “humanitarian” show to cover up the dirty U.S. war against the Venezuelan people. On June 17 it is hosting what it calls an “International Donors’ Conference in Solidarity with Venezuelan Refugees and Migrants.”
(June 10) – On June 3, farmers at the encampments surrounding Delhi marked the 74th anniversary of the proclamation of the partition of India by the British. On June 3, 1947, the last British Viceroy of India, Lord Mountbatten, declared that India would be partitioned into two dominions. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, leader of the All-India Muslim League, spoke after him and accepted the partition of India and creation of the Dominion of Pakistan. Then came Jawaharlal Nehru whose acceptance of partition made him the first Prime Minister of India. So too, Baldev Singh claimed to represent the Punjabi Sikh community in the processes of negotiations that resulted in the Partition of India in 1947, for which he became the first Minister of Defence of India. The Congress laid claim to secularism but nonetheless demanded that Punjab and Bengal also be divided on the basis of religion. Leaders of the Communist Party of India had already accepted partition and all the parties conspired with the British against the peoples of India. June 2 marks the date when Mountbatten presented the plans for the partition of India to all these people and they accepted it. Mahatma Gandhi, who had been saying, “partition over my dead body,” told Mountbatten that he had vowed to maintain silence and would not oppose it.
Filed under Agriculture, Food & Farmers, Asia, History
Signal contribution of the courageous South African students | ISAAC SANEY
The famous Soweto uprising of youth and students which began on June 16, 1976, led to a renewed wave of resistance amongst black South Africans.
Originally published on June 16, 2016
On June 16th, 1976 in the African township of Soweto, on the outskirts of Johannesburg, apartheid South African police massacred 176 Black students, wounding more than 700. The Soweto uprising remains to this day the signal contribution of the infinitely courageous South African students’ movement for justice and social transformation everywhere. Continue reading
By Pauline Easton
The G7 which claims to represent “the world’s most influential and open societies and advanced economies,” has adopted the campaign slogan of the President of the United States “Build Back Better.” Essentially this means that the countries meeting together at the G7 “leaders’ Summit” think they can impose their “shared values” and so-called rules-based international order on the entire world. They say that “might makes right” is something from the past but everything they do is to find new ways to bring it into the present and mold the future based on their pragmatic imperialist conception that nothing succeeds like success. In other words, they make the rules and then they use force to impose the rules against those who do not submit. They do that all over the globe. They did that when the Soviet Union fell and they adopted the Charter of Paris which dictated the rules they subsequently imposed onto the peoples of the world in the name of democracy, human rights and prosperity. They decided the rules for the so-called free movement of goods and capital, multi-party election systems and human rights, none of which adhere to the standards adopted by the United Nations which constitute the international rule of law. Whosoever does not abide by their own arbitrary rules faces sanctions and other forms of death and destruction.
This photo is circulating on social media decrying the massive police presence at the Group of Seven Leaders Summit. The cruise ship, with a capacity of 3,000, hired to accommodate some of the extra police officers deployed to the area is moored in Carbis Bay, Cornwall, England.
Carbis Bay has a population of just 3,500. To defend the G7 “partnership based on shared interests and values” more than 5,000 police from across England are mobilized at the summit. There are also be police boats, drones, 150 police dogs, and special police forces in riot gear. Hundreds of Armed Forces personnel are also be present.
Filed under Europe
Group of Seven Summit in Cornwall, England, June 11-13
The Group of Seven (G7) “Leaders’ Summit” June 11-13, brings together Heads of State from the seven countries that comprise it – the U.S., Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Japan. It will be held in the small town of Carbis Bay in Cornwall, England. Carbis Bay has a population of just 3,500. To defend the G7 “partnership based on shared interests and values” more than 5,000 police from across England are mobilized at the summit. There will also be police boats, drones, 150 police dogs, and special police forces in riot gear. Hundreds of Armed Forces personnel will also be present.
Filed under Europe, United States
Demonstration in Toronto at the NATO Association of Canada on the occasion of the 60th anniversary summit of NATO held in London, UK.
Canada’s Department of National Defence (DND) has announced the creation of another warmongering network of 18 universities whose main aim is to mobilize “the best and the brightest” to take up Canada’s war aims. The Network for Strategic Analysis (the “Network”) is being launched as part of Canada’s “Mobilizing Insights in Defence and Security (MINDS) programme.” DND says it is the very first fully bilingual MINDS network “that will offer cutting-edge expertise in Canada’s two official languages.” This is code for saying that Quebec youth are to be targeted second to none.
Zoom Meeting
Monday, June 14 — 4:00 pm PT/ 5:00 pm MT/6:00 pm CT/ 7:00 pm ET/ 8:00 pm AT
To register for Zoom meeting: go here:https://us02web.zoom.us/…/tZIqcOGoqj4pGdDaZjtXvH…
This event is the Canadian expression of the Stop NATO 2021 actions organized by No to War – No to NATO in Europe opposing the NATO Heads of State summit taking place in Brussels on June 14th.
Everyone is welcome to this webinar to hear brief presentations from activists across the country about why Canada should withdraw from NATO, a U.S.-dominated, nuclear-armed alliance, and why NATO should be abolished for genuine peace and security in the world.
The program is organized by the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace, Canadian Foreign Policy Institute, Mobilization Against War and Occupation, Winnipeg Peace Alliance, Regina Peace Council, Hamilton Coalition to Stop the War, CPC(M-L), Ottawa Peace Council, Canadian Peace Congress and the Anti-imperialist Alliance.
Speakers include
Tamara Lorinc, Canadian Voice of Women for Peace — VOW’s campaign “Feminists Against Militarism: Women Say No to NATO”
Yves Engler, Canadian Foreign Policy Institute — History and Canada-NATO
Isaac Saney, No Harbour for War — Halifax International Security Forum
Margaret Villamizar, CPC(M-L) – the need to break the taboo on discussion on the values NATO represents and who decides they are Canadian values
Alison Bodine, Mobilization Against War and Occupation
David Gehl, Regina Peace Council
Radhika Desai, Winnipeg Peace Alliance
Following the presentations there will be time for a discussion and strategy session.
Filed under Canada
The decisive role of the Soviet Union in the military defeat of fascist Germany was accepted by everyone at the time, and admitted before Hitler’s suicide and the end of the war | François Lazure
In an article published on the 70th anniversary of D-Day, military historian Benoît Lemay, of the Royal Military College of Kingston, Ontario pointed out, “There are many misconceptions about the Normandy landing. It is believed to have enabled the Allies to win the Second World War. A more nuanced view is required. In fact, in June 1944, Germany had already lost. The landing only served to accelerate the end of the war. It was the Russians on the Eastern Front who did most of the work. For propaganda reasons, during the Cold War years that followed, the West would try to minimize the Soviet effort. It would be conveyed that it was the Allies who did most of the work.”[1]
By Hilary LeBlanc
On June 6, 1944, during World War II, an invasion force comprised of U.S., British and Canadian troops landed on the coast of Normandy, France. This date known to history as D-Day, refers to the long-awaited invasion of northwest Europe to open a Second Front against the Nazi forces of Adolf Hitler who had occupied France and most of Europe and had been waging a savage war against the Soviet Union. To that time, the Soviet Union had borne the brunt of the fight against Hitler. From 1941 to 1945, the Soviet peoples fought more than 75 per cent of the German and Axis forces and suffered the loss during the war, all-told, of more than 20 million people.
Filed under Canadian Forces, Europe, History
Henry Ritmo, who lived in Africa, Quora
Since there are so many ways this question could be answered I decided to use pictures. Many of these would be shortly before or shortly after colonization began seeing as the camera was not invented until the late 19th century and colonization in most of Africa started within that period but they come the closest to capturing what pre-colonial Africa looked like.
I was saddened to learn of the loss of Walid Bahlawan. He was a man whom one only has to meet once and yet is a friend for life. I had the opportunity to meet him when he visited our farm some years ago with a mutual friend. He had read our Dossier on Palestine and we had an animated discussion about his homeland and the current struggle of his people. He appreciated the beauty of nature and asked informed questions about the methods and yield of agriculture in the area. I was not surprised Walid had become a communist after emigrating to Canada, as it is little discussed how many Palestinian workers and peasants did so during their heroic fight for national liberation in the 1940s. I heard later that he had expressed interest in a return visit which unfortunately never materialized. Here is a poignant tribute to Walid from CPC (M-L):
Tony Seed's Weblog 