With Fidel's death, an extraordinary revolutionary has gone

[Speech at Fidel memorial meeting, Trades Hall, Melbourne, December 16, 2016.]

With Fidel's death, an extraordinary revolutionary has gone. The imperialists and their hired guns hated Fidel. There is so much utter rubbish circulating online. In 2006 Forbes business magazine listed Fidel as one of the world's richest "kings, queens and dictators"! A recent News Corp article explained that "Western observers have long suspected that 'El Comandante' . . . was siphoning off the proceeds from state-run enterprises, including a small gold mine." And so it goes on . . .

Fidel lives on in the struggle

[Speech given at Melbourne rally in honour of Fidel, December 4, 2016.]

Fidel Castro was a towering figure in world politics for almost six decades. Now, with his passing, the hacks of the capitalist media have been gloating over the death of the "dictator". Of course, he was nothing of the sort. As he truthfully told director Oliver Stone in the movie Commandante, "I am a slave to the people"! His life is a monument of conscience and loyalty to principle.

Why the ban on the PKK is wrong

[Green Left Weekly, August 2, 2016]

Since late 2005 the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) has been included on Australia's list of terrorist organisations. It is illegal for Australian citizens to belong to the PKK, actively support it, raise funds for it or otherwise engage with it. In July Australian-Kurdish journalist Renas Lelikan was charged in Sydney with being a member of the PKK.

Stop Erdogan’s war on the Kurds

[Text of a speech given for Socialist Alliance to protest rally organised by Kurdish Association of Victoria at Melbourne's State Library, December 21, 2015.]

Turkish dictator Erdogan has now taken his war on the Kurds to a new level of barbarity. Cities and towns across the southeast are today under curfew and are being attacked by police and army units. Tanks have fired into populated areas; many people have been killed by the security forces. Many areas have been wrecked by the attacks.