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.

'We need our version of the Rojava Revolution right here'

[The following is the text of a speech given to a meeting and concert to mark the founding of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Some 400-500 people attended the November 28 event organised by the Kurdish Association of Victoria at the Kurdish House centre in Melbourne’s Pascoe Vale.]

Friends and comrades,

I would like to thank the Kurdish Association for the invitation to participate in tonight's very important function and to mark the publication of our pamphlet The Kurdish Freedom Struggle Today.

Socialist Alliance joins with you in celebrating the founding of the Kurdistan Workers Party 37 years ago. We honour the heroism and commitment of the activists of the PKK over this decades-long struggle for the rights of the oppressed Kurdish people. We salute the thousands of martyrs who have fallen fighting for a just cause.

The importance of the Kurdish struggle

[This is the edited text of a talk presented at the Melbourne launch of the pamphlet The Kurdish Freedom Struggle Today, September 29, 2015.]

This pamphlet aims to provide a short introduction to the Kurdish question for non-Kurdish readers in Australia. The focus is on Turkey and Rojava (the Kurdish majority liberated zone in northern Syria) where the struggle is being led by the revolutionary democratic wing of the Kurdish movement, i.e., the People’s Democratic Party (HDP), the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and the Democratic Union Party (PYD). This is a mass struggle, involving hundreds of thousands, even millions of people.

Stop Turkey’s war on the Kurds

[Speech given at Kurdish solidarity rally in Melbourne, 12.09.15]

Regime killed peace process

Turkey is creeping towards civil war. This is a deliberate decision of the Erdogan regime. It killed the peace process with the PKK. At the start of this year agreements had been finalised to enable the guerillas to safely withdraw across the border to their camps in northern Iraq.

Government keeps PKK on terror list

[10.09.15]

On August 11, the Tony Abbott government re-listed the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) as a terrorist organisation. This means it is illegal for Australian citizens to belong to it, actively support it or raise funds for it.