Returning to the major crises we face at this historic moment, all are international, and two internationals are forming to confront them. One is opening today: the Progressive International. The other has been taking shape under the leadership of Trump’s White House, a Reactionary International comprising the world’s most reactionary states.
In short, we face a simple choice: Internationalism or Extinction. Either we form a common front of workers and peoples that can reclaim the world from this tiny set of oligarchs and dictators. Or they will continue to amass wealth and power, watching the world burn outside their window.
The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention stated that Julian was arbitrarily detained and that he should be compensated and released immediately. The last report was in February 2018. It is now 2020 and Julian remains in Belmarsh maximum security prison under 24-hour lockdown.
UN Special Rapporteur Agnes Callamard urged UN member States to “apply sanctions against Filipino officials who have committed, who have incited, or who have failed to investigate or prevent human rights violations including arbitrary killings.”
Anti-China hysteria has emerged as the central ‘threat’ designed to justify endless U.S. military spending and adventurism in the Asia-Pacific.
Workers have been infuriated by the callous treatment they’ve received in their workplaces. But many of them recognized that the most surefire way to get their employers to provide the protection they needed was through collective action.
They urged the Philippine authorities “to carry out an immediate, thorough, impartial, and transparent investigation into Alvarez’s murder, to identify all those responsible, bring them before an independent tribunal, and sanction them as provided by the law.”
“We call on all member states of the UN Human Rights Council to be seized of the seriousness of the human rights situation in the Philippines and to adopt all the recommendations in your June 30 report on the human rights situation in the Philippines,” ICHRP Chairperson Peter Murphy said in his letter to Bachelet.
“Sorry, we are not just for your consumption.”
In particular, two countries, Colombia and the Philippines, continue to top PANAP’s list of deadliest places for land rights defenders.
Under the guise of ‘freedom of navigation’ and ‘commitment to support regional stability’, China and the US have been taking turns in militarizing our territorial waters and plundering our natural resources.