Bolivia Threatens Shutdown of US Embassy

Source:  commondreams.org

Bolivian President Evo Morales threatened Thursday to shut down the U.S. embassy in his country after a forced re-routing and downing of his plane earlier this week on suspicion that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden was on board.

Morales was flanked by the heads of state of Venezuela, Ecuador, Argentina, and Uruguay as he announced the possible embassy closure at a special meeting in Cochabamba, Bolivia. He declared:

Being united will defeat American imperialism. We met with the leaders of my party and they asked us for several measures and if necessary, we will close the embassy of the United States. We do not need the embassy of the United States.

Read more at:  https://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/07/05

 

Christine Lagarde, IMF, in financial scandal

Dear Kitty. Some blog

This video says about itself:

March 20, 2013

French police have carried out a raid on the Paris home of IMF chief Christine Lagarde in connection with a probe into her handling of a high-profile scandal when she was a government minister.

By Olivier Laurent:

IMF head Christine Lagarde implicated in a financial scandal

3 July 2013

Christine Lagarde, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF)—the main organisation behind the austerity policies worldwide—is under investigation in France in relation to a financial scandal involving hundreds of millions of euros.

The main issue in the affair is compensation paid by the French state to businessman Bernard Tapie in 2008, after he brought charges against the state-owned Crédit Lyonnais bank over a complex swindle involving it and some of its subsidiaries.

Tapie ended up ruined in the mid-1990s due to this and several other affairs where he was…

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Brazil Development Bank Gives $1 Billion to Ethiopia Rail

ECO-opia

Ethiopia will receive $1 billion in funding from the Brazilian Development Bank to build a section of a railway that will be extended to connect to neighboring South Sudan, a Foreign Ministry official said.

Andrade Gutierrez Participacoes SA of Brazil will build the link running from the capital, Addis Ababa, to Jimma about 439 kilometers (273 miles) to the southwest, Taye Atskeselassie, director general for the Americas at the ministry, said in an interview on May 24.

The bank “is willing to finance the project,” he said after Ethiopian Prime MinisterHailemariam Desalegn met Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff. “The technical side has been finalized, it’s only the financing part; it’s a matter of the details.” Construction will begin “soon,” he said.

Ethiopia, Africa’s second-most populous nation, needs funding to build 4,744 kilometers of electrified railway lines at a cost of 110.8 billion birr ($5.9 billion) as it seeks…

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Jimmy Cliff’s reggae against Afghan war

Dear Kitty. Some blog

This video from England is called Jimmy Cliff at Glastonbury 2011 singing We Don’t Want Another Vietnam in Afghanistan.

By Peter Rothberg:

Jimmy Cliff Sings for Peace in Afghanistan

June 27, 2011

An aging but still spry Jimmy Cliff, the legendary Jamaican reggae master most renowned for his soundtrack to the 1971 movie The Harder They Come, recently rocked the Glastonbury Festival with a searing version of one of his biggest hits re-tooled as a cry for peace in Afghanistan. (Read the lyrics here.)

Cliff’s uncompromising antiwar message was broadcast to a huge TV audience this past Saturday at England’s fabled annual Glastonbury Festival.

Sign this petition calling for an immediate end to drone strikes in Pakistan and Afghanistan, for a quicker and fuller drawdown of troops than what President Obama has envisaged and for full support for Afghan-led humanitarian and economic…

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Over 200,000 Angolans have learned to read and write using Cuba’s Literacy Program

Angola’s Adult Education Department described as very satisfactory the implementation in that African nation of the Cuban literacy methodology known as “Yes, I can,” which is being applied in nine Angolan provinces.

During the closing of the 3rd National Seminar on the literacy initiative, representatives with the Angolan Adult Education Department said that the meeting allowed for the exchange of experiences among educators from Angola and Cuba, according to PL news agency.

The forum ran for three days at the Viana municipality, in the capital Luanda with the

Anniversary solidarity with Ecuador and Julian Assange in London

WISE Up Action - A Solidarity Network for Manning and Assange

Report from Ciaron. Some observations from David.

Ciaron writes:

Wed June 19th will mark a year since WikiLeaks editor Julian Assange entered the Ecuadorian embassy in London seeking sanctuary. The Ecuadorian government was immediately threatened in private correspondence from British Foreign Minister Hague with the loss of diplomatic status and a consequent raid. The Ecuadorian government made the private threat public, held their ground and conducted an inquiry into the Assange case. This was the same government that had previously responded to a U.S. request for a U.S. military base in Ecuador with, “if you let us have an Ecuadorian base in Florida?”

During this period of inquiry, the London Met were deployed in large numbers around the embassy with 30 police stationed there 24/7. Anti-War, human rights, Latino, Veterans for Peace, Catholic Worker, Occupy and other activists maintained a solidarity vigil at the embassy.

Following the completion of the…

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Cuban-trained American doctor helps save lives in Haiti

Añade tus pensamientos aquí… (opcional)

Cuba+

by: Chasiti Falls

As an Indiana working-class native, I was deeply moved after Haiti’s devastating earthquake of 2010.  I was in Cuba at that time in my forth year of medical school at the Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM).

The school sought out a group of Americans from the 2010 graduating class to incorporate into the “Brigada Medica Cubana.”  This is a famous brigade that rushes to the aide of neighboring and developing countries after a disaster.

One of these new doctors and 2010 ELAM graduate, Dr. Gregory Wilkinson, still works as a general practitioner in Haiti, servicing the dilapidated communities from tents.  He is completing a family practice residency program.

Wilkinson comes from Oakland, Calif., studied at Merritt Community College, and then sociology at Iona College in New Rochelle, N.Y. With Jamaican roots, Wilkinson said he is proud and eager to complete the medical school’s scholarship requirement of…

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5th Traveling Caribbean Film Showcase Arrives in Havana

The 5th Caribbean Film Traveling Exhibition (CFTE) will be in Havana on June 12-17, showcasing 21 films from nine countries of the region.

Presented by nations like Belize, Bahamas, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Colombia and Venezuela, the CFTE will bring documentaries and feature films, including six movies dedicated to children and adolescents.

The CFTE will begin at the Charles Chaplin movie theater, venue of the meeting, with Le Bonheur d´Elsa (Elsa’s Happiness) -a feature film of Guadeloupe, which tells the story of a young woman descending from Caribbean persons who travels from her home, in Paris, to the land of her ancestors.

The 5^th International Forum of the CFTE and the 1st Film Market of the Caribbean, aimed at

Solidarity with Bradley Manning in England and Wales as Trial Begins

WISE Up Action - A Solidarity Network for Manning and Assange

In the run-up to the trial there were solidarity actions in Bristol, Cardiff and Carmarthen between 30 May and 2 June in addition to the US Embassy gathering in London. As the trial began these carried on, in Haverfordwest 3 June, Wrexham 8 June, Peterborough 9 June. In London, solidarity continues throughout the trial with vigil and leafleting on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays outside Camden tube station.

Read a report on last week’s developments in court at bradleymanning.org. Other independent reports from the court are being posted by Alexa O’Brien and Kevin Gosztola.

Bristol – Banner drop

There was a 2 hour banner drop over the M32 in Bristol on the afternoon of Thursday 30 May that culminated in the seizure of the banners by the police on spurious grounds, an arrest and threat of prosecution. Replacement banners were made the same evening.

Cardiff – Food Not Bombs

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Social movements map solidarity with ALBA alliance, by Federico Fuentes

GlobalFaultlines

 

 

May 27, 2013 — Green Left Weekly— An important summit of global significance, held in Brazil on May 16-20, 2013, has largely passed below the radar of most media outlets, including many left and progressive sources.

This summit was not the usual type, involving heads of states and business leaders. Instead, it was a gathering of social movement representatives from across Latin America and the Caribbean — the site of some of the most intense struggles and popular rebellions of the past few decades.

This region also remains the only one where an alternative to neoliberal capitalism has emerged. Pushing this alternative is the Bolivarian Alliance of the Peoples of Our Americas (ALBA). Spearheaded by the radical governments of Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador and Cuba, it has eight member states, but seeks to relate to people’s movements, not just governments.

The purpose…

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