News from around the world

Taking note of the blatant violation of tenant farmers’ rights in Okara, the Pakistan Kissan Rabita Committee has condemned the criminal action of retired army officers hired by Okara Military of destroying the maize crops of two tenants in Chak 18/4L late night on September 29.

¡Solidaridad con Cataluña! Solidaritat amb Catalunya! Kataluniarekin bat! Solidariedade con Catalunya! ¡Solidaridá con Catalunya! ¡Solidaridad con Catalunya!

This statement was published on the Viento Sur website on 20 September 2017.

Today, 20 September, the Spanish state federal government stepped up its attack on the right of the people of Catalonia to hold a referendum on national independence.

The Fourth Internationalists in Catalonia stand firmly in defence of this fundamental democratic right of the people of Catalonia. This statement was issued earlier, at the moment when the Catlinian government passed the law. We will publish more as we can.

Mehar Abdul Sattar is general secretary of Anjman Mozareen Punjab and also Pakistan Kissan Rabita Committee, a peasant leader demanding land rights at Okara Military Farms. He has been in jail since April 2016, 36 false police cases have been registered against him. In March 2017, he was shifted to Sahiwal High Security prison to torture him as much as possible.

The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program was established by an executive order from President Obama in June 2012. Far from a gift from a sympathetic administration, DACA was a victory won only through the brave and militant actions of undocumented activists who were willing to criticize the devastating immigration policies of a supposedly progressive President, including by occupying Obama campaign offices.

The Catalan parliament has passed a law convening the first of October referendum. We consider this law to be legitimate and backed by the will of the majority of Catalan society which wishes to exercise their right to decide even if this involves disobeying the regime’s unjust and repressive legality.

Pablo Solón, the Director of Fundación Solón, former Executive Director of Focus on the Global South, and former Bolivian Ambassador to the United Nations (UN), is being targeted by the Bolivian government for his vocal criticism of the government and the construction of two hydro-electric projects, El Bala and El Chapete in the Amazonian region. Based on the studies done by Geodata, an Italian company hired by the government to identify where the dams will be built, Solón says they will “inundate an area five times larger than the city of La Paz, displace more than five thousand indigenous peoples, deforest more than one hundred thousand hectares and will not be profitable for the country with the current prices of electricity in Brazil.”

Ships carrying Chinese military personnel departed on Tuesday July 11 to set up China’s first military base in Djibouti, state media reported. The United States, Japan and France also have military bases there.

Tens of thousands took to the streets of Hong Kong on Sunday (20 August) to condemn the jailing of young pro-democracy activists over illegal protests, even as the city’s leading legal professionals warned against painting recent court rulings as political persecution.

As Anticapitalistas we want to show our solidarity with the families and the friends of the people killed and wounded in the savage attack today in Barcelona. A horrible and unjustifiable attack, which seeks to gratuitously harm one of the most open and supportive cities in Europe, hospitable to refugees and proud of its diversity.