News from around the world

During Christmas as toxic smog spread from the northern provinces to central China, the country’s netizens expressed concern that air pollution will become the new “normal” as official state media continues to twist a positive angle out of the bad news.

With 99.4% of the votes counted in the Portuguese presidential elections, Bloco candidate Marisa Matias obtained 10.12% of voter support and was the third most voted candidate.

This statement was made by OpenLeft Collective-Russia and Sosyalist Demokrasi ?çin Yeniyol-Turkey on 5 December 2015.

IndustriALL Global Union and other global unions demand the Chinese government to free detained labour activists in Chinese province Guangdong, stop suppressing labour and civil society organisations, and respect the fundamental labour rights enshrined in ILO Conventions.

On December 3 2015, the Danes voted no to ending Denmark’s opt-out on the EU’s justice and home affairs rules. Enhedslisten - the Red-Green Alliance are very happy about the result, which we see as a no to less democracy and less legal certainty – but not a no to international cooperation.

This statement was issued by the NPA Executive Committee on the evening of the first round of the regional elections, which saw the far right National Front top the poll in six of thirteen regions, and the governing Socialist Party in only two.

On the morning of Sunday the 29th of November more than ten thousand people formed a warm and friendly human chain from Oberkampf to Nation to proclaim the climate emergency and denounce the hypocrisy of the COP 21 conference.

Last Monday night (23 November) a group of social activists, intellectuals and newly elected mayors in the Spanish state launched a manifesto against war and hatred, in response to the war rhetoric and the restrictions in freedoms that have been spreading since the Paris bombings. You can find the full English text below and here.

We have obtained already more than 17000 signatures and a strong political echo. We are calling for demonstrations on Saturday noon, already in nine different Spanish cities. See on Facebook here.

From the city of Douma that suffered terrorisms from all shades, a siege, death and genocide, the revolutionaries of Douma stand with the oppressed against all forms of extremisms, terrorism and aggression

We are free humans and we will stay free humans wherever we stand

Douma

Tomorrow is the first major test on the social front for the new Syriza government and the barbaric austerity measures it has just passed in Parliament as part of the 3d Memorandum signed in the summer. The strike is called by the two confederations of civil servants (ADEDY, which has a leftwing majority) and the private and broader public (or former public) sector GSEE, still controlled by the corrupt union bureaucracy of PASOK and New Democracy. At a more grass-root level the strike has been prepared by last week’s branch strikes of seamen, transport workers and municipal employees and by the actions of university and school students. It is also called by the KKE and its syndicalist front PAME. It has been actively prepared by the social movements (particularly the campaigns against the looming wave of house repossessions) and by the forces of the radical and anticapitalist Left (Popular Unity and Antarsya).