Sept. 17, 2005

Its momentum growing, a rejuvenated worldwide mobilization is pressuring the Bush administration to release five Cuban men held unjustly in U.S. jails. Millions are demanding that they be freed immediately. They are “kidnapped,” Cuban National Assembly President Ricardo Alarcon told interviewer Bernie Dwyer. “The abduction has to end — immediately, unconditionally,” he said Sept. 5 in Havana.
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UNITED NATIONS — A week before the UN World Summit, the world body convened a meeting of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) designed to give grassroots, civil society input into the global meeting. The three-day summit, which opened here Sept. 14, is the largest gathering of heads of state in history and is intended to set the UN’s future course.

The U.S. government announced Sept. 2 that Ricardo Alarcon, president of the Cuban National Assembly, would not be granted a visa to attend the second conference of parliamentary presidents held by the Inter-Parliamentary Union Sept. 7-9 at UN headquarters in New York. Alarcon had applied for the visa in June. The president of the Iranian Parliament was also denied a visa.

Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) gained a election victory in the Sept. 11 general election by capturing 296 seats in the 480-seat lower house of parliament.

With the first round of elections set to begin in about eight weeks, Haiti is still not ready to hold free and fair multiparty elections. More than half of Haiti’s population remains unregistered to vote. Further, the country’s largest political party, Famni Lavalas, remains unofficially banned. Local, regional, national and presidential elections are scheduled for Nov. 20, with a runoff on Jan. 3 if needed.
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Africa: Amnesty says oil firms override human rights; Israel: Soldiers testify about killings; Caribbean: PetroCaribe to save millions; Canada: Locked-out media workers

The Communications Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters today announced a proposed alliance to jointly represent passenger service agents at US Airways when the merger of America West and US Airways is completed.

Thomas Friedman, lead New York Times op-ed writer on international affairs, can drive most any class partisan to pull his or her hair out. Like some preachers who visit a picket line to denounce both corporate greed and picket line militancy, Friedman can be counted upon to plant his feet squarely on both sides of nearly every question.

Just days after former First Lady Barbara Bush made widely publicized remarks about people made homeless by Hurricane Katrina, the White House said today that Mrs. Bush had been moved to “a new location away from television cameras and microphones.”

Two wins at Quebecor; Autoworkers sign with Mitsubishi; EFCA adds sponsors