The central plazas of dozens of cities and towns across Spain bear an uncanny resemblance to Tahrir Square in Cairo. They have been taken over by thousands of demonstrators demanding a "new system".
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The annual Sydney Writers' Festival brings together a diverse range of acclaimed writers from around Australia and the world.
This year's theme 鈥淲ords. To Live By鈥 engaged readers and writers in a week long festival of ideas ranging from discussions about the future of media to the ongoing revolutions in the Arab World.
Some of the highlights of this year's May 16-22 festival include:
Songs of Blood and Sword
The response of the British Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government to the economic crisis, which has been to implement billions of pounds worth of public spending cuts, is intensifying the effects of the crisis on the British people.
Austerity measures are worsening mass unemployment. Chief British and European economist at forecasting company IHS Global Insight Howard Archer has predicted unemployment will reach 2.67 million people by the end of 2011.
Springtime: The New Student Rebellions
Edited by Claire Solomon and Tania Palmieri
Verso 2011 283 pages,
paperback, 锟9.99
In years to come, when people look back at 2010-11 and try to identify the moment the fightback against the British Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition really got under way, many will select the huge March 26 TUC-sponsored demonstration in London.
Magnificent and inspiring as March 26 was, however, November 10, 2010 has perhaps a greater claim to be recorded as the moment the fightback began in earnest.
The 鈥淏ig Four鈥 record companies, already responsible for more than 80% of album sales on the planet, may be on the verge of becoming the 鈥淏ig Three鈥.
On May 6, Warner Music Group was sold to Ukrainian-American tycoon Leonard Blavatnik.
Warner is the world's third largest record company. Blavatnik 鈥 the world's 80th richest man 鈥 is also rumored to have his sights set on number four EMI.
If that sale comes to pass, it will create the largest music label in history.
An estimated 3500 building workers walked off the job and rallied in Brisbane鈥檚 CBD on May 24 to protest sham contracts being imposed by unscrupulous contractors in the construction industry.
Building workers from the Gold Coast joined the protest after coming up to Brisbane in a convoy of cars and trucks.
Construction unions have shut down the Gold Coast University Hospital site over the issue of "sham contracts, where employers avoid paying entitlements by forcing workers who are legally employees into contracts," the May 25 Courier-Mail said.
Resistance held its 40th national conference on the weekend of May 6 -8. One-hundred-and-fifty people came over the three days and took part in diverse workshops and panel sessions.
One major session featured Matthew Cassel, former assistant editor of Electronic Intifada and an independent journalist, gave an eyewitness account of the overthrow of Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak.
He said: 鈥淪omething common among dictatorships in the Arab world and so-called democracies in the West and elsewhere is the lack of accurate information available to most people through the mainstream media.
On June 27, 1985, four anti apartheid activists were brutally murdered on behalf of the South African government. Twenty five years later, their killers still walk free.
The murders of these four men illustrate one of the darkest passages of South Africa鈥檚 history.
South African filmmaker David Forbes has directed, edited and produced the film The Cradock Four to tell the story of these four extraordinary men.
Sydney released the statement below on May 26.
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The death of Sergeant Brett Wood in Afghanistan on May 24 should trigger a radical rethink of this failed war, said Stop the War Coalition today.
Instead, PM Julia Gillard and opposition leader Tony Abbott continue to peddle the myth that the West's military intervention into Afghanistan still has merit.
What are some examples of highly offensive words that must be censored from radio? For British state broadcaster BBC, they are not all of the four-letter variety.
The BBC appears to find not just the phrase 鈥淔ree Palestine鈥 but even the geographical entity of the Gaza Strip itself unutterable on a cultural show.
A controversy has broken out over the BBC's anti-Palestinian bias after its digital radio channel BBC 1xtra, which largely plays hip hop, grime and other 鈥渦rban music鈥 genres, censored on air references to Palestine.
The formation of the Mana Party in April marked a 鈥渕ajor step forward for a genuine working-class political voice鈥 in New Zealand, the national director of the Unite Union and Mana party member Mike Treen told Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal.
The Mana Party was formed at a 500-strong conference on April 30. It was called by Hone Harawira, MP for the Maori electorate of Te Tai Tokerau.
At the conference, Harawira announced his resignation from the Maori Party and his re-election campaign as a member of the Mana Party in a by-election.
Sixty-two percent of Australians support equal marriage rights. This support has risen from the 33% who backed same-sex marriage in 2004 鈥 the year gay marriage was banned.
This rise in support has been a result of the grassroots campaign waged by activists with rallies, politician visits, media stunts, Mardi Gras floats, petitions and others mobilisations.
In Sydney, Community Action Against Homophobia (CAAH) has organised rallies since June 2004.
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