Europe

By Christoph Dreier, (WSWS*)

The Greek elections on 6 May will be contested by the greatest number of parties in any vote since the end of the military dictatorship in 1974. Last week, the Supreme Court ruled that 32 of 36 registered organizations are permitted to participate. But despite the many parties on the ballot, workers have no voice in this election.

by Ter Garcia

The 15M movement in Spain has faced repression from the very beginning: 24 young people were arrested and beaten by police in the demonstrations organized by Democracia Real Ya on May 15 last year, which is a large part of why several dozen people decided to camp that night in Sol square, turning the demonstration into an encampment.

International humanist organisation World without Wars and Violence will be present at the upcoming NPT Preparatory Committee that will take place from 30 April to 11 May 2012 in Vienna, Austria. The PrepCom and related civil society events will be attended by members of World without Wars and Violence from the Czech Republic.

Even Medusa had another side. The much reviled gorgon was often present on capitals and freezes of ancient Greece temples to protect them from harm. As Syria heats up threatening to be the trigger for an all out conflict in the Middle East the complexity of the forces at play demands a careful analysis, difficult as it may be because of the vociferous propaganda from all sides.

Dear Friends, I write to let you know that I have decided not to attend the 12th World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates on 23rd-25th April, 2012, in Chicago, USA – writes Mairead Maguire of Peace People, Northern Ireland, rejecting the US State Department, NATO and the Chicago Agenda. “I do not agree with many of the policies of the US State Department.”

Dr Volker Jung, President, Protestant Church in Hesse and Nassau, welcomes the co-operation between his church and the Green Crescent organisation and says that it is part of Evangelical understanding of the Christian faith that Protestants should be open to others. Pressenza retells his Internet posted story – copyright © Qantara.de 2012.

Geneva, 7 April – Within the next five years, for the first time in history, the population of people aged 65 and older will outnumber children under the age of five. The World Health Organization (WHO) also informs that in the middle of the last century there were 14 million people in the world aged 80 years or older.

In 2050, world energy demand will be 80% higher; urban air pollution is set to become the top environmental cause of mortality worldwide; global biodiversity is projected to decline by a further 10%; global water demand will increase by some 55%, and 2.3 billion more people than today –over 40% of the global population – will be living in river basins under severe water stress.

The Global March to Jerusalem to take place on March 30 has been proposed as a peaceful demonstration in many countries around the world to support the Palestinians’ cause in Israel. It is time for all humanists, for all those who aspire to a world of diversity, human rights and equal opportunities to concentrate hearts and minds to achieve a truly nonviolent day of action.

I took this photograph on August 16, 2008. That day my camera caught a multitude of images of the war’s aftermath: wrecked houses, some burnt cars, the city streets strewn with glass shards and cracked tree branches. I can still remember the stench of food thrown out of shops and rotting away under the hot August sun.