Wednesday, March 15, 2006

PROTEST THE "STOLENWEALTH" GAMES




The Black GST campaign to boycott and protest at the 2006 Melbourne "Stolenwealth" Games was launched on 26th January 2005 in Melbourne. The purpose of the action is to expose the racist nature of Australian society.

The Black GST is a group of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people who are appalled at the current state of affairs in Black Australia. The Black GST states,

We deplore:

Ongoing Genocide as demonstrated by police actions and recent events in indigenous communities - Redfern, Palm Island, Goondiwindi, Melbourne

The assimilation policies of all political parties

The perpetual denial of our Indigenous Rights

The sell-out of the national indigenous leadership


The first article is from Special Broadcasting Service (Australia). The second is from SIFY (India)


ABORIGINAL PROTEST FOR QUEEN

More than 500 protesters gathered outside Melbourne's Royal Exhibition Building to call on the Queen to sign a treaty with aboriginal Australians.

The protest has been arranged by an indigenous rights group, the Black GST Collective.

It has been timed to coincide with the Commonwealth Games which will begin with a gala opening ceremony to be attended by the Queen.

The Queen is attending a state luncheon at the Exhibition building in the inner Melbourne suburb of Carlton.

The protesters hope to invite the Queen to talks on a treaty with aborigines but if she did not accept the invitation, protesters will march to Government House where the Queen is staying.

The demonstrators will then deliver a summons to the International Criminal Court alleging that aborigines were the subject of systematic genocide since white settlement.

One will perform a traditional smoking ceremony to purify the land and people and welcome the Queen.

"I did it for the Pope (John Paul II) when he was in Australia and I want to do it for the Queen as well," said 64 year old Uncle Max Eulo from the New South Wales town of Bourke.

Eight of the protesters, some dressed in furs performed traditional music for the crowd as a police helicopter circled overhead.

The demonstrators were monitored by a large police contingent.
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Protests greet Queen Elizabeth II in Melbourne

Melbourne: Queen Elizabeth II was greeted with protests as well as pomp when she arrived in the southern Australian city of Melbourne on Wednesday to open the Commonwealth Games.

About 200 demonstrators backing claims by Aborigines that British colonisers stole the land that became Australia from its original inhabitants more than two centuries ago, were among about 500 people who gathered outside the site where the monarch was to have an official lunch.

"Make sure you tell the queen she’s standing on our land and we want it back," an Aboriginal protester shouted into a megaphone as the official motorcade approached.

The demonstrators, who stayed behind barricades set up about 15 meters (50 feet) from the venue entrance, also jeered Australian Prime Minister John Howard as he arrived to host the lunch, shouting,

"Always was, always would be, Aboriginal land."

Hundreds of police, including officers mounted on horses wearing helmets with riot visors, stood guard.

The lunch was being held in the building where the first sitting of Australia’s federal Parliament was held in 1901, an event that heralded the end of Britain’s direct colonial rule.

Protest organiser Robbie Thorpe urged the queen to sign a treaty with aboriginal Australians and said if she didn’t the demonstrators would march to Government House where the queen will stay while in Melbourne.

Hundreds of well-wishers also gathered as the queen arrived, wearing a mint green hat with white bow and a patterned skirt and top with mint green and dark green floral pattern.

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