Greece: Farmer shoots 30 unpaid Bangladeshi migrant workers when they demand pay

Greece farm shooting: 30 injured in pay dispute

BBC, 18 April 2013

Migrants are employed to pick strawberries in Nea Manolada, a Peloponnesian village in souther Greece.

 

About 30 migrant workers have been injured in a shooting on a strawberry farm in Greece after requesting salaries that had not been paid.

The migrants – mainly from Bangladesh – were shot at by at least one farm supervisor, in a Peloponnesian village in southern Greece.

Several of the workers have been taken to hospital but none are in a critical condition.

The owner of the farm in Nea Manolada and one foreman have been arrested.

Nea Manolada, about 260km (160 miles) west of Athens, is an area where thousands of migrant workers are employed.

Around 200 workers had gathered to request their unpaid salaries when at least one farm supervisor opened fire, reports the BBC’s Mark Lowen.

Police Captain Haralambos Sfetsos told the AP news agency that the workers had “moved threateningly” towards foremen when the shots were taken.

In addition to the two men already arrested, warrants for two further arrests have been issued.

‘Blood strawberries’

Nea Manolada has previously been in the spotlight over exploitation of migrants.

In 2008 workers staged a strike against inhumane conditions. There have also been reports of previous attacks.

A social media campaign has now been launched to boycott the fruit from Nea Manolada, calling them “blood strawberries”.

The Council of Europe – the main European human rights watchdog – issued a report this week detailing abuse against migrants in Greece.

The report warned of a growing wave of racist violence, stating that “democracy is at risk”. It highlighted the role of the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party.

US: AFRICOM’s campaign for a foothold in Southern Africa

By Felix Njini, Southern Times, April 10, 2012

Windhoek – Washington’s “hunt” for Joseph Kony, the leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebel group, is a sideshow masking America’s intention to fulfil a long-held dream to gain a foothold in the DRC’s minerals sector.

An analysis of America’s Africa policy shows that it is premised on an axis of three strategic interests: securing minerals, off-setting Chinese economic and political influence, and moving its African Command (AFRICOM) from Stuttgart in Germany to the continent.

The “humanitarian” card is the pivot, with Washington’s propaganda machinery being deployed to justify America’s increasingly bellicose attitude towards the continent.

At the centre of America’s strategic interests are oil in East Africa and the vast mineral potential in the DRC, which would by implication give the US a significant foothold in Southern Africa.

The Communards Debate Again

[When filmmaker Peter Watkins directed a film on the Paris Commune, “La Commune”, the actors were drawn from non-professionals, people who in many cases occupied the same positions in society today as they depicted in the film.  The liveliness of the production made the issues and revolutionary events of 1871 remarkably current to present times and struggles against capitalist oppression and expoloitation–struggles to remake the world.  In this, some of the actors discussed the way the Commune’s history relates to the world today. — Frontlines ed.]

An engaging discussion with the cast of La Commune (Paris, 1871) a 5 hour docudrama, directed by Peter Watkins about the Paris Commune.

The discussions in question draw upon lessons learned from the Paris Commune, relations to modern life, and what they could have done differently