Australian Labor government hails US passage of AUKUS legislation
By Oscar Grenfell The Australian Labor government has responded with jubilation to the passage of AUKUS legislation by the US Congress last Thursday. The bill enshrines the militarist pact between Australia, the US and the UK, unveiled in 2021, and permits America to sell nuclear-powered submarines to Australia as part of
US financial system a “minefield of vulnerabilities”
By Nick Beams. Those pondering why the US Federal Reserve made a sudden and dramatic turn away from its previous insistence that monetary policy would need to remain restrictive, will find some of the answers in the latest annual report of the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC). In its report, issued the
Poet and teacher Ahnaf Jazeem, victim of Sri Lanka government racist campaign, acquitted
By Sanjaya Jayasekera The High Court of Puttalam last Tuesday (12) acquitted poet and teacher Ahnaf Jazeem of the charge against him framed under draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), three and half years after his wrongful arrest. The acquittal is based on the failure of the State to prove the
US Supreme Court to hear case on banning or restricting abortion pill
By Kevin Reed. On Wednesday, the Supreme Court of the United States announced it would hear a case on the availability of medication commonly used to terminate a pregnancy, its first abortion litigation since the far-right dominated court overturned the constitutional right in Roe v. Wade last year. The case was brought to the
![Kate Cox [Photo: Kate Cox]](https://therepublic.lk/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/e876db53aff2471df625c562c8533a389c20d4e2.jpg)
The Texas Supreme Court’s anti-abortion ruling and the war on democratic rights
By Tom Carter. The Texas Supreme Court’s abrupt intervention to block a medically necessary abortion is not only a monstrous injustice. It is a concentrated expression of the profound rot of the whole social order in America, with fundamental human rights under siege and collapsing across the board. Kate Cox is a
Question mark raised over the world’s most important financial market
By Nick Beams. The current edition of the Economist, one of the world’s leading financial magazines, carries an extraordinary headline. It poses the question: “Is the world’s most important asset market broken?” The article deals with significant problems in the $25 trillion US Treasury market where government debt is bought and sold, and which
Australian government rams through detention and citizenship-stripping laws
By Mike Head Scenes in the Australian parliament on Wednesday made a farce of any pretence of democracy. In fact, the real face of parliament was on display, spearheaded by a Labor government in imposing deeply reactionary laws. Intent on proving itself more draconian than the Liberal-National Coalition, the Labor government again
The barbarity of Australian government’s detainee shackling laws
By Mike Head. The Albanese Labor government is already facing three High Court challenges by refugees to the manacling legislation that it and the Liberal-National Coalition jointly rammed through both houses of parliament in just 12 hours on November 16. Further challenges are likely as well. In a blatant bid to evade
Right-wing Supreme Court majority on brink of gutting federal regulatory powers
By John Burton. At oral arguments Wednesday morning the right-wing majority of Supreme Court justices sympathized openly with an extremist position advocated by the attorney for a fascistic con artist that threatens longstanding federal powers to regulate the securities markets and other major business activities, including workplace safety, environmental protections and
Australian government demands parliament sits until it passes “preventative detention” law
By Mike Head. The Albanese Labor government issued an extraordinary ultimatum to the Australian parliament this week. It declared that both houses must keep sitting, beyond next week’s scheduled holiday shutdown, until they pass as yet unseen “preventative detention” legislation. Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil declared, via Australian Broadcasting Corporation radio: “We