Australia: 'Green Left Weekly' celebrates 20 years!

One of the despairs of our time is a corporate media that speaks for authority and power, rarely for its readers and viewers. One of the excitements of our time is the means by which we can now circumvent the old gatekeepers. WikiLeaks is a new creation, but Green Left Weekly has been a pathfinder for 20 years, no less. Congratulations!

— John Pilger, renowned journalist and filmmaker.

Over the course of the past 20 years, Green Left Weekly has emerged as a focal point of the world green left movement, its leading weekly guide to theory and practice. Long may its flag fly!

— John Bellamy Foster, editor, Monthly Review.

What better birthday present could Green Left Weekly have asked for than the Egyptian people’s taste of freedom? Congratulations to all at GLW. Onward!

— Raj Patel, independent journalist, author and activist.

More Greetings to Green Left Weekly from around Australia.

More Greetings to Green Left Weekly from around the world. Also below.

Send your own greetings to weekly.greenleft@gmail.com  

Sunday, February 13, 2011 – Twenty years ago, on Monday February 18, 1991, the first issue of Green Left Weekly was produced. Its full-colour poster-style cover expressed opposition to the Gulf War, the first US-led invasion of Iraq.

Many of us involved in this new publication project had been busy in the streets organising and taking part in anti-war protests.

We waited desperately for the first issue of GLW because the movement needed a publication that would report on its progress, expose the truth about the warmongers and help activists network with one another.

When it came out, activists around the country snapped up copies at a rate not enjoyed by any Australian progressive publication for a long time.

This is the role GLW has played consistently ever since. It has been a voice against war and oppression, and a voice for building an ecological, sustainable world.

It has stayed fiercely committed to exposing the truth. And it has been a powerful instrument to help empower and organise people fighting for change.

Let’s examine what has changed since those days.

End of history?

Much of the first decade of GLW’s life coincided with a wave of capitalist back-slapping. The Soviet Union and the Eastern European “communist” states collapsed and Professor Francis Fukuyama famously declared neoliberal capitalism the “end of history”.

Since then, the course of history has forced Fukuyama to retreat from his arrogant boast. Neoliberalism (also called “economic rationalism”, “capitalist globalisation” or “free market capitalism”) has become a dirty word.

In November-December 1999, the rejection of the idea that the world’s richest corporations should be free to ruthlessly exploit every corner of the earth exploded in the legendary anti-globalisation protest in the US city of Seattle, which was host to a summit of the World Trade Organisation.

Seattle wasn’t the first big protest against the global capitalist neoliberal offensive.

But Seattle was the first major mass mobilisation against corporate globalisation that could claim a global victory. The new round of trade negotiations demanded by the imperialist states was postponed.

Many people around the world eagerly read reports in GLW about this new movement. It captured the imagination of a generation of young activists and re-energised older activists.

This new movement swept Australia a year later on September 11, 2000, when about 20,000 people took part in a three-day blockade of the World Economic Forum in Melbourne.

As one of the activists that helped organise this “S11” blockade, I reflected on the meaning of this new movement.

It seemed to me that while the new movement took its name from Seattle, its ideological heart was solidarity with the oppressed and exploited masses in the global South — where 80% of the world’s population do not share in the benefits of neoliberal globalisation.

This global movement arose out of the growing moral crisis of capitalism, which was captured succinctly by the Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro in his message to the September 1999 G77 ministerial meeting:

“Globalisation is an irreversible reality characterised by the growing interaction of all countries in the world, their economies and peoples. The major scientific and technical advances have shortened distances and allowed for direct communication and transmission of information among countries located anywhere on the planet.

“With its impressive technological achievements, globalisation holds tremendous potential for development, the eradication of poverty and fostering well-being in conditions of social equality for all humanity. Never before has the world commanded today’s technological resources.

“However, the world is still very far from materialising the potential of globalisation. It develops today under the aegis of neoliberal policies that impose unregulated markets and unbridled privatisation.

“Far from promoting the expansion of development throughout an increasingly interdependent world badly in need of sharing the progresses achieved, neoliberal globalisation has aggravated existing inequalities and raised to inordinate heights social inequities and the most disturbing contrasts between extreme wealth and extreme poverty.”

Viva Venezuela!

In GLW’s second decade, the Western anti-globalisation movement ebbed, but an even mightier revolutionary movement against neoliberal capitalism began to sweep Latin America.

Venezuela and Bolivia have ridden the crest of the wave.

GLW has been at the forefront of systematic and detailed English-language reporting on the Venezuelan Revolution and its political global reverberations.

A GLW bureau has operated in Caracas for most of the decade and our team of correspondents have won worldwide respect for their work.

However, once again GLW’s role was not restricted to just informing its readership.

Our coverage inspired and empowered many people to jump back into the struggle for change, or step up their efforts.

And of course, GLW has helped build movements in solidarity with the new revolutions in Latin America by reporting on and promoting the political study brigades to Venezuela organised by the Australia-Venezuela Solidarity Network, among other things.

Activists, trade unionists and scholars from many other countries have joined the Australians on this brigade.

Each brigade has left a powerful impression on the participants. I was fortunate to join a brigade in November 2008 and my experiences added fire and confidence to my activism today.

The giant rebellion in the South against the global dictatorship of the corporate rich is expanding beyond the continent of Latin America.

As each new front of resistance opens up, GLW has risen to the same challenge of championing, informing, organising and empowering solidarity.

We have been enthusiastic supporters of the movements for democracy and liberation in Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia, East Timor and many more countries.

Now, Egypt is rebelling and dictators all around the world are shaking in their boots.

It is definitely not the end of history.

However, if we look back over the past 20 years we can see that it hasn’t been all forward motion for those fighting for a better world.

The rich and powerful inflicted incredible pain and suffering on millions of people.

Up to 1.5 million civilians — mostly children — were killed by the economic sanctions imposed on Iraq by the West, which was a prelude to the 2003 invasion.

The US-based Just Foreign Policy estimates that 1.32 million Iraqis have been killed as a result of the US invasion of Iraq.

There is no official count of the total Afghan casualties since the US-led invasion a decade ago. But Dr Gideon Polya has calculated that the total the human cost of the Afghanistan War could be up to 4.9 million people (violent deaths plus non-violent, war-related deaths).

Polya also reports up to 3.1 million Afghans have been made refugees (2.7 million in Iran and Pakistan and 0.4 million internally-displaced persons in Afghanistan).

Another holocaust has played out in the war against the Tamil national liberation movement in Sri Lanka. This brutal war has created another army of refugees.

A tiny fraction of these people displaced by war come to Australia’s shores to seek asylum. Yet about 6000 refugees are imprisoned in Australian immigration detention centres. More than 1000 of them are children.

Politicians from the Labor and Coalition parties try to justify this crime by cynically fuelling racism.

Today, this racism is focused most strongly on people of Middle Eastern or Muslim backgrounds. It has built upon a long history of racism in Australia, which has its origins in the colonial theft of this land from its Indigenous peoples.

The ruling elites in post-colonial Australia have used racism to justify genocidal practices against the Aboriginal people and the theft of Aboriginal land.

But they have also turned to racism to justify waging imperialist wars. Vilifying the enemy as “wogs”, “gooks” or “Mussies” makes it easier to sell the idea that killing these people is acceptable.

More insidiously, the rulers, their politicians and the mass media have used racism to prevent many ordinary Australians from grasping the full horror of the system.

The twisted “news” reporting of the corporate media drums out the ugly message that the life of a single “Aussie” is worth more than that of thousands of people in the global South.

GLW has been a powerful antidote to this lie. It has a record as a consistent fighter against racism. The covers of past issues of GLW confirm this.

Whether it be championing the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, or joining the battle against the crude racism of Pauline Hanson and the more effective racism of mainstream politicians who have borrowed her hateful slogans, GLW has been out there fighting.

Unity is strength

This ongoing struggle against racism is a reminder that our biggest challenge is to unite in struggle all the layers of our society that are oppressed and exploited.

GLW was founded on an understanding that building unity is a central challenge.

Our publication’s name expresses one aspect of this challenge. It declares on every masthead the need to unite all those active in the left and the “green” movements.

The left and the green are not mutually exclusive or separate movements. Indeed, looking back over the past 20 years shows that the two movements are more closely entwined today than before.

The right wing radio shock jocks and commentators often depict this as a kind of sinister red-green conspiracy. But it is an entirely natural and necessary process.

These two strands in the movements of change confront a capitalist system facing serious ecological, economic and political crises. These three crises are interlinked.

The links between these crises of capitalism have come up again and again in GLW’s reporting.

For example, a global solution to climate change cannot be contemplated without including measures to end the division of the world into rich and poor countries, between exploiter and exploited nations.

But the process of convincing more campaigners to draw these links — and thus win agreement on the solutions our movements should campaign for — is not simply a matter of preaching the “correct” political program.

From its beginning GLW embraced the need to develop unity around what to do next and ultimately around how we can most effectively organise our resistance. This was done through a process of open dialogue between greens and leftists of all different traditions.

GLW has also sought to be a platform for productive political discussion and debate.

As we mark GLW’s 20th birthday, we pledge to continue this approach.

Although the GLW project was initiated by one left organisation — the Democratic Socialist Party, which has since merged into the Socialist Alliance — it was conceived as a publication for the broader progressive movements.

Uniting these movements remains one of our main goals.

As the Egyptian revolution approaches a point where victory is possible, the people who make up this movement are sharply aware of the great strength unity brings.

This fact comes through in many interviews and reports on the Egyptian struggle. Unity has become urgent and indeed the victory of this movement now depends on it.

Back in relatively conservative and wealthy countries like Australia, the impetus for unity may not be felt as urgently today as it is in Egypt. The political movements in this country will have to go through more common experiences and common evaluations to become more united.

This is why GLW has sought contributions from a wide range of progressive activists and writers and it has hosted and sponsored numerous conferences that have brought activists from different backgrounds together to exchange experiences and discuss how we can move forward together.

One such gathering will be the second Climate Change Social Change conference that will be held in September this year at the University of Melbourne. GLW will cosponsor this conference together with the university’s Office for Environmental Programs.

The power of the truth

Tyrants and dictators cannot abide truth. It is not just inconvenient, but subversive to their regimes that are built on lies, intimidation, persecution, terror, torture and exploitation.

That’s why GLW is a strong defender of WikiLeaks. We are defending the truth and the power it gives all who are fighting tyranny.

One of the contradictions of capitalist globalisation is that is has also spread new information technologies that have opened up new fronts of struggle for democratic movements around the world. WikiLeaks is just one expression of this.

GLW embraced the internet from its first issue. We beat most of the commercial publications in making all our content available free and permanently on the internet.

The GLW internet archive is a resource used by activists and scholars around the world.

Knowledge is power and the brave people in Cairo’s Tahrir Square and other parts of Egypt well and truly appreciate this.

But our commitment is much more than to just spread the truth, or to expose exploitation, oppression and social and ecological crimes.

Movements of resistance and liberation can be greatly strengthened by developing an understanding their own history, and the history of other movements for social change.

So one of GLW's important roles is to keep alive and share this historical knowledge, and the skills and traditions of social activism.

Over the past 20 years we have also seen the great potential of the working people of Australia to become a force for change.

GLW’s widely commended coverage of the big workers’ militant struggle against the thuggery of the maritime bosses in 1998 was a milestone. As was its coverage of the struggle against the John Howard Liberal government’s WorkChoices anti-union laws — a struggle that eventually threw Howard out of office in 2007.

But we’ve also catalogued the series of betrayals by bureaucratic trade union leaderships happy to do the bidding of right wing Labor governments.

It is in the interest of these conservatives to stop the Australian workers’ movement from studying and understanding its own history. For this reason, GLW was happy to support and promote the inaugural Union and Community Summer School, held in the Victoria Trades Hall in Melbourne on December 10-11, 2010.

We hope this will become an ongoing project of the militant trade union movement.

The work of many

Twenty years ago, the first issue of GLW was introduced with these words: “This is the first issue of Green Left. Many individuals made this issue possible by writing articles, letters, poems, drawing cartoons, taking photographs, designing graphics and layout.

“But there is room for many more people to become part of the GLW team. And there is room for you too!

“The broader the range of people who contribute to GLW, the better it will be. This is a paper by and for the green and progressive movement. We would like it to reflect the movement in action and in discussion. We want to reflect the controversies and the concerns as well as the achievements and celebrations. Your input could help us do this better.”

Since then a very large number of people — from all around the world — have made valuable contributions to the GLW project. Their efforts have made GLW one of the most respected progressive English-language publications.

GLW articles are translated into many other languages and it now publishes regular Arabic- and Spanish-language supplements.

We cannot thank these people all by name. They are far too numerous. But we say a big thank you to you all.

GLW needs its army of volunteers to keep growing. It needs to constantly replenish the ranks of its activist-journalists, photographers, cartoonists, storytellers and poets.

We also need help to distribute GLW. You can help grow and widen our precious subscription base. So please consider if there is anyone you know to whom you can introduce to GLW with a gift subscription.

Also get in touch if you can take a small bundle of papers to distribute or know of a good outlet that would be happy to get GLW around.

Finally, our project also needs regular donations to keep going. One of my roles with GLW is to ask for your continuing financial support in our regular Fighting Fund column.

Year after year, our supporters have responded to our Fighting Fund and ensured GLW keeps coming off the presses. This year we have a target to raise $250,000. Our supporters have raised $22,620 so far.

If you would like to help us get closer with a 20th birthday present you can donate online today at www.greenleft.org.au/donate.php

Direct deposits can be made to Green Left Weekly, Commonwealth Bank, BSB 062-006, Account No. 00901992.

Otherwise, you can send a cheque or money order to PO Box 515, Broadway NSW 2007 or phone in a donation on the toll-free line, 1800 634 206 (within Australia).

Green Left Weekly’s 20 years of independence

By Stuart Munckton

February 20, 2011 –

When the first issue of Green Left Weekly came out on February 18, 1991, it was a dark time for the left.

The collapse of Stalinist regimes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe had capitalism’s mouthpieces loudly proclaiming the “end of history”.

But GLW saw it very differently. It was launched by members of the Democratic Socialist Party (DSP — which has now merged into the Socialist Alliance) to help regroup progressive forces to keep pushing for a pro-people alternative.

GLW believed that, behind the triumphalism, the capitalist system was deeply unjust and unstable. It was threatening humanity with extinction through environmental destruction — especially global warming.

GLW believed that any movement that sought to challenge corporate domination would have to put the environment at its centre.

GLW believed that resistance to the crimes of the system was inevitable and it was important to give that resistance, in Australia and globally, a voice.

Two decades on, the premises on which GLW were founded remain true.

Capitalism is wracked by a deep economic crisis, mired in prolonged wars, and has revealed itself incapable of tackling climate change.

And resistance has risen. Powerful revolutionary movements are challenging corporate domination in Latin America. In Venezuela, the government of President Hugo Chavez is promoting “socialism for the 21st century” — a democratic, humanist socialism rather than the Stalinist distortion.

This year, heroic uprisings have broken out in the Arab world by ordinary people terrorised by dictatorships and impoverished by capitalism. Two US-imposed tyrants have been tossed out so far.

Many of the arguments GLW has put forward about the true nature of US imperialism — behind its democratic mask — have been confirmed by the secret cables published by WikiLeaks.

One of the most heartening things for the many people — overwhelmingly volunteers — who help produce GLW is the recognition of the value of GLW for others struggling for better world.

In greetings for our 20th issue, independent journalist and film maker John Pilger said: “WikiLeaks is a new creation, but Green Left Weekly has been a pathfinder for 20 years, no less.”

John Bellamy Foster, editor of Monthly Review and a leading Marxist economist and ecologist, wrote: “Over the course of the last twenty years, Green Left Weekly has emerged as a focal point of the world green left movement, its leading weekly guide to theory and practice.”

Luis Bilbao, who edits America XXI and has worked as an advisor to Chavez, said: “Perhaps the best message we can pass on … is that, often, the articles in your newspaper are either reprinted or utilised as a source of information and interpretation for the work of our collaborators here.”

In Australia, members of the Tamil community, refugee rights activists, trade unionists and those involved in many other campaigns have emphasised the value of GLW in reporting their struggles.

We are proud to have played a positive role, however modest, in assisting the struggles of ordinary people.

When we say GLW is an independent newspaper, we mean more than not being corporate or government-funded. For us, being independent is about class independence.

GLW is a project that is politically independent from the capitalist class — the tiny corporate elite that dominates the economy, the media and politics.

But real independence from this layer of parasites cannot just be declared, it must be practised. For us, independence means seeking to challenge the capitalist class, to actively oppose its injustices and promote the struggles against its crimes.

And it means supporting the building of a political vehicle — built out of the struggles of ordinary people — to oppose capitalist parties and governments.

This was the thinking of those DSP activists who launched GLW 20 years ago. And it is the thinking today of the Socialist Alliance, which takes much of the organisational responsibility for producing GLW.

GLW is very deliberately not a “party paper”. Its pages are open for those involved in struggles and campaigns to get the word out.

It aims to be a network between struggles. And the information and arguments in our articles seek to strengthen active opposition to the system.

Most of the people who write for GLW are “amateurs”. Anyone who wishes to contribute to the project is encouraged to do so.

We don’t believe the political vehicle needed to challenge this system can be built simply by a small group that believes it has the “right line” and simply repeats that line over and over until everyone else realises the “truth”.

It can only be built out of the struggles of ordinary people themselves.

This has been GLW’s guiding principle for 20 years — and will remain so until we have ended this insane system.

[Stuart Munckton is co-editor of Green Left Weekly and a member of the Socialist Alliance National Council.]

Greetings from around the world for Green Left Weekly's 20th anniversary

Raj Patel.

Over the course of the past 20 years, Green Left Weekly has emerged as a focal point of the world green left movement, its leading weekly guide to theory and practice. Long may its flag fly! — John Bellamy Foster, editor, Monthly Review.

What better birthday present could Green Left Weekly have asked for than the Egyptian people’s taste of freedom? Congratulations to all at GLW. Onward! — Raj Patel, independent journalist, author and activist.

No matter how clogged my email inbox is with news and views from various fronts, it’s still the case that Green Left Weekly’s reporters and commentators provide the most reliable, comprehensive and honest coverage. Instead of getting stale en route over the Indian Ocean, a few days later it seems to get sharper and wiser. Keep it coming another 20+! — Patrick Bond, author, activist and director of the University of KwaZulu-Natal Centre for Civil Society, Durban, South Africa.

Green Left Weekly was ahead of its time in linking struggles for ecological integrity and for social justice, providing top notch radical news and analysis. GLW is movement media worthy of emulation by activists worldwide - congratulations on your 20th anniversary! — Derrick O’Keefe, co-author with Afghan feminist Malalai Joya of Raising My Voice.

Starting a publication 20 years ago with the title Green Left Weekly was an inspired and politically critical decision. Now, 20 years later, it is hard to imagine thinking about Left without thinking Green at the same time. Keep up your important work— it will help bring about the point when it is hard to imagine thinking about Green without thinking Left at the same time — Michael Lebowitz, author of The Socialist Alternative and winner of the 2004 Isaac Deutcher Memorial Prize.

Warm revolutionary greetings from South America, where we are attempting to carry out an effort similar to yours: inform, reveal, denounce, explain, debate. We know how much sacrifice is demanded in order to maintain a regular publication for 20 years: Congratulations! Perhaps the best message we can pass on in order to recognise this effort is that, often, the articles that appear in your newspaper are either reprinted or utilised as a source of information and interpretation for the work of our collaborators here. At a time when world capitalism finds itself in an agonising crisis, the task of producing an anti-imperialist and socialist press is vital. Let’s hope you continue with this formidable work! Until victory always! We will win! — Luis Bilbao, director of America XXI.

Congratulations to Green Left Weekly for its revolutionary struggle in awakening consciousness, for its global focus, for recognising our Bolivarian Revolution, for making journalism possible. I always read GLW. Greetings from Venezuela! — Alexis Adarfio, worker and facilitator of socio-political education at Ferrominera del Orinoco.

By reporting the stories that the mainstream media refuse to cover, GLW has become an essential resource in the fight for a better world. I salute them on their 20th anniversary; long may they continue! — Pablo Navarrete, director of Inside the Revolution and Latin American editor for Red Pepper magazine.

I got to know Green Left Weekly about 14 years ago when a few copies would reach Labour Party Pakistan's office in Lahore. Since we did not have access to the internet yet, GLW was a window to the world outside. It was keenly awaited and some of the GLW articles were translated into Urdu for our weekly Workers Struggle. Since 2001 onwards when I moved to Europe, reading GLW online has been a daily habit. It is one of the best left-wing weekly internationals. I am hardly aware of any other English-language left paper as effectively published as GLW. My heartiest congratulations to GLW staff and supporters. I wish to see GLW becoming a daily broadsheet. — Farooq Sulehria, Labour Party Pakistan member and freelance journalist based in London.

For 20 years Green Left Weekly has continued the great tradition of anti-capitalist journalism, by consistently telling the truth about this anti-human system and the global fight for a better world. There really isn’t a better socialist newspaper anywhere, and activists around the world owe GLW a huge debt of gratitude for its immeasurable contributions to the international movement for human liberation. United, we will win! — Ian Angus, editor, ClimateAndCapitalism.com

Green Left, the ecosocialist and anti-capitalist network in the Green Party of England and Wales, congratulate Green Left Weekly on 20 years of fighting for socialism and ecology. You are a global inspiration and part of the fight to create a green left global society. We look forward to working with you in the future. — Green Left Steering Committee.

I am proud to work with Green Left Weekly, unless we build an ecosocialist future it is unlikely that humanity will have a future. Keep up your good work, comrades. — Derek Wall, British ecosocialist activist and author.

Socialist Resistance joins with our comrades in the Fourth International in sending our warmest greetings to Green Left Weekly. Over the past 20 years, GLW has played an important role in the world socialist movement, as well as laying foundations for the Socialist Alliance in Australia. The paper has been a central resource for ecosocialists around the world. In the sharp and speedy way it reacts to world events, it is a reference point for radicals around the world. As tensions sharpen in the Arab world and in Latin America, the paper’s Arabic and Spanish-language supplements provide an important resource. However, GLW is more than a paper: it’s an organiser. That is the paper’s essential role, and we hope that the celebrations of your 20th anniversary encourage GLW’s sellers, readers and friends to organise ever more strongly in the struggles towards a green and feminist socialism. — Duncan Chapel, for Socialist Resistance, England.

For more than 10 years, we have been receiving Green Left Weekly from comrades in Australia. Since then, GLW has become a friend to us in sharing information and analysis. The reports about Australian political struggles and also from around the world, coverage about culture, environment and feminism have become our important resources in shaping our understanding about the situation around us. GLW has been helping us spread information about Indonesia’s democratic struggle and our political situation. For 20 years GLW has existed in Australia and become a tool for the revolutionary people there to fight. We would like to give our respect and congratulations on your achievement. We know that to survive this long with this difficult political situation in capitalist Australia needs strong dedication and diligence. We need to learn more from GLW’s achievement so we also can have a sustainable revolutionary publication in Indonesia. Congratulations and greetings to all our revolutionary friends who work for GLW. Viva Socialism! — People’s Democratic Party, Indonesia.

Congratulations to GLW on its 20th birthday. We are proud of our comrades who have worked hard on the publication of GLW over the past 20 years and we hope GLW keeps voicing the struggles of the oppressed people against imperialism, neoliberalism around the world. — Rismayanti Priyanita, International Relations of the Indonesian National Front for Labour Struggles (FNPBI).

On behalf of the editorial board and all the staff of Berdikari Online, we send birthday greetings and congratulations to Green Left Weekly. We hope that GLW will be able to continue to give a voice to the working class and all oppressed people with ever greater strength in the future. The establishment of Berdikari Online, a progressive media outlet for the anti-imperialist people's movement in Indonesia, was inspired by the achievements of GLW. Almost every week GLW arrives at our office, the office of the People's Democratic Party (PRD), and helps us to understand the development of the international political-economic situation and development of the left struggles in various countries. The Indonesian people are indebted to GLW, which has reported on and given a voice to the struggle of the Indonesian people against the New Order regime and the struggle today. Berdikari Online is only two years old and we have a lot to learn from the experience of GLW. We hope to build stronger bonds of cooperation between progressive media and the left in different parts of the world. — Rudi Hartono, Editor in chief, Berdikari Online.

Green Left Weekly now marks 20 years of continuous publication: a truly historic achievement! The paper has marked the various turning points in the Philippines' struggle to end elite rule: the people's upsurges against the Estrada and Arroyo regimes; the key campaigns in the anti-imperialist and workers movements; the debates, developments and renewals in the Philippine left. It has educated the international movement about our struggle and has educated us about the struggles of Australian workers and struggles of the working class movement worldwide. We salute you for this tremendous effort and achievement. Mabuhay Green Left Weekly! Mabuhay Sosyalismo! — Sonny Melencio, chairperson, Party of the Labouring Masses, Philippines.

We congratulate Green Left Weekly for its 20th year of publication! For years, GLW has provided readers with news and analysis on the development of people’s struggles in Australia as well as all over the world. We hope comrades who have worked hard in publishing GLW for the past 20 years continue to spread revolutionary messages and inspire our struggle against capitalism. Best wishes and keep up the great work — Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM)

A voice for the grassroots who refuse to remain voiceless. That’s the inspired, and inspiring, history of Green Left Weekly. And, without doubt, it’s also the future of this fine paper and its associated websites (including the fantastic international e-journal www.links.org.au). I read GLW each week. Every issue gives me not only many facts I need, but also an emotional and organisational linkage to people in distant lands who are acting to bring humanity together on our freedom railway of social justice and ecological sanity. All power to your pen for many decades to come! — Grant Morgan, international secretary of Socialist Worker New Zealand and co-organiser of Kia Ora Gaza.

I would like to extend my personal greetings and congratulations for the extraordinary two-decade effort of producing such a high-quality paper of the left. It remains a first port of call to keep up with developments in the international movement for genuine democracy and against all forms of oppression and exploitation. Keep up the good work. — Mike Treen, national director, Unite Union, New Zealand.

Congratulations, Green Left Weekly, on entering a third decade reporting the struggles of workers in Australia and overseas. Solidarity from your comrades in New Zealand. — Joe Carolan, editor, www.socialistaotearoa.org.

I write to congratulate Green Left Weekly on its 20th anniversary. I often turn to GLW for valuable insights into a variety of international political issues. The online version of the magazine offers American Socialists a vital window into political developments from the Pacific region, from revolutionary hot spots like Venezuela while also consistently providing cutting edge left perspectives on the environmental crisis. All this, while utilising a writing style that is as clear as it is critical. GLW is truly written in the proud tradition of socialist internationalism. On behalf of the Socialist Party USA, I send our warmest greetings of solidarity on this momentous anniversary. — Billy Wharton, co-Chair, Socialist Party USA.

We in Workers Action (U.S.) take great pleasure in extending congratulations to Green Left Weekly on its 20 years of publication. Today, as capitalism creates ever greater inequalities in wealth between working people and the capitalist class, while abandoning increasing numbers of people to poverty, more and more working people around the world are seeing capitalism for what it truly is: a morally degenerate, environmentally destructive, and economically disastrous system based on exploitation, war, greed and deception. The revolutions that are unfolding in the Middle East and northern Africa, ignited by rising unemployment and poverty and the dictatorships that they spawn, are just the beginning. Surely the time has come for working people to say enough is enough, overthrow capitalism, and begin to construct a new form of society that abolishes exploitation and, by institutionalising real democracy, operates in the interest of the majority. It will be a society in which, as Marx said, “the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all”. We look forward to seeing Green Left Weekly continue publication as an expression that proves that a better world is indeed possible. — Bill Leumer, for Workers Action.

I’ve supported Green Left Weekly since the publication of its first issue. Over the years, its quality and dedicated coverage of the oppressed and exploited in Australia and around the world has made it the best socialist weekly in the world. Your coverage and defence of WikiLeaks with its exposure of US war crimes is just one example of why I read GLW each week. Keep up the excellent application of progressive and revolutionary journalism. — Malik Miah, an editor of Against The Current and supporter of the US socialist organisation Solidarity.

A fine contribution that almost always has relevance even for us here in South Africa! Keep up the excellent work. — Southern and East African Trade Institute, South Africa.

Keep up your good work…. We behind you! Viva! Amandla! — Hanif Manjoo BopaNet, South Africa.

Twenty years of Green Left Weekly. Congratulations from an activist in another colonial settler state on the other side of the planet. It takes willpower and determination to sustain a counter-hegemonic publishing project of any sort. But willpower and determination by themselves will only get you past the first year or so. To go for a generation, that requires politics. And — if your politics allow you to see the importance of the revolution in Egypt, if you identify with the great social movements which have transformed (and are continuing to transform) Bolivia and Venezuela, if you make yourself a voice for the struggles in your own country – then you can succeed. Green Left Weekly has published 860 issues or so because it has those politics. Here's one paragraph from one activist who genuinely appreciates all your work. — Paul Kellogg, activist and political economist, Canada.

I greet Green Left Weekly on the 20th anniversary of publication. Your weekly newspaper has kept me and other Filipino comrades up to date on revolutionary trends not only in Australia but also in Latin America, Africa and the Middle East. Without Green Left Weekly we would be totally dependent on CNN, BBC and the bourgeois news syndicates. — Francisco Nemenzo, veteran Filipino activist and former president of the University of the Philippines.

Congratulations to Green Left Weekly on its 20th! Today, the eyes of the working people and oppressed the world over are focused on the great mobilisations of the Egyptian people against the US- and Israeli- backed Mubarak regime. Already the heroic Egyptian people have dealt world imperialism and its outpost in the region, Israel, a major blow. I look forward to GLW’s continued coverage of these historic events as they unfold. Down with the whole corrupt regime of Mubarak’s crony capitalism! Down with US imperialism! Down with Israel! Solidarity with the uprising of the Egyptian people! — Barry Sheppard, United States.

Congratulations to GLW for 20 years of fine socialist journalism. A vital resource in tumultuous times, and still a primary English-language source on the revolutionary developments in Latin America. — Richard Fidler, Ottawa, Canada.

Congratulations on your 20th anniversary. Keep up the good work. In solidarity — Murray Smith, Luxembourg.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish GLW a happy 20th birthday and look forward to reading GLW in the next 20 years, which will be one of the most dangerous but potentially fruitful revolutionary periods that humanity has known. GLW is in my opinion the best radical newspaper in the world: I often find out more about what's really happening in Europe from GLW than I do from the European press. Its coverage of other areas in the world such as South America and Asia is also unparalleled. I wish the paper continued success in the future — Alex Miller (Scottish Socialist Party member).

Like a 20-year-old, Green Left Weekly is robust and youthful. And as an alternative to the media showbiz, it's role has been well ratified over time. Congratulations for the 20th anniversary of Green Left Weekly — Sombat Boonngamanong, Red Sunday Group Thailand.

I am very happy to see Green Left Weekly not just being "yet another intellectual discussion paper" (as there exist too many here in Germany) but actually gives people the tools (i.e. well-researched information to the point of current affairs) for intervening into day-to-day discussions of things that matter to the people. Keep going and you'll help making this world better — Nobby Brewer, Germany.

Keep up the vital and necessary work in providing alternative information. You can count on my help in whatever way I can. Fraternal greetings from the Island of Dignity (Cuba) — Marta Harnecker.

Great achievement for Liberating World in process. GLW has taught us for decades that "Another Word is Possible" — Lee Yu Kyung, independent Korean journalist

Congratulations on your 20th birthday and a heartfelt many happy returns. You are a beacon for truth-seeking in the increasingly compromised world of journalism. — Keith Ward, National Union of Journalists Life Member, Manchester Branch, UK

Congratulations to Green Left on reaching 20 years. The world needs more clear, strong, alternative voices like yours. — Jonathan Watts, Asia environment correspondent for the British Guardian and author of When A Billion Chinese Jump: How China Will Save the World - Or Destroy It

In the current world of a corporatised media, with intense predatory traits, it is fantastic for you to have endeavoured for 20 years and kept up the search for truth that some of us are still partial to. You are indeed a generation ahead. We in India are proud to have what the Egyptians and the Arab world are now fighting for - democracy - but on the other hand we have joined the US, Europe, Japan and Australia in jeopardising it with the greed of those who already have more. In this context, we have to strengthen Green Left and suchlike movements, in order to preserve and ensure a democracy that truly works for all of our people and for our Gaia. Green Left, do bash on, we are with you. With Best wishes, — L. N. Rajaram, PhD, Founder of local community movement LoKalex, Chennai, India

Warm greetings to Green Left Weekly from Marxmail, a mailing list that takes great interest in the new initiatives being taken by the comrades in Australia toward transparency and ecumenism on the left — Louis Proyect, moderator MarxMail.

A stunning achievement! There can be few radical and anti-capitalist publications anywhere in our world that can claim to not only have survived the last 20 years but also to have prospered. Green Left Weekly always has been and remains a shining beacon of activist and internationalist journalism. More than ever, our movements and indeed our world need the excellent information, incisive analysis and practical solidarity that GLW provides - keep up the revolutionary spirit and work. Our collective struggles are changing our world, word-by-word and action-by action. May GLW continue to be part of that struggle for another 20 years! — Dale T. McKinley, Johannesburg, South Africa.

Liberation and the Communist Party of India (ML) warmly congratulate Green Left Weekly on turning 20! Progressive forces not just in Australia but even in India and presumably many other countries continue to depend on GLW for a powerful and consistent challenge to pro-imperialist, pro-globalisation consensus that dominates the mainstream corporate media, for coverage and reliable analysis of movements around the world. We at Liberation look forward eagerly each week to the issues of GLW arriving in our office. GLW proves that revolutionary journalism can be refreshing and readable at the same time as having depth and seriousness — Kavita Krishnan for Liberation and CPI(ML)