Talking Point with Pat Dodson: Can Australia afford not to be reconciled?

200 NCR landowners demand to be detained

More than 200 owners of native customary rights (NCR) land gathered outside the gate of the Simunjan police station here demanding to be detained together with seven of their collegues who were being held for alleged mischief with fire yesterday.
Fearful of more owners turning up, police quickly closed the gate to prevent them from entering and called for more reinforcement.

http://hornbillunleashed.wordpress.com/2010/10/24/200-ncr-landowners-demand-to-be-detained/#comment-9931

Indonesia confirms Papua torture

"... human rights groups say the Papuan villagers who were tortured were farmers.
They add that this video is evidence of the grave abuses committed by the Indonesian military in Papua, where a small group of rebels have waged a low level war for independence for decades."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11604361

Malaysian Government fails 70,000 Dayaks in their bid to get MyKads

The Sarawak Indigenous Lawyers Association (SILA), it is learnt, offered to help the NRD earlier this year to resolve the problem of stateless people in the state. The NRD is yet to respond.
The SILA feels that the NRD should be staffed by better qualified personnel “who know how to exercise their discretion in resolving the problem of the stateless in Sarawak”. This means not sticking rigidly by the rule book, said a SILA spokesman. “NRD should accept other evidence not covered in the rule book as proof of citizenship.”
For instance, SILA wants the NRD in Sarawak to follow its counterpart in Sabah and not make it mandatory for the marriage certificate to be produced before a child can be given a birth certificate. In cases of non-Muslim-Muslim marriages, it was pointed out, there are no marriage certificates “when a couple chose to live in sin and produce children”.

http://hornbillunleashed.wordpress.com/2010/10/23/10869/

Raziah – Protestors jailed

"In a recent story Sarawak Report exposed the shocking attempt by the firm Quality Concrete to force Iban villagers to hand over their rights to 3,035 hectares of Native Customary Rights Lands in Sebangan for just MR 250 (US$ 80) per family.

The company, of which the Chief Minister’s sister Raziah is one of the Directors,  is after the millions of dollars-worth of rare and valuable hardwood trees in the area.  However the Ibans are refusing, saying they want to preserve their forest for future generations."
http://hornbillunleashed.wordpress.com/2010/10/23/10946/

Sydney's Aboriginal ghetto to be bulldozed

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11502471


"The area will be renamed The Pemulwuy Project after a celebrated indigenous warrior.

Ray Minniecon, a local pastor, believes the rebuilding will harness the area's unique spirit and provide business opportunities: "It is a delicate balance as to how you maintain your history, your culture, your identity. The ways in which the Block has been redesigned encompasses all those kinds of challenges.
"It gives us for the first time in this country an opportunity to put in place within a city a design that comes from the Aboriginal people, for Aboriginal people."

WA police too reliant on tasers: CCC

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/10/04/3029074.htm

The Corruption and Crime Commission (CCC) has found there is a serious over-reliance on tasers within the West Australian Police Service... there were concerns about the disproportionate use of tasers against indigenous people.

(See Also: http://www.taser.com/Pages/default.aspx, http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/IOR41/023/2010/en , http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/049/2010/en (death following Taser use)

Australia's Dark Heart

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/oct/03/alice-spring-murder-racism

When an Aboriginal man was killed by five white youths in Alice Springs last year, it was the latest race-hate crime in an area plagued by violence. But the lenient sentences handed down to the "Ute 5" have sparked alarm that there will be a racial backlash in the Australian outback

Bikes For Remote Indigenous Kids in Australia

New Bikes For The Mt Liebig Kids

http://www.sbs.com.au/podcasts/Podcasts/world-view/episode/114687/Bikes-for-remote-Indigenous-kids

"The Bikes for Bush Foundation presented the 30 bikes to the children of Mt Liebig, about 325 kilometres west of Alice Springs."

When Response was in the UK there was a bike project that took found, left, lost and stolen bikes from the police, made them lovely and then gave them away to local inner-city kids with free workshops where the young people could bring them in and learn to repair and maintain them. It made a big difference to young people's lives and we're hoping it can do the same in remote Australia. Will there be any kind of similar follow-up here?