At the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) Medical Center, the Illinois Nurses Association (INA) is in negotiations for a new contract. The bosses here are out to serve the wealthy few that own the healthcare corporations. They have been bombarding workers with attack after attack, and the INA has been actively resisting. Fight Back! interviewed Barb Cleveland, a nurse in the Oncology Clinic, and a member of the INA bargaining committee.

Just after the protest, Fight Back! caught up with Jose Artemio Arreola, a key organizer of the massive protest for immigrant rights that rocked Chicago, March 10. He explained how the Coalition Against HR 4437 built the unity necessary for a turnout of such proportion.

Fight Back! interviewed Ted Ludwig, president of Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association (AMFA) Local 33, the union that is leading the strike against Northwest Airlines.

Interview with Javier Correa, president of SINALTRAINAL

Javier Correa is the president of SINALTRAINAL, the courageous beverage workers’ union, which fights for labor rights in Coca-Cola bottling plants in Colombia. Coca-Cola-sponsored death squads are responsible for murdering nine Colombian trade unionists. SINALTRAINAL calls for an international boycott of Coca-Cola products because of Coke’s use of paramilitary violence against the union.

Erika Zurawski of Fight Back! interviews two Colombian trade unionists who are in the U.S. through the AFL-CIO Solidarity Center. Jhonny Meneses is a union leader from SINCONSTASCAR (a union of taxi drivers in Cartegena) and an outspoken opponent of U.S. free trade and economic policy in Latin America. Nelson Quijano is a union leader from USO (Oil Workers Union). USO is a leading social force in Colombia. In the spring of 2004, USO went on strike for several months to successfully fight the privatization of the national oil company.

Part Two of an Interview with Miguel Cifuente

Members of the Colombia Action Network, Thistle Parker-Hartog and Meredith Aby, interviewed Colombian peasant leader Miguel Cifuente, the executive secretary of the Cimitarra River Valley Peasant Association. For reasons of space we broke the interview into two parts. The first part can be found in here.

Part 1 of 2

Members of the Colombia Action Network, Thistle Parker-Hartog and Meredith Aby , interviewed Colombian peasant leader Miguel Cifuente, the executive secretary of the Cimitarra River Valley Peasant Association.

The Internationals for Justice delegation visited Palestine from Aug. 7 to Aug. 21. Fight Back! conducted the following interview with Meredith Aby, Katie Bonn and Anh Pham, three members of the Minnesota-based Anti-War Committee who participated in the delegation. The delegation traveled throughout historic Palestine, particularly the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, as well as the 48 territories, which are also called Israel.

Four thousand union members took on the management of one of America’s most elitist bastions of the rich – Yale University. Fight Back! interviewed two leaders of the Yale Strike: Laura Smith, President of Local 34, which represents the Clerical and Technical workers and Shirley Lawrence of Local 35, which represents Service and Maintenance workers.

Pedro Eusse is the Secretary General of the Food and Beverage Union, and the Secretary General of the United Confederation of Venezuelan Workers (CUTV).