Meredith Aby, a leader of the Colombia Action Network slammed the Bush administration’s Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Colombia stating, “We should oppose the Free Trade Agreement with Colombia because it is an attempt by Bush to promote corporate interests at the expense of the working people of Colombia. Colombia is already the most dangerous place in the world to be a trade unionist. The U.S. has spent billions of dollars supporting the repressive Colombian government which sponsors death squads. These death squads kill and attack trade union organizers and anyone else who questions Colombian President Uribe’s right-wing agenda. This free trade deal would be like adding fuel to a fire.”

Tens of thousands of demonstrators will flood into Miami, Florida during the week of Nov. 18 to protest the Free Trade of the Americas Agreement (FTAA). Workers, students, environmentalists and young militants – the folks who brought the world the Battle of Seattle – are reviving the anti-imperialist globalization movement. While the Western Hemisphere’s trade ministers (excluding Cuba) meet in corporate bunkers, youth and workers will be outside marching and protesting. While the rich financiers plot the ruin of Latin America, young protesters will be breaking through police lines.

Protesters who converged on Seattle for the meeting of the World Trade Organization did something really great, for the people of this country and peoples of the world.

Sarah Hirsch is a member of Student Action with Workers and a part-time student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She took part in a historic 16-day sit-in at UNC, demanding that the UNC administration break their ties with the sweatshops that manufacture UNC apparel. Rather than negotiate, the administration had five of the students arrested, including Hirsch, on May 2.

Chapel Hill, NC – A 16-day sit-in at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) administration building came to a dramatic close on Friday May 2, when Chancellor Moeser ordered UNC police to arrest five of the protesters. It was the longest sit-in protest in UNC’s history. Dozens of students had occupied the lobby of South Building, the administrative headquarters at UNC, in a protest against the university’s use of sweatshops for the manufacture of UNC apparel (Sit-in at administration building demands end to UNC sweatshop clothing, Fight Back!, April 2008).

February 20, 3:30 a.m. – Under a banner that read, “The Whole World is Watching,” fifty-four students, workers and concerned community members slept in the office of University of Wisconsin Chancellor, David Ward. They occupied the chief administrator's office to protest university links to sweatshop labor. The peaceful scene was shattered by the approach of over 60 police dressed in riot gear, with billy clubs at their side and tear gas rifles ready.

For this year’s holiday honoring Dr. King, we are printing 3 commentaries on King’s political thinking that are important for understanding today’s situation – Fight Back! editors

In 1967, the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. described the economic plight of African Americans: “Let us take a look at the size of the problem through the lens of the Negro’s status in 1967. When the Constitution was written, a strange formula to determine taxes and representation declared that the Negro was 60% of a person. Today another curious formula seems to declare that he is 50% of a person. Of the good things in life he has approximately one-half those of whites; of the bad he has twice those of whites. Thus half of all Negroes live in substandard housing, and Negroes have half the income of whites. When we turn to the negative experiences of life, the Negro has a double share. There are twice as many unemployed. The rate of infant mortality (widely accepted as an accurate index of general health) among Negroes is double that of whites.”

Iowa City, IA – March 27, students marched on the house of the University of Iowa's President to protest the use of sweatshop labor used to make clothing with the U of I logo. They demanded the University drop out of corporate-backed Fair Labor Association (FLA), and join the pro-labor Worker's Rights Consortium.

Netherlands – Sparked by the battle of Seattle, and Professor Jose Maria Sison's call for greater coordination of the anti-globalization movement, the International League of Peoples' Struggle's founding conference took place in the Netherlands, May 25-27. Over three hundred activists from progressive and anti-imperialist organizations gathered to consolidate the gains and lessons from massive protests in Manila, Prague, Seattle and Quebec.

Chapel Hill, NC – Eight students are risking arrest by sitting in at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) administration headquarters, April 17, demanding that Chancellor Moeser take a stand in opposing the production of UNC clothing by sweatshop labor. Earlier, 50 students, faculty and staff rallied outside to show their solidarity with the sit-in. The protesters, members of the Carolina Sweatfree Coalition – a coalition of 20 student groups at UNC – are demanding that UNC cut ties with sweatshops and adopt the Designated Suppliers Program (DSP).