The Federal Communications Commission is set to give the five top telecoms companies in the United States free rein. nytimes.com/
For five weeks teachers in Argentina have been on strike almost continuously, using the days they do go to school to explain to students and parents the reasons for their conflict with the national government.
labornotes.org/
…About 15% of the inmates in federal and state US prisons perform work for companies such as Boeing, Starbucks and Victoria’s Secret. Migrants detained for violating immigration laws are one of the fastest growing segments of prison labour. Under the Trump administration, their numbers are most likely to increase. global-labour-university.org/
PALESTINE
Some 1,000 Palestinian prisoners have decided to take part in this hunger strike, which begins today, the day we observe here as Prisoners’ Day. nytimes.com/
The Right2Know campaign is deeply concerned at the apparent failure by law enforcement agencies to act on a complaint lodged by Parliament on behalf of ANC MP Dr Makhosi Khoza about death threats issued against her by a Mpumalanga hospital executive. 
Dow Chemical and DuPont are set to merge, and China National Chemical Corporation (ChemChina) is to acquire Syngenta and Bayer is to acquire Monsanto. The proposed Bayer-Monsanto merger will give control of almost 30% of the world’s commercial seed market and almost 25% of the world’s commercial pesticide and herbicide (agrochemical) markets to just one company — African Centre for Biodiversity report (pdf). 
by Arundhati Roy
