6. Razan AlSalah Lebanon's social justice movements, Yves Engler on Saudi Arabia, Canada arms deals

Free City Radio

This is the sixth edition of the Free City Radio podcast, it includes interviews, as well as music contributions from awesome friends in different parts of the world. In this episode we hear from Sam Schuette who works as a cook at Resilience Montreal, a frontline support organization working with people struggling with poverty and homelessness, particularly urban indigenous people, within the context of the pandemic. https://resiliencemontreal.com Also we hear from activist, filmmaker and professor Razan AlSalah who speaks about the impacts of the pandemic on the public health sector in Lebanon and the ways this impacts economically marginalized people. Also Razan speaks about this current context within the framework of recalling the mass protests for social and economic justice that have been taking place in Lebanon over the past year, Razan specifically points to the campaign to Bisri Valley campaign. info : https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/lebanese-dam-project-stirs-earthquake-fears-environment-concerns-190807082828083.html https://www.facebook.com/savebisri I also speak with Samin Abhar who is a medical student in Victoria, B.C. Samin speaks about the importance of governments supporting the public healthcare system in this context of crisis, but also beyond, as a way to avert and prepare for future medical emergencies that touch society. Follow-up on a previous episode of the podcast I spoke with Mohammed who is a night shift worker and baker at Tim Hortons outside Parc metro in Montreal, part of an effort to highlight frontline, long wage workers within the context of the pandemic. In response to the signing of an arms agreement between Canada and Saudi Arabia I speak with author Yves Engler who has written numerous critical books on Canadian foreign policy and recently published an article on this Canada-Saudi arms deal. https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/canada-embraces-saudi-monarchy-again Featured in this podcast musically as two theme tracks, "Hope' by the Dirty Three, and a track by VOID released on @villainrecords Also I feature a track by Tracy Chapman, "Heaven Here on Earth," a track by Anarchist Mountains @anarchistmountains released on ΠΑΝΘΕΟΝ in Russia, also a track by Bas Relief, Treyf, from their album, QTT8, also a track from Anne Waldman's upcoming album produced by Devin Brahja Waldman @brahja, and finally a track by the great George Wassouf. Free City Radio is hosted by Stefan @spirodon Christoff and also broadcasts on @radiockut in Montreal.