 For more videos on people's struggles, please subscribe to our YouTube channel. Hello and welcome to Around the World in 8 Minutes, a show from People's Dispatch where we bring you stories of courage, solidarity and resistance of the oppressed and marginalized people standing up for their rights across the world. For our first story, we go to Colombia. On July 26, tens of thousands of people took to the streets in over 100 cities in the country and over 30 cities worldwide in defense of the lives of Colombia's social leaders and human rights defenders. Dozens of social movements, organizations, political parties, trade unions and civil society organizations participated in a massive protest to call attention to what many are deeming a genocide against Colombia's social leaders and impunity for those responsible. Colombian organizations have estimated that over 800 social leaders, human rights as well as ex-combatants of the revolutionary armed forces of Colombia and the family members have been assassinated since 2016. In addition to the alarming numbers of assassinations, over a thousand have received threats to their lives, hundreds face criminalization and legal processes and dozens have narrowly escaped assassination attempts. The mobilizations in Colombia and across the world were an important movement not only to denounce the government in action on the plight of social leaders but also to remember those who have been assassinated. In many cities, people read out the names of the over 800 social leaders, human rights defenders and ex-combatants and displayed over 10 meter long banners with all of the names of the leaders written down. One of the largest marches was in the Colombian capital Bogota where thousands marched from the center for memory, peace and reconciliation to the Plaza Bolivar. At one point during the march, Colombian President Ivan Duque attempted to join but protesters heckled him yelling assassin. Ivan Duque is seen by many as the political protégé of extreme far-right former president Alvaro Uribe. Uribe's eight years as president were among the bloodiest in Colombia's history. He took an extremely brutal approach to the internal armed conflict and essentially attempted to annihilate the guerrillas and anyone associated with them. This led to the forced disappearance of around 32,000 people during his term as well as illegal via-tapping, extrajudicial executions of thousands in the false positive scandal, countless massacres and the extermination of almost an entire generation of social leaders and human rights defenders. Now we go to Zimbabwe where primary and secondary school teachers affiliated with the amalgamated rural teachers union of Zimbabwe have begun a prolonged strike to demand the restoration of the value of their salaries. Since October, the value of their salaries has declined from 400 US dollars to 30 US dollars for the lowest paid teacher. As a part of the strike action, the teachers have taken their holidays that were scheduled to begin in the first week of August after the close of the second term in advance starting from July 22. Only 12% of the union members have remained in schools to wind up the term. The union said in a statement that the early holiday will enable teachers to engage in other income generating projects to cushion themselves from the economic hardships confronting them. They also implode the government to restore the value of their salaries or they want they will not open schools for third term. Other unions are also likely to take part in the strike by not opening schools for the third term since most teachers are incapacitated. The president of the amalgamated rural teachers union Albert Masurare told people's dispatch that it is not a matter of choice anymore. Teachers do not have enough money to afford to travel to school and back every day. Even teachers who support the government who would want to go to work and not take part in the strike are not in a position to afford the costs of traveling daily. The salary of the lowest paid teacher that was paid in US dollars until last October was around 400 US dollars a month. The government then started payment of all salaries to civil servants in the newly introduced system of currency called RTGS, which stands for Real Time Gross Settlement. While this currency was originally said to be pegged to the US dollar at a 1 to 1 ratio, its value has declined sharply over the months since it was introduced. Due to the falling value of the RTGS, the teachers' minimum salary has now declined to an equivalent of 30 US dollars this month. The teachers and other civil servants have long been agitating for the payment of their salaries in US dollars because the prices of all commodities in RTGS, including basic items or food and medicine, have been rising with every fall in the value of RTGS vis-à-vis the US dollar. However, in a move that shocked many agitating civil servants, the government scrapped the multi-currency system and imposed RTGS as the only legal currency. Masurari said that if the prices change according to the value of RTGS as measured in US dollars, then the salaries must also vary accordingly. The government had earlier promised to give teachers a one-time allowance equivalent to 409 US dollars in order to help cushion the burden of falling wages. However, this allowance has yet to be distributed. While this amount can barely offset the loss of wages that teachers have suffered for over half a year now, the real value of even this amount has declined since the announcement was made. The devaluation is primarily because the fuel prices have been hiked twice since the announcement was made, first from 5.5 US dollars to 6.5 US dollars and then to 7.5 US dollars. The price is now set to reach 9.5 US dollars. During the labor unrest in January, which was triggered by the 150% hike in fuel prices, security forces killed at least 14, raped 17, and injured at least 80 people with live bullets. Over 1,000 people were also arrested. Masurare was also among the arrested. Finally, in the Indian state of Karnataka, around 4,000 of the total 5,000 government and textile workers employed with Himmat Sinka Linen's company have quit their jobs as a mark of protest. This was in response to the arrest of 15 workers of the company on July 24 for demanding payment of pending wages. These 15 workers along with others had been protesting when the police reportedly resorted to bait in charge, tear gas shells, and open fire to disrupt the protest. The remaining workers felt intimidated and decided to leave the company in search of other jobs. Most of the 5,000 workers employed in the company are migrant workers hailing from the states of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and Odisha. The workers were not paid even the minimum wages and were subjected to physical assault, which was another one of the grievances. The government and textile workers in Karnataka have long been struggling to get an increase in the minimum wage. This company is based in a special economic zone or an SEZ. The SEZs are notorious for exploitation of workers and countries' labor laws relaxed in favour of big businesses in these zones. Himmat Sinka Linen's reportedly has a history of exploiting this privilege of falling under a special economic zone. In February 2018, the state government had issued a draft notification revising the wage. The notification had promised an increase of wages from 8,500 Indian rupees to 12,250 rupees. However, on March 24th last year, the government withdrew this notification all of a sudden. This withdrawal came after several management of government industries in the state met the government with regard to the draft notification. Himmat Sinka was one of the companies that actively participated in these meetings, where the various management said that they would not be able to pay that higher amount. In response to the police action, the protesting workers said that all of them have decided not to go back to work and leave for other cities in search for jobs. That's all for this episode of Around the World in 8 Minutes. For more such stories and videos, do follow us on YouTube, Twitter and Facebook. And visit our website peoplesjustpatch.org.