Latin American News
Solidarity news
Events followed by news
Meetings/Public Events1: Alternatives to WTO Forum
FRI, 5 and SAT, 6 September - 'alt-WTO: another world is possible', a
mini-conference on alternatives to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to
begin the Week of Action in Wellington against the WTO and its free trade
policies * Friday - 7pm 'The WTO in Context', Bill Rosenberg (ARENA);
8-30pm 'Visions of the Left', youth debate * Saturday - 9-30am introductory
video on the WTO; 10am 'WTO and South America' including Valerie Morse,
Prue Hyman (ARENA), and Paul Bruce (Latin America Committee); 11am 'Trade
and Development ', Ewan Morris (Council for International Development); 12
noon, lunch; 1pm 'Red Horse Flying', song by Don Fran+ks; 1-10pm 'The Great
Trade Debate' including Rod Donald (Green Party), Robert Reid (Alliance),
and Suse Reynolds (Trade Liberalisation Network); 2-30pm 'WTO and
Sovereignty' including Teanau Tuiono and Helen Te Hira; 4pm 'Learning from
the anti-globalisation movement, and what next' including Sam Buchanan
(Committee for the Establishment of Civilisation) and Nick Henry; 5pm
closing; all at Thistle Hall, Cuba Street, koha entry. Sponsored by the
Wellington Branch of the Alliance and organised by members of the Left in
Wellington; for more info about alt-WTO contact Robert Reid tel 027 415
6069, for more info about the structure of the conference contact John
Anderson tel 04 971 6695 or email john@eclectic.org.nz3: Visit Cuban ambassador
Miguel Angel Ramírez, to visit around the 9th of september.
Useful information can be found at my web´page at www.cubaembassyindonesia.com
4: Nine eleven seventy three memorial for Chile
CHILE: NO TO IMPUNITY30 YEARS OF OPPRESSION, INJUSTICE AND RESISTANCE 1973 11 SEPTEMBER 2003
PROTEST ON 30 YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF US BACKED MILITARY COUP IN CHILE 1973
US CONSULATE, 533 ST KILDA ROAD, Auckland
3:30 PM, THURSDAY 11 SEPTEMBER 2003
Bring: Banners, placard, drums and your ideas
More Info:0401 558373 - 0407 331463 9481 2273 - 9370 4298 - 0405 696695
Auckland Friday September 12th at 7;30pm
Remembrance for the victims of the military coup of 1973, on the 30th anniversary.
The bloody coup was financed by the CIA , Mr Nixon and Henry Kissinger and lead to the destruction of a long standing democracy in South America and to thousand of deaths,
torture and disappearances. Poetry, Music.
Video interview with President Salvador Allende (1972)
Special guest: Keith Lock MP Green.
Trades Hall 147 Great North Rd, Auckland, Friday September 12th at 7;30pmWellington Saturday September 13th at 1.00pm
Homage to Chilean Singer Victor Jara (murdered by Chilean military)
with song and dance. Te Papa Soundings Room.
Information: Rolando_Olmedo@hotmail.com
Selected news
1: Trade imbalances
2: Venezuelan, Brazilian Presidents Call for South American Trade Bloc
3: U.S AGRICULTURAL POLICIES DESTROYING LIVELIHOODS OF MEXICAN CORN FARMERS
4: No growth in Latin America
5: CHILE: OVER 100 ARRESTED IN STRIKE
6: Ecuador: Indigenous Peoples: Distinct Paths, Common Quest
7: Argentina annuls 'dirty war' amnesties
8: WTO deal on drugs Big Pharma takes its medicine
9: Social Forum Aotearoa Te Wananga o Aotearoa Porirua November 21-23,2003
1: Trade imbalances
Speaking at a panel discussion sponsored by the Global Business Dialogue on the ongoing Doha Development Agenda round of negotiation, New Zealand Agriculture Minister Jim Sutton expressed some wariness over providing too much leeway to developing countries in the agriculture talks. Agriculture producers - including developing countries - need to ensure that high tariffs are eliminated across-the-board. South-south trade is growing, Mr. Sutton observed; maintaining protectionist walls will only act to slow that trade.Certainly the developing countries stand to gain from better access to
rich countries' markets for agricultural products and from less rich country
dumping of agricultural surpluses. But there is a trap. Improved market
access in agriculture may lock many developing countries more firmly into
the role of commodity supplier, their economic growth a hostage to export
markets in which they face falling terms of trade.Developing country trade negotiators should be negotiating not only for improved market
access but for more scope to pursue industrial policies that upgrade their own
industrial base and escape the trap of commodity supplier.
Their scope to do this has been sharply cut by the three agreements
from the Uruguay Round: the trade-related intellectual property agreement
(Trips), the trade-related investment measures agreement (Trims), and the
general agreement on trade in services (Gats). These agreements show how, in
the name of open markets and mutual benefit, the playing field has been
tipped even more in favour of the developed countries.Trade ministers from around the world will meet in the Mexican resort of
Cancun from September 10-14 for the next stage of what is supposed to be the
development round of trade talks. At their last meeting in Doha in November
2001, ministers recognised the inequities of the previous round of trade
negotiations, the Uruguay round. This round was supposed to redress those
imbalances.
Joseph Stiglitz, (Guardian), produced a checklist against which to assess whetherthe outcomes of Cancun represent a move towards a true development round.
“One would have thought that the developing countries would look forward to
the meeting as a chance to achieve a fairer global trading system. Instead,
many fear that what has happened in the past will happen again: secret
negotiations, arm twisting, and the display of brute economic power by the
US and Europe aimed at ensuring that the interests of the rich are
protected. While some progress has been made in making the negotiations more open and
transparent, efforts to go further have met with resistance, and for good
reason: unbalanced processes help ensure unbalanced outcomes. Ironically,
the World Trade Organisation (WTO), where each country has one vote, might
seem far more "democratic" than, say, the International Monetary Fund (IMF)
where a single country, the US, has a veto. Yet the realpolitik of economic
power has ensured that the interests of the developed countries predominate.
Stiglitz says that trade negotiators are not even discussing eliminating double
standards. “Developing countries worry that efforts to introduce
"competition" within trade negotiations will only make life even more
difficult. They worry that efforts to promote domestic industries or provide
preferential treatment to disadvantaged groups (the kind of affirmative
action programmes that have been so important, both in developed and less
developed countries) will be labelled "unfair" to foreign firms and be
prohibited.
”There is a danger that what was intended to remedy the imbalances of
previous trade rounds will not only fail to do so, but may introduce new
imbalances. Pushing countries to liberalise their capital markets and open
them up to speculative capital flows is one example. At the very moment when
the IMF has finally recognised that such liberalisation may produce
instability but not growth, the WTO is now pursuing it.
”Failure at Cancun would confirm the fears of those who resisted a new round
of trade negotiations. Needless to say, it would also provide support for
the anti-globalisation protesters everywhere”. [Joseph Stiglitz, is a professor of economics at
Columbia University, Nobel prize winner and author of Globalization and Its Discontents].2: Venezuelan, Brazilian Presidents Call for South American Trade Bloc
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
CARACAS, Venezuela -- The presidents of Venezuela and Brazil called
for creating a powerful South American trade bloc this year before
continuing talks on a U.S.-backed hemispheric free trade zone.
Brazil's Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Venezuela's Hugo Chavez said
Tuesday that integrating South America's two largest trading blocs,
Mercosur and the Andean Community, comes before any hemispheric deal.
They set a Dec. 31 deadline for a regional trade union. Silva and
Chavez argue the Free Trade Area of the Americas -- a proposal to
create the world's largest trading zone -- will deepen Latin poverty
by forcing local industry to compete against developed nations.
"We're not saying that we don't want to negotiate with the United
States, because it is very important for Brazil. But we must
integrate first to negotiate with that country," Silva said at a news
conference. South American nations can create "a power bloc" to
confront the FTAA, Chavez said. "Only united can we break the chains
that oppress us."
Silva and Chavez signed trade and investment pacts. Brazil also
extended a $1 billion credit line to Venezuela for Brazilian
products. Venezuela's political opposition had hoped Silva would
endorse a possible referendum on Chavez's presidency to end
Venezuela's political crisis. Silva only said Latin nations were
disposed to help Venezuela solve its problems peacefully. Brazil has
warned it won't continue with FTAA negotiations unless Washington
relaxes trade barriers on Latin American exports such as oranges and
sugar. Chavez claims the FTAA is the latest incarnation of economic
"colonialism" and vows to put any deal to a popular vote.
The United States prefers agricultural matters be negotiated at the
World Trade Organization and not in FTAA talks. Analysts increasingly
believe the FTAA target date of 2005 is unrealistic. The two
presidents were visiting the southeastern mining town of Puerto Ordaz
to inspect an Orinoco River bridge being built by a Brazilian firm
before Silva returned home.
Mercosur includes Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, with
Bolivia and Chile as associate members. Peru and Venezuela are
seeking associate membership. The Andean Community of Nations
includes Ecuador, Colombia,
Venezuela, Bolivia and Peru. [The New York Times Company ]3: U.S AGRICULTURAL POLICIES DESTROYING LIVELIHOODS OF
MEXICAN CORN FARMERS
ELIZABETH BECKER, NEW UORK TIMES: The more than $10 billion that American
taxpayers give corn farmers every year in agricultural subsidies has helped
destroy the livelihoods of millions of small Mexican farmers, according to a
report released on August 27..
Prepared in advance of critical trade talks next month, the report by Oxfam
International argues that the subsidies given American corn farmers allow
them to sell their grain at prices far below what it costs to produce. That
has led to cheap American corn flooding the Mexican market and pushing the
poorest Mexican farmers out of business, the report said.
"There is a direct link between government agricultural policies in the U.S.
and rural misery in Mexico," according to the report entitled, "Dumping
Without Borders: How U.S. agricultural policies are destroying the
livelihoods of Mexican corn farmers."
Like many other nongovernmental groups, Oxfam is working to promote changes
in international rules at the meeting of the World Trade Organization in
Cancún, Mexico, next month.
Mary Kay Thatcher of the American Farm Bureau Federation said that while it
was obvious that American corn farmers received subsidies unavailable to
Mexican farmers, that did not mean Americans had an unfair advantage. "In
Mexico versus the U.S. it's a no-brainer," she said. "The Mexicans have far
lower labor costs, lower land costs, input costs. To say that our subsidies
are hurting Mexican farmers is ridiculous. It's not true."
Administration officials also rejected the idea that American exports to
Mexico undermined farmers there. Julie Quick, a spokeswoman at the
Agriculture Department, said that since most of the American corn exported
to Mexico was used as animal feed for Mexico's rapidly expanding chicken and
pork industries, it could not be
undercutting small Mexican farmers who grow corn for human consumption.
"If we were dumping corn, then Mexico could file a complaint under the World
Trade Organization, and Mexico has not," Ms. Quick said.
Trade and development experts at the World Bank say that reducing or
eliminating the agricultural subsidies and tariffs of wealthy nations would
help developing nations more than any other single action.
The World Trade Organization has put changes in farm practices and trading
rules at the top of its agenda during the current round of talks, which are
dedicated to the developing world.
Mexico, the birthplace of corn, opened its borders to American corn exports
after signing the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994. Within a
year, corn imports from the United States doubled and today nearly one-third
of the corn used in Mexico is imported from the United States. The United
States is the biggest exporter of corn in the world and the biggest exporter
of corn to Mexico.
The report said the price of Mexican corn has fallen more than 70% since
Nafta took effect, severely reducing the incomes of the 15 million Mexicans
who depend on corn for their livelihood.
But Bush administration officials said the Mexican government gave some
price support to its corn farmers. The support is minimal, however, since
the entire Mexican agricultural budget is only one-tenth the size of the
subsidies given to American corn farmers alone, according to the Oxfam
report.
Trade officials said today that agricultural trade had increased in both
directions under Nafta, noting that Mexico's total agricultural exports to
the United States had doubled under the agreement.
"The U.S. has been at the forefront working for ambitious and substantive
global agricultural reform; we look forward to Mexicans joining us," said
Richard Mills, the spokesman for the office of the United States trade
representative.
A new statistical analysis of global subsidies released today argues
otherwise, and says the wealthier nations have been undermining agriculture
in the poor and developing world.
According to a study by the International Food Policy Research Institute, a
nonprofit research organization, the agricultural policies of wealthy
nations --- including tariffs, export subsidies and direct farm subsidies of
over $300 billion every year --- cost developing nations about $24 billion
every year in lost income.
Latin America and the Caribbean lose $8.3 billion each year, the largest sum
of any region, according to the institute's report.
While both reports acknowledge that Mexico and other developing nations fail
to provide enough support to their rural communities, their focus was to
encourage wealthy nations to cut their subsidies. The institute's report
concluded, "The fates of hundreds of millions of small-scale farmers and
poor consumers in developing countries struggling to survive on a dollar or two of income
a day hang in the balance." [OXFAM]
4: No growth in Latin AmericaLatin American gross domestic product (GDP) is now 2% below its 1997 levels, according to a
report published on Aug. 7 by the United Nations (UN) Economic
Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). After
"six lost years," the report predicted a weak recovery for the
region by the end of this year, with growth forecast at 1.5%.
Venezuela's economy is expected to contract 13%, following a 9%
contraction in 2002. Argentina has recovered significantly, but
its GDP is still expected to end the year 17% below the 1997
level. [Financial Times (London) 8/8/03]5: CHILE: OVER 100 ARRESTED IN STRIKE
On Aug. 13, thousands of Chileans participated in a national
general strike called by the Unitary Workers Federation (CUT) to
demand better working conditions and benefits. It was the first
nationwide strike in Chile for almost 20 years. Traffic was
diminished in much of Santiago, and the CUT claimed the strike
stopped 80% of public transport. Interior Minister Jose Miguel
Insulza called the strike "absolutely partial" and said "no
productive companies were stopped." The government also said
public services operated normally, even though 35% of teachers--
and more than 75% of students--stayed home. Business associations
reported that about 13% of private sector employees did not go to
work.
The militarized Carabineros police used tear gas and water
cannons against a peaceful march of more than 3,000 workers and
students who were heading for the presidential palace. Some
reports suggested that small groups of hooded infiltrators
started the violence by breaking windows and traffic signals. But
Marcelo Trivelli, mayor of the Santiago metropolitan region, said
only that the demonstrators had "broken their word" by trying to
"go beyond" what they had agreed on with authorities prior to the
march. A police agent was injured, and more than 70 people were
arrested (BBC News reported more than 130 arrests). Nelson
Viveros, president of the National Association of Education
Ministry Officials (Andime), said the police "violently
repressed" a march that was "totally and absolutely peaceful."
At a strategic intersection in the south of Santiago, some 100
taxi drivers blocked traffic for an hour before police dispersed
them with tear gas and arrested 16 people. The taxi drivers'
union does not belong to the CUT. More arrests took place at the
port of San Antonio on the central coast, and in the cities of
Rancagua and Punta Arenas. In Calama, northern Chile, union
members used 100 vehicles to block the road leading to the
Chuquicamata copper mine. Several union leaders were briefly
detained. Some 60 unionists tried to block buses that were taking
workers to the El Teniente copper mine in the Andean mountains
near Rancagua; eight people were arrested. [La Jornada 8/14/03
from AFP, DPA, Reuters; BBC News 8/14/03; El Mostrador (Chile)
6: Ecuador: Indigenous Peoples: Distinct Paths, Common QuestThe indigenous peoples of Latin America have spent more than a decade promoting social transformations that overcome racism and exclusion, and that permit them to imagine and construct different manners of coexistence and public regulation. They bring more than a decade, really, centuries, developing paths to achieve their goals.
This month there have been two important steps in this never-ending quest.
In Ecuador, one of the paths created today shows its limits and raises new questions. It was in January 2003 when Lucio Gutiérrez took possession of the government and his inaugural speech didn’t satisfy anyone. He did not clearly commit himself to the goals of his recent allies, the diverse Ecuadorian indigenous peoples organized in the Ecuador Council of Indigenous Nationalities (CONAI, in its Spanish initials) and its plurinational unity movement Pachakutik as its ad hoc political arm to intervene on the formal stage of politics.
In February, the CONAI convened a “summit” meeting between the nationalities of that country half the world so that, discussing among themselves, they would decide the principal points that would be delivered to the new president, in the character of a “mandate” that those who produced his electoral triumph would give him.
The CONAI wrote a document and promoted its discussion throughout the sierra, the coast, and the Amazon. The basic points are sufficiently familiar to us: the need to reorient economic policy, the urgency of directing public resources to the satisfaction of public needs and not to the private enrichment of bankers, industrialists, and politicians; the obligation to intervene in (regulate and contain) the “free market” that has brought the poverty of rural families of all nationalities to impossible extremes; state reform prioritizing the areas of education and administration of justice, etcetera.
Lucio Gutiérrez paid them no attention. He decided the agenda of the country by himself, choosing to make his connections with other “allies” closer: the Ecuadorian businessmen and oligarchs and the multinational corporation. He didn’t want, thus, to “lead by obeying.” And up to this moment what he has effectively done is totally to the contrary of what the social movement and indigenous peoples had suggested.
That’s how it is: the indigenous peoples and nationalities of Ecuador, organized in their diverse mosaic of organizations, spoke, applied pressure, mobilized, and, finally, left their alliance with the president behind. The most visible part of all of this is the Pachakutik movement’s exit from the government on August 6th. Before that, the resentment had been groing from the Andean communities, as well as the jungle and the plains of the coast.
Today, the discussion about mobilizations and future paths is wide open.
By the 21st of the month, the forces were measured for an opening skirmish. The success that Gutiérrez has had with his tactics of bribing communities – with shovels, picks, something of bonuses and fertilizer, distributing them discretionally in some regions and one or another computer delivered to rural schools with en enormous media publicity – begin to be noticed. The point to which the internal agreements of Ecuador’s indigenous movements can be resolved was on exhibit, leading to new steps toward autonomous unification of efforts.
Here in Mexico, meanwhile, we have seen and listened to the Zapatistas and the insurrect communities of Chiapas, that, step by step, develop a collective mechanism toward communal life, from below, from the deepest part of below.
Maybe the Caracoles can illuminate those inside the CONAI who propose “the construction of a parallel government” as the National Federation of Peasant Farmer Security, the Amazon section of the larger organization, has proposed.
There are those who think that there is still a possibility of “pressuring Gutiérrez to demand the correction of the route begun.” Some don’t see it that way. The path of pressure, in my opinion, will be difficult while two political logics confront each other: A liberal one, articulated through the delegation of capacity to decide and execute what is decided; and another path, communal, based on discussion, communal decision, and collective efforts to achieve what is being sought. The indigenous peoples of América, thus, continue to teach us. [Raquel Gutiérrez Aguilar, La Jornada, Mexican mathematician, author of various books – Narco news]
7: Argentina annuls 'dirty war' amnesties
BUENOS AIRES-- Argentina has annulled amnesties for military officers who tortured and murdered leftists between 1976 and 1983. The country's Supreme Court will now decide whether new human rights trials can be held.
After eight hours of debate, more than two-thirds of the country's legislators voted against the amnesty laws. About 100 human rights activists gathered to wave flags and block traffic during the debate.
The lower house of Congress approved scrapping the laws last week
The amnesty laws were granted in the 1980s when the Congress still feared military coups.Human rights groups say about 1,000 officials were involved in the murders of up to 30,000 leftists during
what has been called Argentina's Dirty War. [CBC News]8: WTO deal on drugs Big Pharma takes its medicine
India and Brazil are good at making cheap copies of life-saving
drugs. Should they be allowed to export them too?
SINCE 1996, Brazil has cut the number of people dying of AIDS in
half, by providing patented anti-retroviral drugs to 150,000 people
free of charge. It can do so because it either makes cheap, generic
versions of the drugs itself-or it gets the drugs cheap from the
patent-holder by threatening to make them itself. Brazil's patent-
busting has withstood the grumbles of big western drug companies and
American trade representatives at the World Trade Organisation (WTO).
At the Doha trade talks in November 2001, ministers confirmed that
patents could be broken in cases of national emergency and that
public health crises, such as AIDS or tuberculosis epidemics, counted
as just such an emergency. Intellectual property rights, the Doha
declaration said, should not stymie efforts to "promote access to
medicines for all".
Unfortunately, not every poor country can emulate Brazil's success,
because not every country that needs anti-AIDS drugs can make them
itself. The Doha declaration affirms a country's right to copy these
drugs, but it does not give countries the right to export them. This
leaves the vast majority of poor, disease-ridden countries in a
pickle. They cannot afford to buy the patented versions of essential
drugs; they do not have the resources to make cheaper generic
versions; and they cannot import generics, because the countries that
make them are not allowed to export them. Tucked away in paragraph
six of one of its annexes, the Doha declaration briefly acknowledges
this problem and resolves to find an "expeditious solution". Twenty
one months later, and with just two weeks to go before trade
ministers meet again in Cancún, Mexico, the WTO may be about to reach
a solution to the "paragraph six problem". [Economist Global Agenda]
www.economist.com/agenda/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2020463
9: Social Forum Aotearoa Te Wananga o Aotearoa Porirua November 21-23,2003Another world is possible
Since its first meeting in Porte Alegre (Brazil) in 2001 the World Social Forum (WSF) has helped transform the globalisation debate. Now New Zealand is to hold its first Social Forum - in Porirua in November 2003 (http://www.socialforum.org.nz/)
The Social Forum is an open meeting place where groups and movements engaged in building a global society centred on the human person come together to pursue their thinking, to debate ideas democratically, to formulate proposals, share their experiences freely and network for effective action (WSF Charter of Principles).
The WSF movement seeks to create alternative means of building a globalization in solidarity, respecting the human rights of all and the environment. It is grounded in democratic international systems and institutions at the service of social justice, equality and the sovereignty of peoples. It aims to develop an international coalition of the widest range of social movements and organizations, on the principle of respect for differences, autonomy of ideas and forms of endeavour.
The first meeting of the Social Forum Aotearoa aims to strengthen community/whanau/ngo networking and to showcase community based ideas and solutions in Aotearoa.
It will facilitate input to processes such as· New Zealand's Action Plan for Human Rights
the World Social Forum meeting in Mumbai, India, in 16-21 January 2004
the Commonwealth Civil Society Meeting prior to the Commonwealth Heads of Government
Meeting in Abuja, Nigeria, in December 2003.
Combining workshops, interactive events, cultural performance and entertainment, everyone's
invited to come! There will be marae style accommodation available for up to 200 people but those
requiring this accommodation will have to register and indicate they wish to stay on campus.
Organisations wishing to run workshops or make presentations will also have to register their interest
in doing so.There is no formal registration fee. However, everyone is asked to contribute
financially to the extent of their ability. Organisations in particular are urged toprovide financial support and propose workshops.
Please register at http://www.socialforum.org.nz/
Latin America ReportA quaterly publication providing up todate information and analysis on developments in
Latin America, as well as news on solidarity activities in this country.
Subscriptions $15 per year, Supporter $30Cheques/donations payable to Latin America Committee
P O Box 6083, Wellington. Contact: Lac@apc.org.nz
Websites:
Incal-Wellington
INCAL is a Wellington Latin American Community organisation.
Incal’s website http://incal.orcon.net.nz provides information
on Latin America and local events and courses.
Contact: rolando_olmedo@hotmail.com
Casalatina Auckland
Casalatina also has a revitalised web site at www.casalatinanz.comLea – Lengua Espanola en Aotearoa
http://redgeomatica.rediris.es/elenza