PHA-Exchange> Davos

[Aviva]

> Davos again Saturday, repression if anything worse than two years ago.
>
Let me share with you my thoughts after we got home having been prevented in
one
> of world's most democratic countries from demonstrating against violence
and
> injustice and even having been attacked by the police regularly throughout
> the day and the evening.

Why What When Where

Because I am safe, well fed and in good health, I can TRY to demonstrate
against a system in which half the people in this world of plenty are not
safe, do not eat enough, and are in poor health . . . . So much so that
30,000 of them die every day of avoidable causes.

Because political and economic decisions affecting people everywhere in the
world are taken in a small mountain resort called Davos in Switzerland. Here
leaders of multinational corporations dictate to our "elected leaders"
mostly behind closed doors. For example, the UK (represented by British
Petroleum) and the Netherlands (represented by Shell) decide how to dispose
of Nigeria's oil reserves. Meanwhile Nigerians live (and die) in poverty.

Yesterday, on the 25th of January 2003, I tried with thousands of others to
demonstrate for democracy, peace and social justice.

At Landqart and Berne, we were gassed, hosed, sprayed with rubber bullets,
herded into enclosures, made to stand for hours in the cold, marched along
rail tracks to reach our destination, put on and off trains, chased up and
down streets, running, frightened, outraged.

BUT we had the luxury of transport home in a warm, comfortable train where
we ate snacks, looked after our headaches and stinging eyes, and thought
about what went wrong.

That luxury is the right of every human being on earth.

Next week, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi families may be attacked; they
have been bombed senseless since 1991. They will also be on the move but
without food, water or aspirins. If this happens, many of them will die.

That is why we go to Davos.