PHA-Exchange> Protesters Vow to Derail WTO Meetings

[Claudio]

From: UNNIKRISHNAN PV (Dr) 

WTO: Protesters Vow to Derail WTO Meetings

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
CANCUN, Mexico (AP) -- Activists marched in the
streets and stripped on the beaches in an attempt to
derail a meeting of the World Trade Organization, at
which representatives of 146 countries will try to
increase global commerce without throwing millions out
of work.
At a beach resort best known for turquoise surf and
drunken U.S. college students, trade ministers huddled
in conference rooms of five-star hotels in preparation
for the meeting, which begins Wednesday.
Away from the hotel zone, thousands of
anti-globalization activists from around the world set
up camp, renting hammocks and swatting mosquitoes, and
vowed to derail the meetings with protests and
marches, as they did in Seattle in 1999.
Ministers at the meeting hope to close in on a binding
treaty to make trade freer throughout most of the
world. Under a WTO agreement, they are supposed to
approve such a treaty by the end of next year.
Agriculture will likely be at the top of the Cancun
agenda. Removing barriers to trade in agriculture is
controversial, with developing nations demanding that
rich countries like Japan, the United States and
European nations end subsidies and tariffs designed to
keep unprofitable farms afloat.
Several competing proposals are being pushed,
including one from the United States and the European
Union that would create limited cuts in farm subsidies
and another from a group of developing nations led by
India and Brazil that would move toward eliminating
the subsidies and opening the markets of rich
countries to their farm products.
``We need, without any question, to make some progress
on agriculture, because this is an issue of great
importance to virtually all our members, and it is an
issue on which progress in other areas hangs,'' WTO
spokesman Keith Rockwell said.
Ministers also will consider whether to open their
economies to more foreign investment -- which some say
will drive local producers out of business -- and how
to cut tariffs on industrial goods without shuttering
factories and spurring unemployment.
Anti-globalization activists, farmers and labor rights
promoters planned a week of protests, saying trade can
also increase poverty, encourage mistreatment of
workers and the environment and diminish cultural
diversity.
Thousands of protesters already were in Cancun.
Organizers said they hoped some 15,000 protesters
would participate in the week of action against the
WTO.
Although organizers have said they want to shut down
the talks, they also pledged to avoid violence.
``We are not here to throw sticks or stones,'' said
Rafael Alegria, international secretary of the farm
group Via Campesina. ``We are here to send a clear and
ringing message: Take agriculture out of the WTO
talks.''
In one of the first protests Monday, 29 activists
stripped off their clothes on a public beach and
spelled out ``No WTO'' in the sand with their bodies.
Protesters will be kept away from the meeting venue.
Only one road down the narrow peninsula leads to the
meeting site, and police likely will block it if
protesters try to march down it.



     
     
     


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://phm.phmovement.org/pipermail/phm-exchange-phmovement.org/attachments/20030911/e0d44c70/attachment-0001.html>