From: Montyneill-AT-aol.com
Date: Sat, 6 Oct 2001 14:33:53 EDT
Subject: AUT: FW: PGA Conference in Cochabamba: Solidarity plea$$e! 



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Subj:   PGA Conference in Cochabamba: Solidarity plea$$e!  
Date:   10/5/2001 11:28:27 AM Eastern Daylight Time

Dear friends of North America,

This is a special, urgent appeal for FINANCIAL SUPPORT to you, who with 4
exceptions, were unable to attend the 3rd PGA conference in Cochabamba in
September.

The attack in New York stopped your participation and almost stopped the
conference from happening, but nearly everyone was finally allowed into the
country and it was GREAT! (See the report on the conference sent
separately.) Now a 40 person multinational caravan is working its way from
Bolivia to Peru, Ecuador and Colombia despite even greater state and
paramilitary repression, unleashed after New York : a valuable gesture for
the massive, ongoing and incredibly courageous popular mobilisations in the
Andean region (see first report, sent separately). More documents and
results will shortly be on the web at www.agp.org

Unfortunately, the international crisis pushed the budget deficit from
2,000$ to...

=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 !! 20,000 $ !!

Among other reasons, Asian delegates and others were stranded for days on
the way (anybody from anywhere east of Greece was treated as an "arab" and
thus a potential terrorist), tickets had to be expensively modified or new
ones bought, Bolivian authorities finally admitted many only with special
visas at 120$ a piece... and the North American contingent (whose
inscription fees would have compensated for the very low southern
contributions) never showed up.

- We know that it is always difficult to raise money after an event,
especially to which one did not directly attend, but we know too that the
network had raised money to pay for delegates' tickets and inscription fees
that finally were not used.

- We would also like to point out that there has been up to now practically
NO financial support for PGA from North America, for this conference or for
other PGA activities. The credibility of a network of action and solidarity
also depends on that kind of thing.

- Western Europe managed to find about 80,000 $. Enough to pay for most of
the tickets, visas and expenses of more than 130 southern and eastern
delegates.

- NO northern delegates received any help from the convenors. As always
with PGA activities, costs were cut to the barest: simple food, mattresses
on the floor in Cochabamba and halls of airports for lodging on the way. Of
course none of the people who worked for months organising this was paid a
cent. These sums may seem large, but they are the smallest possible if we
want anti-capitalist, grass roots organisations of the world to be able to
meet and organise resistance. Now we must pay back what we have borrowed
and some (relatively) patient travel agencies!

=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 We are counting on your help.

You can send money to :=A0

Mouvements Populaires et Mondialisation (MPM)
Compte 70.505.5
Banque Alternative BAS (bank clearing number 8390)
CP 11 61 Lausanne 1001, Switzerland

Or a pledge to raise money directly to this address.

In solidarity!

Olivier de Marcellus
(PGA support group)

P.S. Just in case you haven't got it, I am attaching below the most urgent
result of Cochabamba:

=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 The PGA call to global action against the WTO summit in Qatar

Peoples Global Action calls on all grassroots social movements, community
based organisations, trade unions, student organisations, indigenous
peoples, farmers organisations, autonomous collectives and everyone who
wishes to participate around the world to carry out actions against the
World Trade Organisation (WTO) during the next ministerial summit in Doha,
Qatar, November 9th-13th, 2001.

The WTO=B4s aim is very simple: to remove anything that gets in the way of
big business and free trade, upholding the freedom for multinational
companies to act as they please. Made up of 135 member countries, the WTO
polices international trade rules and continues to set an agenda that
places profit above people and the planet.

Faced with a rapidly expanding grassroots resistance to capitalist
globalisation, the WTO has fled to an isolated desert dictatorship for its
next meeting. Already built into the agenda are three immensely
destructive trade agreements: the Agreement on Agriculture (AOA), the
General Agreement on Trade and Services (GATS) and the Trade Related
Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). Between them, they cover issues like:
the privatisation of health, education and water, forcing GMO foods and
seeds on member countries and patents on life forms.

=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 THEY CAN RUN BUT THEY CAN`T HIDE: WE ARE EVERYWHERE!

RESIST THE WTO THROUGHOUT THE WORLD, THROUGH DIRECT ACTION AND CIVIL
DISOBEDIENCE,=A0 WHEREVER COMMUNITIES ARE DESTROYED AND ECOSYSTEMS SACRIFICED
FOR THE SAKE OF "FREE" TRADE!

Regardless of whether the WTO meeting is maintained or not, we will be in
the streets, because the streets are OURS. Grassroots organisations all
over the world=A0 are organising the following kinds of actions and call on
others to do the same:

1) Awareness-raising campaigns against WTO and the effect of their policies
on a global and local level: community based consultations,
counter-meetings, public debates, publications.

2) Maximum disruption of the work of the trade ministers attending the
conference: demands for the publication of national positions, blocking of
communications or of departures of delegations, etc.

3) Mass coordinated actions on a national and international level: work
stoppages, road blocks, occupation of stock exchanges and other financial
institutions (New York, San Francisco, Sao Paolo...), liberation of grain
stocks (India) on Nov. 9th.

4) Decentralised local action: land occupations, creative demonstrations of
grassroots alternatives... Nov. 9th-13th.



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