If greed weren't the motivating factor for our economic system, think of what a wonderful planet this would be! The farmers, fishing people, anyone who works with their hands and sees the profits slipping through their fingers know that change is imperative!
Protests precede G8
summit
Protesters have gathered in the Japanese city of Sapporo to demonstrate against rising food prices, ahead of a summit of the Group of Eight (G8) rich nations.
Thousands of people, including many farmers, are taking part in Saturday's protest.
About 21,000 police officers have been deployed near Toyako, the northern Japanese lakeside resort where G8 leaders will meet on Monday.
The demonstrators are calling for the G8 to pay more attention to food producers.
"We should have a more balanced food supply in the world," Eiichi Hayashizaki, a rice farmer at the protest, said.
"Japan imports the majority of its food from overseas, so we don't starve ourselves, but the government should stop controlling rice production in the country," he said.
[...] Oxfam International has said that soaring food prices and climate change are having a negative impact on world poverty.
"This isn't the time for a holiday, this is the time for sorting out problems," Lucy Brinicombe, an Oxfam International spokesperson, said.
[...] Earlier this week, Robert Zoellick, president of the World Bank, called for G8 leaders to address rising food prices at their summit.
The crisis, which is limiting many poor peoples' access to staple foodstuffs, is a "man-made catastrophe" which is overwhelming the bank's resources, he said.
Global food prices have nearly doubled in three years, according to the World Bank.
[...] Activists said that Japanese immigration authorities barred the entry of more than two dozen South Koreans who planned to take part in Saturday's demonstration.
South Koreans have a reputation for being particularly impassioned on issues of global trade.
A farmer from South Korea stabbed himself to death in 2003 during a protest at global trade negotiations in Mexico.
Showing posts with label Oxfam. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Oxfam. Show all posts
July 5, 2008
G8--Listen to the Farmers!
February 2, 2008
Blame Canada!
As usual the neocons and repuglicans found a scapegoat for their doomed policies. But the world is waking up to the horrors of what we have done to Afghanistan in our murderous drive for world domination.
Rice heads for London as Afghan crisis looms
· Row escalates over Nato troop reinforcements
· Canada may withdraw unless others do more
Ian Black and Patrick Wintour, Saturday February 2, 2008
The Guardian
Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state, is to fly to London next week to tackle an escalating row over Nato troop reinforcements for Afghanistan, amid worries that the entire international stabilisation strategy is in danger of failing.
[...] Alliance divisions burst into the open earlier yesterday with a US demand that Germany, whose forces are in the relatively stable north, send combat troops and helicopters to the volatile south.
[...] German chancellor Angela Merkel made clear that the limited mandate was "not up for discussion".
On Thursday [Robert] Gates met similar opposition from his French counterpart, Hervé Morin, in talks in
Washington. The mood in Paris and Berlin threatens a damaging replay of the transatlantic spats in the run up to the Iraq war five years ago.
[...] But the immediate crisis has been triggered by Canada, which has threatened to bring home its 2,500 troops from Kandahar, next to Helmand province where British forces are fighting the resurgent Taliban insurgency, unless other allies send reinforcements.
[...] Wrangling over the number of boots on the ground coincides with a flurry of warnings that the entire effort to stabilise Afghanistan could fail because of resurgent Taliban violence and a looming humanitarian crisis. On Wednesday the former US Nato commander, General James Jones, suggested Afghanistan was in danger of becoming a "failed state" because there were "too few military forces and insufficient economic aid". Oxfam separately urged troop and aid-contributing countries to undertake "a major change in direction".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,,2251139,00.html
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)