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For Immediate Release: November 20th, 2003
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StopFTAA Media: 305-576-****
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From London to Miami: A Day of
Resistance to the Corporate Empire!
US Trade negotiators in Miami go to plan B
for Bi-Laterals as the FTAA unravels surrounded by riot police, tear
gas, steelworkers and students
100,000 protest Bush’s War in London, as human rights activists gather in Georgia, USA to shut down the School of the Americas
Miami, FLORIDA — Thousands of demonstrators from all walks of life
converged on downtown Miami this morning to stop the Free Trade Area of
the Americas (FTAA) and stand with peoples’ movements from across the
globe for peace, democracy, and an ecological future. Non-violent
demonstrators were met with brute force and chemical weapons by the
Miami police, who received $8.5 Million in taxpayer money for security
at the trade talks as a rider on the $87 Billion Iraq “reconstruction”
package. Steelworkers, students, peace activists, farmers,
environmentalists, and human rights defenders took non-violent direct
action to stop the FTAA and build a future of dignity, democracy, and
self-determination for the communities of the Americas, despite a
'police-state' in downtown Miami.
The FTAA is the proposed expansion of the NAFTA agreement to create a
'free trade' area from Alaska to Patagonia, and will result in the
privatization of essential public services, like education, heath care,
and water. So-called free trade agreements put corporate profit ahead
of people and the planet, and accelerate the race-to-the-bottom that
erodes human rights. "FTAA is Enron economics for the Americas, part of
an Empire-building agenda of corporate rule and occupation," said Adam
Hurter of stopftaa.org. “Today in Miami people marched through the
police state to the Fence to rattle the cages of the Corporate Empire.
We are here standing stronger than greed or fear, for a world of global
justice, ecology and democracy, in solidarity with movements around the
planet."
Amidst a sea of riot squads and global justice demonstrators, the FTAA
talks themselves are faltering around issues of agriculture and
investment, in a breakdown similar to September's WTO collapse in
Cancun, Mexico. "The Bush trade team has gone to plan B for bi-lateral,
forced to abandon negotiation for the FTAA as a whole because of Latin
American nations' opposition and the peoples' resistance across the
hemisphere," said Sra DeSantis, an organic farmer and activist with
stopftaa.org.
Demonstrations will continue throughout the day with a massive Peoples'
March for Global Justice which stepped off at 2 PM eastern time. More
non-violent direct action is planned for this evening and for noon on
November 21st, when demonstrators will showcase alternatives at the
solidarity-economy bazaar for global justice.
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