GREEN PARTY: CAFTA Will Cause Widespread Harm

[Guest guest]

R

Sun, 14 Aug 2005 00:18:56 -0500

Re: *E_T* GREEN PARTY: CAFTA Will Cause Widespread Harm

 

 

 

 

Those six nations are financially puny and will do little to affect

trade. They've got no industry and are too poor to buy from US.

 

With that said, the real danger is they are now targets for US corps to

set up shop there to replace expensive factories here made more

expensive

by EPA laws. Then they'll have something to export to US.

 

Rich Martin

 

On Sat, 6 Aug 2005 19:01:17 -0700 Apollo

<apollo.housemaster

writes:

> *GREEN PARTY: CAFTA Will Cause Widespread Harm*

>

>

> CAFTA Will Cause Widespread Harm to Workers in the U.S. and Central

> America.

>

> Thursday, August 4, 2005

>

> Contacts:

> Scott McLarty, Media Coordinator, 202-518-5624, mclarty

> Starlene Rankin, Media Coordinator, 916-995-3805,

> starlene

> Julia Willebrand, Co-chair of the International Committee, 212

> 877-5088,

> julia.willebrand

>

> Citing CAFTA's NAFTA-like provisions, Greens warn of damage from

> water

> privatization, lost jobs and depressed wages, and blocked access to

> medicine.

>

> WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Green Party leaders called the House's recent

> passage of

> the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA)

> a

> disaster for working people in the U.S., Central America, and the

> Dominican

> Republic and the environmental health and safety in the signatory

> nations.

>

> * " CAFTA will extend NAFTA's job loss, workers' rights abuses, and

> environmental damage throughout Central America, " said Nan Garrett,

> Georgia

> Green and Spokesperson for the National Women's Caucus of the Green

> Party.

> " It will prohibit governments in the region from ensuring that

> foreign

> investment serves national development goals. Instead, it'll enable

> further

> schemes for the profit of U.S.-based corporations. "

>

> *CAFTA encourages nations to privatize and deregulate services such

> as

> education, health care, postal service, construction,

> transportation, and

> the provision of water.

>

> " Privatization and deregulation have proved particularly devastating

> for

> families living in poverty, " said Julia Willebrand, co-chair of the

> Green

> Party's International Committee. " In Bolivia, forced water

> privatization

> resulted in an economic breakdown when poor families were forced to

> pay

> exorbitant fees to Bechtel, a U.S.-based corporation. CAFTA will

> require the

> officials in more than a third of Nicaragua's municipalities to open

> water

> management to bidding by transnational companies. "

>

> Greens note that CAFTA contains a provision similar to NAFTA's

> Chapter 11,

> which allows foreign corporations to sue national, state, and local

> governments that pass strong labor, public health, or environmental

> protections. Under the provision, companies can bypass domestic

> courts and

> sue a government directly for cash compensation if they think an

> environmental or public health law might interfere with their

> ability to

> profit.

>

> CAFTA's " data exclusivity " provisions and monopoly protections for

> brand-name drug manufactureres threaten access to affordable

> life-saving

> medicines in a region where half the population live in poverty.

> According

> to the World Health Organization and UNAIDS, more than 78,000

> Guatemalans

> are HIV-infected; annual AIDS-related deaths totaled 5,800 in 2003.

>

> " CAFTA is modeled on NAFTA and other failed trade policies, under

> which the

> U.S. trade deficit reached a record $600 billion last year after

> American

> companies relocated to take advantage of lower wages and weaker

> worker and

> environmental protections, " said Jill Bussiere, Co-chair of the

> Wisconsin

> Green Party. " The NAFTA-related trade deficit cost U.S. workers

> nearly

> 900,000 net jobs through 2002. Companies that stayed in the U.S.

> used the

> threat of leaving the country as a means of breaking union

> organizing

> drives, and to win concessions at the bargaining table. "

>

> " Despite rosy predictions from supporters about new jobs, NAFTA

> continues to

> harm workers in the U.S. and Latin America. CAFTA will compound the

> damage, "

> added Jody Grage Haug, who lives in Seattle, Washington and serves

> as

> co-chair of the Green Party of the United States. " Protests similar

> to

> Seattle in 1999 may be necessary to show widespread opposition to

> CAFTA, but

> it's equally urgent that we remove the Republicans and Democrats who

> voted

> for it from public office. "

>

> MORE INFORMATION

>

> Green Party of the United States

> www.gp.org <http://www.gp.org>

> 1700 Connecticut Avenue NW, Suite 404

> Washington, DC 20009.

> 202-319-7191, 866-41GREEN

> Fax 202-319-7193

>

> Green Party International Committee

> www.gp.org/committees/intl/ <http://www.gp.org/committees/intl/>

>

> Statement on CAFTA and access to medicine

> Rachel Cohen, Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontierès, New

> York,

> New York

> House Committee on Ways and Means, April 21, 2005

>

waysandmeans.house.gov/hearings.asp<http://waysandmeans.house.gov/hearing

s.asp>

>

> CAFTA Masks Hidden Water Privatization

> Resource Center of the Americas.org <http://Americas.org>

> www.americas.org/item_14706 <http://www.americas.org/item_14706>

>

> " NAFTA's cautionary tale: Recent history suggests CAFTA could lead

> to

> further U.S. job displacement " by Robert E. Scott and David Ratner

> Economic Policy Institute, July 20, 2005, Issue Brief #214

> www.epi.org/content.cfm/ib214 <http://www.epi.org/content.cfm/ib214>

>

>

> search: ecpol, gbl

>

> Office: PO Box 57065 Washington, D.C. 20037

> Email: office 202-319-7191 or toll-free (US): 866-41GREEN

>

> --

> The US is: " ...a nation of 200 million used-car salesmen with all

> the money

> we need to buy guns and no qualms about killing anybody else in the

> world

> who tries to make us uncomfortable. "

> -Hunter S. Thompson

>

> " Friend, hope for the truth while you are alive. Jump into

> experience while

> you are alive! What you call " salvation " belongs to the time before

> death.

> If you don't break your ropes while you are alive, do you think

> ghosts will

> do it after? "

> -Kabir

 

 

 

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