[Imc] FTAA mobilization April 18, Quebec City

[benjamin w harp]

On April 18-22, representatives from every country in the western
hemisphere (except Cuba) will meet to negotiate and adopt FTAA -- Free
Trade Area of the Americas.  Based closely on the North American Free
Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the FTAA would regulate $17 trillion
in goods, services, and investment within the hemisphere. Or, rather, it
wouldn't - the agreement's stated goal is to remove remaining limits on
the free flow of capital by 2005, a move that would impact 800 million
people. 

The myriad concerns with the proposed FTAA also, coincidentally, start
with NAFTA. The North American agreement took the unprecedented step of
including a section - the now infamous Chapter 11 - giving foreign
companies the right to sue national governments for any actions
"tantamount to a barrier to trade." Neither citizens nor domestic
corporations have this power - the ability to sue their  own government
for passing laws that cut into their profits. And when foreign businesses  
do sue, it's not through regular channels such as the target country's
court system.  Decisions are made at closed-door tribunals consisting of
one representative from each party to the dispute and an impartial
third party.  Several environmental "barriers" have already been toppled
in this way.

Quebec City officials already plan to spend $30 million on security.  They
say they will erect a metal fence encircling four or five square
kilometers of the city. merchants, residents, and official visitors will
be required to show passes to enter the city core, and protesters will
likely face a modern-day fortress in the only walled city in North
America. 

www.a16.org
http://www.quebec2001.net/