By Walden Bello, Focus on the Global South At a police hearing on Jan 11, the Hong Kong government dropped charges against 11 of the 14 individuals it had detained in connection with the protests at the World Trade Organization...
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People from all walks of life have demostrated in various capitals around the world against the continuing detention of WTO protestors in Hong kong.
Below is a list of signitories to petitions to the Hong Kong administration to realease the detainees.
Also Click here to see more pictures of demonstrations around the world demanding the release of the activists.
Read More[Espanõl | Français] By Walden Bello* What was at stake in Hong Kong was the institutional survival of the World Trade Organization. After the collapse of two ministerials in Seattle and Cancun, a third unraveling...
Read MoreThe illegitimacy of the Hong Kong deal. Hong Kong marks a historic change in the dynamics of the WTO and global trade politics. Attempts by the US, EU and Director General Pascal Lamy to re-legitimize a discredited institution...
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by Asli Pelit
Focus on the Global South organized a tour called "The Real Hong Kong Tour" previously experienced in Cancun in 2003, to show a very different face of Hong Kong to journalists who are in town covering the World Trade Organization’s meeting.
Like many cities around the world, Hong Kong has traditionally been home to many factories, ranging from textile to plastics. Today most of these factories have moved to mainland China, leaving workers unemployed or working under poor conditions. Meanwhile rich Hong Kong residents, owners of these businesses enjoy comfortable lives, with domestic workers and cheap work force at their service in their factories.
Read MoreThe US and EU have deceived the developing world in this Ministerial.Whilst loud on rhetoric about "Development", this has descended into a Doha Deception Round.Cuts to Export Subsidies Amounts to No Change On export...
Read MoreNews Update 20/12/05: 944 protesters have now been released and there are 14 who have been charged with unlawful assembly.DECEMBER 19 – As many as 800 people are still locked up behind bars and held incommunicado a...
Read More"All the developing world has got is a hollow end date for subsidies in exchange for a bad deal in the rest of agriculture, a bad deal in industry and a bad deal in services," Dr Walden Bello, Focus on the Global...
Read More[Français | Español | Portugese]The unholy trio of the EU, US and Pascal Lamy succeeded in their attempt to force developing countries into accepting a Ministerial Declaration that further forecloses the...
Read MoreHong Kong – December 18Last night, December 17, three thousand unarmed farmers and their allies participated in La Via Campesina-organized march against the WTO. We were stopped by the Hong Kong riot police as we...
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[Français]If the organizers of the ongoing World Trade Organization ministerial chose Hong Kong as their venue because of the relative weakness of the local global justice or anti-globalization movement here, then they...
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In the most intense confrontation yet between demonstrators and the police since the start of the ministerial, around 5,000 protesters from across the world came within just 200 meters off the Hong Kong Convention Center where the World Trade Organization negotiations are being held.
Demonstrators managed to breach several levels of barricades by outrunning the police and catching them unawares, confused, and in disarray. Several small groups first broke off from the main protesters’ block, managed to break into rows of police, paving the way for the rest of the demonstrators to proceed, forcing the police to regroup.
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The draft Ministerial text is a slap in the face for developing countries, reinforcing once again that the WTO is profoundly anti-development and an institution well beyond repair.
There is nothing in this text that is of benefit to developing countries. While the delegations inside the Convention Centre haggled over punctuation, thousands of farmers, fisherfolk and local Hong Kong protesters marched to the Centre insisting their voices be heard.
Read MoreDay 4 of the Ministerial had many ups, downs and roundabouts. It ended with the release of a text on agriculture which maintains dumping, a green room on services from which the results are yet to be seen (article by Benny...
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However, the only magic that the powerful countries are using is illusional language, such as “aid for trade” and “duty-free / quota-free market access” for Least Developed Countries (LDCs) to claim that there is development in the Doha Round.
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Small Farmers Struggling for Their Last StanceHong Kong People Standing Together in Hunger StrikeOver the last few days, we, a group of Hong Kong people, believe that many locals have been inspired and touched by people coming...
Read MoreWe the undersigned civil society organizations are concerned that the positions taken by major developed countries at the Hong Kong Ministerial conference are undermining development interests. We are outraged by how the...
Read More[Français] By Aileen KwaPara 5 – “there has been some convergence concerning the reductions in Final Bound Total AMS, the overall cut in trade distorting domestic support and in both product-specific and non product-specific de...
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By Benny Kuruvilla
In the Ministerial draft that was taken from Geneva to Hong Kong the sections on services (Paragraph 19-21 in the main text and Annex C) were the most controversial. The brackets on Annex C, which showed that it was not a consensus document, partly reflected this.
Knowing that services could stymie a successful outcome at Hong Kong, it was tactically discussed before the Ministerial began in a meeting of the Core Group on services (a non inclusive group which comprises 15 countries and is co-chaired by the US and India) on the evening of 12 December 2005. It was not on the agenda for the first 2 days of the Ministerial. The idea of the main demandeurs was to front load the ministerial with other issues such as agriculture, NAMA and development and introduce Annex C towards the end thereby ensuring that dissenting voices would be muted.
