Hundreds of thousands march
Global actions hit U.S. war, WTO
By John Catalinotto
From Nov. 9-11, worldwide mass protests aimed at the World
Trade Organization's meeting in Doha, Qatar, raised demands
both against capitalist globalization and against the U.S. war
of aggression on Afghanistan.
Unlike the meeting in Seattle two years ago, or similar
gatherings in Prague, Quebec City and Genoa, the Qatar
conference was inaccessible to mass action. So
anti-globalization activists decided to hold local protests
against the super-exploitation of the poorest countries and
people on the earth.
With the expanding U.S. war becoming the top issue in many
countries, many of the demonstrations turned into protests
against war or at least included slogans on this issue.
In Italy the center-right regime of Silvio Berlusconi made
the war the main issue by mobilizing 2,000 troops, with
warships and planes, to join the U.S. attack on Afghanistan.
Parliament voted overwhelmingly to support these war moves on
Nov. 7. He also challenged the anti-war forces by calling a
pro-war demonstration.
In response to this challenge from the right wing, the
largest protest on Nov. 10 was in Rome, Italy. There,
according to a report from Italian Communist Refoundation Party
(PRC) activist and videographer Fulvio Grimaldi, 150,000 people
came out against the war. This figure was confirmed by the
bourgeois daily La Repubblica.
"The double event on Nov. 10," Grimaldi told WW, "was an
incredible victory for the pacifist, anti-war and
anti-imperialist movement. The government and the Olive Tree
coalition--the social-democratic opposition--have blundered
terribly.
"Berlusconi and his kin hoped to counter the anti-war demo
that had been planned for months with a huge pro-war and
pro-U.S. demo in Piazza del Popolo. Well, our demonstration
drew 150,000 marchers, twice as many as we had hoped for,
theirs a bare 30,000.
"It appears, oddly, that Italy has the strongest pro-war
combination of government and loyal opposition in parliament
and at the same time the strongest anti-war movement in the
world. More anti-war protests will accompany the national
metalworkers' strike on Nov. 17."
Grimaldi said the strongest contingent was from the PRC.
There were also large groups of anti-globalist forces, greens,
other left organizations and individuals. He noted that the
Olive Tree leaders, though they voted for Italian participation
in the war, avoided both demonstrations.
A slogan held on posters throughout the crowd was "Not in my
name." Another popular slogan was "Italy is at war--not
us."
The bias of the U.S. press was shown in a Nov. 11 New York
Times article on the Rome demonstrations that ran a photo
showing the pro-U.S. action and implied the two events were
nearly equal in size. But even the Roman police estimated the
anti-war demonstration at about three times the size of the
government event, despite the widely advertised participation
in the latter of celebrities like tenor Luciano Pavarotti and
film star Sophia Loren.
At WTO headquarters
The anti-WTO actions also addressed the war, the struggle
against privatization, destruction of the environment, racism
and deteriorating work conditions.
Some 5,000 demonstrators defied an immense police presence
to protest in Geneva, Switzerland, where the main
headquarters of the WTO is found. Speakers condemned imposing
the laws of the market on the world economy at the cost of the
poorest of the earth. The protests also condemned the newest
U.S. war.
Swiss farmer leader Fernand Cuche said, "Governments have
taken refuge in Doha because they are afraid of the people who
elected them."
Police sealed off Geneva's banking district, and extra
security guards were posted by McDonalds outlets, a favorite
target of protesters.
In Paris, according to organizers, another 10,000
people demonstrated against the WTO and the consequences of
capitalist globalization, with thousands of others in
Marseille, Lille, Lyon and a dozen other
French cities.
The largest German demonstration took place in
Berlin, with 5,000 people gathering, according to the
organizers. In Frankfurt another 500 anti-globalizers
demonstrated. According to an article by Ruediger Goebel of the
newspaper Junge Welt (Nov. 12), there were demonstrations in 27
German cities.
The Social Democratic German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder
has aggressively sought to put German troops on the front line
of the war in Afghanistan. This policy has aroused strong
opposition among the trade unions, which are usually the
strongest backers of his party.
Left calls massive rally in India
On Nov. 9 tens of thousands of peasants and workers filled
the streets of Delhi, India, to participate in an
anti-war, anti-WTO rally. They strongly protested the U.S. war
of aggression on Afghanistan and intervention in Asia. They
also vociferously opposed the anti-peasant policies of the
Indian government and condemned it for surrendering to the
dictates of the WTO.
Addressing the mammoth rally, Gen. Secy. Dipankar
Bhattacharya of the Kisan wing of the Communist Party of India
(ML) said the U.S. is "waging an all-out war on the weak
nations of the world. While in Afghanistan it is using bombs to
kill and terrorize the people of this beleaguered country, at
the Doha ministerial summit of WTO it is trying to use trade as
a weapon of war and terror."
He said while the world had expressed shock and condemnation
over the terrorist strikes of Sept. 11, Washington has misused
and insulted global sympathy against terror by killing and
maiming hundreds of innocent Afghan people and systematically
destroying their country. "And now it is desperately trying to
use the current climate of war to impose a new charter of
economic slavery in Doha."
More than 1,500 peasants and unionists protested Nov. 10
before the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok, Thailand, against
the WTO. In Melbourne, Australia, there was a "die-in"
at the Interior Ministry and the Defense Ministry.
Actions in the U.S.
There were also demonstrations against the WTO in the major
capitals in South America and in cities across the U.S. and
Canada.
Bill Hackwell reports that in Richmond, Calif., on
Nov. 10, over 500 people marched from downtown to the
ChevronTexaco refinery in Point Richmond to protest the routine
dumping of dioxin and other cancer-causing synthetic chemicals
on this predominantly African American community.
It has been years now that the residents of this community
have insisted that there be zero dioxin emissions from the
refinery. ChevronTexaco has all but ignored the community,
along with Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E), which has
dumped PCB into the ground, contaminating the Richmond water
supply, in a blatant case of disregard and environmental
racism.
The day before hundreds of people marched down Market Street
in San Francisco against the WTO and war to the
corporate headquarters of PG&E. The WTO meetings are
designed to allow corporations like ChevronTexaco and PG&E
to beat back and override any local regulations for
environmental protection.
Groups participating in these actions included West County
Toxics Coalition, Greenaction, Art and Revolution, the Laotian
Organizing Project of Asian Pacific Environmental Network and
others.
Dianne Mathiowetz reports that in Atlanta on Nov. 10,
an anti-war march and rally focused on the biased coverage of
the U.S. war on Afghanistan by the major media, particularly
CNN. Called by a group of students at Georgia State University,
who named themselves the 4910 Collective, the theme of the
protest was "CNN--Half the Story, All the Time."
After marching through part of downtown Atlanta, the crowd
went to the CNN Center where chants such as "CNN lies, Afghani
children die!" filled the air.
Earlier in the week, Atlanta anti-war activists found out
that George Bush was coming the next day to deliver what the
White House called "a major public address on homeland
security."
With details of the visit kept vague by the various security
forces, the Atlanta chapter of the International Action Center
put out an email alert to the Georgia Coalition for Peace and
others calling for a protest on Nov. 8 outside the Georgia
World Congress Center in downtown Atlanta.
Despite intense police harassment, some 50-60 people from a
variety of organizations held their ground on a nearby
intersection, making sure that as the presidential caravan
drove by, George Bush, Tom Ridge and the other government
leaders saw their signs and banners. The police arrested three
people as the protest was ending.
People also demonstrated Nov. 10 near the United Nations in
New York where President Bush was telling the world that
they had better actively join the U.S. campaign "against
terrorism."
Upcoming actions against the war
Following the weekend, the next set of anti-war actions
called by International ANSWER against "Bush's war of
terrorism" is Nov. 14, the eve of Ramadan. In New York, the
demonstration is at Union Square at 5 p.m. The park there has
turned into an ad-hoc gathering place for youth and anti-war
forces throughout the city. There has been a running battle
between the youth and the authorities, who are attempting to
remove signs of anti-war feeling from the park.
Other actions are scheduled for Nov. 14 in San Francisco and
Washington in the U.S., in Madrid, Spain, and in Venice,
Italy.
Perhaps the biggest protest set for the first week of
Ramadan is a general strike in Namibia, scheduled for Nov. 16.
The National Union of Namibian Workers (NUNW) called for a
national stay-away from work that day to protest the U.S.-led
bombing campaign against Afghanistan and privatization and
mismanagement at state-owned enterprises.
The NUNW said that it expected more than 100,000 people to
take part in the mass action, which will focus on marches in a
number of towns.
Reprinted from the Nov. 22, 2001, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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