AIDS protesters target Karl Rove
The following is based on a July 25 news
release from ACT-UP.
Chanting and holding signs reading "Dying for
AIDS drugs? Karl says drop dead" and "Bush's lies kill, generic
medicines now," angry AIDS activists staged a noisy disruption
of an appearance by top White House advisor Karl Rove on July
25 at the National Conference of the College Republican
National Committee at the Washington Hilton hotel.
"President Bush is breaking his promise to fully fund a
$3-billion global AIDS bill signed into law in June. Bush is
breaking his promise that countries can put access to medicines
and public health ahead of the patent rights of greedy drug
companies. The deadly global AIDS fraud perpetrated by this
White House has gone far enough," said Sean Barry, a
protester.
"Rove pulls the strings in this administration, and Rove has
the blood of people with HIV on his hands."
On July 23, lawmakers in the House of Representatives, under
the direction of Rove's White House, opposed efforts to fully
fund the bill President George W. Bush had signed into law in
June that would provide $3 billion in global AIDS funding in
2004, with $1 billion for the nearly bankrupt Global Fund, the
only multilateral program spending money on treatment for dying
people with AIDS.
Experts point out that life-saving programs in the
hardest-hit countries around the world could readily absorb the
$3 billion promised by Bush; the White House, on the other
hand, claims funding the Global Fund with $1 billion in 2004
would be profligate.
"President Bush just went to Africa, ground zero of the AIDS
catastrophe, and is immediately breaking his promise to fund
the Global Fund with $1 billion in 2004," said Danae McElroy, a
protester.
The disruption of Rove's speech comes on the heels of the
global AIDS funding vote in Congress, and on the lead-up to
crucial talks at the Cancun Ministerial meeting of the World
Trade Organization on Sept. 10-14, where U.S. and drug company
intransigence has blocked a deal on access to medicines in poor
countries that lack capacity for efficient domestic
manufacturing. Karl Rove has been linked to intense
negotiations with U.S. drug companies in determining White
House policy on what is considered a make-or-break issue for
the Cancun Ministerial.
"While Bush lies about life-saving AIDS funding, he's
preventing countries from implementing policy that assures they
can maximize medicines access by purchasing low-cost generics,"
said Sasha Post, a protester. "The U.S. promised they would
permit countries to put public health before patent rights. For
killer Karl, that's just one more promise to walk away
from."
Reprinted from the Aug. 7, 2003, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
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