As part of some recent WTO trade talks, Pakistan is endeavouring to open it’s waters to international trawlers — Can you guess the result? Coastal Communities are reporting dramatically reduced catches of local species, and are facing widespread hunger and debt.

ActionAid has just released a report called “Taking the Fish” (link below) which focuses in on this issue.

From the ActionAid Press Release: Rogue trawlers are accused of using damaging nets and of indiscriminately catching and dumping huge quantities of young, unwanted, or dead fish at sea - leaving less for locals to catch.

“The trawlers have nets one …

Dennis Ott recently interviewed Noam Chomsky — during which, several “unpopular” but extremely important points were raised about the legal mandate and equally unfounded role of corporations in modern society. Here’s the first bit…

On Capitalism, Europe, and the World Bank
Dennis Ott: In a recent interview you quoted Thorstein Veblen, who contrasted “substantial people” and “underlying population.”[1] At a shareholder’s meeting of Allianz AG, major shareholder Hans-Martin Buhlmannn expressed the view that there is only one limit to the increase of the dividend: “The inferiors must not be bled so much that they can no longer consume. They must survive as …

Latin America Solidarity Coalition Conference
Chicago, Illinois, United States - Apr 13-15, 2007
http://lasolidarity.org

The Americas have a strong legacy of resistance. From the Mapuche struggle for land and autonomy against the conquistadors to the successful fight to force U.S.-owned Occidental Petroleum out of Ecuador earlier this year; from Simon Bolivar’s struggle for freedom from Spain and slavery to the Cuban, Sandinista, and modern day Bolivarian Revolutions — no decade has passed without seeing people coming together to fight subjugation. Millions of Latin Americans, dispossessed by Neoliberal Capitalism, imperialist looting, militarization and …

Chile Explodes
from: www.infoshop.org
March 31 2007

Today on the anniversary twenty years ago when two brothers belonging to the MIR, Rafael and Eduardo Toledo, were shot down by the Chilean police, student protesters shut down the center of Santiago Chile and set up barricades in the poor neighborhoods in the southern part of the city.

The government is blaming the movement on guerilla groups like the Frente Patriotico and the GAP and its propaganda is claiming that they are connected to drugs. The police raided the University of Chile and claimed to find a molotov cocktail factory and an arms deposit with …

Wangari Mathaai: A Global Voice Of Fortitude
By Farah Aziz, Countercurrents.org
24 March, 2007

It had been a hectic day for her, her first day in India, but Wangari Maathai, the first African woman to win the Nobel peace prize, will not undermine any of her priorities. Invited to India by Rajiv Gandhi foundation and Indian council for cultural relations to deliver lectures on linkages between environment, governance and peace, Wangari has little more to say. At Navdanya, she opens up a bit more.

Beginning with biodiversity and the coexistence of natural varieties of seeds, she soon progresses into a wider arena of …

Activists Seek Alternative Model to ‘Neo-Liberal’ Trade Pacts
By Michelle Chen, newstandardnews.net
March 22, 2007

With two controversial trade deals awaiting ratification, Congress is taking stock of the White House’s free-trade agenda, and activists are seizing the moment to call for policies that respond to the social needs of all countries involved.

Lawmakers are considering trade deals with Colombia and Peru that encapsulate some of the most contentious aspects of so-called “free trade”: rules that critics say elevate corporate privilege over human rights, promote exploitation of workers, and destabilize economies.

At the same time, President Bush’s power to broker such deals with minimal congressional …

Why Should we Be Part of the Cucapa Encampment?
from www.infoshop.org
March 20, 2007

1. The Cucapa Camp is an Essential Part of La Otra Campana: The aim of La Otra Campana is no more and no less than TO TAKE MEXICO BACK peacefully— through a democratic process of building a (trans) national horizontal network connecting up all the grassroots local struggles, together developing a new social agenda, social contract or constitution and at a strategic moment, in the near future, taking national coordinated action, like a national strike that is peaceful but massive. The ideal is that Chicanos and Mexicanos and …

The final battle in the continent
Alex B. Hill, scoutbanana.blogspot.com/
February 10,2007

The noise will make all else inaudible, not even the whisper of, “here they come,” will be understood. The noise will be unbearable. TICK TOCK, time is running out to stop and realize the impending doom. CHING, money is flowing so fast and smoothly for anyone to truly care and take notice. RATTA-TATTA, RATTA-TATTA, anti-terrorism gunships will tear through the sky and open fire marking holes on the cratered dirt roads, the cargo shipments will crash and the cheap goods will burn as the bombs fall, KABOOM, refugees will run …

I haven’t actually seen the treaty yet, so I’m going to reserve comment for now, but here are a few stories about this. If you are familiar with this treaty, know where i can find it, or have your own thoughts about this, please add a comment here. I’d like to hear what you have to say. - Ahni.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
New treaty a sham
By Bill Tieleman, billtieleman.blogspot.com

The tentative treaty between the Tsawwassen First Nation and the provincial and federal governments must be rejected.

It is totally unacceptable that the treaty terms would take 207 hectares of valuable …

By Ghida Fakhry in Nevada - For more than 30 years, Carrie Dann, a native Shoshone American, has been fighting the US government for her people’s rights to their ancestral land.

Dann accuses the US government of ignoring her case in favour of multi-national corporations whose interests she says lie in their bottom lines and not in the environment.

Since the dispute began 30 years ago, US armed federal agents have seized hundreds of horses from Dann’s Crescent Valley ranch in Nevada, leaving her with only a few cows.

The US government’s actions were a response to Dann’s refusal to pay …