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| Newsletter | September 2002 |
The summit will put the final nail in the coffin of a deeply discredited idea - the idea that 'socially responsible businesses' will partner with 'civil society' to save the planet. Now we know corporations aren't even 'socially responsible' enough to keep their own books, maybe 'society' can stop being so civil.' -- Naomi Klein
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Of course I am delighted to be going. Now we have settled the delegation I hope we can concentrate on the issues involved. I believe [these are] pushing forward the agenda on energy, water, health, food security and biodiversity to make the world better for the poor and underdeveloped countries. -- Michael Meacher
Business has greater access and influence than any other group and we are concerned that the agenda is being unduly skewed towards the wishlists of companies and away from those of the poor. -- Christian Aid
Ten years after the Rio earth summit, the Johannesburg summit offers the chance to place corporate accountability at the center of sustainable development. Corporate influence means this does not look like happening. -- Christian Aid
In the past couple of months, we have been active in interactions with the UN system and others to put across business ideas for the structure of the summit and in the regional preparation meeting from which the agenda and arrangements will eventually emerge. -- Sir Mark Moody-Stuart, chair of BASDards
South Africa is in the hands of global capital. That's why it can't meet the legitimate demands of its people. -- George Soros
Sudan's oil revenues have been used for the purchase of weapons used for killing and displacing people in the oil areas. -- Sudanese Council of Churches, April 2000
Why such a fuss that Meacher was left off the Johannesburg party trip? Has everyone forgotten that here is the minister who has been pushing incineration and GM crops? The offer by FoE to pay for his trip was a childish gimmick. The best we can say of Meacher is that he is marginally better than the other ministers who are going to South Africa.
But we are prepared to be persuaded. Is Meacher a born again environmentalist, a voice crying in the wilderness?
Having highlighted that the Earth Summit has been taken over by Big Business (BVEJ newsletter #0027 August 2002) others are starting to recognise the same fact. Christian Aid has published a highly critical report, even FoE are making a few whimpering noises.
Blair's only interest in the Earth Summit, is to pass through for a few hours to partake in a photo opportunity - Blair the leader poncing around on the international stage.
Slimmed down from 100 to 70, Blair's junket to Johannesburg contains a number of his Big Business cronies including Bill Alexander, chief executive of Thames Water, Sir Robert Wilson, executive chairman of mining company Rio Tinto, and Chris Fay, non-executive director of Anglo American, another of the world's mining giants.
Chris Fay also serves as a non-executive director of BAA and chairs their ethics committee and environment committee! He was previously chairman and chief executive of Shell UK and is chairman of the government's Advisory Committee on Business and the Environment.
Chris Fay is also a director of Weir Group plc. This the same Weir associated with genocide in the Sudan. Weir Pumps (Glasgow) are a subsidiary of The Weir Group plc.
Weir Pumps (Glasgow) are identified by Christian Aid as a key player in human rights abuses and genocide in Sudan. The flow of oil, which Weir pumps, pays for arming the Muslim north which then carries out atrocities against the Christian south.
The three companies known to be part of Blair's junket have been involved in a number of high-profile and damaging accusations over their environmental record.
Thames Water, the largest water company in the UK with 12 million customers, has been prosecuted by the Government's Environment Agency watchdog for pollution on more than 20 occasions since 1996. During 2000 the firm appeared in court five times for six offences and was fined a total of £288,000. Earlier this year it was fined £12,000 after it admitted polluting tributaries in Gloucestershire.
Thames Water has also been fiercely criticised in the past for operating in Indonesia while President Suharto - whose rule was marked by human rights abuses - was in power.
Rio Tinto, the largest mining conglomerate in the world, has a poor environmental record worldwide, is currently the focus of one of Australia's highest profile environmental rows ever. The company's plans to mine uranium in one of the planet's most valuable wildlife sites - Kakadu National Park, a World Heritage Site - has enraged environmentalists. Clashes involving protesters have led to more than 500 arrests.
Mining giant Anglo American has been embroiled over claims concerning its planned operations in Peru and alleged pollution in Zambia.
Downing Street, still smarting from criticism over its misguided attempt to drop Environment Minister Michael Meacher from the delegation, has refused to release the entire official line-up for fear of further attack.
The Scorched Earth: Oil and War in Sudan, Christian Aid, March 2001
Blair backs big business at the Earth Summit, Corporate Watch, 21 August 2002
Keith Parkins, Blair's junket to Rio + 10 in Jo'burg, South Africa Indymedia, 23 August 2002
[BVEJ newsletter August 2002]
Farnborough International 2002, aka Farnborough Airshow, the world's biggest arms fair, was, according to Flight International 'a flop' - visitor numbers were down, sales were down big time (2000 $52 billion, 2002 $6 billion). Locals had never had it so good as the roads around the site were nearly empty.
Last month we reported hat 260 homes would have to be destroyed to make way for the a third runway at Heathrow - a 2,000-metre runway, which would allow 500 extra flights a day over London. It seems we were wrong. More than 10,000 homes may have to be demolished around Heathrow because of a massive increase in air pollution if the proposed new runway is built.
Ryanair has reported massive increase in profits. GO and easyJet have reported record increase in passenger numbers, 2/3 up on last year. MyTravel (formerly Airtours) has launched MyTravel Lite, a low budget airline to compete with easyJet. Why not offer cheap seats on their existing charters? British Airways under the disastrous leadership of Rod Eddington lurches from one crisis to the next.
How do the low cost airlines do it? From the experience of Ryanair it seems by offering a shit service.
Nats, the Railtrack of the skies, lurches from one crisis to the next. An army of advisers, at a price, charged in excess of £43 million on the Nats sell off. Credit Suisse First Boston, whose fees soared from an estimated £4.7m to £8.9m, the lead adviser on the 'feasibility and structure' of the sell-off, are also advisers on the privatisation of BNFL.
The grounding of all commercial aircraft following the 11 September 2001 attack on the Pentagon and World Trade Center gave a unique opportunity to study the effect aircraft contrails have on climate. What researchers found was that temperatures are lower during the daytime and higher at night, ie the contrails have the same effect as clouds.
Residents living near Kimpo Airport in Seoul have filed the biggest class action suit yet against the government, seeking compensation on damages incurred from airport noise.
Two years of protests, which included violence and kidnappings, have forced the Mexican government to abandon plans to build a major new airport on farmland near Mexico City. [BVEJ newsletter #0027 August 2002]
By 2015 some 35,000 people could be exposed to an exceedence of the annual average EU limit for nitrogen dioxide (NO2) if a third runway was built. -- government paper airports in the South East
Meeting the EU limits for NO2 at Heathrow will be challenging, even without the addition of a third runway . . . It remains clear that another runway at Heathrow could not be considered unless the Government could be confident that levels of all relevant pollutants could be consistently contained within the EU limits. -- government paper airports in the South East
We reported last month that 260 homes would have to be destroyed to make way for the a third runway at Heathrow - a 2,000-metre runway, which would allow 500 extra flights a day over London. It seems we were wrong. More than 10,000 homes may have to be demolished around Heathrow because of a massive increase in air pollution if the proposed new runway is built. [BVEJ newsletter #0027 August 2002]
We only considered the houses that would have to be destroyed to make way for the runway and its associated infrastructure. Buried in more than 1,000 pages of regional consultation documents released by the Government is a section on local air quality at Heathrow. This states that people exposed to air pollution above EU limits may also have their homes demolished.
Oxides of nitrogen cause lung diseases and breathing problems. At Heathrow, which is British Airways' preferred site for a new runway, the main sources of NO2 are aircraft engines and the vehicles and machinery associated with the airport. The areas facing the greatest potential exposure to NO2 are Harmondsworth, Sipson, Harlington, Hayes and West Drayton.
Two solutions are proposed: either move people out and destroy their homes or find a technical fix. The obvious solution - not allowing expansion - does not appear to have been considered. But even with a technical fix it would still leave 5,000 people affected (some 14,000 people would still be exposed even if the third runway was not built). BA, which would benefit financially from a third runway at Heathrow, is pushing for the government to pay the cost of relocating all those affected.
Farnborough faces a similar problem, this time caused by safety not deteriorating air quality. Nothing is allowed to be built within the PSZ (defined by the 1 in 100,000 risk contour), in the long term all the property within the PSZ has to be destroyed. At the Farnborough Airshow, coincidental with the government's announcement of massive airport expansion, TAG announced massive expansion of Farnborough. The PSZ has to be drawn for the level of movements in 2015. [BVEJ newsletter #0027 August 2002]
Ian Hargreaves, journalist and broadcaster, is to spearhead the campaign by the airports group BAA to win public support for the construction of more runways in south-east England.
A former editor of The Independent and New Statesman, a panelist on BBC Radio 4 'The Moral Maze', Hargreaves will join BAA as director of corporate and public affairs at the end of the year. Hargreaves is currently the director of the Centre for Journalism Studies at Cardiff University and writes a regular column for the FT.
Ironically Hargreaves takes over the post vacated by Des Wilson, the former environmental campaigner and turncoat, who took his pieces of silver when he joined BAA to promote the case for building Heathrow Terminal 5.
Hargreaves will be stepping down as the director of Cardiff University's centre for journalism studies. However, he will retain his position as professor of journalism at the school, he also intends to continue writing for the FT and to continue as a panelist on the BBC Radio 4 programme 'Moral Maze'. Conflict of interest? Yes, if you consider journalism and the media as a means of bringing forth the truth, on the other hand if we look at the media we now have and its relationship to Big Business, then it is simply business as usual.
We are aware of the unease which is often expressed about the employment of former special advisers to Ministers in lobbying government. We share this unease, especially where the issues on which the Government would be lobbied are the policy responsibility of the individual's former department. There is particular concern when they are thought to have easy access to serving Ministers and officials and privileged knowledge of internal government thinking. -- Advisory Committee on Business Appointments
Within eight months of Irvin leaving government to take big bucks from the airline industry, his former department is publishing proposals that the airline industry could have written themselves. It appears that he is still pulling the strings and getting away with it. -- Jeff Gazzard, Airport Watch
Joe Irvin's smooth slide from the heart of government to commercial lobbying will just reinforce the view that the aviation industry lives off backstairs deals and insider access. The Government will have to work hard to persuade the public that its so-called consultation on airport expansion is anything more than a rather squalid political fix. -- Charles Secrett, director of Friends of the Earth
Joe Irvin, head of the Freedom to Fly aviation lobbying group, which wants more airports and runways to be built, took up his post after quitting as chief transport adviser to John Prescott last year. His appointment triggered an urgent inquiry by an independent Whitehall committee, which advised senior civil servants to block the move for at least six months. But despite its advice to Sir Richard Mottram, the former Permanent Secretary at the Department of Transport, Irvin joined Freedom to Fly - which is funded by British Airways and the British Airports Authority - just four months later.
Another former adviser to Prescott, Mike Craven, runs a lobbying firm whose main client is British Airways. Stephen Hardwick, chief lobbyist for BAA, which owns Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted, has also worked for the party.
Anji Hunter, Tony Blair's former director of government relations, left to join oil giant BP as a director of public relations. The committee imposed a three-month waiting period, but laid down a condition that she should not lobby UK Ministers for 12 months.
A number of former Ministers are now finding lucrative roles outside government were also banned from lobbying.
Baroness Jay, the former leader of the Lords who will now have a special role in vetting donations to the Labour Party, is barred for a few months from lobbying for corporate criminals Amey, which she joined as an adviser in January. One of Amey's primary source of profits is from private finance deals with the Government (schools, railways, tube). Jay also has a job as non-executive director of BT.
Former culture secretary Chris Smith has a new job as 'adviser' to child exploiters the Walt Disney Company. A mere coincidence that Disney, along with US TV companies and Murdoch, are lobbying hard for a slice of UK terrestrial TV.
... this year's Farnborough air show was, in many ways, a flop. Attendances, for the crucial first three trade days, were down by a quarter on 2000. The static display was small and familiar, there were few aircraft debuts and significant orders were scarce. -- Flight International
We have shown that the airfield is capable of being the focus of world-wide attention for one week every two years. We are now simply looking to maximise its potential as a high-profile venue all year round. -- Amanda Stainer, SBAC
The council has long supported the concept of the site being used on a regular basis. -- Andrew Lloyd, Rushmoor chief executive
An expose on Farnborough Airport in the June-July 2002 issue of Corporate Watch newsletter. Copies from (50p each payable in postage stamps):
Corporate Watch 16b Cherwell Street OXFORD OX4 1BG
A more detailed article on the Corporate Watch website:
The TAG PR comic, aka the Farnborough News, finally has been forced to admit that the Farnborough Airshow was not such a rip-roaring success after all. Sales were down big time - 2000 $52 billion, 2002 $6 billion. Flight International reported it as 'a flop'. [Flight International 30 July - 5 August 2002, Farnborough Mail Tuesday 30 July 2002, BVEJ newsletter #0027 August 2002]
Even the hard core aviation enthusiasts felt obliged to write to the Farnborough News and point out the Farnborough Airshow wasn't all it was cracked up to be. [Farnborough News Friday 16 August 2002]
If the Farnborough News are going to continue regurgitating TAG press releases as 'news', then the very least they can do is to publish the usual health warning: 'advertising feature'.
At the Airshow there was a near miss involving the Airbus models that were flying. Recall how you read all about it in the local press!
You will also have read in the local press that arms protesters in blood splattered t-shirts invaded the VIP dinner!
On the first day of the Arms Fair, neo-Labour Baroness Symons showed what a hard job it is being a minister of state at the 'ethical' Foreign Office. At 5pm she had a meeting with Jeb Bush who worked so hard to ensure his brother George W Bush got elected as US President, the arms industry has never looked back since. At 7pm she attended a government reception at Farnborough International, then at 8.30pm she was whisked off to another arms sales party, this time the BAE Systems Gala Reception held in the palatial surroundings of Hampton Court. [Private Eye No 1060 9-12 August 2002]
The following day three blood-splattered protesters gate-crashed the SBAC arms fair dinner chanting 'thou shalt not kill'. As one of the protesters, Father Martin Newell, said 'The Bishops of Africa have called on Western Christians to engage with decision makers and arms traders to stop the indiscriminate sale of weapons.' Outside, a dozen protesters leafleted delegates as they went into the dinner. When Jack Straw, foreign secretary, walked into the plush hotel, where he was due to speak, he was harangued by protesters, one of whom shouted 'Jack Straw you scumbag'. [Indymedia UK 28 July 2002]
The Russians were noticeable by their absence from Farnborough International 2002. The reason for their no-show was fear of having their planes repossessed for unpaid debts. Their aircraft had a close shave at the Paris Airshow last year but managed to fly the coop before the bailiffs got them in their clutches.
Last year Rushmoor chief executive Andrew Lloyd and Tory leader John Marsh (employee of BAE Systems), went on a freebie trip to the Paris Airshow courtesy of SBAC (organisers of the Farnborough Airshow). At the time not even the council were aware of the trip. Nothing to do with TAG we were told, nor was it anything to do with plans SBAC had to turn their temporary site into a major exhibition site for Europe. Immediately after the Airshow, SBAC held a joint press conference with Dutch company De Boer Structures (contractors for the site and owners of the temporary structures), they were pleased to announce that the site, to be known as Space Farnborough, was going to be a permanent exhibition site, ideally suited with fast links to London and its own airport. It comes as no surprise to also learn that this had all been agreed in secret talks with Rushmoor, once again making a mockery of the planning process. [BVEJ newsletter #0015 August 2001]
SBAC are claiming the Airshow brings $24 million into the local economy!
Early August, the canal at the end of the runway, devastated winter 2000/2001, oops sensitive environmental restoration, was showing signs of recovery, if recovery means the springing up of weed species. The track formed of wood chippings has suppressed all growth, many of the cut down trees are coppicing nicely with the growth 2-3 times as high a person walking along the canal bank.
Does FARA still exist? TAG announce massive increase in numbers, not a whimper from FARA. On their website it does have as a headline TAG are wanting to expand, only problem is it is a year out of date, referring to an article in Flight International of May last year!
Rebecca Chard, Halls, exhibitors and more space, Farnborough International 2002 {News Group Airshow supplement}
Show gives local economy $24m shot in arm, Flight Daily News, Issue 3, 24 July 2002 {Farnborough International 2002}
Arms fair dinner disrupted, UK Indymedia, 28 July 2002
'Space' deal to boost airfield, Farnborough Mail, 30 July 2002
Air show Olympics?, Flight International, 30 July - 5 August 2002
Alan Franklin, Flying into the future, Surrey-Hants Star, 1 August 2002
Cliff Mogg, Permanent exhibition site is being planned, Surrey-Hants Star, 1 August 2002
Keith Parkins, Farnborough International 2002, Indymedia, 8 August 2002
There is too much hype from supermarkets about their plans to cut pesticide use, and not enough action. Only the Co-op and M&S have made a real commitment to getting pesticides out of their food. Government action is needed too. Stricter limits for pesticide residues in fruit and vegetables must be introduced and more is needed to help UK farmers produce pesticide-free food. -- Sandra Bell, FoE pesticide campaigner
FoE have published a survey on pesticide levels in supermarket fruit and vegetables which is somewhat misleading, as it shows the cumulative contamination, whereas what is important is the trend and the level today. None of the levels exceeded government standards. The worst supermarket was Somerfield.
Percentage of fruit and veg containing pesticide residues (1998-2001):
Morrisons 42 Co-op 43 Waitrose 46 Asda 48 Sainsbury 48 Tesco 48 Safeway 49 M&S 49 Somerfield 60
The partnership does not mean that UNICEF endorses McDonald's or its products. -- UNICEF
McDonald's is the flagship for junk food, aggressively targeted at children. Does Unicef think that this is an appropriate partnership? -- Jeanette Longfield, coordinator of Sustain
It is a sad, sad day if the UN's children and health charity is reduced to taking sponsorship from a fast food company. Why should we accept that Unicef has any credibility left? -- Professor Tim Lang, professor of food policy at Thames Valley University
McDonald's is a global leader in the marketing of junk food that is creating soaring rates of childhood obesity and type 2 diabetes, and that is disrupting traditional ways of food preparation in families and cultures. It is truly a challenge to see how this partnership with McDonald's is consistent with Unicef's claim to promote 'good nutrition' to the world's children. -- letter sent to Unicef
Do you still believe in Santa, that the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) really cares about the health of the world's children?
UNICEF and McDonald's have announced plans 'to team up to raise money on behalf of the world's children as part of a new McDonald's fundraising initiative called World Children's Day'. This is the same McDonald's that exploits children as both workers and customers, that is a global leader in the marketing of junk food, that creates soaring rates of childhood obesity and diabetes.
The initiative, which aims to raise money for McDonald's charitable arm and a dozen UNICEF programmes, includes a pop concert in China which will be broadcast over the internet - access to which can only be funnily enough obtained by buying a Big Mac burger! UNICEF will receive a cut of the profits from each Big Mac sold. Sensing a slight inconsistency in the alliance, an international coalition of public-health professionals and activists has asked UNICEF to withdraw from the partnership.
UNICEF claim they are not endorsing McDonald's! But if 'Buy a Big Mac and Help UNICEF' is not an endorsement, we wonder what is?
McDonald's World Children's Day coincides with the anniversary of the UN's adoption of the Convention of the Rights of the Child in November 1989.
When Peter Kasprzyk and several other students from Poland and Slovakia arrived this summer to work for the McDonald's in the US, they said they had been told they would make a lot of money, 'more money than you could imagine.' But Kasprzyk could not buy an item from the dollar menu with his first paycheck. It was zero. That's because he and four fellow students were docked for $2,000 monthly rent on a two-bedroom apartment they share in Abingdon that normally goes for $750 a month. That deduction wiped out every cent Kasprzyk made flipping hamburgers for $8 an hour at McDonald's. On top of those deductions, Kasprzyk had to pay $200 for a security deposit on the apartment, and share the $20 daily round-trip cab fare to work.
The students came to the United States under J-1 visas as part of a work-travel program authorized by the State Department. The visas were issued through the Council on International Educational Exchange, a New York City-based non-profit organization that brings thousands of foreign students to the US every year. Kasprzyk and his fellow workers paid $500 to sign up with the program and $1,000 for air fare. They expected to spend a profitable summer but were swiftly disappointed. Instead of working eight-hour shifts at McDonald's, they said they were sent home when business slowed down. 'It's hypocritical,' Kasprzyk said. 'They smile only to tell you, `Go home.''
As a result, he worked only 17.22 hours during his first pay period, which ended 6 July 2002, and earned gross pay of $137.76, according to his pay stub. But that amount was wiped out by deductions. The pay stub, which misspells his name as Piotor J. Kasprzyk, shows $2 was subtracted for Medicare and $8.54 for Social Security. These deductions were made even though students participating in the J-1 program are exempt from those payments.
Jose Bove has emerged from a French prison thinner but smiling under his trademark moustache, after serving 40 days for ransacking a McDonald's restaurant. The anti-globalization campainer met his cheering supporters outside the prison in the southern town of Villeneuve-les-Maguelone, championing a new cause - the defence of prisoners' rights. Jose Bove, was serving out the remainder of a three-month sentence for using farm equipment to tear down a McDonald's being built in the southern town of Millau three years ago, a protest against globalization. Bove, who staged a hunger strike during most of his prison term, told 1,000 supporters that his incarceration was tolerable but expressed sympathy for his fellow inmates. Bove said he had received about 2,000 letters a day from supporters. He thanked the crowd for their support, which had 'turned this intolerable sentence into a resistance movement'.
A court in the southern town of Foix is expected to announce 16 September 2002 whether Bove must return to prison for up to 14 months for his role in ripping up genetically modified crops in two separate incidents.
The French justice minister, Dominique Perben, has been forced to admit that Bove's growing popularity poses something of a problem for the French judicial system. 'He's an awkward customer for the jail services. But he's served his sentence, and he's getting out. I hope he has fewer problems with the justice system in future.'
[BVEJ newsletters passim]
Corporate responsibility shouldn't stop at the water's edge. If the Bush administration is serious about promoting ethical business practices, it shouldn't be trying to stop this court case from going forward. -- Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch
It is the height of hypocrisy for the State Department to publicly promote human rights principles for the oil and gas industry and then tell a judge that scrutiny of an oil company's human rights record runs counter to foreign policy. Apparently, principles only matter when they don't matter. -- Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch
The International Labor Rights Fund filed the suit with the US district court in Washington last year on behalf of 11 villagers from Aceh who contend that they were victims of murder, torture, kidnapping and rape by the military unit guarding ExxonMobil's gas field. ExxonMobil has denied any involvement with alleged abuses. In Aceh, human-rights groups blame the Indonesian army for regular abuses against civilians.
Where the truth lies we will not know as the US Government has moved to block a lawsuit against ExxonMobil for alleged human-rights abuses at its Indonesian natural-gas operations, claiming the court action could hurt relations with Jakarta and undermine the war on terrorism.
The civil suit, filed on June 11, 2001 in the District of Columbia, alleges that the Indonesian military provided 'security services' for ExxonMobil's joint venture in Indonesia's conflict-ridden Aceh province, and that the Indonesian military committed 'genocide, murder, torture, crimes against humanity, sexual violence and kidnapping' while providing security for the company from 1999 to 2001. The plaintiff's claim that ExxonMobil was aware of widespread abuses committed by the military but had failed to take any action to prevent them.
In the wake of business scandals involving Enron and WorldCom, among others, US President George Bush has called for a new ethic of personal responsibility in the business world,' arguing that Americans need 'confidence in the character and conduct of all of our business leaders.'
ExxonMobil later petitioned US District Court Judge Louis F Oberdorfer, the presiding judge in the case, to solicit an opinion from the State Department whether this suit would have an adverse effect on US foreign policy.
The State Department argued that the Indonesian government would view judicial scrutiny of the company's conduct as a referendum on the human rights record of the Indonesian armed forces, which would dissuade it from co-operating with the United States in counter terrorism. However, the State Department itself routinely criticizes the human rights record of the Indonesian military in its Country Reports on Human Rights Practices while maintaining diplomatic relations. Indeed, in its letter to Judge Oberdorfer, it condemned 'human rights abuses by elements of the Indonesian armed forces in locations such as Aceh.'
The State Department also argued that the litigation's 'potential effects on Indonesia's economy could ... adversely affect important United States interests' and could impede further cooperation with US companies. It said that continued business with US companies would expose the Indonesian government and local companies to the highest business standards as another justification for dismissing the lawsuit, even though the suit could determine whether ExxonMobil did indeed follow acceptable business practices.
'The administration can't simultaneously argue that US companies impart the best business practices in Indonesia while trying to dismiss a case that could determine whether a US company actually followed those practices,' said Kenneth Roth.
The State Department claimed that the suit may actually hurt progress on human rights in Indonesia. Indonesian human rights groups, however, fear that the State Department's letter will bolster and legitimize the Indonesian military's resistance to judicial scrutiny of abuses, especially in conjunction with the US government's recent decision to resume limited military cooperation with Indonesia. Human Rights Watch has strongly criticized the resumption of US military assistance because it could undermine efforts to strengthen civilian and judicial oversight of the military without clear conditions on human rights.
The State Department's efforts to influence the case also undercuts credibility of US efforts to promote an independent judiciary in Indonesia that is free of political interference. Ironically, when a suit by the Karaha Bodas Company, a joint-venture of two US firms, against the Indonesia state energy firm, Pertamina, came up in talks with his counterpart last week in Jakarta, Colin Powell reportedly explained that the US government does not interfere with ongoing court cases.
Two weeks before the State Department sent its opinion to Judge Oberdorfer, Indonesia's Ambassador to the US, Soemadi DM Brotodiningrat, sent a strongly worded letter objecting to the lawsuit to Richard L Armitage, the US Deputy Secretary of State. Chillingly, the Ambassador noted that the lawsuit 'will definitely compromise the serious efforts of the Indonesian government to guarantee the safety of foreign investments, including in particular those from the United States.'
This is the first time the State Department has urged the dismissal of a case filed under the Alien Tort Claims Act (ATCA), a law that permits foreigners to sue for damages for serious human rights violations in federal court against defendants who are present in the United States. The State Department has stayed neutral in similar suits brought by alleged victims of military abuses in Nigeria, Burma, and other countries where plaintiffs alleged that the forces involved were protecting US corporate interests when abuses were committed. Indonesia, it now appears, may be a special case as the Bush administration tries to recruit the TNI for the 'war on terrorism' in Southeast Asia.
According to the New York-based Lawyers Committee for Human Rights (LCHR): 'gross and persistent human rights abuses are understandably embarrassing to government and corporations, but hopefully an American court will decide that the facts of the ExxonMobil case should not be silenced out of hand'.
The State Department's action comes amid a major push, particularly by hardliners in the Pentagon and Vice President Dick Cheney's office, to normalize military relations with Indonesia, the world's most populous predominantly Muslim nation.
The week before the case was dismissed, the administration made a formal announcement that military training to Indonesia's armed forces was being restored right away and that about 50 million dollars would be earmarked over the next two years for training and equipping Indonesian counter-terrorism forces.
The funding was cut off in 1999 after TNI-organized and -armed militias rampaged throughout East Timor after its inhabitants voted for independence in a UN-sanctioned referendum.
Human rights groups and even various forces within the State Department argue that the TNI continues to commit grave abuses, particularly in Aceh, where it has faced a low-level insurgency since the 1970s that has escalated over the past several years.
Meanwhile, in Aceh itself, coincidental with dismissal of the case, 10 people were reported killed, among them five whose bodies were found near the ExxonMobil plant.
Noam Chomsky, A New Generation Draws the Line: Kosovo, East Timor and the Standards of the West, Verso, 2000, 2001
John Pilger, Heroes, South End Press, 1986, 2001
John Pilger, Distant Voices, Vintage, 1992, 1994
John Pilger, The New Rulers of the World, Verso, 2002
Exxon is the climate baddie (BVEJ newsletters passim), was responsible for removal of the guy in charge of the scientific panel on climate change (BVEJ newsletter #0025 June 2002), is attempting crude intimidation of Greenpeace (BVEJ newsletter #0027 August 2002), stands charged with human rights abuses in Indonesia (this issue), and now stands accused of killing whales.
Held over until next month.
Tens of thousands of UK school children are being finger printed by schools, often without the knowledge or consent of their parents, not because they are guilty or suspected of some crime, but as part of a cost cutting 'automation' of school libraries by the company Micro Librarian Systems. As many as 200,000 primary and high school children from the age of seven have already been fingerprinted.
Held over to next month.
Primary School Children Fingerprinted, UK Indymedia, 28 July 2002
As Plymouth prepares a new 'Emergency Plan' evidence is emerging that the risk Devonport poses are being severely downplayed. Dick Cheyne is the owner of DML who manage Britains main nuclear dockyard as well as owning the land itself now. This raises questions of who's in charge at Devonport, the US Vice-President or the Royal Navy?
Risks to Plymouth residents from nuclear facilities at Devonport dockyard are being deliberately downplayed for commercial reasons according to anti-nuclear campaigners and experts. Devonport Management Ltd. (DML) are hiding behind official secrets legislation, they say, to play down the danger the dockyard poses to the public.
John Large, consultant nuclear engineer to the UK and Russian governments, told an audience at Plymouth's Guildhall on Tuesday 2nd July that accident scenarios presented to the city council by Devonport dockyard owners and operators DML involved small radiation discharges which were 'coincidentally' contained just within the 600 yard boundary of the facility. Necessitating little or no evacuation preparation by the Council.
Devonport Management Limited is owned by Brown and Root which is in turn owned by US Vice-President Dick Cheyne's Haliburton. Haliburton are prime contenders to build the Afghanistan pipeline (BVEJ newsletters passim) and have their and DML's accounts audited by the discredited Arthur Andersen company.
Plymouth city council's chief executive, Alison Stone, sent a memo to all Plymouth city councillors requesting they stay away from Mr Large's presentation as it was 'not an official consultation'. Though they were all invited neither the city council, MoD or DML attended John Large's presentation.
In his presentation, Large detailed MoD accident scenario 'BR6' which envisages a substantial release of radiation and nuclear 'meltdown' necessitating the evacuation of hundreds of thousands of people from the city and involving medical treatment for all members of the public within seventy miles. However the BR6 scenario was 'classified' and was not available to city councillors, who are responsible for the city's emergency management plan.
There are serious questions in Plymouth as to why the BR6 scenario has been kept secret. Could it be because local people would be outraged if they knew what a danger the dockyard poses to them? The city of Murmansk, in Russia, also has a nuclear dockyard surrounded by a large population. Plans are in place there for the evacuation of the entire city should an accident occur. And evacuation plans around nuclear facilities in the United States are much more comprehensive than those in the UK.
Plymouth's DevPubSafe Emergency Plans are due to be updated by March 2003 at the latest but look unlikely to take into account the terrorist threat post September 11th. The principle of 'the polluter pays' applies to nuclear accidents and there is commercial pressure for DML to convince the council that no plans are necessary since they would be liable to pay for the emergency provision. Safety provision for BR6 is likely to cost Mr Cheyne's company around ten million pounds.
There has also been a refusal to take into account the dangers posed by high-explosives at the dockyard. Cruise missiles, torpedoes and trident nuclear missiles - with their plutonium warheads. The Navy say submarines are stripped of all weaponry before entering Devonport but submarines are known to make unscheduled and emergency stops in port. The fuel for the torpedoes and Trident nuclear missiles is also highly combustible.
Large also explained that ten or more removed submarine reactors now stored at Devonport amounted to 'a nuclear power station in the middle of a city'. Something that, according to him, violates the first rule of nuclear safety, 'you don't put highly radioactive materials near population centres, let alone in the middle'.
Tony Staunton, chair of Plymouth UNISON, wound up the safety presentation in the Guildhall and expressed dismay that councillors responsible for dockyard safety had declined to attend. He concluded that the present emergency plans for the yard were unrealistic and that DML appeared to be pulling the wool over the city council's eyes to avoid the expenditure necessary were a realistic emergency plan put in place. Patrick van-den-Bulck, for CND, noted that the alternative base for the nuclear fleet, Rossyth, could not be developed because the Scottish Parliament would not allow any expansion of nuclear facilities North of the border. Therefore Plymouth is being 'dumped on' as the cheapest and least publicly accountable option to service Britain's fleet of nuclear submarines. Because of overcrowding and safety issues at Devonport the Royal Navy have been considering basing their Trident submarine fleet in the United States.
Not only is Devonport, the home of the Royal Navy's prestigious nuclear fleet, owned and managed by the Vice-President of a foreign power. But DML is deliberately thwarting Plymouth councillors for commercial gain as councillors attempt to draw up contingency plans for the hundreds of thousands of people in Plymouth and downwind of the docks. To make matters worse both military and civilian authorities are failing to take account of the threat of terrorist attack.
Dick Cheyne downplays Devonport risk to save money, UK Indymedia, 7 August 2002
[BVEJ newsletters #0008 January 2001, #0014 July 2001 & #0015 August 2001]
In an astonishing victory for the residents of San Salvador Atenco, the Mexican government has confirmed that they were abandoning plans to build a new international airport smack on top of the small farming community just outside of Mexico City. The whole saga began last autumn when Mexican President Vicente Fox's government approved plans to build a six-runway, $2.3 billion airport that would gobble up much of San Salvador Atenco's farming land. In October, a federal ruling offered villagers a mere 40 pence a square yard for the land - the land that served as the farmers' main source of food, income, and security. The residents of Atenco and the surrounding villages quickly dismissed this slap-in-the-face offer, and immediate protests and marches were organised. Over the next 9 months, farmers mobilised themselves with few results - but things began to change on Thursday, July 11th, when a demo was organised to protest an official government announcement affirming the airport plans. Farmers travelling in a peaceful caravan to the demo were attacked by police with clubs, tear gas, and live ammunition. Thirty protesters were injured, fifteen arrested, and five hospitalised one of whom, Jose Enrique Espinoza Juarez, died in hospital two weeks later.
This brutal show of force inspired supporters in nearby Atenco to take immediate and radical direct action. Over the next few days, five police squad cars were burnt and used along with other seized vehicles (including some Coca-Cola trucks!) to block the nearby national highway. Thirteen government and police officials were taken hostage, and the Atenco farmers used these hostages as bargaining tools in their struggle with the authorities. On July 14, the last hostages were released in return for the release of all arrested farm workers. It took the government another three weeks to cancel plans for the airport altogether, but with the recent announcement; the Atenco workers victory became certain.
Many people feel that the Atenco struggle has been a vital test of the ability of a community-based movement to stop projects that only serve the interests of a few, powerful and wealthy businesses. The administration of President Fox has a plethora of such projects, including the lofty Plan Puebla Panama (PPP), a plan to privatise the energy industry and support the Free Trade Area of the Americas. The PPP is President Fox's crown jewel economic project, which seeks to transform south eastern Mexico into an industrialised factory centre where maquiladoras (sweatshops) can thrive, producing yet more raw materials for the developed countries in the Northern Hemisphere. The plan involves massive construction projects and generous factory building incentives in an attempt to attract more foreign investment from multinational corporations. But the PPP cuts right through the heart of a lot of indigenous land and territory in the poverty stricken southern Mexico State of Chiapas and beyond. Roberto Rivera, a student involved in a recent Atenco solidarity march, sees the protests in Atenco as 'an important turning point, because the proposed airport is the first integral step in the process of implementing the Plan Puebla Panama . . . if the plans to build this new airport in Atenco are stopped, it will be a major blow to the PPP.'
The events of Atenco have indeed sent a clear message to multinational companies and the governments that seek only to protect their interests. 'Even if they gave us all the gold in the world,' said one Atenco woman, 'We wouldn't leave our land because that is all we have.'
While big business is profiteering, local resources are cut. While poor areas of the city are given a paint job and abandoned shops covered over with corporate adverts, the real problems go unsolved and the real needs of the communities in these areas are ignored. -- Manchester Biotic Baking Brigade.
Our campaign isn't about attacking the Games, or sport - it's about exposing the practices of firms who use sport and sporting events to make millions while paying next to nothing to the workers who make the products. -- Mick Duncan, No Sweat
The Blitz festival blew up in the streets of Manchester with a mind-expanding explosion of art and direct action. Running parallel to the Commonwealth Games, this well-organised, independent festival showed how cunningly the people of Manchester could attack the corporate games spectacle.
The simply splendid march FOR capitalism kicked off with cucumber sandwiches and G&T's in a park, where an impeccably dressed rabble held banners such as 'Bomb Other Countries' and 'the environment can kiss my ass.' AgiTATE put on an art exhibition in a shopping mall, and cyclists and skaters teamed up for a skate-athon around Manchester City centre. Councillors were none too pleased with all this unpredictable activity, particularly when they eventually realised that tourists were wandering around with spoof alternative guides to the city.
For a copy of the splendid spoof booklet send 2 first class stamps on an SAE to NATO, c/o EF! Box 29, MERCi, Bridge 5 Mill, 22a Beswick Street, Manchester, M4 7HR
The Commonwealth Games, like all major sporting events, was used to boost sales of advertising and sponsorship. Reebok sponsored UK Athletes. Chinese Labour Watch say the company encourages 'illegal long hours, failure to pay the minimum wage, lack of social benefits, crowded living, short term contracts, and constant violation of both Chinese law and Reebok's own cosmetic Human Rights standards.' Asda Walmart and Manchester Airport were two other sponsors who both have lousy labour rights records. In 2000, Walmart in the US was forced to pay $50 million to settle claims after 69,000 workers were forced to work unpaid overtime.
The Commonwealth Games - A spectacular delusion?, Corporate Watch, 19 July 2002
[BVEJ newsletter #0027 August 2002]
At the current rate of growth, aviation alone could be responsible for the total sustainable rate of greenhouse gas emissions by the middle of the century ... -- Tony Grayling
The choice we face is not between no growth and unfettered growth, but between sustainable and unsustainable growth. If the aviation industry is to develop on a sustainable path then it must take up its environmental responsibilities. -- Tony Grayling
Tony Blair has a problem, his business cronies may be pushing for a massive expansion of aviation and airports, but last year his favourite think tank, the Institute for Public Policy Research, said the projected growth in aviation is unsustainable. Even more embarrassing for Blair, last summer he chose a cheap and cheerful airline, Ryanair, for his holiday trip to the south of France (this after an even more embarrassing switch from easyJet to Ryanair).
The Institute for Public Policy Research is often described by the mass media as a left-leaning think tank (is it about to fall over?). Nothing could be more misleading. IPPR is a pro-big business lobbying outfit which gives the Blair policies a veneer of intellectual respectability.
Tony Grayling, Flight path to danger, The Guardian, Tuesday 21 August 2001
Tony Grayling & Simon Bishop, Sustainable Aviation 2030, Institute for Public Policy Research, 2001
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