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Fw: Postmark Prague news release on Nov.2002 NATO summit in
Prague
From Ken Biggs, 7/09/01 02:39:17
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POSTMARK PRAGUE No.345
News release/feature (700 words)
THURSDAY 6 SEPTEMBER 2001
NATO SUMMIT IN PRAGUE November 21st/22nd
2002
At a Communist Party press conference on August 23, the chair of the Czech
Republic’s Communist Union of Youth JOSEF GOTTWALD announced that the recent
15th World Festival of Youth and Students in Algiers had endorsed its call for
an international peaceful protest action in Prague against the summit. Its call
was also well-received by the more than 13,000 delegates from 143 countries who
took part in the festival. Leaders of the World Federation of Democratic Youth,
the festival’s organiser, will meet in Prague shortly to discuss the nature of
the protest.
WHY DOES NATO HAVE TO MEET IN PRAGUE?
asks Vaclav Vertelar of the Czech Left daily Halo Noviny*
The size and militancy of anti-globalisation demonstrations at summits of the
world’s richest and most powerful is growing. They peaked at the G8’s Genoa
summit. What goes on at the meetings themselves is usually pushed far into the
background. Instead, pictures of battles between the police and demonstrators and
words full of blood and violence dominate the TV news and front pages. But two
questions have to be asked. Why are these summits held at all and what are the
results? Why are they held in different countries and cities, like world sports
championships?
* Negative results
Only in some cases do these summits have an agenda dealing with specific
fundamental issues of major importance to the world. Their results are usually
very modest or virtually nil, especially from the point of view of the leaders
and countries taking part. Of late they have brought only negative results for
the organising state and city: huge sums spent on organisation, security and
repairing the damage done during street battles. Perhaps originally the idea
was that the organising city would enhance its reputation and benefit from
related building projects and the profits from ”summit-related tourism”. In
fact, quite the opposite has been the case. The cost outweighs the income,
which is certainly not the case with sports championships!
* Brussels or New York?
The agenda, course and method of arranging political and financial summits
mobilises the anti-globalisation forces and violent militant groups. They set
”the timetable”. If this doesn’t change, the demonstrations and accompanying violence
will increase further. So why go on with all this?
Would they be any the less ”world events” if they were more rationally
organised and held at the UN’s headquarters, which was set up for such
purposes? Or, in the case of EU and NATO summits, in Brussels?
Opponents of this idea will say that there would be demonstrations there too.
This is only partly true. If the summit agendas were changed so that they dealt
much more with real problems, and if the discussions were democratically
prepared and the main opposition organisations and respresentatives invited, a
substantial improvement in the situation could be expected.
Anyway, the next G8 talks will be held deep inside Canada’s forests or in the
inaccessible Rocky Mountains, while the World Trade Organisation will meet in
November in the sun-baked desert of the Arab emirate of Qatar. All other things
being equal, this will solve nothing. The opponents of globalisation will
simply look for other ways of making their point.
* Prague
The organisers of NATO’s summit in Prague in November 2002 are granite-like in
their resolve to go ahead. According to Alexandr Vondra, the Czech government’s
plenipotentiary for the summit and its US ambassador, he is not thinking of
moving the summit from Prague. ”It’s inappropriate to react to disturbances by
making concessions,” he says.
So there is no prospect of any reversal of the escalation of violent struggle
by various groups at this stage of the establishment of global capitalism. (I
have resisted the temptation to call this ”an intensification of the class
struggle.”) The government has learned nothing from the IMF/World Bank summit
held in Prague in September 2000. It promised a huge income for Prague from
summit-related tourism and greater prestige for Prague and the Czech Republic
throughout the world. Nothing of the sort happened. Quite the opposite. The
summit cost several billion crowns which there is no hope of recovering. In
addition, the situation today and in a year’s time will be different and worse.
So, while there is still time, why not discuss holding the NATO summit at NATO
itself in Brussels?
* This is an abridged translation of an
article published in Halo noviny on July 27. It is taken from the September
issue of the English-language magazine POSTMARK PRAGUE. Free sample copies of
PP are available from PO Box 42, 182 21 Prague 8, Czech Republic.
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