Summit of the Americas opens with Chavez and Maradona show
By Sam Knight and agencies
A march of 10,000 anti-Bush protesters, led by the footballer and television host, Diego Maradona, and addressed by Hugo Chavez, the firebrand President of Venezuela, is threatening to overshadow the start of a pan-American summit in Argentina today.
The protesters, marshalled by 8,000 troops and police officers who have been despatched to the resort of Mar de Plata to provide security for the conference, will hold a “People’s Summit” in the hours before the official talks begin.
Women belonging to the human rights group Mothers of Plaza de Mayo wave Cuban and Venezuelan flags before a rally against the visit of the US president, George Bush in Mar del Plata, Argentina.
The demonstration will criticise a free trade initiative which President Bush is expected to put before the Summit of the Americas in favour of more programmes to fight poverty and create jobs. Argentina is still suffering from the largest debt default in history in 2001.
Mr Chavez, an vehement critic of Mr Bush who models himself on the great South American liberators, Simon Bolivar and Che Guevara, will address the protest before attending the formal opening of the summit, where he has joked that he will sneak up on Mr Bush to frighten him.
In recent days, the Organisation of American States, a Washington-based group that organized the summit, has expressed its frustration that the US trade proposal, known as the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), has dominated the build-up to the conference.
“This is not a summit about the FTAA,” said Jose Miguel Insulza, the group’s secretary-general, yesterday. Talks tomorrow are expected to focus on South American poverty. Nearly 100 million people in the region survive on less than one dollar per day, according to the UN.
Meanwhile, the American diplomatic team has complained about the posturing of Mr Chavez, who insists that the Bush Administration is determined to topple his government. For his part, Mr Chavez has promised to “bury” the FTAA and yesterday, Venezuela staged an exercise to prepare for a possible US invasion.
“Our respective governments have very different visions for the hemisphere,” said Tom Shannon, the chief US diplomat for the Western Hemisphere, on board Air Force One.
“It’s thus hard to imagine a productive dialogue when the Venezuelan government has repeatedly made clear its negative intentions with respect to the summit and its personal animosity toward the president,” he said.
“For our point of view, for the region to get the kind of growth it needs, to really begin to address some of the social problems… it needs a stronger trade base,” said Mr Shannon, who promised that Mr Bush would listen to South American proposals to fight poverty.
The FTAA, which would aim to create a free trade zone the length and breadth of the Americas, was first proposed by the US in 1994. Supporters of the plan include Canada, Mexico, Chile, Colombia and the Caribbean nations.
But the South American trade bloc of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay opposes the initiative and refuses to set a date to relaunch negotiations. “Every country or group of countries is standing by their positions and no one is ready to budge,” said a source close to Argentine negotiators yesterday.
Evo Morales, Maradona travel together to American *“antisummit”*
www.chinaview.cn 2005-11-03 08:29:14
MAR DEL PLATA, Argentina, Nov. 2 (Xinhuanet)—Bolivian presidential candidate Evo Morales, Argentine soccer idol Diego Maradona, and Cuban singer and composer Silvio Rodriguez will travel together to take part in the 3rd Peoples’ Summit, best known as the American “anti-summit”.
Morales, Maradona and Rodriguez are part of a group of participants of the Peoples’ Summit that will travel aboard the train dubbed “Alba Express” from the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires to Mar del Plata, 400 kilometers southeast from the capital.
The tourist resort of Mar del Plata will be the venue of the 4th Summit of the Americas and will gather the leaders of all the countries of the Western Hemisphere, save Cuba, whereas the Peoples’ Summit will summon American activists who oppose neoliberalism.
In press reports from Bolivia, spokespersons of opposition party Movement to Socialism (MAS), which postulated representative Morales to run for Office, said Argentine singer-song writer Leon Giecco and Argentine lawmaker Miguel Bonasso also comprise the group, together with a large group of athletes.
The whole group arriving in Mar del Plata aboard Alba Express is also scheduled to go to World Cup Stadium of that city where Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez will speak to the crowd.
Then they will join the “peoples’ march” summoned to repudiate the presence of US President George W. Bush in Argentine territory. Enditem
Maradona joins Bush foes ahead of summit
By Monte Reel in Buenos Aires
November 4, 2005
As the US President, George Bush, prepares for a visit to South America this week, thousands of people in the region have been preparing to make sure he knows exactly what they think of him.
Security has been tight ahead of the Summit of the Americas, attended by 34 nations. About 8000 security officers will be at the two-day gathering in the Argentinian resort of Mar del Plata.
In the lead up to the summit, small bombs have been tossed at several branches of US banks and chain stores, and Argentinian soccer idol Diego Maradona has urged viewers of his popular TV talk show to join him in a protest to “say no to Bush” outside the meeting.
In Brazil, where Mr Bush will meet the President, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, thousands of protesters stood outside the US embassy with signs labelling Mr Bush “Public Enemy No. 1.”
The chilly welcome, according to public opinion polls, reflects a general slide of the US Government’s popularity throughout South America. While some of the criticism centres on the war in Iraq, much of it is linked to regional economic policies such privatisation and low tariffs supported by both the Clinton and Bush administrations.
“Relations between the regions have reached their lowest point since the end of the Cold War - they’re dismal,” said Peter Hakim, president of the non-profit group Inter-American Dialogue.
“They began declining in the mid-1990s when the Clinton administration couldn’t come through on a trade agenda, but after September 11 they’ve taken another turn for the worse.”
Mr Bush has said he hopes to work during the summit on forging trade agreements with Latin American countries, although he said on Tuesday that the Free Trade Area of the Americas, an alliance proposed in the 1990s, was unlikely to be revived this week. Instead the US is expected to promote bilateral agreements, such as the trade pact signed with Chile in 2003.
This collection of articles originally appeared on marxsite