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| Monday, 19 January 2004 |
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World Social Forum declares war on globalisation BOMBAY, Sunday (Reuters, AFP) Thousands of dancing, singing and debating activists from across the world declared war on big business at an anti-globalisation meet in India's corporate capital. Labour leaders from South Korea joined Indian farmers, American volunteers and Afghan women to denounce multinational companies as more than 100,000 activists assembled in a Bombay suburb for the six-day World Social Forum which began on Friday. "Nestle, Coca Cola quit our countries. Give us our rights," Jose Bove, a French sheep farmer who has become a flag-bearer in the challenge to "economic imperialism", told a cheering crowd packed in an auditorium in the northeastern suburb of Goregaon. Nobel laureates Shirin Ebadi and Joseph Stiglitz, and Bove, best remembered for demolishing a half-built McDonald's outlet in France nearly four years ago, are among a dozen prominent names at the fourth World Social Forum (WSF), being held in Asia for the first time. As tribals with painted torsos danced vigorously carrying anti-globalisation banners, singers skipped down another lane belting out criticism of big business while another group performed skits about the exploitation of impoverished farmers. Bove said global firms producing packaged food and beverages should be shunned and urged that agriculture be taken out of the framework of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). "Seeds are being patented and are controlled by big industries. This means farmers cannot use their own seeds and they will be out of work. Patenting of seeds has to stop." Earlier WSF activists called for the world to unite against the United States. The common thread for the diverse set of activists is opposition to US President George W. Bush, whom forum leaders accuse of endangering world security and bending trade rules to satisfy corporations. |
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