LATIN AMERICAN ACTIVISTS PREPARE FOR ANTI-FTAA DEMOS

 

Buenos Aires Ministerial Summit Faces Massive Demonstrations

UPDATE: This evening more than 10,000 converged in the streets of Buenos Aires to March from the National Congress building to the Sheraton Hotel where the 6th Business Forum of the Americas is being held and the interest of international capital will be presented to the FTAA/ALCA negotiations. A diverse mobilization of 10,000+ took action marching to the doors of the Sheraton Hotel. The mobilization, diverse unions, farmers, student and parties of left, had arrived without any problems at the fence surrounding the hotel. There were diverse columns met, the police began to repress with tear gas and rubber bullets and water canons. The demonstrators were pursued and divided by the streets of the city, while the mounted police, assault cars and riot squads waited to attack. Currently the numbers of arrests are unknown.

Compañeros from Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Chile and more took diverse actions and are united in declaring 'NO to ALCA/FTAA'. The police today took action in the name of the owners of the capital, with its shields, its bullets, its gases and for those fighting against capitalism, the only possible defense is national and international mobilization.

Updates will follow in the Argentina Indymedia newswire

As trade and finance ministers from 34 American governments gathered in Buenos Aires to finalize the text of the FTAA, activists prepared to confront them en masse at a demonstration planned for April 5, 6 and 7.

Activists oppose ALCA/FTAA, a thinly-veiled extension of NAFTA, which has given North American firms not only a giant market in which to sell their products, but also an inexhaustible supply of cheap labor, all supported by forms of semi-slavery (as in the "maquiladoras" of northern Mexico) and combined with brutal repression. All week they have been organizing info sessions, seminars, demonstrations and diverse actions, which will culminate in a grand March tomorrow. Large numbers of activists from other countries are expected as well, including several thousand from Brazil and Uruguay, where solidarity demonstrations will also be taking place. In addition, some groups and collectives will attempt to block the summit, including the Anticapitalistas de Lomas de Zamora, Bloqueoalca, Contraimagen, En Clave Roja/Jir-CI, Primavera de Praga and the OSL.

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