NEWS FLASH

Participants from Nepal, Liberia, Nigeria and Bangladesh (14 in all), have been denied entry into the U.S. to participate in the PGA Caravan by the U.S. State Department.

Meet the Caravan Participants

The Peoples' Global Action was founded in 1988 when 400 representatives of grassroots movements from 71 countries, who had met through the Zapatista call for resistance, met in Geneva. Three months later, as the G8 countries met in Birmingham and the WTO met in Geneva, 200.000 Indian peasant farmers met in Hyderabad and marched to demand India's withdrawal from the WTO. Over 30 Reclaim The Streets parties in over 20 countries took place, while in Brasilia 50.000 unemployed, workers and landless peasants took to the streets. This year, when the G8 met in Cologne, 500 people from all continents traveled Europe for one month in the Intercontinental Caravan 99 to protest against the new economic world order. The hallmarks of PGA include "a confrontational attitude" and a "clear rejection" of the WTO, a call to non-violent civil disobedience and local alternatives by local people. At the 2nd conference in August this year a fifth hallmark was added, rejecting "patriarchy, racism, religious fundamentalism and all forms of discrimination and domination."

 

Sanjay Mangala is a representative of the National Alliance of Peoples Movements (NAPM), an Indian network including organizations such as National Fish Workers Forum, the NBA's struggle for a free Narmada River and the Dalits (Untouchables) movement.

Rony Armon is an Israeli activist with Green Action, an environmental group focusing on transportation, but also on other issues like coastline conservation and promotion of recycling. In addition Green Action works on educating the public about the dangers of "free" trade.

Sagi Jacobson is an Israel activist with Green Course, an environmental education movement. Last summer he'd been involved in the organizing of a seashore protecting tour. He's heading to Seattle, in order to demonstrate "how the WTO's fright Israelis bite".

Hagit Ganini is an Israel animal rights activist. McDonalds is just one of the international corporations, the Animal Rights Anonymous Activists had been targeting at, and so is Procter & Gamble - well known for animal tested products.

Guido España is a chemical engineer from Bolivia. España researches contamination of rivers by mineral waste, particularly heavy metals and the effects of contaminants on the ecosystem and on genes. España also investigates contracts between transnational oil companies and the Bolivian government. Most of the contracts are signed in secret with large benefits and tax-breaks for the companies. Under the pretense of neo-liberalism, the Bolivian government robs indigenous people of the lands that they have inhabited for thousands of years. The majority of the population finds itself receiving low wages and subsisting on polluted lands. For this reason España is looking to unite forces with people from other countries to confront these companies from all sides and destroy them.

Taira Stanley is from Panama and is a member of the Youth Movement of Kuna, an organization that works for the economic social and environmental culture of the indigenous youth of the Kuna people. She has come to educate people about the problems of indigenous society in Panama. Stanley focuses especially on the consequences of Intellectual Property Rights and the WTO which are violating the human rights indigenous people and destroying their lands.

Clemente "Ibe": is from Panama as well and also a member of the of the Youth Movement of Kuna. He's defending the autonomy, the culture and the viability of the Kuna's way of life.

Dennis Morton is with Operation Sal'AMI, a Montrealdirect action group working against the Multinational Agreement on Investment (MAI).

Asif Rasheed is from Pakistan and represents the AWAMI Committee for Development, a network of agricultural workers, industrial workers and women in South Punjab. AWAMI has been working for twelve years for Human Rights, Peace and Development. On the achievement of these three objectives they are running different types of activities.

For Human Rights it is running more than 60 public meetings in rural areas with information about Human Rights, government duties and constitutional rights. Through these meetings they are building a network between people for their empowerment.

In South Punjab the educational standard is very low, people have no confidence in their own power, so even one policeman can threaten a whole village. AWAMI is also producing literature for its awareness campaign. When people get in trouble with local authorities they provide some technical assistance such as law information. The awareness campaign also contains sharp issue seminars like on the WTO. On WTO AWAMI had organized five seminars for intellectuals, public opinion makers, students and business men, common persons and also government officials. The manifesto and other literature of Peoples' Global Action had been translated in Urdu, the local language, and more than 10.000 times, also in rural areas. From 28th Nov to 3rd Dec AWAMI is organizing public demonstrations and direct actions in 16 districts head quarters. In these events more than 30.000 are expected. The main demonstration on the 30th of November will be hold in Multan, where approximately 10.000 people will participate.

AWAMI is running different activities for the development of women, because in the rural area women are facing problems and live in chain situations. Through skill centers women are able to leave their homes, in an area where a woman mustn't leave the house without permission by a male member of her family. Through these activities women strengthen their abilities and their agency. Women are getting extra income, through this income women are making stable strong economical position in the house. After this training and enterprise women are empowered to participate in house decision makings.

After the nuclear test AWAMI has focused on this issue more than before. AWAMI believes that the Pakistan government is destroying the recourses on nuclear research, while people are suffering. After the nuclear test AWAMI has organized three demonstrations and launched a long period campaign against nuclear power. Due to these activities the government has arrested AWAMI's main activist Mohammad Rafque Abdul Raouf Majeed Ullah Mir Sultan, and 14 other members. Also AWAMI is facing social problems from religious leaders, because they are in favor of nuclear tests. Besides of Peoples' Global Action AWAMI

Michael Charder is a psychologist and an archivist and in addition he's involved in Reclaim The Streets London and local activism to better his community. Hes one of the co-founders of Kings Cross Railway Lands Group which successfully fought the multinational development of the 135 acre site in London. The multinational went bankrupt and the site is still under negotiation. He also founded Unimundal Monad, a pro-active information distribution network.

Friederike Habermann is an economist and fights as part of the autonomous movement in Germoney not less then capitalism, racism and sexism.

Parvathi and Veeranna Kalasannavar join us in San Francisco. They belong to the Karnataka State Farmers Association (KRRS), India, famous for their radical protests against agromultinationals: they went into the offices of Cargill, took the papers out and burned them, and they burned a genetically modified cotton field of Monsanto. They also initiated the InterContinental Caravan of 500 activists from all over the world through Europe during the G7 in spring this year, including 400 farmers of India. Last year in India 300 farmers committed suicide because they didn't know any more how to pay back their debts to the agromultis. 10 million farmers consider themselves as part of KRRS. KRRS is a member of La Via Campesina, the global association of farmers movements. It needs resistance to reclaim independency and self determination, they declay, local resistance, and global resistance.

Joy Marcotte is originally from Oregon. She became involved in organizing this caravan.

What the hell would we be doing without Jeff?
Jeff Dardozzi, an independent filmmaker, intended to be an independent filmmaker who followed the caravan from stop to stop. But things never work out quite the way we hope. He has now become our fairy godmother (so to speak) repairing our bus, chauffeuring us at top speed from place to place, and generally looking intimidatingly cool. He even lets us use his digital camera and laptop. What would we do without him?

This is Lars. Lars met Jeff a day before the caravan took-off, and told him that he thought itd be a great idea to head Seattle, and wondered if Jeff might get bored on the way. So Lars joined Jeff joining us.

And there is Air. We met Air in Boston where first he cooked for us and then joined the crew who painted the bus. Two days later at midnight in the middle of nowhere in Western Massachuchets he showed up at our fire-side. Hitchhiking to catch up with us wasnt hard, given the speed of our bus, and so - here he is! Helping with bus repairing and with Spanish translations he's yet another of the many who will eventually join us in Seattle!

Roman Fliegels accent still tells he's German, although Roman himself doesn't hear it anymore after five years in San Francisco. There he studied economics in order to be qualified enough for driving the Mexican bus (go to S.F. and find out about yourself). And he's got not only the accent in common with Arnold Schwarzenegger: He's a hero too. Realizing the seriousness of the situation (caravan without bus driver) he has not hesitated to abandon his normal life in the Mexican bus to change it with the risky life in our caravan bus.

"I had to stop you, because in twenty years of service I've never seen a vehicle like this!" admits the cop. Was it the beauty of the limo itself that made him say this, or the cruise missile on top? While the missile might appear pretty much as a phallic symbol, Jeff insists on the female sex of his limo. "It's just strapped on", he says, and he must know it. He knew her already before she queered.