Honduras President Zelaya invited to address UN GA

Honduras' Zelaya invited to address UN Assembly
Mon Jun 29, 2009 1:35pm EDT
Reuters

UNITED NATIONS, June 29 (Reuters) - U.N. General Assembly President Miguel D'Escoto said on Monday he had invited ousted Honduras President Manuel Zelaya to address the assembly "as soon as possible."

"I have sent a letter to the President of Honduras ... to come to the United Nations and address the General Assembly as soon as possible and give us an updated report on events in his country," D'Escoto said.

D'Escoto, a former foreign minister in the left-wing Sandinista government of Nicaragua in the 1980s, was speaking at an assembly session he had convened to discuss the coup in Honduras.

The Honduran military seized Zelaya and flew him to Costa Rica on Sunday amid a dispute over Zelaya's bid to extend presidential terms in office. (Reporting by Patrick Worsnip, Editing by Sandra Maler)

WIDF's United Nations Session Speaks Reality: "No Sugar Coating"

WIDF's United Nations Session Speaks Reality: "No Sugar Coating"

by Mike Tolochko

Amuge Rebecca Otengo, a leading member of the Ugandan Parliament, is attending the United National Commission on the Status of Women. She has attended general, main sessions and also participated in a seminar just before the Women's International Democratic Federation [WIDF] special seminar. She was about to leave the room, but something told her to stay. After attending the session she said: "They didn't sugar coat the reality, in this session." That was her comment about the session. She lead off her remarks with solidarity for Palestinian women and support for the Cuban 5's demand for justice.

This special seminar was held in Conference Room C in the Afternoon of March 9. The Annual Commission on the Status of Women was entering its second week.

Vinie Burrows, the Permanent Representative to the United Nations from the WIDF chaired the session. Ms Burrows is a world renounced actor and political activist.

She welcomed everyone with a brief description of the WIDF's beginnings. "The WIDF is as old as the UN itself." Its headquarters are in Brasil and has affiliate locations on all continents around the world.

Ms Burrows announced that Marcia de Campos the President of the World International Democratic Federation, was in Conference Room 2 delivering her prepared remarks to a main session of the CSW. She will return after her remarks are delivered.

The next speaker was Skevi Koukouma. She is a member of the Greek Parliament and a leader of AKEL, the Progressive Party of the Working People and a member of the WIDF Steering Committee, was the next speaker. Ms Koukouma reported on the current situation in Cyprus. She said that there are 200,000 refugees from the turbulence over the past years, ever since the invasion of the Turkish government in 1974 of Cyprus. Cyprus is 37% Turkish. She reported that a special United Nations Committee assigned to uncover grave cites has found many dead people. Through the use of DNA, the families of both Turkish and Cypriots were able to identify their family members who died. There are tireless efforts to being unity to the island. Recently, Turkish and Cypriot women met at point just in front of the Turkish army and tied a ribbon in solidarity for peace. It is for these reasons that Cypriots have a special relationship to the Palestinian people. She also voiced complete support for justice for the Cuban 5.

This ribbon ceremony was meant to symbolize the unification of the island. She said that they need the full support of the United Nations and the full international community to expel from the Island all occupiers.

The next speaker was Maritzel Gonzalez from the Republic of Cuba. Ms. Gonzalez described that Cuban Federation of Woman which has a membership of 4 million women. The full island population is 11 million with half the population being women. The minimum age to join the Federation is 14 years old. She described the work of the Cuban Federation of Women in the field of social work. There are now 71,000 social workers in Cuba. They deal with the rights of women and follow up when the rights of women are being denied.

They investigate and correct acts of violence against women and similar family issues.

The Federation just ended its 8th Congress this past week.

She reported that 43.32% of the Cuban parliament is women.

Of special attention is the freeing of the Cuban 5 and the rights of the families of the Cuban 5 to visit them in the U.S. prisons.

Professor Delia de Dios from the University of Mexico. Dr. De Dios is a professor of sociology. She is the general secretary of the trade union of university women. She talked about the ever-increasing number of women being employed in Mexico. And, while that is good news, the jobs that they are being employed in are low paying jobs and are in the so-called "informal market." In fact, the number of women working in Mexico has increased from 13.6% in 1950 to over 42% in 2001.

Vinie Burrows announced that Emily Naffa a member of the WIDF steering committee from Jordan had to return home. Ms Burrows reported that over 4 million Iraqi's are refugees from Iraq living in Jordan.

Dr. Frank Goldsmith was then asked to deliver comments. He reported that Lorena Jaime, the special representative from the World Federation of Trade Union, was asked to deliver comments to the main assembly last Wednesday. Dr. Goldsmith is the permanent representative for the WFTU at the UN. Ms Jaime was unable, then to deliver, her report since the time ran out at the end of the session. Dr. Goldsmith then read her comments. He added that the WFTU was contacted again, but very late and a far too short notice to again deliver WFTU remarks on Monday morning. [For her statement see the previous PA Blog.]

Ms Burrows then ask for those attending the session to give comments. It was then that Amuge Rebecca Otengo gave her impassioned comments about the importance of this session.

She said that the crisis in Northern Uganda is reaching very bad proportions. She reported that the children are being taken from their families and being turned into fighters. And, when they return, that is all they know. It is a very dangerous situation. Ms Otengo said that this was the best session at the whole two-week session.

Maria Fernanda Carvalho Francisco from Angola then spoke. She said that after 40years of war there is finally peace for 5 years. She voiced complete solidarity with the Palestinians and for the Cuban 5.

Joanne Robinson from Peace Action International said that the importance of reconciliation on the African continent is crucial.

A representative from the country of Cameroon spoke. She voice solidarity with the Cuba and Palestine. She spoke in French and fortunately there was a French speaker in the session that could translate.

Finally, a representative from Nigeria spoke about the Niger Delta and the problems in that region. She works at Delta University as a linguist. A problem in the Niger beach is the growing number of Europeans immigrating there.

By this time, Marcia Campos returned after delivering her remarks to the full governing body in Conference Room 2. She said that the main economic demand must be to nationalize the banks and keep them nationalized. She voiced solidarity with the continent of Africa and called for the dumping of the debt. She ended her comments at the Commission: "We will fight so that the states are mobilized to guarantee the maintenance of jobs and we women will continue to show the way through and out of this crisis for the good of all human beings and the development of our countries. It is appropriate for the United Nations to supervise these measures and to demand that Member states do not allow the onus of this economic crisis to fall on the shoulders of workers with special attention to women workers so that there is guaranteed jobs and protected wages."

Meritzel Gonzalez from Cuba asked to speak. She thanked everyone for their support and she gave back solidarity with everyone's struggles.

Vinie Burrows closed that session by thanking everyone for attending

Note:
Photos Identification

Skevi Koukouma
Vinie Burrows
Delia de Dios
Maritzel Gonzalez
Amuge Rebecca Otengo
Maria Fernanda Carvalho Francisco

UN Millennium Development Goals Review

by Mike Tolochko

The Millennium Development Goals [MDGs]
Third World Summit

Monday, May 19, 2008
Location, Conference Room 2
United Nations, USA

A brief report.

It was not clear who was in charge of this important meeting where Kofi Anan's epic initiative on the MDGs would be discussed and possibly evaluated. The three-hour meeting was brought to order by the head of the powerful UN Department on Economic and Social Affairs, ECOSOC. But, then in her introductory remarks she drew attention to the Virtue Foundation and a group called, Women Together as the launchers of the meeting. It was hard to figure out what was going on.

The Virtue Foundation was established and is essentially run by a NYC dental philanthropist and Women Together is a NGO working mostly out of Barcelona, Spain.

At the outset it was clear that this would not be what many had hoped for, i.e., an evaluation of the progress being made by each of the 8 MDGs. The MDGs were launched about 8 years ago and there are just 7 more years to go.

It turned out that those reporting on the goals would be showing some examples, very limited examples, of how each of the Goals could be achieved. They did not seem to be charged with evaluating progress on that Goal.

Goal #1 Ending Poverty

A leader from an international credit agency called, Microcredit Summit Campaign, showed how lending a few dollars to people in dire poverty significantly help elevated that person out of poverty. The solution was clearly a market solution and not one that would be government driven.

The role of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the World Trade Organization were not even mentioned.

While this report, probably the most important of the MDG, was clearly not getting very far, the representative of the group stepped out her role as a banker. She made it clear to everyone in the room that the recent skyrocketing cost of food is setting back all efforts to move toward the elimination of poverty by 2015. She said the cost of food is up 30% and rice is up 50%. This is very bad for the most impoverished countries. She said that, for example, in Sri Lanka where 80% of income is spent on food; the percent is now far higher. In developed countries, the percent is in single digits. The year of 2007 up to present is a food crisis period that must be addressed.

Goal #2 Primary School Education

This report focused only on limited progress in a few Central America countries. The educational conditions in Nicaragua were reported as being very poor. They reported that for this Goal Costa Rica, Panama and Honduras are doing pretty good.

Goal #3 Gender Equality and Empowerment of Women

This reporter focused on Brazil where she said progress was being made, but a backlash was taking place against the progress. She called for help there. The reporter was very distressed at these developments.

Goal #4 Child Mortality

The example here was pediatric hospital in Barcelona where administrators made the atmosphere a better place to delivery services. Barcelona is a very advanced developed country with resources far greater than the countries that are receiving MDG attention. Somehow, this example bore little resembles the tremendous problems of child mortality in developing and exploited countries.

Goals #5 & #6 Maternal Death and HIV/AIDS

The physician, from a major NYC academic medical center, delivering this case example spoke about the value of drugs to curb the HIV/AIDS crisis. The report was more pure research and clinical rather a policy driven. That was about it.

Goal #7 Environmental Sustainability

A corporate representative gave this very brief presentation. No mention was made of the UN's concentration around Climate Change and other environmental problems.

Goal #8 Global Partnership for Development

The only reporter to actually deliver a policy approach to the MDGs and one, which former UN Secretary-General would have been proud of, was Mireia Belil, from Barcelona and head of a group called Forum de las Culturas Foundation. Her brief comments were right to the point. She quoted Albert Einstein in regard to how to achieve the MDGs by the year 2015, "No problem can be solved from the same level that created it." This is probably her version that if your part of the problem, you cannot be part of the solution.

She showed a lot of fire by her very aggressively stating that, "Money is NO excuse for not achieving the goals." She added, "The money is there; redistribution is the issue." She received strong applause.

NGOs Speak UP

During the very brief question and answer part of the day, each NGO representative expressed frustration at the day's reports. One representative was particularly angry that there was not even one mention of the Goals and African and Southern Asia.

Whither the MDGs?

Given the nature of the Reports and the very poor turnout, less than 100 were in the large room, the future of the MDGs doesn't look good. The three-hour meeting was extremely disappointing.

Guest Blog: UN Conference of NGOs Takes on Climate Change

By Marc Brodine

The 60th annual Conference of the UN's Non-Governmental Organizations is taking place in NYC. The theme this year is Climate Change. There are about 2,600 attendees, most representing an NGO, and coming from over 80 countries.

The first morning, there were welcoming speeches, mostly pretty good, about the general issue and the UN's approach. The speeches addressed the seriousness of the impacts on all the countries of the world from the climate change which is already occurring, forcefully noting that the countries which are already receiving the brunt of the impact are poor countries least able to mitigate the impacts and also the countries which have contributed the least to causing the problems.

I attended two afternoon workshops, the first on soil and agriculture. The panel explained how the increased reliance on chemical fertilizers and pesticides have distorted agricultural development, moving farmers away from sustainable farming practices and driving poor farmers into more debt, leading to larger agribusiness monoculture industrial farming. This is depleting the soil, driving poor farmers off their lands, forcing destructive increased urbanization, and leading to abandonment of land whose farming potential has been destroyed by speeded-up destruction of the soil.

The solutions are moving away from industrial farming towards more labor intensive natural agricultural practices, increased use of natural composting of grasses, leaves, manure, more crop rotation, use of locally-adapted natural plants and seeds, cooperative farming methods and teaching, and moving away from farming for the market to farming with long-term sustainability of the productive potential of the land taking precedence. Examples were given from Japan and Zambia of successful efforts to carry out such a program, resulting in yields both higher than industrial farming and more sustainable, for our long-term food security.

The second workshop focused on the latest scientific understanding. There is still a great deal not known about how our atmosphere, weather, and oceans are going to react to the increased temperature caused by greenhouse gases. but we are already seeing increased melting of ice sheets in Greenland and the Antarctic, and threatening rises in sea level. The science is more certain than ever that global warming is happening, that human activity is causing it, and that we are in for much more serious effects, such as increased incidence of extreme weather events.

While much valuable information and discussion are taking place, often the speakers explain the problems caused by the market, by private capital, but they don't take the next step of pointing out the need for socialism, for an alternative to the system that is causing the problems.

More later...