July, 20 2010, 02:01pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Brent Patterson, Director of Campaigns
(in
Brussels): 613-882-4408, bpatterson@canadians.org
Stuart Trew, Trade Campaigner
(in Canada):
647-222-9782; strew@canadians.org
6,000 Letters Opposing Canada-EU Trade Talks Delivered to Canadian Mission to European Union
BRUSSELS
As negotiations on the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and
Trade Agreement (CETA) continued in Belgium today, the Council of
Canadians delivered more than 6,000 letters opposing CETA to the Mission
of Canada to the European Union on Avenue de Tervueren in Brussels.
"This action sends a strong message to the Canadian government and to
the CETA negotiators here that Canadians have serious concerns about
this deal," says Brent Patterson, Director of Campaigns with the Council
of Canadians, in Brussels this week for the fourth round of
trans-Atlantic trade negotiations.
The letters call for the release of the full draft text of the proposed
CETA deal and cross-country public consultations before the next round
of negotiations can take place in Ottawa this October.
"I am very concerned by reports that this deal will be 'broader and more
ambitious' than NAFTA by including services, regulatory harmonization,
investor rights, and new and unreasonable limits on how local and
provincial governments spend money," say the more than 6,000 letters
submitted to the Council of Canadians to deliver to the Harper
government.
The Council of Canadians was part of a civil society delegation to
Brussels this week to explain to members of the European Parliament,
labour unions, farmers and other groups about the growing concerns with
the CETA deal in Canada. Mr. Patterson was joined by Stuart Trew and
Meera Karunananthan, trade and national water campaigners respectively
at the Council of Canadians, as well as by representatives from the
National Union of Public and General Employees, Canadian Centre for
Policy Alternatives, and ATTAC-Quebec.
Founded in 1985, the Council of Canadians is Canada's leading social action organization, mobilizing a network of 60 chapters across the country.
Office: (613) 233-4487, ext. 249LATEST NEWS
Amid Spying Fight, House Passes Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act
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While applauding the U.S. House of Representatives' bipartisan passage of a bill to ensure that "law enforcement and intelligence agencies can't do an end-run around the Constitution by buying information from data brokers" on Wednesday, privacy advocates highlighted that Congress is trying to extend and expand a long-abused government spying program.
The House voted 219-199 for Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act (FANFSA), which won support from 96 Democrats and 123 Republicans, including the lead sponsor, Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio). Named for the constitutional amendment that protects against unreasonable searches and seizures, H.R. 4639 would close what campaigners call the data broker loophole.
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Wednesday's vote followed the House sending the Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act to the Senate. H.R. 7888 would reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which allows for warrantless spying on noncitizens abroad but also sweeps up Americans' data.
The House notably included an amendment forcing a wide range of individuals and businesses to cooperate with government spying operations but rejected an amendment that would have added a warrant requirement to the bill, which the Senate could vote on as soon as Thursday.
Noting those decisions on the FISA reauthorization legislation, Ruddock stressed that "today's vote is a victory but follows a recent loss and ongoing threat as that Section 702 bill moves to the Senate this week too."
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Jeramie Scott, senior counsel and director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center's Project on Surveillance Oversight, also praised the House's FANFSA passage on Wednesday.
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Kia Hamadanchy, senior policy counsel at ACLU, similarly said Wednesday that "the bipartisan passage of this bill is a flashing warning sign to the government that if it wants our data, it must get a warrant."
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As the United Nations Security Council prepares to vote Thursday on Palestine's bid to become a full U.N. member, the Biden administration—which claims to support Palestinian statehood—is lobbying UNSC nations in an effort to wrangle enough "no" votes so that the United States can avoid resorting to a veto.
Leaked cables obtained by The Intercept show U.S. pressure on Security Council members including Malta—which currently presides over the body—and Ecuador.
While claiming that President Joe Biden backs "Palestinian aspirations for statehood," one of the cables asserts that "it remains the U.S. view that the most expeditious path toward a political horizon for the Palestinian people is in the context of a normalization agreement between Israel and its neighbors."
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The U.S. argument essentially is that the U.N. should not create an independent Palestinian state by fiat—even though that's precisely how the world body voted in 1947 to establish the modern state of Israel.
The renewed push for Palestine's U.N. membership comes as Israel wages a genocidal war on the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian Authority, which hasn't controlled Gaza for nearly two decades, rejected the Biden administration's requests to hold off on seeking full membership.
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As The Intercept's Ken Klippenstein and Daniel Boguslaw noted:
Since 2011, the U.N. Security Council has rejected the Palestinian Authority's request for full member status. On April 2, the Palestinian Observer Mission to the U.N. requested that the council once again take up consideration of its membership application. According to the first State Department cable, U.N. meetings since the beginning of April suggest that Algeria, China, Guyana, Mozambique, Russia, Slovenia, Sierra Leone, and Malta support granting Palestine full membership to the U.N. It also says that France, Japan, and Korea are undecided, while the United Kingdom will likely abstain from a vote.
Along with the United States, China, France, Russia, and the United Kingdom are permanent members of the UNSC, so they also have veto power.
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Belgium—which is seeking economic sanctions against Israel in response to its genocidal war on Gaza—is expected to join Spain's push for Palestinian statehood after the country's European Union presidency expires in June.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—who has also claimed to support a so-called "two-state solution"—has alternately boasted about thwarting Palestinian statehood.
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