Full coverage: Governance

30.04.2004 En avril 1994, l'ensemble de la communauté internationale avait les yeux rivés sur les premières élections multiraciales de l'histoire de l'Afrique du Sud. Deux défis attendaient Nelson Mandela et son nouveau gouvernement : en plus d'avoir à garantir une réconciliation nationale essentielle, il devait rapidement s'attaquer à restructurer un système économique où la richesse des Blancs n'avait été « gagnée » que par l'exclusion et l'exploitation directe des travailleurs africains, métis et asiatiques. Dix ans plus tard, les inégalités s'aggravent.

30.04.2004 BC health workers are holding to their protest lines, in defiance of Thursday's controversial back-to-work legislation. Bill 37 imposed deep concessions on 43,000 workers, including a 15 per cent wage rollback and no protection against the continuing contracting-out of jobs to low-wage private firms. See webvideo footage from the lines outside Vancouver General Hospital, where the Hospital Employees' Union announced its intention to keep fighting.

30.04.2004 Billions of people still can't access basic water and sanitation services. Thousands die daily from preventable disease as a result. As the world's water crisis deepens, there's a drive to have water recognized as a human right - not a scarce commodity to be tapped for profit. But in 2002, Canada cast the sole vote against that idea at the UN Commission on Human Rights.

29.04.2004 Canada's largest union calls this morning's strike-breaking legislation in BC a frontal assault on women and public medicare. "If men held these jobs," said CUPE President Paul Moist, "and if [Premier] Campbell weren't determined to open up the health care system to foreign corporations, these workers wouldn't be on strike and the Liberals wouldn't be gutting their contracts."

29.04.2004 Chinese officials hinted darkly that if Canadian politicians expressed support for Tibetan independence in meetings with a visiting Dalai Lama, there could be fallout for our bilateral trade. Economist Jim Stanford calls it a great offer, since "evidence is mounting that trade with China is doing us much more harm than good."

29.04.2004 Just four days in, BC's Liberals are legislating an end to job action by 43,000 health workers in 10 unions. Bill 37 imposes a 15 per cent wage rollback, a longer work week and no protection against the continuing contracting-out of jobs to low-wage private firms. The Bill received Royal Assent at 6:30 a.m. this morning after an all-night session. No word yet on whether health unions will defy the order - or whether other unions will move toward a rumoured general solidarity strike.

29.04.2004 Amnistía Internacional, Médicos Sin Fronteras, Intermón Oxfam y Greenpeace han pedido al nuevo Gobierno que cumpla sus compromisos electorales y dé un giro de 180 grados en la política de transferencia de armas. Las entidades han realizado esta demanda durante la presentación del anuario Alerta 2004 de la Escuela de Cultura de Paz de la UAB, un estudio que ofrece un diagnóstico sobre el estado del mundo y que, según las ONG, da datos útiles para "guiar la política española sobre transferencia de armas".

29.04.2004 Amnistia Internacional, Metges Sense Fronteres, Intermón Oxfam i Greenpeace han demanat al nou Govern que compleixi el seus compromisos electorals i doni un gir de 180 graus en la política de transferència d'armes. Les entitats han realitzat aquesta demanda durant la presentació de l'anuari Alerta 2004 de l'Escola de Cultura de Pau de la UAB, un estudi que, segons les ONG, ofereix un diagnòstic sobre l'estat del món amb dades útils que "han de guiar la política espanyola sobre transferència d'armes".

29.04.2004 Finally, Bill C-9 will go to Parliament this week for third and final reading. That will end nearly a year of wrangling over legislation aimed at allowing the export of affordable generic medicines to developing countries. A coalition of NGOs welcomed this final step from Canada ... while urging other countries to do much better.

29.04.2004 Three Canadians will be killed today in the peaceful pursuit of a living. Thousands more will be made sick or disabled by their work. Each year, a thousand are killed, a million more injured. Today, on labour's international day of mourning, we reflect on the price so many have paid.

29.04.2004 With Prime Minister Paul Martin scheduled to meet George W. Bush on Friday and the Canadian Council of Chief Executives pushing what it calls "deep integration" with the United States, Maude Barlow says she "couldn't have picked a better time" to launch a speaking tour in opposition to the initiative.

29.04.2004 Il Ministro Martino (che cosa avrà da ridere ogni volta che viene ripreso in Tv? è tanto compiaciuto di sé? trova che viviamo nel migliore dei mondi possibili?) ora sostiene che in Iraq bisogna mandare la Nato, opinione non tanto originale dato che il ministro della guerra degli Usa lo ripete da tempo. La Nato deve entrare in Iraq senza tener conto della data del 30 giugno, abbandonata come passaggio del comando dalla Coalizione alle N. U. - di Lidia Menapace

28.04.2004 When Paul Martin visits George Bush this week, Canadian involvement in missile defence will be on the table. And look who's out breaking his trail to Washington: On April 19-20, the Canadian Council of Chief Executives met with Chief of Staff Andrew Card, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, and Homeland Security Advisor General John Gordon.

28.04.2004 A Bolívia, parlar d'accés gratuït i sostingut als antiretrovirals és il·lusori i llunyà, tot i les promeses dels polítics. L'Estat només busca donacions d'altres països però no garanteix la continuïtat del tractament, segons afirma en aquest article Andrés Vargas, de l'Instituto para el Desarrollo Humano - SidAcción de Bolívia. Vargas adverteix que les autoritats es limiten a observar només el cost dels medicaments i no veuen el problema global a mig termini que representa el VIH/sida: importants costos hospitalaris per malalties oportunistes, disminució de la força laboral, i augment de nens orfes, entre altres.

28.04.2004 El president de Veneçuela, Hugo Chávez, es va comprometre la setmana passada a anul.lar els contractes per a la producció i comercialització d’organismes modificats genèticament. El posicionament va respondre a la petició de Vía Campesina que exigia l’anul.lació d’aquests contractes al considerar que atemptaven contra la sobirania dels pobles.

28.04.2004 Brasil ha aceptado liderar la fuerza internacional de paz de las Naciones Unidas en Haití, a partir del próximo 1 de julio, cuando los Cascos Azules tomarán el relevo a la fuerza encabezada por EE.UU., que desplazó al Presidente Jean- Bertrand Aristide del poder el pasado 29 de febrero. Esta fuerza está compuesta actualmente por 3700 efectivos de EE.UU., Canadá, Francia y Chile.

27.04.2004 During the first Iraq war, Howard Zinn wrote that George Bush Sr. did talk about oil. "Then he got the notion that this is embarrassing. People will not die for oil. They will die for words: democracy, liberation, freedom..." A Canadian interviews one of America's most influential intellectuals.

27.04.2004 Yesterday, on the 18th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster, environment groups urged Ontario to reconsider its own nuclear strategy. Exactly two years ago, in what it called a "logical response to Chernobyl," Germany passed a nuclear phaseout law closing all 19 of its reactors at the end of their operating lives.

27.04.2004 Legislation tabled yesterday will soon end a month-long strike by 20,000 public workers in Newfoundland. Staying off the job will earn termination for workers and steep fines for unions and their leaders. The bill enforces a two-year wage freeze and seals sweeping concessions sought by the province's Tory government.

27.04.2004 Life in the highrise jungle of urban post-communism is not for the fainthearted. New Internationalist's Richard Swift takes the measure of a new capitalism – that’s all shock and no therapy.