[News] ALBA Summit vows to fight Climate Change with System Change

[Anti-Imperialist News]

ALBA Summit in Venezuela vows to fight Climate Change with System Change

Apr 21st 2010 , by Kiraz Janicke - Venezuelanalysis.com

Caracas, April 20, 2010 (venezuelanalysis.com) – 
During the IXth Summit of the Bolivarian Alliance 
for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA) held in 
Caracas, Venezuela, April 18 to 19, member 
countries of the regional fair-trade bloc, 
founded in 2004, signed an agreement to 
consolidate regional integration and sovereignty 
with the aim of building socialism.

The heads of states and governments of Ecuador, 
Rafael Correa; Cuba, Raul Castro; Bolivia, Evo 
Morales; Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega; and the prime 
ministers of Antigua and Barduda, Winston 
Baldwin; Dominica, Roosevelt Skerrit; and St. 
Vincent and the Grenadines, Ralph Gonsalves and 
Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, ratified these objectives 
in the text of a document entitled the “Caracas 
Manifesto Consolidating the New Independence.”

A central theme of the summit was the global 
climate crisis, which according to the leaders of 
the ALBA member countries, is a product of the capitalist economic model.

Speaking to his ALBA counterparts, Bolivian 
President Evo Morales, who this week is hosting 
the World People's Conference on Climate Change 
and the Rights of Mother Earth in Cochabamba, 
said, “The hour to combat the capitalist economic 
model and system, which has caused so much damage 
to life and humanity, has arrived.”

The “crisis of world capitalism” was demonstrated 
by the failure of the UN Climate Summit in 
Copenhagen last year Morales said. “They did not 
approve the documents from our countries due to 
the pressure of North American imperialism,” he explained.

“We have a commitment; our responsibility is not 
only to save Latin America, but care for humanity which inhabits our lands.”

The key banner of struggle against capitalism and 
unbridled industrialization “is the defence of 
mother earth” because “each and every one of us 
are children of our mother earth,” Morales argued.

He castigated the capitalist model because this 
system “does not take into account the serious 
damage it does to humanity and
the plunder of natural resources.”

Cuban President Raul Castro emphasised the need 
to raise awareness about the implications of 
climate change and in particular the need to 
reduce carbon emissions and other environmental 
pollutants, otherwise the planet will begin to 
“make us pay” for all the ecological damage we 
are causing, “Everyday we get closer to the point of no return” he warned.

The summit affirmed the “firmest support” for the 
World People's Conference on Climate Change and 
the Rights of Mother Earth in Bolivia.

Anti-imperialist unity

The summit also dealt with issues such as 
defence, the negative impacts of capitalism, the 
threat of U.S. imperialism towards ALBA countries 
and the need to strengthen the process of independence in the region.

Castro stressed the importance of unity among 
ALBA countries and also more broadly in the 
region in the context of an increased 
“imperialist campaign that aims to put an end to the progressive governments.”

In particular the statement called for “concerted 
political action” to expose the hypocrisy and 
double standards in international relations shown 
by the United States and expressed “preoccupation 
over the excessive presence of foreign military forces in Haiti”

Also adopted was a condemnation of the United 
States unilateral economic blockade of Cuba and 
for increased efforts to free the Cuban Five.

The statement also declared support for the 
unanimous decision of the Rio Group summit in 
Mexico earlier this year to hold the founding 
summit of the Community of Latin American and 
Caribbean States, a hemispheric-wide organisation 
without the United States or Canada, in Venezuela in June 2011.

The ALBA summit also affirmed the continued 
struggle to promote social justice, human rights 
and economic independence the across the region 
through strengthening cooperation over health, 
education and poverty reduction programs and 
facilitating fair trade through the Sucre – a 
virtual currency system - amongst other projects.

Chavez outlined some of the achievements of the 
ALBA process in the field of assistance programs 
for people with disabilities, saying, “A total of 
897,883 people with disabilities have been seen 
in six of the countries that comprise the ALBA”

He also reported that some 2,052,931 homes have 
been visited on activities undertaken by groups 
of specialists who visit house to house in order 
to comprehensively address the living conditions 
of persons with disabilities among other things.

“We're showing what we can do by joining together 
and breaking with the capitalist model,” he said.

Social movements

The declaration also outlined the necessity to 
promote the development of social movements and 
the formation of the ALBA Council of Social 
Movements, following the creation of a national 
council of social movements in each country.

ALBA will only achieve real unity by promoting 
unity from the grassroots, of the peoples, not from above, Chavez argued.

In addition, the Caracas Manifesto agreed to 
convene a summit of indigenous and 
afro-descendent movements June 3 to 4 in the town of Otavalo, Ecuador.

The closing ceremony of the summit, which 
included the participation of representatives 
from communal councils and social organisations 
from around the country, concluded a week of 
activities celebrating the bicentenary of the 
establishment of Venezuela’s first government 
independent of Spanish colonial rule, on April 19 
1810, which sparked off a broader independence struggle across the continent.

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Source URL (retrieved on 21/04/2010 - 12:09pm): 
<http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/5296>http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/5296




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