[News] Evo Morales calls on world leaders to adopt proposals from the peoples’ summit

[Anti-Imperialist News]

TWO articles follow

Bolivian President Evo Morales on President 
Obama: “I Can’t Believe a Black President Can 
Hold So Much Vengeance Against an Indian President”

http://www.democracynow.org/2010/4/23/bolivian_president_evo_morales_to_president

As the World Peoples’ Conference on Climate 
Change in Cochabamba closes, we speak to Bolivian 
President Evo Morales about the US decision to 
cut off climate aid to Bolivia; narcotrafficking; 
the tenth anniversary of the Water Wars in 
Cochabamba; the protest at the San Cristóbal 
silver mine; and the contradiction between 
promoting the environment and extractive 
industries­oil/natural gas exploration, mining.

On Thursday organizers of the peoples’ summit 
released an Agreement of the Peoples based on 
working group meetings. Key proposals include the 
establishment of an international tribunal to 
prosecute polluters, passage of a Universal 
Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth, 
protection for climate migrants, and the full 
recognition of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.


AMY GOODMAN: We’re broadcasting from Bolivia in 
the town of Tiquipaya, just outside Cochabamba. 
On Thursday, the World Peoples’ Summit on Climate 
Change and Rights of Mother Earth concluded with 
a major rally at the Félix Capriles Stadium in 
Cochabamba featuring Bolivian President Evo 
Morales and Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.

Over the past three days of the summit, known 
here simply as “La Cumbre,” seventeen working 
groups met to discuss various climate-related 
issues, from climate debt to the dangers of 
carbon trading. Last night, summit organizers 
released an Agreement of the Peoples based on the working group meetings.

Key proposals include the establishment of an 
international tribunal to prosecute polluters, 
passage of a Universal Declaration of the Rights 
of Mother Earth, protection for climate migrants, 
and the full recognition of the UN Declaration on 
the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The peoples’ 
summit also condemned a proposed forest program 
known as REDD, or Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation.

At Thursday’s rally, Bolivian President Evo 
Morales called on world leaders to adopt these 
proposals from the peoples’ summit.

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] If we apply 
and implement all of the conclusions of this 
World Conference on the Rights of Mother Earth, 
Cochabamba will be a hope to the world. What the 
governments of developed countries suggest is 
allowing the earth to warm two degrees or more. 
Clearly, the proposals coming from some working 
groups are not solutions, but ways to cook all of humanity.

AMY GOODMAN: Bolivian President Evo Morales, 
speaking before over 15,000 people in Cochabamba’s largest soccer stadium.

In the hours before the rally, supporters of 
Morales filled the sidewalks of the city. Morales 
is the first indigenous president of Bolivia, and 
much of his support comes from the majority indigenous population.

Signs of Bolivia’s vibrant indigenous culture 
were on full display outside and inside the 
stadium. Many indigenous women wore bowler hats 
and flared skirts. The sound of pan flutes and 
the Andean string instrument, the charango, could 
be heard throughout the stadium as several 
musical acts gave impromptu performances on the 
field. Bolivian women and children sold empanadas and fresh juices.

At the rally, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez 
warned that capitalism could lead to the destruction of the planet.

PRESIDENT HUGO CHÁVEZ: [translated] We will not 
submit to the hegemony of the imperial Yankees. 
You can even write it down. If the hegemony of 
capitalism continues on this planet, human life 
will one day come to an end. For those of you who 
believe that’s an exaggeration, one must remember 
this: the planet lived for millions of years without the human species.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, 
democracynow.org, the War and Peace Report. We’re 
broadcasting from Cochabamba. Again, you were 
listening to the closing ceremony and the closing 
speeches at Cochabamba’s largest soccer stadium. 
It took place on Earth Day. You just heard the 
President Evo Morales. You also heard, as well, 
President Chávez. In just a moment, we are going 
to be joined by President Morales. He has just 
arrived by van. He’s coming up the stairs. So 
we’ll go to a break, some of the remarkable 
indigenous music that has been playing throughout 
the area, and then we’ll be joined by the president of Bolivia, Evo Morales.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: As the World Peoples’ Summit on 
Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth 
concludes, we are joined now by Bolivian 
President Evo Morales. Following the failed 
Copenhagen climate talks in December, Morales 
issued a call to hold the peoples’ summit to give 
the poor and the Global South an opportunity to 
strategize on fighting climate change. President 
Morales joins us now for the hour. We’re here at 
the Universidad del Valle­Uni. del Valle, it’s called here­in Tiquipaya.

Welcome to Democracy Now!, President Morales.

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] Thank you very much.

AMY GOODMAN: You have joined us in New York 
several times on Democracy Now! We are very 
honored to be here in your country, in Bolivia.

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] And thank you 
very much for the invitation to converse, as we’ve always done.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, we are speaking on the day 
after the World Peoples’ Conference has 
concluded, the day after Earth Day. What do you feel you have accomplished?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] First of all, 
we have been surprised by the participation of 
all the peoples of the world. We didn’t imagine 
so many people, more than 30,000 participants in 
sixteen­or seventeen working groups, and a 
declaration that provides so much direction for 
life and for nature, the participation of 
scientists and people responsible for different 
sectors and regions of the world.

There are two particularly important things. In 
Copenhagen, there was interest in having a 
document approved that would cause harm to Mother 
Earth. And the debate was only about the effects 
of the climate crisis, not the causes. And the 
peoples here have debated the causes, which is 
capitalism­I could elaborate on that­genetically 
modified crops, which cause harm to Mother Earth and human life.

And in addition, I am so pleased to see that 
there’s been such deep interest in engaging in a 
dialogue with the United Nations, so that these 
conclusions of the peoples of the world can be 
heard and respected. Not just by the peoples who 
participated, they should also be heard and 
respected by humankind as a whole, all of those who live on the planet.

AMY GOODMAN: The proposals that have come out of 
this conference, this summit, can you name them 
and explain them, beginning with the climate justice tribunal?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] For example, 
the developed countries should respect the Kyoto 
Protocol, and that means put it into practice, 
the 50 percent reduction in greenhouse gas 
emissions; and that the global temperature 
increase should be a maximum one-degree 
Centigrade; that a climate justice tribunal 
should be established, based in Cochabamba­and I 
say thank you very much to the social movements 
who approved this proposal that it be based here; 
that there should continue to be a debate or 
there still is a debate on having a world 
referendum on climate change; that the economic 
resources spent on defense and wars should be for life and for nature.

According to information we have, we find that 
the developed countries spend $1.7 trillion, 
supposedly for defense and international 
security, but that actually means in military 
intervention in other countries. Imagine, with 
$1.7 trillion for life and for nature, that would 
be so important. And that is the right of Mother 
Earth, the right to regenerate Mother Earth’s 
caring capacity. It’s very important.

And I can tell you, I know and I have lived in my 
family, in my community, in my aillu, traditional 
community, where we said this year, we’ll grow 
chili peppers the next year, and we evaluate this 
among five different or eight communities. And 
over that time, it is regenerated in another 
place. Some time goes by, and we replant it in 
different place. And so, if we rotate the crops, 
then there’s not a detrimental impact on the 
environment. These seem like small things, but 
they translate into large things internationally 
in terms of the world environment.

In Bolivia, after this event, we are going to 
begin with reforestation. And the plan that we 
have in Bolivia, as of the first anniversary of 
the Declaration of International Mother Earth 
Day, because last year that was approved­before, 
it was Earth Day, and now it’s International 
Mother Earth Day. So one year after that, which 
is now, we’re going to begin planting. And next 
year, as of April 22nd, we will plant ten million 
trees. What does that mean? That a Bolivian, 
whether it’s a child or an older person, has to 
plant a plant or a tree. And we’re ten million, 
and there will be ten million, without any 
international contribution. This would be just an 
effort by Bolivians to begin to reforest our country.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you explain what is happening to 
the glaciers here in Bolivia?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] It’s a very 
bitter experience. Chacaltaya, near the city of 
La Paz, when I was a child, I always heard that 
people would ski there. And now that I am 
president and living in La Paz, there is no 
skiing there. And there’s just a spot of snow 
left. Also, in the department of Potosí, we have 
another mountain, and the miners would say 
[inaudible], that they would say that it was 
dressed in white. It was all snow-covered. And 
what I’ve been told is that fifty years from now, 
there will no longer be snow on Illimani, the 
major mountain overlooking La Paz. This is what 
the experts say. These have to do with water 
problems, and that is the great concern, not only 
of the peasant and indigenous communities who 
love their Mother Earth and who take care of it, 
but also of the whole population.

AMY GOODMAN: President Morales, who would be 
brought before a climate justice tribunal?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] First, the 
developed countries that are not respecting the 
Kyoto Protocol. It’s a basic document, the Kyoto 
Protocol. The developed countries should 
responsibly implement the provisions. We would 
begin with the countries that have not ratified 
or adopted the Kyoto Protocol, such as the 
government of the United States. And to that 
effect, you also have the International Court of 
Justice. So this is a new organization that would 
grow out of this event, this world movement for 
the rights of Mother Earth. This world movement 
for the rights of Mother Earth should already 
bring an action, as I say, against the countries 
that have not ratified the Kyoto Protocol. And 
second, those that have ratified it, but are not 
implementing the Kyoto Protocol.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re talking to President Evo 
Morales, the president of Bolivia. Yesterday at 
the Earth Day rally, the foreign minister of 
Ecuador said that the US had cut two-and-a-half 
million dollars to Ecuador because they didn’t 
sign onto the Copenhagen Accord. He said he would 
give two-and-a-half million dollars to the United 
States if they signed onto the Kyoto Protocol. 
Bolivia, the US cut two-and-a-half million 
dollars, or $3 million, because you didn’t sign 
onto the Copenhagen Accord. Can you explain what happened?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] The thing is 
that there’s permanent sabotage and blackmail 
from the US government. I cannot believe that a 
black president can have so much vengeance with 
an Indian president, because our grandparents and 
our populations, black and indigenous, have been 
excluded, marginalized, humiliated. That’s where 
Obama is coming from, from that experience and 
that suffering. And me, too. And so, it’s one 
who’s been discriminated against discriminating 
against another who’s been discriminated against, 
one oppressed who is oppressing another 
oppressed. So much blackmail, and the so much 
blackmail we had experienced before, and now I’m 
being subject to $3 million blackmail.

But it’s with great pride and humility that we’re 
now better off without the United States. We’re 
better off economically. And in terms of 
macroeconomic policy, we’re better off without 
the International Monetary Fund.

AMY GOODMAN: What was the $3 million supposed to be for, before it was cut?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] Of course, 
for social programs, as well as environmental 
programs, but that’s just $3 million. In terms of 
fighting drug trafficking, they have the 
responsibility to make an investment, and that 
it’s not just a question of cooperation, it’s a 
matter of an obligation on their part. 
Nonetheless, they have pulled out, and we are 
facing drug trafficking alone­some crumb to make 
it seem like something, certainly. And so, for 
example, I had information that they were going 
to invest in the Millennium Development Account, 
like $600 million, and they withdrew all of it. 
And so, we worked this out with other countries. 
We’re talking about investment. One is not going 
to raise that claim about this. We are a country of dignity.

But what they do is take vengeance, intimidate. 
And that is why my doubt is, one who has been 
subjugated, one’s family has been subjugated to 
discrimination, is now president; how is it 
possible that he can discriminate against another 
movement that has been discriminated against? It is the peoples who will hear.

AMY GOODMAN: Do you see a change between President Bush and President Obama?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] If something 
is changed, it’s just the color of the president that’s changed.

AMY GOODMAN: President Morales, you have often 
talked about the difference between coca and 
cocaine. You say coca is not cocaine. For a US 
audience, that is hard to understand. Please explain.

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] Cocaine is 
like the white hair of our interpreter, and the 
coca leaf is green like the leaves that you see 
on the tree outside. The coca leaf, in its 
natural state, is food, it’s medicine. It is used 
quite a lot in rituals, as you will have seen in 
the ceremonies that have taken place at this 
World Conference on the Rights of Mother Earth.

To turn coca into cocaine, many chemical agents 
are required, chemical precursors, and therefore 
a mix of sulfuric acid and other chemicals will 
turn it into a drug. But we have no culture of 
cocaine, but we do have a profound culture of 
coca leaf. I’m very sorry that the US State 
Department considers that people who consume coca 
leaf are drug addicts. That’s absurd. It’s 
totally false. And that those of us who produce 
coca leaf are drug traffickers and that they say 
that coca is cocaine, well, that is a lie. And 
so, we’re engaged in a permanent battle to 
continue to inform the whole world about this. 
But people like you, for example, know now that coca is not cocaine.

But in addition to that, when Bolivian tin was in 
its boom, it was used by US industry. And at that 
time, the United States was encouraging coca 
production, so that the miners, the workers, 
would consume coca leaf to help them extract tin 
to be sent to the United States. The best 
producers of coca leaf at that time were given awards. This is documented.

And I continue to be convinced that cocaine and 
drug trafficking is an invention of the United 
States. And with that invention, they’ve been 
able to create this war against drug trafficking. 
Capitalism lives from war. Capitalism needs wars 
in order to sell its weaponry. So this is not an 
isolated drug issue. It goes to the very 
interests of capitalism. And on the pretext of 
fighting drugs, they establish military bases. 
It’s political control and domination that they 
want. It’s the new colonialism.

AMY GOODMAN: President Morales, let me ask you, 
though­I have been speaking, not with your 
opponents, but your supporters, who are concerned 
that there is a growing narcotrafficking problem 
here. And I’m wondering if you feel that is the 
case. And you, more than anyone, understand that 
anything like this could be a trigger for massive 
intervention. So what will you do about this?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] It is a 
problem, and we acknowledge it. I don’t know if 
it’s growing, but the drug cartels and the 
cocaine cartels have become so powerful, the 
Plurinational State of Bolivia does not have 
certain instruments and technology for struggling 
against the drug cartels. It is a weakness on our part.

And the most important thing is that the peasant 
movement is voluntarily reducing coca crops. 
Before, it was forced eradication, which violated 
human rights. The disadvantage is that we don’t 
have radars, satellites, and a drug trafficker is 
not the one who steps on­who processes the coca 
leaf. They go around all around the world, and 
their money is in the banks. We need to end bank 
secrecy, for example. Why not? So, imagine, 
there’s not any real effective contribution to 
the anti-drug trafficking effort.

AMY GOODMAN: Is there a role the US can play in 
combating drug trafficking here that you think would be constructive?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] We just need equipment and technology.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re talking to Bolivian President 
Evo Morales, who rose to the presidency­was a 
cocalero, the head of the coca growers’ union. 
And now I want to go back ten years. I want to go 
back to the Water Wars, where you really rose in 
popularity and ultimately to the presidency. 
Right outside this window here at the University 
del Valle, we can see the mountain Tunari. That 
was the name used for this mysterious company, 
Aguas del Tunari, that was actually the US 
company Bechtel, who came to privatize the water 
supply. You joined with the farmers, with the 
factory workers, led by Oscar Olivera, and you 
led a mass movement against the privatization and 
pushed out Bechtel. Talk about those moments.

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] I was born in 
Oruro, Orinoco, in another department in the 
Altiplano, and­before doing my obligatory 
military service in 1978. In 1979, I went to the 
Chapare region, which is here in the department 
of Cochabamba. And in 1979 and 1980, when I was 
going back and forth, I would come by Tunari, and 
it was always covered with snow. Most of the year 
it was snow-covered. Now, when there’s snowfall, 
it may be covered with snow just for half a day 
at most. I have experienced that.

Now, apart from that, the first companions who 
rose up against the drilling of wells was right 
over here in a place called La Vinto, Vinto 
Chico. I remember perfectly well that the 
communities had mobilized and put up roadblocks. 
And they said, “Evo, you have contacts with the 
press. Bring the press.” And they said, “The 
privatization of water is harming us.” I had some 
friends in the press. We brought them there. They 
talked with them, and they denounced it. I was 
very struck by the situation. And now I’m talking 
about the 1990s. I learned a great deal.

And then this contract came with the company 
called Aguas del Tunari. For the people in the 
city, the rate that they were going to be charged 
for water was going to increase threefold, 
fourfold, sevenfold. That provoked a response 
from the population. And the privatization of the 
springs, the melting, for irrigating, for the 
peasant movement, all of this was a problem. And 
Oscar Olivera and others came together. We all 
came together in order to wage debates. There was 
a colleague named Fernandez, who was among the 
irrigators. There was Oscar Olivera from the workers’ sector.

And what had most struck was that in the 
legislature­and at the time, I was a legislator, 
in 1999, 2000­I was told in the Congress that we 
need to approve a $50 million loan for the­and 
from the Andean Development Corporation, but that 
was going to be for Aguas del Tunari. So I 
figured that if there’s a company that is going 
to be awarded a project or a contract for 
privatizing water, they need to invest the money. 
Why is it that the government needs to lend money 
to the company Aguas del Tunari? Am I making 
my­you get my point? In the indigenous and 
peasant world, in the world of the poor, the 
businessperson is one who has a lot of money. 
Transnational corporations are great 
millionaires. And a transnational, Aguas del 
Tunari, was given a contract for privatizing the 
water. Well, then the legislature has to approve 
a law to give a loan to that company? What kind 
of privatization is that? Now I can make some 
more comments, with all the more reason, about 
other transnationals. That really struck me. 
There’s no investment by the company at all here. 
Then we found out who were the partners of this 
transnational: a politician by the name of 
Medina, another politician. And they put the 
papers together to create a company. But there 
wasn’t any money, and so the Bolivian government 
was supposed to lend it money.

This and many things brought us together­the 
peasant movement, the irrigators, the people in 
the city. I would say that the factory workers of 
Oscar Olivera participated in this struggle very 
little. It was essentially the peasants, the 
irrigators and the coca growers. We joined the 
struggle. We didn’t have water problems in 
Chapare. There’s flooding in Chapare. The issue 
was that it had to do with a policy of 
privatization. And drinking water included the 
trade unions. So we said, “This policy is going 
to come to Chapare, and before that happens, let’s fight it in Cochabamba.”

I remember that one day I felt defeated in our 
mobilizations here. About a thousand of us went 
out, said, “Let’s go out and march.” And we went 
out to march, and they began to shoot teargas at 
us. And the press said they’re shooting teargas 
at the coca growers, who are defending water. And 
then the population rose up, and there was a 
state of siege. It was the last state of siege 
that we defeated. And since then, there’s been no state of siege.

AMY GOODMAN: So how does it feel, from­going from 
that victory, pushing Bechtel out of the country, 
being a stone-throwing protester, to becoming the 
president of your nation, representing the police 
and the military that you were opposing at that time?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] Well, as 
president, we continue getting the companies out 
of the country. Before, as a social movement 
leader, now as president. We also have removed 
the company Aguas del Illimani from La Paza, as 
president. As president, we have removed 
Transredes, an oil company. So that’s not 
changing. These are policies that have been 
defined by social movements in Bolivia, and we’ll continue to pursue them.

But I do want you to know, we said no more will 
we have companies being the owners of our natural 
resources. We do need partners. For example, some 
agreements that we’ve signed with some companies, 
the company invests, but under the control of the 
owner is the Plurinational State of Bolivia. We 
are owners of 60 percent of the shares, and the 
investor holds 40 percent. It is legally 
guaranteed and constitutionally guaranteed that 
they will recover their investment, but they 
also­we also guarantee the right to share in the profits.

AMY GOODMAN: We have to break for sixty seconds, 
but then we’re coming back to our exclusive hour 
with the president of Bolivia, Evo Morales, as we 
broadcast live from Cochabamba, Bolivia. Stay with us.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: You’ve just been watching and 
listening to the celebratory music, the major 
celebrations that took place at the close of the 
summit yesterday in the main soccer stadium here in Cochabamba, Bolivia.

This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, the War 
and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman. And we have 
been broadcasting all week from the World 
Peoples’ Summit on Climate Change and Rights of 
Mother Earth. We’re here now in the Bolivian town 
of Tiquipaya, just outside of Cochabamba, with President Evo Morales.

You are talking about industry and the role of 
corporations. I’d like to address how you deal 
with indigenous rights, environmental rights, and 
reconcile that with corporations. Let’s go to San 
Cristóbal, the mine, the protests of the last 
week. Please tell us what is happening there. The 
miners have shut down the area. They’re calling 
on Sumitomo, the Japanese company, to give them 
reparations, stop polluting the water. I think 
6,000 liters of water a second are used. What is 
the government doing? What are you doing, President Morales?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] First, that 
is a concession that is legally guaranteed and 
armored by the previous governments. It’s the 
legacy of the neoliberal governments. But in 
addition, the people in the area know that the 
company has negotiated with them. They’ve created 
a foundation to give money to community members 
and the experience that is that such kinds of 
agreements, blackmail or prebends, are not a 
solution. Those are not eternal. And that those 
who are culpable are the leaders of the 
communities who agreed to enter into agreements 
with the company. There’s also a political 
component. When the right lost in the municipal 
elections, the next day, they began to wage 
conflicts. So there’s an internal issue there.

If we want to resolve the issue of San Cristóbal, 
we need to change a law, a law on mining. And 
certainly, that is going to be subject to an 
in-depth review, the concession contract itself. 
But yesterday, the day before yesterday, the 
conflict has ended. They lifted that, and we 
explained the truths. But sometimes these kinds 
of conflicts are used politically at the local level.

AMY GOODMAN: The State Department has issued a 
warning that people shouldn’t travel in that area, the US State Department.

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] You always 
hear campaigns of that sort from the US State 
Department. It’s just one part of the highway 
that’s been blocked. But, as I say, that was 
lifted two days ago. And then I was informed that 
some tourists were kept from going through, but 
the community members, in a responsible way, had 
the tourists come through. You can see that this 
is a satanization by the United States State 
Department. And we say, in a humanitarian sense, 
they have a right to be there, even though they’ve politicized it.

But they don’t realize that those responsible for 
those agreements are not only the previous 
governments, but also the leaders of­the previous 
leaders of those communities. So there was this 
agreement between the state and the leaders of 
the community. I know about it. I was there 
talking with them. They accepted that there be a 
foundation that would invest, I’m not sure how many millions in the community.

That also doesn‘t mean that we’re trying to 
deflect responsibility. It is our responsibility 
to seek solutions. And I was saying a moment ago 
that we need to­that there are contracts that are 
armored, and we need to figure out how to change them.

AMY GOODMAN: Let’s go to the bigger issue. 
Bolivian economy is based on 20 percent, 30 
percent on extractive industries like silver, 
zinc. You are really getting into lithium now. 
Bolivia has the world’s majority reserves in 
lithium, an incredible alternative energy source 
for batteries, for electric cars. How do you 
reconcile the extractive industries with the 
environment, Pachamama, the indigenous word for 
Mother Earth, with indigenous rights?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] We need 
in-depth studies on this. If we want to defend 
Mother Earth and the rights of Mother Earth, any 
project for industrializing natural resources has 
to respect the regeneration of bio-capabilities. 
Like with some minerals, for example, 
non-renewable minerals, it will be difficult. So 
the internal debate is what to do about this, 
because Bolivia, before, lived from tin, as a 
colonial state. Now we live off of gas and oil. 
Our economic resources come fundamentally from 
oil and gas, and mining is in second place. To 
what extent can the industrialization of these 
resources allow for respect for Mother Earth?

As of this conference, and going forward, 
everything has to change. But when they tell us 
that lithium could be an alternative energy 
source, I was asking, what about the brine, and 
in what time can it be regenerated? Some tell me 
fifty years, some tell me 100 years. I would be 
happy if it were fifty years, because we have 
there these salt flats of 10,000 square 
kilometers. And if you take a broader look, it’s 
16,000 square kilometers. It’s immense. So we’re 
going forward. And if that happens, then we’ll be 
satisfied, in terms of having a replacement for 
the energy sources that cause so much harm to Mother Earth.

AMY GOODMAN: These are the issues that have been 
raised by mesa 18, the group that was not 
included in the summit, the issues of­even 
someone on the stage in your opening ceremony, 
Faith Gemmill from North Alaska, said, “Keep the 
coal in the hole, keep the oil in the ground.” 
What is your response to that, to stop the extractions?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] You want me 
to tell you the truth about working group 18? 
That’s a business of the NGOs and the 
foundations. The indigenous brothers and sisters 
had never before had an indigenous working group 
within the seventeen. But since it’s a question 
of justifying investments by the NGOs, then they set up working group 18.

Now, the internal debate. Those foundations, 
NGOs, said, “Amazon, no oil.” So they’re telling 
me that I should shut down oil wells and gas 
wells. So what is Bolivia going to live off of? 
So let’s be realistic. But since these 
foundations and NGOs justify using some of the 
indigenous brothers and sisters­I don’t blame my 
indigenous brothers and sisters. They use the 
leaders to justify their good salaries and their own way of life.

I heard yesterday­last night I was with the 
people from Via Campesina up until 2:00 a.m. You 
know Via Campesina. I’m one of the founders. And 
they tell me, “Don’t build roads.” And another 
one says, “Don’t build dams.” The day before 
yesterday, when I was just back here, I announced 
that we’re going to build a road from Oruro to a 
place near here. That is the most widely 
applauded project by the grassroots people, 
because the people who need to be able to have 
access. If we look just out here, in Alto, every 
day they’re asking for small-scale dams. So NGOs 
and some leaders say, no, when they’re not 
interpreting the needs of their grassroots. That 
is the truth. And for this reason, it was like a confrontation Via Campesina­

AMY GOODMAN: We just have thirty seconds. Your hope for this summit?

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] I wanted to 
explain­I don’t want to feel that there’s not 
freedom of expression, in terms of addressing 
your concern. But I do want you to know, that is 
the truth, and that last night, with Via 
Campesina, we had those confrontations. So they 
ended up­they stopped talking about the dams, 
about the roads. Now I’m an enemy of 
thermoelectric plants, for example, but not hydroelectric plants.

AMY GOODMAN: Five Seconds.

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: [translated] Well, then, thank you very much.

AMY GOODMAN: Thank you very much. We’ve been 
speaking with Bolivian President Evo Morales. And 
that concludes our exclusive week here in 
Cochabamba, Bolivia at the Worlds Peoples’ Summit on Climate Change and Rights


******************************
A New Climate Movement in Bolivia

By Naomi Klein - April 21st, 2010
http://www.naomiklein.org/articles/2010/04/new-climate-movement-bolivia

Cochabamba, Bolivia

It was 11 am and Evo Morales had turned a 
football stadium into a giant classroom, 
marshaling an array of props: paper plates, 
plastic cups, disposable raincoats, handcrafted 
gourds, wooden plates and multicolored ponchos. 
All came into play to make his main point: to 
fight climate change, "we need to recover the 
values of the indigenous people."

Yet wealthy countries have little interest in 
learning these lessons and are instead pushing 
through a plan that at its best would raise 
average global temperatures 2 degrees Celsius. 
"That would mean the melting of the Andean and 
Himalayan glaciers," Morales told the thousands 
gathered in the stadium, part of the 
<http://pwccc.wordpress.com/>World People's 
Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of 
Mother Earth. What he didn't have to say is that 
the Bolivian people, no matter how sustainably 
they choose to live, have no power to save their glaciers.

Bolivia's climate summit has had moments of joy, 
levity and absurdity. Yet underneath it all, you 
can feel the emotion that provoked this gathering: rage against helplessness.

It's little wonder. Bolivia is in the midst of a 
dramatic political transformation, one that has 
nationalized key industries and elevated the 
voices of indigenous peoples as never before. But 
when it comes to Bolivia's most pressing, 
existential crisis­the fact that its glaciers are 
melting at an alarming rate, threatening the 
water supply in two major cities­Bolivians are 
powerless to do anything to change their fate on their own.

That's because the actions causing the melting 
are taking place not in Bolivia but on the 
highways and in the industrial zones of heavily 
industrialized countries. In Copenhagen, leaders 
of endangered nations like Bolivia and Tuvalu 
argued passionately for the kind of deep 
emissions cuts that could avert catastrophe. They 
were politely told that the political will in the 
North just wasn't there. More than that, the 
United States made clear that it didn't need 
small countries like Bolivia to be part of a 
climate solution. It would negotiate a deal with 
other heavy emitters behind closed doors, and the 
rest of the world would be informed of the 
results and invited to sign on, which is 
precisely what happened with the Copenhagen 
Accord. When Bolivia and Ecuador refused to 
rubber-stamp the accord, the US government 
<http://views.washingtonpost.com/climate-change/post-carbon/2010/04/bolivia_ecuador_denied_climate_funds.html>cut 
their climate aid by $3 million and $2.5 million, 
respectively. 
<http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5i9TuMrvrknh-ZXwqmZ2N-48kff3wD9F14CP81>"It's 
not a free-rider process," explained US climate 
negotiator Jonathan Pershing. (Anyone wondering 
why activists from the global South reject the 
idea of "climate aid" and are instead demanding 
repayment of "climate debts" has their answer 
here.) Pershing's message was chilling: if you 
are poor, you don't have the right to prioritize your own survival.

When Morales invited "social movements and Mother 
Earth's defenders...scientists, academics, 
lawyers and governments" to come to Cochabamba 
for a new kind of climate summit, it was a revolt 
against this experience of helplessness, an 
attempt to build a base of power behind the right to survive.

The Bolivian government got the ball rolling by 
proposing 
<http://pwccc.wordpress.com/2010/01/15/call/#more-12>four 
big ideas: that nature should be granted rights 
that protect ecosystems from annihilation (a 
"Universal Declaration of Mother Earth Rights"); 
that those who violate those rights and other 
international environmental agreements should 
face legal consequences (a "Climate Justice 
Tribunal"); that poor countries should receive 
various forms of compensation for a crisis they 
are facing but had little role in creating 
("Climate Debt"); and that there should be a 
mechanism for people around the world to express 
their views on these topics ("World People's Referendum on Climate Change").

The next stage was to invite global civil society 
to hash out the details. Seventeen working groups 
were struck, and after weeks of online 
discussion, they met for a week in Cochabamba 
with the goal of presenting their final 
recommendations at the summit's end. The process 
is fascinating but far from perfect (for 
instance, <http://www.democracyctr.org/blog/>as 
Jim Shultz of the Democracy Center pointed out, 
the working group on the referendum apparently 
spent more time arguing about adding a question 
on abolishing capitalism than on discussing how 
in the world you run a global referendum). Yet 
Bolivia's enthusiastic commitment to 
participatory democracy may well prove the 
summit's most important contribution.

That's because, after the Copenhagen debacle, an 
exceedingly dangerous talking point went viral: 
the real culprit of the breakdown was democracy 
itself. The UN process, giving equal votes to 192 
countries, was simply too unwieldy­better to find 
the solutions in small groups. Even trusted 
environmental voices like 
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/mar/29/james-lovelock-climate-change>James 
Lovelock fell prey: "I have a feeling that 
climate change may be an issue as severe as a 
war," he told the Guardian recently. "It may be 
necessary to put democracy on hold for a while." 
But in reality, it is such small groupings­like 
the invitation-only club that rammed through the 
Copenhagen Accord­that have caused us to lose 
ground, weakening already inadequate existing 
agreements. By contrast, the climate change 
policy brought to Copenhagen by Bolivia was 
drafted by social movements through a 
participatory process, and the end result was the 
most transformative and radical vision so far.

With the Cochabamba summit, Bolivia is trying to 
take what it has accomplished at the national 
level and globalize it, inviting the world to 
participate in drafting a joint climate agenda 
ahead of the next UN climate gathering, in 
Cancún. 
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/apr/18/bolivia-climate-change-talks-cochabamba>In 
the words of Bolivia's ambassador to the UN, 
Pablo Solón, "The only thing that can save 
mankind from a tragedy is the exercise of global democracy."

If he is right, the Bolivian process might save 
not just our warming planet but our failing 
democracies as well. Not a bad deal at all.




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