Archive - 2005 - Article

The Hong Kong development package is a guise for further impoverishment of developing economies, those hardest hit by liberalization.

Thousands of anti-globalization activists marched in the streets of Hong Kong Sunday as the city prepares to host the World Trade Organization's (WTO) annual summit.

Several thousand anti-globalisation protesters have marched through Hong Kong, in the first of several demonstrations planned against this week's World Trade Organisation talks.

Several thousand people have staged the first of a series of protests in Hong Kong over the World Trade Organization summit to be held this week.

Intense and rushed formal and informal consultations have been taking place since last Friday 2 December to find agreement among WTO Members on the content of an amendment to the TRIPS Agreement, which is to constitute a 'permanent solution' for facilitating the supply of medicines to countries with insufficient or no drug manufacturing capacity.

With the Doha global trade talks stalled by US and European discord over agriculture, US lawmakers are warning that domestic political support for the round could be jeopardised if the Hong Kong ministerial meeting next week focuses exclusively on the narrow demands from a few developing countries

The WTO General Council late Tuesday 6 December approved an amendment to the TRIPS Agreement making permanent a decision originally adopted in 2003 to resolve the problem of supply of generic versions of pharmaceutical products to countries with inadequate manufacturing capacity, due to limitations in the TRIPS Agreement when using compulsory license.

The study Trading away our last ancient forests (1)concludes that liberalisation in the forestry sector must be halted immediately in order to avoid destroying the last remaining ancient forests and the indigenous communities dependent on them.

The latest draft is more interesting for what it omits than what it has added. The cover note that was attached to the 1 December draft has been removed.

Over 100 groups across India, including social movements and trade unions, have challenged the minority government