Seattle WTO ministerial

Robert McClure's picture

InvestigateWest will be covering climate talks in Copenhagen; WTO-style street protests expected

 By Alexander Kelly

Ten years after Seattle witnessed the largest anti-corporate globalization action the United States has seen, protesters will take to the streets of Copenhagen in a week to oppose the global capitalization of the struggle against climate change.

The delegates attending the upcoming high-stakes negotiations are expected to entertain mostly market-based solutions to climate change, which critics say improperly treat carbon as a commodity to be traded among the world’s largest polluters.

Plenty of activists aren’t buying it, and like their predecessors at the WTO rallies in ‘99, they’re ready to let world leaders know.

Nor are they buying the rhetoric spouted at Singapore’s recent international economic summit, where the official goal of the Copenhagen meetings was reduced from the development of a “legally binding treaty” to a “political” one. The announcement has activist groups like Bill McKibben’s 350.org and members of the Climate Justice Action network in an uproar, with street-side frustrations on the rise as the will to tackle climate change seemingly takes a political nosedive.

As tens of thousands of protesters from the world over converge on December’s climate talks, so will InvestigateWest.

Robert McClure's picture

On the eve of Seattle's WTO 10th anniversary, rioting breaks out at WTO in Geneva

Just days before the 10th anniversary of N30, the biggest day of rioting at the 1999 World Trade Organization ministerial meeting in Seattle, protesters went on a rampage overnight in Geneva at the latest WTO meeting.

Cars were set on fire and police said perhaps 200 of the 3,000 protesters were intent on violence. Authorities responded with water cannons, tear gas and rubber bullets.

Watch this space next week, as InvestigateWest will have an exciting and related announcement.

 -- Robert McClure

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