Chavez ousts US missionary group

From aljazeera.net

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has ordered a US-based Christian missionary group working with indigenous tribes to leave the country, accusing the organisation of imperialist infiltration and links to the CIA.

Chavez said missionaries of the New Tribes Mission, based in Sanford, Florida, were no longer welcome. He spoke at a ceremony in a remote Indian village where he presented property titles to several indigenous groups.

"The New Tribes are leaving Venezuela. This is an irreversible decision that I have made," Chavez said on Wednesday.

"We don't want the New Tribes here. Enough colonialism!"

''Economic Brief: E.U. Plans for Alternative Energy''

From Power and Interest News

On September 12, a group of European deputies announced the creation of a broad platform designed to find the quickest way to a European hydrogen-based economy, thus ending the E.U. countries' dependence on fossil energy.

Italian liberal-democrat deputy Vittorio Prodi recently told the press that given the high price of oil and the widespread worries about peak oil and an energy crisis, it was time for action in order to ensure energy independence for E.U. member states through the exploitation of renewable, ecology-friendly alternatives to oil and gas. The initiative followed those of the 2002-2004 period, all of which concentrated on the use of hydrogen as the primary energy source. Previous initiatives, however, led to very few concrete results.

US dead could be 9,000 now

Number US Casualties in Iraq is possibly much more than Double Official Figures

Says Puerto Rican Government - Over 4,000 US Dead
Coastal Post Online Article - July, 2005
http://www.coastalpost.com/05/07/03a_.html

http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/print.asp?ID=3328

July 10, 2005

Official US. government reports on soldiers under US command killed in Iraq are so fragmented that they account for less than half of the total number, according to information uncovered as part of an inquiry by the Government of Puerto Rico regarding the total number of Puerto Rican war casualties.

This analysis was confirmed by El Diario/La Prensa's review of multiple documents, including official reports issued by the US Department of Defense, the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior & more than 230 battlefront reports, which reveal that more than 4,076 troops under US command have been killed in 799 days of battle.

This information contrasts markedly with the limited information on casualties generally issued by US military authorities, which focus only on US uniformed troops.

9,000 Dead GIs In Iraq War?

US Military Report: The High Death Rates Exposed By Brian Harring
http://tbrnews.org/Archives/a1654.htm

The claim is that those wounded, who died while on flights to Germany or while in German hospitals, have NOT been counted in the Iraq dead totals!

Pentagon Figures Don't Add Up By Jim
http://www.rense.com/general63/peen.htm

Despicable Deception - DOD Body Count Fraud by Ted Lang
http://www.rense.com/general66/decep.htm

Casualties In Iraq DOUBLE Pentagon Claims
http://www.rense.com/general66/casualties.htm

Better Off Without Him?

From alternet.org

"Religion is the opiate of the masses." - Karl Marx
"Now religion is the crystal meth of the masses." – Salman Rushdie

Christian fundamentalists claim religion is associated with lower rates of violence, teen pregnancy and divorce. A new study says they couldn't be more wrong.

Are religious societies better than secular ones? It should be an easy question for athiests to answer.

Most of those now seeking to blow people up -- whether with tanks and missiles or rucksacks and passenger planes -- do so in the name of God. In India, we see men whose religion forbids them to harm insects setting fire to human beings. A 14th-century Pope with a 21st-century communications network sustains his church's mission of persecuting gays and denying women ownership of their bodies. Bishops and rabbis in Britain have just united in the cause of prolonging human suffering, by opposing the legalization of assisted suicide. We know that the most dangerous human trait is an absence of self-doubt, and that self-doubt is more likely to be absent from the mind of the believer than the non-religious infidel.

The Democratic Party's Urge to Lose

From TomDispatch

Remember when the Democrats were keeping their powder dry for the fierce battle against the President's still unknown second nominee to the Supreme Court -- and so, during the Roberts nomination hearings, didn't even ask the judge a question about his well-reported role in the Florida 2000 vote recount battle? They were, they swore, saving their "opposition" for the even worse candidate sure to come. Now she's here -- Harriet Miers, the President's lawyer, who contributed $5,000 to his Florida "Recount Fund" in 2000 and was running political/legal interference for the President and Vice President that year. She may also rate as the single most sycophantic candidate for just about any office in memory. (According to former Bush speechwriter David Frum, "She once told me that the president was the most brilliant man she had ever met.") In essence, having passed on a man who, in at least a modest way, helped George grab the 2000 election via the Supreme Court -- not a Democratic senator even asked him if he'd recuse himself, should another such case ever reach the court -- they are now in the process of topping themselves by sending courtwards a family retainer; or rather, as on so many other issues (count the Iraq War as issue number one in this regard), they seem to be preparing yet again to stand aside and let the President willingly commit suicide, or, in the case of Miers, the right supposedly take her down. It could happen, but don't hold your breath waiting (despite all the recent press punditry about this).

Brasil, el atolladero

From rebelion.org

Ni Brasil ni los brasileños merecen esto”, declaró abrumado el presidente de Brasil Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Aludía al escándalo de corrupción que desde hace cuatro meses viene sacudiendo a su país, salpicando a ministros y dirigentes de la formación de donde surgió, el Partido de los Trabajadores (PT). Revelada con júbilo por los grandes medios de comunicación y atizada por acusaciones públicas formuladas por las personalidades implicadas, la cuestión ha cobrado rasgos de telenovela (1). Ha convulsionado toda la escena política con la violencia de un huracán devastador.

Al parecer está comprobado que el entorno de Lula da Silva y especialmente José Dirceu, ministro de la Casa Civil del Presidente (una especie de primer ministro), había edificado un amplio sistema de sobornos para comprar el voto de diputados aliados del PT (2). Cada parlamentario corrupto recibía mensualmente una suma aproximada de 10.000 euros extraídos de una caja negra alimentada por las finanzas públicas… Por otra parte, desde 2002 un mecanismo sofisticado de desvío ilegal de dinero había permitido financiar la campaña que culminó con la elección del presidente Lula.

Sin embargo hasta el momento no se ha aportado ninguna prueba de la implicación personal del Jefe de Estado. Tampoco parece que los diferentes dirigentes políticos miembros del PT comprometidos en este asunto se hayan enriquecido a título personal. Cabe decir que eran corruptores activos (y no corruptos pasivos) que actuaban en nombre de lo que consideraban el interés superior de su partido.

Desde enero de 2003 el PT ha gobernado con el apoyo de diversos aliados. Pero a pesar de sus apoyos no contaba con una mayoría en la Cámara, lo cual le obligó a buscar la neutralidad o el apoyo de grandes fuerzas conservadoras, como el Partido de la Socialdemocracia (PSDB), el Partido del Movimiento Democrático (PMDB) y el Frente Liberal (PFL). En Brasil los parlamentarios son tradicionalmente independientes de los partidos cuya etiqueta llevan. No vacilan en cambiar de pertenencia. De modo que son sumamente sensibles a todas las formas de corrupción. Se trata lamentablemente, como en muchos países, de una práctica constante en política, cualquiera que sea el equipo que esté al mando. Salvo que esta vez, con el PT en el poder y Lula da Silva en la presidencia, los ciudadanos esperaban una erradicación definitiva de esas costumbres detestables.

O PT, depois das eleicoes internas

From alainet.org

Com 38 votos a favor, foi eleito no fim de semana passado o presidente do PSDB em São Paulo, sede da força hegemônica do partido que já governou o Brasil durante oito anos e alenta a esperança de repetir a dose a partir de 2007. Foi eleito um candidato único, resultado do acerto dos dirigentes tucanos pré-candidatos à presidência da república, sem debates, com conchavos de bastidores, sem nenhuma participação do que seriam os militantes tucanos, como convêm: um assunto das elites paulistas com elas mesmas.

Enquanto isso, cerca de 215 mil petistas voltavam às urnas, para encerrar o maior processo eleitoral que jamais um partido brasileiro havia promovido, ao longo de vários meses, para eleger o presidente do PT. Foram necessários centenas de debates por todos os estados brasileiros, mais de 500 mil votos, em meio à campanha totalitária da grande mídia privada, para que o PT escolha quais que dirigentes estarão à cabeça do partido nos próximos e cruciais anos para a esquerda brasileira.

Como o papel suporta tudo – e a Internet faz circular, junto com todo tipo de vírus e de venda de produtos – se disse tudo ou quase tudo, tentando desmerecer as eleições internas do PT. Qualquer que fosse o resultado, tudo ia continuar igual. Quem apoiou a esquerda nas eleições, vai apoiar a continuidade da direção, se esta se der. Todos são marionetes da velha direção. Nada mudou. A natureza petista está irreversivelmente maculada. A política está perdida, entreguemos de vez tudo na mão dos economistas – e sejamos amigos deles, para nos darmos bem, Abandonou-se o PT no meio das eleições desconhecendo que a realidade não é o que a gente quer que ela seja, mais ainda quando se tenta adaptá-la a decisões que tem calendários eleitorais e opções pré-estabelecidas.

O PT reafirma-se como o maior partido da esquerda brasileira, aquele do qual vai depender o futuro da esquerda no Brasil. Nos tempos duros que têm pela frente, o PT vai ser testado na sua capacidade de redefinir as relações da nova direção com a militância, com o governo, com os movimentos sociais, com a intelectualidade crítica. Disso depende o seu futuro e, com ele, o futuro da esquerda

GIVING DEMOCRACY THE BIRD - Bush Asks Congress for Martial Law

From Yahoo News

Soldiers brandishing automatic weapons, a defining characteristic of life in Third World dictatorships, have become commonplace at airports, bus and train stations, government offices and highway checkpoints since 9/11. Now troops are becoming our first responders to situations, such as natural disasters and flu outbreaks, which normally fall under civilian jurisdiction.

Everything's gone topsy-turvy: The National Guard, charged with keeping order here at home and legally under the control of state governors, has been shipped off to Iraq and Afghanistan, shanghaied by the federal government. Here in the U.S., whatever comes up, the Bush Administration's first reaction is to send in the regular army troops who are supposed to be in Iraq. Whether it's a sinister plot against American democracy or the most sustained large-scale foolishness in history, the Bush Administration is tearing down the traditional wall between overseas military action and domestic law enforcement.

South America: Integration at the crossroads

From alainet.org

The recent summit of heads of state for the South American Community of Nations (CSN) left exposed not only the difficulties of coming to terms for regional integration based on the models of MERCOSUR and CAN (the Andean Community of Nations), but also the capacity for initiative of the President of Venezuela.

Hugo Chávez came close to wrecking the summit in Brasilia held on September 30 to set the CSN on its feet, by refusing to sign the formal Declaration. Chávez criticised the institutional structure for repeating the failed formulas of MERCOSUR and the Andean Community of Nations and, in the frank and direct style for which he is known, held that, along that road, regional integration will only just have become reality "in the year 2200".

No one contradicted the Venezuelan President, perhaps because at bottom all accept that he is right. The Brazilian Minister of External Relations, Celso Amorim, admitted that the documents which Chávez was refusing to sign - the Brasilia Declaration – were just "political declarations" and that the 12 countries of the CSN should negotiate a treaty that would give form to the community. "In a reaction approaching panic, and flushed red, Lula declared that if Chávez did not change his mind the heads of state would leave Brasilia "as paralyzed as when we arrived", according to press reports. (1)

Amorim proposed that, within 90 days, the debate on five of the 20 proposals be finalized on the format of the community that still had not been approved, and that they respond to the suggestions presented by Presidents Chávez and Tabaré Vásquez (absent from the meeting like the Presidents of Colombia, Guyana, Surinam). Before accepting, Chávez assured that he would not discuss those issues with Ministers but only with Presidents. Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, pressured by the circumstances, came around to proposing that, in order to speed up the debates, discussions between the Presidents take place via fax, telephone and e-mail. Chávez accepted and everyone headed to Itamaraty for a private lunch, knowing that in reality everything remained up in the air.

The Avian Flu Fright: Politically Timed for Global “Iatrogenocide”

From GlobalResearch.ca

If avian flu becomes more than a threatened pandemic, it will have done so by political and economic design. This thesis is supported by current massive media misrepresentations, profiteering on risky and valueless vaccines, gross neglect of data evidencing earlier similar man-made plagues including SARS, West Nile Virus, AIDS and more; continuance of genetic studies breeding more mutant flu viruses likely to outbreak, inside trading scandals involving pandemic savvy White House and drug industry officials, curious immunity of these pharmaceutical entities over the past century to law enforcement and mainstream media scrutiny, and published official depopulation objectives. With the revelations and assertions advanced herein, the public is forewarned against this physician-assisted mass murder best termed "iatrogenocide."* This genocidal imposition is expected to serve mainly economic and political depopulation objectives.

Penn State Alumni Association offers Skull and Bones Gear

The Penn State Alumni Association now offers an array of commemorative Skull & Bones merchandise like sweatshirts and caps for members of the organization. Its bizarre to see these people treating this occult emblem as though it were a Texas Longhorn or some equally innocuous icon.

Clearly this Penn State arm of the group is less aware of the deep occult connections that exist within the Yale membership because otherwise they would not so brazenly display their skull and crossbones symbol (lacking the Yale version's "322" numerology) on articles of clothing of this ilk.

In his newest film, The Order of Death, Alex Jones details the historical significance of secret societies such as Skull & Bones and the Bohemian Grove and their links to the power-corrupted ancient mystery schools, the first intelegence agencies, that were created to protect the secret wisdom of science, mathematics and governmen

Dying For the Emperor? No Way

From LewRockwell.com

US President Harry S. Truman, with consent of his top brass, ordered the atomic bombings of Japan in order to save one million US lives. The Japanese were fascists. They were religious fanatics who worshipped the emperor as their God and were prepared to fight to the death. This was evidenced by the Kamikaze pilots and vicious fighting in Saipan and Okinawa. The annual Hiroshima and Nagasaki commemorations are exercises in blame-shifting and obfuscation; the fact is that WW II in Asia and the Pacific was a war between aggressive Japan and everyone else, and in each case, Japan was the aggressor. Japan attacked the United States first.

~ An average (ignorant) US history professor

What a bunch of post-war revisionist nonsense. The above statement is pure US government propaganda. It contains almost as many outrageous lies as it does individual words. The only part of this statement that is absolutely true is, "US President Harry S. Truman ordered the atomic bombings." This drivel, in many forms, has been repeated again and again to US schoolchildren over these past 60 some years to the point that even some (supposedly educated) US scholars have begun to repeat the mantra. This lie has been so overblown that, recently, the absurd amount of "saved lives" has ballooned from "one million lives" to "two million lives" to even the point where President George W. Bush has stretched it to "millions of lives." At this rate, by the year 2025, the atomic bombings will have saved 20 million lives. America, this is a lie. It’s time you faced up to the truth about the war and the atomic bombings.

When in the history of mankind have people actually fought to their deaths for one man? I propose to you that this has never happened. It’s against human nature to do so. The only people who even made the outlandish claim that the emperor was a living God were a very few Japanese rightists – and Shinto priests (a very minor religion) – who merely used this idea as a means to forward their own imperialist agenda (as well as modern American apologists for the atomic bombings). The average Japanese never thought the emperor was anymore than a man – just like they do today. I would like to end this misconception of the Japanese people. All people – regardless of the political system they are living under – will, however, fight to the death if they believe that they are saving their homes and families. That’s natural human behavior.

Besides the obvious common sense of the preceding two paragraphs, I would like to put every piece of this fabrication to rest – From the idea that the Japanese were suicidal maniacs – To the excuse of dropping the atomic bomb to save one million American lives. Am I a scholar historian? No, I am not. But I do have some unbeatable advantages over just about every US historian who has ever written on the subject: I speak Japanese and I live with the Japanese. The other trump card I have is that there are still a very many everyday Japanese alive and well today, who clearly remember the war, with whom I have spoken.

Do you really want this woman to have a seat on the most important Court in the country?

Parade Magazine's Chavez Smear

From Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting

On October 9, Parade magazine--the Sunday newspaper supplement with a circulation of 34.5 million, making it the country's most widely distributed magazine--published an inaccurate smear against Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. The smear, appearing in the Q&A column "Walter Scott's Personality Parade," was a response to a letter writer who wanted to know "where Fidel Castro gets the dough to shore up his bankrupt regime."
Scott's full answer was:

"In the wake of the collapse of the USSR, which bankrolled him to the tune of $4 billion a year, Castro has turned to Hugo Chavez, Marxist president of Venezuela, the world's fifth-largest oil exporter. In addition to shoring up Castro, he's funding revolutionaries and terrorists throughout Latin America."

Scott's two-sentence response managed to misrepresent several issues. Chavez is not a Marxist; asked about his politics by the left-wing publication CounterPunch (8/16/04), Chavez replied: "I don't believe in the dogmatic postulates of Marxist revolution. I don't accept that we are living in a period of proletarian revolutions.... Are we aiming in Venezuela today for the abolition of private property or a classless society? I don't think so." Chavez describes himself as a Bolivarian, a follower of the 19th Century Latin American independence leader Simon Bolivar.

And while Venezuela does provide discounted oil to Cuba, more than 20,000 Cuban doctors are sent to work in Venezuela in exchange; the relationship is mutually beneficial.

As for Scott's claim that Chavez is funding "revolutionaries and terrorists throughout Latin America," Parade should provide evidence for this charge or issue a retraction. The U.S. State Department, hardly a pro-Chavez source, does not include Venezuela among the list of state sponsors of terrorism in its most recent "Country Reports on Terrorism" (4/05). The report's section on Venezuela only alleges that "it is unclear to what extent" Venezuela might support any of the principal combatants in Colombia's long-running civil war. The report goes on to mention, however, that the Colombia and Venezuela governments have cooperated on some terrorism-related cases, and that several Venezuelan National Guard officers were reportedly killed by FARC forces near the border between the two countries.

While some anti-Chavez partisans have claimed that Chavez supports various terrorist groups, they have failed to back up these allegations with evidence. For example, Pat Robertson--the right-wing televangelist who has called for Chavez's assassination (700 Club, 8/22/05)--recently claimed on CNN (10/9/05) that Chavez "sent $1.2 million in cash to Osama bin Laden right after 9/11." When asked for evidence, Robertson could only claim that "sources that came to me" told him of the transaction.

"Walter Scott" is the pseudonym of Edward Klein, the author of the "The Truth About Hillary," a biography of Hillary Rodham Clinton that is riddled with errors (Media Matters, 6/23/05). Klein's book relies overwhelmingly on anonymous sources to make a series of lurid claims and innuendos, asking peculiar questions like, "Were there any telltale signs on the presidential sheets that [Hillary and Bill Clinton] ever had sex with each other?" Klein's book also floats the suggestion that that Chelsea Clinton was conceived as a result of Bill Clinton raping Hillary while on vacation in Bermuda. Perhaps Parade should consider whether "Scott"'s journalism deserves closer scrutiny.

ACTION:
Please call on Parade Magazine to either provide evidence for its claim that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is "funding revolutionaries and terrorists throughout Latin America" or else issue a retraction of the unattributed charge.


CONTACT:
Personality Parade
personality@parade.com

Parade Magazine
Lee Kravitz, editor
editor@parade.com

If your local newspaper includes Parade in its Sunday edition, you might want to send your letter to them as well.

Mystery ship near Zambo

Mystery Ship

No mystery. The ship is the HSV-X1 Theater Support Vessel.

ZAMBOANGA CITY - A US military ship, escorted by a small gunboat, was spotted Tuesday off the southern Philippines, where security forces are battling members of the al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf group.

Filipino security officials said they were unaware of the presence of the US ship. Nothing on its bow identified what class the vessel was, except a US flag hoisted on the deck.

Local fishermen watched in awe as the ship appeared on the horizon off Basilan Island and sailed past Zamboanga City around 8 a.m.

It was not known if the ship was involved in antiterrorism operations in Mindanao. But the US is helping the Philippine military fight terrorism in the region, where two Jema'ah Islamiyah bomb makers, Dulmatin and Umar Patek, who masterminded the 2002 Bali bombings, are believed to be hiding.

"That old-fashioned philosopher Karl Marx used to say that religion was the opiate of the masses. Now it's the crystal meth of the masses."

– Salman Rushdie

Bush administration claims new "milestone" in the occupation - Sham constitution in Iraq

From SocialistWorker.org

GEORGE W. BUSH tried to regain some of his plummeting popularity with a speech last week hailing the administration’s supposed successes in the "war on terror"--even as a crisis looms over the constitutional referendum in Iraq.

To start with, he turned to an old standby--whipping up fears of terrorism--with the stern claim that the U.S. "and our partners have disrupted at least 10 serious al-Qaeda terrorist plots" since September 11. Then he repeated the fantasy that Iraq is on the road to democracy and sovereignty, with the constitutional referendum set for October 15 the latest milestone.

Just how democratic the "new" Iraq will be was clear from the efforts of officials of the U.S.-backed regime to ram through the proposed draft.

Under the procedures established by the U.S. occupation authority, the constitution will fail if it’s rejected by a two-thirds majority in three of Iraq’s 18 provinces. But last weekend, the Iraqi parliament quietly changed the rules to be two-thirds of "registered voters"--rather than those actually casting ballots.

The 'Iraq' Business - Is Iraq an Artificial Construction?

From uruknet.info

[Time and again I come across statements that Iraq was a state 'artificially' constructed at the end of World War I by the occupying French and British out of the three separate Ottoman regions of Mosul, Baghdad and Basra. These statements are frequently made by 'experts' on Iraq! I have come across such assertions only too often... I would like to elaborate on this, at least to have something to refer people to in the future!]

In a nutshell

Iraq's habitation goes back at least to the end of the last ice age. As a single country, it has been in existence for about 4,400 years. In addition to the long history, the country has been defined by geography: The two rivers of Mesopotamia clearly define a geographically unified region surrounded by mountains on the east and desert on the west in which people have been freely mixing for several thousand years!

Se avecina la polémica IV Cumbre de las Américas

From alainet.org

Momento de definiciones en relación con EE.UU.

Falta menos de un mes para la IV Cumbre de las Américas, prevista para el 4 y 5 de noviembre en Mar del Plata. Menos Fidel Castro, eterno excluido de reuniones de la OEA, 34 presidentes dirán una maratón de discursos en el Hotel Hermitage y tendrán su foto de familia. La relación de Argentina con EE.UU. entra en zona de definición: prevalece la unidad pero subsisten discrepancias en la Declaración y la Agenda.

Dicen que viene Bush

El vocero de la Casa Blanca, Scott Mc Clellan, confirmó que Bush participará del evento marplatense y luego hará visitas a Brasil y Panamá. El embajador estadounidense en Argentina Lino Gutiérrez ya había manifestado que eso sería así en un "99,9 por ciento" de probabilidades.

Si esos funcionarios dicen la verdad, el gobierno argentino comenzará a respirar con más tranquilidad. Es que en julio, cuando el entonces subsecretario de asuntos hemisféricos del Departamento de Estado, Roger Noriega, se entrevistó con el vicecanciller Jorge Taiana, quedó flotando cierta amenaza de inasistencia. En ese momento las diferencias sobre el documento base para la IV Cumbre, dieron lugar a una presión de los negociadores del Norte. Hasta deslizaron que si no había acuerdo previo, su jefe no vendría a cosechar un fracaso a orilla del mar.

Ahora aparentemente la Casa Blanca ha decidido dar el presente. Y esa noticia, si bien seda algunos ánimos en el Palacio San Martín y la Casa Rosada, por otro lado tensa la relación bilateral. Es que las diferencias visualizadas por Noriega y Taiana siguen en su lugar, impertérritas.

Además, como es obvio, la confirmación de la venida del texano incrementará contradicciones al interior de nuestro país, entre el gobierno y los movimientos populares. Y a escala continental, entre países dispuestos a seguir a Washington hasta al polo sur y los que tienen reparos propios del Mercosur, además de Hugo Chávez, ubicado en las antípodas de Bush.

DECLARACIÓN DEL IV CONGRESO DE LA COORDINADORA LATINOAMERICANA DE ORGANIZACIONES DEL CAMPO

From movimientos.org

A 513 años del inicio de la invasión extranjera a nuestros territorios, que han marcado la lucha y resistencia de nuestros pueblos, mujeres, jóvenes y hombres del campo de América Latina y el Caribe, herederos y herederas del espíritu libertario de nuestros ancestros que alzaron sus luchas contra la invasión esclavista europea y contra el capitalismo y el imperialismo subsecuentes.

Nos hemos reunido en Iximulew -Guatemala-, territorio maya, cuna del maíz, de saberes, culturas, idiomas e identidades diversas, en el IV Congreso de la Coordinadora Latinoamericana de Organizaciones del Campo -CLOC-, realizado del 9 al 11 de octubre de 2005, con la participación de 178 delegadas y delegados de 88 organizaciones campesinas e indígenas, provenientes de 25 países. Precedido de la “II Asamblea Continental de la Juventud”, que se reunió con el propósito de construir sus estrategias de articulación para enfrentar combativamente al sistema capitalista; y de la “III Asamblea Continental de Mujeres”, que consensuó una agenda política para enfrentar las desigualdades que imponen la globalización y el patriarcado a la vida de las mujeres.

Hemos unido nuestras voces y pensamientos, intercambiado nuestras experiencias, compartido nuestros logros y dificultades, tejido nuestras propuestas para continuar la lucha por la transformación de la sociedad y construir una alternativa política al modelo, desarrollando una perspectiva campesina de un futuro justo, igualitario y sin ninguna forma de discriminación. Nuestro corazón y solidaridad está con nuestras hermanas y hermanos guatemaltecos que han sufrido los efectos del huracán Stan, que afecta también a El Salvador y México, y que es un resultado de la depredación que provoca el modelo capitalista, que afanado en la búsqueda de lucro genera vulnerabilidades asociadas a la pobreza y rompe el equilibrio armonioso entre seres humanos y la naturaleza.