In the News

Naomi Klein is so right. At the G20 the banks win big. The people pay the bill.

June 28, 2010

by Naomi Klein Globe and Mail

My city feels like a crime scene and the criminals are all melting into the night, fleeing the scene. No, I’m not talking about the kids in black who smashed windows and burned cop cars on Saturday.

I’m talking about the heads of state who, on Sunday night, smashed social safety nets and burned good jobs in the middle of a recession. Faced with the effects of a crisis created by the world’s wealthiest and most privileged strata, they decided to stick the poorest and most vulnerable people in their countries with the bill. ► More

Bill Nighy: It's Up To Robin Hood to Save the G20

June 27, 2010

The G8 leaders meeting in Toronto managed to live down to my worst expectations.

I arrived at the G8 by a roundabout route. Just a day earlier, I was standing in Dandora, a toxic tip on the edge of Nairobi where little girls as young as five live on a mound composed of toxic and human waste. They survive by competing with wild pigs for scraps of rubbish, forced to sell their bodies to get access to the richest pickings. ► More

Toronto Star: The G8 fails its own test

June 27, 2010

Prime Minister Stephen Harper put on a brave face and claimed that the Group of Eight “reshaped and re-energized” itself at the Huntsville summit this weekend. But there was little sign of that as the leaders emerged from their lacklustre get-together.

Canada pledged a credible $1.1 billion in new funds over five years for Harper’s signature “Muskoka Initiative” to improve maternal and child health care. While that commitment fell noticeably short of the $1.2 billion the G8 and G20 summits cost to stage, it will lend welcome impetus to a lifeline for Africa and help save lives. ► More

Make Poverty History tells CTV Maternal Health Initiative a Big Disappointment

June 27, 2010

The national coordinator for the group 'Make Poverty History' says he is disappointed in Canada's pledge for maternal health and says the country has fallen short of the funding needed to reduce maternal mortality. He says Harper failed at getting other political leaders to deliver on maternal health. ► More

G8 here to stay, Harper says. Critics see little to justify its existence

June 26, 2010

HUNTSVILLE, Ont. — After months of speculation that the G8 is on its last legs, Prime Minister Stephen Harper capped his role as G8 summit host Saturday with a defence of how the small club of wealthy countries is a “refocused, reshaped and re-energized” form of world leadership.

Harper’s clarion call was scoffed at by New Democratic Party Leader Jack Layton, who said the G8 has lost its way and serves no useful purpose if it doesn’t serve the world’s poor as well as it appears to be serving the rich and powerful. ► More

Continental aside: No room for Africa at the G20 Table

June 26, 2010

The G20 is failing Africa, both in terms of delivering on development promises and in providing the African Union with a permanent voice within the international political club. This was the message delivered by the Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP) members during a Saturday press conference at the Toronto summit's Alternative Media Centre.

"Africa, as a continent, just as the EU does, should have a permanent seat at the table. Over 52 states are excluded. Countries rich in natural resources that the whole world has benefited from are excluded. Countries rich in human resources are excluded," said Sonia Kawami, GCAP Project Co-ordinator for Ghana. ► More

Media Advisory: Do You Want to Know What Africans Really Think of the G8/G20?

June 25, 2010

African Civil Society Speaks – Nothing About Us, Without Us!

Kumi Naidoo, co-chair of GCAP and Executive Director of Greenpeace, will lead a GCAP Africa press conference on Saturday, 26 June 2010 at the Alternative Media Centre, All Stream Conference Centre, Toronto.

GCAP has spearheaded the campaign to have the African Union “At the Table” of global decision-making forums such as the G8 and G20. This campaign has contributed to the invitation extended by the Canadian Government to the Presidency’s of the AU (Malawi) and NEPAD (Ethiopian) respectively to participate in “African Outreach” meetings with the leaders of the G8 (25 July 2010). ► More

G8 Press NGO Roundup

June 25, 2010

Yesterday, June 24, NGOs released their opening statements to the press to share their demands and set the hurdle for a succesful summit outcome.

The assembled NGOs, split between the International Media Centre and the Alternative Media Centre issued their opening releases throughout the day. A couple of NGOs including Oxfam and World Vision did media stunts in Toronto and there were people's actions throughout the city.
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People around the world demand the G8 & G20 "Invest in the Future"

June 24, 2010

People in Toronto and around the world send a message to their leaders - invest in a clean and just future at the G8 and G20.

Toronto, Canada is the site of the G20 and played host to the main action of the day. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Chair of the G8 & G20 Summits, has said that 'climate is a sideshow'. With that in mind, event organizers from At the Table, The Anti-Poverty Coalition and TckTckTck decided to make Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper the star of his own sideshow. ► More

Vancouver People's Bus is Toronto Bound

June 24, 2010

A team of dedicated activists will be bringing citizen’s recommendations to Toronto for the summit and providing Vancouver a voice.

Stay tuned for updates from the People’s Bus, which left at 7pm June 20th from the Vancouver Peoples’ Summit on Main and 32nd in Vancouver. A team of dedicated activists will be bringing citizen’s recommendations to Toronto for the summit and providing Vancouver a voice. Participants in the Vancouver Peoples’ Summit sat down throughout the day to discuss Women’s Rights, Climate Change and Global Financial Justice. Further to that everyone had their chance to write an update on the side of the bus. ► More

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