November 8, 2001	Thursday	Shaba’an 21, 1422

BEIRUT, Nov 7: A forum of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) called on Wednesday for a joint international campaign against globalisation and war, ahead of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) ministerial meeting in Doha.

“Global capitalism has now a military wing: the military industry,” Britain’s Lindsey German, editor of the publication Socialist Review, told the forum in Beirut.

“It is not the job of the West to intervene in the internal affairs of other smaller countries. We have to resist the concept of bombing countries back to civilisation,” said German.

She argued the US-led strikes on Afghanistan were not a war on terrorism.

“If it was, it would have been rooting out terrorism in the world, including the state of Israel and its prime minister (Ariel Sharon), who is probably the best case in the world to be tried for war crimes.”

Christophe Aguitton of the association ATTAC-France, which lobbies for taxes on trade to help citizens, called for close coordination between anti-war and anti-globalisation groups.

“It is absolutely important to link the movement against globalisation with the movement against war,” he said. “The big role of these movements is to resolve conflicts, social, economic and political conflicts.”

The four-day World Forum on Globalisation and Global Trade winds up Thursday, on the eve of the start of the WTO meetings.

Samir Amin of the Third World Forum warned of the “dangers of global economy ... for which the US is using violence in its international relations to impose its hegemony.”

“This violence — military and police systems — can only produce counter violence,” warned Amin, a French-Egyptian national.

Raphaella Bollini from the ARCI Social Forum network in the Italian city of Genoa urged “movements around the world to put together economics and politics.”

She said “anti-globalisation movements are full of negative symbols, because even our name is always anti-something. We need positive symbols, we need to build an identity of defenders of human rights.”

“The international declaration of human rights ... should be defended at the universal level and without discrimination. It is not only about political rights, but about life, freedom, health, education, social rights.”

She charged the United Nations had become “a disaster because it depends on the United States, it is no more independent and there is too much bureaucracy.”

“But we still have to defend it against those attacking it. We have to form a world campaign and we want to tell the UN, ‘We need you, but you have to change,’” she said.

More than 200 NGOs, trade union and activist groups are taking part in the Beirut forum, with delegates from 45 countries. Organisers said plans were due to be announced for street actions in Lebanon on Friday.—AFP