Brussels, June 10th, 2015
We, members and representatives of diverse collectives and
organizations from Europe and Latin America and the Caribbean, meeting in
Brussels around the Days of Mobilization for Peoples Sovereignty against TNC
Corporate power and the Architecture of Impunity established through Free Trade
and Investment Treaties, during the second EU-CELAC summit,
Declare,
Our strong objection and rejection of the neoliberal and
austerity policies that are being applied in the EU countries in response to
the crisis generated by the extreme deregulation of the financial system whose
only interest is to maximize profits through the privatization of gains and the
socialization of impacts and losses. After the financial crisis came the
governments' debt crisis which has now given way to budgetary crisis in
austerity-ridden States. More than 25 million people are now unemployed in the
EU, mainly youth, while European banks have received multibillion bailouts. We
denounce the attitude of the IMF, European Central Bank and European Commission
who are attempting to impose the interests of the creditors on the Greek people
and the Syriza-led government. We support their resistance and mobilizations,
as well as the public debt audit currently ongoing in that country and the
cancellation of all illegitimate debts.
We demand substantive changes to the resource extraction
policies in Latin America and the Caribbean that have been generalized all
over, from Mexico to Argentina and from Brazil to Bolivia, generating
dispossession and land expropriation, massive displacement of communities and
environmental damages.
We demand the governments to immediately suspend
indefinitely the negotiations of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment
Partnership (TTIP) of the UE with the United States, the Trade in Service
Agreement (TiSA) which involves the EU and several States from Latin America,
as well as the Transpacific Partnership (TPP). Signing this treaties would carry
extremely negative consequences for the people not only in Europe, Latin
America and the US but everywhere around the world, as a consequence of the
ensuing deregulation of employment, food security, environmental laws, the
privatization and/or deregulation of public services, and the granting of
rights to transnational corporations and private investors that could
significantly increase their ability to sue States -- a direct attack on their
sovereignty.
The second EU-CELAC summit is developing under the theme of
"Shaping our common future: working for a prosperous cohesive and
sustainable societies for our citizens". However, by insisting in focusing
that relationship on the multiplication and establishment of Free Trade
Agreements --cloaked as 'partnership agreements'-- these objectives will only
get derailed and diluted and our societies will be driven to new and ever
deeper crises.
We demand a public and democratic assessment of the impacts
of the EU FTAs with Mexico and Chile, whose governments are now ready to
sellout whatever is left of the national economy in order to attract new
capital and investors. We call on the governments of the MERCOSUR countries not
to reinitiate the negotiations for an FTA with the UE. We reiterate our call
against the ratification of the EU FTAs
with Colombia, Peru, Central America, currently under discussion in Parliament
in several European countries.
We call on EU and CELAC governments to firmly reaffirm the
principle of common and differentiated responsibilities for climate change and
its impacts, and to ensure the strict implementation of this principle all
throughout the new global agreement to address climate change, that shall
emerge from the coming COP 21 in Paris in December 2015.
That means European governments have to commit to the needed
strict emissions cuts of European companies all over the world --with no
recourse to market-based mechanisms and without carbon-offsets-- so we all can
avoid further global warming and runaway climate change; and it means they need
to provide the necessary financial and technical assistance to Latin American
countries so they can adapt to the impacts of climate change and undertake the
necessary transition to equitable economies that move away from fossil fuel
dependency while ensuring the realization of all human rights.
We call on governments to commit urgently to participate
actively and constructively in the negotiations for the establishment of an
international legally binding instrument on business and human rights, as mandated
by the UN Human Rights Council in June 2014 (decision A/HRC/26/L.22/Rev.1) in
order to force transnational corporations to respect human rights wherever they
operate.
Our struggles are not only resistance -more than ever
necessary to face social, economic and environmental threats to our societies-
but also efforts to create alternatives to the current trade and investment
policies which respect human rights and guarantee true social, integral, just,
democratic and plural development.
LIST OF SIGNATORIES (alphabetic order)
Alternative Information and Development Center (AIDC),
Asamblea Nacional de Afectadas/os Ambientales (México), Asamblea Veracruzana de
Iniciativas y Defensa Ambiental (LAVIDA), Attac Argentina, Brazilian Network on
Peoples Integration (REBRIP), Committee for the Abolition of Third World Debt
(CADTM), CADTM AYNA., Comunidades Construyendo Paz desde el Territorio –
CONPAZ, Center of United and Progressive Workers (SENTRO), Copenhagen
Initiative for Central America and Mexico (CIFCA), Collectif Venezuela 13
Avril, Bruxelles, Comité pour les Droits Humains “Daniel Gillard”, Corporate
European Observatory (CEO), Ecologistas en Acción, Enginyeria Sense Fronteres,
Enlazando Alternativas, Entrepueblos, France America Latina, Food First Information
and Action Network (FIAN), Friend of the Earth Colombia (CENSAT), Friend of the
Earth Guatemala (CEIBA), Friends of the Earth International, Friends of the
Earth Latin America and the Caribbean, Friends of the Earth Uruguay (REDES),
Global Campaign to Dismantle Corporate Power and Stop Impunity, European
Network of NGOs Grupo Sur, Hemispheric Social Alliance (HSA), Institute of
Policy Studies- Global Economy Project, International Cooperation for
Development and Solidarity (CIDSE), Mémoires des Luttes France, Mouvement VEGA,
Movement of Peoples Affected by Dams in Brazil (MAB), Movimiento Mexicano de
Afectados por Presas y en Defensa de los Ríos
(MAPDER), Mundubat, Observatori del Deute en la Globalització (ODG),
Observatorio de Multinacionales en América Latina (OMAL, Paz con Dignidad),
Oficina Internacional de los Derechos Humanos – Acción Colombia (Oidhaco),
Party of the European Left, Red Latinoamericana sobre Deuda, Desarrollo y
Derechos (LATINDADD), Red Mexicana de Accion frente al Libre Comercio (RMALC),
Rosa Luxembourg Foundation Brussels, Solidaridad Suecia – America Latina (SAL),
TIYE International (Black, Migrant and Refugee women in the Netherlands),
Transnational Institute (TNI), WIDE +, World March of Women.
