Tag Archives: TPP

MEPs’ mounting TTIP opposition scandalously silenced ahead of knife-edge US vote

Faced with a possible shock rejection of TTIP by MEPs, Brussels simply cancelled the vote this week – and now Washington moves swiftly to speed up the publicly unpopular trade deal.

By Molly Scott-Cato. Published June 11, 2015 at openDemocracy.

Open_the_Door_to_Transparency-_-StopTTIP_-_15543248792

Image: Wikipedia

For a while there, it looked like the EU/US TTIP deal – the monumental power grab by corporations over democracy – was, far from “fast-tracking” in the US, crawling along the slow lane, or maybe even stalled in the hard shoulder. Democrat senators dug their heels in last month on TTIP (and the equally contentious Trans-Pacific Partnership (TTP) deal), claiming these trade deals would drag down US wages and cost American jobs.

But these Democrats eventually decided to switch sides.

And now it looks like Obama is going for a high-stakes vote to renew the ‘fast-track’ TTIP negotiation process (minimising democratic oversight) as early as tomorrow (Friday).

It’s in this light that we have to view the scandalous decision by the EU presidency to deny myself and other MEPs a vote on TTIP this week. Continue reading →

WikiLeaks Strikes Again: Leaked TISA Docs Expose Corporate Plan For Reshaping Global Economy

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Leaked Docs reveal that little-known corporate treaty poised to privatize and deregulate public services across globe

By Sarah Lazare, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published June 3, 2015

“It’s a dark day for democracy when we are dependent on leaks like this for the general public to be informed of the radical restructuring of regulatory frameworks that our governments are proposing,” said Nick Dearden, director of Global Justice Now. (Image created by Common Dreams)

An enormous corporate-friendly treaty that many people haven’t heard of was thrust into the public limelight Wednesday when famed publisher of government and corporate secrets, WikiLeaks, released 17 documents from closed-door negotiations between countries that together comprise two-thirds of the word’s economy.

Analysts warn that preliminary review shows that the pact, known as the Trade in Services Agreement (TISA), is aimed at further privatizing and deregulating vital services, from transportation to healthcare, with a potentially devastating impact for people of the countries involved in the deal, and the world more broadly. Continue reading →

Food, Water, Health, Life: UN Experts Warn of Threats Posed by Secret ‘Trade’ Deals

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‘All draft treaty texts should be published so that Parliamentarians and civil society have sufficient time to review them and to weigh the pros and cons in a democratic manner,’ say officials

Written by Sarah Lazare, staff writer for CommonDreams. Published 6-2-2015.

The human rights stakes are too high to keep so-called “free trade” deals secret, say UN experts. (Photo: Jerrick Romero-Backbone Campaign/flickr/cc)

Echoing the protests of civil society organizations and social movements around the world, a panel of United Nations experts on Tuesday issued a stark warning about the threats that secret international “trade” agreements such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) pose to the most fundamental human rights.

“Our concerns relate to the rights to life, food, water and sanitation, health, housing, education, science and culture, improved labor standards, an independent judiciary, a clean environment and the right not to be subjected to forced resettlement,” reads the statement, whose ten signatories include Ms. Catalina Devandas Aguilar, Special Rapporteur on the rights of person with disabilities and Ms. Victoria Lucia Tauli-Corpuz, Special Rapporteur on the rights of Indigenous peoples. Continue reading →

Is US Trade Rep a Wall Street Crony? Groups Demand Transparency.

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Public interest watchdogs say Americans deserve to know what US top trade negotiator Michael Froman ‘has been privately saying to big banks’

By Deirdre Fulton, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published May 28, 2015

US Trade Representative Michael Froman, the groups note, “received a more than $4 million golden parachute from Citigroup upon leaving the large financial institution to join the Obama administration in 2009.” (Photo: US Institute of Peace/flickr/cc)

Noting deep ties between the country’s top trade negotiator and Wall Street banks, ten groups representing millions of Americans are calling on the White House to make public all communications between U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman and the massive financial institutions that stand to benefit from proposed trade deals.

In a letter (pdf) addressed to Froman—lead champion of President Barack Obama’s corporate-friendly trade agenda—groups including National People’s Action, Public Citizen, Friends of the Earth, and CREDO Action request “the prompt, voluntary, and proactive disclosure of all records of communication between yourself and representatives of the ten largest U.S. financial institutions—including lobbyists, employees, and trade associations—during your tenure as U.S. Trade Representative.”

Those financial institutions include JP Morgan Chase & Co., Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Citigroup. Continue reading →

Reversing Grassroots Win, US Senate Approves Fast Track Trade Measure

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By voting away their authority to set trade negotiating objectives, the majority of our Senators chose corporate polluters over the American people,’ says Friends of the Earth

Written by Deirdre Fulton, staff writer for CommonDreams. Published 5-14-15.

Barack Obama and Mitch McConnell. Photo by The White House [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Progressives reacted with dismay as the U.S. Senate on Thursday approved a motion to begin debate on the Fast Track authority President Barack Obama needs to advance controversial trade deals like the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The measure passed 65-33.

Senate Democrats blocked the first attempt to proceed on the trade legislation on Tuesday, but backtracked in the wake of further negotiations—and intense pressure from the White House.

With Thursday’s vote, Fast Track has cleared a major procedural hurdle. Continue reading →

Race to the Bottom

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At least 31 people are dead after a fire gutted a rubber slipper factory yesterday in Valenzuela, which is a suburb of Manila, the capital of the Philippines. The fire started when sparks from welding equipment used to repair a broken inner gate ignited flammable chemicals that were stored in the area. More than 30 people are still unaccounted for.

Photo via Facebook

Fires like this are a common occurrence in the Philippines. Fire and safety regulations are lax to begin with, and many times they’re just ignored.

Of course, the Philippines are far from being alone in this attitude towards regulations; we only need to look at what happened in West, Texas two years ago or the ever-increasing incidences of exploding oil trains (coming to your town soon!) to debunk that idea. And, that’s the problem; we’re beginning to see a race to the bottom..

We see more and more examples every day of what happens when you allow corporations to write the policies and laws that affect how they do business. Everything becomes fair game if it means that the profit margin’s larger, and usually one of the first things to go is safety standards, or as they put it “overreaching regulations.” Continue reading →

As Bills Advance, Will Grassroots Resistance Finally Overcome Fast Track Push?

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Grassroots and labor groups to hold week of action calling on Democratic lawmakers to block secretive trade pact

Under fast track, ‘fast’ is little more than a euphemism for ‘avoid the public, and benefit the fortunate few,’ warns Ohio State law professor Margot Kaminski. (Photo: Backbone Campaign/cc/flickr)

Written by Lauren McCauley, staff writer for CommonDreams, published April 14, 2015.

Signaling that loud grassroots resistance may be working, congressional Democrats are failing to get behind the White House’s push for unilateral authority over the secretive 12-nation trade deal known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), according to news reports on Tuesday.

At issue is whether the House will approve a pending bill that would grant President Barack Obama ‘Fast Track’ trade promotion authority, which would allow the White House to bypass Congress and seal the deal on the controversial TPP. Continue reading →

As Oil Money Flowed, Clinton Turned Back on Rights Abuses in Colombia: Report

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‘This much is clear: After millions of dollars were pledged by the oil company to the Clinton Foundation, Secretary Clinton abruptly changed her position on the controversial U.S.-Colombia trade pact.’

Then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaks with Colombian Vice President Angelino Garzon in January, 2011. In her remarks, Clinton praised Colombia’s efforts in “reaching out to civil society to add their voices to a national conversation about human rights and labor rights.” (Photo: US State Department/flickr/cc)

Written by Deirdre Fulton, staff writer for CommonDreams. Published April 8, 2015.

A new investigative look at the ties between big business interests in Colombia, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and her family’s charitable foundation are raising troubling questions about the role that corporate trade deals and big oil may have played in softening the powerful Democrat’s position on human rights in the South American country.

During her time heading the State Department, presumptive 2016 presidential nominee Clinton stayed silent on reports of violence and threats against labor activists in Colombia, even as her family’s “global philanthropic empire” was developing—and benefiting from—private business ties with a major oil corporation accused of worker-intimidation in the country, according to new reporting published Thursday by International Business Times. Continue reading →

Who Are They Supposed To Represent?

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One of the worst kept, and at the same time best kept, secrets in Washington over the last few years has been the negotiations over the Trans Pacific Partnership, commonly referred to as TPP. If you’ve been following what we discuss, the TPP should be very familiar to you by now; it’s one of our favorite subjects to write about.

Trade Ministers from TPP meeting in Vladivostok. Photo by East Asia and Pacific Media Hub U.S. Department of State [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

We’ve discussed ad nauseum the secrecy that the Obama administration has enshrouded the negotiations with. However, on Monday The Huffington Post ran a story that puts all the other attempts at hiding the details of the TPP from the public to shame. It goes like this: Continue reading →

Trans-Pacific Partnership’s Big Pharma giveaway

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By Conor J. Lynch

Out of all big industries making billions in profit, the pharmaceutical is probably the most ethically questionable.

Pills. Kandy Talbot/Wikicommons. Some rights reserved.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal is causing quite a stir around the world, and for good reason. There are multiple pro-corporate provisions within this massive trade deal that certainly merit being labeled “profit over people.” One of these is the Investor-State dispute settlement, which gives foreign corporations the ability to sue governments if a new law or regulation has effects on their profit rate; a blatantly pro-investor mechanism. Beyond this, intense criticism has also been provoked by some generous giveaways for the pharmaceutical industry.Provisions within the deal would expand patent rights for big pharmaceutical companies, which would keep important medicines overpriced around the world. One of these provisions, “patent term extensions,” would allow companies to extend their patents beyond the original twenty years, preventing other companies from bringing the medicine onto the generic market, which generally lowers costs by 30-80 percent. Other provisions would allow companies to re-patent drugs after twenty years for developing “new uses” or slightly altering the chemical.

Continue reading →

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The Movement Continues – Globally

Tag Archives: TPP

MEPs’ mounting TTIP opposition scandalously silenced ahead of knife-edge US vote

Faced with a possible shock rejection of TTIP by MEPs, Brussels simply cancelled the vote this week – and now Washington moves swiftly to speed up the publicly unpopular trade deal.

Is US Trade Rep a Wall Street Crony? Groups Demand Transparency.

Public interest watchdogs say Americans deserve to know what US top trade negotiator Michael Froman ‘has been privately saying to big banks’

Reversing Grassroots Win, US Senate Approves Fast Track Trade Measure

By voting away their authority to set trade negotiating objectives, the majority of our Senators chose corporate polluters over the American people,’ says Friends of the Earth

Race to the Bottom

As Oil Money Flowed, Clinton Turned Back on Rights Abuses in Colombia: Report

‘This much is clear: After millions of dollars were pledged by the oil company to the Clinton Foundation, Secretary Clinton abruptly changed her position on the controversial U.S.-Colombia trade pact.’

Who Are They Supposed To Represent?