Darryl wrote:
> 1) How , in the name of all that is sane, did this ever come to pass?
> and
>
> 2) How, in all good conscience could the court of any country being
> sued allow judgment against said country? Is the court in some other
> country like the U.S. of A.?
>
> 3) Who are the insanely greedy individuals who drew up these treaties
> and why would any /sane /country vote for them or allow them to be
> invoked when signing a trade agreement?
>
> [snip]
>
> http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/05/07-0
> By Isolda Agazzi
That's what the furor over the MAI (Multilateral Agreement on
Investment at the OECD) was about 15 years ago. The police riot in
Seattle was a follow-on and "anti-globalization" as a byword emerged
more or less from same.
Within 5 years of the defeat of the MAI (because France caved in and
withdrew support) all the political movers & shakers of the OECD
countries were back at proposing the same kind of thing.
Essentially, these investment protection clauses make major
corporations and financial institutions the only enfranchised citizens
of the globe and reduce people to the status of biomass. Under that
rubric, national governments exist to protect investors.
Along with other New Democrats, Bill Blaikie has insisted that the
investor-state procedure inappropriately gives multinational
corporations a status equal to that of democratic governments and
greater than that of citizens. It sets up a binding, secretive
process that has not just a legal effect but also a "chilling"
effect, by which governments may, out of fear of such litigation,
refrain from environmental and other legislative actions intended
to protect the public interest. Moreover, because only foreign
investors have access to the investor-state procedure, it
perversely gives foreign investors more rights in Canada than
Canadian investors.
-- April 7, 2000 (I've misplaced the source reference. Some
newspaper, posted to misc.activism.progressive.)
>From Isolda Agazzi article:
"Watching these developments, countries like Brazil, which
never ratified any of its investment treaties, must count
themselves lucky," she added.
Yes, indeed.
- Mike
--
Michael Spencer Nova Scotia, Canada .~.
/V\
[email protected] /( )\
http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/ ^^-^^
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