[Announce-DAN] General Strike in Ecuador!!!

["david martin" <p_hayze@hotmail.com>]

Quick update, followed by detailed report:

Ecuadorian indigenous, labor and other civil-society organizations have 
launched a massive campaign to reject the IMF-imposed adjustment program in 
that country.  They have encountered repression, including mass arrests and 
several deaths resulting from confrontations with the police.  A number of 
people are now occupying the offices of the IMF, and over 6,000 indigenous 
people have converged in the capitol city, Quito. Civil-society groups are 
planning a GENERAL STRIKE starting today, Feb. 7, and there are serious 
concerns that the violent measures employed by the government will escalate.

Ecuadorian activists are urgently requesting letters, telephone calls, 
public declarations and any other type of actions which let the government 
know that the world is watching. These acts of international solidarity are 
a way of preventing even worse abuses and violations of the fundamental 
rights of the Ecuadorian people, and a protest against institutionalized 
racism against indigenous people.

TAKE ACTION!

Solidarity demonstrations are being organized.  One took place this morning 
in Washington, DC and in the Bay Area.

Call or fax the Ecuadoran consulate, the IMF Managing Director and Secretary 
of State Colin Powell TODAY to show your support for the general strike and 
the people of Ecuador (see talking points below).


These are the demands of the national strike today:

Urge President Gustavo Noboa to end the state of emergency and all forms of 
repression, free those who have been detained, end the IMF-imposed economic 
measures, maintain real salary levels amidst inflation, and reject the US 
military presence and the implementation of Plan Colombia in Ecuador.

President Gustavo Noboa
Presidencia de la República
despresi@presidencia.ec-gov.net
or care of:
Ambassador Ivonne A-BAKI
2535 15th Street NW
Washington, DC 20009
telephone: [1] (202) 234-7200
FAX: [1] (202) 667-3482

Urge Managing Director Horst Köhler to lift the structural adjustment 
conditions imposed on Ecuador and to publicly oppose the use of repression 
and the suspension of human rights as means to enforce those conditions.

Horst Köhler
Managing Director, IMF
International Monetary Fund
700 19th Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20431
Telephone Operator: (202) 623-7000
Fax: (202) 623-4661

Urge Secretary of State Colin Powell to publicly support the respect of all 
human rights for Ecuadorians, refuse all US support or cooperation in 
repression, and to observe demonstrators demand's for a US military 
withdrawal from the Manta Base.

Gen. Colin Powell
Secretary of State
U.S. Department of State
Washington, D.C. 20520
Fax: 202-261-8577
secretary@state.gov
------------

PROTEST IN ECUADOR ESCALATES -
INDIGENOUS PEOPLES AND CITIZENS' GROUPS CALL FOR
REPEAL OF IMF-IMPOSED STRUCTURAL ADJUSTMENT POLICIES

GOVERNMENT RESPONDS WITH REPRESSION -
SEVERAL INDIGENOUS PEOPLE KILLED OR WOUNDED
AND HUNDREDS ARRESTED

Indigenous peoples in Ecuador have been mobilizing over the past month to 
demand the repeal of new IMF-backed economic measures announced by the 
Ecuadoran government in late December as part of an ongoing structural 
adjustment program.  The measures involve the removal of subsidies on 
cooking fuel and gasoline, causing the former to double in price and the 
latter to increase by 25%, and a 75% increase in transportation costs.

The IMF's insistence on the application of these measures -- as well as a 3% 
increase in the value-added tax which is still pending -- has put access to 
dignified living conditions even further beyond the reach of large segments 
of the Ecuadoran population.  The escalating protests in recent days are not 
only in response to these economic measures but to the overall structural 
adjustment program that has intensified with Ecuador's conversion to the US 
dollar last year.

Beginning on 21 January, indigenous groups led by CONAIE (Confederation of 
Indigenous Nations of Ecuador) organized marches and blockaded roads in the 
countryside and cities in half of the country's 22 provinces.  Farmworkers, 
students and others also joined in supporting these protests.  The 
government sent military forces to disperse many of these peaceful 
demonstrations with force, using teargas and weapons, that resulted in 
several indigenous people injured, some by bullets, and several hundred 
arrested.

In response, on 26 January, indigenous organizations called for a national 
mobilization from communities across the country and a convergence on the 
nation's capital, Quito.  The government responded with further repression. 
Quito was militarized when as many as 10,000 indigenous people arrived over 
the course of several days.  After gathering on the grounds of the 
Polytechnic University, they were surrounded by military troops who have cut 
off water and electricity and have intermittently been stopping food and 
medicine from being brought in and indigenous people from leaving.

Attempts at dialogue between indigenous leaders and the government have 
failed to produce any results, as the government has shown no willingness to 
discuss economic policy or refrain from using force against peaceful 
protest.  Indigenous leaders have presented a series of demands, including 
an end to the repression and an open dialogue on economic policy, and insist 
on meeting directly with President Noboa.  The government responded by 
declaring a state of national emergency on 2 February, suspending citizens' 
basic constitutional rights -- including freedom of association and 
mobilization, as well as protection from arbitrary search and seizure.

Several dozen indigenous people then escalated their protest by beginning a 
hunger strike.

While tensions have mounted in Quito, road blockades and marches have nearly 
paralyzed 12 provinces.  The use of force by 300 troops to disburse the 
blockade of a bridge in the Amazon region on 5 February resulted in at least 
two indigenous people killed by gunfire, including a 14-year-old who was 
shot in the head, and some 20 wounded.  Nevertheless, 5,000 indigenous 
people returned the next day to blockade the same bridge.

Media censorship has made it difficult to ascertain the extent of the
mobilization and protest, particularly outside the capital, and to be
certain of the number of people killed or wounded by military gunfire or the 
number arrested.  Human rights activists in Ecuador say they have not seen 
the current level of repression in their country in the last 20 years.

Indigenous peoples have been joined by trade unionists, farmworkers,
students, academics, environmentalists, small-scale producers, women's 
groups and others to resolutely demand the repeal of IMF-supported economic 
measures.  They are putting their lives on the line to stop structural 
adjustment in Ecuador, affirming that this economic model is clearly neither 
politically nor economically viable.  They want to open a policy dialogue 
with the government to formulate an alternative economic program.

As the government has not shown willingness to enter into such a dialogue, a 
national strike has been called for 7 February by a coalition of trade 
unions, professional associations and others in support of the indigenous 
mobilization and to demand a repeal of the economic adjustment measures and 
an open dialogue on the national economic program.

While the Ecuadoran government is repressing protest by large segments of 
society against economic adjustment measures, the IMF and World Bank, who 
are responsible for designing and promoting these policies, remain silent.

Over nearly 20 years, the IMF and the World Bank have made the
implementation of structural adjustment programs a condition of financial 
support to the government of Ecuador.  These programs and the specific 
economic policies they embrace have placed the major burden of adjustment on 
the nation's poor and working people, its small farmers and businesses.

This is clearly evidenced by the recently concluded SAPRI process in Ecuador 
-- a tripartite initiative to assess the impacts of structural adjustment 
policies in which the World Bank, government and SAPRIN civil-society 
network have been jointly involved.

The SAPRI process of consultation and participatory research on the impact 
of adjustment in Ecuador since 1982 concluded that trade and
financial-sector liberalization in Ecuador have led to a marked contraction 
in the national productive apparatus, particularly of small and medium-scale 
enterprises, as well as a greater concentration of productive resources.

This, in turn, has increased unemployment and underemployment while, along 
with labor-market "flexibilization" policies, reducing job security.  The 
lack of adequate, stable employment and the further concentration of wealth 
have generated an increase in poverty and a deterioration in the living 
conditions of a majority of the Ecuadoran population, conditions that have 
been extensively documented.

Furthermore, the research reflected the belief held by a majority of
citizens that a policy of universal subsidies on certain basic goods -- such 
as gasoline, electricity and cooking fuel -- is necessary until support for 
the reactivation of national production generates adequate employment and 
greater income for the poor and middle-income segments of society. 
Researchers concluded that targeted subsidies are unviable in Ecuador, where 
the target group is  comprised of the majority of the population and 
continues to increase.  They recommended a reorientation of macroeconomic 
policy to reactivate production, increase employment generation and 
substantially improve income levels before removing subsidies or applying 
measures that negatively affect the living conditions of large segments of
Ecuadoran society.

6 February 2001

(For information in Spanish, see the web site of CONAIE
http://conaie.nativeweb.org)

The indigenous uprising throughout Ecuador continues. For news in Spanish, 
see the website of the Council of Indigenous Nations of Ecuador (CONAIE)'s 
website at http://conaie.nativeweb.org/index.html. See also the Ecuador 
electronic news source Pulsar (quoted below) at 
http://www.pulsar.org.ec/Index.html.

The Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador is requesting 
international solidarity:

"We appeal once again to the high spirit of solidarity, to support us with 
letters to the National Government, and with food or money, which will allow 
us to continue feeding the 13,000 of our compañeros who are in Quito."

Monetary support to CONAIE can be wired to their account at PRODUBANCO 
#0100700288-0 in the name of CONAIE.

Communications in solidarity should be sent

to info@conaie.ecuanex.net.ec or to:
Av. Los Granados 2553 y 6 de Diciembre - QUITO-
Telephone: (593-2)442 271 fax: (593-2) 248 930
------------

Write your own letter or follow the one below!

February 2, 2001

President Gustavo Noboa
Presidencia de la República
Fax: +593 2 580774
despresi@presidencia.ec-gov.net

Dear President Noboa,

We are writing to you to express our solidarity with the members of
social movements who took part in a nonviolent protest action yesterday at 
Ecuadorís Consejo Nacional de Modernizacion. Hopefully, this assemblage of 
environmentalists, human rights activists, womenís
liberationists, and unionists coming together in direct challenge to
your governmentís policies, has sent a powerful and clear message to
you. It is our hope that you can hear the message of the thousands of
indigenous peoples engaging in peaceful action across your country.

These people have organized themselves in movements, each representing 
fundamental aspects of humanity: labor, freedom, survival of body and 
culture in the face of genocidal violence, harmony with the larger 
environment, and the majority of people who are women and girls. That people 
who have organized their lives around these human capacities, which we all 
share, are now united in opposition to your policies should be a reminder of 
the harsh consequences of your governmentís policies upon the human lives 
that make up your nation.

The organizations occupying CONAM address themselves to the
International Monetary Fund and its current delegation to Ecuador. They 
write:

Your efficient policies, which have been applied by successive
governments in turn, have resulted in the destruction of Ecuador's
natural resources, have dedicated more than 50% of the national budget to 
paying an illegitimate foreign debt, have burdened the country with the 
highest rates of inflation on the continent, the highest levels of 
corruption, the most advanced rate of deforestation and contamination, the 
worst example of maldistribution of wealth ... and this disaster, the result 
of your policies, is repeating itself throughout the Third World in which 
you have intervened to "help us rise out of poverty."

Will you insist on continuing to give us advice and proposing policies?

As Americans, as citizens of a country that has been enriched at the
expense of the global South, we are prepared to stand in solidarity with 
you, should you demand justice from the IMF and other institutions of 
globalization.

Unfortunately, another possibility looms. It looms in your threat that all 
subversive agents who are responsible for fomenting destabilization in such 
a stable democracy will be arrested for disturbing the peace.

And it looms in the fact that, as the occupying organizations write:

The Ecuadorian government, anxious to comply with the conditions you
have imposed as a condition of your pending loan, is resorting to
violence and attacks on the human rights of the Ecuadorian people. There 
exists, in fact, the hidden threat of punishing an indigenous movement that 
has won its rights and broken out of the constraints of racism.

President Noboa, you stand at a point of choice between challenging and 
reinforcing violence and racism; between demanding justice from the world 
system or imposing injustice on your fellow Ecuadorians; between embracing 
their cries for humanity and snuffing out your own humanity.

We urge you, do not seek to silence the growing calls for justice from 
Ecuadorians. We urge you to respect the human rights of all people. We urge 
you to order your government, armed forces and police to refrain from the 
use of violence in response to protests. Finally, we urge you to join your 
words and your actions to their struggle for a just, human, and living 
world.

Sincerely,


cc:
Ministry of Defense of Ecuador, Quito
Ambassador Ivonne A-Baki, Embassy of Ecuador, Washington
Accion Ecologica Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador
_________________________________________________________________
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