COMMISSION 2: Socio-economic Development & Social Justice

World production of material wealth has gone global, bringing peoples and nations closer together. Yet, at the same time, poverty grips a swelling number of destitute people trying to survive on less than $2-a-day, estimated at 1.2 billion or nearly one-third of the global labor force in 2010.

Addressing the socio-economic roots of poverty, unemployment, rising food prices, budget cuts for public services and other social ills, an international gathering of progressive organizations and movements convenes in Manila, Philippines this July.

Led by the International League of Peoples’ Struggles (ILPS), hundreds of delegates from 39 countries are set to share insights, discuss and resolve to intensify the struggles for employment, decent incomes, better working and living conditions, access to social services, and control over land, water and other productive resources.

This resolution is part of the three-day event where the general call of the ILPS to build a brighter future is bannered.

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COMMISSION 3: Human Rights in the Civil, Political, Economic, Social and Cultural Fields

On February 14, 2008, Guatemalan indigenous rights leader Ramiro Choc was arrested by six armed soldiers and sentenced to six years on trumped up charges of aggravated robbery, land stealing, and kidnapping. On the third year of his incarceration, three of Choc’s colleagues at Encuentro Campesino, a peasant organization he helped form, were found dead, each shot multiple times. Choc is one of the 592 cases of criminalization of defenders of human rights in Guatemala between 2004 and 2009, according to Unidad de Defensores/as de Derechos Humanos en Guatemala (UDEFGUA).

In the Philippines, peasant leader Dario Tomada survived an assassination attempt in Kanangga, Leyte but ended up in jail on July 22, 2010. He was charged with murder that took place almost three decades ago. Tomada is but one of the more than 340 political prisoners languishing in 67 detention centers in the Philippines.

In Iran, prison guards are reportedly facilitating rape of young opposition activists by giving out condoms to criminals. In its 2010 report, Amnesty International documented the rape of male and female detainees by security officials.

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As a million people demonstrate in Cairo today to pursue fundamental changes after Mubarak’s downfall, internationalists gathered in Manila, Philippines reveal more protests and resistance from various peoples across major continents.

After gaining world attention from the media for 18 days leading to the crucial regime change, the Egyptians are now putting forward socio-economic and democratic demands such as more equitable wages, retaking of privatized enterprises, constitutional reforms, free elections, independence for organizations, recovery of some $70 billion in corrupted wealth and the prosecution of all criminals associated with Mubarak.

Aside from Egypt, the Palestinian people’s resistance against Israeli occupation continues to be the biggest threat to US interests in the Arab world. Calls for boycott and sanctions against Israel and the pullout of US support are made.

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