Will the European Union Save the UN Summit?
The EU has invested significantly in the UN Summit next week. With a small group of countries including the United States having recently thrown the negotiations on the outcome document into a tailspin, the EU is confronted with a significant roadblock and challenge for its leadership. By Denise Auclair.
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The U.S. Onslaught Against the World Summit
The 450 changes that Washington is demanding to the action agenda of the September 2005 United Nations summit are a clear onslaught against any move that could strengthen the United Nations or international law, says Phyllis Bennis.
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L20 and ECOSOC Reform: Complementary Elements
The ongoing power shift within the global economy calls into question the established structures of multilateral decision-making. As the emerging powers of the South gain new prominence, the G7/G8 summit of the leading industrial countries, correspondingly, loses in significance. A Briefing Paper by Andrew F. Cooper and Thomas Fues.
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Security Council Reform: Not a Quick Fix
Global Policy Forum has published a paper on Security Council reform that sharply criticizes current reform proposals and argues in favor of regional representation as a future path to Council renovation. The paper by James Paul and Céline Nahory, reflects a decade of study of the Security Council and conversations with dozens of UN diplomats.
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Debunking a Dam Legend
In 1963 India's then prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru gushed at a ceremony for a new dam project: “The Bhakra Project is something tremendous, something stupendous, something which shakes you up when you see it. Bhakra, the new temple of resurgent India, is the symbol of India’s progress.” Shripad Dharmadhikary’s newly released report “Unravelling Bhakra” deconstructs this myth. By Ann Kathrin Schneider.
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The State of ODA: Budget Constraints?
While rich nations claim that increasing ODA is impossible due to budgetary constraints, Jens Martens points out that global arms spending topped $1 trillion last year. He also criticizes the proposed International Finance Facility because it does not incorporate the voices of poor countries, and concludes that the only feasible way of implementing the IFF is in combination with global taxes as a means for refinancing.
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Germany makes or breaks the summit
Presently, the majority of the EU-15 has either achieved the 0.7% or has set a timetable to do so well in advance of 2015. Germany has not done so and its present ODA (0.28% of GNI) is well below the EU average. An interview with Eveline Herfkens.
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International Taxation: Necessary and Realistic
International taxes are a completely new paradigm. Their realisation is an innovation of historical significance because until now, taxes have been firmly linked to the nation state. However, the process of economic globalization reveals the need for international taxation. As a consequence of the transnationalisation of economics and communications, new possibilities have emerged to create profits. By Peter Wahl.
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Biopirates in the Kalahari
The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) signed in 1992 at the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNECD) in Rio de Janeiro, entrusts national governments with sovereignty over the genetic resources in their respective countries. In return, they are made responsible for regulating access to these resources and making sure that the benefit is shared justly and equitably between countries, companies and local people, who over the centuries have contributed to the conservation and development of biological diversity (Access and Benefit Sharing - ABS). By Uwe Hoering.
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Europe: After the Debacle and Before the Storm
The unequivocal French rejection of the new European Constitution (50% “No” votes with electoral participation at 70%) anticipates the turbulence ahead in much of Europe. The vote represented a clear class division, with majorities against the Constitution in the working class (in factories and offices) and amongst voters for the Socialist, Communist, ultra-leftist, and Green parties. By Norman Birnbaum.
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