One Planet...because countries and corporations share their information, allocate their resources, and plot their responses on a global scale. So should we.

Operation SalAMI

On the morning of Monday, May 25, activists from across Quebec and Canada converged on the Sheraton Centre Hotel in downtown Montreal and blocked access to several hundred business people and high level politicians who were planning to open the Montreal Conference on Globalized Economies. Operation SalAMI (in French, literally, bad MAI) brought over 400 people out to protest the fourth annual gathering dedicated to economic globalization and the supreme rights of corporations.

Headline speakers included Bank of Canada President Gordon Thiessen and OECD chief and MAI proponent Donald Johnston, just returned from the latest round of Paris talks on the global corporate rights treaty. Despite being asked not to participate--and invited instead to address the protesters--federal NDP leader Alexa McDonough chose to hobnob with the organizers of economic globalization as dozens faced bail hearings the following morning.

About 120 were arrested, and the conference opening was delayed several hours. The action blocked several entrances into the hotel, which covers a city block. The hotel and an adjacent bank were shut down from 6:30 AM until police were finally able to clear a cordon through at about 2:30 PM. All arrestees face four criminal charges each: mischief, unlawful assembly, resisting arrest, and causing a disturbance. The action was--unlike U.S. counterparts--a lead national news item that evening in Canada, where the Multilateral Agreement on Investments is highly controversial.

In another Canadian protest, a group of activists celebrated the 50th anniversary of Israel on May 14 by dumping a pile of rubble at the Israeli Consulate at Toronto. Three representatives from the protest, attempting to speak with Consulate officials on the 7th floor, were rebuffed by security guards but did have the opportunity to present some rubble--symbolic of bulldozed Palestinian homes--to the guards.Geov Parrish

Caught Red-handed

There's new evidence that Indonesian police and military may be responsible for arsons, rapes, and murders in the week prior to Suharto's resignation last month. During three days from May 13th to May 15th Indonesians looted stores, shopping malls, businesses, and the homes of Suharto's family and associates. But during the looting, at least 1,188 people died when fires swept through shopping malls, houses, and stores that were set ablaze with looters trapped inside. In addition, many ethnic Chinese businessmen and their families were killed or driven from their homes, and over 100 ethnic Chinese women and girls were raped.

Two well-established human rights groups (including the National Commission on Human Rights, the government's own human-rights monitoring agency) have been gathering information from victims who were assaulted during the rioting and other eye witnesses. The evidence indicates that organized groups instigated attacks of arson and vandalism aimed largely at ethnic Chinese neighborhoods. Victims described groups of men arriving simultaneously in trucks at various targets within the city armed with gasoline bombs and other weapons. Some participants in the attacks have already confessed to being recruited, briefed, armed with gasoline bombs, paid and then transported by unidentified men. These "unknown" men may be members of the military; victims described them as having muscular builds and military haircuts and, in one case, a victim described being raped by men who had a military uniform in their car.

Other groups may have been composed of right-wing Muslim paramilitary squads, which have direct links to Indonesian military intelligence. Rape victims, most of them ethnic Chinese women, were often told that they were targeted because they were "Chinese and non-Muslim."

Of course, this part of the story hasn't made it into the mainstream press here, which still insists that the Indonesian military is very popular and well-liked in Jakarta. To uphold this myth, our media needs to blame the worst destruction on the looters--starving, debt-ridden, unemployed Indonesians. It's impossible to admit the obvious: that US money has supported and trained Indonesian soldiers and paramilitary squads, so that they could efficiently burn 40 large shopping centers, 4,083 businesses, 1,026 private homes, and murder over 1,000 people in three days.--Maria Tomchick