Qld: Green party to support M1 blockade on stock exchange

AAP General News (Australia)
04-27-2001
Qld: Green party to support M1 blockade on stock exchange

BRISBANE, April 27 AAP - The Queensland Greens party has thrown its support behind
next week's M1 anti-globalisation protest in Brisbane.

Greens' spokesman Drew Hutton said the party was considering joining the May 1 blockade
of the stock exchange which is expected to include thousands of activists, including school
students.

Mr Hutton said he supported the non-violent and symbolic nature of the protest because
companies involved in human rights abuses traded at the exchange.

Similar protests erupted into violence in Seattle last year and in Melbourne during
the World Economic Forum's Asia Pacific Summit last September when police and members
of international anti-globalisation activists from the S11 alliance clashed outside Crown
Casino.

"Globalisation has set in train in countries like Australia processes like privatisation
and deregulation and the result has been a concerted attack on the public interest," Mr
Hutton said today.

Mr Hutton said Greens around the world were fighting against the increased power of
global corporations in the past two decades.

He argued the World Trade Organisation agreements had allowed global giants to conduct
activities without consideration for social inequalities, human rights abuses and environmental
destruction.

He said the best part about the protests was the large number of young people involved
which showed they cared deeply about human rights and the environment.

Protest organisers have urged school students to leave school on the day to attend
the protest action which starts at 7am outside the stock exchange in inner-city Brisbane.

AAP ap/jhm/ns/de

KEYWORD: M1 GREENS

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