Protest the Security and Prosperity Partnership in New Orleans April 21st

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1. Secretive Summit
   Today on
   NAFTA Expansion!

   Call Congress!

   Witness for Peace, Mexico April 21, 2008

   Today and tomorrow, President Bush will be meeting in New Orleans
   with Mexican President Calderon and Canadian Prime Minister Harper to
   discuss implementation of the Security and Prosperity Partnership
   (SPP), a backdoor NAFTA expansion deal. The SPP has never been
   brought to Congress for debate or vote. It has never included input
   from civil society, and no civil society representatives will be
   present at the talks in New Orleans today. Those who will be present
   at today’s summit include representatives of thirty of the largest
   corporations in Mexico, the U.S., and Canada. To protest, a plethora
   of organizations opposed to the deal are holding a People’s Summit in
   another part of New Orleans.

   While details of the SPP have not been disclosed, the stated objective
   is to “keep our borders closed to terrorism yet open to trade.” Doing
   so would likely mean an expansion of the failed NAFTA model that has
   sacrificed US jobs, Mexican farms, consumer protections, and
   environmental laws to boost corporate investments and exports. In
   addition, the security component of the SPP calls for further
   militarization of the U.S.-Mexico border and a renewed “war on drugs”
   at the expense of civil liberties. For more information on the SPP,
   see below for a just-released organizational SPP sign-on letter.

   Call your members of Congress today to stop this anti-democratic
   process! Dozens of organizations have signed the letter below to
   demand transparency. The letter is being delivered to Congress
   today. We need you to add your voice by calling your House and Senate
   representatives and asking them to:

   Require the Bush administration to immediately halt SPP implementation
   and submit the process to Congressional oversight and vote.
   Hold congressional hearings in which the process and goals of the SPP
   are thoroughly aired and input is invited from a broad cross-section
   of the public.

   Oppose the Merida Initiative, the first concrete manifestation of the
   SPP model, when it comes up for a vote in Congress.

   Sign the petition:
   globalexchange.org/petition.jsp?petition_KEY=978

   See below for background info and talking points.

   To reach your members’ offices, call the US Capitol Switchboard at
   202-224-3121 and ask to be connected to your House and Senate members
   (give your state and zip code if you don’t know who your
   representatives are).

   Plan Mexico: Chapter 1 of the SPP

   While the SPP is not yet subject to congressional review, Congress now
   faces the first concrete manifestation of the SPP model: the Merida
   Initiative. Popularly known as “Plan Mexico,” the initiative would
   destine $1.4 billion dollars to Mexico and Central America, mostly in
   military aircraft and drug interdiction equipment, with the stated
   purpose of fighting drug trafficking and organized crime. This is a
   step in the wrong direction:

   Arming a foreign military won’t curb our drug problem. After over
   eight years and five billion dollars of equipping the Colombian
   military through Plan Colombia, just as much coca is grown today in
   Colombia as was grown before Plan Colombia. There is no reason to
   suspect that repeating this failed model in Mexico would produce
   different results.

   Supporting Mexican security forces would seriously endanger civil
   liberties in Mexico. In response to the 2006 civilian protest in
   Oaxaca, Mexican security forces arbitrarily detained hundreds,
   tortured many, and killed 23 unarmed people, including US journalist
   Brad Will. With no one held accountable yet for these abuses, the
   Merida Initiative now proposes to finance these same security forces.
   For more background on the Merida Initiative, check out our new
   factsheet.

   Say NO to Plan Mexico

   Organizational Sign-on Letter Against the SPP

   April 21, 2008 Dear Member of Congress, On the occasion of the 4th
   Leaders Summit of the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP), to be
   held in New Orleans on April 21-22, we take this opportunity to call
   on all members of Congress to educate themselves on the SPP, which was
   never brought to Congress for debate or vote. Our concerns include
   the opaque and undemocratic nature of the SPP, its definition of
   “prosperity” as the expansion of a failed trade model, and its
   definition of “security” as the expansion of military force and the
   restricting of civil liberties. Congress has been entrusted with
   oversight on such issues of trade and security. It is imperative that
   they exercise their responsibility on this matter by examining what
   prosperity and security really mean. Rather than proceeding along the
   failed path of NAFTA, all efforts should be made to implement a trade
   agenda that focuses on the needs of communities and people. That
   agenda should include the voices of those populations most affected,
   as well as their advocates in civil society. Therefore, as civil
   society advocates, we call upon the U.S. Congress to:

   Require the Bush administration to immediately halt SPP implementation
   and submit the process to Congressional oversight.

   Hold congressional hearings in which the process and goals of the SPP
   are thoroughly aired and input is invited from a broad cross-section
   of the public.

   Make subject to congressional vote the decision of whether SPP
   implementation should proceed.

   The SPP is an executive-level, tri-national pact between Mexico, the
   United States and Canada, agreed upon in 2005 by the chief executives
   of the three countries. According to the official website, the SPP
   seeks to “provide the framework to ensure that North America is the
   safest and best place to live and do business. It includes ambitious
   security and prosperity programs to keep our borders closed to
   terrorism yet open to trade.” What differentiates the SPP from other
   security and trade agreements is that it is not subject to
   Congressional oversight or approval. The SPP establishes a corporate/
   government bureaucracy for implementation that excludes civil society
   participation. As at past SPP summits the New Orleans meetings will
   be open only to government officials and representatives of the
   corporate sector. Civil society will be kept on the other side of the
   fence, their voice silenced. The leaders will hear reports from the
   various SPP working groups and receive advice and input from the North
   American Competitiveness Council (NACC). The NACC is made up of 30
   large corporations, 10 from each of the three countries. Their
   interest is in maximizing profit and removing all impediments to such
   profit by lowering or removing “non-tariff barriers to trade.” In
   common language this includes local and state regulations such as food
   safety and environmental laws, labor rights and other measures
   designed to protect and enhance quality of life. The SPP aims to reach
   its goal of economic growth by facilitating the flow of goods and
   capital, while ignoring the needs of people and communities. This
   translates to a further expansion of the neo-liberal agenda manifested
   through free trade agreements such as NAFTA and DR-CAFTA, except that
   approval from Congress is neither sought nor required. These trade
   agreements, while boosting investment and exports, have failed the
   vast majority of citizens in participating countries. NAFTA’s impacts
   have been well documented: the loss of over a million decent US
   manufacturing jobs to exploitative Mexican factories, the decimation
   of Mexico’s small-scale agriculture and subsequent rise in migration,
   the subordination of environmental law to investment rules, and the
   annulling of consumer protections in the name of corporate
   protections. After 14 years of such devastating legacy, the SPP now
   proposes to move even further in the same direction. Meanwhile, the
   security side of the agreement seeks to “develop a common security
   strategy” and to create a common security perimeter for North
   America. The recent agreement between the U.S. and Canadian
   militaries (without Congressional approval) to allow cross-border,
   domestic military action can be viewed as integral to the SPP. In
   addition, the announcement last fall of the Merida Initiative, a U.S.
   program to provide $1.4 billion in training, intelligence and military
   aircraft to Mexico has been linked to SPP by critics of the
   agreement. Though not officially a part of SPP, it is a manifestation
   of the “deep integration” that is the core of the SPP strategy.
   Through implementation of the SPP, the U.S. is also exporting its War
   on Terror to Canada and Mexico through agreements on the sharing of
   intelligence, airline passenger lists, border surveillance programs
   and the further militarization of the border between the U.S. and
   Mexico-leading to erosion of civil liberties. As New Orleans prepares
   to host the SPP summit, recent changes in the city foretell the SPP’s
   security objectives. In a move that could only be described as
   opportunistic the disaster resulting from Katrina is being used to
   alter the character and demographic makeup of New Orleans. The city
   has been highly militarized, with both National Guard and private
   military firms providing “security.” Documented cases of abuse and
   violence directed at residents of the city by these “security”
   providers show that the interest is not in protecting the residents,
   but in “securing” the city for developers. In this respect New
   Orleans is the perfect backdrop for the SPP summit, put forth as a
   model for the future of North America. Facing a worrisome pact pushed
   forward in secrecy, it is time for Congress to halt this undemocratic
   approach and establish a process based on openness, accountability,
   and the participation of civil society. While civil society may be
   kept away from the SPP summit, their voices will still be heard in New
   Orleans at the People’s Summit. This gathering of residents,
   activists and other concerned people will link the Gulf Coast struggle
   to the fight for the survival of communities in Mexico, Canada and the
   rest of the United States.

   Signed by the following members of U.S. civil society,
   Alliance for Democracy
   Alliance for Responsible Trade (ART)
   APEN (Asian Pacific Environmental Network)
   ASOCOL (Association for the Sovereignty of Colombia)
   Campaign for Labor Rights
   Center of Concern
   Chicago Religious Leadership Network on Latin America
   CISPES (Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador)
   Coalition for Justice in the Maquiladoras
   Democratic Socialists of America
   Fellowship of Reconciliation Task Force on Latin America and the
   Caribbean
   Global Exchange
   Global Ministries of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
   Grassroots Global Justice Alliance
   Institute for Policy Studies, Global Economy Project
   Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns
   National Family Farm Coalition (NFFC)
   National Network for Immigrant Refugee Rights (NNIRR)
   New York CISPES (Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador)
   NYC People’s Referendum on Free Trade
   Nicaragua Network
   Portland Central America Solidarity Committee
   Portland Jobs with Justice
   Quixote Center
   SHARE Foundation: Building a New El Salvador Today
   United Church of Christ
   Vermont Workers’ Center
   Witness for Peace

   For additional information regarding the SPP please contact Jon Hunt
   at 202.550.7025 (cell) or Kathy Ozer at 202.543.5675 or 202.421.4544
   (cell)

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