Heads of governments or high-level delegations from the 114 NAM member countries attended the six-day summit. The NAM includes the majority of governments from Third-World nations oppressed by imperialism. How to confront the depression conditions increasingly spreading throughout Africa, Asia, and Latin America was a constant theme of the meeting.
It was the Cuban delegation above all that staked out an uncompromising stance against political, economic, and military domination by the Yankee empire. In many cases, their positions matched those of the South African government, led by the African National Congress.
South African president Nelson Mandela opened the inaugural session of heads of state September 2. He called for a "new era." "The violence we see all around us, against people who are as human as we who sit in privileged positions, must surely be addressed in decisive and sustained manner," he said.
Cancel Third World debt
The South African president devoted much of his speech to
discussion of the international economic crisis, particularly
the widespread depression conditions in the semicolonial world
and the unequal trade relations enforced by the industrial
capitalist countries against the peoples of Africa, Asia,
Latin America, and the Caribbean.
"Today, one of the most immediate challenges that faces the developed countries is the need to remove the burden of the unbearable debt. Much has been said about this. What is needed is action by the developed countries and their partners in the south.
"From this," Mandela continued, "it would be correct to conclude that the problem of Japan is a problem of an excess of wealth. Thus...we have to grapple with such conundrums as an excess of wealth in one area of the world which contributes to the creation of poverty in another....
"There are resources within the world economy which could and should be mobilized to address the development needs of the poor of the world.
"The process of globalization has imposed on all of us a fashionable orthodox uniformity according to which we must all address such questions as budget deficits, rates of inflation, interest and exchange rates, capital movements, the flexibility of labor markets, the affordability of social welfare systems and so on.
"Might the situation not arise that these, and other phrases, occupy so prominent a place in our daily political vocabulary that, inadvertently, we end up deifying the means to an end?"
Mandela's speech was followed by remarks from heads of state or foreign ministers of all the countries represented.
The empire and its subjects
In his brief speech on behalf of the peoples of Latin
America, Castro noted, "A deep and already inevitable economic
crisis of unforeseeable consequences threatens us all."
Speaking for the Cuban government later in the meeting, Castro responded to criticism in the local and international press of the NAM as an outdated talk shop. "There is no need for the Movement to apologize or ask anyone's permission to exist and continue fighting," he said. "Even the United States earnestly requested to attend this meeting as a guest - so be it. It's better that way, so that the great empire may learn how its modest subjects feel."
Returning to Mandela's call for restructuring of the United Nations, Castro said that "the Security Council's dictatorship must cease." Likewise, he said, the International Monetary Fund should be transformed. "It should no longer be ... a financial gendarme for U.S. interests."
The revolutionary leader defended the rights of immigrant workers. "The acclaimed free movement of capital and commodities must also apply to that which should be above all else: the human being. No more bloody walls like that under construction along the American-Mexican border which is taking a high toll of hundreds of lives every year. The persecution of immigrants must cease. Xenophobia must die, and not solidarity."
Castro denounced "the hypocritical protests of those who strongly complain when others want to produce nuclear weapons," referring principally to the U.S. government, which is "turning to more powerful, accurate, and deadly weapons. This only encourages proliferation and will never be conducive to real disarmament."
Castro concluded by saying: "One day we will not be separated by our ethnic origins, nor by national chauvinism or borders, rivers or seas, oceans and distances. We shall be, above all else, people that will unavoidably live in a globalized world, but a truly just, fraternal, and peaceful world.
"That day we must earn by struggling," he said.
NAM denounces embargo and bombing
Washington's embargo of Cuba was denounced by Mandela,
Castro, and in the final summit resolution. The document also
criticized the widening extraterritorial nature of the
economic blockade and demanded the return of Washington's
naval base on Cuban soil - Guantánamo - to the Cuban people.
The summit document also condemned the August 20 U.S. missile attack on Al Shifa Pharmaceutical Plant in Khartoum, Sudan, calling it "a serious violation of the principles of international law" and "a threat to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Sudan." NAM members denounced "the continuing threats made by the U.S. government against the Sudan" and supported Khartoum's call for full material compensation by Washington.
The 127-page resolution also lent support to the Korean people's fight for reunification of their country and for the Palestinian struggle for a homeland.
In his opening speech, Mandela said that the "narrow, chauvinistic interests" of the Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu were blocking "progress towards a just and peaceful solution, including the formation of a sovereign state of Palestine."
Palestinian Authority president Yasser Arafat told delegates that the Israeli government "bears full responsibility for this total freeze in the peace process and for the total anarchy that is difficult to control, and that will encompass the whole area," if talks break down. Arafat emphasized in both his speech and at a press conference that he was relying on the U.S. government to "save the peace process."
Mandela's remarks on Kashmir - where the majority opposes rule by New Delhi -touched off a firestorm of controversy. The South African president said that "the issue of Jammu and Kashmir should be solved through peaceful negotiations."
Indian prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee vociferously objected to this remark. "Let me say this loud and clear," he told the summit. "There is no place for any third party involvement in this process. The state of Jammu and Kashmir has been and will remain part of India. The real problem is one of cross-border terrorism," a thinly veiled reference to Pakistan.
Efforts by New Delhi and Islamabad to win recognition from the NAM as nuclear powers were unsuccessful. The summit condemned the failure of the existing nuclear powers to take steps to dismantle their arsenals.
Wars in Africa
The war in the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly
Zaire) was a major discussion at much of the meeting.
The governments of Angola, Namibia, and Zimbabwe have sent troops to defend the government of President Laurent Kabila from forces that reportedly include soldiers from Rwanda and Uganda. During the NAM summit, Mandela dropped his government's objection to the participation of the Angolan, Namibian, and Zimbabwean forces, referring to Kabila as the "legitimate head" of government in Congo.
As we go to press, cease-fire negotiations broke down in Zimbabwe, as representatives of the Congo rebel forces walked out.
The threat of renewed civil war in Angola also drew attention. Mandela demanded in his speech that the United Nations -which supposedly is the guarantor of the "peace" in Angola - act to enforce agreements reached four years ago for Jonas Savimbi's National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) to disarm. UNITA has stepped up its military activities in recent months, seizing towns and villages, with the de facto political encouragement of UN officials.
On August 31, the Angolan government announced the suspension of 70 UNITA ministers and members of parliament.
Washington immediately protested. "This decision calls into question the government's stated commitment to full implementation of the Lusaka protocols," said State Department spokesperson James Foley.
In his speech to the summit, Angolan president Jose Eduardo dos Santos announced news of a split in Savimbi's ranks. A group of leading UNITA members has formed UNITA Renovada and wants to negotiate with the government.
In opening the summit, Mandela remarked that "the greatest challenge we face ... is the obligation to ensure that the objective of the rebirth of the continent of Africa should and must succeed. Without this, all declarations of the emergence of a new world will be without meaning."