Fence it

I have been away to Heiligendamm over the weekened to get an idea of the area - well as far as i could get. as you can see from picture above roads leading to Heiligendamm are blocked at the moment. I went to Rostock too, to check out the accommodation I booked online for my ActionAid colleagues to come here later in June and last but not least to look at the fence I mentioned earlier. This is what it looks like! They are still in the middle of constrution - later on cameras will also be added. I dared to google pictures from the former GDR to get a comparison - you may want to do so yourself.

cheers ladies

it is five to noon - well by the time this blog is written it is past midnight - and then it is our day - international women's day. Let's call upon Chancellor Angela Merkel to show us what's in it for women's rights during the double presidency of the EU and the G8. Today, more than 100 organisations launched a new campaign "women won't wait" which sheds light on the vicious circle of violence against women & girls and HIV/AIDS. If one reads that young women account for 76% of all new HIV infections in Sub-Saharan Africa then for sure we can't wait any longer - we should not and we must not, as Mary Robinson said in her remarks at the launch event. Indeed, actions are needed - i guess it's Merkels turn just now.

yet again, good night and good luck

Making the most of a Friday evening...

I went to see Jeffrey Sachs who gave a talk titled "Making the most of the Heiligendamm G8 Summit". A successful G8 summit for him this year is about timetables and funding plans being delivered. It is about implementing existing commitments instead of adding new promises, is the mantra of his talk.

His focus is on the 2005 G8 promise to double aid to Africa to at least US$ 50bn in 2010 while hardly any attention is paid by Sachs to the crucial G8 commitment: achieving universal access to prevention, treatment and care for all people with HIV and AIDS also by 2010. UNAIDS estimates that this year alone approximately US$ 8bn are needed!

For Sachs, all this is fundamentally an economic problem and not a challenge to a G8's budget but a challenge to decency. He provides a figure indicating the 20hrs of US pentagon spending is sufficient to combat malaria.

Missing this years opportunity to follow through on very practical steps as an action plan that outlines which G8 country increase its official development assistance on which date relates to the summit being meaningless, according to Sachs - for sure something that Chancellor Merkel is trying to prevent. The cost of not delivering is economically as well as politically not viable.

But don't get me wrong - it wasn't my best Friday evening.

I don't agree with Sachs that the nature of the problem is an economic one and that one can ignore the politics. I don't understand how a 2hrs talk about the G8 summit can get away with not mentioning the WTO negotations. His speech is about needs that can be satisifed if only we follow his practical guidelines as in the Millennium Villages.

I wonder, if it would be all that simple as Sachs is putting it, why are there 850 million people hungry though there is enough food to feed the world. It is a violation of poor people's rights - and only one of them is the denial of women's rights to land...

Oh, no single women in fact managed to be taken into the question session...
Oh, and the host managed to acknowledge all but NGOs attendance in his entry speech...
Oh, thank god it was Friday and off I went through yet another rainy night in Berlin...

No comment

Bob Geldof in a recent interview with "Der Tagesspiegel"

"...Live 8 is probably the biggest movement of all time, certainly it's bigger than the civil rights or anti-apartheid movements..."

Another wall

Isn't it a bid odd for a former Eastener, the first female chancellor in Germany to be responsible for building yet another wall in Germany. This time it will only be 12km long; 2.50m high and at the little cost of 11 Mio Euro!

To be honest, it is more of a fence but still it is about fundamentally excluding people from Heiligendamm. Obviously, the official language is different - and it is about security and protection of the heads of state of the G8 countries as they are also expecting some 50.000 protestors. For sure, a fence that is built now and will be demolished right after the summit (lasting 6-8th June) to protect Merkel and her "partners in crime" is causing some controversy in an area in Germany with beautiful landscape but lack of employment options so that in fact there aren't that many people living anymore in or around Heiligendamm...but many will come and visit later this year; e.g. also some 16.000 police men

One for my mum

This one goes to my mum! Yeah right - are you wondering how it all links to G8.

Well, it happens to be her birthday on Friday, the exact date of the first official meeting of the G7 Finance Ministers. This will take place in Essen while I will be enjoying myself on some holiday out of the country, for sure far enough away from Essen! But I managed to tick off crucial bits and pieces of my to-do-list and ActionAid will launch a report addressing the upcoming meeting. Big on the to-do-list of the Finance Ministers is hopefully to commit to a proper funding plan for the target of universal access to prevention, treatment and care of HIV/AIDS by 2010. The G8 leaders have promised to do so already back in 2005 - so far all talk but no action. It seems, that political decision makers want to ensure us with more talk that all promises will be kept, albeit we see no action...yet again the G8 agenda headline "growth and responsibility" is ringing an alarm bell (if only in my ears) that the G8 wants to hand over the responsibility of fighting HIV onto developing countries. However, in 2007 alone 10 billion are lacking to fight HIV/AIDS! Someone in Germany would dare to say it is peanuts (sorry for an insider)- for developing countries it is not; for people living with AIDS it is not.

With establishing the Global Fund it sounds like G8 has fulfilled its obligation and the call is thus for African countries to come up with appropriate health budget, strengthening health systems, formulation of comprehensive anti-AIDS strategies, and development of strategies to overcome the scarcity of professional staff in the health sector. As if those strategies don’t yet exist; as if those nurses and health personal are not dying of HIV; as if the health budget is not cut due to IMF economic conditionalities...

Mixed messages

When the European Commission called this week for a binding legislation that would require carmakers to reduce new cars' CO2 emissions to an average of 120 grams per kilometer in 2012 Germany's industry unsurprisingly and uninspiringly has been quick with a very noisy response: binding limits at a fixed level of 120 would threat thousands of jobs in Germany and the competitiveness of the entire car industry. So far, so good - one would not expect a different response albeit some of us would wish for a more holistic one - thinking of climate change concerns instead of industry concerns only.

Here, Chancellor Merkel comes into the picture. No matter, whether looking at the G8 agenda or listening to her opening speech at the World Economic Forum - climate change is being pushed by her as an issue. A pity, that she is as quick as the car industry then in opposing any binding obligation that could indeed bring us closer to lowering CO2 emissions!

Moreover, the G8 agenda titled "growth and responsibility" cannot be read that it is about G8 countries' responsibility to spearhead policies and actions addressing the changing climate. Rather, it looks like Germany is spearheading the G8 this year in shifting the responsibility onto emerging powers such as China, India, Brazil, South Africa. Their rapid increase in energy consumption as well as consequently the increase in greenhouse gas emissions sounds like the greater challenge to the G8 than the changing climate per se. Though, it seems obvious that the G8 has not only the greatest capacity but also the greatest responsibility to lead by example.