They consider themselves the leaders of the civilised world and they claimed they were going to make poverty history. But first they sat down to a feast with the Queen (who lives on $67.1 million a year of welfare) at the Gleneagles luxury resort, "tucking in to Marrbury smoked salmon and roasted langoustines, fillet of Glen Ean lamb with broad beans and peas, aubergine caviar and parmesan polenta, all washed down by a fruity Chateau Climens (Barsac) 1990".
"No better way to kick-start talks to end African poverty and hunger", observed Mike Carlton in the July 9 Sydney Morning Herald.
The next day these leaders of the civilised world considered the problem: 2.8 billion people live in poverty; 30,000 children die of poverty-related causes each day; 800,000 people suffer from chronic hunger; 1.1. billion lack access to safe drinking water; and total Third World debt equals $2.4 trillion.
And in their wisdom and deep humanity (later eloquently contrasted with the inhumanity of those barbaric terrorists who exploded bombs in London's public transport system, which the G8 leaders never use) they decided to forgive $55 billion worth of debt of the 18 poorest countries in the world on condition that these countries eliminate "impediments to private investment, both domestic and foreign".
The true wisdom (or devilish cunning) of this civilised little condition was explained by Norm Dixon in the July 6 edition of Green Left Weekly, with this telling example: The last 20 years of trade "liberalisation" — a condition for aid, loans and debt relief — have made sub-Saharan countries a massive $272 billion worse off than they otherwise would have been as a result of being forced to open their markets to heavily subsidised imports from rich countries. What chance does an African subsistence farmer have against US and European produce subsidised to the tune of $350 billion a year!
But these folk would not want to be seen as heartless. So they promised to release enough extra aid in five years' time (they want to teach the starving the civilised value of patience) to save five million African children's lives. In the meantime, this lesson will cost 50 million lives, according to Oxfam. It clearly won't be a lesson easily forgotten.
After the $470 million dollar holiday (at the British public's expense) at Gleneagles, the leaders of the civilised world vowed to continue waging wars to defend their values and way of life.
Attacks on the civilised world and its way of life would not be tolerated, warned US President George Bush (whose civilised government cut $200 billon in taxes for the rich and will spend $440 billion on its military in 2006).
Speaking at the FBI academy in Virginia, Bush said: "We continue to take the fight to the enemy and will fight till this enemy is defeated."
Such wars are needed to defend the civilised way of life, which involves the rich countries robbing the world's poorest people of $3 billion a day simply through "free trade". Barbarians? Never!
Peter Boyle
From Green Left Weekly, July 20, 2005.
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