14.04.2004 (by ANNCOL) During the First Andean Day of Action against the Free Trade Area of the Americas, FTAA, and other free trade agreements, recently agreed upon in Quito, thousands of farmers will take to the streets on Thursday, April 15, demanding that the governments of Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and Bolivia not sign free trade agreements sponsored by Washington.
In Colombia, the National Association for Agricultural Salvation, headed by Ángel María Caballero, is planning 15 assemblies. Coffee planters, growers of sugar cane, potatoes and rice, indigenous communities, farm workers, businessmen of the banana industry and other producers will march and celebrate assemblies during the day.
Participating in the planned activities are the Coffee Union, the Sugar Cane Union, the Huila Farmers Association, the Meta Association of Farmers and Ranchers, the Cauca Association of Small and Medium Farmers (Agropemca), The Colombian Peasant Association, The National Trade Union Federation of Agricultural Workers (Fensuagro) and other important agricultural organizations from the coffee growing region and the departments of Antioquia, Magdalena, Boyacá, Huila, Meta, Cesar, Cundinamarca, Santander, Tolima, Valle, Cauca and Nariño.
In a message to the editors of ANNCOL, Colombian senator Jorge Enrique Robledo gave his support to the demonstrations. Robledo said that the subject of the multilateral FTAA and other, bilateral, free trade agreements is becoming more pressing day by day.
– It is a crucial subject, because here we a playing with the future of the 300 million people who live South of the Rio Grande and who are headed for a new colonization, worse than that of Spain, declared Senator Robledo, who called for civil resistance to stop the treaties.
