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Gerry Barr

Close and summing up

Gerry Barr, President-CEO, Canadian Council for International Co-operation
and Chair, Make Poverty History Canada

CSO letter regarding government boycott of corporate accountability conference

Hon. Stockwell Day
Minister of International Trade

Hon. Lawrence Cannon
Minister of Foreign Affairs

Hon. Lisa Raitt
Minister of Natural Resources

Hon. Beverley Oda
Minister of International Cooperation

November 3, 2009

Re: Withdrawal of civil servants from corporate accountability conference

Dear Ministers Day, Cannon, Raitt and Oda:

On October 29, civil servants from the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, Natural Resources Canada and the Canadian International Development Agency suddenly withdrew their participation from a conference jointly organized by the Canadian Network on Corporate Accountability (CNCA) and the Mining Association of Canada (MAC), which is taking place today. These civil servants withdrew not only as speakers on each of the conference’s panels, but also as registered participants.

Presentation to the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development on Bill C-300

Presentation regarding Bill C-300 - An Act respecting Corporate Accountability for the Activities of Mining, Oil or Gas in Developing Countries

Karyn Keenan, Program Officer, Halifax Initiative
October 22, 2009

The Halifax Initiative is a coalition of human rights, environmental, faith-based, development and labour organizations. Our objective is to transform public international financial institutions to achieve poverty eradication, environmental sustainability and the full realization of universal human rights.

My work focuses on the operations of public institutions that provide support to the private sector, in particular the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank Group and Export Development Canada. The latter, a Crown corporation, is Canada’s export credit agency and will be the focus of my comments this morning.

Action Alert Archives : August 21, 2003

The World Bank and other donors have vowed to fight corruption, which undermines development and democracy. Yet their focus is consistently only on corrupt acts perpetrated by poor country governments, when it actually takes two to tango.

"There is always somebody who pays, and international business is generally the main source of corruption", said none other than the billionaire financier, George Soros.

Sacred Land, Scarred Land

"Sacred Land, Scarred Land" - a video, backgrounder, and action sheet about 4 projects involving Canadian companies and the impacts on communities, with a particular focus on the violation of land rights.  Two of the projects highlighted received support from Export Development Canada. Video available for $10.  (Video - 2000)

Canada's Export Development Corporation - Financing Disaster

In 1999, Amnesty International raised alarms about the killing of four indigenous people protesting a hydroelectric dam in Colombia that has devastated their food source and, if completed, would flood most of their land.

In 1998, an accident at a mine in Kyrgystan resulted in two tons of cyanide entering a river. A lack of an emergency response plan worsened the disaster, leaving two people dead and over 600 hospitalized.

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