President Lula said the decisive moment in the current "Doha round" of talks would come in the next few weeks, with the G8 summit at a trade ministers' meeting due in mid-June.
"I think that this month something has to happen. If nothing happens, we will go into history as a generation of politicians that failed humanity, especially the poor," the president said. "If there is no agreement on Doha round, it's useless to talk about fighting terrorism, its useless to fight organised crime because poverty is the principal seed for the growth of terrorism."
The only more important issue in the world than trade, President Lula said, is climate change, and both are nearing a potential turning point.
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So Lula of Brazil and Mbeki of South Africa share a point: address nurture and many problems will be solved. A bit like the old adage of marry for intelligence, and the rest will follow. The underlying issue is that the third world wants first world living quality. Until that arrives, displacement or genocide are the only rational courses.
Public and even private corporate morality is shifting positively. As positively as shareholder morality will allow. State morality may be doing so in several countries. Murder as state policy is still used locally and condoned by silence globally. though. Leaks by internet are helping fear of justice spread, especially when governments are seen trying to plug them.
Understandably the survival and growth of the state are seen as paramount over individual rights and lives in knife-edge countries. Now we need ways of sharing technology and the good will to use it well. Do the western corporates have the bottle to get it right for all of us? Perhaps do-no-evil google rather than bottom-line Microsoft is the ambassador I would still trust for now. National ambassadors are too well known as honest men sent abroad to lie for their country.
Rendering unto Mammon is the hard part to swallow, when you have little faith that the institutions of mammon can turn away from their historic evils. At this point, for me, denial reigns. Would I could tame it.
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