Protests against APEC meeting in Korea



Many Koreans are protesting against the APEC meeting in Pusan next week. Kang Ki-kap of the Democratic Labor Party stages a hunger strike for the 18th consecutive day against the move to ratify Korea's rice deals, at the main staircase of the National Assembly in Yoido, Seoul, Sunday.

"The right to live of some 3.5 million peasants are at peril because of the United States’ push to open the rice market," said the KPL, which combines dozens of local peasants’ councils, in a statement. "We demand the APEC forum, which serves to support the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the Doha Development Agenda (DDA), be stopped immediately."

The South Korean government should take a lesson from the case of the Summit of Americas in Mar del Plata, Argentina last week that "failed to come to agreement due to strong protests from the South American people against the U.S. and U.S. President George Bush," the statement said. Otherwise the peasants will wage a "strong battle" on Friday shoulder to shoulder with other civic groups to stop the APEC summit scheduled to start on that day, it added.

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