GENEVA, May 22 (Reuters) - Claims by
anti-globalization groups and labour unions that current global trade
negotiations will force privatization of public services are baseless, a senior
developing country envoy said on Thursday.
The issue is high on the list of causes
-- alongside the invasion of Iraq -- for planned demonstrations against the
June 1-3 summit of the Group of Eight (G8) industrial countries to be held in
Evian, France, just across Lake Leman from Geneva.
Alejandro Jara, Chile's ambassador to the
World Trade Organization (WTO) and chairman of talks on opening up service industries,
said: "Concerns expressed over public sectors are all unfounded, even
completely unfounded."
"There is no reason for the sort of
concern expressed by many NGOs (non-governmental organizations)," he said,
adding offers made so far showed governments were not giving up regulatory
powers in areas like health and water.
Organizers, who expect tens of thousands
of protesters to block roads between central Geneva and France for up to a week
around the summit, say the 146-member WTO is a tool of the major powers to
impose economic domination on the rest of the world.
Even moderate labour groupings, like the
Brussels-based International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), say the
only way to protect education, health and public utilities is to exclude them
formally from the services talks, or GATS.
The British-based World Development
Movement (WDM) says the European Union, driven by powerful service industries,
is pressing many developing countries to open up water services, electricity
supply and postal deliveries.
NGOs say the United States is driving
hard to get openings for its private health and education firms.
But Jara said at a news conference that
the 25 negotiating offers tabled so far in the talks - part of the WTO's
overall Doha Round of free trade negotiations due to be completed by the end of
2004 - show that the services governments provide are excluded from GATS.
Public services, which in some poorer
countries are already contracted out to private firms, would only be opened up
to full international competition under GATS "if governments want them to
be," he said.
NGOs point to Bolivia, South Africa and
Colombia as countries where, they argue, privatization of water, electricity and
telecommunications has led to costlier and worse services.