NGO preparations are already underway for the World Bank’s 2000 annual meetings.
Rights
Rights
News
Major Bank pollution prevention handbook out
After 5 years of preparation the World Bank and IFC have jointly published a Pollution Prevention and Abatement Handbook.
Conditionality
News
Strikers in Colombia in protest at IMF and debt
In late August Colombian labour unions began an indefinite national strike in protest at the government’s political, social, and economic agenda and calling on the government to declare a moratorium on the payment of its internal and external debt.
Rights
News
Call to halt aid after Timorese massacres
Massacres perpetrated and condoned by the Indonesian army have led to calls to halt World Bank and IMF aid programmes to Indonesia.
Land
News
Oil-Palm Watch
Indonesian NGOs, concerned about the spread of oil palm plantations since the onslaught of the crisis, have formed “Sawat (Oil Palm) Watch”.
Rights
News
UK committee criticises Bank and Fund over conflict roles
The UK International Development Select Committee of MPs has criticised the IMF and Bank for failing to raise concerns with the Rwandan government about the discrimination and intimidation of Tutsis prior to the civil war.
Rights
News
Confronting Gender Inequities and Political Disempowerment
The Women’s Eyes campaign was launched by women’s movements and NGOs to monitor World Bank progress in bringing its lending operations in line with the Platform for Action of the Fourth World Conference on Women Beijing Women’s Summit in 1995.
Rights
News
Poverty project endangers Tibetans
In early June the World Bank rushed to defend the proposed China Western Poverty Project from charges that it would disrupt the lives of ethnic Tibetans and had undergone too limited environmental scrutiny.
Rights
News
IMF transparency improved
The IMF has outlined a new information policy.
Environment
News
New report on problems with forest policy reform
The World Rainforest Movement and Environmental Defense Fund have produced a briefing on the World Bank’s Forest Policy Review and Strategy Development process.
