Freedom and Its Adversaries

Neil Clark writes:

The 'Freedom and its Adversaries' conference was held in Prague last month to commemorate 20 years since the 'Velvet Revolution', and which was supported by several western multinationals, including the Coca-Cola Company, Deloitte and TNT Post.

You can read a list of the participants here, and what a bunch they were too.

Neo-con pin-up boy Vaclav Havel, described by current Czech President Vaclav Klaus as 'the most elitist person I have ever seen in my life', Iraq war supporting philosopher Andre Glucksmann and the fanatically anti-communist playwright Tom Stoppard, who is on the advisory board of the hardcore neocon magazine Standpoint.

And guess who’s there on top left? Yup, former US Secretary of State, 'Mad' Albright.

Her bio says:

As Secretary of State, she reinforced America’s alliances, advocated democracy and human rights, and promoted American trade and business, labor, and environmental standards abroad.

Well, I think we can fairly say Mad ‘promoted American trade and business' - but ‘advocated democracy and human rights’?

By supporting the genocidal sanctions on the people of Iraq?

"When asked on US television if she thought that the death of half a million Iraqi children was a price worth paying, Albright replied: "This is a very hard choice, but we think the price is worth it."

Or by bombing innocent Yugoslav citizens and helping to topple a democratically elected government whose only ‘crime’ was continuing to run an economy where social ownership predominated a decade after the Berlin Wall came down?

The 'freedom' that Ms Albright wants is the 'freedom' for big corporations to make money. Certainly not the freedom of people to elect governments the US State Department and global capital disapprove of.