We, the participants of the Second Continental Conference Against Free Trade and Privatizations, stand opposed to the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) Conference of the Americas being convened by US President George W. Bush in New Orleans, Louisiana April 21st and 22nd.

This meeting is a heinous crime against the peoples of North America, but particularly against the dispossessed and displaced peoples of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. Calling this meeting in the city of New Orleans, which remains largely unoccupied more and 30 months after Hurricane Katrina and where more than half of its historic African American majority remains displaced, only highlights the true intentions of this undemocratic initiative and the neo-liberal agenda it seeks to propagate.

In the case of New Orleans, this neo-liberal agenda advances the ethnic cleansing of the cities African American population as a means to eliminate a strategic base of "Black Power" resistant to the program of privatizations and retrenchments needed to maximize profits for transnational corporations.

In the case of North America as a whole, the SPP seeks to eliminate the national sovereignty of Mexico and Canada in the name of US national security and plunder their natural resources (oil, gas, water, etc.) for US consumption and the profit maximization of transnational corporations.

We, the participants of the Second Continental Conference Against Free Trade and Privatizations, stand in active solidarity with the People's Summit being organized by the democratic forces of resistance in New Orleans and throughout North America to counter the neo-liberal program of state privatization and working class dispossession being advanced by treaties like the SPP, NAFTA, CAFTA, and other Free Trade Agreements.

We, the participants of the Second Continental Conference Against Free Trade and Privatizations, support the conclusions of the International Tribunal on Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, held in New Orleans August 29th - September 2nd, 2007 and demand the right of return for all displaced people from New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, the recognition of internally displaced person (IDP) status for the displaced people, reparations for all those displaced and a massive publicly funded reconstruction program, beginning with the restoration of all public housing for the residents of New Orleans.

We, the participants of the Second Continental Conference Against Free Trade and Privatizations, call for the unity of the peoples of the Americas for self-determination, national sovereignty, and human rights against reactionary privatizations, free trade agreements, and corporate driven dictatorships. The people united will never be defeated!

Adopted Sunday, April 6, 2008 in Mexico City, Mexico

For more information on the II Encuentro Continental visit www.encuentrocontinental.org

For more information about the struggle against Privatization in Mexico see:
Mexico Legislators Storm Congress
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7341821.stm