The activity was held as part of the mobilizations around the Peoples Summit and was organized by the Continental Articulation of Social Movements Towards ALBA and Via Campesina.

Social Movements Towards ALBA is part of the Social Movements Communication Convergence in Rio+20 through groups such as ALBA TV (Venezuela), the Frente Darío Santillán (Argentina) or the Martin Luther King Memorial Center of Cuba.

Latin American integration was the focus of the activity, which lasted two hours. There, Francisco Toloza (Colombia), Salvador Zuñiga (Honduras), Jean Baptiste Chavannes (Haiti), Perla Alvarez (Paraguay), Rafael Gonzalez (Guatemala), Jesus Cegarra (Venezuela) and Carlos Zamora (Cuba), talked about the challenges of Social Movements in Latin America and the Caribbean and the different struggles against imperialism, highlighting the rejection to “green economy” as a false solution to the environmental problems of our societies.

Francisco Toloza, of Marcha Patriotica, described the situation of social movements in Colombia who resist a neoliberal government as the one led by Juan Manuel Santos. Toloza said “we are resisting in a heroic way a war by the State. After 12 years of the Plan Colombia, the social conflict continues and the problem of peace is only solved in political terms”. He also expressed his support to the more advanced processes of change in the continent, especially the cases of Cuba and Venezuela.

Then it was the turn of Salvador Zuñiga, of COPINH (Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras), who made reference to the Human Rights violations suffered in his country. He said “the Honduran people, since June 28th, 2009, is living a difficult situation characterized by murders: hundreds of brothers and sisters were murdered in this period. And this is not ending, it continues, because the administration that took office after the Coup d’etat continues this death and repression policy”. In terms of socio-environmental issues, Zuñiga talked about the struggles of the Honduran social movements against Lobo’s administration and his model of common goods’ looting. He said: "the struggles continue: we won’t let them take water away from us, we won’t let them take lands away from us, we won’t let them destroy our country".

The intervention of Jean Baptiste Chavannes focused on denouncing the foreign occupation suffered by Haiti, and said that "many countries of the continent still have troops in our country and we need the solidarity of everyone so that they leave the country". Then, he thanked the different campaigns that have been taking place in those countries which sent troops to the island after the earthquake, pretending to be "humanitarian aid", which is not the case, contrary to what happened with ALBA countries that sent doctors and food, supporting the Honduran people in a real and concrete way”.

The situation of Paraguay was also addressed by Perla Alvarez, of CONAMURI (the National Coordination of Rural and Indigenous Women). Alvarez made reference to the recent repression of peasants by the National Police and said that “when we were travelling here to express our opinions with reference to the crisis imposed by the capitalist system, eleven of our friends were massacred in an eviction process. Our people has been suffering this type of actions for a long time.”

The activity, one of the largest in the framework of the Peoples Summit, shows the importance of the unity of the peoples of our America to find real solutions to the socio-environmental problems, in terms of the discussions taking place in Rio+20.

Based on material by the Social Movements Communication Convergence in Rio+20