The World Trade Organization has decided against every environmental, public health, and safety regulation it has ever considered, according to a book-length report released today by Ralph Nader’s consumer watchdog group Public Citizen. The report, the most comprehensive of its type to date, argues that the WTO has usurped the right of nations to determine their own environmental, health, and labor laws. It also argues that the five-year-old institution is threatening democracy worldwide while concentrating wealth and power in the hands of the world’s largest corporations and financial institutions. The Clinton administration quickly rejected the report’s conclusions. Pres. Clinton plans to make a speech tonight outlining his objectives for the WTO meeting to begin in Seattle on November 30. Some 300 groups are expecting to bring 50,000 anti-WTO protestors to Seattle during the meeting.
