Thursday, July 13, 2006

Uruguay vs Argentina, first round, 14-1

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The International Court of Justice in The Hague gave it's first order in favor of Uruguay, to the argentinean request of provisional measures. I quote:

"The Court finds that the circumstances, as they now present themselves to it, are not such as to require the exercise of its power to indicate provisional measures"

Argentina had requested the suspension of the pulp mills constructions as a provisional measure, but in order for it to be granted they had to probe irreversible damage, which seems they couldn't.

This is actually very good news for Uruguay, which really didn't make much noise among people yet, maybe because it was somehow expected. It's worth noting that it's unusual (or so they say) such unanimity in the veredict, 14-1. The only vote against was from an argentinean in the court.

Uruguay will continue with the constructions on it's own risk, knowing that if Argentina wins the case some years from now, they'll be useless (will they? but that's another story).

As a consequence argentina's president, kirchner, is now giving speeches about how their strategy now will be to exercise pressure on the european authorities to cut funding for the corporations behind the pulp mills. What, the heck, does this mean? Should we win the case, will Argentina's stop it? We are on court on their initiative, the least to be expected it for them to bow the veredict, but to he honest I'm not sure they will.

Meanwhile in GualeguaychĂș they decided to blockade route 14 in Argentina, with a march of about 3.500 vehicles, demonstrating against the veredict and the pulp mills. The GualeguaychĂș movement seen in perspective seems like a snowboll rolling down a hill, ending in an avalanche, to think it all started with their "governor", Busti's declarations.

Myself like almost anyone else around (even in buenos aires) is pretty fed up with the whole subject, I guess there's not much to do but hope it all turns out right.
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5 comments:

Ana said...

Hi, I'm Ana, born and raised here in Uruguay. I just came into your site and I read it all, I love it! what a great job you've done. (I don't know why I'm writing in English, :P but it's ok so everyone understands).
Anyway, I bookmarked this site and I will recommend it to anyone who doesn't know about Uruguay (that's to say...pretty much everyone!).
About the paper mills, I agree. I'm getting so tired of this, what a sad way to ruin a nice relationship between 2 countries. Tough job for our new government.

Saludos
(y aguante el Bolso :)

gabo_uy said...

hi Ana,

glad you liked the site, if you want to "contribute" you might want to bookmark it here.

thanks,
gabo_uy

cecitazzz said...

Hey gabo! I'm also from Uruguay. Love your blog and I'm also reccommending the site to all my foreign friends.

Great job.
Ceci:P

Gerd Heinrichs said...

Finally something is good coming from Holland :)
I'm born in Holland and living now in Belgium. Visit your country during 2000 twice and really liked and enjoyed this country. I had a very good guide and visit many places like Punto Diablo ,Colonia , Minas, Pirapolis, Casa Pueblo , Maldonado , Trenta tres etc etc. Maybe a few suggestions for future blogs is Uruguayan artists like Sabelero, Jaime Roos , Los Fatalos. I hope you keep writing this blog , i like to read stories about Uruguay.

gabo_uy said...

thanks, I'm actually evaluating a couple of things for the next posts, one of them is about Uruguayan music in the 60's.