WATER ABLAZE - Patagonia Sin Represas

the particular circumstances in which an individual national economy
finds itself. As a result of this form of “aid”, countries dependent on
foreign loans lose all control in the relevant political spheres.
The IMF has thus become an instrument of the industrial nations,
whose main aim is not to deliver humanitarian aid but to control economic
policy in the Third World. There are countless examples to
prove this point: the water wars in Cochabamba (Bolivia), the inglorious
part played by the IMF in the East Asian crisis of 1997 47 or its decisive
contribution to the Argentine crisis, whereby the IMF prescription
for privatisation was adhered to in exemplary fashion, resulting in the
total bankruptcy, in 2001/2002, of the second-largest South American
country and the resignation of President Fernando de la Rúa.
Credit-granting facilities have one further knock-on effect: borrower
nations often find themselves in a long-term debt trap, from which
there is no escape – unless they are given genuine debt relief – and
so they subsequently become susceptible to blackmail. In the process,
the natural resources of the nations in question are increasingly being
used as bargaining objects, with water supplies at the top of the list of
coveted assets.
9.3 The World Bank
The World Bank (WB), also known as the International Bank for
Reconstruction and Development, with headquarters in Washington
D.C., was founded, like the IMF, within the framework of the
Bretton Woods Conference in 1944 and came into formal existence
on December 27, 1945. Its main objective originally, as laid down in
its statutes, was to assist reconstruction and development in the 151
member states by providing investment capital on reasonable terms.
Private foreign investments were to be promoted by means of credit
guarantees or credit-sharing.
Today, the World Bank is organised in a much more complex way
than at the time of its founding and actually consists of five individual
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