Social Watch E-Newsletter - Issue 144 - September 6, 2013

The political stalemate continues in Egypt; the dismissal of the Rabeaa and Al‐Nahda sit‐ins was one of its bloodiest events. Although many players are keen to protect the Egyptian state, safeguard its persistence and support its role, efforts are still required on all fronts, including the international front, to reach effective and permanent solutions s that respect human rights and allow for a resumption of the transitional political process.

This process includes promulgating a new constitution that meets the aspirations of all Egyptians s of all factions and affiliations and making conditions suitable for holding fair, democratic and unchallengeable elections. This will guarantee the right of Egyptian men and women to decide a future for them and for their representative institutions. The Arab NGO Network for Development (ANND), Beirut released a statement on August 27, 2013.

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The U.S. Federal Reserve recently announced it is reviewing its policy allowing financial firms to trade in physical commodities, which has been known to distort market prices of food, fuels, and metals. This reassessment comes almost a decade after the Fed ruled that Citigroup Inc. could continue trading in physical commodities after finding the practice within the bounds of the firm’s trading and investing in financial instruments.

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A consortium of civil society organisations (CSOs) of which Women for a Change is part, has reiterated its call on government to suspend the current non-governmental organisation (NGO) registration exercise and immediately initiate a process to repeal the Act.

The civil society organisations said they will remain resolute and unshaken to any innuendos and manoeuvres by any section of society to force them to be registered under an instrument that they claim was aimed at ‘killing’ the country’s democratic liberty.

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Concrete measures to improve the functioning of the legislature in the Indian state of Gujarat were suggested to the state Governor by the local Social Watch coalition. The network of civil society organizations demands more careful consideration of the human rights reports and more days of functioning of the Assembly among other measures to improve the democratic mechanisms.

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