Welcome to BASE21

From Oct. 10 to Oct. 15, "Seoul International Conference NGOs" was held at the Olympic park, in Seoul, under the theme of "the Role of NGOs in the 21st Century". It was co-organized by CONGO(UN), Executive Committee of NGO(UN) and GCS, co-sponsored by the Korean government and some daily newspapers(Donga Ilbo and Joongang Ilbo).
About 800 NGOs in 100 countries participated in the conference. It was called as "the Last NGO Olympic Game in the 20th Century". According to the Seoul Declaration accepted at the closing ceremony, "international NGOs will develope partnership, try to maintain autonomy and independence as well as build constructive relationship with the governments and UN, and take actions with the highest human rights, transparency and confidence".
The Organizing Committee said, "we review many issues in each sector proposed in the last decade, such as Environment, Social Welfare and Woman etc. And proposals recommended in the sectoral international conference such as the Rio Conference, Copenhgen and Beijing, were discussed and then we estimated the level of performance of them in each country." And it expects the results of Seoul NGO international conference to be useful reference to the UN Millenium Forum of NGOs which will be held in May, next year.
However, Seoul NGO conference had many problems from the viewpoint of Korean people's and social movement. Firstly, in the process of preparation,there were no room or opportunities for Korean progressive organizations to participate in it. On the contrary, it was organized mainly by the UN and the Korean government. We call it, "NGO conference without NGOs". Secondly, on the Seoul declaration, we cannot see any comment on actions and struggles, but only 'declarations'. The 'real' role of NGOs in the 21st cemtury, I am sure, is to resist globalization, to protect the people's livelihood rights, human rights, and ecology. However, the Seoul declaration don't refer the WTO Millenium Round which is being considered as the most important thing by the international civil society in recent days. Thirdly, ridiculously in the spot of the Seoul NGO conference, freedom of expression was oppressed. Actually, in the morning on Oct. 11, activists from a local human rights organization were picketing in front of the stadium in which the opening ceremonies were held. They cried for the establishment of real human rights organization on the state level which can monitor cases of human rights oppression with the full participation of non-governmental human rights groups. However, the riot police blocked and oppressed the demonstrating activists using the protection of the Korean President Kim Dae-Jung as an excuse. The police even demanded the presentation of ID cards to voluntary participants in order to enter the conference hall. Most of them couldn't take part in the conference. We can't find any cases among international conferences like the Seoul NGOs conference, in which the freedom of expression and demonstration( the heart and soul of the NGO spirit, we believe) were oppressed and ignored, in which the participation of so many others with ideas that could certainly help the development of NGOs were excluded and left out. The reality of the conferene was even more disheartening after hearing president Kim Dae-Jung present himself in the opening speech as a humn rights activist, not a state leader. Open up the gates and allow the circulation
of all ideas, actions and ideologies; this is the starting point f1or a true NGO conference.