15 September 2006

International development agency ActionAid is demanding that the World Bank and International Monetary Fund do not again hold their annual meetings in countries restricting civil and political liberties, after four of its staff were detained at Singapore’s Changi airport. One is due to be deported tonight (Friday 15 September).

"The World Bank and IMF preach ‘good governance’ but they refused to move their annual meetings out of Singapore despite news last week that the government had a blacklist of civil society delegates who were to be denied entry," said Eric Gutierrez, international policy coordinator with the agency, who is in Singapore for the meetings.

"This highlights just how out of touch they are with the practice of genuine democracy. The 'Singapore effect' is likely to continue unless these global institutions get their house in order."

The Singapore 2006 Organising Committee today (Friday) decided to let in 22 of the 27 blacklisted individuals, but this gesture was "too little, too late," according to Gutierrez. "All these people will have cancelled their travel plans so are unlikely to attend. It’s a disgrace," he said.

"Singapore has realised its mistake, yet its decision has been made too late.  The damage has been done," he added.

The Singapore government ‘blacklist’ denying entry to civil society representatives violated the terms of the Memorandum of Understanding that Singapore signed with the global institutions, Gutierrez said.

"We are calling on Singapore to launch a full investigation into why Maria Clara Soares, ActionAid’s head of policy for the Americas and a former economic advisor to the Brazilian Ministry of Finance, was held for 30 hours and is being deported tonight.

"Deportation is very serious and ActionAid is concerned about the professional and personal implications for our representative caught up in this process,” said Gutierrez. “Her phone was confiscated and she was refused access to other members of staff present in Singapore."

Three other senior ActionAid colleagues, all officially accredited by the World Bank and IMF, were detained at the airport for several hours and repeatedly interrogated and fingerprinted before being released.

They were Rose Wanjiru from Kenya, held for nearly six hours and released at 3am, also denied permission to use the phone; Thao Haong from Vietnam, interrogated four times and fingerprinted three times by immigration officials; and Rashid Titumir from Bangladesh, ActionAid’s head of policy for the Asia region.

Ms Soares was part of the ActionAid delegation travelling to Singapore to take part in seminars and peaceful protests on the fringes of the World Bank and IMF Annual Meetings. She has spent more than ten years researching World Bank and IMF policies and their impact on poverty and inequality.

According to latest reports, about 20 people from a range of organisations have been denied entry by the Singaporean authorities.