Activists perform "Exorcisim" on Law Firm Likely to Benefit from TIPP

[hueymahl]

Have to give them credit for creativity in bringing the message to the masses. They brought in clergy and held a public exorcism to "exorcise them from this brutal slab of architecture."

King & Spalding is a huge multi-national law firm that, when not defending tobacco companies, often represent corporations when they sue governments for doing crazy things, like "governing."

One controversial TTIP provision, called Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS), would allow foreign investors to sue an EU state or the EU itself for damages from policies that they think have hurt their corporate profits.
Global Justice Now in the U.K. and European groups such as the European Citizens Initiative that oppose the TTIP say it would increase the power of multinationals at the expense of democracy and the rule of law.

Global Justice Now's website says it targeted King & Spalding because of the firm's large foreign investor-state treaty arbitration practice.
King & Spalding represents multinational corporations in similar arbitration claims against national governments before the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes at the World Bank, under the provisions of bilateral investment treaties.

Global Justice Now highlighted King & Spalding's representation of French utility company Veolia in a $92 million investment treaty suit that it filed against Egypt in 2012 after the country raised the monthly minimum wage from 400 to 700 Egyptian pounds ($56 to $99).
Veolia is claiming breach of a waste disposal contract that it has with the city of Alexandria, because the city refused to change the contract to meet higher costs from the wage increase. Veolia is claiming additional damages because the local police failed to prevent the widespread theft of trash cans by Alexandrians.

"This is a taste of what the EU-U.S. trade deal TTIP could bring us if it is implemented," Global Justice Now said.

Read more: http://www.dailyreportonline.com/id=1202725385488/Activists-Perform-Exorcism-on-King-amp-Spalding-in-London#ixzz3ZrJAfVei

[KamaAina]

1. Was Booby Jindal there?