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03/31/2008: "UN rejects water as basic human right"

The Harper government can declare victory after a United Nations meeting rejected calls for water to be recognized as a basic human right.

Federal officials in Canada said last week that the government wanted to ensure the meeting's outcome reflected the fact that access to water is not formally recognized as a human right in international law. But a social advocacy group said that the position was designed to protect the right to sell water under the North American Free Trade Agreement.

[ It is certainly not acceptable that all sources of water would be ownded by corporations if that is what this ruling amounts to. Yet neither is it right that a country with a water shortage has to be supplied water by another country. It is likely this law has more to do with commercial intereststs. ]

http://www.dose.ca/news/story.html?id=b65b35fd-477f-4956-98f4-c17a46fe3e26