SOUTH AFRICA: Nelson Mandela urged thousands to join a global campaign against poverty yesterday, saying: "Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural."
Later this week, the former South African president, who made his call at London's Trafalgar Square, will address finance ministers from the G7 - the Group of Seven - industrialised nations, the United States, Japan, Canada, Germany, Britain, France and Italy.
He told the crowds at the Make Poverty History Rally, aimed at encouraging the public to put pressure for real action on trade, debt and AIDS, that achieving "trade justice" would be crucial to success.
Key meetings this year, such as the G7 meeting and the gathering of G8 (the G7 plus Russia) leaders in Scotland in July must be used to help focus international minds on the issue of poverty, he added.
"Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural," he said, standing in Trafalgar Square - the scene of many anti-apartheid demonstrations in the 1970s and 1980s.
"It is man-made and it can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings. And overcoming poverty is not a gesture of charity. It is an act of justice. It is the protection of a fundamental human right, the right to dignity and a decent life. While poverty persists there is no true freedom."
Mr Mandela, who visited Gordon Brown yesterday after the Chancellor promised almost £530 million for vaccines for children in poor countries, described massive poverty and obscene inequality as the "terrible scourges of our times".
And this is unforgivable in an age when the world boasts breathtaking advances in science, technology, industry and wealth, he said. "They have to rank alongside slavery and apartheid as social evil," he said.
Police estimated that at least 20,000 people attended the rally. Introducing Mr Mandela and his wife Graca Machel, Live Aid supremo Bob Geldof called on campaigners to pressurise politicians at the Scotland summit to "Feed The World".
Using the now world famous Live Aid slogan he said: "I say again 'Feed The World' for we starve for justice, hunger for dignity, thirst for an end to degradation and we have nothing to nourish our dreams." Mr Mandela later attended talks with the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair.