Aung San Suu Kyi Freed!
13 Nov 2010 Leave a Comment
in Amnesty International, Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma, Human Rights
I received the good news at 6:43 am this morning via text message: Aung San Suu Kyi is finally free in Burma! Even though it was really early on a Saturday, I was happy to get the news. Aung San Suu Kyi has been under house arrest in Burma (or Myanmar, as it’s officially known) for the past 7 and a half years, and has spent more than 15 of the past 21 years under house arrest. She has been adopted as a Prisoner of Conscience by Amnesty International and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991.
Free Aung San Suu Kyi Rally In San Francisco
Amnesty International members and our allies have been working for her release and we’ve written many letters, circulated many petitions and held many rallies and events over the years, including the one above as part of AIUSA’s Western Regional Conference in San Francisco last week.
Our work is not done, however. Burma (or Myanmar, as we are to refer to it as Amnesty International members) still has over 2,200 political prisoners, many of them also prisoners of conscience, in prison solely for exercising their right to peacefully protest. Take action with this link to call for the freedom of Myanmar’s prisoners of conscience!
Speaking Out for the People of New Orleans & the Gulf
06 Sep 2010 Leave a Comment
in Amnesty International, Human Rights, New Orleans Tags: Nicolas Cage
As we just passed the 5 year anniversary of Katrina and the people of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast are now recovering from the massive oil spill as well, Amnesty International released a revised edition of their report, Unnatural Disaster: Human Rights in the Gulf Coast.
Amnesty’s report is available online at: http://www.amnestyusa.org/dignity/pdf/unnaturaldisaster.pdf
Looking at Amnesty’s new video of Nicolas Cage visiting the Lower Ninth Ward, I have mixed feelings about not visiting while I was there for AI’s Annual General Meeting in April. I had no idea that it could still be so barren, with vacant lots and so few houses rebuilt 5 years after Hurricane Katrina. It looks so rural, not like a neighborhood in a major American City. Yet, without an opportunity to volunteer there, I’d feel like I was gawking, maybe especially with my tendency to take too many pictures.
Thousands of public housing units were demolished in New Orleans, including units that sustained little storm damage. Redevelopment is slow, with a shift towards mixed income developments with only a small percentage of affordable housing units being built. Damaged public housing units in Gulfport and Pascagoula, Mississippi have been sold off to private entities or redeveloped into mixed income housing.
Over 82,000 rental housing units were lost in Louisiana, most of them in New Orleans. Only 38% of the lost units in New Orleans have been replaced. Rents are 40% higher than pre-hurricane levels. Even though damage to rental units was greater, a majority of federal and state funds are going to homeowner units. There are an estimated 10,000 to 12,000 homeless in New Orleans, 60% who are homeless because of hurricane Katrina. Even homeowners didn’t fare so well, 81% have insufficient funds to re-build. Mississippi and Alabama residents face similar problems with lack of funds to rebuild.
Few hospitals have reopened. Neither of the two in St. Bernard’s Parish have reopened and only 12 of 23 in Orleans Parish. Charity Hospital, the safety net hospital for New Orleans, has not reopened. Lack of mental health care and police accountability issues are also covered in the report.
All this and now the massive oil spill on the Gulf. Amnesty International has a new online action calling on our Congress members to introduce and support legislation to establish a Gulf of Mexico Independent Regional Citizens’ Advisory Council where the voices of the people most affected by the spill would be heard, unlike after Katrina.
Both the report and action can be found online at: http://www.amnestyusa.org/katrina
Another Busy June with AI in Seattle
27 Jun 2010 Leave a Comment
in Amnesty International, Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma, China, Human Rights, Seattle, Shi Tao Tags: Easy Street Records, Fremont Fair, Joe Cocker, Kerry Park, Lakeside School, Neptune Coffee, Pearl Jam, Radio Static, Solstice Parade, Sting, Tom Petty
June has always been a busy month for our Amnesty International group, and we went into it with a busy May, some of which I’ve already posted. . . and. . . I didn’t even make it to everything.
Untitled by AmnestyWA Justice, on Flickr
It was a nice, if overcast, day on May 22, the Saturday we took group and individual photos at Kerry Park in support of AI Prisoner of Conscience Aung San Suu Kyi of Burma (or Myanmar, as the current military rulers call it). Aung San Suu Kyi has been under unofficial detention, house arrest and/or with restrictions on her movements for 14 of the last 20 years. In 1990, her party, the National League for Democracy, won 80% of the parliamentary seats in a general election, and the military leadership refused to cede power and instead jailed NLD party leaders and activists.
Read more about Aung San Suu Kyi at: http://www.amnestyusa.org/individuals-at-risk/priority-cases/myanmar-aung-san-suu-kyi/page.do?id=1101239
The photos were part of the Stand with Suu Kyi! action by Amnesty International, to gather at least 2,100 photos in support of Aung San Suu Kyi and human rights in Burma/Myanmar, representing the 2,100 political prisoners detained in Burma.
Learn how you can take part here: http://www.amnestyusa.org/individuals-at-risk/priority-cases/stand-with-suu-kyi/page.do?id=1691013
Photos are online at: http://www.flickr.com/groups/standwithsuukyi
Then Lakeside School‘s Amnesty International club hosted a Freedom of Speech Night at the Neptune Coffee House the next weekend, in the middle of Memorial Day weekend and Folklife (more on that music soon). They focused on Prisoner of Conscience cases including Aung San Suu Kyi and Shi Tao, a Chinese journalist/blogger in prison for sending an e-mail to the US about the Chinese government’s orders to play down the anniversary 1989 Tiananman Square Massacre (after Yahoo! gave up his name).
Their entertainment included a rock group called Radio Static, who played great music of their own, and covers including Springsteen‘s Radio Nowhere:
They also had an impressive poet, who started out by reading Shi Tao’s poem June in Chinese, then proceeded to mesmerize the audience and a guy who was standing outside waiting for a bus who came on in with his own poems:
More information on Shi Tao at: http://www.amnestyusa.org/individuals-at-risk/priority-cases/china-shi-tao/page.do?id=1101243
Radio Static has music on their MySpace page at: http://www.myspace.com/radiostaticband
I missed our Tiananmen Square memorial this year, on June 3, as it was in the afternoon at UW and I got there too late. Our Amnesty International group took part in a Capitol Hill garage sale that weekend. I just came and bought a t-shirt. Thanks to everyone who did all the work! We also tabled a Sting concert that weekend at the White River Amphitheatre, and then Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers at the Gorge the next weekend (carpooling it to both, as I don’t drive). Those are a lot of fun, and we do get to talk to new people about AI, even if it can get frustrating trying to get signatures for our petitions at times (and challenging, literally doing it by candlelight before finally breaking down for the evening and catching the rest of the show).
I’m not going to go too much into the Sting and Tom Petty concerts since I’m so far behind, and I figure everyone knows who they are and what they sound like (and Joe Cocker, who opened for Tom Petty – at least for those of my generation). Although, I’d like to get around to a review of Ton’s latest, Mojo, at a later point, as he and the Heartbreakers going to their blues roots on this one.
Sting was playing with a full orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic, for this tour (with no opening act, and an intermission). He was really impressive with the orchestra and the woman singing with him, and having so much fun with it (including howling at the moon at one point, and 4 encores!). Sting’s audience was a little more aware of who Amnesty International was from the benefits he played for AI back in the 80s & 90s. I also noticed quite a few people with Russian accents, and thought about his song The Russians (which he played that night) and the power of music in reaching people.
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers were awesome and still rocking out with no signs of slowing down, and it was great hearing Joe Cocker with all those classics from the 60s. Good thing we had a full crew for the table, because there was always one of us who just had to catch one of Joe’s or Tom’s songs, until it finally got too dark and we packed up to watch the show. Tom’s is a mixed crowd politically. There were a lot of peace t-shirts along with folks who are more to the right. It was frustrating, because even most of them walked right by the table.
I think AI needs to do a better job of reaching people, so they at least know who we are and what we stand for in the US. It’s my impression that more people are aware in Europe. I think more people should be stopping by (and I don’t count out reaching people with more conservative views – human rights shouldn’t be political).
The Gorge itself was absolutely beautiful, as promised. I’ve got to find some way of getting there the next time Pearl Jam plays! There are times it’s real frustrating not being able to afford a car. . .
More photos of the Gorge and our drive there at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/javacolleen/sets/72157624142632977/
Coming up solstice, the next weekend, our Amnesty International group had our booth at the Fremont Fair, as we always do. It was a rainy, dreary weekend this year (though fortunately it held off a bit for the Solstice Parade, and those bicyclists wearing only paint beforehand. . .).
In addition to our usual petitions, t-shirts, buttons & literature; this year we raffled off a copy of the Pearl Jam vs Ames Bros concert poster book and a new, silver, iPod Shuffle. We were off the main track this year, near the Rocket; our new t-shirts didn’t get done because of a death in the screen printer’s family; and it was rainy and cold much of the time. We still collected a lot of signatures and it sounds like we broke even; which is good because our main reason for being there is outreach. Let’s just say the raffle winners got a good deal and great odds, and that fortunately both items were previously won at other events by Group 4 members, then donated (the Pearl Jam book, by me, at the Backspacer Bash at Easy Street Records back in October).
Photos from the Fremont Fair, and especially the Solstice Parade (but not the bicyclists – in keeping with community standards) at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/javacolleen/sets/72157624313617514/
Then last Tuesday, we had a vigil and solidarity event for Troy Davis, who is on death row in Georgia. Troy’s evidentiary trial (ordered by the Supreme Court) started Wednesday. We are still awaiting the outcome, and I’m going to hold off blogging until then to do it more justice. I need to find some way to keep caught up.
Learn more about Troy’s case at: http://www.amnestyusa.org/troy
June isn’t totally over yet, either, and I’ll be tabling the Steve Earle concert at Zoo Tunes for Amnesty International on Wednesday night (& hopefully blogging about it sooner than a month or so later. . . )
An Interrogator On Why Torture Doesn’t Work
16 Jun 2010 Leave a Comment
in Amnesty International, Human Rights, Torture Tags: Matthew Alexander
On May 21, our Amnesty International group co-sponsored a talk by Matthew Alexander, author of A Chair, A Brain, and A Heart: An Interrogators Mission to Return America to the Rule of Law.
Matthew Alexander was a senior military interrogator in Iraq and led the interrogation team that gathered the intelligence that led to the successful airstrike against Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq.
During his talk, Alexander spoke about how rapport building techniques work, and the importance of cultural awareness. He spoke about how torture, in addition to being generally ineffective and immoral, as the torture and abuse by Americans was a major recruitment factor for those who came to Iraq from other countries to fight.
Ironically, the theory that torture works cited even by some of our elected officials seems to come from fictional characters like Jack Bauer on 24, rather than talking to real interrogators. As Alexander noted, “If you’re going to quote Jack Bauer, why not quote Superman?”
Watch the video of the talk, courtesy of Mike McCormick of KEXP and Talking Stick TV:
Exiled Voices for Justice
14 May 2010 Leave a Comment
in Amnesty International, Children's Rights, Corporate accountability, DRC, Human Rights, Immigrant Rights, Women's Rights
Next up, I tabled two films for Amnesty International for the local Exiled Voices for Justice film series.
Which Way Home, which screened at UW two weeks ago Saturday, was about unaccompanied migrant children. While I was aware of the issue, I had no idea the number of children heading north from Central America and Mexico on their own, hopping trains.
Some of the children were as young as 9. While some of them had trouble with their step-fathers, they usually were close to their mothers at least, wanting to give them a better life. Sometimes the parents sent them, as the US police officer notes above. A grandmother and a child who came at 9 were interviewed, with their faces hidden as they aren’t legal. Even though the child almost died in the desert, it was worth it to give her a chance at a better life. It’s hard to get your mind around poverty so desperate.
The panel included two young men who came here themselves as children, and had found foster homes. The Lutheran Community Services’ Refugee and Immigrant Children’s Program is an organization that helps them find homes locally and took part in the panel as well.
You can find more information on how to help at: http://www.refugeechildren.net/
Lumo, that Sunday’s movie at Seattle University, is about a young woman who is a survivor of a brutal gang rape by soldiers in the Congo. Rape very much is a weapon of war in places like the Congo, with many women like Lumo suffering from fistulas, internal damage that causes urinary incontinence and infertility.
HEAL Africa set up and the hospital for survivors where Lumo and others are treated. Learn more at: http://www.healafrica.org/
Jeanne Muliri Kabekatyo (Mama Muliri), from the hospital, was one of the speakers on the panel. She is the pioneer of HEAL My People, HEAL Africa’s gender-based violence program.
Another speaker was Wemba Koy-Okonda, who fled the first Congolese war in 1997, and was granted asylum in the US in 2002. Wemba-Koy founded OKONGO, an organization that both teaches newly resettled Congolese refugees and asylees English and technical skills; and serves people in the Congo in promoting health through public awareness and food self-sufficiency, condemning sexual violence against women and girls, and asking people around the world to help end violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Read more online at: http://www.okongo.org/
What’s fueling the war in the Congo? Mining. Mining for blood diamonds? No. Something closer to home to even more of us, maybe even especially those of us who are activists. . .
I’ll give you a hint – Can you hear me now?
Most of us involved in human rights know to ask for that certificate that your engagement ring isn’t a blood diamond, but do we know what’s in our cell phone in our pocket or running our laptop?
Urge your US Representative to co-sponsor The Conflict Minerals Trade Act (H.R. 4128), introduced by Congressman Jim McDermott (or if you live in the Seattle area and he’s your rep, be sure to thank him).
Learn more and take action online at: http://www.amnestyusa.org/drc
Brass Bands, Mardi Gras Beads & Human Rights
24 Apr 2010 Leave a Comment
in Amnesty International, Death Penalty, Human Rights, Immigrant Rights, Maternal mortality, New Orleans Tags: Asia Rainey, Bernice Johnson Reagon, CEDAW, Dave Tieff, Dr. Allen Ault, Get on the Bus, Ginetta Sagan Award, Howard Zinn, John Thompson, Rebecca Masika Katsuva, Resurection After Exoneration, United Nations
I went down to New Orleans a couple weeks ago for Amnesty International USA’s Annual General Meeting (AGM), and caught some of their French Quarter Festival and explored the city as well (parts 2 & 3 of my adventures).
Mardis Gras beads! I joked that the AI ID should be on lanyards of Mardis Gras beads, updating Facebook via texting Twitter while wandering around the French Quarter Festival. Fair Trade, Union Made Mardis Gras beads, of course! I was thinking about the film, Mardis Gras: Made in China that we showed at the Seattle Human Rights Film Festival a few years back.
I know, I know. New Orleans has had a lot of human rights issues of their own to contend with since then (and the same film makers made a film about the aftermath of Katrina a few years later).
Still, I like the colorful Mardi Gras beads, not appropriate for an Amnesty International meeting. While I’d probably end up with a few, certainly our human rights organization wouldn’t be giving them out. Well, hopefully not made by our group’s POC (Prisoner of Conscience), here they are:
I should hasten to say that none of my other strands were from flashing anything! Amusingly enough, I did have a young man yell, “All right!” when he saw mine heading out of the hotel at one point. Then he stopped mid sentence, umm maybe because he realized how old I was (I’m hitting the big 5–0 in a couple weeks), or saw the Amnesty ID. Err, I certainly hope none of these AI Mardis Gras beads went out for umm, umm . . . Never mind!
Phew! Yes, I was in New Orleans!
In New Orleans and enjoying a lot of great music and food, even though I wasn’t into the more hedonistic Bourbon St. scene. . .
I confess to staying too long at the French Quarter Festival and missing our march and rally, which included a brass band! Fortunately several Seattle members made it, including my friend, JoJo, who took this photo. I did get to hear some of the brass band, from inside the meeting with the board session that I was one of the few people to make (since nearly everyone else was marching).
Our opening plenary included the moving tribute video (by The People Speak), to historian Howard Zinn, who was to be our keynote speaker before his death earlier this year. His The People’s History of the United States should be required reading in high schools and colleges, and cuts through so much nonsense. What amazed me about the video was how genuine and down to earth he was.
Bernice Johnson Reagon, veteran of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) during the Civil Rights Movement in the 60’s and member of Sweet Honey in the Rock provided further inspiration in both words and song.
Here’s Bernice from a tribute to Howard Zinn earlier this month:
Also inspiring was the Ginetta Sagan Award, given in memory of Ginetta Sagan, who was captured while working for the Italian resistance during WWII and tortured by the fascist police; and went on to found one of the first AI chapters in the US and work to free prisoners, found the Western Region and co-found the AIUSA Urgent Action Network, among other things.
Ginetta’s granddaughter accepted the award on behalf of this year’s recipient, Rebecca Masika Katsuva, of the Democratic Republic of Congo, who couldn’t be there.
According to the brochure announcing the award:
Katsuva, recipient of Amnesty International USA’s 2010 Ginetta Sagan Award for Women’s and Children’s Rights, has endured four sexual assaults and many other threats to herself and her family while sheltering women and child rape survivors in her home, and defending their rights in South Kivu, in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
At the end of the award, a man from Vietnam who Ginetta Sagan had worked to free asked if he could say a few words. Very moving, and a reminder that all those letters (and faxes, phone calls and e-mails) do make a difference in real people’s lives.
We had tasty New Orleans appetizers during the Ginetta Sagan award, and next was cheesecake & resolutions. Of course, I couldn’t have the cheesecake with my health problem, but i could have coffee. We discussed the upcoming resolutions we’d be voting on the next couple days, how AI decides things and makes changes starting at a grass roots level, coming not only from AIUSA, but AI sections around the world.
AI fed me good the whole time I was there, amazingly enough, both as in recent years, due to the budget crisis, we were lucky to get an occasional coffee; and with my health problem limiting what I can eat. My vegetarian friends were not so lucky, some parts of the country don’t have much of a concept of vegetarian cuisine (other than having some vegetables out).
I made it early for breakfast with the board the next morning, and we had a discussion on what’s going on at the international level, including next year’s International Council Meeting (ICM), where every two years, representatives from AI’s sections in countries worldwide come together to have discussions and make decisions.
Our Saturday morning focus plenary was on maternal mortality. Once again, as at our regional in San Francisco, I was shocked to learn how bad the situation was here in the US, even. One of the panel members was a woman who lost her sister to complications after the birth of her son. Complications that the new mother and her husband (both EMTs) were not warned about the symptoms of deep vein thrombosis and told to take her to the hospital immediately if she had them. She waited all day for a call back from the doctor and as she got up to answer the phone, with her husband nearby, the clot broke loose and killed her.
That poor women were dying of preventable conditions giving birth and following birth was clear from the first session in SF. That preventable death could happen even a woman with adequate insurance, with both her and her husband EMTs, more medically knowledgeable than the rest of us, was a shock. It’s one of those things that really makes you question the value (or lack of value) our society puts on women’s lives and health.
America has gone backwards on maternal mortality. According to Amnesty International’s report, Deadly Delivery:
Maternal mortality ratios have increased from 6.6 deaths per 100,000 live births in 1987 to 13.3 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2006. While some of the recorded increase is due to improved data collection, the fact remains that maternal mortality ratios have risen significantly.
In addition to often a lack of adequate pre-natal care and after birth care, there is a high rate of Caesarian sections (most of which, according to the doctor who spoke, are unneeded.
According to some estimates, improving the quality of
maternal care could prevent 40 to 50 percent of
deaths. For example, studies in other medical fields
show that embolism (blood clot) following surgery has
been reduced by approximately 70 percent by using
either compression stockings or drugs. However, these
simple measures are not routinely used following
c-sections, which account for 32 percent of births.
Learn more about maternal mortality in the US online and take action online to Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius at:
Of course, the situation is much worse in the other countries we heard from, including Burkina Faso, Sierra Leone and Peru.
Find out more and take action on ending the high rate of maternal mortality in these countries as well:
http://www.amnestyusa.org/demand-dignity/maternal-health-is-a-human-right/page.do?id=1041189
I went to vote on resolutions at Working Party A: AIUSA Membership and Policy, next. Which I found very worthwhile, as these were the issues our local group, including myself, felt most strongly about. I was disappointed they scheduled them at the same time as the workshops on AI’s priority campaigns, and a special one on fighting for the right to return after Hurricane Katrina, though.
Voting ran a little late, but there was still lunch if not seats, and I made it in time to hear the greeting from our special guest, Nicholas Cage!
Here’s the least blurry picture, of the projection of Nick’s speech, as you really can’t make him out in the photos of him at the podium.
Yes, I had lunch with Nick Cage!
OK, it wasn’t exactly an intimate kind of affair (like Rosanne Cash’s meeting with Gabriel Bryne she twittered about earlier this week). Yes, that’s Nick Cage at the podium, off in the distance! He told us how great we were and then had to leave (but it was pretty cool)!
Yeah, I know what I said all cynical about celebrities and AI, but this is Nick Cage! (In other words, a celebrity I’m actually a fan of. . .)
OK, back to human rights work. We had the local groups meeting next (and there was also a student one at the same time), and compared notes about what we’re doing in our groups.
Next, I went to the workshop on immigration detention. We talked about how immigrants, including asylum seekers and torture survivors are put in mandatory detention with no hearing to see if they belong or not. They’re often housed with criminals (even though only 11% of them are accused of any crime). All this even though cheaper alternatives to mandatory detention are available (with detention costing $100 a day and alternatives for as little as $12 a day). We talked about the quotas for arresting immigrants, oops, what ICE (Immigration & Customs Enforcement, what used to be the INS) calls “performance goals”. Then we talked about what we could do locally, including visiting detention facilities and lobbying our congress members for several bills currently in the House and Senate.
I did take my one brief break for the conference here and caught about an hour or so of the French Quarter Festival (& caught a lot more Friday before, and Sunday after the conference, coming in my next post).
I came back for the 6 pm session (did I mention we started at 7:30 in the morning?) and went to the one on challenging America’s human rights record at home. We talked about the upcoming UN Periodic Review of the US that AI and other organizations are contributing papers and recommendations for (and how AI does this for all countries).
Among other things, the US still needs to ratify 4 treaties, The Convention on the Rights of the Child (we’re the last holdout, Somalia has now signed this one), CEDAW (the Convention to Eliminate All Forms of Discrimination Against Women), the one on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ESCR), and the Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
We also talked about the rights of asylum seekers, including the fact mentioned earlier, that they are automatically detained on entry. Then we talked about the right of return for New Orleans’ residents. Among the problems I’ve heard – public housing was torn down (and the films I’ve seen on this show that this housing was untouched by Hurricane Katrina), houses people tried to refurbish in the Lower 9th were bulldozed, many schools still not open, public hospitals still closed. . .
More information on the UN Periodic Review (UPR) at: http://www.upr-info.org/
More information on human rights post-Katrina and the right of return at: http://www.ehumanrights.org/ourwork_residents.html
We had a reception for our region after that, with some more food to graze on. I headed back to my hostel after this before checking out the AI event at the New Orleans Hard Rock (which was loud disco, that I wasn’t really into and didn’t stay long). As it took us awhile to get back with streetcar service (or, rather lack of), I missed any awards or drawings; and I don’t know if Nick Cage, who invited us all there ever showed up. ; )
I started out the next morning at the breakfast with the Board Candidates meeting. OK, now I’m tracking down the ballot that came in the mail just before I left for the AGM. . .
Next up was voting on the resolutions, which was actually over early by some miracle. After a breath of fresh air, I went to the session on the Membership Engagement Team report. I knew I was in trouble when I got a huge document with the disclaimer: “Do not be alarmed by the size of this report!” Although it was a useful, if dry, session for a local group leader.
We had box lunches with po-boy sandwiches during the final plenary session, a panel on the death penalty abolition that included a former prison warden (Dr. Allen Ault) as well as an exoneree (John Thompson). Louisiana has one of the highest rates of exoneration.
Louisiana also has, probably not coincidentally, one of the highest prison rates, and worst educational system. Angola Prison in Louisiana has 5100 men, 4000 are African American. Interestingly enough, though, Dr. Ault, the former warden said that in Georgia the prison he worked at was once 75% black, 25% white; and is now 50–50; thanks to the increase in meth, which is more a white person’s drug.
Learn more about the death penalty at: http://www.amnestyusa.org/death-penalty/page.do?id=1011005
Find out more about the program John Thompson started, Resurrection After Exoneration at: http://www.r-a-e.org/
As our AGM wound down, AI applauded the staff of The New Orleans Marriott, our conference hotel, literally, as they all marched across the stage!
We also thanked the AI staff and volunteers who put the conference together (and having been with the local group when we put on the 2002 AGM in Seattle, I can tell you that’s a lot of work, months before the conference begins).
Then AI volunteers and staff performed short pieces from Howard Zinn’s The People Speak, bringing history alive and adding a further fitting tribute to Howard Zinn.
Local Group 133, from Somerville, Massachusetts, was awarded the annual Sister Laola Hironaka Award for Local Groups. Group 133 organizes the annual Get on the Bus event.
Now in its fifteenth year, GOTB draws upwards of 1,200 participants riding buses, commuter trains, and carpooling down to New York City to take peaceful action in front of embassies, consulates and corporate headquarters in NYC in support of human rights.
Learn more about the Get on the Bus event at: http://www.gotb.org/
Closing out with music and poetry, first local New Orleans poet and activist Asia Rainey shared powerful poetry, and sang a very moving spiritual (even though she claimed she wasn’t a singer).
Here’s Asia with her poem, No Rainbows for the Colored (with a little singing first), at an event earlier this year. This young woman really speaks truth to power.
Then musician Dave Tieff performed Love and Freedom, a song he wrote for Amnesty International.
Finally, Larry Cox closing out the conference with praise and encouragement for the work ahead for the coming year.
Next year’s AIUSA Annual General Meeting, celebrating AI’s 50th birthday, is in San Francisco, March 17 -19, 2011!
More on the music, and my other adventures in New Orleans coming up.
On, and also a couple concerts, including another Flight to Mars show, since coming back!
It’s hard to find time to blog about life while you’re living it. . .
Judge Garzon – Human Rights vs Historical Amnesia
04 Mar 2010 1 Comment
in Human Rights Tags: Augusto Pinochet, Chile, Judge Baltasar Garzon, Spain, Spanish Civil War
Judge Baltasar Garzon, the Spanish judge who tried to bring Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet to justice, spoke at the UW Law School last week. Unfortunately, a lot was lost in the translation (by headset) and I really regret not speaking Spanish.
Judge Garzon spoke on the importance of justice and of not forgetting the human rights abuses for the victims and society. Of course, the trouble is, that societies want to forget; or are pressured into forgetting. Amnesty is granted for human rights abuses in order to move forward.
None of which deters Judge Garzon, who is willing to take on human rights violations by anybody.
According to the LA Times:
Spain’s world-famous magistrate, Baltasar Garzon, has made many enemies over the years. He has indicted Osama bin Laden. He has gone after Spanish paramilitaries, Basque separatists and members of drug mafias. On this side of the Atlantic, Garzon is best known as the judge who pushed the frontiers of international law, trying to extradite former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet from London and launching an inquiry into the suspected torture of detainees at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo.
Which has now got him in trouble with his own country, for investigating Spanish Civil War atrocities.
After all that, it is perhaps ironic that the biggest threat to Garzon right now comes not from some hit man but from his own judiciary, which alleges that the judge has overreached at home by trying to probe Spanish Civil War atrocities that were covered by an amnesty the country’s parliament passed in 1977. Many of Garzon’s adversaries on the right and the left have come together in support of the case against him.
Talk about historical amnesia – 70 years later and still there are many who don’t want to look at the truth.
Tens of thousands of Spaniards died or disappeared in the civil war, which ushered in the dictatorship of Gen. Francisco Franco in 1939. When Franco died in 1975, the amnesty was widely seen as essential for a transition to democracy. But many of the victims have never been accounted for, and the country has not fully come to terms with its violent past. Garzon opened the case on behalf of relatives who sought to exhume and identify the dead. After right-wing groups filed a complaint, an investigative judge concluded that Garzon “consciously decided to ignore” the will of parliament in pursuing the case, and now a five-judge panel must decide whether to put him on trial for criminal intent. Garzon denies wrongdoing; the disappearances, he says, were crimes against humanity and, therefore, cannot be covered by an amnesty.
Can human rights just be negotiated away or forgotten to move forward? What about the victims? Judge Garzon spoke about the victims and their families, and how it is now not only the Mothers of the Plaza in Argentina, but their grandchildren, the children of the disappeared, who are the loudest calling for justice.
Of course, that kind of amnesia is happening in the U.S. as well, as the Obama administration avoids investigating or prosecuting members of the Bush administration for their involvement in torture. Judge Garzon is willing to bring that case to court. First, he has to deal with the charges that he refuses to forget that Spanish Civil War human rights violations.
The Response and Military Tribunals
27 Feb 2010 Leave a Comment
in Amnesty International, Barack Obama, Human Rights, War on Terror Tags: CAIR, military tribunals, The Response, Veterans for Peace
We’ve had a couple recent forums on human rights over the past week and a half that I went to. On February 17 Amnesty International showed the Oscar-nominated short documentary The Response, with a panel discussion on military commissions. Then on February 23, Spanish Judge Baltazar Garzon, who tried to bring former Argentine dictator Augusto Pinochet to justice spoke at the UW Law School.
Sara Schmidt, our field organizer from the San Francisco office, introduced the panel, who spoke briefly before the film, which we watched next.
The Response is based on transcripts from actual military tribunals, and highlights a procedure that is administrative (they can only rule if the prisoner has been properly categorized, not on whether he or she should be held), and allows for evidence the prisoner isn’t allowed to know the details of nor the source of to refute.
As Amnesty International notes, about the the commission system formed under the Military Commissions Act:
Notably, it strips the right to a speedy trial, permits the use of evidence obtained through compulsory self-incrimination, and restricts defense access to materials used to prosecute the defendant. There is no right to confront accusers, no exclusion of evidence based on the failure to obtain a warrant, and hearsay evidence is permissible.
Joseph McMillan & Jamie Mayerfeld
Our panel included Arsalan Bukhari, Executive Director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), Jamie Mayerfeld, Associate Professor of Political Science at UW; Joseph McMillan Legal Defense for Salim Ahmed Hamdan, Osama bin Laden’s personal driver; and Tom Parker, Policy Director: Terrorism, Counterterrorism & Human Rights, Amnesty International.
Arsalan Bukhari & Tom Parker
We talked about how both the US in other instances, and other countries like Britain have dealt with terrorism with regular courts (and without torture). Ironically, the US courts are a far more effective way of prosecuting terrorism. According to the New Security Action website, “Only 3 detainees at Guantanamo have been convicted of any crime through the military commissions system,” while “(t)he Federal court system has convicted 195 terrorists since 2001.”
Arsalan also brought up the issue of profiling Muslims since September 11, and even before, like, ironically, after the Oklahoma City bombing, before it came out that Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols were responsible. Tom brought up a number of cases of recent right wing terror attacks and attempts that most of us and the general public has never heard of.
Ironically, again, the next day a right wing anti-tax fanatic flew a plane into an IRS office in Austin, Texas. I don’t see any difference. There are even people who see the man as a hero. Again, not much different from al Quaida or any other terrorist. Should we start rounding up clean cut white guys who are angry with the government, based on innuendo from their neighbors or co-workers who they won’t be able to confront, and hold them indefinitely because of what they might do? Or is that un-American?
We also talked about what has been a major disappointment for me, that President Obama has back tracked on Guantanamo and issues like military commissions and indefinite detention. One of the things that impressed me about Obama during the primary was that he had been a constitutional law professor who understood the importance of habeas corpus and other legal issues relevant to Guantanamo and the “war on terror.” I realize he’s getting a lot of pressure from the right, but still thought he would stand his ground because it is so important.
We collected postcards to send to President Obama at The Response screening, and you can take action online at:
http://www.amnestyusa.org/counter-terror-with-justice/fair-trials/page.do?id=1041195
We had co-sponsorship by and shared tabling with a number of good groups, including CAIR, the WA State Religious Campaign Against Torture, Veterans for Peace and the Fellowship of Reconciliation. The conversation continued out to the reception in the lobby another hour, making it difficult for the young man sent to clean up and put our tables and chairs away.
Coming next (and hopefully soon), Judge Garzon’s visit.
Marching & Music – AI on My Vacation
27 Jan 2010 2 Comments
in Amnesty International, Death Penalty, Human Rights, Music, Seattle, Steve Earle, Troy Davis Tags: Elliott Bay Books, Garfield High, Martin Luther King Day, State Radio, The Moore, The Showbox
Apparently I’m a little unclear on the concept of a vacation, as I managed to volunteer for Amnesty International 3 days of my vacation week (and one Sunday meeting). Especially given that I had to use or lose some of my vacation time to begin with. . .
I did have fun, though, and had a couple of days to myself to explore bookstores and museums (more on that later).
Sophia & Sarvenaz on MLK Day March
Last Monday was Martin Luther King Day, and as usual I went to Garfield High to table for Amnesty during the workshops, attend the rally in the gym and march downtown to the Federal Building. All making for a very long day! Sophia and Sarvenaz joined me this year, and we collected a lot of signatures for petitions and postcards for President Obama to close Guantanamo and seek accountability for the torture that happened there. Followed by an inspiring rally in the gym (with young martial arts students showing their skills in between speakers and singers); then we marched (and it was actually a sunny day this year)! Another rally at the Federal Building and a long wait for free buses back to Garfield (where we could have stayed for free food, including Ezell’s Chicken, although I wouldn’t be able to eat the fried part anymore, so just as well to leave it for someone who can).
Tuesday night I tabled a State Radio concert at The Showbox (at the Market). I know, tough work tabling all these shows! Though, while it’s fun, it is work and this past week I just did not have it together, tracking down supplies and, for the State Radio show, a color cartridge for my printer for our upcoming showing of Taxi to the Dark Side at Shoreline Community College.
Jordan, a member of a local high school group joined me to table State Radio. It was her first time tabling a concert and she was great! Very passionate and knowledgeable about the issues. Also very polite. Our table was out in the lobby area, and she kept asking me if I wanted to go in to hear what would turn out to be her favorite songs, then asked if it was okay for her to go.
I was also impressed by the band, who came out to check out our table and signed our petitions, and gave a shout out for the Amnesty International table (and the other organizations tabling), asking their fans to sign our petitions, including the one for their friend Troy Davis.
Troy is on death row in Georgia, even though most of the witnesses in his case have recanted. The Supreme Court mandated a new evidentiary hearing for him in August. We had his petition and fact sheets out at MLK Day and both concerts.
Opening for State Radio were 1776 from Portland, and the Aggrolites from LA. Oh, yes, State Radio is from Boston, and bore the bad news (oops, taking my non-partisan AI hat off from a moment) that the Republican had won the Massachusett’s Senate seat that was Ted Kennedy’s (messing up health care for all of us, because somehow 41 votes out of 100 = minority rule these days).
I actually took a couple days break next. Wednesday I picked up my paycheck, and stopped at Elliott Bay Books with my camera after wandering around the Pioneer Square area first. Sad news there as well, as Elliott Bay Books are losing their lease to that beautiful, old building and moving to Capitol Hill. I had coffee and a delicious molasses cookie in their cafe downstairs, and bought a copy of The Duel: Pakistan on The Flight of American Power by Tariq Ali (the February selection for their Global Issues & Ethics Book Club).
Thursday I went to Tacoma for their free museum day. More on that in my next entry!
First, some more music!
Friday, I tabled the Steve Earle concert at the Moore. I was refreshed from my museum tour the previous day, but now scrambling to buy black ink to finish my next batch of flyers before the show. I originally was going to table with Percy from my AI group, but it turned out he was so excited when he heard Steve Earle was coming to town that he forgot about his own charity gig he was playing that night.
I had our usual spot in their lobby, which is right in the middle of things for people waiting for the doors to open, or to finish their drinks before going in, as they’re not allowed. So, even though it was still light, I did get a bit more traffic than usual signing our petitions and checking our our literature.
One thing I did notice, I think thanks to all Steve has spoken out over the years on the death penalty (and sung about, one young man mentioned Billy Austin being his favorite song), not only did a lot of people sign our petition for Troy Davis and take the information sheet; but when I’d emphasize the questions about Troy’s guilt, they’d come back at me that the death penalty is wrong in all instances. A response that’s very unusual, and not one I got tabling Steve’s concerts even a few year’s back. They’d often add they thought the person should rot in jail; but you can tell they’ve thought it over and come to the conclusion it’s not right.
The one draw back in tabling The Moore, and The Paramount as well, is that there is no guarantee you’ll hear the show, whereas the club shows, like The Showbox are so small, and arena shows so loud, that even if you don’t see it, you’ll hear it; these are theaters with doors. So, especially given that it was noisy with a lot of people still milling about (which meant I didn’t want to leave the table), I’ll have to wait until some other time to hear what Hayes Carll, Steve’s opener, sounds like live.
Fortunately, it was okay for me to slip back on the side of the balcony and listen to most of Steve’s concert after the crowd finally disappeared inside (which took a few songs even then, as people had to finish their drinks they couldn’t take inside).
As Steve was doing a lot of songs from his current Townes tribute album, he told a lot of tales of him and Townes Van Zandt, including how Townes heckled him when he was starting out.
Steve also talked about the owner of the deli he lives near in New York, a Korean immigrant and long time US citizen, who, Steve notes, speaks Korean (which really impresses Steve) and English as well as Steve, and has grown sons who speak English better than both of them. Now the deli owner is learning Spanish, which really embarrasses Steve, who never learned it, despite growing up in Texas, or as he put it “occupied Mexico.”
It always amazes me in the anti-immigrant debate how people forget their own ancestors and how they came here, too as immigrants. Immigrants who came because they were hungry or to escape persecution. Immigrants who may not have known much English to begin with. Immigrants facing discrimination from those who in that time were anti-immigrant.
I slipped back downstairs when Steve left the stage after his main set, remembering my job was to be out at the Amnesty table. I was amazed how many people were actually already leaving (and I’ve seen that even at Springsteen and Pearl Jam concerts). Do some people really not understand the concept of encores? Do they really need to beat traffic so bad they missed Copperhead Road? Yeah, I could hear that one through the doors!
Great show, and a great week, even if a bit busy!
Still to come, a tour of Tacoma’s museums on their Third Thursday see it free day*. . .
Yes, there’s an asterisk. . .
*Check for times on the free part. . .
Tom Morello for Amnesty International
21 Dec 2009 Leave a Comment
in Amnesty International, Human Rights, Music, Tom Morello Tags: Killing in the Name, Rage Against the Machine
While he’s been in the news more lately for helping turn Rage Against the Machine’s Killing in the Name into a UK Christmas hit, Tom Morello also released two soul-filled covers this month to benefit Amnesty International. Live at Lime with Tom Morello, his versions of Human (by The Killers) and Joe Hill are available at the LimeWire Store.
The lyrics for Human seem especially appropriate for Amnesty International.
Are we human, or are we dancing?
My sign is vital. My hands are cold.
And I’m on my knees looking for the answer.
Are we human, or are we dancing?
In the video above, Tom talks about why he supports Amnesty International. He talks about realizing that Amnesty was real, grassroots activism on an international scale while watching the Human Rights Now Tour on tv in the 80’s.
At it’s heart, Amnesty is organized around the idea of asking people around the world writing, calling, and as technologies evolved, faxing and using the internet, all to ask for things like justice, freedom, fair trials and/or the end of torture for human rights victims around the world. We’re also organized around local and student groups, reaching out into our communities and/or schools with tabling, events like films and lectures, rallies and legislative work.
As Tom also notes, Amnesty takes the moral high ground, starting from our roots back during the cold war era. Amnesty International calls all countries into accountability for human rights, not just one side or another along some idealogical divide.
Poverty, which Tom would like to see us do more work on, is one of the issues we’re going to be taking on with the Demand Dignity campaign. Admittedly, it’s been a bit slower rolling out and getting us literature and actions than I’d like, although I suspect that has a lot to do with budget and staff cut backs in this economy.
Here’s a video of Tom sound-checking the title track to his album, The Fabled City, which is also available on LimeWire.
I’m not going to say too much about Rage Against the Machine’s UK Christmas song win. Granted, Killing in the Name isn’t exactly a Christmas song, then again neither are the manufactured pop hits that the UK’s X Factor evidently feed the public each year. according the Guardian article, Killing in the Name sold 500,000 copies last week, as compared to 50,000 for The Climb, Joe McElderry’s cover of a Miley Cirus song.
I don’t know anything about the X Factor, but given Simon Cowell’s involvement, I’m assuming it’s along the lines with American Idol, a show that’s never impressed me (and one that, thankfully, we apparently don’t have to worry about Rage Against the Machine selling out and guesting on). I saw it once, and it seems to be people singing covers and people voting on them. Not that some of them don’t have good voices, although it all seems kind of bland to me. It’s just that there are so many talented musicians playing for peanuts at bars and coffee houses, in cities like Seattle and towns across America. Singers and musicians paying their dues, working on their craft, and often writing their own songs. Why not a tv show showcasing some of them instead of this glorified karoke?
In any case, with a parental (or easily offended) advisory warning, I give you Rage Against the Machine’s BBC interview and live playing of Killing in the Name. I was thinking, wow, they left off the chorus for the British equivalent of the FCC. Well, until the end (and to give her credit, the censor lady was quick, too)!
The Guardian article reports that Rage Against the Machine is giving all profits for the single to the homeless charity Shelter, who say on their website that £50,000 has been raised so far. Awesome!
Meanwhile, check out Tom’s tracks for Amnesty International at:
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