Sendoffs for Iraq Sanctions Challenge III:
Boston and New York City
Sendoffs for Iraq Sanctions Challenge III:
Boston and New York City
Boston:
IRAQ SANCTIONS CHALLENGE III SEND-OFF RECEPTION 1/7/00
Friday January 7, 8PM Community Church of Boston 565 Boylston St (in Copley Square)
PLEASE ATTEND THE NEW ENGLAND SEND-OFF RECEPTION for Sanctions Challenge delegate Ed Childs, Chief Shop Steward of the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Local 26 at Harvard University, at 8 P.M. at the Community Church of Boston in Copley Square. The reception will include video footage from Iraq, updates on the challenge and a chance to meet the delegate. It will also be an opportunity to contribute funds to the medical shipment.
On January 14, 2000, former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark and a 60-person delegation from the United States, as well as from Japan, Spain, Italy and England, will defy United Nations sanctions in effect against the people of Iraq. For the third time in 20 months, the delegation, the IRAQ SANCTIONS CHALLENGE, will transport a shipment of millions of dollars worth of medicine to Iraq to ameliorate a severe health crisis caused by the sanctions. Similar trips in December 1998 and May 1998 were successful efforts by people from the U.S. to rally support for the people of Iraq while providing them life-saving medicine. As a direct challenge to the sanctions, delegates are risking both fines and jail terms to express their solidarity.
TO CONTRIBUTE FUNDS TO PURCHASE MEDICINE FOR IRAQ, send your contribution to Iraq Sanctions Challenge c/o International Action Center Boston, 31 Germania St Boston, Ma 02130 email iacboston@yahoo.com, http://home.earthlink.net/~npcboston
There will be a report-back meeting when the delegates return from Iraq, on Sunday, January 30 at 1:30 pm, also at the Community Church of Boston.
"This is the third time we’ll challenge the US/UN sanctions", says Richard Becker, spokesperson for the ISC. "These sanctions are a severe abuse of human rights. Since they were first imposed in 1990, more than 1.7 million Iraqis have died. Babies, children, the elderly, the disabled, and sick - the most vulnerable members of Iraqi society - suffer the consequences of an illegal, genocidal U.S. policy."
According to ISC organizer Gloria La Riva, the UN sanctions thinly disguise U.S. intent to safeguard American and British oil interests in the Persian/Arabian Gulf. "This insistence on new weapons inspection is a ruse to violate the sovereignty of Iraq. More than 9,000 inspections were carried out between 1991-1998. The inspections teams were later proven to be fronts for CIA operations."
"Punishing Iraq for rejecting new weapons inspection is nothing more than UN sanctioned imperialism," La Riva continues. "The ‘Oil for Food’ provision is the best example of this. ‘Oil for Food’ was the UN’s provision to relieve mass starvation in Iraq. However, 50% of the escrowed proceeds from oil sales are never used for food. The money is paid to US/UK oil companies and the Kuwaiti Royal family as war reparations. The remainder pays for the administration of the sanctions. This is the thin edge of the wedge of neo-colonialism."
Members of the delegation represent a cross section of the U.S. students, religious leaders, community activists, health care workers, and trade unionists. They are people of conscience who "refuse to allow this [U.S.] government to speak in our name to facilitate genocide."
More details about the upcoming ISC trip and the recent UN vote on sanctions are available on the website http://www.iacenter.org. Delegatestraveling on the Iraq Sanctions Challenge are available for interview before or after the trip. To contact them, call (617) 522-6626, or contact iacboston@yahoo.com.
As activists prepare to defy sanctions, recent developments at the United Nations prompted the International Action Center to issue an analysis of the U.S. resolution on Iraq at the UN. at the following link: http://www.iacenter.org/iraq1299.htm
RALLY TO SUPPORT IRAQ SANCTIONS CHALLENGE 1/13/00
The U.S.-led war against Iraq has continued for 9 long years.
Join anti-sanctions activists to say:
Stop the bombing!
Stop the sanctions!
Stop the war against Iraq!
Join:
Rev Lucius Walker, IFCO/Pastors for Peace
Suhair Soukkary, Arab American Women’s Friendship Association
Ray Laforest, DC 1707
A representative from Hunter SLAM!
Iman El-Sayed, College Voice of CSI
Michael Tarif Warren, civil rights attorney
Sara Flounders, Co-director, International Action Center
Richard Becker, West Coast Regional Co-director, IAC
and others
Thursday, January 13 • 6:30 pm @ 33 West 14th St. (between 5th and 6th Ave. in Manhattan)
In the early morning hours of January 17, 1991, the U.S. began a 43 day high tech war against Iraq. An anti-war movement had been building along with the war drive, and it took the streets to oppose this bombing. Since then, a movement built on international solidarity has come together to oppose the continued bombing and the genocidal sanctions that have killed over a million Iraqis.
Join us at a send-off rally for the 60 delegates of the Iraq Sanctions Challenge—who come from the U.S., and also from Japan, Palestine, England, Canada, Spain and Italy—on the eve of their departure.
On the anniversary of the beginning of the Gulf War nine years ago, they will be in Iraq to break the sanctions by delivering a huge shipment of vitally needed medicine to the people of Iraq.
International Action Center
39 West 14th Street, Room 206
New York, NY 10011
email: iacenter@iacenter.org
http://www.iacenter.org
phone: 212 633-6646
fax: 212 633-2889
