action

The lives of children and mothers have been placed at high risk by the forced withdrawal of non-governmental organizations (NGO) from Darfur, Sudan. The withdrawal was an act of vengeance on the part of the Sudanese President, Omar al-Bashir when arrest warrants of the International Criminal Court (ICC) were signed against him. The people who suffer are Sudanese victims of five years of violence in Darfur. Nearly three million people have been displaced as villages have been destroyed, crops burned and farm animals deliberately killed. Wells which provide water have been filled in with sand. As a result, a large percentage of the population depends on food, shelter and medical aid from the United Nations and humanitarian NGOs.

Here is an update on the Gaza situation from our partners at Interfaith Peace-Builders. (Focused on peace and justice in Israel/Palestine, IFPB was founded as a program of FOR-USA. Since 2006, IFPB has been an independent organization in partnership with and with financial support from the Fellowship of Reconciliation.)

Interfaith Peace-Builders is saddened and shocked as the death-toll continues to mount in Israel's latest assault on the Gaza Strip.  We urge our friends and supporters to take action today to protest this needless loss of life, call for an immediate cease-fire, a complete end to the siege of Gaza, and an opening of its borders to humanitarian supplies, commercial goods, and people. 

"Speak Truth to Power" takes on a new dimension when you realize you are under surveillance! That is exactly the position we at FOR find ourselves in once again. In 2005, we informed FOR supporters that more than 10,000 pages of FBI files had been released to us, documenting decades of surveillance of the organization. Now, we have just learned that for two full years - since December 2006 - our Latin America program has been targeted and monitored by state agents. Specifically, the e-mail messages intercepted include FOR communication in the US and with Colombia!

Paramilitary forces are making increasingly violent threats against members of the Peace Community of San José de Apartadó and other peasant families in the area, with no apparent action by the Colombian government. Immediate action is needed by US Ambassador William Brownfield to leverage Washington’s enormous influence and prevent further violence against the community and area’s civilian population.

Our budding local FOR chapter in Nyack and our friends at Whole Women Healing have come up with a wonderful way to spend this upcoming Election Day.  After going out and working for your candidate of choice (of course!), why not come together with friends and neighbors and meditate for peace... peace in the election results, peace in the future administration, peace in Latin America or the Middle East, peace here at home.

Attached is a flyer for the Nyack event to help you in making your own. As you can see, it's a simple event to organize. Simply open your doors, and open your hearts.

(And if you live in the New York area, please grab a flyer and come to Shadowcliff on Tuesday.)

Police repression and unjust arrests in the Twin Cities related to the Republican National Convention have caused concern among nonviolent organizers.  

Youth Against War and Racism (YAWR), a partner organization of FOR, has asked us to mobilize our members and networks to support the rights of youth to resist militarism in their schools and in our country through a nonviolent student walk-out on the last day of the RNC.  

On Tuesday 9/2, some households in the St. Paul school district received a pre-recorded phone call warning parents that the streets would be unsafe for their children on Thursday, and to please urge their children not to attend the student strike.  

YAWR has called on our support for these solidarity actions: 

FOR has worked with and accompanied the courageous anti-militarism youth group, Red Juvenil de Medellín (Medellin Youth Network) since 2003. Red leaders and supporters were recently subject to a death threat from the newly emerged "Black Eagles" paramilitary group. We urge readers to respond to the Red’s appeal in the face of this threat.

Click here learn more and sign our petition.

Below is a letter from our friends at Red Juvenil:

We wish to inform human rights organizations and other official entities that our organization has been the subject of a death threat from the paramilitaries known as the Black Eagles.

Facts:

1. Thursday and Friday May 29 and 30, the Red Juvenil (Youth Network) received an email from the address redesnegras@hotmail.com with the following message:

"Death to anarchists disguised as pacifists, no more drug concerts or communists, this is the last warning." Those threatened were eight people: members and close friends of the Red Juvenil. It was signed by the group Black Eagles.

In addition to the request we posted earlier calling on African leaders to save Zimbabwe from Robert Mugabe, we also invite you to send an e-mail to your U.S. Senators urging congressional action for peace and the restoration of democracy.

Here is the letter we hope you will send:

Tens of thousands of Colombians marched on March 6 in Bogota (see photos by Sarah Koopman) and many other cities to stand with the victims of right-wing paramilitary violence and to protest violence by all armed groups. Solidarity events occurred in New York, Washington, and San Francisco.

Now, in the wake of accusations by a presidential advisor that the activists in Colombia who helped organize these peaceful marches are guerrillas, they are being targeted with paramilitary threats, kidnappings, and even killings.

Lethal attacks on Colombian labor activists also continue. On March 4 in Washington, President Bush called on Congress to approve the Free Trade Agreement with Colombia, although Colombia is the most dangerous nation in the world to be a trade unionist. As if in response, in the four days following his statement, four labor leaders in Colombia were murdered.