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Thursday, November 02, 2006
Mexico police surround Oaxaca university
By REBECA ROMERO, Associated Press Writer
OAXACA, Mexico - Federal police surrounded a university packed with leftist protesters Thursday in conflict-ridden Oaxaca, clearing barricades and firing tear gas as the activists showered them with gasoline bombs.
At least 20 protesters, 10 officers and three news photographers were injured in the clashes.
About 200 police in body armor and carrying riot shields advanced to the university gates and fought the protesters for more than six hours before they finally retreated.
Under Mexican law, the university rector must give the police permission to enter. Rector Francisco Martinez, speaking on the university radio station, called the operation an "attack" and demanded the police withdraw.
The federal police said they simply intend to "restore order and peace" on the streets and did not plan to storm the school.
Protesters with scarves covering their faces were seen running from the campus and lobbing gasoline bombs packed with nails, stones and firecrackers at police.
Officers hit back with water cannons and repeated rounds of tear gas, supported by helicopters and armored vehicles. Some officers also picked up rocks and bottles and hurled them back at protesters.
A free medical clinic near the university reported that more than 20 protesters had been treated for bruises, cuts and injuries related to tear gas.
The 10 officers received various gas-fire burns and bruises, the federal police said in a statement.
Photographer David Jaramillo of the Mexican daily El Universal was hit in the arm by a bottle rocket loaded with nails, and was hospitalized in stable condition, the statement said. Another two photographers suffered minor injuries after being hit by stones or nails from bottle rockets.
The university radio station reported that at least six demonstrators had been arrested and demanded their release. An unidentified commentator also said the protesters were furious after the attack and might blow up a gas station.
The university is a stronghold of the movement to oust Oaxaca Gov. Ulises Ruiz, who is accused of rigging the 2004 election to win office and organizing bands of thugs to attack dissidents. Protesters, including trade unionists, leftists and Indian groups, have been flocking to Oaxaca since May to press their demands, and took over the center of the state capital for more than five months.
Many retreated into the university campus Sunday after the government sent in thousands of federal police who swept into the city center, firing tear gas and tearing down camps and barricades.
Other activists still occupy a plaza several blocks away since police chased them out of the main central square, the Zocalo. And the university radio station is broadcasting messages supporting the protests and calling for federal police to leave Oaxaca.
At least nine people have died in the conflict, mostly protesters shot by police or armed gangs. Among the victims was activist-journalist Bradley Roland Will, 36, of New York, who was shot in the stomach while filming a gunbattle Friday.
.The state prosecutor's office said two people are in custody in connection with Will's death. They were detained after residents identified them as the alleged shooters. Mayor Manuel Martinez of Santa Lucia del Camino on the outskirts of Oaxaca, where Will was killed, said the suspects are municipal officials.
The embassies of the U.S., Canada, Britain, France and Germany have warned their citizens to avoid traveling to the region.
The conflict has shattered tourism in the city, noted for its colonial architecture and ancient ruins. In outlying towns known for unique handmade crafts, the lack of income for artisans is being deeply felt.
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Associated Press Writer Mark Stevenson contributed to this report.
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Slideshow: Oaxaca Unrest ~Great pictures via this Link! ~PSL
AP Photo: Protesters launch rocks towards federal police officers during a clash near Oaxaca's main university in...
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November 03, 2006 edition
Immigration crackdown debated
A lawsuit this week claims that a 'get tough' raid in Georgia crossed a line.
By Patrik Jonsson | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
ATLANTA =What happened in tiny Stillmore, Ga., either delights or disturbs observers of the nation's immigration debate.
As part of a get-tough campaign against America's estimated 12 million undocumented workers, immigration agents over Labor Day weekend raided a Hispanic community with connections to a poultry plant, sweeping up 125 people in a series of raids across three mid-Georgia counties, with Stillmore at the epicenter.
But was the raid legal? And was it right? In a lawsuit filed Wednesday in Federal Court in Atlanta, the Southern Poverty Law Center claims the constitutional rights of six US citizens were violated by overzealous agents during the Stillmore raids. Moreover, they allege the government used "Gestapo-like tactics" as part of a deliberate campaign of fear ordered by the Department of Homeland Security.
In the absence of a legislative revamp of the nation's immigration laws, the clash over America's immigrants is headed for its day in court. And the emerging legal picture will either redefine the constitutional status of illegal immigrants, or, at least, clarify what steps communities and law enforcement can and cannot take to stem the flood of illegals across the city limits.
"The problem we face now is to what extent is this, even if it's constitutional, good policy - both from the perspective of its effect on US citizens, but, also, is this what we should be doing with taxpayer dollars?," says Victor Romero, an associate dean at the Dickinson School of Law at Penn State.
An investigation into document fraud at a poultry plant in Stillmore led to what immigration officials called a "targeted action" to round up specific scofflaws.
But witnesses say the strike sparked general mayhem. Residents describe people running desperately from their homes and hiding for weeks in the woods. At least one child was left behind by her fleeing parents. The dramatic shift in the aftermath from a busy town to near ghost town disturbed many local people.
The lawsuit claims that the raids "trampled on the constitutional rights of every person of Hispanic descent unfortunate enough to get in the way." Three plaintiffs - mobile-home park owner David Robinson, Tina Martinez, and her daughter, Justeen Mancha, - spoke to reporters at a press conference in Atlanta.
"I was shocked," says Justeen, age 15, describing how she was getting ready for school when more than a dozen black-clad men, at least one with his hand on his holster, entered her house without knocking. She was questioned, but not arrested.
Officials say agents conducted the raids lawfully. "We didn't target any race or ethnic group; we targeted illegal aliens," says Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) spokesman Marc Raimondi.
Immigration officials have a lower threshold for establishing suspicion than local law enforcement, legal experts agree, which is why agents may not have needed to flash search warrants during the raid.
"Regulations authorize ICE to take action when they have a reasonable suspicion of a violation," says Jennifer Chacon, an immigration law expert at the University of California, Davis. "What this does is it creates the ability for them to carry out enforcement actions in a way that are less court scrutinized ... than ... criminal investigations."
But what the Stillmore lawsuit shares with other court cases cropping up from New Orleans to St. Louis is to what extent government can go to push illegals out while guaranteeing essential constitutional and human rights.
While federal officials are specifically assigned that responsibility, a growing number of local communities are adopting the so-called Hazleton Ordinance, a law that makes it illegal for citizens to employ or rent to illegals. Proponents say it's a legal way to address local crime and social problems.
A federal judge in Pennsylvania this week ordered a stay on the Hazleton laws until Nov. 14 to allow for a trial. US workplace rules give anybody who is drawing a paycheck - no matter their residential status - certain protections. Those rules played into a recently settled case over the refusal of a labor outsourcing company to properly pay Hispanic workers for helping to clean up after hurricane Katrina.
How race figures into the equation is at the core of the current court cases, says Mr. Romero. Courts will have to figure out whether, or to what extent local, state, and federal officials are using race or ethnicity as a factor in prosecutions.
"The way these ordinances are worded, they're flexible enough to allow for this type of complaint to move forward even though race might be a factor, and we have to worry about that," says Romero.
Driving much of the legal blowback, experts say, are increasingly aggressive tactics driven by popular discontent over the immigration situation. Deportations are up 10 percent over last year. Worksite enforcement arrests have gone from under 1,300 in 2005 to more than 4,300 this year. ICE has nearly doubled its number of detention spaces in the past year - from 16,000 to 27,500.
ICE's bolstered profile is "reflected across the board in what we do," says Mr. Raimondi in Washington. "The paradigm has shifted and today's realities regarding illegal immigration are far different than yesterday's norms."
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Posted on Thu, Nov. 02, 2006
Commerce secretary urges fellow Latinos to assimilate
By Rick Alm / McClatchy Newspapers
KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Cuban-born Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez on Thursday urged fellow Hispanics in the U.S. to assimilate and participate in American society.
"It is only by fully engaging in every aspect of American life - and not stand on the edges looking in -
that we will achieve success as a community," he told the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of Greater Kansas City at the opening session of a two-day business conference.
"That is what generations of Americans before us have done. And that is what we must do now.
"Irish, Italians, Greeks, eastern Europeans, Vietnamese - it's our turn. We can make a better society."
While in Kansas City, Gutierrez also announced $6 million in Commerce Department grants to business technology incubators and workforce training centers.
U.S. Treasurer Anna Escobedo Cabral is scheduled Friday to address the conference, which drew nearly 600 people to business skills workshops, sessions on immigration law and networking.
Gutierrez and Kansas City Chamber president Miguel Meneses both hailed dramatic gains by Hispanic businesses and workers in recent years. Growth of Hispanic-owned business is 31 percent in recent years - three times the national average for all business.
Meanwhile, Hispanic unemployment this year reached historic lows, averaging 5.4 percent and rapidly closing a historic 3 percent gap with the national average.
Michael Barrera, president of the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of the Commerce, noted that the combined $800 billion spending power of Hispanics in the United States was greater that the gross domestic product of Mexico. He said that makes the United States a prime market for foreign businesses and in turn creates jobs here.
"Hispanic business in the U.S. is exploding," he said.
Despite such gains, widespread Hispanic success in the United States is "a work in progress," said Gutierrez.
"I don't think any Hispanic that comes to this country is looking for a handout," he said. "The one thing that we want, that we ask for, is opportunity."
He cited his own story as a truck driver for Kellogg USA who rose through the ranks to become the company's chief executive. President Bush appointed him to the Cabinet post in 2004.
But Gutierrez said twin forces of isolationism and security concerns threatened vital international free trade and a controlled immigration flow into this country.
Secure borders are essential, he said, while echoing the president's call for a middle ground in the immigration debate between amnesty or deportation for those who entered this country illegally.
In an interview, Meneses said the challenges of cultural assimilation were daunting.
He said his local chamber's survey earlier this year of more than 300 area Hispanic business owners found many were "not yet a part of the 21st century."
First-generation immigrants especially, he said, distrust banks and operate their small business on a cash basis. Many are far behind technologically and appear out of the loop on knowing where find ready assistance.
"We're starting to gather momentum," he added, with expansion of Spanish-language media and growing but still modest clout in the board rooms and executive suites of corporate Kansas City.
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November 2, 2006
US Latinos Vote against Republicans
Washington, Nov 2 (Prensa Latina) Analysts and polls highlight the importance of the Latin vote and in some cases, it is considered decisive for the US half-term elections which will take place on November 7.
The newspaper La Opinion, which defends the cause of US Hispanics, published a poll on the Internet Tuesday in which 75 percent of the people considered the Latin vote will be relevant.
While 25 percent gave less importance to the 5.6 million Latin people registered to vote, Latinos have taken a great relevance in states where a close struggle for elections can take place, such as New Mexico, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida and Illinois.
The Latin vote will be important to define many posts, among them in the Chamber of Representatives and Senate.
There were Latin candidates fighting for positions in 38 states, as much federal as state posts.
No less important will be the vote to renovate 34 of the 100 seats in the Senate, 435 seats in the Chamber of Representatives, and 36 of 50 in the state governor houses.
Political analysts considered Latinos might be decisive in the close struggle at national level for the control of both institutions in the US Congress.
Different analyses said the discussions of the migratory topic will be important, and it will be influential that Latinos tend to vote more for Democrats.
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Thu, 2 Nov 2006 10:57:05 -0800 (PST)
PFP and Army, Out of Oaxaca, Long live the resistance of the barricades! Steven R. Argue st ]
From: "Steven R. Argue"
Subject: PFP and Army, Out of Oaxaca, Long live the resistance of the barricades!
Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 10:57:05 -0800 (PST)
The following message, "PFP and Army, out of Oaxaca," is an unofficial translation of the latest declaration by the Mexican Trotskyist LTS on the situation in Oaxaca.
I hope everyone has an opportunity to read Adolfo Gilly's excellent article, on the situation facing the people of Oaxaca and the complete inaction of Lopez Obrador and of the PRD, which the Infamous Vinnie just sent to us. Thanks, Vinnie. That article appears after the first.
With regards,
--Yosef M
PFP and Army, Out of Oaxaca
Long live the resistance of the barricades!
In spite of the harsh military operation to put an end to the "Oaxaca Commune," the valiant people of Oaxaca are resisting today by putting up barricades and confronting the occupiers at several points in the city. They have not succeeded in defeating it. That big resistance shows that it is possible to curb the PFP invasion, but also that in all the organizations of the country we have to go help strengthen our class brothers in this unequal battle.
The betrayal that the Rueda Pacheco agreement with the Interior Department (Gobernación) represents, so that the teachers would return to classes, dividing and weakening the movement of the APPO “ in spite of the sit-in and the APPO hunger strike in the DF “ has generated a lot of dissent among the thousands of militant educational workers who, in a principled manner and fulfilling the APPO agreements, are not returning to classes until the fall of the tyrant URO. No one in the APPO can go on saying that we must respect the decision that the teachers' leaders might take. Strike-breaking cannot be justified with the excuse of "trade union autonomy" of the
organizations. It was obvious that the return to classes would weaken the movement and encourage the repressive policy against the struggle. No negotiation with those who attack the people's struggle!
Let us break through the military siege on Oaxaca
An action on the national level that can mobilize against repression, like the one that forced Zedillo to halt the military offensive against the indigenous peoples and Zapatista peasants in Chiapas in 1994, is urgently needed. In all the movements in the states of the country, we ought to go to help the comrades of this big workers' and people's movement. On Sunday, October 29, several organizations blockaded the Lázaro Cárdenas Eje Central ("central axis") as a means of supporting Oaxaca. The students are already seizing departments and prep schools and CCHs (science and humanities high schools) and making barricades.
Now the trade union, peasant, social, and political organizations must carry out actions in their places of influence, like the seizure of border bridges and custom houses, seizing embassies, strikes, etc. (Mexican consulates overseas have been seized in countries of Europe and Latin America.) Although delayed, the EZLN has announced that it is joining this support and will blockade highways in the zones of Chiapas that it controls. Time is pressing, let us form brigades to work in the whole DF and let us increase international solidarity. Let us make the agreements we voted on in the national and international Solidarity Forum with the APPO in Oaxaca a reality.
On the results of this struggle which has held the state and federal government at bay for 5 months, depends the reorganization of the workers' and mass movement or a big fall. In many years, we had not seen a struggle as deep as this one, disputing the state, la Federación, over territorial control; and with organs of self-defense that infuriated the bourgeoisie. Let us coordinate with the normal school students of Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, who are confronting repression by the PRD government of Zeferino Torreblanca. A Caravan of Caravans that will arrive at Oaxaca City from the north, south, east and west, should be the aim of meetings like the Assembly of the Peoples of Mexico. Let us make international attention focus on Oaxaca. We have to arrive at the Oaxaca Zócalo to help our comrades recover that bastion of struggle that the APPO installed. With forceful actions, let us show the heroic comrades of Oaxaca that they are not alone!
Promote a national strike!
The unions must spare no effort in these decisive moments. Unfortunately, faced with savage repression, they failed to call a strike and mobilization, limiting themselves to declarations against the entry of the PFP. The comrades of Oaxaca must not be left alone! It is urgent that in their assemblies the unions now discuss the national strike to force Ulises Ruiz and the troops out of Oaxaca. The SME has already declared in its meeting with the Interior Department on Monday, October 30 that it agrees with the national strike. Rank and file electrical workers should discuss the date for this national day to make it a reality. But the university students' unions must also do like the students and join this action, promoting the universities' and teachers' strike (STUNAM, SITUAM, CHAPINGO, Bachilleres, CNTE). Let us pass from declarations to deeds. Let us vote on a tentative date now!
For a broad and democratic coordinating body of the actions of struggle
Together with the APPO, let us promote a coordinating body that can promote the necessary tasks to keep up the people's resistance in Oaxaca. Let us join forces for that. The different organizations in the DF and other states where we are, should elect their delegates to this coordinating body and vote in a united and democratic manner on the necessary tasks and actions. Let the APPO feel that it can rely completely on the organizations with which we unconditionally support its struggle. For its part, the APPO can help organize a national body that, independently of the interests of the parties of the Congress of the Union, moves forward toward a class-conscious and militant unity.
Ulises Ruiz and troops, out of Oaxaca!
Stop the arrests in the state! Freedom for political prisoners!
Down with the agreements with the government that weaken the movement!
For a Provisional Government of the APPO!
For a Revolutionary Constituent Assembly on the ruins of the regime!
Long live the Commune of Oaxaca!
Liberation News:
From LA JOURNADA:
Oaxaca: Solitary in Flames The Democratic Revolution Party Isn’t Willing, Nor can it Mobilize, to Defend the Popular Movement in Oaxaca
By Adolfo Gilly, La Jornada, November 1, 2006
The entire structure of political organizations and institutionalized labor unions are, in spite of their differences, leaving Oaxaca in solitude during these crucial moments. No great social mobilizations have sprung up, like the ones that were started to stop the war against zapatismo in 1994, not like the mobilizations that arose against the Acteal massacre. The electoral routine, that is, the logic of the existing institutions, has taken over every social mobilization. There are a few declarations and a few protests, but no great mobilization of forces like the one organized in the electoral dispute. The Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) is absorbed in the congressional aspect of the dispute. In Congress, the PRD voted in favor of the disappearance of power in Oaxaca and asked for a political trial. If that didn’t work, too bad, we saved our honor and we’re off for the extended weekend.
All of the governors chosen by the PRD, including the one from the Federal District, signed next to Ulises Ruíz during the Conago (National Conference of Governors). The CND (the National Democratic Convention organized by Andrés Manuel López Obrador), a motive for so many illusions and bewilderments, has demonstrated its inexistence for all practical effects, except the vote recount.
The old pact between the PAN (National Action Party) and the PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party) has now mobilized in support of Ulises Ruíz and against the people of Oaxaca, making them responsible for fifteen deaths in Oaxaca so far. This has to uphold a repudiated governor and oppose a legitimate social movement of the people of Oaxaca.
The old pact between the PAN (National Action Party) and the PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party) has now mobilized in support of Ulises Ruíz and against the people of Oaxaca, making them responsible for fifteen deaths in Oaxaca so far. This has to uphold a repudiated governor and oppose a legitimate social movement of the people of Oaxaca.
Now, they have imposed the PFP (Federal Preventive Police) and military soldiers dressed as PFP, another sign of their impotency and discredit, all to achieve political solutions as they were often achieved in the past. The PRI-PAN pact is no novelty. It comes from the PAN’s foundation in 1939, as the legal inheritor of sinarquismo (a largely religious social movement in the 1920s and 1930s against what would later become the PRI) and of the political voice of the ecclesiastical hierarchy and of Mexican conservatives. This pact always came into action during crucial moments: the repression of the rail workers’ strike in 1959, the student movement of 1968, the dirty war of the 1970s, the neo-liberal restructuring begun in 1982, the 1988 voting fraud (with its sequel of hundreds of PRD members killed as well as others, since political resistance then was no joke), the burning of the certificates of the election in 1991, the disappearance of articles 27 and 130 of the constitution, the signing of NAFTA, the repression in Chiapas since 1994, the rupture of the San Andrés accords and the vote against the Cocopa law, the Fobaproa (the agreement to absorb the private bankers’ debt into public debt), the pact of buffoons where 360 congressmen of both parties voted in favor of stripping Andrés Manuel López Obrador of his political rights to become a presidential candidate (an initiative that didn’t prosper because of massive popular discontent), the refusal of recounting the votes in the 2006 election. The list is endless and without significant exceptions.
Today, the PRD, with both of its masks, the institutional one called the “Front to Extend Progress” and the pseudo-institutional mask called the “Democratic National Convention” isn’t willing, nor can it mobilize the popular forces that it assembled in the capital’s main square in September against the electoral fraud, to support Oaxaca and to repudiate the repression of the federal government. Fortunately, La Jornada and several other medias (including Indymedia, that already paid with the life of one of its reporters), in addition to the innumerable individual voices, preserve information, protest and create indignation (cheers Blanche, always there!). But their task isn’t, and can’t be, the organization of the movement.
The task applies to those that were given fifteen million votes in July and that hold, as was confirmed, the right apparatus. But nothing is coming from that way. They simply repeat the same things they said about the Atenco repression. The letter written by Andrés Manuel López Obrador, published Sunday October 29th in La Jornada, isn’t acceptable. He limits himself to denounce the actions of the police, the pact between the PAN and the PRI, and the “sinister and repressive” government of Ulises Ruíz. He declares that the governor’s resignation is the only possible solution and he reminds the readers that in the July election most oaxaqueños voted for him. That is it.
One would expect that the sequel to these affirmations would be to call for a large mobilization in the Federal District and in other places of the country in support of the oaxaqueño movement, against the murders of Ulises Ruíz’s paramilitaries and against the repression of the federal government. A call like this one, coming from a man that got fifteen million votes, would overfill the capital’s mains square and many other plazas around the country. A mere late accusation, as is written in his letter, is useless.
As I write these lines, Oaxaca is being occupied by federal forces that the PAN government has launched in defense of the murderous governor of the PRI. Today two more people have been killed. I don’t ask the leaders of the CND to mobilize their forces in the public squares and in the places of work and study of the country, first of all because I know they won’t, and secondly because they don’t have the influence to mobilize these forces. Neither do I ask the leader of the opposition, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, since his letter states that he doesn’t have the intention of doing so.
In the presence of the indignation and astonishment of the Mexican people, who once more contemplate how the repressive forces of the federal government attack a massive and legitimate popular movement and try to corner it and drive it to extremes and misbehavior; in the presence of protests, denunciations, mobilizations of popular support, human rights and other organizations “ those not counted as major forces “ the silence and the passivity of the large organizations leave Oaxaca standing alone, with its own forces, its own courage, its own ability to mobilize and its own and ancient organizational framework. As in the unforgettable verse of the poet of Muerte sin fin (Death without end), Oaxaca is now the “solitude in flames.” The people of Oaxaca will leave this trial beaten up, but possibly more organized. Meanwhile, the vote collectors will have new occasions to remember other verses:
“
We are the ones who carry and we ride on the path / and everyone will get what they deserve.”
We are the ones who carry and we ride on the path / and everyone will get what they deserve.”
Protests Today:
Austin: Solidarity encampment at Mexican Consulate (corner of Brazos & 9th)
Boston: 4pm New England Day of Action at Mexican Consulate (20 Park Plaza)
Chicago: 3pm “Day of the Dead” Alters at Plaza Tenochtitlan (18th and Blue Island in Pilsen)
Los Angeles: 10am Demonstration and 5pm Vigil (Park View & 6th St)
Los Angeles: 7pm Cuauhtemoc Mexica Dance at Mexican Consulate (Park View & 6th St)
San Diego: Ongoing Protest at Mexican Consulate (1549 India St Little Italy)
San Francisco: 7pm Day of the Dead in the Mission District (24th & Bryant)
Sacramento: 3pm Protest and Day of the Dead at Mexican Consulate (8th & J St)
San Jose: 2pm Day of the Dead march, protest and vigil at Mexican Consulate (540 North First St.)
Seattle: 11am Protest at Mexican Consulate (2132 3rd Ave)
Liberation News:
Get off the internet, I'll see you in the streets.
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Wed Nov 1, 2006 11:50 pm
REMINDER: Important National Immigrant Solidarity Network Conference Call
11/9, Thursday 8:00 PM EST
Dial-in Number: 1-605-725-3600 (South Dakota)
Participant Access Code 91030
Family:
This is the second reminders for our next important National Immigrant Solidarity Network conference call, schedule at Thursday, November 9th 8 PM EST. Please mark your calendar to join!
We will discuss and need to make some important decisions about our important 2007 planning for the NISN, such as: May Day 2007 and NISN National Grassroots Immigrant Strategy Conference.
Initial Call Agendas:
1) Next 6 months NISN working plans:
- Nov 06 - Jan 07 Immigrant Town Hall Meeting
- March - April 07 Immigrant Caravan
- March Bi-national Border Actions
- 2007 NISN National Conference
(We should decided the date for the conference soon and create working groups for May Day 2007 and NISN National Conference).
2) NISN Participating At The Following Conferences:
- Nov 3-5 NAASCon Conference at Chicago, IL
- Nov 17-19 Labor Tech 2006 Conference at San Francisco, CA
- Dec 2-3 US Labor Against the War Conference at Cleveland, OH
- 2007 UFPJ National Conference, time and location: TBA
- March 17-19 4th Anniversary of U.S. Invade Iraq, Washington D.C.
- June 27 – July 1 U.S. Social Forum at Atlanta, GA
3) Working Group Reports and Fund Raising
Please let me know if you have any questions and suggest agenda items for the call.
Thursday, November 09, 2006
Time: 8:00 PM - 8:55 PM Eastern Std Time
Dial-in Number: 1-605-725-3600 (South Dakota)
Participant Access Code 91030
In Solidarity;
Lee Siu Hin
National Coordinator
National Immigrant Solidarity Network
No Immigrant Bashing! Support Immigrant Rights!
e-mail: info@...
New York: (212)330-8172
Los Angeles: (213)403-0131
Washington D.C.: (202)595-8990
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Published: November 1, 2006
An Activist, Then a Journalist, and Now a Victim of the Violence He Covered
By COLIN MOYNIHAN
When Bradley Will traveled to a state in southern Mexico last month, his goal was to document and describe the turbulence in the region, where striking teachers and their allies demanding the resignation of the state’s governor have clashed at times with armed attackers.
The conflict had received scant attention in much of the news media, but it was exactly the kind of situation that Mr. Will relished witnessing and writing about. He often traveled from New York City to Latin America to chronicle little-known disputes, and his articles made him a familiar figure in the world of the alternative media.
On Friday, Mr. Will, 36, was fatally shot in the chest while videotaping near a barricaded road at the edge of the city of Oaxaca, the capital of the state with the same name, during a confrontation between demonstrators equipped with Molotov cocktails and fireworks and a group of men armed with pistols and rifles. Witnesses have said that Mr. Will was hit by bullets fired toward the demonstrators.
Five people have been detained in connection with the shooting, including two local officials and two police officers. State officials are running the investigation, and a spokesman for President Vicente Fox said that the federal government could take over the inquiry if state authorities did not do an adequate job. Human rights groups and a New York-based organization that advocates on behalf of journalists have called for the federal government to take over the investigation immediately.
“
The story of the situation in Oaxaca was not getting out,” said Beka Economopoulos, a friend who lives in New York and works for an environmental group. “Brad died trying to get the story of what was happening in Oaxaca out to the world.”
The story of the situation in Oaxaca was not getting out,” said Beka Economopoulos, a friend who lives in New York and works for an environmental group. “Brad died trying to get the story of what was happening in Oaxaca out to the world.”
Although Mr. Will grew up in Illinois and lived for years on the Lower East Side, he traveled from coast to coast to attend protests on a variety of issues, sometimes getting to far-flung spots by riding the rails in empty box cars.
Mr. Will’s writings appeared in newspapers and on Web sites run by the Independent Media Center, a collective of left-leaning volunteers organized in chapters around the world, who commonly act as both participants in events and chroniclers of them. Its reporters and photographers typically include personal observations as they document issues that they have strong feelings about, like the war in Iraq or the impact of global trade on the developing world.
Mr. Will had a long history of advocating for environmental causes and attending political demonstrations in the United States. In his travels to Latin America, Mr. Will, at times, found himself in perilous settings. In a 2005 article about squatters in Brazil, he described being shot at by the authorities and detained. Friends said that Mr. Will was haunted by violence he witnessed there.
“
He was really affected by that,” said Seth Tobocman, an artist in New York who discussed the experience with Mr. Will. “He started out as an activist and became a journalist so he could tell people about what he saw.”
He was really affected by that,” said Seth Tobocman, an artist in New York who discussed the experience with Mr. Will. “He started out as an activist and became a journalist so he could tell people about what he saw.”
In his last written dispatch, which was posted on Oct. 16 on a Web site maintained by the New York City chapter of the Independent Media Center, Mr. Will described the killing of a man in Oaxaca and said that some people in Oaxaca blamed the death on paramilitary vigilantes.
The images filmed by Mr. Will minutes before his death, which are on the Independent Media Center’s Web site, show a chaotic scene, in which men used slingshots to shoot projectiles and gunshots can be heard. At one point, Mr. Will appears to videotape from beneath a truck, aiming his lens at a man firing a pistol. Minutes later, during the final images of the video, a cry is heard and the camera appears to fall to the ground.
Mr. Will’s funeral was held Saturday in Oaxaca. A priest splashed holy water onto his coffin and a woman bent down to kiss its side. Mr. Will’s mother and father, along with two sisters and a brother, issued a statement mourning Mr. Will’s death.
“
We are grieving over the tragic and senseless loss of Brad’s life,” it read in part. “We believe he died doing what he loved.”
We are grieving over the tragic and senseless loss of Brad’s life,” it read in part. “We believe he died doing what he loved.”
++++++++++
Elisabeth Malkin in Mexico City and Carolyn Wilder in New York contributed reporting.
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November 1, 2006; 7:33 AM ET
The 'Cauldron of Oaxaca'
By Jefferson Morley
Brad Will, an American freelance journalist, was filming a street battle in the Mexican city of Oaxaca last Friday when a burst of gunfire took his life.
The footage he took in the last moments of his life, viewable at indymedia.org, captured the chaos and danger of a long-running conflict that few people outside of Mexico had been paying attention to.
The deaths of three people, including the 36-year-old activist and freelancer from San Francisco, prompted President Vicente Fox to order federal troops to reclaim the city, a popular tourist destination that has been gripped by protesters demanding the ouster of Gov. Ulises Ruiz for more than five months.
On Sunday, Fox declared that order had been restored. But as The Washington Post's Manuel Roig-Franzia reported, "the president's declaration seemed out of sync with events on the ground."
The burst of violence intensified Mexico's debate about how to deal with protest movements driven by the country's most disaffected and impoverished citizens. As the Oaxaca protests brewed over the summer, Fox found himself at the center of a similar dilemna as thousands camped out in Mexico City's Zocalo in protest of the presidential election results, which gave conservative Felipe Calderon a narrow victory over the leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. Fox left the protesters alone, but had to ramp up security ahead of a state of the nation speech which he didn't wind up delivering.
Editorialists of La Imparcial, a conservative Oaxaca daily, welcomed the arrival of the federales to rout the demonstrators, whom they called "delinquents." The leftist Mexico city daily La Jornada (in Spanish), meanwhile, called Fox's action "counterproductive repression."
"The grievances boiling in the cauldron of Oaxaca exist across all of Mexico," wrote David Usborne, correspondent for London's Independent newspaper. The country, he said, is "seemingly unable to close the yawning gap between its wealthy and grindingly poor and where full democracy, born only six years ago, remains fragile."
The seizure began with the annual union strike by schoolteachers seeking higher pay and better conditions for their poor students. When Gov. Ruiz sent police to shut down the demonstrations in June, the normally peaceful demonstration was radicalized. The protesters took over the city center and demanded Ruiz's resignation. Ruiz, in the words of U.K. Guardian correspondent Jo Tuckman, is regarded as "as the epitome of political corruption and authoritarianism."
The editors of El Universal, the centrist daily in Mexico City, emphasized that Oaxaca is the third poorest state in Mexico with a population that is "very poor, super-exploited and marginalized."
"Social peace is at permanent risk which is why one must begin to act today to avoid the probable deaths of tomorrow," they wrote.
The editors of the Siempre newsweekly disputed the legitimacy of the protesters saying, "The radicals do not know how to build. They are nihilists who have to destroy so that they can construct a society that submits to their will."
In an analysis of the newsweekly Proceso, Jorge Carrasco blamed the standoff on an "absence of power" in the Mexican government. He noted that for five months, Fox refused to intervene in Oaxaca, saying it was a local issue. Only after Fox sent in the troops did the Mexican Congress and Senate call on Ruiz to resign for the good of Oaxaca.
Ruiz refused and, thanks to the troops, was able to return to his office.
Whatever happens next, Carrasco says that Oaxaca shows the demands of social movements around the country "are not going to be satisfied by electoral democracy."
++++++++++
From : Eric Stewart
Sent : Wednesday, November 1, 2006 7:19 AM
Subject : Multiple Updates from Oaxaca
In this post:
1. US Ambassador orders Fox to Crack Down
2. Mexican Progressives Support Oaxaca
3. Oaxaca Negotiations Stalled; Governor Refuses to Quit
4. Protests in solidarity with the people of Oaxaca
5. A Call from the Zapatistas: Oaxaca is not alone!
6. Additional Information
Please click here:
Big Medicine
Souljah
Outside the Box
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Updated: 5:49 a.m. PT Nov 1, 2006
Possible 5.6 million Latinos to cast ballots
Largest portion expected in Texas, biggest increase in Colorado
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - An estimated 5.6 million Latinos could vote in this year's midterm elections and help Hispanics make gains in state and federal political office, a nonpartisan Latino group said Tuesday.
The expected Latino votes is an increase from about 4.7 million who turned out in 2002, the last year of elections that didn't include a presidential contest, according to a study by the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. The association works to increase civic participation by Latinos and raise their numbers in public office.
Latinos also are expected to cast a slightly larger share of the overall votes, 6 percent this year, up from 5 percent four years ago.
In Texas, the number of Latino voters is expected to increase from 982,000 Latinos voting in 2002 to about 1.19 million in 2006.
The biggest change is expected in Colorado where NALEO projects Latino voters to go from 118,000 in 2002 to 163,000 this year, a 38 percent jump. Latinos will comprise the largest share of voters, 40 percent, in New Mexico.
"We think that Latinos are just becoming increasingly engaged in the electoral process. Latino voters want to make their voices heard on issues important to the community," said Rosalind Gold, a senior director at NALEO and one of the study's researchers. She said the estimates are considered conservative.
The increase is a result of demographic change, population growth and increased outreach by both political parties to Latinos, she said.
The increases are showing up in states with some of the more competitive races for U.S. House and Senate seats.
Latinos are expected to make up at least 7 percent of the vote in New Jersey where incumbent U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez, a Democrat, faces a tough challenge from state Sen. Thomas Kean, Jr.
They should comprise 13 percent of voters in Arizona where Democratic real estate developer Jim Pederson, a Democrat, is challenging Republican incumbent Jon Kyl in the Senate race, NALEO said.
In Texas, the Latino share of the vote is expected to be 22 percent, up from 19 percent.
Incumbent Rep. Henry Bonilla, R-San Antonio, is on the ballot with seven challengers, five of whom also are Latino. About 48 percent of eligible voters in that district are Latino, NALEO said.
In Congressional District 22, a Houston area district that was represented by former Majority Leader Tom DeLay, 17.1 percent of the eligible voters are Latino. In that race, Democrat Nick Lampson shares the ballot with Libertarian Bob Smither. Republicans are waging a write-in campaign for Shelley Sekula-Gibbs, who is considered the underdog to Lampson.
In this year's election, Latinos are running for top federal and state offices in 38 of 50 states, compared to 35 they hold now. Many of the candidates are running in nontraditional Latino communities.
"In those communities, Latino candidates are starting to be able to raise money, get top endorsements and build political networking," Gold said.
Latinos are expected to see a net gain of four seats in state Houses, Assemblies or Delegates, mostly due to Latino Republicans winning in nontraditional states or communities.
In congressional races, Democrat Patricia Madrid is in a tight race against incumbent Republican Heather Wilson for New Mexico's District 1 House seat. Albio Sires, a Democrat, is considered to have locked up the race to fill Menendez's seat, which has been vacant since January.
Currently, there are 18 Latino Democrats and four Latino Republicans in the U.S. House. Should Madrid and Sires win and all Republicans be re-elected, the number would increase to 24.
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Last modified Wednesday, November 1, 2006 10:54 PM PST
Report: More Latinos needed on Southwest County school boards
By: JENNIFER KABBANY and PAUL EAKINS - Staff Writers
Contact staff writer Jennifer Kabbany at (951) 676-4315, Ext. 2625, or
Too few Latinos are represented on school boards throughout California, a nonprofit advocacy group contends in a recent report -- but it's even worse in Southwest County: There are no Latinos among the 25 trustees representing the area's five public school districts.
Among the school boards identified in the report by the Latino Issues Forum as being especially unrepresentative of the community they serve are two in Southwest County -- the Lake Elsinore Unified School District and the Perris Union High School District.
Yet, the Nov. 7 election promises little change to the under-representation of Latinos in Southwest County, because few Latinos are running in local school district races.
Similarly, across North San Diego County, it is rare for Latinos to hold seats even in districts that are more than 50 percent Latino. Among 20 North San Diego County school boards, only one of 100 trustees is Latino.
Other unrepresentative school districts in Riverside County include the Banning, Corona-Norco, Riverside and Palm Springs unified school districts, the report states.
Regional Latino leaders say that having Latino candidates is a good step toward empowering them to play a strong role in setting educational policies. They say that with Latino students' high dropout rates and often limited post-secondary education, more Latino voices are needed on school boards.
"The Hispanic community does not have enough representation," said George Cambero, who ran twice unsuccessfully for a seat on the Lake Elsinore Unified School District board and is now running for a seat on the Western Municipal Water District. "One of the reasons why is we are not well organized, but I think it's overdue."
The report, released Oct. 23, compared the percentage of Latinos living in a school district, based on U.S. Census Bureau data, to the percentage of Latinos on the school board.
The organization compiled the report from information provided by 693 of California's 979 school districts. From this information, the report identified 24 districts where Latinos are considered to be severely under-represented because of a high number of Latinos in the community but scarce Latino board members.
The report also lists 148 other school districts as simply under-represented, with a significant but less extreme disparity, a category the Lake Elsinore and Perris school districts fall into.
Perris has a Latino population of 31,965 residents and Lake Elsinore has 21,680 Latino residents, according to statistics used in the report. Figures from the 2000 U.S. census indicate that at that time, more than half of Perris' population was Latino, while Lake Elsinore's was nearly 40 percent.
Sonja Wilson, a Lake Elsinore district trustee for three decades, said Latinos have run for the board in the past but she believes they have conducted ineffective campaigns.
"If they had been out there a little bit more (they might have won)," said Wilson. "Visibility is one of the most important things as far as being involved."
The Latino Issues Forum report offers several solutions to the lack of Latino representation. It suggests creating task forces and programs to identify potential Latino candidates, to train them, and to help fund all candidates' campaigns so that financial barriers are eliminated.
Also, school districts where voting is "at large," rather than by district, have a slightly lower percentage of Latino school board members than districts in which candidates are elected to represent specific neighborhoods and geographic areas, the report says.
Perris and Lake Elsinore have at-large voting. In contrast, Cambero said he supports a neighborhood district voting system, adding that he believes such a system would have helped him get elected.
He said the city of Canyon Lake, which is within the Lake Elsinore district's boundaries, is gated and thus somewhat closed off to some candidates, and the cost of getting a message to all Lake Elsinore voters can also be too much for some families, such as his own.
He said he believes smaller, neighborhood voting districts would be less overwhelming and more effective for Latino school board candidates.
Raquel Donoso, associate director of Latino Issues Forum, said that while the study's overall findings weren't surprising, the range of school districts lacking Latino representation was.
"What we were able to see is that this is an issue across urban areas, rural areas, big districts, small districts," Donoso said. "When you look at it regionally and district by district, you really get to see the disparities that are occurring."
Menifee Union School District school board member and community activist Rita Peters, who is up for re-election, touts a platform that includes an emphasis on ensuring Latino students are learning. Peters' son is half-Latino, she said.
Peters recently pushed for a probe into how Latino students are faring academically after rumors spread that they may be falling through the cracks. She has been the main advocate in getting a campus built in Quail Valley, where many Latino students live.
The Latino Issues Forum report cites a New York study that says diversity, or the lack of it, on school boards can have a direct effect on Latino students.
"I got on the school board because I felt I could do more -- and I have done more," Peters said of helping Latino students. "They need to get out and get involved politically, the Hispanics do."
According to the report, "researchers discovered that absent Latino school board members, Latino students were subject to more suspensions and expulsions, were under-represented in gifted and talented classes, and were over-represented in special education classes."
One Latino school board candidate, Bill Sanz, who is running for a seat on the Temecula Valley Unified School District board, said no one should be elected simply because of their ethnic background.
Sanz, who is bilingual, said he believes his ethnicity could help ensure that area Latino families who have questions and may not speak English very well can turn to him, but he said he also believes in providing the best education possible for Latino students so they can learn English.
The full report, entitled "Beyond the Classroom: An Analysis of California's Public School Governance," can be viewed @
Latinos Issues Forum
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Last Updated 12:36 am PST Wednesday, November 1, 2006
Housing groups win $200,000 grants
By Todd Milbourn -
Story appeared in METRO section, Page B2
SACRAMENTO -- Two local nonprofit groups have been awarded $200,000 grants from a Bank of America program aimed at revitalizing communities.
Sacramento Cottage Housing Inc. and the Sacramento Mutual Housing Association received the grants, which were awarded through the bank's Neighborhood Excellence Initiative, a national program that has awarded more than $48 million since 2004.
Cottage Housing provides transitional housing to homeless adults and families. Sacramento Mutual Housing Association offers permanent housing for low-income families.
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October 31, 2006
Indigenous Border Summit Opposes Border Wall and Militarization
By Brenda Norrell
Indigenous peoples at the Border Summit of the Americas on Tohono O'odham tribal land opposed the construction of a border wall, which will dissect indigenous communities on ancestral lands split by the U.S.-Mexico border. They also issued a strong statement against the ongoing militarization of their homelands.
During the Border Summit, held Sept. 29-Oct. 1, organized by Tohono O'odham Mike Flores and facilitated by the International Indian Treaty Council and the American Indian Movement, indigenous peoples unanimously opposed the Secure Fence Act, passed by the Senate. The wall will divide the ancestral lands of many Indian Nations, including the Kumeyaay in California, Cocopah and Tohono O'odham in Arizona, and the Kickapoo in Texas. The wall is expected to be completed by May 2008.
Describing it as “psychological oppression and terrorism,” the participants representing many tribes from the United States and Mexico also called for a halt to the militarization of their ancestral homelands and sacred places along the border.
Key Challenges
* The border wall divides ancestral lands, separates indigenous people from sacred places, and denies them the right to pass freely within their traditional lands.
* Heavy militarization of the border has led to defamation of the lands, harassment of indigenous members, and even death.
* In violation of international treaties, indigenous nations were not consulted prior to the application of anti-immigrant measures on their land such as Operation Hold the Line and Operation Gatekeeper.
* The Tohono O'odham tribal government has supported the U.S. government in denying immigrant rights and the rights of tribal members to aid immigrants.
Tohono O'odham offered testimony on how their human rights are violated by the Border Patrol, immigration agents, and more recently the National Guard. The Tohono O'odham's tribal land of 2.8 million acres is located on the Arizona border and traditional lands span the border into the northern Mexico state of Sonora.
Members of the Tohono O'odham Nation said the proposed border wall would be a barrier to traditional routes of passage for ceremonies and traditional practices. The wall would interfere with O'odham ways for O'odham members living on both sides of the border who cross routinely for ceremonial, cultural, family, and health reasons. One Tohono O'odham father said increased border security has already made it impossible for his children to ride the bus to school because of harassment by border agents.
Bill Means of the International Indian Treaty Council noted that the U.S. government plans to build the southern border wall in violation of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, environmental laws, and other federal laws.
“
This is a violation of indigenous peoples' human rights and a violation of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples now being considered by the United Nations General Assembly,” Means asserted, noting that in 2005, Homeland Security waived all federal laws, including environmental laws, to complete the border fence in Southern California.
This is a violation of indigenous peoples' human rights and a violation of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples now being considered by the United Nations General Assembly,” Means asserted, noting that in 2005, Homeland Security waived all federal laws, including environmental laws, to complete the border fence in Southern California.
During the testimony, several indigenous representatives said the militarization and occupation of indigenous lands are in direct violation of indigenous peoples' rights to economic, political, social, and cultural control of their lands.
One participant, Tohono O'odham Mike Wilson, also stated that his Nation has had no say in the state and federal programs implemented on its lands. He said he asked former Tohono O'odham Chairman Edward Manuel whether the Tohono O'Odham Legislative Council was consulted before the United States' Operation Gatekeeper or Operation Hold the Line were launched. Those two operations funneled migrants onto tribal land, where they often died in the desert.
According to Wilson, Chairman Manuel confirmed that the Tohono O'odham were never consulted.
Cross-border Indigenous Activism
Indian Nations are now uniting to take action in defense of ancestral lands, burial sites, and the environment. Earlier, the Kumeyaay opposed the border wall and said it would allow the U.S. government to “plow through” the burial places of their ancestors in Southern California. Members of the Kumeyaay Nation supported the Tohono O'odham in resisting the latest phase of wall-building.
Among those attending with a new vision of indigenous border solidarity was Mark Maracle, Mohawk, representing the Women Title Holders. Maracle presented Flores with two flags of solidarity and spoke of the need for unified action at the northern and southern borders.
He presented a statement of the Women Title Holders that said that native people can freely exercise their right to free transit at the northern border as established under traditional and federal law by the Jay Treaty at the northern border.
It states, “… the Red Card indicates that a person is a Haudenosaunee/Six Nations Iroquois of Turtle Island. According to the Two Row Wampum Agreement, at all times we are free to pass and repass by land or inland navigation [or by air] onto our territories, that we are free to carry on trade and commerce with each other, that we shall not pay any duty or import whatever, that we are free to hunt and fish anywhere on our vast territory, and that we shall have free passage over all toll roads and bridges.”
Wall Violates Indigenous Rights
During the summit, Tohono O'odham described how Border Patrol intrude into the homes of elderly O'odham without permission, hold people at gunpoint and ask for papers, and throw garbage in sacred sites on their patrols. Tohono O'odham described harassment by Border Patrol, including being tailgated in the vehicles, spotlighted in their homes, and held at gunpoint while being asked for papers on tribal land.
“
As far as I am concerned the United States Border Patrol is an occupying army. If we were truly a sovereign nation, we would not have an occupying army on sovereign land,” Wilson stated. He pointed out that the Border Patrol's “occupying army” has a military camp two miles north of the international border on Tohono O'odham tribal land in Arizona.
As far as I am concerned the United States Border Patrol is an occupying army. If we were truly a sovereign nation, we would not have an occupying army on sovereign land,” Wilson stated. He pointed out that the Border Patrol's “occupying army” has a military camp two miles north of the international border on Tohono O'odham tribal land in Arizona.
Wilson said O'odham, too, are migrants and most have moved about looking for work during their lives. Many of those dying in the desert are indigenous peoples, from Chiapas, Guatemala, Honduras, and other countries in Central and South America. “Where is our moral outrage?” Wilson asked the gathering. “We collectively in the social justice community turn away and let our brothers and sisters die.”
Summit participants pointed out that the Tohono O'odham Nation law criminalizes transporting migrants, including a fine for the first offense and jail time for second offense. Means pointed out that in the event that a migrant was dying in the desert, an O'odham on tribal land would be charged with a crime for transporting the migrant to a hospital.
During the Border Summit, Angelita Ramon, Tohono O'odham, described how her son, 18-year-old Bennett Patricio, Jr., was run over and killed by the Border Patrol on April 9, 2001 in a deserted area of tribal land. Ramon, and Patricio's stepfather Irvin Ramon, said they believe Patricio witnessed a possibly illicit transfer of items by Border Patrol agents and was intentionally run over. The family's case against the Border Patrol is proceeding on federal appeal to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
“I'm here to let everyone know about the Border Patrol and how they killed my son,” Angelita told the summit. She said the truth of what happened that night has still not been revealed.
Jimbo Simmons, member of the International Indian Treaty Council, said, “The Border Patrol is a death squad. They are operating like they do in Central and South America, because no one can hold them accountable.”
Manny Pino of Acoma Pueblo said indigenous people all along the border are affected by the militarization. “As indigenous people, we didn't draw lines on the land,” Pino told the summit. “It was all our Earth Mother.”
Pino said the militarization of the border and the manipulation of truth follows in the pattern of the Indian Reorganization Act, which established systems of government that were “shoved down the throats” of Indian people in the United States in the 19th century.
Now, Pino said, the U.S. government is telling the Tohono O'odham Nation that if the tribe does not allow the military on their lands, their federal funding will be cut off.
Pino added that nationwide, some American Indian people are being caught up in attitudes of racism toward migrants. This reflects a tactic that the U.S. government has long used to divide the people, he noted, citing the example of the so-called Navajo and Hopi land dispute.
He pointed out that it is important for Indian people to recognize the real enemy. “It is George Bush, Homeland Security, the Patriot Act, and the people who want to tap our phone lines,” Pino concluded.
Reflecting the comments of many in the border area, Pino said a border wall would not stop the people from coming across. “The ‘Tortilla Curtain' will be torn. The real challenge for indigenous peoples is to ‘decolonize' the mind.”
One Man Makes a Difference
The Baboquivari District on Tohono O'odham lands has one of the highest rates of migrant deaths on the border. Mike Wilson, Tohono O'odham, has challenged the Tohono O'odham Nation to become “morally responsible,” and take actions to prevent deaths on tribal lands.
Wilson began to put out water for migrants when they started to die in disproportionate numbers in 2001. Since then, between 240 and 250 migrants have lost their lives each year in the Sonoran Desert. Of those, 70 to 90 have died on O'Odham lands. He states simply, “Let me be very, very clear, hopefully, in what I'm trying to do. No one deserves to die in the Arizona Sonora Desert for want of a cup of water.”
Wilson does volunteer work with Humane Borders away from tribal land, but his actions on tribal land are as an individual. The Tohono O'odham tribal government has halted humanitarian groups from coming onto tribal land to render aid, he said. He urged that the tribal government be held accountable for its callous inaction. “We who were once oppressed, are ever increasingly becoming the oppressor.”
The Tohono O'odham tribal Attorney General's Office and Superintendent of Public Safety earlier told Wilson to stop maintaining the water stations for migrants. Both offices threatened him with banishment as a tribal member and said, “Under penalty of banishment you must cease putting out water.” However, when asked about the banishment, Chairman Manuel responded, “You are O'odham, no one can banish you.”
Wilson appears in the film, “Crossing Arizona,” shown at the Border Summit, which includes his efforts of putting out water in gallon jugs and barrels, and testing for impurities, on a weekly basis at stations. During the summit, he shared more of one migrant man's story documented in the film. Wilson said he told the man in the desert that if he goes north, he would be dead within a few hours. The man said he would rather die in the desert than return to Mexico and watch his wife, who needs surgery, and his children, starve to death.
The reasons for Wilson's actions go beyond altruism and touch on his fundamental beliefs and the experiences that led him to his activism. Over the past five years, he has witnessed migrants dying of thirst on tribal land, including a seven-year-old girl with blood in her urine who barely survived.
“
All human life is sacred … When it comes to people dying in the desert, we are all equal.” When one undercover detective asked him whose authority he was acting on, Wilson replied, “The man upstairs.”
All human life is sacred … When it comes to people dying in the desert, we are all equal.” When one undercover detective asked him whose authority he was acting on, Wilson replied, “The man upstairs.”
Threats to a Traditional Way of Life
The impact of the border wall and militarization on communities were not the only threats to Native American way of life that were denounced at the Summit. Pointing out that the fragile desert ecosystem and all of its creatures will be affected, Maracle said, “The environmentalists should be up in arms.”
Representatives of the Tarahumara in Northern Mexico also spoke out against the devastating effects of the North American Free Trade Agreement. Urging a halt to trade policies that are leading to unemployment in the Americas, the summit called for nullification of the North American Free Trade Agreement and other trade agreements.
Other indigenous peoples from the Americas said that genetically modified seeds are destroying the peoples' crops and their health. They also opposed corporate profiteering by Halliburton's Kellogg, Brown, and Root. This company, accused of profiting off corporate contracts in Iraq, is now under contract to build migrant prisons.
The Border Summit also opposed anti-Indian legislation in Arizona, including Proposition 103 English-only, Prop. 200 voter identification, and Prop. 300 proof of citizenship for services.
Local, state, and federal governments were told to recognize the international rights of indigenous peoples as upheld by the United Nations, treaty rights, and the sovereignty of American Indians. They were also mandated to obtain prior permission before entering onto or engaging in construction or development on indigenous lands.
During the Border Summit, indigenous peoples called for removal of the existing Border Patrol detention center for migrants on Tohono O'odham tribal land near San Miguel, AZ.
Tohono O'odham described how Border Patrol agents occupied sacred sites, including Baboquivari Peaks, the sacred place of the Creator I'itoi. Dennis Manuel, Tohono O'odham spiritual keeper of the traditions, said the Border Patrol—now under Homeland Security—occupied the sacred area of I'itoi and refused to leave the area. Manuel took his plea for help to the United Nations. When the Border Patrol did later leave, he said, they left their garbage strewn in the sacred area.
On the third day of the summit, the indigenous participants drafted a proclamation with recommendations for direct action:
Proposals and Demands
* The United Nations is asked to intervene and prevent the United States from violating federal laws to build the border wall. These laws protect American Indian burial sites and traditional routes of passage necessary for ceremonies, which are vital for the continuance of traditional lifeways.
* American Indian tribes are urged to use federal laws, including the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, and other laws protecting Indian cultural and burial sites and environmental laws, to halt construction of the border wall.
* The government of Mexico is asked to demand an environmental impact statement by the United States before construction of the border wall begins in the fragile desert ecosystem.
* The Border Summit calls for the nullification of the North American Free Trade Agreement, and
other trade agreements, which are resulting in widespread hunger and desperation for indigenous peoples in the Americas.
* The Border Summit demands a halt to the dissemination, export, and distribution of genetically modified seeds, particularly corn and other grains.
* The summit calls for the creation of a new human rights office in conjunction with the Tohono O'odham Nation.
* The Bennett Patricio, Jr., Memorial Human Rights Fund was established to assist the families of indigenous border victims, including attorneys and court costs.
* The Tohono O'odham Nation is urged to establish water stations and develop the goal of zero migrant deaths on tribal lands from dehydration and heat exhaustion.
* Educational campaigns are encouraged to inform migrants that Indian people in the United States are not their enemy, and their lands and people should be respected.
* Camera and camcorder patrols are to be created, with Indian youths encouraged to carry cameras and video cameras to document the treatment of people at the border, carrying out regular patrols to the homes of elderly and people with special needs.
* Stockholder direct action campaigns will be organized, including a campaign to inform Boeing stockholders of the sovereignty of Indian lands and federal laws protecting burial places, traditional routes of passage, and the fragile ecosystem of the desert.
* The Tohono O'odham Nation is urged to set a date for the time when the Border Patrol will leave sovereign tribal land. Tohono O'odham should be trained to provide their own border security.
* Indigenous classes in language, accurate history, and cultural continuity and the right of O'odham children to school transportation are to be increased.
* Indigenous peoples are urged to create their own newspapers and radio stations so their own voices can be heard.
* The Border Summit encouraged efforts to address racism and xenophobia within tribes and establish protocol for conflict resolution within and between tribes to achieve unity.
* Mexico is urged to establish a living wage and take earnest steps to eradicate poverty.
* The Border Patrol is obliged to observe mandatory speed laws and other tribal, state, and federal laws.
* The United States is urged to adopt the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and abide by Article 35, which recognizes the rights of indigenous peoples whose lands are separated by international borders and their right to continue their spiritual and cultural practices.
* States within the United States are advised that free, prior, and informed consent of Indian people is required before states or corporations begin any development on sovereign Indian lands.
Michelle Cook, Navajo law student, noted that the protection of burial places is vital. “If there are ancestral remains, they have to stop development. They have to repatriate those remains. However, it is the native peoples' responsibility to make them accountable. We have to go out there and watch them to make the accountable.”
During the Border Summit, American Indian actor and activist Floyd Westerman Red Crow showed a work in progress, the first in a series of films revealing the genocide of American Indians. The first segment tells how Indian people in California were targeted for systematic genocide by the delivery of blankets infected with small pox. The state and federal government also paid bounties for Indian heads and scalps as the gold rush progressed.
Westerman performed in concert with American Indian singer Keith Secola. Before the Border Summit began, a traditional sweat was held for purification purposes and tobacco offered in the traditional way.
At the conclusion of the Border Summit, Jose Garcia, lieutenant governor of the O'odham in Mexico, said the most important aspect of the summit was bringing O'odham people together with other indigenous peoples to work to resolve issues. “It brought us together in unity.”
The testimony was aired live on radio in the Tucson area and on the Internet, with listeners responding around the world, including e-mails of appreciation from listeners in Alaska, the Dominican Republic, and Europe. The audio file archives will be available online at Earth Cycles (see Resource List below).
Brenda Norrell has been a news reporter in Indian country for 23 years, working as a staff reporter for Navajo Times and Indian Country Today and as an AP correspondent during the 18 years she lived on the Navajo Nation. She is currently a freelance writer based in Tucson and a contributor to the IRC Americas Program, online at www.americaspolicy.org
Resources:
Earthcycles (Audio link)
http://www.earthcycles.net
Humane Borders
Mike Wilson
740 E. Speedway Blvd.
Tucson, AZ 85719
(520) 628-7753
www.humaneborders.org
humaneborders@gainusa.com
International Indian Treaty Council (San Francisco Office)
Tony Gonzales or Jimbo Simmons
2390 Mission St # 301
San Francisco, CA 94110
(415) 641-4482
Mohawk Nation News
Recommended citation:
Brenda Norrell, "Indigenous Border Summit Opposes Border Wall and Militarization," Citizen Action in the Americas Profile (Silver City, NM: International Relations Center, October 31, 2006).
Web location:
Production Information:
Author(s): Brenda Norrell
Editor(s): Laura Carlsen, IRC
Production: Chellee Chase-Saiz, IRC
PO Box 2178, Silver City, NM 88062-2178 | irc@irc-online.org | 505.388.0208 | 866.628.0742 | www.irc-online.org
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Tuesday, October 31, 2006 12:39 AM
The No-Fly List Method of Harassment
Members of the Green Party and Greenpeace have been detained at airports because they had been put on a the no-fly list. So far we have Senator Edward Kennedy and Ralph Nader having been held up under similar insinuations. Now, another member of Congress has been refrained from passing go and how much ya wanna bet it wasn't a Republican. To quote the article below:
"Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez said Monday she was briefly denied access to a United Airlines flight last week because her name appeared on a "no fly list" set up after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Sanchez, a Democrat, is favored to win a sixth term representing the 47th Congressional District about 30 miles south of Los Angeles. The district includes many of the 24,000 Arab-Americans who live in Orange County and Sanchez has been a strong critic of the no-fly list."
Recently, it was discovered that several of the nineteen alleged hijackers are on the no-fly list. Authorities have attempted to paint it as a sloppy job but I submit that in each case of someone appearing on the no-fly list, the common denominator is not ties to Al Qaeda but ties to criticisms of the Bush administration. Since the BBC reported that several of the alleged 9/11 hijackers are actually quite alive, we can assume, I think, that their appearance on the no-fly list is more a matter of the national security state getting its hands on them so they can be properly disposed of, in some hidden Gitmo or modern day Gulag as is the record of this regime. Here is the article:
+++++++++
No-fly list mix-up disrupts California congresswoman's travel
By GILLIAN FLACCUS, Associated Press Writer
Monday, October 30, 2006
(AP) - Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez said Monday she was briefly denied access to a United Airlines flight last week because her name appeared on a "no fly list" set up after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Sanchez, a Democrat, is favored to win a sixth term representing the 47th Congressional District about 30 miles south of Los Angeles. The district includes many of the 24,000 Arab-Americans who live in Orange County and Sanchez has been a strong critic of the no-fly list.
Sanchez said her staff had booked her a one-way ticket from Boise, Idaho to Cincinnati through Denver. Her staff, however, was prevented from printing her boarding pass online and were also blocked from printing her boarding pass at an airport kiosk.
Sanchez said she was instructed to check in with a United employee, who told her she was on the terrorist watch list. The employee asked her for identification, Sanchez recalled.
"I handed over my congressional ID and he started laughing and said, 'I'm going to need an ID that has your birthday on it,'" Sanchez said in a phone interview with The Associated Press.
The employee used Sanchez's birth date to determine that she was not the same Loretta Sanchez listed in the database and she was able to board her flight, she said.
Sanchez said she has not had a problem flying since and believes her name has been removed from the list — unlike some of her constituents.
"When they want to, TSA can make sure that you don't have that identification problem," she said.
"Sometimes it's taken us months to get these people off the lists so they can travel in a normal way. I can't have to worry about that."
Sanchez said she has fought to get some of her constituents' names off the no-fly list and it has taken up to six months.
"Imagine if, instead of taking an hour at the airport, you had to take two or three or four hours every time? Why is it such a big deal to get someone off the list?" she said.
TSA spokeswoman Jennifer Peppin said for security reasons she couldn't confirm that a Loretta Sanchez was on the list. She said, however, that name mix-ups do occur.
"Generally what happens is people have a name that is very similar to someone who is on the no-fly list. It's the airlines' responsibility to do further checking," Peppin said.
Peppin said usually the appeal process for someone in Sanchez's situation takes several weeks but "anyone who's on the no-fly list will never be allowed on a flight."
SOURCE: SFGate.com
Big Medicine
"If you give a man the correct information for seven years, he may believe the incorrect information on the first day of the eighth year when it is necessary, from your point of
view, that he should do so. Your first job is to build the credibility and the authenticity of your propaganda, and persuade the enemy to trust you although you are his enemy."
A Psychological Warfare Casebook - Operations Research Office –
Johns Hopkins University (1958)
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Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Mexico: The last moments of Bradley Roland Will + Video Link
Message #25995 of 25995
Monday, October 30th, 2006 @ 21:07 EST
Mexico: The last moments of Bradley Roland Will
Middle East & North Africa, Breaking News, Iraq, Americas, Mexico, U.S.A., Weblog, Freedom of Speech, Governance, Human Rights, Indigenous, Protest, War & Conflict, Politics, Human Rights Video
Journalism seems like a precarious profession to practise in Mexico. It¡¯s ranked by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) as one of the most dangerous places to be a journalist.
The latest tragic example of this came on Friday 27th October, in the southern state of Oaxaca, with the shooting of Brad Will. Brad was in Oaxaca as a journalist for New York City Indymedia, trying to get stories out about the protests in Oaxaca (for up-to-date accounts and context of the crisis in Oaxaca, read my GV colleague David Sasaki¡¯s latest post). While filming skirmishes between paramilitaries and protestors in Santa Lucia on Friday afternoon, Brad was shot in the abdomen and neck, and died from his injuries, prompting the CPJ to call on the government to investigate Will¡¯s death. Now Indymedia has released the tape that was in Brad¡¯s video camera when he was shot.
It's a sixteen-minute video with English subtitles, and beware, the last minute (from 15¡ä30) is very difficult to watch. Click the picture below to launch the Quicktime video (there¡¯s a YouTube version without subtitles here).
There¡¯s more footage at Mexican opposition blog Hoy PG, which points to a piece of unidentified news footage of Brad Will shortly after he was shot - not for the faint-hearted.
It¡¯s a moot point whether these are human rights videos per se, but Brad¡¯s tape in particular ends so shockingly, and depicts with such brutal suddenness the risks run by those determined to bring human rights stories to light, that it demands to be seen. But as one of the blogs David Sasaki quotes had it, there¡¯s a balance to be struck between outrage at the killing of Brad Will, and at the mounting number of local deaths and injuries.
Part of the reason that Brad was in Oaxaca was because there has been scant international attention paid to the growing crisis there. But while cases like Brad¡¯s - involving attacks on journalists and human rights activists from information-rich societies - gain huge amounts of traction in global media, in this case bringing Oaxaca to the top of the news agenda, the far greater number of local journalists and human rights activists affected in similar ways rarely receive the same level of coverage.
Think back to Alive In Baghdad, which brought us the Iraqi Torture story a few weeks back, and which finds that its correspondents can receive harassment and intimidation, if not worse. One correspondent, Marwan, was recently kidnapped by a militia group, possibly the Mahdi Army. Iraq is an extreme example, but it¡¯s by no means the only example.
At the end of the information chain, all over the world, there are people working to bring to light human rights abuses, oppression, torture, genocide. They are often working under difficult, extreme conditions, whether alone or in a group, undercover or in public, and often without a safety net. They might be journalists, human rights activists, lawyers, doctors, mothers. They often live in fear of repercussions, for themselves, or their families. Most of the time, it¡¯s these people - the locals - who are threatened, attacked and imprisoned, rather than foreign correspondents or international human rights workers. Brad Will was working with these people to tell their stories, and suffered a tragically similar fate.
Anyone already doing or supporting this kind of work should take note, and prepare accordingly. The WITNESS manual Video For Change has a chapter on safety and security (PDF, 1.28 MB), an essential read for anyone going into similar situations. The Rory Peck Trust, mentioned in the chapter, offers support to ¡°the families of freelance newsgatherers killed whilst on assignment [and] to freelancers who are unable to continue their work due to severe injury, disablement or imprisonment¡±, and works in Mexico, as well as South Asia and the Middle East. Feel free to add other useful resources via the comments box.
As for Oaxaca, if you¡¯re interested in the background on the protests, in addition to David Sasaki¡¯s latest post, you could do worse than read previous updates:
David Sasaki on the original teachers¡¯ protest in June 2006 | Liza Sabater shows 8 videos from the June protests | October 10th: APPO says ¡°Stay away from Oaxaca¡± | October 12th: More updates from Oaxaca-based bloggers | October 19th: More death in Oaxaca | October 27th: APPO locks down the city
Sameer Padania
Video= Mexican government killed american journalist
Added October 29, 2006
From demobserver06
Provided By:
Hoy PG - Contra la ignorancia: informaci¨®n
More Links=
Report from Oaxaca: Federal Police Do Not Have Control of the City: Monday, October 30th, 2006
Note: Click Hot Links for more...
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Liberation Now!!!
Peter S. Lopez ~aka Peta de Aztlan
Sacramento, California, Amerika
Key Web Links=
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