Group 133's Electronic Newsletter for May 2008 =============================================== Next Meeting: Tuesday, May 13, 2008 The Northeast Regional Office is still undergoing rennovations. Our monthly meeting will be in a special location: Physicians for Human Rights Office 2 Arrow Street, Suite 301 (Near Harvard Square), Cambridge, MA 02138 =============================================== THE STATUTE OF AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL Adopted by the 25th International Council Meeting, Dakar, Senegal, August 17-25, 2001 VISION AND MISSION Amnesty International's vision is of a world in which every person enjoys all of the human rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights standards. In pursuit of this vision, Amnesty International's mission is to undertake research and action focused on preventing and ending grave abuses of the rights to physical and mental integrity, freedom of conscience and expression, and freedom from discrimination, within the context of its work to promote all human rights. CORE VALUES Amnesty International forms a global community of human rights defenders with the principles of international solidarity, effective action for the individual victim, global coverage, the universality and indivisibility of human rights, impartiality and independence, and democracy and mutual respect. =============================================== CALENDAR *Tuesday, May 13th: Group 133 Monthly Meeting, 7pm Physicians for Human Rights Office, 2 Arrow Street, Suite 301, Cambridge *Wednesdays in May and June; Death Penalty Film Series All films will be shown at 7:00 pm at the Lucy Parsons bookstore, 549 Columbus Ave, South End, Boston, 02118. (617) 267-6272 5/14 - Step by Step: A Journey of Hope *Boston Premiere* 5/21 - At the Death House Door *Special Screening* 5/28 - Thanatos Rx: the Death Penalty Debate in America 6/4 - Redemption: The Stan Tookie Williams Story =============================================== GROUP CONTACTS (NOTE: To avoid potential spamming, your newsletter editor has replaced searchable parts of email addresses with words.) Group Co-Coordinators: Kelly Turley, kellyturley-AT-excite-DOT-com Rick Roth, roth-AT-igc.apc-DOT-org Newsletter Editor: Tamara Jenkins, 617-267-7262, tamara_ann_jenkins-AT-yahoo-DOT-com Refugee Action Team Coordinator: Eric Aronson, 617-512-7526, eric-AT-amnesty133-DOT-org Urgent Action Letter Coordinator: Kirsten Burt, kirsten.burt-AT-comcast-dot-net Tabling Coordinator and New Member Coordinator: Becky Ticotsky, rticotsky-AT-wesleyan-DOT-edu Treasurer: Tina Huang, tinalhuang-AT-gmail-DOT-com Secretary: Tamara Jenkins, 617-267-7262, tamara_ann_jenkins-AT-yahoo-DOT-com For questions about the following issues, please contact these individuals: Tibet Actions: Rick Roth, roth-AT-igc.apc-DOT-org Death Penalty Actions: Molly Johnson,mollykj-AT-email-DOT-com or dp-AT-amnesty133-DOT-org Stop Violence Against Women Campaign Kelly Turley, kellyturley-AT-excite-DOT-com Amnesty International USA Northeast Regional Office 58 Day St, Davis Square Somerville, MA 02144 617-623-0202 aiusane@aiusa.org www.amnesty133.org Available Positions: * Tibet Action Team Coordinator * Death Penalty Abolition Team Coordinator * Human Rights & the Environment Coordinator * Media Coordinator * Communications Coordinator * Tabling Coordinator * Web Site Coordinator =============================================== Please join us for the March meeting of Amnesty International Group 133 ! Tuesday, March 11, 2008 7 p.m. - 9 p.m. ** Special Location: Physicians for Human Rights Office 2 Arrow Street, Suite 301 (Near Harvard Square), Cambridge, MA 02138 ** Agenda • Letter Writing* • Introductions and Amnesty Mandate • Special Presentation: A Photo Story: The Death Penalty in the U.S. - Scott Langley. In addition to being a Group 133 member, Scott Langley also is an accomplished photographer and the AIUSA Death Penalty Abolition Coordinator for Massachusetts and North Carolina. Scott will be sharing photos with us from the death penalty documentary project. • The South Asia Regional Action Network - Julia Todd Were you energized by our recent Get on the Bus actions in support of human rights in Sri Lanka and Bhopal, India? Do you want to get more involved in working for human rights for people in South Asia? Julia Todd, Group 133 member and AIUSA Nepal Country Specialist, will be joining us to talk about the work of the South Asia Regional Action Network (SARAN). • Get on the Bus for Human Rights 2008: Recap and Next Steps • Brief Action Team/Campaign Updates and Past and Future Events Our May meeting will be held at the Physicians for Human Rights Office. Special thanks to Danielle Fox for once again making the arrangements for us. Please click on the address above for a map of 2 Arrow Street, Cambridge. The meeting will be on the third floor, in the conference room. Please e-mail me if you will be able to volunteer to bring refreshments to this meeting. Hope to see you there! With peace, Kelly *If you have time, please help us gather action letters for the meeting. Materials are available on http://takeaction.amnestyusa.org and www.amnesty.org/actnow/ . Please send letters to Marijke Haverkorn at marijke@astro.berkeley.edu. ============================================== QUOTES "You are the embodiment of what Amnesty International is all about." -AIUSA Executive Director Larry Cox, addressing the audience at the GOTB speakers panel, April 11, 2008 "There are no whole truths; all truths are half-truths. It is trying to treat them as whole truths that plays the devil." - Alfred North Whitehead ============================================== GROUP 133 ANNOUNCEMENTS REM TOUR Fri 06/13/08   REM at Mansfield, MA  Tweeter Center For The Perf. Arts.   We have permission to have an AI info/action table during the upcoming REM tour. Dates, cites below We are allowed up to FOUR volunteers I need full name and emails of all volunteers. Arrival time is ~ 1 hour before doors open to the public Spots are filled on first-come, first-served basis. More details to those who volunteer. If you are not available, please forward this on to others in the area who may be available. Many thanks angie hougas AI Concert Liaison hougasa@execpc.com www.rhythmnrights.com DEATH PENALTY DOCUMENTARY WORK PRESENTED BY SCOTT LANGLEY May 7, Wednesday, 7:00 to 9:00 pm – Boston premiere of the documentary film “Love Lived on Death Row” which includes some of my still photos and video footage I shot in a North Carolina execution chamber. This film is part 1 in a 5 week film series on the death penalty to take place each Wednesday from now until June 4. See the end of this email for the other films to be shown. Location: Lucy Parsons Center, 549 Columbus Ave, South End of Boston. FREE FOOD AND DRINKS. May 13, Tuesday, 7:00 to 9:00 pm – Amnesty International monthly meeting. I will be presenting a photo slideshow from my photo documentary project (and possibly video too if time permits), and will also lead a discussion about the current state of the death penalty in the U.S. Regular Amnesty business will also take place before and after my presentation, so there will be other opportunities to learn about other human rights work going on locally. Location: Physicians for Human Rights Office, 2 Arrow Street, Suite 301 (Near Harvard Square in Cambridge). Thanks for your support! Scott Langley Death Penalty Documentary Photography Project http://www.langleycreations.com/photo/deathpenalty/ =============================================== REFUGEE ACTION TEAM For information on participating in human rights activism concerning refugees and immigrants, contact Eric at 617-512-7526. URGENT ACTION: CHECHEN RISKS TORTURE IF RETURNED TO RUSSIA: This month’s action concerns an ethnic Chechen man who is in imminent danger of being deported to the Russian Federation, where AI believes he would be in danger of torture or other serious human rights violations. Your letters can help protect him. UPDATE ON REFUGEE ACTION TEAM MEMBER FRANK ENWONWU: Refugee Action Team member FRANK ENWONWU, a Nigerian asylum-seeker, has been issued a final order of removal, and faces possible torture and/or execution by organized crime syndicates if he is forcibly returned to Nigeria. Frank and his son, Brian (a US citizen), are now homeless. Frank has filed a motion to reopen with the Board of Immigration Appeals, and therefore has a temporary stay of removal. Eric wrote to the BIA about due process issues, and also contacted John Kerry’s staff to request a meeting. Wanted: someone with Web skills to develop a Website for Frank; please contact Eric. SAMI AL-HAJ RELEASED FROM GUANTANAMO: After more than six years of imprisonment, the Al Jazeera cameraman Sami al-Haj has been released from Guantanamo Bay, and has returned home to Khartoum, Sudan. He was arrested in Pakistan in December 2001. According to the organization Reporters Without Borders (http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=26786), he was accused of secretly interviewing Osama Bin Laden, gun-smuggling for al-Qaeda, and running an Islamist website. No evidence has ever been produced to back up these allegations, and no charges have ever been brought against al-Haj. Chicago Tribune syndicated columnist Clarence Page (http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/balance/stories/051507dnedipage.1dd2c75.html) had written in May 2007 that Sami al-Haj might have been the victim of mistaken identity, confused with another suspect with a similar name. Reporters Without Borders stated in a press release that al-Haj had been tortured while at Guantanamo and was subjected to 200 interrogation sessions. He had been on a hunger strike for over a year. According to his lawyer, al-Haj had serious health problems. In an interview with Democracy Now! following his release (http://www.democracynow.org/2008/5/2/headlines#1), al-Haj said, “I’m very happy to be in Sudan, but I’m very sad because of the situation of our brothers who remain in Guantanamo. Conditions in Guantanamo are very, very bad, and they get worse by the day. Our human condition, our human dignity was violated, and the American administration went beyond all human values, all moral values, all religious values. In Guantanamo, you have animals that are called iguanas, rats that are treated with more humanity.” GUANTANAMO PROSECUTOR SAYS MILITARY COMMISSIONS UNLAWFUL: Former Guantanamo prosecutor Col. Moe Davis criticized the military tribunals at Guantanamo Bay on April 28 as marred by political influence and evidence obtained through “waterboarding” and other forms of cruel and abusive treatment (http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080428/ts_nm/guantanamo_hearings_dc). In testimony at a pretrial hearing for Salim Hamdan, the prisoner from Yemen whose case resulted in a Supreme Court ruling and the Military Commissions Act, Davis said political appointees pressured prosecutors at the tribunals to file charges even before legal rules for proceedings had been established. He cited pressure to bring charges before the 2006 congressional elections, and to pursue high-profile cases that would sway public opinion in favor of the tribunals. He also accused legal adviser Brig. Gen. Thomas Hartmann of being biased and effectively joining the prosecution team. He testified that Hartmann had overridden Davis’ ban on filing charges based on evidence obtained through waterboarding. LEGISLATION TARGETS PIMPS AND SEX TRAFFICKERS: The William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (H.R. 3887) is a bill that would strengthen the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 by criminalizing anyone who transports a person across state lines for purposes of prostitution, and by eliminating language that required evidence that “force, fraud and coercion” was used by human traffickers. (Due to that requirement, only 70 sex trafficking cases have been successfully prosecuted since that law was passed http://www.equalitynow.org/english/campaigns/sextourism-trafficking/tvpa/tvpa_en.html.) H.R. 3887 would also reauthorize funding for trafficking enforcement and for protection and services for victims, and would make sex tourism a federal crime. It passed in the House of Representatives on December 4 2007 by a vote of 405 to 2. (William Delahunt was the only Massachusetts cosponsor.) The bill was received in the Senate and referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee on December 5. It has been combined with S. 1175: The Child Soldier Prevention Act of 2007. That bill was cosponsored by Senator Kerry but not by Senator Kennedy, who is on the Judiciary Committee. Please let Senator Kennedy know what you think about this legislation. KERRY CRITICIZES NEW BEDFORD RAIDS: Speaking at the Massachusetts State House on April 7, at hearings of a national commission on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids, Senator John Kerry condemned as “overkill” the federal raid on a New Bedford factory in March 2007 that separated numerous dependent children from their undocumented immigrant parents (http:// www.statehousenews.com). Kerry stated: “Of all the threats being assessed by the Department of Homeland Security, apparently none were more insidious or challenging to us or more menacing, than several hundred people, mostly young women in New Bedford, who were making backpacks for the U.S. Army.” He denounced ICE’s contention that the immigrants were simply detained in order to be “interviewed,” pointing out that they were “handcuffed and manacled” (http://www.yaledailynews.com/articles/view/24288). ICE officials did not attend the hearings, and have dismissed the alleged rights violations as fabrications by immigrant rights advocates. Meanwhile, Senator Kerry discussed legislation he had introduced September 2007, the Families First Immigration Enforcement Act, which would require immigrants detained in raids to be provided translators; given access to state social services, to determine whether they have medical needs; to be considered for release based on age-related, medical- or family-related humanitarian grounds; and to be released within 72 hours if they are not subject to mandatory detention and do not pose a flight risk. That bill has not yet been scheduled for a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. =============================================== Minutes from April 2008 meeting 1. Guest Speaker: Shanti Maung is a student activist at Harvard University. She was born in Burma, and has been a leader on campus and beyond in the struggle for justice for the people of Burma. Shanti was in Burma this summer when the protests erupted, and since returning to the United States, Shanti has been organizing Harvard's Burma Action Movement and concerned citizens from the Boston communities to take action in solidarity with the people of Burma. Burma is a country of 53 million people and 130 ethnic groups. It has rich natural resources. There are 1 million Burmese refugees living outside of Burma. The ruling junta has a “4 Cut Policy”: 1-cut food supplies, 2-burn villages, 3-plant land mines, 4-destroy crops. Since the 1962 military dictarship, Burma has gone from one of the richest countries in eastern Asia to one of the poorest. There are approximately 1000 political prisinors in jails. 40% of the national budget goes into the military. $1 per yer per person is spent for health and education combined! It is estimated that 30-75% of the population is living in poverty. Is is estimated that 60% of its civilians are malnourished, and TB and AIDS have become epidemic. Burma now rates second to last in the world for health care. Actions: Pressure China in Olympics. US govt needs to look beyond sanctions. Call to the UN Security Council 2. After the presentation, we helped to assemble bus packets for GOTB! =============================================== Mr Sergei STANISHEV Council of Ministers of the Republic of Bulgaria 1194 Sofia, 1 Dondukov Blvd BULGARIA Fax: 011 359 2 980 2056 Email: primeminister@government.bg# Dear Prime Minister: I am writing in order to express my deep concern about the safety of Said Kadzoev, an ethnic Chechen man who is in imminent danger of being deported to the Russian Federation. Amnesty International believes that, if he is forcibly returned to the Russian Federation, Mr. Kadzoev would be at risk of serious human rights violations, including torture and other ill-treatment. Said Kadzoev has been held in the Special Center for the Temporary Accommodation of Foreigners (SCTAF) in the village of Busmantsi, near Sofia, since 1 November 2006. He has alleged that he had been previously detained and tortured by Russian police forces. A complaint was filed with the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in December 2007, following the rejection of his appeal of the denial of his asylum application by the Sofia Court in October 2007. I respectfully urge you not to deport Said Kadzoev. I ask that he be provided with the urgent and adequate health care appropriate to his medical condition. I also respectfully request that Said Kadzoev be immediately released from detention, as he has already been held for over 17 months, including more than 10 months in solitary confinement. I would like to remind you that Bulgaria is obligated under international law, the UN Refugee Convention, Convention against Torture and the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, to which it is a party, not to return anyone to a country or territory where they would be at risk of torture or other ill-treatment, and this is an absolute prohibition. Thank you for your attention to this very important matter. Sincerely, Copies to: Mihail Raykov MIKOV Minister of the Interior 29, 6th September Str. 1000 Sofia BULGARIA Fax: 011 359 2 987 7967 Email: ysimov.15@mvr.bg Mr Ognian Stefanov GERDJKOV 2 Narodno sabranie Square Sofia 1169 BULGARIA Fax: 011 359 2 987 88 59 Mr Stefan Vasilev HRISTOV 48 Knyaginya Maria Louiza Blvd. 1202 Sofia BULGARIA Fax: 011 359 2 982 37 75 Email: migration@mvr.bg Ambassador Elena Poptodorova Embassy of the Republic of Bulgaria 1621 22nd St. NW Washington DC 20008 Fax: 1 202 234 7973 Email: office@bulgaria-embassy.org