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Tunisia - A People's Revolution
Thursday, January 20 @ 7 PM
Ras Restaurant and Cafe, 4809 Georgia Avenue, NW
WASHINGTON DC
The corporate media is calling it the Wikileaks or Twitter or Facebook revolution...anything so that they don't have to call it the Tunisian people's revolution, which is what it was. More than 100 Tunisians died fighting to bring down the US backed regime of Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, including Mohamed Bouazizi, the street vendor whose suicide protest ignited the protests in mid December. US support of the regime is rarely emphasized but in addition to the millions in economic aid which created the massive inequality that fueled the protests, the Ben Ali regime received hundreds of millions in military aid. The Obama administration put out a statement in support of the Tunisian people but only when it was clear that Ben Ali had fled the country.
The situation in Tunisia is still volatile. While elections have been called for March, it appears that a coalition government with the main opposition parties has been agreed to. Arab rulers are keeping a close eye on events and are clearly worried about the impact the revolt is going to have in their countries. It's already inspired and emboldened Arabs in Algeria, Egypt, and Jordan to take to the streets.
Join us in helping build solidarity for the Tunisian people and others in the Middle East fighting against poverty and dictatorship. The following speakers will give some historical and regional context to recent events, discuss the latest developments, and where things might be headed:
Radia Daoussi, a Tunisian native, is the president of the Vineeta Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to public health and human rights worldwide. She is a dedicated rights activist, from cluster bombs to peace in the Middle East to HIV in DC to development worldwide. She also works for international organizations, including UNDP, UNICEF, and the World Bank. Recently, she was the lead author of the Millennium Development Goals report for the South Pacific island of Tonga, which included work on good governance. She has worked with the medical journal The Lancet to produce articles on the health of the Palestinians in the occupied territories.
Chris Toensing is editor of Middle East Report and executive director of the Middle East Research and Information Project (www.merip.org). Toensing has written for the Los Angeles Times, The Nation, The Progressive and other US newspapers and magazines, and has appeared on numerous radio and TV programs to discuss Middle East politics.
For more info, contact Rami El-Amine at relamine (at) gmail.com or leave a message at 888 810 6202.
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