Nonviolent Resistance

By Gordon Clark

Even for these now veteran activist eyes, it was a glorious and inspiring sight to see.
On Tuesday, September 26, more than 100 nonviolent activists took over the central lobby and atrium of the Hart Senate Office Building, and staged a protest of the war in Iraq while dozens and dozens of Senate staffers looked on. For one hour, at least, American opposition to the war in Iraq became the central focus for these offices of the U.S. Senate, and 71 individuals were arrested for making this happen.

By Beth Friedlan

14 peace activists were arrested, at senator santorum's local philadelphia
office building, the widner building ,on south penn. square, monday,
september25,2006. shortly, before 5 pm. after being taken to 39th and lancaster ave,
the 14, were transferred to 8th and race, the round house, and released the
following day,added to the original charge of aledgided , defiant trespassing,

By Associated Press

FORT LEWIS, WASH. - The U.S. Army brought charges Wednesday against Spc. Suzanne Swift, a military police officer who has become a rallying point for the antiwar movement after refusing to return to Iraq and alleging her supervisor there coerced her into a sexual relationship.

Swift, of the 54th Military Police Co. based at Fort Lewis, Wash., faces charges of being absent without leave and missing movement. The latter means she wasn't with her company when it left in January for a four-month tour of duty in Iraq, a military spokeswoman said.

Download Flyer

Download PDF with more information.

Sign Petition Against Attacking Iran

By David Swanson

216 Photos -- Photos by Joe Robbins. -- Video by William Hughes

Peace activists were arrested earlier today on the west grounds of the United States Capitol. The event was organized by the Declaration of Peace, and the plan was to march around the Capitol and then proceed to protest in Senators' offices (plans are to go to House Members' offices tomorrow)....

Sign the petition www.petitiononline.com/thefive

Protesters call for charges to be dropped
People at Saturday's anti-war rally say police violated their rights
KYTJA WEIR
kweir@charlotteobserver.com
http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observer/15609095.htm

An online petition with hundreds of names calls for police to drop charges against protesters arrested Saturday in a scuffle with police in uptown Charlotte.

By Elaine Brower
http://www.opednews.com

While my son is fighting for his life in Fallujah, under some false pretense that we are "defending democracy" or "killing terrorists", I decided to take up the fight at home. Very few here are left defending our Constitutional rights. Those who are trying are getting exhausted. We have a march after a rally and, then, march again. Five years later, the war gets worse and the Middle East is on fire. There is extreme rendition, Hurricane Katrina "survivors", spying on U.S. citizens in the name of preserving our freedoms, domestic economic failures and disasters, higher gas prices, and the global cowboy foreign policies that we have to listen to and witness on a daily basis.

DULUTH SCHOOLS: Few people know about a No Child Left Behind link to recruiters, they say.
BY SARAH HORNER, Duluth News Tribune

When East High School senior Jamie Payne hit her junior year, she started getting mail from colleges and other post-secondary institutions urging her to consider them after graduation. One agency even started calling her at home: the military.

"They were absolutely friendly," Payne said about the recruiters. "But that didn't make it any less annoying."

By David Howard
http://www.politicalaffairs.net

US Army First Lieutenant Ehren Watada is facing an eight-year term in military prison for just doing his duty: serving our country and protecting the Constitution.

The charges against Lieutenant Watada are conduct unbecoming an officer, missing movement, and contempt toward President Bush. But they boil down to the “crimes” of thinking, speaking and following his conscience.

Protest at Cluster Bomb Factory in Colleferro
In solidarity with the "Declaration of Peace"
http://www.peaceandjustice.it

The town of Colleferro, just outside of Rome, has a long history with the arms industry – it was, in fact, founded under Fascism as a factory town, the factory being a gunpowder concern. One of the streets, for example, is named via degli Esplosivi (Explosives Way). The town is currently home to a number of companies operating in the weapons industry, including Simmel Difesa, a munitions manufacturer and cluster bomb producer.

American Voices Abroad (AVA) Military Project
a project of U.S. citizens living overseas supporting U.S. military personnel stationed overseas

CONTACTS: Elsa Rassbach - AVA Military Project; Elsa_Rassbach@compuserve.com;
Cell Phone: 1-646-400-9206.
Fernando Suarez del Solar - Guerrero Azteca Peace Project (also speaks Spanish); fernando@guerreroazteca.org; Phone: 1-760-746- 4568; Fax: 1-760-737-2334; Cell Phone: 1-858-774-0172.
Peter Goldberger & Jim Feldman – Aguayo attorneys ; Phone: 1-610-649-8200.
J.E. McNeil & Bill Galvin, Center on Conscience & War; Phone: 202-483-2220.

PRESS CONFERENCE
With Army Specialist AGUSTÍN AGUAYO, Family, and Supporters
Agustín Aguayo is a Conscientious Objector, a War Resister, and an AWOL U.S. Soldier;
on September 26, 2006, he will turn himself in to Fort Irwin Army Base near Barstow, CA.

LEXINGTON, Ky. (Sept. 23) - A soldier who fled to Canada two years ago after serving in Iraq said he would return home to face consequences from the U.S. Army.

Anderson's attorney missed a deadline for filing paperwork to have him declared a refugee, which would have allowed him to remain in Canada.

"I decided that I've got to go back and get this over with once and for all, instead of living in limbo up here forever," Darrell Anderson told the Lexington-Herald Leader for Saturday's edition from Toronto.

After being assaulted by police during Tuesday's non-violent protest at the
UN and then jailed overnight, Episcopal Minister Father Luis Barrios of NYC
has been charged with felony assault on a police officer, resisting arrest,
and disorderly conduct. Disabled Iraq war veteran Geoffrey Millard was also
held overnight and charged with resisting arrest and disorderly conduct.
Both were released Wednesday morning.

Call to demand the release of the two protesters!

As George W. Bush was laying down his diktats to the world in the UN General Assembly, sixteen activists staged a non-violent civil disobedience protest directly in front of the United Nations.

Stung by the fact that the protesters got through intense police security and that they were calling out Bush as a war criminal, several of the demonstrators were hit serious bogus charges:

By Abena Agyeman-Fisher

Giving Congress up to September 21 to stop the invasion of Iraq, Reverend Lennox Yearwood, CEO of the Hip Hop Caucus of Washington D.C., and Church of God and Christ minister, plans to lead a press conference in front of the White House to protest the war in Iraq on Thursday (Sept. 21).

Yearwood, citing a moral obligation, says that he, along with 270 cities and 350 organizations nationwide, will no longer be passive observers of Bush's War on Terror. "We are in a time of peril in which people of morals have to stand up. We are willing to do whatever it takes-all on peace-to urge Congress and the administration to take a new course on Iraq, including a timely and responsible withdrawal of troops," he stated.

The Associated Press
Saturday 16 September 2006

Fort Lewis, Washington - The Army added another charge against a lieutenant who refused to serve in Iraq because he believes the war is illegal, but did not say if the case will proceed to a court martial.

The new charge is based on Lt. Ehren Watada's remarks to the national convention of Veterans for Peace, held in Seattle last month, Army spokesman Joe Piek said Friday.

Published on Friday, September 15, 2006 by the Kingston Daily Freeman (New York)
by Katie Young

TOWN OF ULSTER - Kings Mall has filed a civil suit against protesters who read the names of dead soldiers and distribute anti-war literature in front of the military recruitment center at the U.S. Route 9W mall.

The mall's attorney, Jon A. Simonson, said the suit stems from tenants' complaints over loss of business from the protests, with damages estimated at $50,000.

Fundraiser
8 to 10 PM
Monday Sept. 4th
Busboys & Poets Restaurant
2021 14th Street NW
Near U St. Metro, Green Line
Washington, D.C.

Celebrate Democracy on Labor Day with:

Investigative Journalist Greg Palast discussing breaking investigative reports

By Peter Laufer, Sunday Times UK

Scores of American troops are deserting - even from the front line in Iraq. But where have they gone? And why isn't the US Army after them? Peter Laufer tracked down four of the deserters.

They are the US troops in Iraq to whom the American administration prefers not to draw attention. They are the deserters - those who have gone AWOL from their units and not returned, risking imprisonment and opprobrium.

By Eli Sanders, Time Magazine

An army officer who refused duty in Iraq goes to court with a novel argument: he had a duty to disobey because the war is illegal.

When he refused to deploy to Iraq in June, Army Lt. Ehren Watada said he was following his conscience and upholding his duty not to obey illegal orders. But that didn't impress military officials, who promptly charged him with violating Army rules and sent him on a path toward a likely court-martial.

Judge downgrades charges. Nine war opponents arrested after refusing to
leave Rep. Dent's office.
By PRECIOUS PETTY, The Express-Times

ALLENTOWN | A judge Monday reduced the severity of charges pending against
nine peace group members arrested during a January demonstration at the
Bethlehem office of U.S. Rep. Charlie Dent.

Lehigh County President Judge William H. Platt granted First Assistant

By MICHAEL GILBERT; The News Tribune

Defense witnesses said Thursday that Army Lt. Ehren Watada had no choice but to refuse orders to go to Iraq if he wanted to avoid complicity in what they called war crimes.

“I personally believe that the decision of the Bush administration to invade and occupy Iraq without getting the authority of the U.N. Security Council … falls into the category of a war of aggression, which is by international law a war crime,” said Ann Wright, a retired Army colonel and U.S. diplomat who resigned in protest of the war in 2003.

By MIKE BARBER, SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com

FORT LEWIS -- The issue before an Army officer Thursday was whether Lt. Ehren Watada ought to face a court-martial for refusing to go to Iraq.

But the war itself and whether it is based on deceit or defense of a nation was on trial. And so was Watada and whether he acted out of courage or dishonor.

AP
Lt. Ehren Watada, left, walks with his father, Bob Watada; his stepmother, Rosa Sakanishi; and attorney Eric Seitz during a lunch break in an Army hearing on Watada's refusal to deploy to Iraq.

Witnesses to appear tomorrow in Lt. Watada's defense: Prof. Francis Boyle, Dennis Halliday, and Army Col. Ann Wright (ret.)

On August 17th, U.S. Army First Lieutenant Ehren K. Watada, the first commissioned officer to publicly refuse to deploy to Iraq, will appear before a military court, for the first hearing of a case that raises core Constitutional issues about the legality of the Iraq war, freedom of speech, and the limits of presidential power.

By Carolyn Ho, t r u t h o u t | www.truthout.org

Dear Fellow Americans and Citizens of the International Community,

I am the mother of Lt. Ehren Watada, an officer stationed at Ft. Lewis. He was part of a Stryker brigade unit that deployed to Iraq on June 22nd. On that fateful day, he quietly defied the movement order and chose not to board the plane with his men. Despite unrelenting pressure to conform from the day he submitted his request for discharge (in January 2006) to the day of deployment, he remained true to his conviction. He believed that he could support his men best by not leading them into an illegal war and occupation that had already claimed countless Iraqi and American lives. He believed that he could serve them by taking a stand against the war rather than an being an accomplice in a policy that uses our troops for immoral, unethical purposes.

By Sarah Olson, t r u t h o u t | www.truthout.org

Clifton Hicks was looking for a body. Specifically, the Army tank driver was fumbling about in the dark, looking for and failing to find the remains of the Iraqis who, moments before, had been firing on his tank. When Hicks's flashlight swept the ground around his feet, he realized he was standing in the remains of a man. Literally. His boots wedged between the rib cage and the pelvis, blood and human organs squishing out from beneath the souls of his shoes.

Veterans for Peace Convention - August 12, 2006
A Film by Sari Gelzer
http://www.truthout.org/multimedia.htm

In Seattle at the Veterans for Peace Convention, Lt. Ehren Watada, the first commissioned officer to publicly refuse deployment to Iraq, spoke about what he calls a "change of strategy" for the peace movement. Watada said: "Today, I speak with you about a radical idea ... The idea is this: that to stop an illegal and unjust war, the soldiers can choose to stop fighting it." He received overwhelming support from the crowd, and members of Iraq Veterans Against the War lined the stage in solidarity.

By Dahr Jamail
t r u t h o u t | www.truthout.org

On Saturday night, I was lucky enough to be at the Veterans for Peace
National Convention. For that night, Lt. Ehren Watada was able to give
the following speech, which I've just received permission to post here.
The speech was met with a powerful, standing ovation from the vets
who've been there.

Lt. Ehren Watada, for those who don't already know, became the first

By David Swanson

CLICK FOR PHOTO GALLERY

SEATTLE -- Ricky Clousing, a Sergeant in the U.S. Army, and a veteran of the Iraq War who has been AWOL for a year announced today at the Veterans for Peace convention in Seattle that he will turn himself in later today at the gates of Fort Lewis and face whatever punishment the military chooses to impose.

By Sara Rich
t r u t h o u t | www.truthout.org

It has now been 60 traumatic days since my daughter - who signed up with the Army as an MP, and after bravely serving one tour in Iraq, chose to go AWOL rather than engage in the two more tours to Iraq that awaited her - was forcibly taken from our home in handcuffs. Like many soldiers, she was suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. What we didn't know, what she couldn't tell us, is that she was also suffering Military Sexual Trauma. Late the evening of Sunday June 11, 2006, PFC Suzanne Swift was taken to the county jail, where she was strip-searched and orifice-checked. She was denied medical care for an abscessed tooth until the following day. She sat in that cell for two and a half days, a veteran of Iraq combat, terrified that she may be sent back. Outside, supporters of Suzanne's plight lined the sidewalks. The mother bear in me rose up - and I swung into action. I am trying to save my daughter's life.