July, 03 2013, 02:54pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Tarak Kauff: (845) 706-0187 (c), (845) 679-3299 (h), takauff@gmail.com
Ellen Davidson: (917) 297-8076, ellen.davidson@verizon.net
Veterans on Trial for Peaceable Assembly at Vietnam Veterans Memorial
17 U.S. military veterans and their allies will stand trial on Monday, July 8th after being arrested as they read the names of the fallen and laid flowers in their memory at New York City's Vietnam Veterans Memorial. The NYPD leadership had an opportunity to safeguard the First Amendment protections of those gathered to mark 11 years of war and destruction in Afghanistan. Instead, the police chose to arrest 25 vets and supporters, charging them with violating a rarely enforced 10 pm curfew at the memorial.
NEW YORK, NY
17 U.S. military veterans and their allies will stand trial on Monday, July 8th after being arrested as they read the names of the fallen and laid flowers in their memory at New York City's Vietnam Veterans Memorial. The NYPD leadership had an opportunity to safeguard the First Amendment protections of those gathered to mark 11 years of war and destruction in Afghanistan. Instead, the police chose to arrest 25 vets and supporters, charging them with violating a rarely enforced 10 pm curfew at the memorial. Their trial will hinge on whether their constitutional and international human rights to speech and assembly may be superceded by municipal park regulations.
On the evening of October 7, 2012, the veterans and their supporters gathered to condemn government lies and betrayals that precipitated wars where so many died. At 9 pm they began to read the names of the fallen. They gathered to respect those who died and the many more who were maimed in body and spirit and still suffer, as some of the Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan veterans present that night still do.
The gathering, in keeping with the solemnity of the venue, was orderly and respectful, yet powerful, as Vietnam combat veterans like Bishop George Packard, Mike Hastie, Paul Appell, and others talked of the need to speak truth to power and expose the lies that send young men and women to kill and be killed in wars for profit and empire.
"I chose to travel 2000 miles to stand with my fellow Veterans For Peace in the cold rain on the night of October 7, 2012, because the effectiveness of the First Amendment is being chipped away at an increasing and alarming rate through the imposition of limits on the people's exercise of their inalienable rights. We see coming to pass precisely the 'abuse of its powers' that the states feared would result from a strong federal government unfettered by these necessary restrictions." --Major Ken Mayers, USMC Ret.
"We are watching our First Amendment rights recede into a deep darkness, to a place where those who speak out could be detained indefinitely without trial and tortured. We see the day when dissent becomes impossible and we know that the only way to keep our rights is to challenge the system while we still can."--Dr. Margaret Flowers
"I stand in the place of my friends who were killed in Vietnam. I want to disrupt the collective unknowing of war by refusing to remain out of sight, out of mind." --Vietnam combat veteran Paul Appell
On that cold, rainy night the veterans and their allies demanded an immediate end to the brutal 11-year war in Afghanistan and an end to all U.S. wars of aggression. They were there to remember and honor the fallen and to stand up for their constitutional rights to assemble peacefully in a public place. If these rights are not upheld by the court, many of them say they will refuse to pay a fine, do community service, or acknowledge any wrongdoing and will do jail time if necessary to stand up for people's right to assemble.
Veterans For Peace board member Tarak Kauff, also arrested that night, said, "Can you imagine if there were an independent-thinking judge who saw his or her duty to actually protect the Constitution, specifically, the First Amendment? The prosecution reads the charges, describing the circumstances of our arrest. I can just picture the judge: 'Wait, are you serious? These veterans were arrested while laying flowers at a veterans memorial? Were they disturbing the peace, desecrating property, using illegal substances?' 'No, your honor.' 'Then what in God's name are they doing in this court? Have the police nothing better to do?'"
The trial will begin at 9:30 am in Jury 4, 100 Centre Street, Manhattan, and is expected to last for at least four days. The defendants are represented by National Lawyers Guild-NYC attorneys Diane Brody, Ellery Ireland, Martin Leahy, Vikrant Pawar, Martin Stolar, Jonathan Wallace, and Patricia Wright.
Veterans For Peace is a global organization of Military Veterans and allies whose collective efforts are to build a culture of peace by using our experiences and lifting our voices. We inform the public of the true causes of war and the enormous costs of wars, with an obligation to heal the wounds of wars. Our network is comprised of over 140 chapters worldwide whose work includes: educating the public, advocating for a dismantling of the war economy, providing services that assist veterans and victims of war, and most significantly, working to end all wars.
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"These mass, illegal firings will not stop us," said organizers. "Make no mistake, we will continue organizing until the company drops Project Nimbus and stops powering this genocide."
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The peace coalition No Tech for Apartheid accused Google of a "flagrant act of retaliation" late Wednesday night as the Silicon Valley giant announced it had fired 28 workers over protests against its cloud services contract with the Israeli government.
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"They punished all of the workers they could associate with this action in wholesale firings," said the coalition, which includes Jewish Voice for Peace and MPower Change, a Muslim-led anti-war group.
Google accused the workers of "bullying," "harassment," defacing property, and physically impeding other employees—allegations No Tech for Apartheid rejected as it noted organizers "have yet to hear from a single executive about" their concerns over Google's collaboration with Israel.
"This excuse to avoid confronting us and our concerns directly, and attempt to justify its illegal, retaliatory firings, is a lie," said the workers. "Even the workers who were participating in a peaceful sit-in and refusing to leave did not damage property or threaten other workers. Instead they received an overwhelmingly positive response and shows of support."
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Kate J. Sim, a child safety policy adviser at Google who said she was among those fired this week, said the terminations show "how terrified [executives] are of worker power."
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The House notably included an amendment forcing a wide range of individuals and businesses to cooperate with government spying operations but rejected an amendment that would have added a warrant requirement to the bill, which the Senate could vote on as soon as Thursday.
Noting those decisions on the FISA reauthorization legislation, Ruddock stressed that "today's vote is a victory but follows a recent loss and ongoing threat as that Section 702 bill moves to the Senate this week too."
"As FANFSA and the 702 reauthorization move to the Senate, lawmakers in that chamber need to take a stand for the rights of people in the United States," she argued. "That means passing FANFSA and reforming Section 702 authority—and prioritizing everyone's First and Fourth Amendment rights."
Jeramie Scott, senior counsel and director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center's Project on Surveillance Oversight, also praised the House's FANFSA passage on Wednesday.
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Kia Hamadanchy, senior policy counsel at ACLU, similarly said Wednesday that "the bipartisan passage of this bill is a flashing warning sign to the government that if it wants our data, it must get a warrant."
Hamadanchy added that "we hope this vote puts a fire under the Senate to protect their constituents and rein in the government's warrantless surveillance of Americans, once and for all."
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While claiming that President Joe Biden backs "Palestinian aspirations for statehood," one of the cables asserts that "it remains the U.S. view that the most expeditious path toward a political horizon for the Palestinian people is in the context of a normalization agreement between Israel and its neighbors."
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As The Intercept's Ken Klippenstein and Daniel Boguslaw noted:
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Currently, 139 of the U.N.'s 193 member states recognize Palestine as an independent state.
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