April, 03 2009, 01:58pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167
NATO; Wall Street; Nevada Protests Against War
WASHINGTON
REINER BRAUN
Braun is in Strasbourg, where NATO meetings are being held. He is with the International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms and is able to arrange media interviews with many others from various countries protesting against NATO. The group is a leading organization in a broad anti-NATO coalition, which recently put out a statement that read in part: "[NATO] has waged seven years of brutal war in Afghanistan, where the tragic situation is escalating and the war has expanded into Pakistan."
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PAUL KAWIKA MARTIN, BARBRA BEARDEN
Political director for Peace Action, Martin will be in New York on Saturday for a march on Wall Street under the banner "Beyond War: A New Economy Is Possible."
Martin said today: "The current presence in Afghanistan costs the U.S. taxpayer more than $2 billion per month. The proposed plan for Afghanistan would increase that figure by 60 percent this year. Sending 21,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan will not protect us against terrorist attacks. To the contrary, more troops, air and Predator drone strikes and night raids that kill, injure and traumatize innocent civilians drive people to the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. Instead, the U.S. and the international community should increase funding for Afghan-led humanitarian aid, development work, and landmine cleanup while supporting regional diplomacy."
Bearden, a spokesperson for Peace Action, said today: "President Obama has to make a choice for our country: healthcare, education, and help for needy families or two foreign wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The U.S. economy cannot sustain both."
Saturday marks the anniversary of Martin Luther King's "Beyond Vietnam" speech, given exactly a year before his assassination. For more information, including links to audio and text of the speech, see here.
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Co-coordinator of the Nevada Desert Experience, Haber said today: "Creech Air Force Base is home to the latest high-tech weapons that use unmanned aerial systems to carry out surveillance and increasingly lethal attack missions in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq. Once Unmanned Aerial Vehicles become airborne in places like Afghanistan and Pakistan, pilots inside trailers at Creech Air Force base begin to control them. The MQ-9 Predator and MQ9 Reaper drones both function to collect information through surveillance and both can carry weapons. The MQ9 Reaper drone, which the USAF refers to as a 'hunter-killer' vehicle, can carry a 500-pound bomb."
Kelly, co-founder of Voices for Creative Nonviolence, just wrote the piece "The Drone War: A Closer Look," which states: "It's one thing to study online articles describing the MQ-9 Reapers and MQ-1 Predators. It's quite another to identify these drones as they take off from runways at Nevada's Creech Air Force base, where our 'Ground the Drones ... Lest We Reap the Whirlwind' campaign is holding a ten-day vigil."
A nationwide consortium, the Institute for Public Accuracy (IPA) represents an unprecedented effort to bring other voices to the mass-media table often dominated by a few major think tanks. IPA works to broaden public discourse in mainstream media, while building communication with alternative media outlets and grassroots activists.
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