October, 21 2013, 12:00am EDT
Delivering Petition Signatures from Around the World to Louisiana Gov, Amnesty International Demands Release of Last "Angola 3" Prisoner
Amnesty International USA today delivered more than 25,000 petition signatures from supporters throughout the U.S. and globally to Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, demanding the immediate release of the last "Angola 3" prisoner Albert Woodfox. The human rights organization says after 38 years of "cruel, abusive" solitary confinement and a deeply flawed trial, the state cannot justify holding him one more day.
BATON ROUGE, La
Amnesty International USA today delivered more than 25,000 petition signatures from supporters throughout the U.S. and globally to Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, demanding the immediate release of the last "Angola 3" prisoner Albert Woodfox. The human rights organization says after 38 years of "cruel, abusive" solitary confinement and a deeply flawed trial, the state cannot justify holding him one more day.
Boxes of petitions signed by 25,199 people around the world were carried inside the Capitol to Jindal's office. More than half of the signatures were collected in the week after Herman Wallace, among the Angola 3, died on Oct. 4, three days after he was released from prison on a judge's order.
At a press conference on the steps of the State Capitol in Baton Rouge, Amnesty activists and campaigners were joined by Robert King, the first freed member of the Angola 3; Michael Mable, Albert Woodfox's brother; and Rev. Dr. Patricia Bates, of the National Religious Campaign Against Torture and the United Methodist Church. Statements were read from U.S. Rep. Cedric Richmond, D-La., and State Rep. Patricia Haynes Smith.
Amnesty International is asking Gov. Jindal to withdraw the state's latest appeal against a third court ruling last February that overturned Woodfox's conviction, to remove him from solitary confinement and to release him from prison.
Amnesty International USA Executive Director Steven W. Hawkins said: "We must not tolerate this continued cruelty by the state of Louisiana another day. After decades of holding him in abusive conditions, based on a flawed murder conviction, the only just and humane action the state can take is to free Albert immediately."
"For Amnesty International, one of the bitterest pills we have swallowed was the death of Herman Wallace on Oct. 4- just three days after he was freed from prison after being held in solitary confinement for more than 41 years," said Hawkins. "Herman Wallace died a free man but his freedom was short-lived and nothing could erase the abuse he suffered. That suffering must end now for Woodfox."
Woodfox has insisted he is innocent of the murder, as Wallace did. No physical evidence linked the men to the crime. The testimony of the main eyewitness has been discredited and potentially exculpatory DNA evidence has been lost.
Woodfox and Wallace have maintained they were falsely implicated because they organized a prison chapter of the Black Panther Party and worked to desegregate the prison, end systematic rape and violence and demanded better living conditions for the prisoners.
"Holding a man with no human contact in a cell the size of a parking space for 38 years is simply depraved," said Jasmine Heiss, Amnesty USA campaigner. "Albert maintains, as do all of the Angola 3, that he continues to be punished for organizing against injustice inside Angola as a member of the Black Panther Party. It is clear that, were it not for the state's dogged determination to pursue vengeance rather than justice, Albert Woodfox would be a free man.
"We are here today representing tens of thousands of people from around the world who are calling for Albert Woodfox's release," said Heiss. "We are calling on Attorney General Buddy Caldwell, Secretary James LeBlanc, and Governor Bobby Jindal to stop standing in the way of justice."
Rep. Richmond, in his statement, wrote: "I am firm in my resolve to continue to fight to address the horrors of long term solitary confinement. The plight of the Angola 3 has shined a disinfecting light on this terrible unconstitutional practice of indefinite solitary confinement without meaningful due process reviews."
Following Wallace's death, Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., paid tribute to him and his fellow prisoners in the Congressional Record. Conyers said Wallace's "greatest hope was that his case would help ensure that others, especially Albert Woodfox, would not continue to suffer the cruel and unusual confinement that he had suffered."
The decision by prison authorities to hold the Angola 3 in solitary confinement has never been reviewed in any meaningful way and prison records showed no serious disciplinary infractions by the men for decades, nor did mental health records indicate that they posed a threat to themselves or others.
The United Nations special rapporteur Juan Mendez has described the long term solitary confinement that Woodfox has endured as torture.
Amnesty International is a worldwide movement of people who campaign for internationally recognized human rights for all. Our supporters are outraged by human rights abuses but inspired by hope for a better world - so we work to improve human rights through campaigning and international solidarity. We have more than 2.2 million members and subscribers in more than 150 countries and regions and we coordinate this support to act for justice on a wide range of issues.
LATEST NEWS
Amid Spying Fight, House Passes Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act
"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," said one advocate.
Apr 17, 2024
While applauding the U.S. House of Representatives' bipartisan passage of a bill to ensure that "law enforcement and intelligence agencies can't do an end-run around the Constitution by buying information from data brokers" on Wednesday, privacy advocates highlighted that Congress is trying to extend and expand a long-abused government spying program.
The House voted 219-199 for Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act (FANFSA), which won support from 96 Democrats and 123 Republicans, including the lead sponsor, Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio). Named for the constitutional amendment that protects against unreasonable searches and seizures, H.R. 4639 would close what campaigners call the data broker loophole.
"The privacy violations that flow from law enforcement entities circumventing the Fourth Amendment undermine civil liberties, free expression, and our ability to control what happens to our data," said Free Press Action policy counsel Jenna Ruddock. "These impacts affect everyone who uses digital platforms that extract our personal information any time we open a browser or visit social media and other websites—even when we go to events like demonstrations and other places with our phones revealing our locations."
"We're grateful that the House passed these vital and popular protections," she added. "The bill would prevent flagrant abuses of our privacy by government authorities in league with unscrupulous third-party data brokers. Making this legislation into law with Senate passage too would be a decisive and long-overdue action against government misuse of this clandestine business sector that traffics in our personal data for profit."
Wednesday's vote followed the House sending the Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act to the Senate. H.R. 7888 would reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which allows for warrantless spying on noncitizens abroad but also sweeps up Americans' data.
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.
"The passage of the Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale underscores the extent to which reining in abusive warrantless surveillance is a bipartisan issue," Scott said. "We urge the Senate to take up this measure and close the data broker loophole."
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."
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), a critic of the pending 702 bill and FANFSA's lead sponsor in the upper chamber, called the the House's Wednesday vote "a huge win for privacy" and said that "now it's time for the Senate to follow suit."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Leaked Cables Show Biden Pressuring Nations to Oppose Palestine's UN Membership
"This is the evidence that President Biden's talk about a two-state solution is nothing but idle talk," said one former Lebanese diplomat.
Apr 17, 2024
As the United Nations Security Council prepares to vote Thursday on Palestine's bid to become a full U.N. member, the Biden administration—which claims to support Palestinian statehood—is lobbying UNSC nations in an effort to wrangle enough "no" votes so that the United States can avoid resorting to a veto.
Leaked cables obtained by The Intercept show U.S. pressure on Security Council members including Malta—which currently presides over the body—and Ecuador.
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."
"We therefore urge you not to support any potential Security Council resolution recommending the admission of 'Palestine' as a U.N. member state, should such a resolution be presented to the Security Council for a decision in the coming days and weeks," the document advises.
The U.S. argument essentially is that the U.N. should not create an independent Palestinian state by fiat—even though that's precisely how the world body voted in 1947 to establish the modern state of Israel.
The renewed push for Palestine's U.N. membership comes as Israel wages a genocidal war on the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian Authority, which hasn't controlled Gaza for nearly two decades, rejected the Biden administration's requests to hold off on seeking full membership.
"We wanted the U.S. to provide a substantive alternative to U.N. recognition. They didn't," one unnamed Palestinian official toldAxios on Wednesday. "We believe full membership in the U.N. for Palestine is way overdue. We have waited more than 12 years since our initial request."
As The Intercept's Ken Klippenstein and Daniel Boguslaw noted:
Since 2011, the U.N. Security Council has rejected the Palestinian Authority's request for full member status. On April 2, the Palestinian Observer Mission to the U.N. requested that the council once again take up consideration of its membership application. According to the first State Department cable, U.N. meetings since the beginning of April suggest that Algeria, China, Guyana, Mozambique, Russia, Slovenia, Sierra Leone, and Malta support granting Palestine full membership to the U.N. It also says that France, Japan, and Korea are undecided, while the United Kingdom will likely abstain from a vote.
Along with the United States, China, France, Russia, and the United Kingdom are permanent members of the UNSC, so they also have veto power.
Ahead of Thursday's planned vote, Spain has been doing its own lobbying in Europe to build greater support for Palestinian statehood. At a joint Tuesday press conference with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, Slovenian Prime Minister Robert Golob said the question is "when, not if, but when is the best moment to recognize Palestine."
Belgium—which is seeking economic sanctions against Israel in response to its genocidal war on Gaza—is expected to join Spain's push for Palestinian statehood after the country's European Union presidency expires in June.
Currently, 139 of the U.N.'s 193 member states recognize Palestine as an independent state.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—who has also claimed to support a so-called "two-state solution"—has alternately boasted about thwarting Palestinian statehood.
Critics pointed to the leaked cables as more proof of U.S. duplicity and double standards on the Israel-Palestine issue.
"This is the evidence that President Biden's talk about a two-state solution is nothing but idle talk," Massoud Maalouf, a former Lebanese ambassador to Canada, Chile, and Poland, said on social media.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Database Exposes 'Illicit Network Undermining Democracy Around the World'
Yanis Varoufakis hailed the effort as "a treasure chest of well-researched reports on how the reactionaries of the world unite."
Apr 17, 2024
"Coups. Assassinations. Riots. Detentions. Disinformation. We know the tactics that have been deployed to undermine our democracies. But who is behind them?"
Progressive International (PI) asks and answers this and other questions with an extensive new database published Wednesday that connects the dots in what the leftist group calls the "Reactionary International"—a loose global network of right-wing leaders and organizations working to subvert democratic institutions.
PI calls it an "illicit network undermining democracy around the world."
"Today is a mask-off moment for the Reactionary International and the parties, politicians, judges, journalists, foundations, think tanks, tech platforms, NGOs, activists, financiers, and entrepreneurs that comprise it," PI said.
"After a year of preparation, we finally open the doors to our new research consortium, exposing the global network of reactionary forces that corrode our democracies, destroy our planet, and drive us closer to world war," the group added.
"The twin insurrections at the U.S. Capitol in 2021 and Brasília's Three Powers Plaza in 2023 left no doubt about the international coordination of reactionary forces," PI argued. "Yet far too little is known about the entities of this network, their sources of financing, and their institutional allies operating inside our political systems."
Ultimately, PI aims to "support democratic systems to become more resilient to their insidious tactics."
From leaders like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and former U.S. President Donald Trump—the presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee—to evangelical Christian groups influencing laws in African countries criminalizing LGBTQ+ people and tech companies empowering ubiquitous state surveillance, Reactionary International is a who's-who of the world's right-wing forces.
A cursory search of the database's contents shows users can:
- Learn about Israel's NSO, Rayzone, and Team Jorge, and how a team of Tel Aviv tech entrepreneurs fuel unrest in Latin America;
- Meet the Grey Wolves, Turkey's roving death squad with links to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the ethno-nationalists in his governing coalition; and
- Explore the global network of the Falun Gong, its Trump-connected media outlet The Epoch Times, and its traveling dance troupe known as Shen Yun.
Yanis Varoufakis, a PI member and secretary-general of the left-wing Democracy in Europe Movement 2025, called the database "a treasure chest of well-researched reports on how the reactionaries of the world unite."
PI invites the public to contribute to the database.
"Together, we will not only name, shame, and expose the forces of the far right—but also dismantle their network of complicity," the group said.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular