Monday, January 30, 2012

UPDATED Thurs from FCNL: Peace Actions for Diplomacy with Iran

PLZ SEE the Updates at end of post!

The new motto of Saturday's Peace Actions toward Diplomacy with Iran is:

HUMANITY and the PLANET come FIRST: We are seeking to de-emphasize the differences between our nations, governments and cultures and to emphasize the similar needs, joys, concerns and connections between the humanity of the world.

Watch for another post here/and or nomorecrusades which will aim to simplify the material/actions in this post.

The list of groups who are supporting these actions keep growing:

The U.S. Day of Mass Action to Stop a US War on Iran: SATURDAY -- FEBRUARY 4, 2012 NO war! NO sanctions! NO intervention! NO assassinations!

Endorsers include:
World Can’t Wait * United National Anti-War Coalition (UNAC) * International Action Center (IAC) * SI! Solidarity with Iran * Refugee Apostolic Catholic Church * Workers World Party * CODEPINK Women for Peace * American Iranian Friendship Committee * ANSWER Coalition * Antiwar.com * Peace of the Action * ComeHomeAmerica.us * St. Pete for Peace * WAMM, Women Against Military Madness * Defenders for Freedom, Justice & Equality-Virginia * WESPAC Foundation * Minnesota Peace Action Coalition * Twin Cities Peace Campaign * Bail Out The People Movement (BOPM) * We Won’t Fly * Movement for a Democratic Society (MDS) * Granny Peace Brigade * Veterans for Peace – NYC Chapter 034 * Waco Friends of Peace * Malcolm X Center for Self Determination * David Swanson, Author of When the World Outlawed War * Phil Wilayto, Author of In Defense of Iran: Notes from a U.S. Peace Delegation’s Journey through the Islamic Republic * Ramsey Clark, Former US Attorney General, awarded UN Human Rights Award * Cindy Sheehan, National Co-ordinator of Peace of the Action * Ray McGovern, Veterans for Peace * Karla Hansen, Producer/Director “Silent Screams” * George Phillies, Editor for Liberty for America * Larry Everest, correspondent for Revolution Newspaper, author of Oil, Power & Empire: Iraq and the US Global Agenda

Visible street protests and other events and outreach will happen in many places, including around the world: in Ireland at Shannon Air Base (forward base for NATO); in Dacca, Bangaldesh; in Calcutta and other cities in India.

Stay tuned for more announcements, write here to endorse the Call for Mass Action, and/or to get more info. You can also use this page to find or organize a protest in your area -- GO here

Notice which country is surrounding Iran with military. So WHO is the aggressor in the Middle East? We must end our US/Western complicity and silence.

Become a Citizen Diplomat and help get the word out -- Call your legislators, writer letters to the editor, send letters to world leaders, create a petition and gather signatures.

By the way, news and groups in Iran are paying attention to our efforts for peace.
These are nurturing peace and goodwill unlike our western threats and military gesturing. Let's stop being the US bully in the world...

READ more on peace efforts with Iran, diplomacy and similar conversations at nomorecrusades.blogspot.com or CLICK here

==========
UPDATE from Friends Committee on National Legislation:
Iran: What is Congress Trying to Do?
Thursday, February 2, 2012 5:01 PM

Right now, most of Congress seems to think that Iran needs to be punished and
isolated. New Iran sanctions just went into effect last week, and more sanctions are coming out of the Senate Banking Committee today. These are headed for a vote on the Senate floor in the next few weeks. Please urge your senators to oppose these new sanctions as ineffective foreign policy and to speak out in favor of this one:

DIPLOMACY NOT WAR with Iran

GO here

Three decades of sanctions have not persuaded Iran to agree to full transparency
of its nuclear program. Continued pressure could have the effect of pushing
Iranian leaders to demonstrate their power. As Princeton Professor Anne-Marie
Slaughter argues, the current course of sanctions piled on sanctions "leaves Iran's government no alternative between publicly backing down, which it will not do, and escalating its provocations." 1 [ #1 ] This kind of escalation is a "dangerous game of…chicken" that could lead to violent conflict.

Instead, the U.S. should be finding ways to keep Iran within the international
community; open lines of diplomatic communication, as former head of Joint Chiefs
of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen has recommended; 2 [ #2 ] and reduce the incentives
for Iranian leaders to take Iran's nuclear program to the next level.

Business leaders 3 [ #3 ] and many former U.S. officials and foreign policy experts 4 [ #4 ] are endorsing this view. Yet as our lead foreign policy lobbyist Bridget Moix noted this week, 5 [ #5 ] the people making decisions aren't weighing the diplomatic options that could steer the U.S. and Iran away from violent conflict - and the policy of threats that Congress is undertaking is closing down the space for diplomatic options to be seriously considered and pursued.

As the Senate takes up new sanctions legislation, your senators are hearing from
people in your community who support tougher sanctions on Iran. Your senators need to know that some of their constituents want a different approach. Please urge your senators to oppose the new sanctions legislation introduced this week by Senators Tim Johnson (SD) and Richard Shelby (AL):

GO here

Sincerely,

Diane Randall
Executive Secretary

Footnotes:

1. here ] Anne-Marie Slaughter, " Saving Face and Peace in the Middle East GO here ] ,"
Project Syndicate

2. [ GOhere ] FCNL's Letter to Congress: Time for Diplomacy, Not War, With Iran [ GO here ]

3. [ GO here ] Richard Sawaya, " Will Common Sense Prevail in U.S.-Iran Relations? [ GO here ] "
USA Engage

4. [ GOhere ] Jim Lobe, " Growing Elite Opposition to Military Option Against Iran [ GOhere ] ,"
Antiwar.com

5. [ GOhere ] Bridget
Moix, " Can War With Iran Be Prevented? [ GOhere ] "

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Reply to dianerandall@fcnl.org
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1 comment:

connie nash said...

Re: Duke Human Rights Center: Inaugural Resident Fellow Anne Cubilie to deliver public lecture, host two other events
Impossible Ethics: Justice, Responsibility to Protect and Operational Practice
Tuesday, January 31, 2012 4:00 pm

Human rights scholar Anne Cubilié will discuss her experiences in disaster zones and humanitarian interventions, focusing on the issue of testimony and issues of ethics and witnessing. What are our ethical obligations as witnesses to these events? How do different groups, among them women, experience abuses and then relate those stories to outsiders? In her work for the United Nations – ranging from the collection of survivor testimony in Afghanistan to policy guidance for emergency response to major reports and funding documents – she has maintained an insistence on remembering the individual within the broadest international discourses.

For the past decade, Cubilié has worked in humanitarian and development policy at United Nations headquarters while maintaining a consistent interest in bridging the gap between academic research and the political and policy considerations of international aid. Her book, Women Witness Terror: Testimony and the Cultural Politics of Human Rights, reads testimony by women survivors of war and human rights abuse through critical frameworks of ethics, trauma and witnessing. Prior to joining the United Nations, Cubilié was an assistant professor of transnational feminist cultural studies at Georgetown University. She has spent a year working for the UN in Afghanistan and Pakistan and has also lived off and on in Cairo, most recently participating in a joint United Nations/American University of Cairo program as a visiting scholar conducting research into women’s relationships to state structures.

Free and open to the public.
The Garage, Smith Warehouse, 114 South Buchanan St. Durham
A reception follows the talk.