Student Activism

Urge your member of Congress to sign an urgent Dear Colleague letter requesting China to release Rebiya Kadeer's children. After prisoner of conscience Rebiya Kadeer was released last year, Chinese authorities started to harass her children, and recently arrested three of them.

Rebiya Kadeer is a former Amnesty International prisoner of conscience.  Her family was subjected to harassment by the authorities following her initial detention in 1999 and has experienced intensified persecution since she was released from prison on medical parole on March 17, 2005.  Prior to being freed, Rebiya Kadeer claims she was warned that if she engaged with members of the Uyghur ethnic community or spoke publicly about "sensitive issues" after her release, her "businesses and children will be finished." 

Rebiya Kadeer's children, (L to R) Akida, Kekenos, Reyla and Rouxian Rouzi. Rebiya Kadeer, on her way to a meeting with U.S. congressional staffers 11 August 1999, was detained, arrested and eventually sentenced in March 2000 to eight years in prison for mailing newspapers to her husband. © (JOYCE NALTCHAYAN/AFP/Getty Images)

The Chinese government recently arrested her children, in an attempt to silence her continued action for the Uyghur, who are under continued prosection for their Muslim faith since China passed new anti-terrorism lawa. Alim and Ablikim Abdiriyim were detained along with their sister Rushangul and six other family members (four of them children) on May 29, in an apparent attempt to prevent them from with a United States Congressional Team which was scheduled to visit them the following day. The police are planning to file charges against the children and possibly imprison them for a long period of time. For more information on the case, click here.

Thank you for actions!

Zodiac

student activism | Rebiya Kadeer | China | Prisoner of Conscience | human rights

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Despite international outrage over the human rights crisis in Darfur, not a single perpetrator of war crimes or crimes against humanity has been brought to justice. Send two crucial messages to Secretary of State Rice and your Members of Congress today: strengthen the U.S. government's relationship with the ICC, and keep the pressure on Sudan's government to cooperate with the ICC investigation. The conflict in Darfur, Sudan, has led to some of the worst human rights abuses imaginable: systematic and widespread murder, rape, abduction and displacement. Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed. Over 2.5 million civilians have been displaced.

The U.S. Government's policy toward the ICC has taken a number of twists and turns since the international community first began working to create the Court. President Clinton signed the treaty in December 2000. However, in 2002, the Bush Administration withdrew the United States' signature and subsequently launched a campaign to undermine the Court. However, in 2005, the U.S. did not vote against the U.N. Security Council's resolution referring the crimes committed in Darfur to the ICC. Administration officials have since stated that the U.S. stands ready to assist the ICC with its work in Darfur, signaling what could be the beginning of a remarkable shift in U.S. policy toward the Court. Now is a critical time to let the Bush Administration and Congress know that U.S. citizens support the ICC and its work in Darfur.

This action is a pre-written message that can be personalized, then sent to Condi, your state Reps and Senators. It is part of the Issue 2 (International Justice) of the four part Darfur Summer Action Series: 100 Days on Darfur. Cheers!

--Zodiac--

student activism | Darfur | online action | human rights

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The website, Irrepressible.info, enables people to oppose internet repression in three primary ways:

1.) Signing a pledge calling on all governments and companies to respect internet freedom. Signatures to the pledge will be presented to a UN meeting on the future of the internet in November 2006.

2.) Undermining censorship by publishing irrepressible fragments of censored material on their own blogs or websites. If you have a website or blog, help us spread the word and undermine unwarranted censorship by publishing censored material from our database directly onto your site. Just go to http://irrepressible.info/addcontent and paste the html code into your site.

3.) Taking online action targeting the companies Yahoo, Google, and Microsoft, as well as the Chinese Government. These web actions are continuations of actions we launched earlier this year.

The more people take part, the more we can defeat unwarranted censorship and create an unstoppable network of protest.

--Erica & Zodiac--

If you've been following the news lately, you've no doubt heard about the most recent crisis in Israel and Lebanon.  While television screens are full of images of armies, insurgents, and evacuees, one group you may not be hearing much about are civilians in the regions.  As Hezbollah and Israeli armies launch missiles into towns and villages in Israel and Lebanon, innocent civilians are being killed.  So far, 15 Israeli civilians and hundreds of Lebanese people have become victims of the conflict.  This act goes against many tenants of international humanitarian law which seeks to protect all civilians.  Join us in demanding that these forces end their attacks on civilians.  Amnesty has begun a letter writing initiative aimed at officials from all sides of the conflict.  To learn more and to add your name to the campaign, check out the online action center. 

Later, 

Erica

Workshop topics included issues like Stop Violence Against Women, the Death Penalty, Darfur, and Torture, and building skills like organizing, event planning, working with the media, and lobbying. We also got to hear great keynote speakers on the crisis in Darfur, and former Prisoner of Conscience Doan Viet Hoat. YAKtivists toured Georgetown and the monuments, made cool t-shirts and jewelry, and showed off their talents during our talent show. If you want in on the action, don't forget to apply for YAK next year, and check out this month's issue of Plugged In for more info. Also, consider attending the next regional conference or Annual General Meeting, or applying to be a Student Area Coordinator or YAK Planning Committee member. Contact your Field Organizer at 1-866-A-REGION for more info. 

YAKtivists- we want to hear from you! Fill us in on your weekend by posting your comments on this blog.

Peace, 

Laura

Check out the latest activist resource, the 4-part Darfur Summer Action Series. Each issue in the series will include all the actions, tools, and organizing tips members need to mobilize their Amnesty International group, members of their community, family, and friends. You can read Issue 1: Arms and Security now, and Issue 2: International Justice comes out on July 17. Need more? We've also got a new fact sheet on arms dealing Sudan.

Take Action Now: Help Stop the Flow of Arms in Darfur (NEW!) Ruthless arms brokers have been at the center of many weapons transfers to abusive armed groups in Sudan and countries under U.N. arms embargoes. Help us raise support for a strong global agreement on arms brokering, and better enforcement of U.S. law to halt this global threat to human rights.

Visit the Darfur Crisis Page to read more, and don't forget to check back with the student and youth blog for the latest updates.

student activism | Darfur | online action | human rights

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Here's another testimony of a victim of the US government's use of extraordinary rendition. Ever since September 11^th they have been using this as a tool in the "war on terror". No trials, no explanation, no accountability. For more background information on extraordinary rendition, visit our Air Torture website.

Maher Arar is a Syrian-born Canadian citizen who worked as a telecommunications engineer in Ottawa. In September 2002, he transited through Kennedy Airport in New York on the way home from a family vacation in Tunisia. Passing through customs, he was detained by U.S. Immigration agents who questioned him for nine hours about his alleged ties to al-Qaueda. Two weeks later he was transferred to Syria without a hearing, even though he repeatedly expressed his fear of being tortured in Syrian custody. Neither the Canadian consulate or his family were informed of his transfer.  

Maher Arar remained in custody in Syria for almost a year in a military intelligence facility, without being charged with a crime or informed of the reason for his detention. He was held in isolation in a tiny, grave-like basement cell with no light. Maher Arar has said that he was severely beaten with an electrical cable during six days of interrogation and was threatened with electric shocks and the "metal chair," a torture device that stretches the spine. Eventually, he broke down and signed a false confession that he had been in Afghanistan. Maher Arar was released in October 2003 after intervention by the Canadian government and an acknowledgement from the Syrian government that there was no evidence that he was ever involved in terrorism.

Upon return, Maher Arar has been struggling with the emotional scars common to victims of torture, such as depression and acute fear of travel. He has experienced difficulty securing employment, and his wife and young children also have been profoundly affected by the lasting impact of their own related trauma and anxiety.

Maher Arar filed a lawsuit seeking damages from the US government. However, US District Court Judge David Trager dismissed his suit, even though he agreed with Maher Arar's assertion that US officials had known he was likely to be tortured in Syria. Sending an individual to a country where they are likely to be tortured is illegal under interantional treaties the US has signed. Judge Trager dismissed the case because it would have entailed disclosing state secrets, and involved a foreign policy question that was beyond the purview of the courts.

This man spent over a year in Syria, where he was tortured, without ever being charged with a crime and with no evidence to suggest he might be a terrorist suspect. His story is one from our administration's careless and desperate "war on terror", in which officials have nothing better to do but arrest individuals of Arab descent and then circumvent legalities by sending them away.

student activism | torture | extraordinary rendition | human rights

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