Daily Archives: April 24, 2013

Uncategorized

U.S. Fourth Graders Fight to Bring Home Deported Classmate

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Kyle and Scott Kuwahara, nine-year-old twins, talk to their friend Rodrigo Guzman via Skype in their Berkeley, California home. Credit: Judith Scherr/IPS

By Judith Scherr

BERKELEY, California, Mar 28 2013 (IPS) – Rodrigo Javier Diaz Guzman was a fairly typical Berkeley, California kid. He loved playing baseball and video games, enjoyed school and got good grades, watched Ninjago on TV, and ate take-out burritos and Chinese food whenever he could.

His mother was one of those parents who always showed up at school with snacks for field trips and came along to help if she could get away from work.
In school we are learning about all these important people like Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks who fought for people’s civil rights and freedom. So what about Rodrigo’s freedom?
Continue reading U.S. Fourth Graders Fight to Bring Home Deported Classmate →

Uncategorized

In Hopeful Sign, EPA Slams State Department for ‘Insufficient’ KXL Review

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Ruptured Enbridge Pipeline from Kalamazoo Spill,(Photo: NTSB)

Common Dreams

Agency questions assumptions of ‘inevitability’ and calls for further review of greenhouse gas emissions

– Lauren McCauley, staff writer
On the final day of the Keystone XL public comment period for the State Department’s draft supplementary environmental impact statement (SEIS) of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, the Environmental Protection Agency issued a sharply critical assessment declaring the analysis “insufficient.”
Continue reading In Hopeful Sign, EPA Slams State Department for ‘Insufficient’ KXL Review →

Peru

A sustainable community is born

Latin America Press

Based on the principles of Buen Vivir, indigenous youth in the Amazon create an intercultural community.

University students from seven indigenous communities who live together in the Peruvian city of Iquitos, on the banks of the Amazon River, have created a sustainable community based on the tenets of Buen Vivir, or “good living” — the concept of existing in harmony with other people and with nature.

The youths, of Achuar, Kichwa, Murui, Tikuna, Matsés, Shawi and Awajún descent, decided in 2010 to start the Sustainable Community in the student housing where they live, which is run by the non-governmental organization, Red Ambiental Loretana (The Loreto Environmental Network). The initiative was first launched during their first conference, taking place between February 21 and March 1, during which they established the four pillars on which the community would be based: time, resources, funding and spirit.
Continue reading A sustainable community is born →

Peace

Note from Tikkun

Uri Avnery, now in his eighties, is one of the most respected leaders of the Israeli peace movement. His description of the gathering last week of Israelis and Palestinians together to mourn those killed in the ongoing struggle, a unique spiritual event (though Avnery rarely uses that word),  can give hope to even the most cynical. And his analysis of the role of emotion in peace-making makes us proud to be distributing our book Embracing Israel/Palestine (which you can order at www.tikkun.org/EIP) which actually embodies a way to speak not only to the head but to the heart of those in both camps who despair of bringing peace to the Middle East.

Uri Avnery

April 20, 2013

                                              In Praise of Emotion

IT WAS a moving experience. Moments that spoke not only to the mind, but also – and foremost – to the heart.
Continue reading Note from Tikkun →

Migration, USA

LCWR Statement on S-744 the Immigration Modernization Act of 2013

The Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) welcomes the release of S-744, Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act of 2013  and thanks  Senators Charles Schumer (D-NY), John McCain (R-AZ), Richard Durbin (D-IL), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Marco Rubio (R-FL), Michael Bennet (D-CO) and Jeff Flake (R-AZ)  for their efforts to craft bi-partisan legislation  to fix our nation’s broken immigration system.

The Senate bill provides hope to our immigrant brothers and sisters and the promise that values that are the bedrock of our national identity will flourish. Continue reading LCWR Statement on S-744 the Immigration Modernization Act of 2013 →

Nigeria

Nigeria fighting ‘kills scores’ in Baga

BBC

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Much of Baga was destroyed in fires

Intense fighting between the military and Islamist militants in north Nigeria is reported to have killed at least 185 civilians and destroyed 2,000 homes.

Rocket-propelled grenades and heavy gunfire bombarded the remote town of Baga near the border with Chad for hours on Friday evening, government and military officials say.

Nigeria faces a long-running insurgency in its predominantly Muslim north.

The Boko Haram insurgency has left thousands of people dead since 2009.
Continue reading Nigeria fighting ‘kills scores’ in Baga →

Peace

Global Campaign to Ban Killer Robots Models Landmine Treaty

“Giving machines the power to decide who lives and dies on the battlefield would take technology too far.” — HRW’s Steve Goose

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Apr 20 2013 (IPS) – When international human rights groups launch a global campaign next week to ban “fully autonomous weapons”, they will follow in the footsteps of the highly-successful 1990s collective worldwide effort to ban anti-personnel landmines and blinding lasers.

The new campaign, to be launched in London, will be aimed primarily at the United States: the only country with a formal policy on fully autonomous weapons, also called “killer robots”, equipped with the capacity to choose and fire on targets without human intervention.
Continue reading Global Campaign to Ban Killer Robots Models Landmine Treaty →

Uncategorized

US Bishops disappointed at Senate failure to support measures to reduce gun violence

Independent Catholic News

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The chairman of the Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) expressed “deep disappointment in the Senate’s failure to support reasonable regulations to reduce gun violence in our nation” in an 18 April letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

“The USCCB has been working with other faith leaders and organizations urging Congress to support legislation that builds a culture of life by promoting policies that reduce gun violence and save people’s lives in homes and communities throughout our nation,” wrote Bishop Stephen E. Blaire of Stockton, California. “In the wake of tragic events such as the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary, the failure to support even modest regulations on firearms is a failure in moral leadership to promote policies which protect and defend the common good.”
Continue reading US Bishops disappointed at Senate failure to support measures to reduce gun violence →

Economic Justice, Europe

Nun Emerges as Spanish Leader in Fight Against Austerity

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Wearing her nun’s black habit, Forcades spoke with AFP about austerity, religion and revolution. (Photo: AFP)

Common Dreams

Sister Teresa Forcades: “The current economic model, institutional and political order has failed.”

– Lauren McCauley, staff writer
From the peaks of Monserrat, a new and unlikely leader has emerged in Spain’s rising “indignado” protest movement, leading the charge against the excesses of capitalism.

Sister Teresa Forcades—a Harvard-educated Catalan nun who resides at the convent Sant Benet—along with economist and “indignant” leader, Arcadi Oliveres, has launched a political manifesto that’s amassed nearly 17,000 signatures in just two days.
Continue reading Nun Emerges as Spanish Leader in Fight Against Austerity →