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---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 22 Apr 1998 21:44:45 -0500
Subject: National Send off for Iraq Sanctions Challenge
Iraq Sanctions Challenge
39 West 14th Street, #206
New York, NY 10011
212-633-6646 Fax: 212-633-2889
email: iacenter@iacenter.org
Web: http://www.iacenter.org/iraqchallenge
For Immediate Release
Attention: Assignment Editor
Press Contacts: Deirdre Sinnott, Greg Butterfield
212-633-6646
April 22, 1998
MASS INDOOR RALLY IN NYC MAY 5 TO SUPPORT IRAQ SANCTIONS
CHALLENGE
RAMSEY CLARK & BISHOP THOMAS GUMBLETON TO LEAD LARGEST
CHALLENGE TO U.S./UN SANCTIONS WITH MEDICAL AID
A mass indoor rally in New York on May 5 will support
religious leaders, medical professionals and anti-war
activists traveling to Iraq to bring badly-needed medical
supplies, the Iraq Sanctions Challenge announced today.
Hundreds are expected to flood Judson Memorial Church at
6:30 pm to hear former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey
Clark, Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, and others.
Clark and Gumbleton will lead a 100-person delegation to
Iraq May 6 to 13, 1998, in opposition to the U.S./UN
sanctions. The Iraq Sanctions Challenge will take tons of
medicine and medical supplies to Iraq as an act of
friendship and solidarity with the Iraqi people, who have
suffered more than 1.5 million deaths as a result of
eight years of sanctions.
In an April 15 letter to members of the United Nations
Security Council, Ramsey Clark wrote: "The Security
Council must acknowledge that its sanctions against Iraq
violate the Genocide and Geneva Conventions. Those
sanctions are made `_ with intent to destroy_ the
national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such_
[by]_ deliberately inflicting_ conditions of life
calculated to bring about [its] physical destruction in
whole or in part_' The Geneva Conventions prohibit
`starvation of civilians as a means of warfare.'
"A death occurs in Iraq on the average every two to three
minutes as a direct result of the sanctions," wrote
Clark. "More than 1,500,000 human beings have died, the
vast majority infants, children and the elderly, since
August 6, 1990_ when sanctions were first voted by the
Security Council."
Besides being the largest delegation from the United
States to defy the sanctions, the Iraq Sanctions
Challenge will also bring the largest donation of medical
aid. Millions of dollars worth of medicines have been
collected for the trip, including large amounts of
antibiotics, anti-parisitics, heart medications, anti-
malaria medicines, and other basic necessities prohibited
by U.S./UN sanctions.
Others on the delegation include Rev. Lucius Walker of
Pastors for Peace; Christoph Arnold, author and elder of
the Bruderhof Community; Sara Flounders, Gloria La Riva
and Brian Becker of the International Action Center;
Clayton Remy of Fellowship of Reconciliation; Kathy Kelly
of Voices in the Wilderness; Kadouri Al Kaysi of the
Committee in Support of the Iraqi People; Ahmed El Sherif
the President of American Muslim Council, Mid-West; Sonya
Ostrom of Metro New York Peace Action; Attorney Michael
Tarif Warren; Dr. Barbara Nimri Aziz (anthropologist);
and Manzoor Ghori of the American Muslims for Global
Peace and Justice.
More details about the sanctions and the Iraq Sanctions
Challenge are available on the web site:
http://www.iacenter.org/iraqchallenge.
_30_
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