2,000 march in Chicago
against summit of CEOs
Compiled by Nicholas Holt
Nov. 12 (AGR)— An estimated 2,000 protesters gathered
in the streets of Chicago on the occasion of the TransAtlantic
Business Dialogue (TABD) economic summit.
The TABD is a coalition of US and European CEO’s that
is mandated by, and allowed unlimited access to, US and European
governments.
Protesters included representatives of social justice, anti-corporate
globalization, peace, labor, and anarchist groups.
After hearing from anti-war, anti-Boeing, and pro-worker speakers
outside the headquarters of the Boeing Corporation, protesters
marched towards the Sheraton Hotel where 350 corporate CEO’s
were meeting for the TABD.
Organizers used double bullhorns on a board to emphasize their
decision and the crowd’s implicit agreement to use peaceful
tactics on the march, which traveled east on Washington and
north on Michigan, ending just north of the river.
Demonstrators expressed grave concerns with Boeing’s thirst
for profits at the expense of bombed civilians, lost city tax
revenue and laid-off workers. The aerospace giant and weapons
contractor was a co-sponsor of the summit.
For many it was their first demonstration, one flanked at all
times by baton- and gun-toting police officers in full riot
gear, separating the street marchers from sidewalks and march-watchers
on both sides.
One speaker addressed the corporate media directly, telling
them to make sure they reported on the protestors’ issues
and the facts of the march, while criticizing print and broadcast
outlets for previously anticipating property damage and showing
clips of window-smashers from Seattle, 1999.
Marchers held up signs saying People Not Profits, Wal-Mart
Is A Bad Neighbor and stressed the need for worker unity against
layoffs and a government emphasis on militarization at home
and abroad.
Established in 1995, the Transatlantic Business Dialogue is
considered by some to be the most far-reaching international
alliance between corporations and states. Unlike other lobby
groups, it acts as a mandate for the US government and the European
Commission to work meticulously to identify “barriers to
transatlantic trade” — in effect, any regulation or
policy proposal that does not fit the corporate agenda on either
side of the Atlantic.
The 150 large corporations in the Business Dialogue have managed
to delay, weaken or even dismantle a wide range of environment
and consumer-protection regulations, including a planned EU
ban on marketing of animal-tested cosmetic products. High-level
government officials are active participants at the Dialogue’s
major events and officials entertain the demands of their many
working groups on a daily basis.
A major Dialogue success includes the EU-US Mutual Recognition
Agreement, which allows corporations to market a wide range
of products in both the EU and the US if they have been tested
on either side of the Atlantic. A member of the TABD claimed:
“We got [World Trade Organization Director General] Mike
Moore to come to one of our meetings before the Seattle WTO
Ministerial. I think he found it quite helpful. We’re a
non-governmental organization, an NGO, like all the others.
I really can’t see what all the fuss is about.” The
TABD played a key role in the launch of the new WTO round of
trade negotiations in Qatar last November.
Following the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in New York and Washington,
DC, and the initiation of US President George W. Bush’s
“War on Terror,” EU and US arms producers have taken
a leading role in the TABD and a new working group to find “ways
to capitalize on... the new awareness of the importance of the
security sector.”
At least 1,200 police in black riot gear and Chicago’s
characteristic blue helmets formed nearly unbroken lines over
the length of the protesters’ two mile march, at some spots
standing two and three deep.
When asked if the display of police force was excessive, Chicago
Mayor Richard Daley responded “They had Seattle, they had
Washington, DC, they had Europe. I’m sorry. This is Chicago.”
The city threatened to sue individuals for any property damage
committed during the protest.
Police jeered protesters and there were multiple reports of
policing pushing away people who tried to join the march.
In addition to riot police, there were dozens of officers on
bicycles and on horseback.
Fewer than five arrests were made during the protests.
At the conclusion of the march, more speakers addressed the
crowd, who dispersed without incident.
TABD attendees departed around 7pm under police escort.
The police videotaped the protesters under intelligence gathering
powers they regained from courts after a two-decade ban. The
images were then beamed back to police headquarters for analysis,
police said.
Department rules that took effect Oct. 25 also permit officers
to pose as members of groups and let officers scan groups’
Web sites for information about them.
Harvey Grossman, legal director for the American Civil Liberties
Union of Illinois, said he fears camera-wielding police scare
people from exercising their constitutionally recognized right
to protest.
“Is the cost worth the benefit?” he said. “What
about city employees who want to protest corporate policies?
Do you think they want their photo in a police dossier?”
The expanded police powers extend from an easing of the “Red
Squad” consent decree in Jan. 2001.
The department’s notorious Subversive Activities Unit
(commonly known as the Red Squad) was a Richard J. Daley (father
of the current Mayor Daly)-era corps that kept dossiers on more
than 250,000 private individuals and lawful organizations in
systematic violation of the First Amendment. The Red Squad was
killed by a court-ordered “consent decree” in 1981.
In March 1997, the city petitioned the District Court to relax
the decree, which proscribes law enforcement from gathering
intelligence on or disrupting any First Amendment activities
unrelated to a criminal investigation. The thrust of the suit,
rejected in September 1999 and currently on appeal, is that
the police department has cleaned up its act: “There is
no likelihood,” reads the petition, “of the City’s
returning to the activities that prompted” the decree.
However, a coalition of activists charged “political spying
and disruption” by Chicago police during the 1996 Democratic
National Convention. Officers allegedly stormed the Active Resistance
Counterconvention, after extensive surveillance of its organizers;
pepper-sprayed the participants and destroyed personal property;
and subjected several in attendance to lengthy interrogations.
The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals modified the consent decree
in Jan. 2001, giving the city more freedom to collect intelligence.
According to the city government, police can now save photos
of demonstrators to prepare for future protests, a practice
that was not previously allowed.
He also said that police officers are allowed to sit in on
demonstrators meetings and, with permission from the superintendent
of police, they may infiltrate the groups by pretending to be
members. The superintendent must also grant permission for the
use of electronic surveillance.
A spokesman for the police department said the modified consent
decree allows the department to share intelligence with other
agencies for the first time.
Sources: Chicago Indymedia, Chicago Sun-Times, In These
Times, New Internationalist
Pat Robertson shows faith-based
‘initiative’ with Operation Blessing
By Bill Berkowitz
When President Bush announced his faith-based initiative in
January 2001, televangelist Pat Robertson was among the first
on the religious right to blast the initiative.
“I really don’t know what to do,” Robertson
told viewers of his TV show, The 700 Club. “But this thing
could be a real Pandora’s box. …What seems to be such
a great initiative can rise up to bite the organizations as
well as the federal government. And I’m a little concerned
about it, frankly.”
Robertson was worried that groups he didn’t care for would
be eligible to receive public tax dollars under the Bush plan,
including the Hare Krishnas, the Church of Scientology, and
followers of Rev. Sun Myung Moon.
Now, one of the earliest and most vociferous critics of President
Bush’s faith-based initiative is smiling all the way to
the bank. In early October, the Department of Health and Human
Services (HHS) awarded a $500,000 “demonstration grant”
to Robertson’s Virginia-based Operation Blessing International.
Pat Robertson
Operation Blessing was among 21 groups receiving a total of
$24.8 million from HHS through something called the “Compassion
Capital Fund” – a program approved by Congress last
year to provide grants to religious and social service organizations.
Included among the 21 organizations were such faith-based organizations
as Philadelphia’s Nueva Esperanza, which got nearly $2.5
million; the United Way of Massachusetts Bay, which received
$2 million; Christian Community Health Fellowship of Illinois,
which got $1.1 million; and Volunteers of America, which received
$700,000. Another $850,000 went to research into how religious
groups provide social services, a subject about which little
is known.
HHS implemented the program to provide small faith-based groups
with the technical assistance they need to successfully apply
for further funding. The grants were awarded even though a compromise
version of the president’s faith-based initiative still
languishes in Congress. Bush is asking Congress for $100 million
in unrestricted funds for faith-based funding for next year;
while the House has agreed to the increase, the Senate has voted
to keep funding at this year’s level.
By sidestepping Congress through discretionary g
rants, the administration doesn’t have to deal with such
thorny issues as separation of church and state, as well as
discriminatory hiring practices – particularly those directed
at gays and lesbians. Bobby Polito, director of the HHS Center
for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, said in an interview
with the Associated Press this summer that organizations receiving
government funding would be permitted to consider religion as
a factor in employment.
There are also questions about where the money is really going.
Operation Blessing, for example, has a somewhat questionable
reputation. In 1996, the Norfolk, Virginia-based Virginia-Pilot
newspaper reported that two pilots who were hired by the charity
to fly humanitarian aid to Zaire in 1994 were used almost exclusively
for diamond mining operations. Chief pilot Robert Hinkle claimed
that in the six months he flew for Operation Blessing, only
one or two of more than 40 flights were humanitarian –
the rest carried mining equipment.
Operation Blessing resources were being diverted to support
the African Development Co., a private corporation run by Robertson.
At the time, Robertson also had a relationship with Zaire’s
then dictator Mobutu Sese Seko.
“My first impression when I took the job was that we’d
be called Operation Blessing, and we’d be doing humanitarian
work,” Hinkle, a former Peace Corps volunteer, told the
Virginia-Pilot. “We got over there and ‘Operation
Blessing’ was painted on the tails of the airplanes, but
we were doing no humanitarian relief at all.”
Charles Henderson, executive director of CrossCurrents, an
interfaith organization, recently pointed out that Operation
Blessing has made some awfully strange purchases. Last year,
the organization that prides itself on helping the poor and
hungry in Third World countries spent more than $2.5 million
on Ensure, a dietary supplement, and Splenda, a no-calorie sweetener;
and more than $10.4 million on candy and panty hose.
Advocates for government funding of faith-based organizations
argue that religious groups dispense services more quickly than
the government and have dramatically lower administrative overhead.
But Henderson claims Operation Blessing’s administrative
expenses far exceed the zero to 10 percent claimed by faith-based
supporters. Out of a total budget of $36 million in 1999, according
to tax returns, Operation Blessing’s administrative costs
were over $11 million – a far cry from 10 percent. Henderson
estimates that, after considering administrative costs for all
of the smaller and subsidiary organizations the group gives
grants to, “about half of all donations to Operation Blessing
[reach] those who are truly needy.”
Source: In These Times
Activists under cyber-attack
in internet propaganda war
By George S. Hishmeh
Washington, DC, Nov. 8— A little-reported nationwide
cyber-attack has been under way in the United States for some
time, aimed at regularly disrupting, if not eliminating, the
websites of pro-Palestinian advocacy groups and the e-mail addresses
of some of their prominent American supporters like Noam Chomsky
and Francis Boyle.
Although no one has claimed responsibility, some activists
suspect pro-Israel groups. They point out that these internet
hackers target various well-known websites and addresses of
key activists and bombard them with copies of forged e-mail
messages sent to their subscribers or friends misrepresenting
their views.
Usually the messages are embarrassingly anti-Semitic, racist,
or pornographic and sometimes include computer viruses.
Nigel Parry, co-founder of Electronic Intifada, one of the
widely read online publications that has been subjected to these
attacks, said that “the fact that pro-Israel forces have
sought refuge in this electronic shouting down of pro-Palestinian
activists is a sign of their desperation and a feeling that
they are losing the argument.”
“The truth is that no amount of Israeli effort will prevent
the world from understanding that normal Palestinians, through
no fault of their own, live a desperate life under Israeli military
occupation. And this bothers people of conscience as Apartheid
did a decade ago,” he said.
Some law-enforcement agencies in various constituencies have
been reluctant to undertake any serious investigation, alleging,
some of the targeted activists were told, that there are no
statutes against this type of activity. Many of these messages
are sent from internet cafes or the like. These are then routed
through various servers around the world.
Boyle, a professor of law at the University of Illinois at
Champaign and a onetime legal adviser to the Palestine peace
delegation, recalled that upon his return last August from a
17-day vacation he found to his surprise some “55,000 messages
in my inbox - and this has been going on continuously since
then.”
In addition, “large numbers of forgeries have been put
out in my name on the internet, circulating all over, basically
misrepresenting my viewpoints on the Middle East, on the Arab
world and the Muslim world - even on the United States.”
“And last week I got a threat saying that I would be eliminated
because of my support for terrorism,” he added.
But Boyle, who inspired the campaign for Israeli divestment/disinvestment
which has now spread to more than 50 US campuses, refuses to
seek the help of law-enforcement agencies like the FBI. He said
he does not want a “fishing expedition” through his
computer files.
Professor Chomsky, the eminent linguist who teaches at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology and is a harsh critic
of Israeli policies, has also complained about cyber-attacks.
He told The Nation magazine: “There is an awful lot of
stuff going out in my name that’s totally insane and that
I haven’t written.”
Chomsky’s inbox, as those of several other key activists,
has also been regularly inundated with return-to-sender mail,
or “Joe jobs” as they are called in the industry.
Obviously, these may constitute only a small fraction of the
e-mails that have been sent using his private address.
In Boyle’s opinion, pro-Israel sources are trying to drive
pro-Palestinian activists off the internet for two reasons.
“First, the internet is very important to get information
that challenges the Israeli party line that is injected into
the mainstream news media here and the so-called academic world,
which is mostly pro-Israel. Secondly, the internet is very important
for organizing ... The whole divestment campaign [was] organized
on the internet.”
Many Arab-American activists and organizations in the country
have been targeted, including Ahmed Bouzid of the Philadelphia-based
Palestine Media Watch, Nidal Saqr of the Miami-based The March
for Justice, Yale medical school professor Mazin Qumsiyeh and
the Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), the largest Arab-American
organization, especially its New York office, run by Monica
Tarazi.
In an e-mail message, Tarazi wrote: “While these e-mails
are a nuisance, offensive and intimidating, the FBI didn’t
find anything illegal. There haven’t been threats that
rise to the level of a hate crime, no money has been stolen,
public safety has not been endangered and, as far as we can
tell, our computers have not been hacked or ‘technically
intruded into’ as one agent put it. The offensive messages
are all protected by the First Amendment.”
Nevertheless, for individuals, the task of deleting these forged
messages that are clogging personal computers is frustrating
and time-consuming. For organizations, it is disruptive and
may compel them to shut down, as in the case with one popular
site, Free Palestine.
According to Bouzid: “The effect is my mailbox is down.
There is confusion. In addition to the bad name, you are slowed
down tremendously. It is frustrating.” He added:
“What you have here is clearly a case of spamming, that
is, malicious intent, identity theft.”
Although some believe this bombardment could be stifled with
little effort by well-established organizations, Bouzid and
Saqr teamed together and last month began the National Coalition
against Cyber Terrorism. Membership is open to organizations
or individuals, Bouzid explained. Parry noted that the bombardment
coincided with the launching of the Israeli reoccupation of
the West Bank.
But the national office of the ADC seemed more hopeful about
getting help from law enforcement agencies.
In an interview, Nawar Shora, the ADC’s legal counsel,
disclosed that he has been working with law-enforcement agencies
in an effort to have an investigation opened. Shora said that
he has recently met with the FBI’s Civil Rights Division
and its Cyber Crimes Unit, as well as the Washington field office,
“on the identity theft and spoofing of ADC [and] other
civil rights groups and organizations, and Arab-American advocates
and professors.”
“It is in its initial stages, though,” he cautioned.
“We are setting another meeting, hopefully next week, in
order to hit the ground running. We are planning to broaden
the scope, not for only the ADC national [but also for other]
Arab-American organizations.”
Source: The Daily Star (Lebanon)
New Jersey Groups outraged
over INS conduct
By Shawn Gaynor
Asheville, North Carolina, Nov. 11(AGR)— Over a
year after the 9/11 attacks on the United States hundreds of
immigrants continue to be held by the INS (Immigration and Naturalization
Services). But citizens in New Jersey are beginning to speak
out against the detentions, demanding a release of INS detainees
who they claim are being held due to their race and religious
beliefs, and not because of evidence that they are part of a
terrorist organization.
On Nov. 9, roughly 50 concerned citizens gathered on Main Street
in Montclair, NJ, to raise awareness about the detentions. Local
high school students and residents from the immigrant community
joined members of Anti-Racist Action (ARA), New Jersey Free
the Detainees! (NJFtD), Montclair College Arab Student Association,
and others, in calling for an end to the detentions, and a Justice
Department investigation in what the groups are characterizing
as reprisal beatings of detainees for an Oct. 12 demonstration
at the Passaic County Jail.
“We will not stand by as the current state of racist policies
continues to allow for the unjust, arbitrary detentions of hundreds
upon hundreds of individuals. We will speak out against the
actions of our government and provide a voice for those who
are silenced behind prison walls,” said a statement from
New Jersey ARA.
At the Oct. 12 demonstration police were out in numbers, moving
protesters from a permitted demonstration area in the front
of the jail to an area in the back and surrounding them. Following
the demonstration a number of complaints surfaced of reprisal
beatings in the jail.
According to the New Jersey Action Network, on Oct. 16 a dozen
guards and a dog attacked and beat a Jamaican detainee, Sebastian
Allen, and another Jamaican detainee, who declined to give his
name. On the following day, guards beat a third detainee,
Tony Bonne, from the Ivory Coast.
“This is the second case of retaliation after protests
at the New Jersey county jails demanding the release of the
detainees,” said Jeannette Gabriel of Workers Democracy
Network.
Police presence at the high profile Main Street demonstration
was limited, with only about a half dozen officers on foot patrolling
the event.
Aside from the alleged reprisals, many of the detainees have
been held months without legal council. According to New Jersey
ARA the situations for some of the detainees has been even more
severe.
“Two dozen detainees were brought to Union County Jail
in Elizabeth, New Jersey after acting out their frustrations
about jail conditions in a previous jail. For three days, detainees
from Albania, India, Ghana, and elsewhere were beaten, held
naked, made to crawl on their hands and knees through a gauntlet
of jail officers, and forced to chant ‘America is Number
One.’ One Indian detainee claimed that between beatings,
correctional officers used pliers to pinch the skin on his genitals
and squeeze his tongue.”
Following the Sept. 11 attacks thousands of immigrants were
rounded up by federal authorities. Most of the detainees now
being held are from a second phase of roundups that started
in February of this year, said Eric Learner of NJFtD!. “Officially
they have been picked up on minor immigration violations. However
there are 800,000 people in the United States with these violations,
and this is a very select group. They have targeted Muslim males
age 15-45.”
“Certain communities of people have been scapegoated as
terrorists, and it is our job to demand our basic civil liberties
and civil rights back — to demand that all of the INS detainees
are freed!” said Diane Krauthamer from NJFtD.
The groups involved called the protest a success and say they
plan to continue their campaign for the immediate release of
the detainees.
“We will not allow the United States government to get
away with the prosecution and persecution of immigrants in the
name of ‘national security’ or ‘terrorist defense’,”
stated New Jersey ARA.
Nation Briefs
FTAA talks in Miami
The next round of high-level negotiations for the Free Trade
Area of the Americas (FTAA) will be in Miami next fall, trade
ministers decided Nov. 8. As the Quito meeting adjourned, US
Trade Representative Robert Zoellick said he was optimistic
that negotiators would conclude a trade deal on schedule by
2005. If completed, the FTAA would be the largest free-trade
area in the world, encompassing 34 countries with a combined
population of 800 million.
The trade agreement is on uneasy footing due to causes such
as the current transition in Brazil to a new leftist government,
Argentina’s financial implosion and growing political instability,
and economic slowdown in the area.
The biggest disagreement remains over the issue of US domestic
farm subsidies and high tariffs on agricultural products. The
central demand of Latin Americans on trade, repeated at every
meeting, is that the US open its borders to Latin agricultural
products. (Miami Herald)
NYPD bid to lift
political surveillance restrictions
The New York Police Department (NYPD) recently requested changes
that would dramatically increase its ability to monitor political
groups, particularly Muslims, and severely curtail a panel that
monitors and regulates police surveillance of domestic activists.
In particular, the NYPD claim that the Handschu Authority, created
in response to a 1971 Black Panther Party lawsuit, hinders the
hunt for terrorists who use mosques and Islamic institutes to
shield their activities. The three-member Handschu Authority
was established by a 1985 consent decree that settled a lawsuit
alleging that the NYPD illegally monitored and infiltrated the
Black Panthers and other activist groups. The NYPD now wants
the Decree altered to eliminate its duty to ask permission to
conduct undercover investigations of political groups, and no
longer wants to alert the panel when it begins investigating
a political group believed to be planning a crime. (Associated
Press)
Council attacks DC surveillance cameras
The Washington, DC Council lambasted the police department’s
system of surveillance cameras, with several members saying
vehemently that they did not want the technology to be used
at all. The objections, with several members talking about the
Orwellian potential of the cameras, could have serious consequences.
Council member Jim Graham said: “These cameras have been
set up to deal with demonstrations and dissent. This will have
a chilling effect and discourage citizens from demonstrating
openly here in the capital of the United States of America.”
Fourteen DC police cameras were installed across the city without
notice to Congress or the council. Guidelines for their use
allow for the monitoring of traffic, large demonstrations and
city emergencies.
Kathy Patterson urged her colleagues to draft and submit a
bill to kill the camera program. She added she would also like
“the public’s perspective.” (Washington Post)
US wants prints
of Muslim visitors
The Justice Department announced Nov. 6 that it will require
thousands of students, workers and other men from five Muslim
countries who are temporarily residing in the US to be fingerprinted
and photographed, the latest step in its program to register
visitors from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, and Syria. US groups
representing Muslims and Arab Americans have denounced the plan
as ethnic profiling.
Under the new measure, which takes effect Nov. 15, men ages
16 and older from the five nations must register with a US immigration
officer by Dec. 16. They must present travel documents and proof
of residence, such as school registrations, and be interviewed,
fingerprinted, and photographed. They must check in with authorities
once a year. The fingerprints will be entered into a new, computer-based
system used to screen for terrorists, officials said. In addition,
the new program requires visitors to provide more information,
including their cell phone numbers and exact dates of travel.
(Washington Post)
Hundreds march against war on Iraq
In Richmond, Virginia on Nov. 9 nearly 700 people met for a
peaceful rally and then marched through downtown to voice their
opposition to a possible US invasion of Iraq. Richmond police
provided an escort.
One 69-year-old participant, David Rodriguez, said, “I
think this war in Iraq, Bush is doing it primarily to get his
hands on the oil. It’s inflamed the entire Middle East.
I think he’s manipulated the American people into thinking
this war is necessary, but it isn’t.”
Another protester, Bill Frankel-Streit, said he’d traveled
to Iraq in 1998 to deliver medicine and to see how Iraqi children
are suffering as a result of US sanctions. “Weapons of
mass destruction are the problem,” he declared. “It
doesn’t matter whose finger is on the trigger.” (Richmond
Times-Dispatch)
Proposed law seeks to make environmental protesters
pay
A bill passed by the state Senate of Pennsylvania, 36-14, would
force protesters to pay for the profit loss they caused a company
as a result of an “act of environmental harassment.”
Environmentalists are angry and say the bill threatens their
rights to “assemble and exercise freedom of speech on issues
of clean air, water, soil, food, and public health.” Sen.
James Gerlach, R-Chester, said, “No one begrudges people
their right to free speech and protest, but when a company has
to shut down and lose money, they should have that lost revenue
returned.”
Carole A. Rubley, R-Chester, member of the House Environmental,
Resources and Energy Committee, says she doubts the bill will
ever make it into law. She said no action has been taken since
the proposed bill was sent in June to her committee. Bills not
acted on by the end of the session die. (Associated Press)
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