ilovemylife: THIS IS IT. THE BIG EVENT. STAND UP & BE HUMAN

DARFUR is a western region in the country of SUDAN.
The President, Omar al-Bashir, of Sudan is killing some people that he doesn't like, the Darfuri families. When you target a group of people because of who there are it is not only sick, we invented a word for it after World War II. The word is GENOCIDE. But Bashir says that he isn't murdering his people. But by accounts but his, he is. And there are Chinese companies in Sudan with oil rigs reaping their oil. And 70% of the money made by selling the Sudanese oil goes to buy the very weapons that are used to murder the people of Darfur and on the border of Sudan and Chad.

Recognizing liars isn't a difficult thing. But it does mean we have to face the truth. And sometimes we choose not to face the truth. Sad, very, very sad. And a disgrace. And it means once again that we never meant it when we said “NEVER AGAIN!”

DO or DIE.

WE DO. . .

or . . .THEY DIE. .................................................................................................................

.................................................................................................................

WE = the average, common every day human being, living in our homes.

THEY = the average, common every day human beings, the Darfuri family members and some Chadian family members.

There's a GENOCIDE going on. But is your American free press reporting it?

Who cares? President Bush - after reading the report on the 100 day 1994 Rwandan genocide that President Clinton complicitly allowed to go on, while ignoring its grim story - wrote in the margins of the report

“Not On MY Watch”

Well, we know he didn’t mean it. Don’t we?

Does he mean ANYthing he says?

Rwanda went on for 100 days. Darfuri families having been living, or dying, in a state of “shock and awe” otherwise defined as genocide since 2004 – for over four years. Yes, four years and “not on MY watch” are just

empty

words.

In GW Bush’s second swearing to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States he uttered these words:

“All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know: the United States will not ignore your oppression, or excuse your oppressors…” I think that is exactly what GW has done…ignored the Darfuri families’ oppression and excused their oppressors.

In the same speech just a couple paragraphs below he also said:

“The leaders of governments with long habits of control need to know: To serve your people you must learn to trust them. Start on this journey of progress and justice, and America will walk at your side.” How does he say his words without choking while he says them.

His words are noble. His actions are not.

He says a lot of things. He just doesn’t do many of them, but the senseless ones.

<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<

PETER, PAUL AND MARY lyrics - Rolling Home

(Eric Andersen)

Truth, with all its far out schemes,

Lets time decide what it should mean;

It's not the time but just the dreams that die.

And sometimes when the room is still,

Time with so much truth to kill,

Leaves you by the window sill so tied

Without a wing, to take you high,

Without a clue to tell you why.

Now, I just want to keep my name, not bother anybody's game

Without ideas of gold or fame or insane heights.

I don't want a lot of money, I don't want a Playboy Bunny,

Just a love to call me honey late at night,

In my arms, by my side, in my arms late at night.

But I don't know, I ain't been told,

Ev'rybody wants a hand to hold.

They're so afraid of being old,

So scared of dying, so unknown

And so alone, rollin' home.

Well, I see the ones who crawl like moles

Who for a front would trade their souls,

A broken mirror's the only hole for them;

And for you who'd exchange yourselves,

Just to be somebody else,

Pretending things you never felt or meant;

Hey, you don't live what you defend,

You can't give so you just bend.

Now if you care what people think,

Like they supplied some missing link;

They'll just stand back and watch you sink so slow.

They'll never help you to decide,

They'll only take you for a ride,

After which they'll try and hide the fact that they don't know

What you should do, where you should go,

What you should do, where you should go.

There's nothing big I want to prove,

No mountains that I need to move,

Or even claim what's right or true for you.

My sights, my songs are slightly charred,

You might think they miss their mark,

But things are only what they are and nothing new

But for me, I think they'll do,

But for me, I think they'll do.

Well, I can see a king and queen, a beggar falling at my feet;

They all must see the same sad dreams at night;

Futility and senseless war, pit the rich against the poor,

While cause is buried long before the fight

For what was wrong, for what was right,

It's just the strong, who ever says what's right.

I thought of this song because of one word that is in it near the end: senseless.

<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<

We Had to Invent a Word for What Was Done

The Word

Genocide

The following excerpt about the definition of GENOCIDE is taken from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum site:

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10007043

On December 9, 1948, in the shadow of the Holocaust and in no small part due to the tireless efforts of a Polish-Jewish lawyer named Raphael Lemkin, the United Nations approved the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. This convention establishes "genocide” as an international crime, which signatory nations “undertake to prevent and punish.” It defines genocide as:

Genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

INTERNATIONAL MILITARY TRIBUNAL: THE DEFENDANTS

The defendants listen as the prosecution begins introducing documents at the International Military Tribunal trial of war criminals at Nuremberg. November 22, 1945.

On October 18, 1945, the chief prosecutors of the International Military Tribunal (IMT) read the indictments against 24 leading Nazi officials. The four charges brought against these officials were:

1. Conspiracy to commit crimes of peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity

2. Crimes against peace

3. War crimes

4. Crimes against humanity

At this link there are the sentences handed down to the defendants at the

International Military Tribunal:

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10007070

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

The Great Mandala by Peter Yarrow & Richie Havens

This weekend, Saturday, but probably more on Sunday, there are events going on around the planet earth networked by average, common every day human beings who are leaving the comforts of their homes for people who have no homes, STANDING UP, walking, lying down at the Boston Commons DIE-INS, carrying posters with messages that Time Is Up - Darfur needs us to be what we claim to be.
Decent human beings who have the moral conscience that we were born with.

I sent my final email out to my list of sign-ups and others that are on an email list regarding Darfur, but most of which I have never met. Here it is:

April 26, 2007 Last Email before the Newport Darfur Walk & Gathering

Dear Person of Conscience,

This email is going out to all people that have either signed up for Newport’s Darfur Walk & Gathering on www.savedarfur.org/globaldays or are on my original Darfur email list. I would like to send what will probably be my last email before the Walk & Gathering, this Saturday, April 28 at 3:00 p.m. – 4:30 p.m. Rain or Shine. Let’s send positive thoughts out for the “Shine” option. I request that if you haven’t gone online to sign up, that you do so. This gives me a better sense of what to tell NBC, ABC and CBS when I call them again Saturday morning to see if they have chosen us for coverage that day on the news. It is important that Darfur gets in the news. If you go to www.beawitness.org and watch an extremely brief clip, you will see why it is important to me that this Darfur Walk & Gathering get in the news here in Rhode Island along side all the other events around the world.

Bring your digital cameras, take pictures and download them to me at________. I am looking for a few good pictures that capture the essence of our day to send in to have them posted alongside every other event on www.savedarfur.org If you are able Save Darfur asks us to put clips of the day up on www.youtube.com This is our way of saying we’ve had enough silence and complicity on this human rights issue of genocide vs. living out a natural life. Cox Cable is willing to put up video of the day’s event on the public access channel. It needs to be in DVD form. Another great way to help be the media instead of waiting for the media to find this story and put it on the radar screen of what is note worthy. Real news and not the entertainment news that is too common.

This is the first time that the Save Darfur Coalition of Churches, organizations and small groups have networked and planned the Darfur movement in this way where we aren’t having one central city where we transport ourselves out of state and even have to stay overnight to participate in this grassroots quiet, but steadily growing swell of voices that are saying “NO MORE” Standing Idly By and being complicit in yet one more genocide. This is the first genocide that the citizens around the world are empowered by the networking available to us through the wonderful world of the web. Over 400 events in the USA are planned this week of Global Days for Darfur. And over 30 countries besides US are stepping up and taking our swing at being the voice of the people who have no voice in Darfur.

GOOD for US. And we must not let the momentum grind to an abrupt stop after Saturday. I just got off the phone of our weekly conference call with the Save Darfur office in Washington, D.C. And what I like about this activism this time is that we already have in place plans for two or three follow-up actions to take after Saturday and Sunday’s big events are over. I’ll be telling you all about these on Saturday.

Don’t stay home. Come. Bring your friends, children, family members, co-workers…I am so excited that we ARE going to have media coverage. This is one of the goals for this under-reported story that belongs on the front pages of responsible journalism. Not relegated to a Letter to the Editor or infrequent mentions over the four years that it has been allowed to deny our words of NEVER AGAIN. Overall, Rhode Island is apathetic about this issue. But you are not. And because there is so much disinterest and apathy, you are even more important than you think you are.

The Newport Daily News has committed two things: 1) publish my Letter to the Editor, hopefully, April 28, Friday, otherwise, my text will be stale 2) they are sending a reporter and a staff photographer to our event. So, if you have a Darfur t-shirt, wear it. If you have a blue hat we suggest you wear it to signify UN Peacekeepers’ blue. Four women “who rule in my book”
got together last evening for two intensely artful hours and made fabulous posters for you to carry and make our presence effective as we walk. I have various flyers that will need to be passed out not only to you, but to people we pass as we walk to Washington Square. This is an historic town and we are on an historic path to be the first citizens to insist that genocide’s termination is long over due.

We are a part of probably hundreds of thousands over the weekend around the world. We may not be a huge group, but we walk along side other “people of conscience” around the nation and around this planet that all want to see peace. We are given love to give it.

And please, when asked by a volunteer to sign the petition to ask Fidelity to divest their holdings from Chinese Oil Companies in Sudan which in turn that money buys the Sudanese government’s military equipment (70% of Sudan’s budget goes to the military) to bomb and murder their own unarmed families in their homes - please, sign the petition. It IS ONE thing we can do with or without our government’s direct support and action.

Come, find that there are others in Rhode Island who care about the human disaster, genocide.

Thanks for being willing to “Stand Up & Stand Out” for Darfur.

Sandra

<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<:<

Great news! Thanks to your work, 96 Senators are now signing the

Biden-Lugar Darfur letter to President Hu of China!

Here’s The Letter your elected politicians have been signing to pressure China to stop being supporters of President Omar al-Bashir and his government-supported genocide on unarmed families, while using rape as a tool of genocide.

April ___, 2006

President Hu Jintao

c/o Ambassador Zhou Wenzhong

Embassy of China

2300 Connecticut Avenue NW

Washington, DC 20008

Dear President Hu:

We are writing to request your assistance on a matter of grave mutual concern requiring urgent action.

The devastating crisis in western Sudan has escalated despite UNSC Resolution 1706, and the subsequent agreement brokered by the United Nations late last year in Addis Ababa to establish a joint African Union-UN peacekeeping mission in Darfur. Simply put, the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) has not had the troop level, financial resources, institutional capacity or mandate to protect civilians or humanitarian organizations in Darfur. The Government of Sudan has yet to formally agree to admit UN peacekeepers. In fact, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir recently sent a disturbing letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon in which he backed away from the Addis agreement to implement phases II and III, the heavy support package and a robust UN peacekeeping force. President al-Bashir’s stonewalling while civilians are raped and killed in Darfur is unacceptable.

The conflict waged by Sudanese government forces and government-backed Janjawid militias against armed rebel groups has driven more than 230,000 Darfuri refugees into Chad, and displaced more than 120,000 Chadians. Hundreds of thousands of Darfuri civilians have been killed and an estimated 2 million displaced in Darfur itself. The conflict has had particularly devastating consequences for women and children, who make up the vast majority of victims. Humanitarian operations have also been increasingly attacked and disrupted in recent months—leaving millions without access to the most basic assistance.

We appreciate the steps the international community and China have taken to confront war crimes and other egregious human rights violations in Darfur. Now, we urge China to do even more and to reassess one recent decision. Providing the Government of Sudan an interest-free loan to build a presidential palace clearly sends the wrong message to Khartoum. We hope that you will reconsider the loan and impress upon President al-Bashir the need to halt Sudan's military operations throughout Darfur, to withdraw Sudanese troops from the area, and to accept a robust AU/UN peacekeeping force in Darfur. These steps, at a minimum, are essential to enforce the ceasefire, protect civilians, ensure access to humanitarian assistance, and begin the path to reconstruction and reconciliation in Darfur.

As Members of the U.S. Congress, our primary objectives in this endeavor, and those of our constituents across the United States, are to protect civilians in Darfur, end the violence, find a just resolution to the political conflict, and begin the long path to reconstruction and reconciliation.

We must now work together as an international community; there is no time left to wait. We therefore appeal to you today to use your influence in words and in deeds to protect civilians. China has a lead role to play in insuring that President al-Bashir accept the best and most reasonable path to peace, move forward with the heavy support package, and the full contingent of UN peacekeepers and related personnel in Darfur. We would appreciate any information you can share on actions China intends to take to protect civilians in Darfur.

Sincerely,

Your Senator’s Name

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

www.savedarfur.org

www.fidelityoutofsudan.com

www.genocideintervention.net

www.standnow.org

Call 1-800-GENOCIDE

to tell President Bush,

your Governor,

your U.S. Senators and Representatives

to proactively support and/or pass legislation to end the genocide in Darfur.