[Organize] Aug 6 and 9, call and action

[Tara Dorabji]

Dear Friends,
Sorry for cross postings. The call to action for the Aug 6 and 9 days of action is below, please send it out. Also, just a reminder that we have a conference call for the Aug 6 and 9 working group on Thursday, July 6, 2:00pm Eastern, 
11:00 Pacific, various times in between. 
Call in number: 218-936-1200
code: 0358620 #
Be Well,
Tara

Proposed Agenda

1. Roll Call and Intros
2. Brief site updates
3. Media Plan
4. Action (call in, postcards, etc) 
5. Next Call

please forward...
*From Hiroshima to Yucca Mountain to the Middle East: Stop Bechtel*
NO NUKES! NO WARS! NO PROFITEERS! Support Indigenous Rights!

Between August 6 and 9, the anniversaries of the U.S. atomic bombings of 
Hiroshima and Nagasaki, demand an end to the war in Iraq, no military 
attacks on Iran or North Korea, and the global abolition of nuclear 
weapons, starting with our own. This year, we call on groups to protest 
at the corporate offices of Bechtel, the world's number-one nuclear 
profiteer, and at nuclear facilities everywhere. Sixty-one years after 
the U.S. killed tens of thousands of civilians by dropping nuclear bombs 
on two densely populated cities, our aim is to expose the continuing 
hypocrisy of the U.S. nuclear double standard and to directly confront 
the U.S. corporations who are perpetuating and profiting from a 
worldwide nuclear crisis and the war in Iraq.

August 9 has also been declared by the United Nations as the 
International Day of the World’s Indigenous People. Indigenous peoples 
have often borne the brunt of nuclear devastation. In the United States 
alone, Native Americans have seen their land stolen to build nuclear 
infrastructure, mined for uranium, and bombed with test weapons; the 
U.S. government continues to push forward with plans to store massive 
amounts of highly radioactive waste beneath Yucca Mountain in Nevada, a 
site sacred to the Western Shoshone. We have an opportunity to make the 
connections between nuclear proliferation and attacks on indigenous rights.

The U.S. is the ONLY country that has used nuclear weapons. As war and 
occupation continue in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush Administration is 
fomenting nuclear crises in Iran and North Korea. At the same time it is 
pushing for new nuclear weapons and power plants here at home. We say NO 
to nukes, NO to wars, NO to war profiteers, and YES to the sovereignty 
of indigenous people around the world!

*WHY BECHTEL *
Bechtel Corporation is a leading beneficiary of the Iraq war and 
corporate globalization policies. Bechtel “connects the dots” for the 
anti-war, anti-nuke and global justice movements. Through its 100 years 
of revolving-door relationships with government, Bechtel illustrates the 
connections between corporate profiteering and war, between nuclear 
power and nuclear weapons proliferation, between “free trade” and the 
exploitation of indigenous peoples, and between corporate power-brokers 
and decision-makers at the highest levels of government. Click here for 
more background <http://www.august6.org/why_bechtel>.

*WHERE TO PROTEST *
Bechtel has many facilities, projects and offices across the country 
<http://www.august6.org/whereis_bechtel> and around the world. Plans are 
underway for protests at most of the major U.S. nuclear weapons 
facilities, including the Livermore <http://www.august6.org/bay_area%5D> 
and Los Alamos Labs, the Oak Ridge plant in Tennessee, the Nevada Test 
Site and the Pantex plant in Texas. Actions are also planned at 
Bechtel’s Bettis Atomic Laboratory <http://www.august6.org/pittsburgh> 
in Pennsylvania, and Bechtel corporate offices in Houston 
<http://www.august6.org/bay_area> and San Francisco. See www.August6.org 
for a growing list of actions.

*ACTION IDEAS *
Based on your group's capacity and background, you could organize anything:

    * marches
    * civil disobedience
    * citizen’s inspections
    * events that promote the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
      Commitments Act <http://www.august6.org/hr_373> (H. Res. 373)
    * teach-ins
    * educational events
    * outreach.

You might want to organize a bus trip to one of the larger regional 
events, or a protest at a nuclear power plant that Bechtel built or at 
another nuclear profiteer’s facility or office, such as BWX 
Technologies, Lockheed Martin or Raytheon 
<http://www.august6.org/war_profiteers>. We especially encourage civil 
disobedience and nonviolent direct action. Let’s use our people power to 
confront key pillars of war and empire - including corporations like 
Bechtel.

At the 2004 World Social Forum, Arundahati Roy called on people to 
identify and locate the offices of Iraq war profiteers 
<http://www.forumsocialmundial.org.br/dinamic.php?pagina=arundhati_2004_ing> 
“in every city and every country across the world” and “go after them.” 
She continued, “We could shut them down. It’s a question of bringing our 
collective wisdom and experience of past struggles to bear on a single 
target. It’s a question of the desire to win.”

*WE CAN WIN *
Recently, the Western Shoshone Nation and its supporters helped to 
postpone indefinitely the “Divine Strake” simulated nuclear test 
explosion at the Nevada Test Site that could have exposed people who 
live downwind from a dust cloud of radioactive particulates. Indigenous 
resistance in Cochabamba, Bolivia, forced that government to cancel 
Bechtel’s contract after the company privatized Cochabamba’s water 
systems and sent prices skyrocketing. In San Francisco, activists helped 
to defeat Bechtel’s plans to privatize water in their hometown.
*
*WHO WE ARE **
This call was initiated by an ad hoc coalition of local and regional 
groups organizing August 6-9 actions <http://www.august6.org/about> in 
collaboration with the UFPJ Nuclear Disarmament/Redefining Security 
Working Group <http://unitedforpeace.org/article.php?type=71&list=type>.

Our efforts are intended to complement the United Nations’ International 
Day of the World’s Indigenous People 
<http://www.august6.org/www.un.org/depts/dhl/indigenous/> (Aug. 9); 
Global Call Iraq’s call for civil resistance to end the Iraq occupation 
<http://www.august6.org/www.globalcalliraq.org> (Aug. 6-9); the War 
Resisters League’s “Stop the Merchants of Death 
<http://www.warresisters.org/smod/smod_hp.shtml>” campaign and its 
upcoming conference on war profiteering (Sept. 29-Oct. 2), United for 
Peace and Justice’s Nuclear Disarmament Campaign and No War on Iran 
Campaign <http://www.unitedforpeace.org/article.php?id=3240>, and 
growing efforts to link the anti-nuclear, anti-war, anti-corporate 
globalization and indigenous rights movements around common themes. We 
also hope to build momentum for the Declaration of Peace 
<http://www.declarationofpeace.org>'s September 21-28 week of resistance 
to end the occupation of Iraq.

*JOIN THE CALL*
We invite other groups to join in this call 
<http://www.august6.org/endorse>. You can circulate the call among 
progressive organizations in your community; you can connect with others 
who are organizing against the war machine. Seek peace, be part of the 
solution.

Be sure to list the activities that you are planning on the august6.org 
calendar: Add your event now <http://www.august6.org/add_event>.

*The following groups are participating in the August 6-9 planning:*

    * Citizen Alert Nevada
    * Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety
    * Global Call Iraq Campaign
    * GRACE Nuclear Abolition Project
    * Nevada Desert Experience
    * Nuclear Watch of New Mexico
    * Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance
    * Peace Action
    * Peace Farm, Amarillo
    * Physicians for Social Responsibility Maine
    * Pittsburgh August 6 Committee <http://pittsburgh.august6.org>
    * Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice
    * Tri-Valley CAREs
    * UC Santa Cruz Students Against War
    * United for Peace and Justice
    * War Resister League Stop the Merchants of Death Campaign
    * Western States Legal Foundation
    * Women's International League for Peace and Freedom

-- 
Tara Dorabji
Outreach Director
Tri-Valley CAREs
www.trivalleycares.org
tara at trivalleycares.org
ph: (925) 443-7148
fax: (925) 443-0177

Before the word, was the silence. In this silence existed neither thought nor judgment. First came laughter,then the tears, and the sound was born. With the sound, the world flooded with memories.