I will scatter them, and then I will gather them: Deuteronomy 4:27; 28:64; 32:26; Isaiah 11:12; Jeremiah 23:8 / Read about the African Slave Trade in Deuteronomy 28th Chapter. REPARATIONS NOW IN OUR LIFETIME! N E W S L E T T E R…….#20 AUGUST 2001 "Take direct action against the U.S. government!" Dr. Robert Brock ********* GIVE POWER AND MEANING TO THE REPARATIONS MASS MOVEMENT - GIVE OF YOURSELF!   Note from the REPNOW Newsletter Editor: REPARATIONS ADVOCATES ARE NOT GOING OFF INTO THE SUNSET UNTIL COMPENSATION FOR THE TRANSATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE ARE PAID TO THE DESCENDANTS OF SLAVES I’m publishing another issue of the REPNOW Newsletter due to the fact that the United States and other ruling nations are threatening not to attend the World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) if this meeting is not held on their terms. Unreal, right?! One of the culprits, the United States, the guilty one after instituting Slavery and sustaining human suffering unto this day, called the "Greatest Country in the World" and the so-called "proponent of Human Rights" is threatening to pass on the WCAR if payments for Reparations for its involvement in the Slave Trade in Blacks out of Africa are to be discussed. Do we really need the United States there? Let’s think about this. If they sit out the WCAR because of the above reason, aren’t they confirming the truth about their being a country that sustains racism against Blacks and other people of color? Aren’t they speaking volumes in confirming our plight? Aren’t they telling the World Community that they are indeed RACIST and are not going to do a darn thing about it? That which the Founding Fathers of America have done to Blacks out of Africa and to us - their descendants and survivors of this horrible captivity - is unconscionable. Human nature - the "don’t blame me" attitude - is alive and kicking. We didn’t get here by coming through the woodwork, and the misery and frightful and barbaric enslavement we faced at the hands of the Slave Masters with US governmental support and the racism and discrimination resulting from this heinous Slave Trade cannot and will not be dismissed! This is an issue that the United States government has got to address, discuss, and resolve. Colonial America brought us to these shores, and now with Reparations, the United States has got to take us back to where WE WANT TO GO! And those who wish to remain in this country must be compensated for the anguish and savage treatment we yet endure. If the United States is the proponent of Human Rights, then they have to prove it and act accordingly. Until the US pays Reparations for the Slave Trade and the harm it has caused Blacks out of Africa, it is no more a proponent of Human Rights than are the Ku Klux Klan and the Willie Lynchers. And the United States has no right to point the finger at China for its Human Rights violations until this "Greatest Country in the World (the US)" resolves its own Human Rights violations. At every chance, it’s imperative to continue to force the US and other White ruling Nations to demonstrate just how racist they really are. We’ve proclaimed it, and now they are admitting to it in not working with the true victims to resolve the racist issues that sustain degradation and suppression of Black Peoples. Let our forces appeal to the US Supreme Court and the Secretary General Kofi Annan to let them also commit themselves one way or the other. So far we have it in writing that the US refuses to discuss the racism and discrimination Blacks face and the past atrocities of the Slave Trade. They know what they have done and continue to do to suppress and control Black Peoples. Unfortunately, they don’t know and don’t care to know the wise, intelligent, and right thing to do to foster harmony and happiness between all groups throughout the country. Hey, I know I don’t speak for everyone, but one thing is for sure, we need Reparations and much worse than the European Jews need our tax dollars to build new settlements all over Israel and schools for their determination. By the way, why aren’t Blacks all up in arms about this? What is wrong with us? Why do we stand by and permit this racism and discrimination to continue while our people continue to live in the worst communities in the country and even without kitchens and bathrooms in some rural areas and while our children lack an adequate and significant education to encourage achievement, prosperity, and well-being??? We have been quiet too long and long enough! Let’s end this complacency NOW! We’ve got to stop the US from sending our tax dollars to Israel while at the same time spending our tax dollars to build prisons and incarcerate our youth and men and women who are conditioned to failure in the ghettoes where they are compelled to live. Yeah, I know, we don’t have to sit in the back of the buses or use the back entrances any more. But look at where we are in this White Society and in the World!!! Wake up and take a good long look! Have you driven through any one of the US ghettoes lately??? Come on, my people, this can’t continue like this. Just driving through - and don’t get lost, whatever you do - is absolutely frightening and depressing: filthy streets, dilapidated buildings, trashy vacant lots, dumping grounds, broken down iron fences, and poverty infestation everywhere. And this exists in every major city and all over the United States, i.e., this country that is supposed to be the "proponent of Human Rights." I dare you to go take a good look at what the powers-that-be have created and done to our people while they fatten Israel with a minimum of ten billion dollars EVERY SINGLE YEAR!!! This is blatant racism and discrimination that is killing us, and we, as a People numbering at least 50 million are doing the least possible while our people live in poverty and are transformed into monsters due to the controlled environments in which most of us are forced to live. Don’t be fooled by the psychology that we should give back to and remain in the ghetto. The ghettoes are hell holes with all manner of bad elements to purposely produce and perpetuate the impoverished, single parenting, welfare recipients, prostitution, drug dealers, the illiterate, and worst of all, Black-on-Black crimes. To where can the impoverished move without substantial salaries for affordable and decent housing? Let’s not play dumb!!! The powers-that-be have maintained a controlled environment and a merciless system to keep Black Folks in poverty, in depressing residential areas far from the "American Dream," in suffering, in peril, and in despair obviously with great hopes for our demise. And they have been very, very successful in keeping Blacks in their places in order to maintain this madness. It’s immoral and inequitable that the powers-that-be, the regulators, the Environmental Protection Agency, and all those organizations determined to uphold White control and their healthy lifestyles will demand and mandate that EVERYONE conserve energy, water, and end pollution, etc., but no where do these groups ubiquitously speak out and demand that EVERYONE end RACISM, an issue that is just as important as is safe water and air! Racism is a most debilitating disease of hatred and oppression that infests the minds of all its victims and creates environments and circumstances that slowly destroy generations of peoples as has already happened in the United States and in other countries that exploited Blacks out of Africa in the Slave Trade. We cannot continue to succumb to the misery and tribulations we face - WE JUST CAN’T! Reparations, relocation, self determination, and empowerment (if it is your choice to remain in the lands of our captors) are the only solutions to our problems. Hence, we must all get involved and end this insane madness that our people face. And don’t delude yourselves in believing that because you live in an affluent suburb that it’s not "your" problem. The United States is a complex racist society with overt and covert institutional racism that sets Blacks up to fail in its efforts to provide the least possible assistance towards promoting gratification and contentment in hiring practices, in the school systems, in medical care, and in the ghettoes and other Black communities. Believe it!!! Blacks are victims of a racist society that conditions and wills us to fail and commit crimes in order that we fall into the hands of this reprehensible and deadly penal system. Overcrowded, impoverished ghettoes spur violence and are the reasons this United State system directs the working poor into impoverished communities, SO THAT THE POLICE CAN PUT BLACKS IN JAIL AND LONG-TERM PRISONS until death or old age! The horrible powers of racism are rampant throughout these political, so-called JUSTICE, social, and educational systems and affect all Blacks, as well as other people of color. Therefore, THIS DILEMMA IS "OUR" PROBLEM! Below, please find an "Open Letter" requesting Reparations for those of us who seek to leave the lands of our captivity, as well as for those who wish to remain. I urge you to become even more involved in the Reparations Movement and more diligent in the demand for the DEBT that this country owes Descendants of Slaves. We have come too far to give up now. Stay strong and be active in the cause because our efforts are for the liberation of us all. And for those who are working persistently and joining the Reparations Movement, may the True and Living GOD bless us and guide us as we strive to amend the ills that plague Black Peoples all over the World. Continue to spread the news about Reparations, and send this newsletter to at least ten people who know nothing about this cause. By the way, YOU DON’T WANT TO MISS THIS ISSUE! To those attending the World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) in behalf of Africa and the Descendants of Slaves, again, I pray that the Most High GOD will be with you to prepare a means of acquiring Reparations for the TransAtlantic Slave Trade and an end to RACISM. PLEASE Support The Afrikan Diaspora Nation State Conference scheduled for October 19 - 21, 2001 (See Calendar of Events). Tziona Yisrael, Editor REPARATIONS NOW IN OUR LIFETIME Newsletter www.thelawkeepers.org (Click on "Repnow") ********* *******The LawKeepers, Co.******* *Canaan is the Land / Jerusalem is the Place* *Where My GOD Has Said HIS Heart Would Be* E-mail Address: Afraqueen@AOL.COM August 8, 2001 AN OPEN LETTER TO THE UN COMMISSION FOR HUMAN RIGHTS, THE UNITED NATIONS (AND WATCH), AND THE MASSES REGARDING REPARATIONS FOR SLAVERY TO END THE CRUEL INJUSTICES BLACKS FACE IN WHITE SOCIETIES AND OUR RIGHT TO LIBERTY AND FREEDOM TO LEAVE THE LANDS OF OUR CAPTIVITY AND TO WORSHIP FREELY   Dear UN Commission and All Who Desire Peace and Harmony on this Planet, REGARDING: Ending RACISM and DISCRIMINATION Obtaining Reparations for Africa Our Right to Leave the Lands of Our Captivity Obtaining Reparations for Descendants of Slaves to Relocate to Friendly Countries Obtaining Reparations for Blacks who wish to remain in the Diaspora Our Right to Self Determination and to Educate Our Children Our Right to Worship Freely Our Right to Human Rights According to the Preamble of The Universal Declaration of Human Rights REPARATIONS NOW IN OUR LIFETIME FOR OUR WELFARE AND IN OUR PURSUIT FOR HAPPINESS! THE ASSERTION THAT RESTS IN WHITE CIRCLES AND DISSEMINATED TO BLACKS THAT "MOST WHITES ARE NOT RACIST" IS PROVED IN THIS WHITE SOCIETY TO BE THE GREATEST FARCE SINCE THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT! IT IS THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION, THE U.S. GOVERNMENT, AS WELL AS OTHER WHITE RULING POWERS THAT ARE MAINTAINING AND CONTROLLING RACISM IN WHITE SOCIETIES AND FORBIDING THE NECESSITY OF THE WCAR THAT COULD REMEDY THE AGONY OF RACISM AND FEASIBLY INSTITUTE JUSTICE IN RACIST SOCIETIES AND THIS WORLD! I am writing in behalf of The LawKeepers, Co. and others seeking Reparations for the Slave Trade and for the ongoing racism in today’s White Societies that harms Blacks and other people of color. Black Peoples all over the World have been victims of greed (the TransAtlantic Slave Trade), gross racism and neglect, hate crimes and merciless and barbaric atrocities that have caused Black Humanity to be under total control of the powers-that-be and without any empowerment of significance or self determination. Without a doubt, Blacks are victims of the worst Human Rights atrocities, ethnic cleansing, and forced migration ever imaginable. The reason is that the Slave Trade has caused our condemnation, defeat, and our calamity unto this day, and all because our forebears were completely usurped and degraded during the institution of Slavery that took Blacks out of Africa. The White Societies on this globe lack compassion for Descendants of Slaves and refuse to forget the Slavery and its stigma that sustains the oppression and despair we endure. If most White Folks were not racist, then Blacks wouldn’t be suffering at their hands and under their control unto this today. Because of this oppression, many Blacks, with the aid of Reparations, wish to leave the lands from where our forbears were forcibly migrated to live in friendly countries that do not tolerate racism. And for those countries that open their doors to Descendants of Slaves, we feel that it is only fair for the World Community to support these nations’ exemption of all debts owed to all creditors, as a gesture of appreciation and compassion in their efforts to do what’s right for the oppressed. We also suggest that there be an International Fund in place for contributions from all countries that prospered from Slave Labor for Reparations for Africa and for Descendants of Slaves wherever we choose to live. With Reparations we deserve the Human Right to establish our own settlements in friendly countries. After all, we did not ask to be brought here. WE WERE FORCIBLY TAKEN TO EUROPEAN CONTROLED COUNTRIES IN CHAINS WITHOUT ANY REGARD FOR OUR HUMAN RIGHTS. Settlements for Descendants of Slaves in friendly countries is not too much to ask considering what the United States grants on a yearly basis to Israel and other countries in the billions of U.S. tax dollars annually. The US funds Israeli settlements and its social programs with our tax dollars. In that our forebears were Slaves for hundreds of years in this country, the right thing to do would be to enable Descendants of Slaves to leave the lands of our captors and pursue true happiness if this is our desire. The United States is also on record using our tax dollars to assist the European Jews in acquiring Reparations for the slave labor they endured in their Holocaust. The United States even set up a Commission to assist them in obtaining their funds from Swiss banks. Yet the United States does not want to provide Reparations to Descendants of Slaves for the TransAtlantic Slave Trade that took place on US soil. And to add insult to injury, the United States has refused to discuss the atrocities committed during the Slave Trade or the RACISM/DISCRIMINATION and other injustices Descendants of Slaves face unto this day at the World Conference Against Racism. The World Conference Against Racism was established specifically to end racism and fight for the Human Rights of ALL Peoples. In that the United States has assisted people of other countries, especially the European Jews and Israelis, in building settlements for them while Descendants of Slaves live in the worst ghettoes known to exist in a Super Power country called "The Greatest Country in the World" with educational systems in impoverished communities lacking the substance needed to educate and inspire Blacks to excel is the blatant racism that the United Nations and the WCAR are specifically established to discuss and bring to an end in this World. The United Nations and the WCAR cannot back down on its responsibility and purpose for being, as ending racism will end the pain and suffering of Black Peoples everywhere. Racism is racism by any other name. If the United States will give other groups Reparations and assist yet others to acquire same, then to not give Reparations to Blacks for the heinous TransAtlantic Slave Trade resulting from the merciless and barbaric atrocities it entailed and the injustices Blacks yet face in this country today is racism, discrimination, race hatred of Blacks and injustice of the worst kind. We all know that the United States is not about to end the savage inequalities Blacks face in this country. If after 136 years (since the end of Slavery in America), the Black dilemma in the United States has not improved any more than it has, then why should we waste our time and the precious lives of our children waiting for a change for the better that we know will never manifest? Therefore, the only alternative is for us to obtain Reparations and seek to relocate elsewhere. And the fact that the US refuses to speak on the atrocities of the TransAtlantic Slave Trade and the institutional racism that plagues this country is just more reason why Descendants of Slaves should be given the opportunity to leave the land that forcibly brought us to these shores. The following are just a few MAJOR instances of U.S. cruelty to Blacks in this day and age that serve as shameful and disheartening evidence of total disregard for the needs and welfare of Blacks and for Black interests and is even more evidence of continued efforts to suppress Black achievement and prosperity: The Tulsa Riots, induced by racist Whites, that brought down the affluent Black "Wall Street" Community in 1921 The CIA/Crack Connection And its Distribution in the African American Communities Nationwide Rosewood - where an angry White mob burned down this predominantly Black town The merciless Tuskegee Syphilis Project involving the United States Public Health Services infecting 339 black males with syphilis that resulted in murdering and affecting these men and their wives, not to mention their loved ones who stood by and watched them suffer COINTELPRO - during the 1960’s and the 1970’s the FBI and other sections of the US military and intelligence apparatus conducted a secret war against black political groups and the Native American Movement. The Federal Government conducted a secret, systematic and at times, savage use of force and fraud against a small political minority exercising fundamental freedoms considered sacred by the US Constitution. The Demise of Affirmative Action - which was an erroneous remedy for past atrocities against Blacks Government Investment in the Construction of Prisons for Black Imprisonment (Nouveau Slavery) resulting in White Wealth at the expense of Black and Latino Prisoners who make up the overwhelming majority of those prosecuted in federal courts and given stiff mandatory sentences of ten years to life even for the lesser crimes. But, White wealthy political donors and criminals routinely get favors for their money in the form probation, lesser time in jail, or none at all. US Government’s TOTAL DISREGARD for Congressman Conyers’ H.R Bill 40 that’s been proposed annually since 1989 to "establish a commission to examine the institution of slavery... economic discrimination against African-Americans ...to make recommendations to the Congress on appropriate remedies." Social Programs and tax cuts that benefit the rich and not the working poor Racist and Unjust Hiring Practices Police Brutality and Murder and Racial Profiling based solely on racial appearance Growing array of studies documenting racial disparities in the nation's criminal justice system White Superiority White Privilege, Double Standards, and Gross Impoverishment and Deprivation BLATANT MEASURES TO PREVENT THE EXPOSURE OF THE UNITED STATES AND COLONIAL AMERICA’S INVOLVEMENT IN THE TRANSATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE and race hatred at the World Conference Against Racism The racism and discrimination blacks face in the United States is real, and there is no indication or signs of these injustices and degradation declining. And what’s worse is that the US government is making no effort to eliminate the disparity and inequality that sustains Blacks second-class citizenship. Therefore, we must exercise our Human Rights to leave the lands to where we were taken as Slaves and pursue the opportunity to serve and worship Our GOD according to HIS Ordinances, guidelines, and determination of Righteousness, as it is written in HIS Book of the Law outlined in the First Five Books of the "Old Testament." All of us must be given the RIGHT to return to our cultures from which we were taken during the TransAtlantic Slave Trade and tragedy that destroyed as many as 100 million Blacks so that White Societies and their Nations could be termed the wealthiest and strongest in the World. Given the fact that all Descendants of Slaves do not desire to leave the United States or other white dominated country, we also wish that Reparations will be used to better the lives of all Blacks and other people of color who choose to remain in the land of our captivity. We are especially and most definitely concerned about Black progeny. We must save our children, our youth, our heritage, our future. And we must be able to teach our children and other people of color the academics and survival among all Nations, as well as the Truth - that Blacks are not inferior to Whites. After the pain and suffering, humiliation, and suppression we have experienced on a daily basis since our captivity, we must also instill a positive sense of self esteem in being Black in our children and in all of us who are deemed people of color. Without Reparations for Descendants of Slaves and an end to race hatred and the many injustices and crimes in place against Black Humanity, there will be no harmony between groups, peoples, and nations on this globe. Blacks and other people of color only want to live in appropriate and stable environments conducive to producing admirable and altruistic members of our societies and the World. IT IS TIME FOR AN END TO RACISM AND FOR REPARATIONS FOR THE EVILS OF THE TRANSATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE, SO THAT DESCENDANTS OF SLAVES CAN MOVE ON AND HEAL FROM ALL THE PERILS AND DEGRADATION BROUGHT UPON BLACKS BY THE SLAVEMASTERS AND THEIR DESCENDANTS! Respectfully, Tziona Y. Nelson, Executive Secretary The LawKeepers, Co. (A member of The LawKeepers, Co. whose Spirituality is GOD’s Book of the Law, as given to the Prophet Moses) ********* WORLD CONFERENCE AGAINST RACISM Black Power - Black Power August 5, 2001 Black Power - Black Power Either way will work! If the U.S. and its allies choose not to attend the WCAR we will have a golden opportunity to present our African Reparations Case to the rest of the World who are a potential and necessary Third Party in this issue, as in Plaintiffs, Defendants and a Jury of One's Peers. It will also be a golden opportunity to network amongst ourselves, watching for informants as we go. If the U.S. attends, then we can confront them face-to-face before the World. The fact of their opposition to attending if African Reparations are to be discussed is an excellent indicator that we are on the right track. Their failure to attend, to fess up, is a selling point in making our case to the potential third parties. Let us use the left against the right and the right against the left in these matters. The true masters do exactly this. And you can bet the U.S. is using it and has been using it for centuries. Let us put back into utilization our own African original concepts to restore our own African liberties. By Omowale Za African Reparations Activist wewinnin@juno.com ********* U.S. PROPOSES PACT ON RACISM AGENDA Compromise in works over language on slavery issue GENEVA, Aug. 6 — The United States, which has threatened to boycott a U.N. racism conference over African and Arab demands, Monday moved toward a compromise over a denunciation of slavery as long as it stops short of a basis for financial compensation. ‘The world community should recognize that the slave trade and the enslavement of Africans as well as colonialism constitute crimes against humanity.’ — AHMED BEN BELLA Ahmed Ben Bella, right, former Algerian president, and Aminata Traore, left, former minister for culture of Mali, ask for compensation for slavery during a news conference on the slavery in Africa, in Geneva, Switzerland on Monday.   "WE EXPRESS our deep regret and profound remorse for the terrible suffering caused," said proposed wording given by the U.S. team to other negotiators preparing for the World Conference Against Racism starting Aug. 31 in Durban, South Africa. The wording would substitute for an African proposal that would demand "an explicit apology" to victims by countries that benefited from slavery. Diplomats said the change on the slavery issue was important because the word "apology" could be used as a legal basis for future claims. South African Foreign Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, in Geneva to boost efforts for a successful conference that would include the United States, said she had yet to see the U.S. response and would have to study it before she could comment. But she said the African group was trying to compromise and the United States also had to be willing to make concessions. "We will give, but we would also like to take," Dlamini-Zuma told reporters. The African insistence on compensation for slavery and colonialism remains a major part of the draft declaration proposed for the conference. The U.S. proposal left a space to be filled by a discussion of colonialism, for which European countries refuse to consider paying compensation. The proposed African wording says that "states which are former colonial powers should extend apologies to all victims of colonialism for the massive human suffering caused." CALLS FOR COMPENSATION The United States has warned other countries that it will refuse to attend the meeting if the compensation demand or what it regards as unacceptable criticism of Israel remains on the agenda for the conference by the end of this week. Ahmed Ben Bella, a leader of Algeria’s drive for independence from France in 1962, said Monday that the West should acknowledge that the trans-Atlantic slave trade was a crime and compensate by forgiving Africa’s current debt. "The world community should recognize that the slave trade and the enslavement of Africans as well as colonialism constitute crimes against humanity," Ben Bella told reporters. "The Holocaust, in which seven million Jews died, has been recognized as a crime against humanity," he said. "The death of 142 million Africans during the slave trade was a holocaust too." Ben Bella is a member of a group — known as the Goree Initiative — launched in June in Senegal to push the Durban conference to address the issue of slavery. Goree is an island off the west coast of Africa where captured Africans were held before they were shipped across the Atlantic to be sold into slavery in the Western Hemisphere. The African group proposed having the final declaration say, "The World Conference recognizes that slavery, the slave trade, colonialism and apartheid constitute crimes against humanity." It also would recognize "the urgent need" of problems stemming from the practices of the past and call "on those who have benefited from these practices to assume full responsibility." It said steps could include "enhanced remedial developmental policies, programs and concrete measures." CLEARING THE AGENDA U.S. officials said Washington’s delegation, which includes Bush administration officials, was being joined by two Congressional Democrats, Tom Lantos of California, an outspoken supporter of Israel, and Cynthia McKinney of Georgia. McKinney said last week that the administration’s boycott threat "was a clear example of their indifference to racism." U.S. officials have said they were particularly disturbed by proposed wording equating Zionism with racism, but Arab delegates have indicated they are willing to drop the criticism of the movement that led to the founding of the modern state of Israel. Nonetheless, there are many other condemnations of Israel laced through the 88 pages of draft text, and the United States wants all of them removed as well. AGENDA ON REFUGEES BLASTED In other news, a decision to delete all reference to the 1951 Refugee Convention from the conference agenda was blasted by the rights group Human Rights Watch. "Refugees and asylum seekers are often double victims of racism," said Rachael Reilly, Refugee Policy Director at Human Rights Watch. "They flee their countries to escape racism and ethnic intolerance, then many of them are again subject to racist and xenophobic treatment in their countries of refuge." "It is deeply ironic that less than one week after the UN marked the 50th anniversary of the international refugee convention, states should choose to ignore its importance for the World Conference Against Racism," said Reilly in a press release. The group urged governments participating in the upcoming conference look seriously at the issues faced by refugees and asylum seekers world wide and to take immediate steps to reinsert a commitment to the 1951 Refugee Convention into the conference platform. By Ahmed Ben Bella The Associated Press contributed to this report. Submitted by AlArkam@webtv.net *** The former President of Algeria, Mr. Ahmed Ben Bella, is absolutely correct when he says that the WCAR must recognize the slave trade and colonialism as crimes against humanity. The Conference should also acknowledge that millions of African-Americans and Africans are still suffering from the lingering effects of the slave trade and plantation slavery. Minister Malik Al-Arkam www. afre-ngo. Org ********* CONGRESSMAN LANTOS ADVISES U.S.A. TO BOYCOTT THE WCAR Congressman Tom Lantos claims that if the issues of Zionism and slavery are on the WCAR agenda, U.S. participation would be like endorsing the lynching of Israel. The U.S. government's real fear is that a full and fair discussion of these issues will set in motion the wheels of justice for Africans, African-Americans and Palestinians. The administration of President George W. Bush dreads the day when African-American legislators, scholars and activists all join hands at the WCAR and inside the United Nations and expose the USA as the perpetrator of ethnocide, forced assimilation and institionalized racism against 40 million African-Americans. Pharoah Bush trembles at the thought of our people estabishing our own collective political identity inside the U.N. He is frightened at the prospect of the United Nations following the advice of the Honorable Silis Muhammad by placing a Reparations Sanction upon the U.S. government because of its long-term and ongoing oppression of African-Americans. And he is enraged by our just demand for Reparations and Restoration. Minister Malik Al-Arkam www.afre-ngo.org Submitted by BRC-REPARATIONS: Black Radical Congress - Reparations Caucus ********* REPARATIONS YES - MOVEMENT JuneTeenth International 1220 L St. N.W. Suite # 100-403 Washington, D.C. 20005 Announces Historical Nation-Wide Petition Campaign PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE July 31, 2001 On Tuesday, August 21, 2001 the nation-wide petition drive in support of reparations for Black American descendants of slavery will officially Kickoff in Capitol Heights, Maryland. According to Clara Peoples, founder of the People's Oregon JuneTeenth Reparations Project, commonly referred to as the "Forty Acres and a Mule" initiative, the goal of the petition drive is to increase public awareness of and interest in the issues surrounding reparations. The petition drive seeks to also gain the "people's support" for two key pieces of legislation: House Bill 40 and House Resolution 356. Both call on America to reexamine the complete institution of slavery and its lingering effects on America society. The Congressional bills also act to establish present day solutions and remedies for America's historical discrimination against its Black citizens, including a formal apology for slavery and specific acts of reparation that can begin to provide healing and a real sense of closure, not just for a race of people, but an entire nation. Congressman John Conyers has introduced House Bill 40 into every session of Congress since January of 1989, and his commitment to reparations is evidenced by his unwavering endeavors to continue to submit this bill every year until as he states, "it is passed into law" House Resolution 356 is a concurrent resolution whose first submission before congress occurred in June of 2000 by Congressman Tony Hall. Ms. Clara Peoples of Portland, Oregon, has worked all of her life to better the lives of Black Americans and her one true desire is that before her death, she will experience the reality of Reparations for her people. Ms. Lisa Clay of Portland, Oregon, a dedicated assistant to Ms. Clara Peoples is also a key organizer for this petition drive Michael Anthony Turner of Compton, CA will serve as the key organizer for the greater Los Angeles and West Coast area, and Lynn Elliott of Garland Texas the key organizer for the state of Texas. Dr. Saharra L. Bledsoe of Washington, D.C., founder of JuneTeenth International has accepted Ms. People's invitation to spearhead the national petition campaign. The entire campaign seeks to secure 50 thousand signatures from each state as conclusive evidence that America is now ready to make amends for the wrong and injury it inflicted upon an entire race of people. Dr. Bledsoe sates once the petition drive is complete the state-by-state results shall become accessible to congress, the nation, and the entire world during the Reparations-Yes! March for Reparations, which will take place on Monday, September 15th, 2003. This March will be like none other! Because it shall either be a celebration of the victory that has been won, or a firm historical reality spoken from and by the true voice of a united people declaring that this debt which is owed to Black America is way past due, and must, at long last, begin to be satisfied, until it is paid, in full! The Five-day Kickoff Petition Drive will take place at the T&T Soul Food Restaurant located at 1505 Eastern Avenue in Capitol Heights Maryland, from 6 A.M.. till 6 P.M. beginning August 21, 2001. The Web Design Company Creative Hands Inc., of Washington, D.C. is in charge of designing the web sites www.ablackworld.com and 4thepeople.com which will host all online information pertaining to the Reparations-Yes Movement including the national petition drive and will be open to the public on August 15th. If you would like to lend your support, make a financial contribution, and or become a volunteer TODAY! You may write to: JuneTeenth International 1220 L St. N.W. Suite # 100-403 Washington, D.C. 20005 Phone:202-783-3705- Fax 202 638-0816 CONTACT: Ms. Clara Peoples 503-287-7532 Ms. Lisa Clay 503-284-6152 Dr. Saharra L. Bledsoe 202 783-3705 MzWayMaker@aol.com or call 503-287-7532,or 202 783 3705 Submitted by MzWayMaker@aol.com (Please see Calendar of Events.) [Just a suggestion: Those who have petitions in place for Reparations might want to consider placing them in every state and major city in government offices and with Notary Republics in support of Reparations, so that individuals can go and sign them at their convenience. In this manner, signatures can be obtained quickly. Black radio stations and newspapers should be advertising these petition drives daily in an effort to inform people of the thrust for Reparations and the need for signing these petitions. T.Y., Editor] ********* REPARATIONS ENDORSED BY GROUP ONCE HEADED BY REV. KING Reparations Endorsed by Group Once Headed by Rev. King Aug. 7, 2001 The ground laid by the founding fathers of the civil-rights movement did not shake, but it surely trembled a little with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) announcement it would join a growing movement to seek reparations for slavery. Speaking from the group’s national convention in Montgomery, Ala. on Tuesday, the SCLC - which recently shook its own ground with outspoken criticism of its current head, Martin Luther King III - -said African Americans are still suffering from the racism of the nation’s past and should be compensated. "America owes us a debt," said Chicago Alderman Dorothy Tillman in a panel on reparations at the convention. "We built this country on our backs." Joseph Lowery, a former SCLC president and civil-rights icon, said reparations should be paid in the form of scholarships to the descendants of those who were enslaved for more than 300 years. "They need to devote a program that deals with the problems created by slavery," he said. The group also said it would continue its efforts to bring an end to racial profiling. Formed in 1957, the SCLC quickly became an umbrella organization for the many different denominations coming together to fight Jim Crow laws and discrimination in the South during the late 1950s and 1960s. Its first president was the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. who remained in that position until he was assassinated in 1968. Recently, the group has been embroiled in a struggle over ideology and where it is heading. Even Andrew Young, former mayor of Atlanta, and one of the early members of the SCLC, was highly critical of its leadership for allowing an image of King to be used in a telecommunications commercial. King’s wife, Coretta, is a member of the board of SCLC and reportedly gave her permission for the image to be used. Submitted by brc-reparations@yahoogroups.com [Mr. Lowery should know that scholarships for universities/colleges should be a given for Descendants of Slaves for as many years as our forebears were enslaved and denied an education. And Reparations should be used for the many needs that the Slaves and the survivors of the Slave Trade have never had the opportunity to enjoy for manifestation of "our" prosperity: First and foremost to use Reparations for freedom and liberty to relocate/repatriate to friendly lands if this is the desire, to build safe and stable communities, schools, farms, and to establish small businesses for our livelihoods be they in the lands of our captors or elsewhere - for a start! Self Determination would be included. T.Y., Editor] ********* CO-OP PETITION TO THE UNITED NATIONS WORLD CONFERENCE AGAINST RACISM - O WORLD, HEAR THE CRIES OF THE HOPES AND DREAMS OF THE AFRICAN SLAVE First, let me give honor and glory to God for this is a day He has made. It is an awesome opportunity to communicate with you regarding the overdue matter of Reparations for the African Diaspora. Let all that can hear be blessed abundantly. This is an important task-oriented E-mailing. With this E-mail we are launching a 3-week petition drive, both electronically and on the ground to demonstrate to the United States and nations of the world that the hope and dream of the African slaves are determined to have the past atrocities and contemporary inequities committed against our African humanity addressed during the United Nations World Conference Against Racism scheduled for Durban, South Africa August 30, 2001 through September 7, 2001. Whether the United States answers the roll call or not, their role in the continuing inequitable treatment of the African humanity must take the world stage whereas, the subject is Racism. Reparations are Due. When? NOW! When? RIGHT NOW Reparations are Due! Signify your agreement by electronically signing the petition and demonstrate your unity and support through sharing the link with everyone that you know and love. Print copies of the UN WCAR Petition page for others who are not online to return by mail. Distribute copies of this petition on the job, in church, during meetings, at school, while riding the bus and rail and when walking or riding on a bike or driving your car. And don't forget to share it with your closest neighbors. Join us in taking a timely proactive stance and help to generate at least 1 million signatures to send to the World Conference, the world's media and to the President of the United States and the Congress via Congresswomen Cynthia McKinney of Georgia and Eddie Bernice Johnson of Texas. Our victorious effort will see Congressman John Conyers of Michigan reintroducing House Resolution 40 (HR-40) early in the 109th Congress and successfully working it to the full committee will establish a Commission to study reparations for African Americans. That's this year. The Commission should begin meeting in early 2002. President Bush is our man and over the next few years we will wear on his heart and soul in preparing to negotiate a 21st Century "Du Deal", covering the millions affected by the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. Let's watch our own smoke, while the world too is watching. And, by all means, pull up some chairs, dish out some food, and turn up the drum, then sit down and tell the babies all about the debt, the 40 acres & a mule that we were to receive in the 19th century. Get ready, get set, it's time to distribute the Reparations are Due Petition to the world! Please return Petition hard copies to the New Panther Vanguard Movement by August 27th (in 3-weeks). The mailing address is 1470 West Martin Luther King Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90062. I'll keep you updated on the Petition's progress. Until then, these links are important to our movement and the list continues to grow. Look for these and other sites on the upcoming Black Web Tour. http://www.reparationsusa.org http://www.globalpanther.com http://www.ncrew.homestead.com http://www.blacklawdocument.com http://www.newmediacoop.com http://www.africaservice.com http://www.nul.org http://www.ncobra.org Tammy Lee New Media CO-OP Web Guide http://www.newmediacoop.com Submitted by JELPO@AOL.COM ********* INTERNATIONAL DAY OF ACTION AGAINST RACISM (IDAAR) IS AUGUST 31, 2001 VISION DECLARATION : "Tolerance and Diversity: A Vision for the 21st Century" Status of signatures As a new century begins, we believe each society needs to ask itself certain questions. Is it sufficiently inclusive? Is it non-discriminatory? Are its norms of behaviour based on the principles enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights? Racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and all kinds of related intolerance have not gone away. We recognize that they persist in the new century and that their persistence is rooted in fear: fear of what is different, fear of the other, fear of the loss of personal security. And while we recognize that human fear is in itself ineradicable, we maintain that its consequences are not ineradicable. We all constitute one human family. This truth has now become self-evident because of the first mapping of the human genome, an extraordinary achievement which not only reaffirms our common humanity but promises transformations in scientific thought and practice, as well as in the visions which our species can entertain for itself. It encourages us toward the full exercise of all its inventive, creative and moral capacities, enhanced by the equal participation of men and women. And it could make the twenty-first century an era of genuine fulfillment and peace. We must strive to remind ourselves of this great possibility. Instead of allowing diversity of race and culture to become a limiting factor in human exchange and development, we must refocus our understanding, discern in such diversity the potential for mutual enrichment, and realize that it is the interchange between great traditions of human spirituality that offers the best prospect for the persistence of the human spirit itself. For too long such diversity has been treated as threat rather than gift. And too often that threat has been expressed in racial contempt and conflict, in exclusion, discrimination and intolerance. Preparations for the United Nations World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, to be held in South Africa in September 2001, offer an opportunity to consider how far the aspirations of the three UN Decades Against Racism have been realized. The horrors of racism - from slavery to holocaust to apartheid to ethnic cleansing - have deeply wounded the victim and debased the perpetrator. These horrors are still with us in various forms. It is now time to confront them and to take comprehensive measures against them. The World Conference should adopt a declaration and plan of action which would provide the standards, the structures, the remedies -in essence, the culture - to ensure full recognition of the dignity and equality of all, and full respect for their human rights. Over the coming year we pledge ourselves to seek that conversion of mind and heart. What we envisage for every man, woman and child is a life where the exercise of individual gifts and personal rights is affirmed by the dynamic solidarity of our membership of the one human family. Reparations Supporters and Anti-Racism Activists in Los Angeles: The 3rd United Nations World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) will meet from August 31, 2001 to September 7, 2001 in Durban, South Africa. Thousands of political activists from every corner of the globe are planning to attend this very significant international gathering of people concerned about the lingering institutions of racism and racial discrimination. As you may have also heard, the African Preparatory Group and the Americas Preparatory Group are both planning to recommend a Plan of Action Against Racism that includes a demand for the payment of "reparations," and the establishment of an international reparations fund and mechanism, to Africans, Africans living in the Americas/Caribbean, and Indigenous peoples who have suffered and continue to suffer the effects of the African Slave Trade, Colonial Conquest, European/American Racism and Racial Discrimination. Unfortunately, the peoples of the world cannot afford to fly to Durban, South Africa to participate directly in this Conference, which will have a far reaching impact on their lives for decades to come. Organizations in 13 countries around the world, including 55 organizations in the United States, have called for an International Day of Action Against Racism (IDAAR 2001), to take place on August 31, 2001, the opening day of the WCAR. This "call" for a "day of protest" acknowledges the following general principles. *That the European invasions of Africa and the Western Hemisphere were "crimes against Humanity" and "genocidal wars" waged for the purpose of theft, colonization, rape and pollution of the lands of African, Asian, Arab/Palestinian, and Indigenous peoples; That Colonialism, Neo-colonialism, settler-colonialization, Zionism and Apartheid-like states are crimes against humanity; That "economic racism," "environmental racism and ecocide," especially with respect to "globalization," are serious concerns to the world's "people of color"; That racism in the administration of justice, especially in the continued incarceration of political prisoners and prisoners of war and the rise of the prison-industrial complex, has resulted in a "new form of slavery" sanctioned by the United States Constitution, but condemned by international laws; That European and the American governments must ADMIT and APOLOGIZE for their historical and continuing role in the commission of these and other crimes against Humanity and gross violations of human rights; and That European and the American governments must DEVELOP, in cooperation with the United Nations, and with the input of African nations and peoples and Indigenous Peoples, "appropriate financial schemes" and "funding structures" to award "reparations" and or "compensation" to the victims and their descendants, who continue to suffer from these "historical" and present "crimes against humanity." The New Panther Vanguard Movement (NPVM) is taking the initiative locally to propose a local activity to be organized in conjunction with, and supportive of, this Call For an International Day of Action Against Racism. There is not much time to organize such an activity, so we are calling for the immediate formation of a local IDAAR Organizing Committee to plan, coordinate and mobilize, a local protest for August 31, 2001 For more information call Kwaku at (323) 296-4383 or (323) 290 6146 or email Kwaku@globalpanther.com Remember to share the UN WCAR Petition http://www.unwcarpetition.homestead.com Where there's activism up here, Tammy Lee Black Web Guide http://www.newmediacoop.com tammylee@successnet.net (Tammy Lee) tammylee@successnet.net (Tammy Lee) tammyleecoop@hotmail.com (tleecoop) ********* U.S. PUSHES TO REFOCUS RACISM CONFERENCE New York Times Article August 1, 2001 WASHINGTON, July 31, 2001 - State Department officials said today that they have been engaged in a strenuous and complicated diplomatic effort to persuade other nations to omit two contentious issues from the agenda of a coming United Nations conference on racism whether Zionism is racism and whether nations should pay reparations for slavery. The officials said the outcome of the negotiations would determine whether the Bush administration takes part in the conference, scheduled to open on Aug. 31 in Durban, South Africa. "We want to go," a State Department official said today. "But not at any cost." This week, a small corps of American diplomats is in Geneva attending sessions with conference planners about the agenda. However, the real negotiations, one administration official said, are expected to occur behind closed doors during the next few days as the diplomats press their argument that the inclusion of the two agenda items would subvert the conference and impede any progress. "It's our policy that we can't go to this conference unless we get these matters resolved somehow," a Bush administration official said today. The draft agenda, which includes language calling for reparations and equating Zionism with racism, was drawn up at several regional conferences called to prepare for the Durban meeting. Officials said the portion concerning Israel had emerged from a meeting of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, held in Iran. The question of whether the United States will send an official delegation and, if it does, at what level has engaged not only the State Department, but several American civil rights groups, Jewish organizations and members of Congress. It has also revived a contentious debate about whether the notion that Zionism is racism can be a legitimate discussion topic or whether it is, as the United States has long contended, a rhetorical device for opponents of Israel to bludgeon Israel. The United States first condemned the effort to equate Zionism with racism in 1975, even as the United Nations General Assembly approved a motion affirming that notion. The United Nations repealed that resolution in 1991. International conferences also often become forums for a variety of international and parochial political agendas and concerns. The United States did not attend United Nations- sponsored conferences on racism in 1978 and 1983 because it disagreed with the language of the agenda. This time, the debate over Zionism and reparations on the agenda has the potential to stir up several problems including exacerbating friction between black and Jewish groups. That seemed evident today at a congressional hearing over whether the United States should attend. Blacks, both members of Congress and others who testified at the hearing, said it was imperative that the United States participate in the conference to demonstrate its concern over racism. Jewish lawmakers and representatives of Jewish groups expressed deep concern over the inclusion of language in a draft agenda that characterizes Israel's settlements as "crimes against humanity" and describes Zionism "as a movement based on racial superiority." Representative Cynthia A. McKinney, a Georgia Democrat and member of the House International Affairs Committee, which was conducting the hearing, said the Bush administration's reluctance to attend smacked of racism. "I have to wonder if the Bush administration's position on the World Conference on Racism is just politically dumb or if it is perhaps indicative of something more malignant," she said. "Is the Bush White House just full of latent racists?" Representative Tom Lantos of California, also a Democratic member of the committee, criticized Ms. McKinney's remarks about Mr. Bush and outlined his own opposition to the conference. Mr. Lantos, a Holocaust survivor, said the United States should not attend the conference unless the agenda was changed. "We have a group of countries hellbent on hijacking a noble and worthwhile event into yet another forum for Israel-bashing and for the most extreme form of anti-Semitism to gain global notoriety," he said. On Monday, the House overwhelmingly passed a non-binding resolution sponsored by Mr. Lantos calling for the agenda to be changed before the United States agrees to attend. Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Charles E. Schumer, Democrats of New York, among others, have written to the White House urging that United States insist on having the language about Israel changed. Testifying before the committee today, William B. Wood, the acting assistant secretary of state for international organizations, said the offensive language about Israel was especially inflammatory. He also said that while no one should doubt the profound regret the United States feels over the "abomination of slavery," the administration opposes the idea of reparations. By Neil A. Lewis http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/01/international/01NATI.html?ex=997704749&ei=1&en=0627a5fd283106b8 Submitted by alarkam@webtv.net [One would think that the White Jews who proclaim, "Never Again" and who live in the best of several wealthy Worlds would support Reparations for Blacks who died in the tens of millions during the TransAtlantic Slave Trade and who yet endure great pain and suffering. White Jews have free money going to Israel and a Washington museum supported by our tax dollars, yet they, too, are totally against our cause - Reparations for the betterment of Survivors of the Slave Trade. The Anti-Defamation League is just as racist as is the US that spent our tax dollars getting Reparations for White Jews and their monies out of Swiss banks but turns its racist back on the poor and needy. These White Jewish organizations that provide financial support to the various Black organizations only do so to oversee and manipulate Black concerns and affairs and to keep Black operations from telling the Truth about White Jewish involvement in the Slave Trade, from working for Reparations for the Slave Trade, and from supporting Blacks’ relocation to other countries. These racist White Jews feel that "Never Again" is a catchy phrase for their use only and want Black Folks to remain in degradation, as much as do the racist US powers-that-be. Let’s not forget that White Jews have also come forward speaking out against Reparations and payment for this crime against Black Humanity, and they have also generated the lie that Blacks are inferior to Whites. Let’s keep the TRUTH real and tell it like it is! T.Z., Editor] ********* RESTITUTION FOR AFRICAN SLAVE LABOR July 31, 2001 Jewish holocaust survivors sued several of Germany's biggest companies, alleging that the firms profited from Nazi-era slave labor. The lawsuits followed the recent Holocaust settlement of $1.25 billion with Swiss banks, and a pledge by the Italian insurance firm Asscurazioni Generali to pay $100 million to compensate Holocaust victims for unpaid insurance policies. Generali was one out of sixteen insurers facing a class-action lawsuit filed in behalf of Jewish survivors. Accordingly, the Nazi regime forced more than seven million people to work as slave laborers. The use of slave laborers, however, was not unique to Nazi Germany. Asian women, mainly Koreans, have argued that Japan forced them into sex slavery (Teishintai). Additionally, some Japanese companies have been accused of using wartime Chinese slaves. Five survivors of wartime slave labor sued Kajima Corporation seeking reparation for their labor. Accordingly, Japan sent Chinese without compensating them into mines, construction sites and factories operated by 135 Japanese companies. Spain, Portugal, England, France, the Colonies and Arabs profited from the African slave trade. The African holocaust began in 1592 when Spain licensed Gomes Reynal to transport African slave laborers to the Americas. This barbarous agreement required that at least 80 percent of the slaves shipped each year should arrive alive. In 1619, African slave laborers arrived in Jamestown, Virginia. However, the first colony to recognize slave labor as a legal institution was Massachusetts. Later, other colonies followed with the legalization of slave labor. These laws reduced Africans from human status to merely property. For instance, in 1669 Virginia's legislature decreed that they would not punish any slave owner for maltreating or killing a slave. Thus, history documents the government's complicity in legitimizing African slave labor, as well as the contribution of African slave laborers to the American economy. For instance, in 1773, George II allowed James Oglethorpe to establish Georgia as a slave free colony. However, Georgia, slave free, could not compete economically. The Georgians then recognized the advantages of uncompensated slave labor and sent letters to their trustees advocating slavery. Additionally, because slavery had been such profitable business, it was one major item on the agenda during the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787. Thus, they extended the slave trade for an additional twenty years under Article 10, Section 9, of the new Constitution of the United States. Article 1, Section 9, of the Constitution forbade Congress from prohibiting the importation of slaves before 1808. Article 4, Section 2, allowed for the extradition of fugitive slaves. Thus, the United States government established laws to exclude Africans from labor compensation. This apparent complicity leads many blacks to advocate restitution for the descendants of African slaves. The exclusionary socio-cultural climate created by these laws, continue to define and shape the economic destiny of Africans and their descendants in the United States of America. These ungodly laws limited their opportunities and influenced cognitive processes, and thus affected their economic development. Therefore, the imposition of these immoral laws warrants compensatory redress. Clearly, the government did not protect, nor provided rights, to Africans in America. As a result, Africans did not receive compensation for their labor. Similarly, states passed legislation effectively prohibiting the education of slaves, or free blacks. In 1829, a ruling by North Carolina's Supreme Court, The State v. Mann, ruled, "The end (of slavery) is the profit of the master, his security, and the public safety. The subject is one doomed in his own person and his posterity to live without knowledge and the capacity to make anything his own, and to toil that another may reap the fruits." In 1857, in the Dred Scott v. Sanford, the U.S. Supreme court affirmed that blacks were not citizens of the United States. Moreover, the court ruled that blacks had no rights that a white man should respect. Germany, Italy, Switzerland and other nations are disposing of their bleak and inhumane legacies by providing compensation for victims. They have included slave labor victims and their descendants. Clearly, there is amply justification for the descendants of African slaves to seek redress for the 246 years of uncompensated slave labor. Legalized slave labor ended December 18, 1865, with the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the constitution. Passage of the amendment, however, did not end the practice of involuntary servitude. Slave labor did not end until well into this century (2000]. Ironically, the Thirteenth Amendment led to the system of prison farming, which was another form of legalized slave labor. Thus, some have argued that the conditions of blacks after the 13th Amendment, sharecropping, Jim Crow laws and prison farming, were more brutal than under legalized slavery. Descendants of black slave laborers should learn from the Jewish approach in obtaining compensation from the Swiss, Italians and Germans. Blacks must assess, according to national and international laws and treaties the legal responsibilities for past misdeeds of all countries that exploited, or made possible the exploitation of, African slave laborers. Moreover, they must begin to build international alliances to pursue restitution in courts and in the United Nations. Likewise, they should study and determine the legal basis for restitution, and widely discuss, document, and publish atrocities committed against Africans during the slave labor and Jim Crow periods. Additionally, they should examine past and current worldwide restitution cases and United Nations resolutions for precedence. In addition, they should seek opportunities to sue with other national or international groups. More important, however, blacks should set up a management team to manage and fund the litigation process. By Byron A. Ellis Guest Commentary ********* BUSH URGED TO SUPPORT ANTI-RACISM SUMMIT New York, July 31, 2001 Human Rights Watch today called on the United States to throw its support behind an upcoming United Nations-sponsored World Conference Against Racism. "The Bush administration needs to show that it really cares about the problem of racism, in the United States and around the world. The way to do that is to use this conference to press for concrete solutions and programs to address the problem, not to sit on the sidelines." Reed Brody, Advocacy Director of Human Rights Watch The group is concerned that with only one month remaining before the summit opens in Durban, South Africa, the United States had not yet even decided whether to participate, and is providing only paltry financial support. "The Bush administration needs to show that it really cares about the problem of racism, in the United States and around the world," said Reed Brody, Advocacy Director of Human Rights Watch. "The way to do that is to use this conference to press for concrete solutions and programs to address the problem, not to sit on the sidelines." The Bush administration is postponing a decision on summit participation until it has assurances that the conference will not take up several hot-button issues. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said on June 20 in a Senate hearing that matters like compensation for slavery and attacks on Israel could derail the meeting and State Department spokesman Richard Boucher has said the United States' participation depends on how these topics are dealt with. Human Rights Watch also is troubled that many countries were seeking to single out Israel for condemnation of racist practices. While it has documented and denounced Israeli abuses against Palestinians and called on Israel to respect the right of Palestinian refugees to return, it stressed that if the conference were going to name countries which practice severe forms of racism, its list should be much longer. At the same time, Human Rights Watch emphasized that if the United States wants to influence the outcome of this debate, it must stay engaged. "The Administration thinks it can delegitimize the conference by staying away," Brody said. "It's only going to succeed in ceding important decisions to others." A Bush administration paper has also warned the meeting not to apportion blame for past injustices or to seek to exact compensation for these acts. Human Rights Watch has said that governments should compensate groups that suffer today because of slavery or other severe racist practices and it has proposed the establishment of truth commissions to examine how a government's past racist practices contribute to contemporary deprivation and to propose methods of redress. Human Rights Watch was also critical of the U.S. lack of financial support for the meeting. The Clinton administration committed an initial $250,000 toward the conference before it left office, and the Bush administration has not increased that. By contrast, the United States provided several million dollars to the 1995 United Nations conference on women in Beijing. Human Rights Watch said that it hopes that the conference, in addition to addressing past injustices, will establish concrete programs to stamp out racism today and that it will recognize caste-based discrimination as a form of racism, address the racist treatment of refugees and migrants and press governments to review how their laws and practices favor one race over another. The U.N. World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance will meet from August 31 to September 7. [Hmmm, the Clinton Administration committed $250,000 toward WCAR and several million dollars to the 1995 United Nations Conference on Women in Beijing. Does that speak volumes or what?! And you might ask, "What’s with Secretary of State Powell? Doesn’t he realize that he isn’t helping the Black Plight but hurting it?!" Well, mark my words, Secretary Powell is in for a very rude awakening, and then he will gladly join ranks with those of us fighting for the betterment and self determination of Black Peoples. His White Masters haven’t hit him where it hurts, yet - at least not to the understanding that he is not one of the "powers" but rather just a "Powell." Right now, he’s in the limelight and a little confused with equating Power with Powell, but eventually he will get it right. The leopard cannot change its spots, and the racist White Masters will sooner or later put him back in his place - with us and company. T.Y., Editor] ********* The Reparations Movement’s goals are as follows: - Obtain Reparations from all countries that prospered from Black Slave Labor Schedule Conferences, Marches, and Protests until the White Society apologizes and compensates Descendants of the Slave Trade - Speak at the United Nations on Reparations for Survivors of the Slave Trade in order to gain International Support from all or most countries - Demonstrate in front of the UN in Geneva for World Attention - Establish an International Fund for Descendants of Slaves - Target Companies that existed during the days of Slavery for Reparations, and if they do not comply, then list them as "Unworthy" for Black patronage - Seek support for Reparations from Companies that prosper off of Black Clients - Seek Celebrity support for Reparations - Involve the Media - Make "Reparations" the buzz word for the turn of the century - Etc., etc., and by "any means necessary" within the Law ********* IN SUPPORT OF REPARATIONS! WAKE UP! STAND UP! STEP UP! and DO SOMETHING IN SUPPORT OF REPARATIONS! OR THERE CAN BE NO REAL - PEACE! Ahna Tafari ********* *****MARK YOUR CALENDAR OF EVENTS***** SUNDAY REPARATIONS MEETINGS Muhammad Mosque of Islam in Boston, Massachusetts invites you to attend weekly meetings each Sunday at the Dillaway located at: 183 Roxbury Street Roxbury, Massachusetts (Next to the Timilty School, in Roxbury) Meetings start at 2:00 PM, but on the last Sunday of the month we start at 1:00 PM. For more information and to schedule free lectures on Reparations at your church, school, business or organization, feel welcome to telephone Minister Malik Al-Arkam at (617) 770-2017. ********* August 13, 2001 (Monday) 6:30 P.M. REPARATIONS MOBILIZATION CONFERENCE PLANNING MEETING   REMINDER.... The next Planning Meeting for the Reparations Mobilization Conference is Monday August 13, 2001 at 6:30 P.M. LOCATION: The Brecht Forum 122 W. 27th Street -10th Floor (Between 6th + 7th Avenues) New York City The Conference is progressing strongly and needs your help to make it even bigger and more historic! CONTACT: ebontek@earthlink.net ********* August 21, 2001 (Tuesday) From 6:00 A.M. to 6:00 P.M. REPARATIONS YES - MOVEMENT Announces Historical Nation-Wide Petition Campaign The Five-day Kickoff Petition Drive will take place at: T&T Soul Food Restaurant 1505 Eastern Avenue Capitol Heights, Maryland, from 6 a.m. till 6 pm beginning August 21st. CONTACT: Ms. Clara Peoples 503-287-7532 Ms. Lisa Clay 503-284-6152 Dr. Saharra L. Bledsoe 202 783-3705 MzWayMaker@aol.com or call 503-287-7532,or 202 783 3705 ********* FREE THE MIND... FREE THE PEOPLE... FREE THE LAND THE NATIONAL COALITION OF BLACKS FOR   REPARATIONS IN AMERICA (N’COBRA) *********   THE REPARATIONS EDUCATION AND MOBILIZATION CONFERENCE SCHEDULED FOR JUNE 29/30, 2001 WAS POSTPONED! ********* August 31, 2001 - September 7, 2001 THE LEGACY OF THE BLACK POWER MOVEMENT AND THE UNITED NATIONS WORLD CONFERENCE AGAINST RACISM The December 12th Movement, based in New York, and The National Black United Front (NBUF) are co-sponsoring a Black Power conference in support of the United Nations World Conference Against Racism. The United Nations World Conference Against Racism will be held in Durbin, South Africa from August 31, 2001 - September 7, 2001. By Dr. Conrad W. Worrill *** YOU MUST BE IN SOUTH AFRICA NEXT AUGUST 2001!   To All Concerned African People:   The United Nations' World Conference against Racism begins August 31, 2001 in Durban, South Africa. The December 12th Movement International Secretariat is seeking you to be a part of the Delegation of 400 African people to South Africa in support of two crucial issues:   1) Declaration of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade as a Crime against Humanity 2) Reparations for Africans in the Diaspora and on the Continent.     Malcolm X said that we must put our situation on the international agenda, in the international arena. We must be there in a massive presence to defend our human rights. Join us, if you want to go to Durban in support of these issues. The application is included in the text of this message, as well as an attached document in .rtf format. Costs: We estimate that the total cost for the trip (the Conference is from August 31, to September 7), i.e., travel, lodging and meals, will be approximately $2500.  If you are planning to go we need a deposit of $250.00 immediately. We, along with the National Black United Front, are working with a Black Travel Agency based in Chicago which has already made airline travel arrangements to and reserved blocks of hotel rooms in Durban. Your check or money order should be made out to AARCO TRAVEL AND TOURS and should be sent to the: December 12th Movement 456 Nostrand Avenue Brooklyn, NY 11216 For more information on the World Conference against Racism and the struggle to defend the human rights of African people, contact us at: Telephone #718-398-1766 Fax #623-1855 E-mail: D12M IF YOU WISH TO GO TO SOUTH AFRICA, PLEASE FILL OUT THE FORM BELOW. APPLICATION FORM FOR THE DURBAN 400 NAME: ADDRESS PHONE : FAX: E-MAIL: ORGANIZATIONAL AFFILIATION (if any): YES: I want to be a member of the Durban 400.  Enclosed is my check in the amount of $_______________. _____________________________________________________________ NAME ********* August 31, 2001 INTERNATIONAL DAY OF ACTION AGAINST RACISM (IDAAR) IS AUGUST 31, 2001 The New Panther Vanguard Movement (NPVM) is taking the initiative locally to propose a local activity to be organized in conjunction with, and supportive of, this Call For an International Day of Action Against Racism. There is not much time to organize such an activity, so we are calling for the immediate formation of a local IDAAR Organizing Committee to plan, coordinate and mobilize, a local protest for August 31, 2001 For more information call Kwaku at (323) 296-4383 or (323) 290 6146 or email Kwaku@globalpanther.com Remember to share the UN WCAR Petition http://www.unwcarpetition.homestead.com Where there's activism up here, Tammy Lee Black Web Guide http://www.newmediacoop.com Also CONTACT: tammylee@successnet.net (Tammy Lee) tammylee@successnet.net (Tammy Lee) tammyleecoop@hotmail.com (tleecoop)   ********* October 19/20, 2001 PHILOSOPHY BORN OF STRUGGLE CONFERENCE ON RACE, REPARATIONS, AND RESTITUTION Place: Brown University CONTACT: J. Everet Green HUMANITAS 3000 37 Old Oregon Road Cortlandt Manor New York, New York 10567 *********   October 19, 20, 21, 2001   THE AFRIKAN DIASPORA NATION STATE CONFERENCE We need to practice Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility) and send in early Registration Fees and Donations to pay for this Kujichagulia (Self Determined) conference, through Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics). Pan Afrikan Black Nationalist have for scores of decades developed Kummba and held on to Imani. Now the time has come to practice what we have organized around. Umoja and Self Determination "By any means necessary." Or Are you spewing rhetoric without substance? "Idle words....make for idle minds... creating idle bodies..... Power to the people..... Hotels / Motels: Best Western 1800 Palm Beach Lakes Blvd. West Palm Beach, Fl. 33401 (561) 683-8810 Group rate 15 rms. - $ 52. + tax   DAYS INN 2300 45th. Street West Palm Beach. Fl.33407 (561) 689-0450 (Kate Riley) Group rate 10 rms. - $49. + tax (single or double)   Crown Plaza 1601 Belvedere Rd. West Palm Beach, Fl. 33406 (561)689-6400 No Group rate available at this time * $99. Single $119. suites + tax   All rooms are within five (5) miles of conference site. Transportation will be provided by schedule to and from Hotel / Motel stops. The conference space will be centrally located to all motels. Some motels will set aside at least ten (10) rooms for our conference and will provide group rates as we meet the group room minimum. You must make your own motel reservations. Ask for shuttle service from the airport, bus, or train stations. Please REGISTER EARLY for the conference. Your Registration Fee will all go toward conference expenses. Don’t forget to let advise us of where you intend to stay. Registrations Form (copy and return via E-mail):   AFRICAN NATION DIASPORA STATE CONFERENCE AFRIKAN NATION STATE PRE-REGISTRATION FORM Name____________________________ Phone #______ _____________________   Address __________________________ Country___________________________   City______________________________ State____ District./Region_____________   Organization Affiliations________________________________________________   I (We) will staying at: __________________________________________________   $40 Registration Fee Enclosed __ Yes __ No   Donation Included $_______ Please make Checks and Money Orders Payable to: Robert Hazard. Send all mail to the following address * Mawusi c/o Robert Hazard * P.O. Box 2186 * West Palm Beach, Fl. 33402. For information and assistance call Robert Mawusi Hazard at (561) 881-8298. Round trip transportation from the motels to the conference will be scheduled. CONTACT: RHazard988 ********* November 28 – December 2, 2001 THE "STATE OF THE BLACK WORLD" CONFERENCE Convenes in Atlanta November 28 – December 2, 2001 at the Georgia International Convention Center. "A set of goals and objectives have been outlined," he said. "We hope to identify, analyze and discuss the critical crises and issues facing Black people. We also hope to provide some sort of leadership and skill development training to enhance our collective capacity to engage the struggle for liberation." "Our agenda also includes discussion of meaningful definitions of liberation and reconstruction, intensifying the global movement for reparations and working towards the convening of an International Black Arts and Cultural Festival," For more information, call 1-866-ATL-SOBW or visit www.TBWT.com ********* BOOK LISTINGS The book listing on Reparations and Black History can be found in REPNOW Newsletters 1 - 5. *** KHALIFAH'S BOOKSELLERS & ASSOCIATES Producers & Disseminators of the Literature that is Finally Freeing Afrikan People: "Those at Home and those abroad!" www.KBAbooks.com ********* WE SHALL WIN THIS WAR! Imari A. Obadele ********* "Without Sanctuary" The web address for Without Sanctuary" is listed in the REPNOW Newsletter #13. Please pass this information on to others for it is out of… AMERICA'S SHAME: CONTEMPT & THE LYNCHINGS James Allen’s photos on the lynchings of Blacks in America ********* See a wide range of E-mail Addresses & WebSites on REPARATIONS in the REPNOW Issue #13. ********* A WISE LIBERATION MOVEMENT USES BROAD RANGE OF TACTICS Minister Malik Al-Arkam Boston Representative of the Honorable Silis Muhammad www.afre-ngo.org   ********* JOIN THE BLACK REPARATIONS MOVEMENT TODAY ! IT IS A WIN, WIN CASE FOR US! Oscar L. Beard ********* Stay strong in the struggle; we will win! Dejoser ********** Hotep, I am Gregory Carey, Founder and President of Reparations Central, an online reparations searchable database. We would like for you to view our website that is in the development stage at http://www.reparationscentral.com We are also attempting to unify and centralize the reparations movement. We are looking for other organizations that are doing reparations work to put on our website. Also, we are asking every organization to consider putting an audio/video presentation on our website. This website is the hub of the reparations movement worldwide. We need your support and help to make this reparations clearinghouse a successful venture. In Struggle, Aluta Continua Asante Sana ********* HOW CAN I SUPPORT THE REPARATIONS MASS MOVEMENT? 1.) I suggest that you approach the city in which you reside for reparations, support for reparations, or information as to how to obtain reparations. Your strategy may be a model we all may benefit from at the local level. 2.) Next, demonstrate your willingness to join others in the struggle for reparations. 3.) I would hope that you join or start an N’COBRA chapter in your locale area (if there is none) and become an active and energetic member/reparations information resource, for your Afrikan brothers and sisters. Submitted by R. Hazard, N’COBRA *********   "Together We shall Win REPARATIONS NOW!!!" Free Your Mind - Join N’COBRA.... Free The People.... Free The Land... Robert Hazard S.E. Regional Rep. N’COBRA ********* "If you are thinking one year ahead, sow a seed. if you thinking ten years ahead, plant a tree. If you thinking one hundred years ahead ... educate the people." A Manchurian Proverb Compliments of Shakira A. Ali ********* Up You Mighty Race; We Can Accomplish What We Will!!!! I Remain to Serve, Senghor Baye ********* INTERESTING INFORMATION OF SIGNIFICANCE AND FYI: WHO FINANCED THE SLAVE TRADE?   THE COMING OF BLACKS TO AMERICA The following is an introductory verse to Part One The Coming of Blacks To America taken from the Tales of Southwest Willie. (Carl A. Patton, FreedomJournal). With skill, wisdom and the sought after quality of strength and endurance did the African arrive. To be used as human animals, removed from land culture and family in service of his captors who rose to power and the mood of resentment and hate. Peace, Carl A. Patton, writing for the FreedomJournal August 15, 2000.   Part 21: Who Financed the Slave Trade? Slavery in America was the darkest period in American history. This period also was a conscience keeper for many who sold human flesh and committed ungodly sins against other human beings. The wretched psychological problems and nightmares of the slave-holders, slave-breeders, slave kidnappers and the financiers have driven many to strong drink. Many have also taken on a guilt conscience that they have been passed down through the ages. Perhaps this is why in the study of American history, there is little or no discussions that reflect on who was actually behind the slave trade. In other words, who financed it? Who carried out slavery and those that benefited from this trade has some documentation. Nevertheless, the former question (who financed slavery?) is not clearly gleaned from the historical accounts of this period? In all actuality these people also made profits from the slave trade. We must answer these questions as Black people seek to unlock the mysteries of our past. However, first what is finance? Finance means to provide money for a particular undertaking. So finance means money and who put up the money. At this point we argue that most historians agree that the beginning of the slave trade in the New World took place in 1517. The Spanish Bishop, Bartholomew de Las Casas took steps to encourage the importation of Blacks to the New World. In so doing he persuaded Charles V to encourage immigration to the New World by permitting Spaniards to import twelve slaves each. It is a well-known fact that slavery was a very profitable business. The Spanish and later the Portuguese were the first major slave traders. Later the Dutch, French and English dominated the slave trade. By the 18th century the African slave trade became an important economic institution. Eventually the English became the dominate power in the slave trade. At Jamestown in 1619 Blacks were first introduced to slavery in North America. At least ten million Blacks were brought to the New World as slaves. Also many historians have recorded that millions of Blacks died during slavery. The number ranges from one million to 10 million Blacks that died during the slave period. Some died of starvation and disease. Also, many Blacks chose to take their lives rather than suffer the abuse placed on them by the demented and perverted crews that sailed on slave ships. Therefore, many Blacks died during the infamous middle-passage (the voyage to America) and many died at the hands of their captors. Meanwhile, the individual governments of the countries involved in the slave trade profited from the slave trade. We can also determine that the captains and their crews made a profit or wages from the slave trade. Southern plantation owners also grew very wealthy from the slave trade. Because for all practical purposes, the old South was built from slave labor. While historical accounts are relatively clear on profits made by plantation owners, crown governments and those that manned the slave ships, there were other parties involved who put up money to carry out the slave trade. In other words, there were other people who financed slavery? To answer this question, one must ask, who has historically been the great bankers of the world? Who has historically been the money lenders? Furthermore, crown governments did not sponsor many of the ships that sailed with a human cargo of slaves. Thus, the banks of Europe financed many of those involved in the slave trade. "The Jews in America were artisans, candle makers, distillers, tailors, more commonly they were shop-keepers, sellers of dry good, hardware and liquor. The most successful became merchant shippers in the international trade, which frequently meant West Indian rum and sometimes slaves. (Lenni Brenner, Jews In America Today, p. 17). Brenner argues that some Jews went into the banking world and many became some of the most profitable bankers on Wall Street. (Brenner, p. 20). Therefore, it is argued the greatest money lenders and bankers in Europe and America during the time of the slave trade were the Jews. Most of the first Jewish immigrants to the U.S. were Spanish and Portuguese. In fact, Jews had so much money that a Polish Jew named Haym Salomon loaned money to the distressed Continental Government of America. Salomon and another prominent Jew, Philip Minis frequently advanced money to pay the bills for the Continental Army. So Jews in the New World just like Jews in the Old World were the big money lenders. They even helped finance the American Revolution. And later, they helped the southern slave masters finance the purchase of slaves to maintain the plantation system in the South. "When King Cotton dominated the South, Jews began to enter the planter class in substantial numbers. Later yet, many German-Jewish peddlers went into the commercially underdeveloped South and several became prominent cotton traders. According the Encyclopedia Judaic, Southern Rabbis, in conformity with their surroundings supported slavery fully. Meanwhile Judah P. Benjamin, was never a member of a synagogue and took no part in Jewish affairs. Still, he was the most important Jew during the Civil War. First as the Confederacy's Attorney-General, then it's Secretary of War and finally its Secretary of state. (Brenner, p. 222). Meanwhile, the Jews fought on both sides of the Civil War. Brenner argues that many German Jews were against slavery. Therefore, there was a division on the question of race and slavery among the Jews of the North and the South. However, there is a record of Jews despite region supporting slavery.   By CALPatton [Hopefully, we can see now why it is so important to know our history. A sensational book to read on this very topic is The Secret Relations Between Blacks and Jews. You should be able to find it at KHALIFAH'S BOOKSELLERS & ASSOCIATES www.KBAbooks.com. We cannot let these people off the hook. They are no angels, by no means, and must pay for their active and economic interest in the enslavement of Blacks out of Africa. Professor Jeffries did not lie about their involvement in the Slave Trade, and every single Civil Rights group and Black individual should have supported him in revealing the absolute Truth about White Jews and the TransAtlantic Slave Trade. Thank you, CALPatton for your enlightenment. T.Y., Editor] ********* INTERESTING TIDBITS:   NOT DOWN WITH THE LOCKDOWN: YOUTH SPEAK OUT AGAINST SUPER JAIL July 31, 2001 Mary Rubach is wincing. "There's no need for this noise," she says in a clipped British accent. She appears to be in her early seventies, though I don’t dare ask her exact age. "Shouldn't someone go up there and tell them to turn the speakers down?" I shrug in sympathy. After three hours of blasting protest and lyrical celebration, my own ears have certainly been ringing. But try telling that to this crowd -- the hundreds of folks who’ve come to Frank Ogawa Plaza in Oakland, protesting the construction of what may become one of the largest juvenile detention centers in the nation. Organized by Books Not Bars and the Youth Force Coalition, this "Summer Jam to Stop the SuperJail" is the biggest public gathering for the campaign thus far. Alameda County officials have been pushing for two years to build a massive "Juvenile Complex" to replace its present 330-bed juvenile hall. The proposed structure would be the largest per-capita juvenile detention center in the country and may house 450 beds. It would be larger than the juvenile halls in Cleveland, Philadelphia, and Las Vegas, the largest of which has only 112 beds. Officials argue that the old juvenile detention center is overcrowded and structurally dangerous, as it was built on an earthquake fault line. While activists agree that a new detention center needs to be built, the proposed scale seems like a wasteful way to spend money and social resources. It also has people worried that more beds will mean more arrests. In the last decade, the juvenile crime rates have dropped consistently in the Bay Area. In a region desperate for more spending on education and social services, one might question using $131 million of public funds on a huge detention center. "Everyone knows that we shouldn't be spending millions of dollars to put more kids in jail," said Rory Caygill, 23, of the Youth Force Coalition. "We should be spending millions of dollars to keep kids out of jail." The clamorous hip-hop activists -- or "raptivists," as some journalists have dubbed them -- have stepped down from the stage. The volume comes down, to a less ear-blasting level, as Julia "Butterfly" Hill steps up to the mic. She wants to tell us how her two-year stint in a redwood tree is directly connected to the burgeoning prison-industrial complex. "The same forces that are making nature into a monoculture," she says, "are making humanity into a monoculture." The volume of the rally swells up again. I look around at the swarm of faces, bodies, and t-shirts around me. Playaz. Babies. Wheelchairs. Mumia. Che. Farrakhan. Bikini tops. Hooters shirts. Big gold chains. B-Boys. Skater chicks. Unionists. Crunchy Berkeleyites. Generation Queer. El Teatro Campasino de Atlatn. Black-booted militants with gaunt faces. Grandmothers with melting ice-cream cones. There's hardly a segment of the East Bay community that seems absent -- except those on the Alameda County Board of Supervisors. In fact, any and all supporters of the SuperJail are noticeably absent. On the bright side, the coalition against the SuperJail has scored some significant upsets, led by local youth activists and supported by over 50 local organizations. In July, nine youth activists were arrested during a sit-in after the Board voted against a federally-recommended study to determine the size and viability of the proposed facility. Initially, the Board of Supervisors was unanimously in favor of the construction project. Since May, protests and direct actions by activists have managed to split the board, 3-2 in favor of the jail, block $2.3 million in funding from the California Board of Corrections, and downsize the project from 540 to 450 beds. Bay Area youth are doing their part to push the envelope. Those most likely to fill these new beds -- working class and low-income youth of color are actually the ones stepping up to the mike and the steps of the City Council. The coalition has already begun to incorporate the stage show with the sit-in, using hip-hop on the fly to announce their presence at various stuffy bureaucratic meetings. "We're showing how much positivity we have in our communities," said Van Jones, director of the San Francisco's Ella Baker Center for Human Rights before the rally. "Our opponents aren't going to want to see these young people locked up," he continued, optimistically. "Even the people who think that youth are sh-t are going to be shaking their booties." For youth, there is an immediacy to the fear behind the fun. Just the term "SuperJail" has a frightening right to it. In the Bay Area, as elsewhere, the effects of police harassment and over-incarceration are felt on a daily basis. "Some of the first interactions people have with the system are [the result of] racial profiling or harassment by officers in their neighborhoods," says Nicole Lee, 25, from the Oakland-based organization, Let's Get Free (Formerly Third Eye Movement). "Our communities are under attack," says Omana Imani, 24, of the Youth Force Coalition. "If you look at all the proposition that have been passed in California -- from Prop 184 to Prop 21 -- all of them have been blatant attacks against youth." Even in a socially and politically progressive region like the Bay Area, the criminalization of youth, particularly low-income youth of color, has been on the rise. According to a study by the D.C.-based Justice Policy Institute, while juvenile arrest rates in San Francisco declined 46% since 1996, juvenile detention bookings increased 22%. African-American youth have experienced historically sharp rises in bookings; Hispanic, Asian, and Pacific Islander girls, while accounting for fewer than 4% of the city's arrests, comprised nearly half of the increase in bookings. These regional statistics correspond with media hype that has demonized youth as "super predators." Youth Force's first campaign, in fact, was against California's Proposition 21, the initiative that started what many in this state still refer to as "The War on Youth." Ironically, the backlash against the passing of Prop 21 may have prompted officials to push for expanding juvenile detention centers, as a way to assure local citizens that younger offenders wouldn't be sent off to adult facilities. Clearly, this next move hasn't had a very warm reception, either. Among local youth themselves, the sense of indignation is immediate. Fourteen-year-old Nathan Reyes joined the prison campaign through his involvement with Asian & Pacific Islander Youth Promoting Advocacy and Leadership (APAL). But there is nothing abstract about his involvement in today's protest. "I get followed by the police," he says. "I've never personally been taken in, but me and my friends get harassed by the police just because of the way we look." Reyes life experiences so far have made him acutely aware of how youth like him are treated by larger societal structures. Books Not Bars and the Youth Force Coalition have drawn kids as young as thirteen to the support their efforts, some of whom are already becoming seasoned activists. Local organizations, have given youth the support, knowledge, and resources they need to keep themselves informed and aware of their rights. Let's Get Free, for example, distributes a pocket-sized pamphlet explaining what to do if you are arrested, stopped by police, or if you witness or experience police brutality. Local numbers for PoliceWatch, CopWatch, and San Francisco Public Defender are listed on the back. "APAL kept me alive," Reyes says, adding that learning about his legal rights, and concrete tactics for dealing with police, have kept him out of "juvie." In contrast to the popular image of apathetic youth, Reyes believes that many of his friends have become immediately incensed and engaged within the SuperJail struggle. Even regarding the kids who are reluctant to engage in social activism. "You just have to give them something to relate to," he adds. "Ask what’s going on in their community that you don't like, and then say, well how do you want to fix that?" Even the youngest activists today have firm answers to those questions. Sara Kugler, 11, of Baltimore is already a seasoned protest-goer; her conscientious older sister has brought her out to more than a few events like Saturdays rally in Oakland. "Kids need education, and they need somebody to care for them," said Kugler, who was looking at a display on police brutality victims when I spoke to her. "It's important for me to have people I know trust me. They can tell me when Im doing something wrong so that I can correct my actions." Katie Tobler, a San Francisco schoolteacher who was in the crowd that day, echoed her words. "Ask kids what they want," she said, "and they'll tell you what they need to make their lives rich." But leading a "rich" life may be easier said than done in a state that is first in the nation in prison spending and forty-seventh in education spending. California has built twenty new prisons since 1984, while adding only one new campus to the state university system here. Moreover, the alternatives to detention have proven to be successful. In Chicago and Portland, the detention rates have been reduced through alternative service and outreach programs, with no increase in re-arrest rates. [See Less Cost More Safety by Mikhaila Richards for more about a recent study on alternatives to incarcerating youth.] The foundation that funded and supported these programs -- the Annie E. Casey Foundation -- is offering a similar technical assistance package on detention alternatives to Oakland. But the county turned the foundation down. Not only is it politically useful to appear to be "tough on crime," it is also profitable for the corporations whose products and services are used within the jails. "We are talking about an industrial complex. That means its a for-profit industry," said Isaiah, 20, an Oakland-based activist who was in attendance on Saturday. While many speak of building solidarity between the local and global protests, the slant of corporatization may be the clearest concrete link between the two. "A lot of times, anti-globalization activists will talk about working with local communities, but they're just waiting for these communities to come to them, or else pick up their issues," said Shawn OHearn of an Anti-Globalization Network in Richmond, Virginia. "Some of them don't see grassroots as radical enough, and don't see how going to city hall meetings makes a difference. But locally-based activists are standing up and directly changing their own relationship to the system, and it's the same system were all fighting." Van Jones adds: "I feel connected to what's going on in L.A., Philly, Cincinnati, abroad -- it's the same situation. They're hiring more militarized police, making corporate profits -- there's no difference except that we’re all on different places on the conveyor belt, and we're all going to the same garbage dump together." By the end of Saturday's rally, my back is completely sunburned and my pockets are overflowing with pamphlets from every social justice organization you can imagine. The gigantic puppet that APAL made has been taken down, and the crowds are slowly beginning to thin out. Where to go from here? I found myself asking. Tim Roust, a young man who attending the rally with the East Bay Food Not Bombs had similar questions. "We've come together, but what are we going to do with this energy, and how we are going to channel it?" It is true that there are only so many times you can hear "f--k the police" before the words lose all their vehemence and meaning. As Van Jones put it, the rally did emphasis "the power of youth culture, the power of the word and the power of a good time when you're whoopin some ass." But it's unclear how many who turned out today will turn their awareness into action. For now, Books Not Bars and the Coalition against the SuperJail is already gearing up for the next step. The Board must vote publicly to approve an environmental impact report, award a construction contract, and approve a multi-million dollar public bond. As their press release reads, We will be marching, rallying, holding poetry slams, doing sit-ins, writing letters, jamming phone/fax" lines, and generally raising hell -- at every step and stage." Rachel Jackson, an organizer from Books Not Bars may have said it best with her concluding speech: "If those fools think we have been too rude, or too rowdy, all we have to say is that they have no idea what is about to hit them." By Suzy Khimm <suzkhimm@aol.com> -- Suzy Khimm, 20, is a freelance writer, activist, and poet currently roaming around the Bay Area. Soon enough, she will have to leave her West Coast Wonderland for her chilly home in New Haven, but she vows to return soon. Check out her other articles on Alternet and her first chapbook of poetry, available at City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco. http://alternet.org/wiretapmag/story.html?StoryID=11256 WireTap Submitted by brc-news@lists.tao.ca [Rachel Jackson is certainly making the right start towards keeping our youth out of jail. Now, she needs Reparations to insure upgraded communities, decent and affordable housing for the working poor, the best care/baby sitting program for the working parent(s), a quality educational system for our youth, self esteem, and self determination. T.Y., Editor] *** No he didn’t!!! HIS GIFT TO US