Minneapolis, MN – People gathered at the May Day Bookstore here in Minneapolis, April 18, for a forum titled “U.S. Meddling Escalates: Venezuela: A New Crisis?”

The forum began with Anne Winkler-Morey, a member of Women Against Military Madness and a professor of Latin American history at Metro State University, orientating the audience to the history and context of U.S. intervention in Latin America.

Joe Callahan was the next speaker. Callahan, a long-time Cuba solidarity activist, spoke about U.S. intervention in Venezuela since 2002. He explained the significance of the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela, “Removal of the Chavista government in favor of a right-wing regime would be a big blow first and foremost to the people of Venezuela, and a sharp blow to ordinary people around the world and to Cuba. Venezuela has been a bright example to the world, increasing social service expenditures 60% since Chavez was elected, as opposed to the world trend of brutal austerity measures. And they have been a thorn in the side to the empire’s international aggression.”

Meredith Aby-Keirstead, a member of the Anti-War Committee, was the last speaker at the forum. She agreed with Callahan that the revolutionary struggle in Venezuela is important for the U.S. anti-war and international solidarity movements to defend.

Aby-Keirstead explained, “Venezolanos learned in 2002 the power and importance of defending their Bolivarian Revolution and as long as the U.S. continues to attack their government they will respond. Some predict that the right-wing opposition will continue to try to overthrow the Maduro government and that when these leaders are jailed for treason that the U.S. will use their cases as ‘human rights’ stories. The mainstream media in the U.S. has enjoyed telling the narratives of the opposition leaders like Leopoldo Lopez as moderate liberals fighting for democracy when in fact they represent a political elite that want to line their own pockets with the oil wealth of Venezuela. We have our own role to defend the Bolivarian Revolution. We must challenge this narrative of the Venezuelan right wing as a Latin American ‘occupy movement’ or an ‘Arab Spring’ to the U.S. media in letters to the editor, to members of Congress with phone calls, and to Obama with protests and letters. The Venezuelan people will do their part and we need to do ours!”

On March 9 the U.S. increased sanctions on Venezuela and Obama signed an executive order declaring Venezuela an “unusual and extraordinary threat to national security.”

Foreign ministers of the 12-country Union of South American Nations and many members of the Organization of the American States, including Colombia – the U.S. main ally in the region – have called for a revocation of the U.S. sanctions.

#MinneapolisMN #AntiwarMovement #Venezuela #MeredithAby #JoeCallahan #AnneWinklerMorey #Americas

Happy Holidays to our friends and supporters,

On Sept. 24, 2010 my life changed as the FBI rummaged through my home looking for evidence of “material support for terrorism” as I stood holding my 18-month-old. I felt alone when they came to my home but I have not felt alone since. Locally and nationally the response from the peace and justice movements has been amazing. Thank you for standing with me and the other 22 anti-war and international solidarity activists who were raided and subpoenaed in 2010.

The Committee to Stop FBI Repression plays a key role in leading the national effort to defend the Anti-War 23. It coordinates our national outreach and organizing on our case and against state repression. Our activists speak out against surveillance and political repression on the national and local level at conferences and protests. We are on the forefront nationally and locally in defending our rights to protest and to show solidarity.

Currently we are organizing support for Rasmea Odeh, the newest activist to be caught up in the crosshairs of the FBI’s investigation of Midwest solidarity and anti-war activists. We continue to be concerned about the FBI’s continued investigation into our movement but we are not afraid to organize against war! Thanks for standing with us!

Your Support is Key!

We could not have kept the Anti-War 23 out of jail, stopped the attack on Carlos Montes, or continued our grassroots organizing for civil liberties without YOUR support. Thank you.

The Committee to Stop FBI Repression is a grassroots all volunteer national organization. We hope you can support our work by contributing financially to support this important work. Your contribution will be spent organizing against state repression, funding our legal support of Rasmea Odeh and our continued activism around the case of the Anti-War 23.

Peace,

Meredith Aby-Keirstead

Donate here: http://www.stopfbi.net/donate

#UnitedStates #MeredithAby #CommitteeToStopFBIRepression #PoliticalRepression #RasmeaOdeh

Minneapolis, MN – The FBI says they have finished copying the political material and personal papers seized in the Sept. 24, 2010 raids on the homes of Twin Cities anti-war and international solidarity activists. On the afternoon of Nov. 1, FBI agents delivered the last batch of notebooks, family photos, membership lists for anti-war and several other groups, computer backup discs and political documents to the office of attorney Bruce Nestor. The FBI has been returning batches of the copied material seized in the September 24, 2010 raids over the last several weeks.

“This is a serious violation of our right to organize against war,” states Jess Sundin of the Twin Cities-based Anti-War Committee. “The FBI took the computers from the office of the Anti-War Committee and made copies of lists that include thousands of our supporters. They copied notes from meetings and plans for events. They took our personal papers, political materials and books from my home. They are stepping all over our right to organize, associate and speak out.”

The material that the FBI copied and returned comes from the homes of Twin Cities activists Jess Sundin, Steff Yorek, Mick Kelly, Meredith Aby, Anh Pham and Tracy Molm and the office of the Anti-War Committee. All of them are among the 23 anti-war and international solidarity activists summoned to appear in front of a Chicago grand jury headed by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, investigating ‘material support for terrorism.’

The U.S. Attorney’s office is threatening to indict the anti-war activists.

Mick Kelly, of the Committee to Stop FBI Repression states, “We have done nothing wrong. The FBI should destroy the copies of everything they took.”

The FBI returned the copied material after Attorney Bruce Nestor filed a motion in Federal Court to demanding that the property of Jess Sundin be returned. The hearing on the motion scheduled for Nov. 10 will be canceled.

Activists from around the country will attend the national conference organized by the Committee to Stop FBI repression in Chicago on Nov. 5 to build the fight that against the ongoing attacks on anti-war and international solidarity activists.

#MinneapolisMN #JessSundin #MeredithAby #September24FBIRaids #TracyMolm

Chicago, IL – More than 200 activists from 73 organizations met at the Kent College of Law here, Aug. 28, to lay the groundwork for massive protests at the G8 and NATO summit is scheduled for May of 2012. The conference, initiated by the United National Antiwar Coalition (UNAC) served as the founding meeting of the “Coalition Against NATO / G8 War and Poverty Agenda.” Participants agreed that the meeting was a resounding success.

Joe Iosbaker, the Chicago spokesperson for UNAC, told attendees, “We have been running flat out since June to bring this meeting together to found both a national coalition and a local coalition against NATO and the G8, to say no to their wars and attacks on the lives of workers and oppressed people. This meeting today brings together over 70 organizations. We have key groups here – folks who played a leading role in the major anti-war and anti-corporate globalization protests in recent years; veterans of all the anti-war movements since Vietnam; as well as leading fighters in the community and labor struggles in Chicago. We have reached out broadly, gathering support from faith-based activists, from Arab and Muslim, African American, Puerto Rican and Chicano/Mexicano communities, and all the organizations in Chicago and across the country in the anti-war movement to build the largest protests possible in May.”

Iosbaker was one of the anti-war and international solidarity activists whose home was raided by the FBI on September 24, 2010.

Speaking of the protests planned for the Summit, Iosbaker stated “When we march on the McCormick Convention Center, our front banner will read, ‘Jobs, Housing, Healthcare, Education, Pensions, the Environment – Not War.’ We think that will speak for most people in this city, and we think that tens of thousands will join us to say ‘No to NATO/G8 and their War and Poverty Agenda.’”

#ChicagoIL #AntiwarMovement #NATO #JoeIosbaker #MeredithAby #UnitedNationalAntiWarCommittee #UNAC #G8 #NATOG8Summit

Minneapolis, MN – Cynthia McKinney, former six-term member of the House of Representatives, and Sara Flounders, co-director of the International Action Center, spoke to a packed room of over 60 supporters, July 9, at the Plymouth Congregational Church. Both gave motivating speeches for how the U.S./NATO intervention in Libya is endangering and killing the civilian population and demanded an immediate end to the war on Libya.

President Obama claims U.S. involvement in Libya is not a ‘war,’ but McKinney’s firsthand testimony of the nighttime and daytime bombing of Tripoli, the country’s largest urban center, during her month long stay disputed that claim. She saw missiles fly over her head and heard drones and bombing attacks repeatedly. “The bombing for me, and I was only there for a couple of weeks, takes a psychological toll. If I’m subject to it, imagine the children. That first day of intense bombing took place on the day of national exams for the little kids…The first day of the super intensive bombing they started bombing at 11:30 in the morning and kept on going until 11:30 at night. We counted a total of 89 bombs that day,” McKinney told the audience.

During her stay McKinney had the opportunity to meet with people who were carrying out their everyday lives as an act of resistance to the U.S./NATO bombing campaign. She occupied the plaza in front of Momar Qadafi’s home with thousands of Libyans and Africans who support Qadafi, refuse to leave and are offering themselves as protection from bombing. She met with students who came to the university to take their finals despite the bombing raids because they refused to put their lives on hold because of U.S. imperialism. “They said they were not going to be deterred because of NATO.”

Both McKinney and Flounders addressed the roots of the conflict directly. They argued effectively that the U.S. and NATO are using the civil war as an excuse to carry out regime change in Libya. They articulated that the U.S. and European powers want to install a puppet government so they can control the largest oil reserves in Africa.

Flounders attacked one of President Obama’s main justifications for the war, “He says this war is for humanitarian intervention. This is an excuse. There is not a country in the world that is better off after U.S. warfare. Just ask the people of Yugoslavia, Iraq and Afghanistan!”

This event was a part of the national speaking tour of the Dignity delegation, which was lead by Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney. This tour is playing an important role in giving voice to the Libyan people during a time when an increasing number of Americans are strongly questioning the U.S. role in this conflict while state and federal governments are in debt and cutting needed social services. By a margin of 2-to-1, people in the United States oppose the war in Libya.

The Eyewitness Libya event was co-sponsored by the Minnesota Anti-War Committee, the Emergency Committee to Stop U.S./NATO War on Libya, the Minnesota Peace Action Coalition, the Twin Cities Peace Campaign and Women Against Military Madness.

#MinneapolisMN #AntiwarMovement #AntiWarCommittee #SaraFlounders #CynthiaMcKinney #MeredithAby #Libya #InternationalActionCenter #Africa

Minneapolis, MN – Responding to President Obama’s June 22 national televised speech on Afghanistan, Meredith Aby of the Twin Cites based Anti War Committee stated, “The U.S. needs to get out of Afghanistan now.” Aby was one of the main organizers of the massive anti-war march on the opening day of the 2008 Republican National Convention and she is one of the 23 peace and international solidarity activists who have been subpoenaed to appear in front of the Chicago grand jury investigating ‘material support for terrorism.’ The grand jury, headed by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, is attempting to criminalize anti-war activism.

Commenting on the president’s speech, Aby stated, “The president has been forced to announce a small withdrawal because the American people are overwhelmingly opposed to the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan. However, just like Obama did with Iraq last year, he is trying to muddle the debate by announcing a ‘withdrawal’ when in fact he is continuing the occupation. The American public does not want to fund death and destruction and instead is concerned about the cost to important social programs at home. We need to continue to protest for all the troops to be brought home.”

Tracy Molm, a member of Students for Democratic Society, said this about the president’s speech, “What the U.S. is doing in Afghanistan is wrong and the people of Afghanistan are suffering because of it. The U.S. and its allies are backing a corrupt puppet government that the Afghan people do not support. On top of that, the U.S. government is responsible for a massive number of civilians being killed and injured.”

Steff Yorek, the Political Secretary of Freedom Road Socialist Organization states, “No one, including the people of Afghanistan, wants to live under occupation of a foreign power, so they have created a massive resistance to that occupation. The announcement that 10,000 out of the 100,000-plus troops in Afghanistan will leave does not cut it. All the troops need to come home now.”

#MinneapolisMN #AntiwarMovement #Afghanistan #AntiWarCommittee #FreedomRoadSocialistOrganization #BarackObama #MeredithAby #TracyMolm #SteffYorek

Minneapolis, MN – On one of the first warm spring afternoons here, over 50 people joined an anti-war protest on April 2 to demonstrate against the U.S. war on Libya.

The protest lined the sidewalks at one of the major intersections in Minneapolis with signs and banners against the newest U.S. war in the Middle East.

Protesters’ signs read, “U.S. hands off Libya,” “Foreclose the war, not people’s homes,” and “Say no to U.S. war against Libya.”

For over an hour participants chanted anti-war slogans and held signs as thousands of people went by in cars, buses and the light rail train.

Many people showed support for the anti-war message by waving, honking horns and joining the protest.

Two TV stations reported the event on evening newscasts.

A statement issued by organizers says in part, “Eight years after the start of the war in Iraq, the U.S. has launched a new war in the Middle East, this time against Libya. This is not a ‘humanitarian intervention.’ This is a war launched to try to control the oil resources of the region. The big powers intervene for their own economic interests, not for the interests of the people.”

The statement continues, “We need funds for jobs, education, the environment, housing and human needs, not a new war in the Middle East.”

Meredith Aby, of the Anti-War Committee, told the crowd, “This is not ‘change we can believe in.’ This is the Bush doctrine version 2.0. This was an unprovoked attack on the Libyan government because the U.S. wants a regime change. But Obama doesn’t have the right to decide for the Libyan people who their leader is or what they do with their oil. Those questions are for the Libyan people to answer and them alone.”

Aby, one of anti-war leaders raided by the FBI September 24, 2010, also urged participants to sign the pledge to resist Grand jury and FBI repression.

The Saturday protest was sponsored by Anti-War Committee, Emergency Committee to Stop U.S. War in Libya, Military Families Speak Out, Students for a Democratic Society (U of MN), Twin Cities Peace Campaign, Veterans for Peace, Women Against Military Madness and others.

#MinneapolisMN #AntiwarMovement #MilitaryFamiliesSpeakOut #AntiWarCommittee #WomenAgainstMilitaryMadness #TwinCitiesPeaceCampaign #VeteransForPeace #MeredithAby #Libya #EmergencyCommitteeToStopUSWarInLibya #StudentsForADemocraticSocietyUOfMN

Minneapolis, MN – About 75 protesters demanding an end to the U.S.-led war on Libya gathered at the Federal Building here, March 21. The demonstration was initiated by Women Against Military Madness and endorsed by the Anti-War Committee, the Twin Cities Peace Campaign and others.

Speaking at the rally, Meredith Aby of the Anti-War Committee said, “Why is the U.S. attacking Libya? Oil. The U.S. and Europe are happy with the Saudi and Bahrainian royalty and their oil supply so they choose to look the other way when their militaries kill innocent people. The Libyan government controls the largest reserves of oil in Africa and the imperialist powers are using the revolutions throughout the Arab world as an excuse to grab Libyan oil for themselves and to reassert their dominance in a region struggling for freedom.”

Aby continued, “On Saturday the U.S. military shot 110 Tomahawk cruise missiles at a cost of $2 million each at Libya. Who will pay for this war? Not the wealthiest in our society. It will come at the expense of the poor, programs for children, etc. The accounts of civilian deaths are piling up. We must raise our voices loudly and demand: Not one more death, not one more dollar – Hands off Libya!”

#MinneapolisMN #AntiwarMovement #AntiWarCommittee #WomenAgainstMilitaryMadness #MeredithAby #Libya #LibyaWar

The house was packed on Dec. 17 in Cambridge, Mass., as a wide spectrum of organizations and activists came out to a forum on the growing menace of FBI repression. The program was organized by the new Boston chapter of the United National Antiwar Committee, along with 17 Boston-area anti-war and social justice organizations, including the International Action Center.

The program featured Meredith Aby, one of several anti-war and international solidarity activists from the Minneapolis area whose home was raided by the FBI on Sept. 24. Aby was subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury that was supposedly investigating “material aid to terrorism” charges. (Details can be found at stopfbi.net.) The program was part of a four-stop New England tour for the Committee to Stop FBI Repression, including two forums in Western Massachusetts and one in Connecticut.

Also speaking on Dec. 17 was Boston City Councilor Chuck Turner, who has been falsely convicted in a targeted attack by the FBI and a campaign by the U.S. Attorney’s Office to smear and take down progressive African-American elected officials. A petition demanding no jail time for Chuck was circulated and can be signed online at iacboston.org.

Kathy Manley and Lynne Jackson of Project Salam spoke of the hundreds of cases of Muslims who have been victims of “preemptive prosecution,” convicted on secret evidence and secret charges and given long prison sentences. Their prosecution has been based on the FBI conclusion that the individuals had the “mindset” or “ideology” to commit or aid terrorism. Information on these cases can be found at projectsalam.org.

Laila Murad described the case of Tarek Mehanna, a respected leader in the Muslim community in Sudbury, Mass., who, after refusing to talk to the FBI about his friends and neighbors, is being locked down in solitary confinement 23 hours a day. His support committee can be contacted at www.freetarek.com.

Nancy Murray of the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts described the refocus of law enforcement away from solving crimes and toward using massive databases to data-mine in order to “predict” who will commit crimes and then arresting them. She also reminded the audience that they should not allow the FBI into their homes without a warrant or speak to them without a lawyer.

#CambridgeMA #FBI #MeredithAby #September24FBIRaids #CommitteeToStopFBIRepression #grandJury #ChuckTurner #ProjectSalam #TarekMehanna

Fight Back!: Many are saying that the occupation in Iraq is coming to an end. What is your view?

Meredith Aby: In a recent speech President Obama claimed, “Our commitment in Iraq is changing – from a military effort led by our troops to a civilian effort led by our diplomats.” But 50,000 U.S. troops and tens of thousands of contractors is an occupation plain and simple. The Democratic Party is worried about the mid-term elections this November and their base has strong opposition to the war in Iraq. The president is decreasing the amount of U.S. troops there as a crumb to anti-war Democrats. However, it is not a significant change in U.S. policy. Obama’s foreign policy is the same now as it was a year ago; he has escalated the war in Afghanistan and is keeping enough troops in Iraq to keep the country under the thumb of U.S. imperialism, even though it isn’t the focus of current U.S. war efforts.

Fight Back!: Why is Iraq so important to the U.S.?

Meredith Aby: Iraq is critical to the U.S. for three main reasons. The number one reason is Iraq’s large oil reserves that are important to the U.S.’s economic agenda. The second reason is as a warning to other nationalist governments about the costs of standing up to the U.S. And finally, if the U.S. were to officially lose the war in Iraq that would be a huge blow to the U.S. in the region and around the globe. The U.S. went all in on this war and can’t leave without a victory or the U.S. will lose its status as a super power. In reality though, the U.S. is locked in a standstill with the resistance fighters in Iraq. The U.S. isn’t going to be able to come out of this war a stronger imperialist power because there is no way for the U.S. to win.

Fight Back!: What should the anti-war movement be doing about the occupation of Iraq?

Meredith Aby: Well it’s critical that the anti-war movement not drop the demand for a complete and immediate withdrawal from Iraq. While Afghanistan is naturally going to remain the focus for the anti-war movement in this period, we can’t let Iraq fall off the radar. If we do that, it lends credibility to the White House’s claim that the occupation is ending and will help people think that U.S. occupations can just be wished away. We need to keep building this movement and take to the streets demanding an immediate end to both the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.

#MinneapolisMN #AntiwarMovement #Iraq #IraqOccupation #MeredithAby