OurPledge

An important Sudan action for Californians

[From the San Francisco Bay Area Darfur Coalition:]

Dear Darfur Activist:

Sudanese civilians have endured even more suffering at the hands of their government than usual during the month of May. See the report referenced at the end of this email.

The U.S. is the President of the U.N. Security Council during June and has the power to set the Council’s agenda.

Please sign on to the letter below TODAY by replying to this email with your:
Name, Street Address, Town, and Zip Code. Your personal information will be used for no purpose other than as a signatory to the letter.

ACTION: Arrest War Criminals in Darfur

Ahmad Harun, Sudan’s former Minister of the Interior and current Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Janjawid leader Ali Kushayb, are charged with multiple counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes committed in Darfur. Amnesty International is campaigning for their arrest and surrender to the International Criminal Court (ICC) the Government of Sudan continues to refuse to do so.

Call on U.S. authorities to take action to press the government of Sudan to arrest and surrender Harun and Kushayb to the ICC.

[End of Post]

ACTION: Tell TIAA-CREF to put genocide-free investing on the ballot

Join Investors Against Genocide and tell TIAA-CREF to put genocide-free investing on the ballot for their shareholder meeting on July 15. To learn more about this campaign, read IAG’s Op-Ed in The Chronicle of Higher Education. For your convenience we’ve included the Op-Ed below.

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Tell TIAA-CREF You Do Not Want Your Retirement Money to Support Genocide

By Eric Cohen

TIAA-CREF, a $400-billion provider of financial services, promotes itself with the tag line “financial services for the greater good.” In a recent television commercial, the company proclaimed its “unique insight into the hearts and minds of those who give us hope for the future.” Its literature asserts that it has been “refining our approach to Socially Responsible Investing for nearly 30 years” and that it is “bound to do things very differently” from other financial institutions.

While TIAA-CREF’s marketing messages may be well-suited for its target customers in the academic, medical, cultural, and research fields, its record of actively investing in the worst companies financing the genocide in the Darfur region of western Sudan, tells a different and far less noble story.

ACTION: Collect some signatures for Darfur

I received this email from the Save Darfur Coalition earlier this week. Will you help them collect grassroots signatures in advance of the U.S.’s presidency of the UN Security Council? – Nikki

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You may have heard about the recent escalation of violence in Sudan. We are already receiving word that the government is retaliating. Reports indicate that government forces have been detaining, torturing and killing Darfuris in and around Khartoum, and Janjaweed militias have commenced attacks in North Darfur.

As leaders of local Darfur activist groups, I wanted to make sure to send you have the most up-to-date information as we receive it, and that you are equipped to react.

Last week many of you signed our online petition urging President Bush to help expedite deployment of peacekeepers and help protect Darfuri civilians. Now we’re asking local activist groups like yours to get the word out the old-fashioned way — within your own community.

Can your local Darfur group help us reach our 75,000 signature goal by the end of May? Click here to learn more and to download our printable petition to gather signatures in your community.

A need for vigilance

A statement from the ENOUGH Project, released yesterday:

The unprecedented attack on a suburb of Khartoum by the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) demonstrates once again the urgent need for a credible and inclusive peace process to resolve the crisis in Darfur. It is too early to predict what effect the attack will have on the political and military dynamics of the conflict going forward, but Sudan’s ruling National Congress Party is making clear that its response will focus on civilians. The government and its proxies are launching a new round of assaults against civilian targets in Darfur and we are receiving credible reports of arrests, beatings, disappearances, and executions of Darfuri civilians (particularly Zaghawa) in Khartoum and Omdurman. Today’s alarming reports of heavy fighting in Abyei–a flashpoint that threatens to ignite full scale civil war–further underscore the urgent need for sustained, high-level diplomacy. To prevent the further deterioration of the volatile situation in Sudan, ENOUGH and the Save Darfur Coalition urge the U.S. government and the international community to take immediate steps to launch and sustain an all-encompassing peace process that addresses the local and national issues that are fueling conflict.

Read ENOUGH’s Re-Released report “Creating a Peace to Keep in Darfur”

To learn more about the violence in the Abyei region of Sudan, read ENOUGH’s report, “Sounding the Alarm on Abyei”

[End of Post]

UN Global Compact Called Upon to Influence Petrochina to Help Darfur

[A press release this week from Investors Against Genocide:]

Over 80 organizations and individuals ask UN Global Compact to uphold its principles

Boston, MA – May 12, 2008 – Three days before PetroChina’s annual meeting of shareholders, over 80 civil society organizations including human rights, corporate accountability, religious and anti-genocide groups from 17 countries have signed an open letter to the United Nations Global Compact. The letter calls upon the UN Global Compact to use its influence with PetroChina, a compact participant, to help bring an end to the humanitarian crisis in Sudan. PetroChina, the listed arm of China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), Sudan’s largest oil industry partner, is indisputably linked to the regime perpetuating the five-year humanitarian crisis in Darfur which many consider to be genocide.

The letter, which was coordinated by Boston-based Investors Against Genocide, was also signed by members of US Congress, Canadian Parliamentarians, actor Mia Farrow, and Sudan researcher and analyst Eric Reeves. For the full text of the letter including signatories, visit www.InvestorsAgainstGenocide.org/UNGCandPetroChina.