|
The
Thomas Merton Center |
|
|
|
|
|
|
For Immediate Release Local Group Organizing Trip to Fort Benning, Georgia to protest the U.S. Army School of Americas Meeting and nonviolence training on Saturday, November 10th The Western PA Coalition to Close the SOA has chartered a bus to Fort Benning, Georgia, to join thousands of protesters from across the U.S. demanding the shutdown of the U.S. Army School of the Americas. The bus will leave from Phipps Conservatory, Oakland, at 8:00 p.m., Friday, November 16th and will return to Pittsburgh on Monday evening, November 18th. A meeting and nonviolence training for all who will be making the trip from Pittsburgh will be held on Saturday, November 10th, 4:00 p.m. in Posvar Hall, Room SPC56, the University of Pittsburgh. The School of the Americas (SOA), dubbed the “School of Assassins” by its critics, is a combat training school that has trained some of Latin America’s most notorious war criminals. In its 53-year history, the SOA has readied over 60,000 Latin American troops in commando tactics, military intelligence, psychological operations, and advanced arms training. SOA-trained soldiers have used their training to wage war against their civilian populations. Entire villages have been massacred and thousands have “disappeared.” Most appalling are the abuses of human rights, violations of civil rights, and the targeting of grassroots leaders (especially religious workers, student leaders, and union organizers working for better conditions for the poor) by School of the Americas graduates. “It is now more important than ever to put a stop to the military training at the SOA. The current war on terrorism must include closing the SOA, where millions of taxpayer dollars are still being used today to train terrorists in our own backyard,” says Tim Vining, Executive Director of the Thomas Merton Center and one of the participants in this year’s protest to close the SOA. “The SOA is the ultimate union buster. Its training manuals identify unions as enemy targets and union organizers have been among those murdered by SOA graduates,” adds John Thompson, Representative of the United Electrical Workers and one of the organizers of the bus trip. The vision and purpose of the Western PA Coalition to Close the School of the Americas is to grow a local movement to contribute to nationwide education and advocacy around the SOA and the effort to close it down. For more information about the school, visit the SOA Watch website at www.soaw.org or contact the Thomas Merton Center at 412-361-3022. |
|
"I am against war, against violence, against violent
revolution, for peaceful settlement of differences, for nonviolent but
nevertheless radical changes. Change is needed, and violence will not
really change anything: at most it will only transfer power from one set
of bull-beaded authorities to another."
Thomas
Merton |
