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News Releases

  • Major Military Issues: Bombing Vieques, National Missile Defense, Terrorism Report

    ROBERTO RABIN Director of Vieques Historic Archives and a spokesperson for the Committee for the Rescue and Development of Vieques, Rabin said today: “The people of Vieques, with the wide support of the Puerto Rican community, have mounted an intense campaign to end 60 years of U.S. Navy presence, exercises and destruction of the island of Vieques. Since the death of a civilian security guard on April 19, 1999, there have been protests…. The recent resumption of bombing on April 27 sparked widespread civil disobedience with over 150 people arrested for entering into the bombing zone as human shields to…

  • Interviews Available: What Kind of Globalization?

    The World Bank and International Monetary Fund are holding their spring meetings in Washington. The following critics of those institutions are available for interviews: NJOKI NJOROGE NJEHU Director of the 50 Years Is Enough Network, a coalition of over 200 U.S. grassroots groups dedicated to transforming the World Bank and the IMF, Njehu testified before the U.S. Congress on Wednesday. Today, she said: “Sub-Saharan Africa continues to pay back more to the World Bank and the IMF than it gets from those institutions. They should immediately cancel 100 percent of the debt of impoverished countries, as a bipartisan congressional commission…

  • On Bob Kerrey and Vietnam

    Former Sen. Bob Kerrey’s public statements during the last day — prompted by revelations about to be reported by the New York Times and “60 Minutes II” about a raid he led that killed unarmed civilians during the Vietnam War — have raised important issues. This afternoon, the following statement comes from Brian Willson, a former U.S. Air Force captain who served in Vietnam. BRIAN WILLSON After participating in the Vietnam War as a member of the U.S. Air Force, Willson became a peace activist. In 1987, in a civil disobedience action with other activists at a military base, Willson…

  • Peru Plane Downing: Broader Issues

    A front-page article in today’s Washington Post reports that the CIA was late in warning the Peruvian military not to fire on the civilian airplane carrying missionaries. The following analysts are available for interviews on broader U.S. policy questions: CECILIA ZARATE-LAUN Co-founder and director of the Colombia Support Network, Zarate-Laun said today: “The downing of the airplane in Peru makes more public the level of U.S. military presence in the Amazon area, which is rich in natural resources. The U.S. government is selling its ‘war on drugs’ to the American people as its solution to voracious drug consumption. But when…

  • FTAA: Liberty or Oppression?

    As he left the U.S. for the Free Trade Area of the Americas summit in Quebec today, President Bush said that the goal was to create a “hemisphere of liberty” and fight against “poverty, disease and ignorance.” Interviews are available with the following analysts who have a different assessment of the FTAA: CAROL PHILLIPS Director of the international department of the Canadian Auto Workers, Phillips said today: “In Quebec City today, the streets are shut down, there is a strong military presence in the city. They have put up a three-mile wall. The idea that what they are doing is…

  • Converging on Quebec: ‘Free Trade’ Issues

    Government ministers and heads of state from throughout the hemisphere are gathering in Quebec for the Free Trade Area of the Americas summit. For activist perspectives, see: www.indymedia.org. For in-depth analysis, see: www.zmag.org/a20quebec.htm. The following critics of the proposed FTAA pact are available for interviews: MARIA LUISA MENDONCA Director of the Global Justice Center in Brazil, Mendonca is currently in Quebec. She said today: “FTAA provides for the free circulation of capital and goods for the benefit of big multinational corporations, not civil society. Such an agreement prevents countries like Brazil from developing embryonic industries — it would force us…

  • A Week That Will Shake the Hemisphere?

    This Friday (April 20), leaders from 34 countries will gather in Quebec to chart the course of the Free Trade Area of the Americas. Protests by a range of human rights, environmental, labor and pro-democracy activists are planned. The following analysts are available for interviews: More Information LORI WALLACH Director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch, Wallach said today: “The FTAA negotiators are working behind closed doors to foist the failed NAFTA model onto the entire hemisphere — including the extreme new investor protections and rights that sank the Multilateral Agreement on Investment in 1999. Recently, in Buenos Aires, 20,000…

  • Police Brutality: Cincinnati Aftermath

    With Cincinnati in crisis amid protests against police shootings, the following analysts are available for interviews: DE LACY DAVIS The founder and president of Black Cops Against Police Brutality and a 15-year veteran of the East Orange, N.J., police department, Davis is a sergeant in the community services unit. He said today: “Often the victims of police brutality are minority males, usually black or Latino or poor whites. I’m a police officer, but the police cannot police the police. Until there’s a crisis, these issues are ignored, then we begin to see a system respond to their pain — and…

  • U.S. Crew Release: Analysts Available

    JOHN QUIGLEY Professor of law at Ohio State University specializing in international law, Quigley said today: “From what we know, China basically complied with international law.” L. LING-CHI WANG Director of Asian American Studies at the University of California at Berkeley and editor of the two-volume anthology The Chinese Diaspora, Wang said: “China could have announced its decision to confiscate the spy plane and place the crew in solitary confinement, like we did with Wen Ho Lee…. It did not. On the other hand, the White House, without knowing what had happened, started with arrogance and belligerence, demanding the immediate…

  • Budget: Analysts Available

    FRANCES FOX PIVEN Distinguished professor of political science and sociology at the graduate school at the City University of New York and coauthor of The Breaking of the American Social Compact, Piven said today: “Presumably ‘conservatives’ in power in Washington today are against a government role in redistributing wealth. But in fact, redistribution is exactly what they are about, not from the rich to the middle class and the poor, but from all of us to the very wealthy. This is clear in their tax package which shifts the burden of taxation to ordinary people. And it will also be…

  • China and the Bombing Campaign

    ROBERT WEIL Author of Red Cat, White Cat: China and the Contradictions of ‘Market Socialism’, Weil said: “The anger in China is widespread and is no doubt very genuine. Either it will stiffen the Chinese government reaction to the U.S., which would have its own serious consequences; or they won’t stand up to the U.S.,…

  • Perspectives on Juvenile Crime

    While the White House Conference on Children, Violence and Responsibility has been in the spotlight, some researchers are questioning the focus of the event. Among those available for interviews are: VINCENT SCHIRALDI The director of the Justice Policy Institute, Schiraldi warned against Senate legislation to be submitted Tuesday that gives colleges access to juvenile records…

  • Some Religious Perspectives on the War in Yugoslavia

    REV. DR. JOAN B. CAMPBELL General secretary of the National Council of Churches, Campbell was co-leader with the Rev. Jesse Jackson of the recent U.S. religious leaders’ mission to Belgrade, which culminated in their winning the release of the three captured American soldiers. “The National Council of Churches is a faith-based community that reaches out…

  • Russia and Negotiations

    The following analysts are available for comment on Russia and possibilities for negotiations: DAVID KOTZ Co-author of Revolution From Above: The Demise of the Soviet System and professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts, Kotz said: “The U.S. is trying to use Russia as a club to pressure Milosevic to submit to U.S. demands,…

  • Last Night’s House Vote Makes It Official: The Bombing of Yugoslavia is Illegal

    JULES LOBEL Professor of Constitutional and International Law at the University of Pittsburgh MICHAEL RATNER Attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights Lobel and Ratner have litigated numerous cases challenging illegal wars including Dellums v. Bush, the case that forced President Bush to obtain congressional authority for the Gulf War in 1991. In a joint statement released…

  • New Attention to Unpublicized Provisions of Rambouillet

    WASHINGTON — New questions are continuing to emerge about the actual terms of the Rambouillet text. Milosevic’s refusal to sign Rambouillet was the cited reason that NATO began the bombing of Yugoslavia. Today, the Washington Post published an exchange between NATO spokesman Jamie Shea and a representative of the Institute for Public Accuracy: [The Washington…

  • Despite Denials from NATO Official, Questions Emerging

    Did Allies Demand Right to Occupy All of Yugoslavia? WASHINGTON — New questions are emerging about the actual terms of the Rambouillet accords prior to the initiation of NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia. When NATO spokesman Jamie Shea appeared at the National Press Club in Washington yesterday, a representative of the Institute for Public Accuracy asked…

  • Is Prominent Think Tank a Bastion of Racist Theory?

    One of the most influential think tanks in the United States also houses several of the nation’s most controversial pundits on race issues. In a new analysis, researcher Deborah Toler scrutinizes what she calls the “race desk” at the American Enterprise Institute. Toler, a policy analyst with the Institute for Public Accuracy, contends that mainstream…

  • NATO: Critical Analysis

    BASIC (British American Security Information Council) BASIC can arrange interviews with Admiral Sir James Eberle, former NATO commander-in-chief; Otfried Nassauer of the Berlin Information Center for Transatlantic Security; and other NATO experts. More Information HUSSEIN IBISH Foreign policy analyst at the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, Ibish said: “The Clinton administration has made it perfectly clear that…

  • Colorado and Kosovo: What is NATO Teaching Our Children?

    President Clinton on the school shootings: “We must do more to reach out to our children and teach them to express their anger and to resolve their conflicts with words, not weapons.” MARY JOAN PARK A peace educator and director of Little Friends for Peace, a peace camp for young people, Park contrasted Clinton’s statement…

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