From the Archive
WAT in Cleveland for the RNC, Saying, “No to Torture!”
We’re converging on Cleveland today on the eve of the Republican National Convention to take part in the People’s Justice and Peace Convention. The convention organizers tell us that “the PPJPC2016 is a legacy of countless efforts of people who have longed for justice and sought to transform the world nonviolently to end oppression.” We are answering the call!
We have been invited to propose anti-torture planks for a “People’s Platform.” At a Saturday morning workshop, entitled “Waterboarding or Worse? Building a Nation Without Torture,” Witness Against Torture will present a platform for torture abolition and accountability. (Click here to view TorturePlatform). We are proud of the comprehensive document that Jeremy Varon has written. It is a principled treatment, while also attuned to policy. Thanks to Jeremy and all those who helped edit the document.
From that document come the twenty specific planks that WAT is proposing for inclusion in the People’s Platform. (Click here to view “PlatformPlanks – Torture Abolition and Accountability”). This list is a thorough compilation of specific policies necessary for “building a nation without torture.” It includes planks on Guantanamo, indefinite detention, accountability, and more. While we are eager to repudiate Donald Trump’s horrifying calls for “waterboarding or worse,” we remind ourselves that both Republican and Democratic leaders have been complicit in torture policies over the last 15 years. Our planks and many others will be vetted and incorporated into a final People’s Platform that will be presented to both the Republican and Democratic conventions.
Sunday evening we will come together for The People’s Mic: Word to our Resistance, when the Peace Poets and local poets and musicians will come together to speak peace and put music over hate
Monday finds us joining the End Poverty Now March on the streets of Cleveland.
We invite you to join us wherever you are to intervene in the public space to lift up the humanity, dignity, and decency of oppressed peoples, be they in Guantanamo, the impoverished neighborhoods of Cleveland, or every place where sisters and brothers struggle.
Peace and solidarity,
Witness Against Torture
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Witness Against Torture is completely volunteer driven and run. We have no paid staff, but do have expenses associated with our organizing work. If you are able, please donate here: http://www.witnesstorture.org.
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Witness Against Torture
www.witnesstorture.org
Witness Against Torture will carry on in its activities until torture is decisively ended, its victims are fully acknowledged, Guantánamo and similar facilities are closed, and those who ordered and committed torture are held to account.
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