Right to Dissent a Cherished American Freedom

War protesters creatively make their voices heard in Washington
By Lea Terhune

Washington -- Families and school tours visiting the nation’s capital during spring vacation were treated to an example of direct political action as protestors against the Iraq War mingled with throngs of tourists and residents March 19.

Demonstrators young and old dispersed throughout the city to mark the fifth year of the conflict by publicly voicing their concerns. Equestrian police sat placidly on their horses as a group bearing a large orange sign that read “Iraq get out, Iran stay out” crossed McPherson Square. Peaceful groups chanted anti-war slogans and songs near the White House and other federal buildings.

President Bush, speaking at the Pentagon the same day, acknowledged the “understandable debate over whether the war was worth fighting, whether the fight is worth winning, and whether we can win it.”

But he maintained his support for the Iraq war, saying the troop buildup, or surge, is working. “The battle in Iraq has been longer and harder and more costly than we anticipated -- but it is a fight we must win,” he said, lauding soldiers’ courage and determination and calling the military action noble, necessary and just.

Nearby on the Capitol Mall and on surrounding city streets, Americans from various parts of the country disagreed.
Veterans for Peace intoned responses to the military cadence call “Sound Off” with words tailored to the peace march, rather than the drill field. Member of the group held signs aloft and flashed peace gestures. Some were in wheelchairs. Stopping in front of the White House, a member of the group delivered a speech condemning the war.
“Support our troops -- bring them back” was a sentiment expressed by many.

Mike Ferner, a Navy hospital corpsman, or medical specialist, during the Vietnam War, told reporters, “I’m here because this president apparently is not interested in listening to the will of the majority of people in this country, and we need to get out and demonstrate more … what we really need to do is stop business as usual.” He said delivering that message peacefully was the goal of the demonstrators.

More theatrical were groups of black-swathed protesters wearing white death masks who silently threaded their way through the city. They called their protest a “Death March.”

FREE SPEECH GUARANTEED UNDER THE U.S. CONSTITUTION

Although the Washington demonstration was not as large as some in the past, it was earnest. Protesters tried to blockade the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the U.S. tax office, to symbolize a call to halt the flow of U.S. taxpayers’ money to fund the Iraq War. Some groups held up traffic. A few dozen were arrested across the city.

“Protesting is not illegal. It is our right. It’s in the Bill of Rights in the Constitution,” Officer Josh Aldiva, spokesman for the Metropolitan Police, told America.gov. But when protesters break laws by blocking traffic, crossing a police barrier or trying to enter a restricted building, they may be arrested.

In those cases, Aldiva explained, people are taken to the local police station and their police records are checked. If they have no recorded offenses, they may be asked to pay a fine, after which they may leave.

Various law enforcement agencies, local and federal, policed the protests, which were calm despite arrests.

According to Federal Protective Service press officer Ernestine Fobbs, “It was peaceful at the IRS, but you are still required to charge people with failure to comply.”

Countering anti-war protesters were a group of people at a military recruiting center with signs stating “We support our brave military and their just mission.”

CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE DEEPLY ROOTED IN AMERICAN HISTORY

Civil disobedience is an old weapon in the American arsenal of dissent, dating back to the 1773 Boston Tea Party, when Colonists dumped a British vessel’s tea cargo overboard into Boston Harbor to protest against an unfair British system of taxes and tariffs.

Writer Henry David Thoreau’s famous 1849 essay on civil disobedience still resonates to Americans: “The authority of government … is still an impure one: to be strictly just, it must have the sanction and consent of the governed.”

Nonviolent protest was used in the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s, and in the movement against the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 1970s. Both employed marches and sit-ins, a form of passive resistance.

Organizers such as the group United for Peace and Justice offered training in nonviolent protest and political activism ahead of the peace march. Similar events were staged in cities around the country.

Anti-war protester Diane Rosen explained why she was there: “I want to just take part in letting people know there are people who think like this.”

Rice Comments on Regional Issues, Including Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia

INTERVIEW
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
With William Waack of Globo TV
March 13, 2008
Salvador de Bahia, Brazil

QUESTION: Madame Secretary, in terms of the capacity of your government to influence positively events in this region, under President Bush, what’s your assessment? This capacity has increased or decreased?

SECRETARY RICE: In many ways, our relations have never been better in many parts of the region. With Brazil, we’ve developed a very important and strategic relationship where we’re cooperating together on projects in Africa, where obviously we have the biofuels initiative. Brazil is such an important actor not just in the region, but globally. And I spent a long time today talking to the Foreign Minister, for instance about the Middle East -- Brazil was a participant in Annapolis -- and even on issues that are not of high politics, but I think that touch the lives of people. The United States has doubled foreign assistance to Latin America and we are trying to do more about education and healthcare because ultimately, this President cares about social justice in this hemisphere; democracy, good economies and social justice.

QUESTION: I read your remarks at the OAS as recently as last October when you said this is a change in history. This President, for him, it’s not important where you are, your ideological background, whether you are leftist or rightist. But after we heard from President Bush yesterday, Wednesday about Chavez, this position has changed.

SECRETARY RICE: No, this is – we are sitting here in Brazil. Brazil has a president from the left. He’s one of America’s closest friends and partners in the region and on the globe. I will go on to Chile, another country where the president is from the left and again, we have excellent relations with Chile.

And so this is not about where you are on the ideological spectrum. It’s a question of: Do you respect democratic values and democratic institutions; are you working for the good of your people; are you working for the good of your neighbors. Those are the issues that are important to the United States, but it’s certainly not a matter of whether you come from the left or from the right.

QUESTION: So definitely, you can work with Chavez?

SECRETARY RICE: This is a question of what policies the country pursues, what interests the country pursues. We’ve had good relations with Venezuela historically. We would like to have good relations with Venezuela again. The question is: Are countries and are leaders working for democracy and for free trade and for prosperity and for social justice for their people and are they respecting their neighbors.

QUESTION: Now the United States is involved directly in armed conflict in Colombia. How seriously do you take the allegations that the FARC would be defeated were it not for the help it’s getting from neighbors like Ecuador and Venezuela?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, the United States is involved and has been, on a bipartisan basis going back to the Clinton Administration, in helping the people of Colombia deal with what was a terrible situation in which insecurity was a daily matter for the Colombian people; kidnapping and bombings along roads, roads that no Colombian would even go along, narco trafficking and terrorists who were killing innocent people, paramilitaries who were involved in all kinds of crimes.

And President Uribe, following on President Pastrana, has carried out what he has called a program of democratic security. And indeed, life in Colombia is much better. I was in Medellin just a couple of months ago and I’ll tell you something about Medellin. This is a name that used to be synonymous with trouble and now, it is a city that is booming and where prosperity is coming again and where people are beginning to feel safe. That’s the partnership that the United States has engaged in with Colombia.

Now to the degree that the FARC, a terrorist organization by U.S. designation, is operating someplace outside of Colombia’s borders, Colombia’s neighbors owe it to the people of Colombia to deal with that problem, not to allow them to operate on their territory. And it is, by the way, a UN requirement of member states to do everything that can be done to prevent terrorists from using irregular groups, from using financing, from using ungoverned territories to attack innocent people. And so we’ve worked very closely with Colombia. Colombia is a good partner and Colombia is a good partner in the region for a better Western Hemisphere.

QUESTION: In your assessment, Madame Secretary, why are so many South American and Latin American countries shy or reluctant to adopt the same designation to the FARC as the U.S. does?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, we have different histories. We have different tasks to where we are now. But I don’t think that many would deny that the FARC has been associated with some of the most horrendous violence against the people of Colombia. If we were sitting here with my Foreign Minister colleague from Colombia, we would be sitting with somebody who was six years in captivity because of the FARC. So whatever one wants to call them, and we designate it as a terrorist organization, the FARC has had a horrendous impact on lives – for the lives of ordinary Colombians.

QUESTION: Would you call Brazil a leader in this region?

SECRETARY RICE: Brazil is clearly a leader in this region. Brazil is looked to, President Lula is looked to for his wisdom, he’s looked to for his ability to bring the region together, he’s looked to for his vision. And by the way, not just his vision for the region, but because he has been effective here in Brazil in helping to deliver a better life for its people, in having relationships now with countries like the United States that I think will put biofuels on the map as a way to deal with the terrible problems that we face in energy supply and climate change.

So President Lula is looked to as a leader and Brazil is looked to as a leader. I think increasingly, Brazil will be looked to as a global leader as well, not just a regional leader.

QUESTION: On the other hand, the branch of government that you lead, the State Department, as recently as the day before yesterday was worried about the level of corruption in Brazil, stating – well, in a country report that Brazilian authorities are not doing enough. Is that impunity what worries you?

SECRETARY RICE: Well, I don’t believe for one moment that there – that it’s a question of impunity. I know that it’s very difficult when corruption gets rooted in, to get it out, to root it out. But I strongly believe that the Brazilian Government understands the connection between corruption and growth. Corruption is attacks on the poor. Corruption is a sure way to kill international investment and I know that those things are understood by the Brazilian Government and that efforts are being made to fight out – to fight corruption.

QUESTION: Have you time to talk a little bit about more pleasant issues?

SECRETARY RICE: Sure.

QUESTION: Have we? Because she was giving me time.

SECRETARY RICE: Yeah, we’ll take a moment to do that, yeah, sure.

QUESTION: Have we time? Yeah.

SECRETARY RICE: Sure.

QUESTION: Okay.

SECRETARY RICE: Sure.

QUESTION: So it – apparently, it was one – a personal wish from your side to be in Bahia. And why?

SECRETARY RICE: It was a personal wish of mine to be in Bahia. First of all, I’ve heard so much of Bahia over the years, of Salvador as a great city, but also because of the Afro-Brazilian community here and the expression of that culture here. I am, of course, myself of – partly of African descent and I’ve always believed that Brazil and the United States, in some ways, look more like each other than any two countries in the world; great European and Latin and African and (inaudible) traditions all living side by side.

And so I was – I wanted to come to Bahia. I can see I wasn’t wrong. It’s absolutely beautiful here. I’m just sorry I don’t have longer to be in Bahia.

QUESTION: You do feel at home?

SECRETARY RICE: I feel right at home and as we came through the streets, you can see the wonderful mixture of people. I’m a great believer that the future is in big, multiethnic democracies like Brazil and India and the United States and South Africa, where all kinds of people find their place and all kinds of people find opportunity and they live together. In so much of the world, difference is still a license to kill and when you drive along in Brazil or in the United States and you see that there are people whose faces look like the world, but they speak the same language and they want the same things, it’s really quite affirming of our common humanity.

QUESTION: Madame Secretary, thank you very much.

SECRETARY RICE: Thank you.

Innovation Will Safeguard Uruguay’s Future

By Frank E. Baxter / US Ambassador to Uruguay

At least once a year, business leaders from around the world gather to discuss the trends in economic growth, education, and technology that will shape the future. They usually decide to meet in a friendly country that boasts an intelligent work force and a government which is open to fresh ideas.

It came as no surprise to me that the organizers of the 2008 Americas Innovation Forum decided to meet from March 30 to April 2 in Uruguay. Of course, it takes more than a surplus of friendly and intelligent people or a picturesque setting to convince highly competitive business representatives to take time away from their busy schedules to spend a few days contemplating the future. They chose Uruguay because this country has the potential to become a South American innovation center and the headquarters for companies seeking to take advantage of an emerging Mercosur.

This year’s Innovation Forum will highlight advancements in cutting-edge technology; business practices that reflect long-range thinking and planning; and Uruguay’s growing attractiveness to world business. Visitors will hear how this country is creating nationwide programs that support the ambitions of the small enterprise leaders and innovators of the future.

Though the Forum will focus on the Southern Cone, other Western Hemisphere countries are also taking part. Speakers and participants will explore and highlight new ways to spark innovation and competition, with the goal of creating and sustaining economic growth. I am sure this important forum will be more than merely another conference in which the participants congratulate each other or replicate the work of existing institutions and agreements.

Being the first country to implement a “one laptop per child program” makes Uruguay especially attractive to forward-looking business leaders, particularly to those who might otherwise overlook South America in favor of the emerging technology centers in Eastern Europe and the Indian subcontinent.

Hosting the Innovation Forum further demonstrates that the Uruguayan-American bilateral relationship is headed in a positive direction. The creation of the Joint Commission on Trade and Investment in 2002; the negotiation of a bilateral investment treaty in November 2006; and the signing of a trade and investment framework agreement in January 2007 clearly shows good will and a commitment to ensure that young people in both of countries will have the skills they need to take advantage of the opportunities of the future.

The Innovation Forum is itself a follow-up of the Americas Competitiveness Forum held last year in Atlanta, and a preview of the second Competitiveness Forum, to take place this August in Atlanta.

U.S. Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez summed up the outlook for Uruguay, and our relationship, when he praised this country for making “great progress in opening doors for business, creating advances in technology, and improving education,” adding that “by working together, both bilaterally and regionally (Uruguay and the United States) can ensure that we have robust, dynamic business environments and flexible, skilled talent pools that are equipped to meet the challenges of the 21st century and to compete globally.”

I urge Uruguayans and Americans to pay close attention to the Americas Innovation Forum. The ideas and proposals discussed here will directly touch our lives and positively impact the future of our young people.

Ambassador Baxter Encourages Participation in Americas Innovation Forum

U.S. Ambassador Frank E. Baxter, Canadian Ambassador Alain Latulippe and Mexican Ambassador Cassio Luiselli at the March 13, 2008 launching of the Americas Innovation Forum.

By Leigh Miller

Montevideo -- During a presentation March 13, U.S. Ambassador Frank Baxter urged companies to participate in the upcoming Americas Innovation Forum, endorsing the event as an opportunity for Uruguay to position itself as a center of innovation in the region.

The forum, to be held March 30-April 1 at the Conrad Hotel in Punta del Este, will draw business and government leaders from 20 countries to discuss the further development of innovation in education, entrepreneurship and technology in the Western Hemisphere.

“It does not surprise me that the organizers chose Uruguay as the headquarters of the Americas Innovation Forum. This country has the potential to become the center of innovation in South America,” Mr. Baxter said during a breakfast presentation at the Montevideo Golf Club.

The March 13 event was organized by the embassies and binational chambers of commerce of the United States, Canada and Mexico in order to encourage the Uruguayan business community to participate in the Americas Innovation Forum.

The forum will propose strategies to increase innovation in the region, focusing on education and public policies that support the advancement of technology and entrepreneurship.

Plenary sessions are to address information and telecommunications technologies, biotechnology, engineering and human capital, while workshops will highlight international cooperation for the development of alternative energy, digital communications, tourism, agroindustry, pharmaceuticals and nanotechnology.

Mr. Baxter invited Uruguay businesspersons to attend the forum, emphasizing its importance for showcasing Uruguay’s potential for investment and economic development.

“The forum will demonstrate advances in recent technology and business practices that reflect Uruguay’s long-term plans and attractive growth in the business world. Visitors will learn how this country is creating programs that support the ambitions of small business owners and innovators of the future,” he said.

The Americas Innovation Forum in Uruguay is to feature 47 speakers, 20 countries, 25 multinational corporations and 22 institutions and government agencies. More than 1,000 entrepreneurs, executives, academics and government officials from the throughout the hemisphere are expected to attend.

The forum, organized by Uruguay’s National Research and Innovation Agency, is a follow-up to the Americas Competitiveness Forum held in June 2007 in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, which Mr. Baxter attended with a group of Uruguay government officials and technology business representatives.

The Americas Innovation Forum in Uruguay forum will expand on the topics of innovation and competitiveness discussed at the Atlanta forum, and will serve as a preview to the second annual Americas Competitiveness Forum to be held in Atlanta, Aug. 17-19, 2008 (http://trade.gov/competitiveness/acf/index.asp).

For more information, or to register for the Americas Innovation Forum in Punta del Este, March 30-April 1, please visit http://www.fia2008.com.uy/Fia_2008.

Following is a translation of ambassador Baxter's remarks, delivered in Spanish:

(begin transcript)

Hello and thank you very much for being here this morning.

At least once a year, business leaders from all over the world meet to discuss the trends in economic growth, education and techology that will be shaping the future.

These leaders usually decide to meet in a friendly country that is proud of the intelligence of its labor force and who’s government is open to new ideas. So it does not surprise me that the organizers chose Uruguay as the headquarters of the Americas Innovation Forum. This country has the potential to become the center of innovation in South America.

El Foro destacará los avances en la más reciente tecnología; la práctica de negocios que reflejan planes a largo plazo y el atractivo crecimiento de Uruguay hacia mundo de los negocios.

The Forum will highlight the most recent advances in technology and business practices that reflect Uruguay’s long-term plans and attractive growth in the business world. Visitors will learn how this country is creating programs at the national level that encourage the goals of small business leaders and innovators of the future.

The Americas Innovation Forum is itself a follow-up event of the Americas Competitiveness Forum which took place last year in Atlanta, and this meeting preceeds the second Americas Competitiveness Forum that will take place again in Atlanta next August.

I urge everyone attend the Americas Innovation Forum, to register and to participate in the multiple and diverse sessions. The ideas and proposals that will be discussed will directly impact on our lives and have a positive impact on the future of our young people.

My wish is that the discussions generated here, in which we will promote knowlege and innovation as well as investment in technology as part of strategies for development, will be of real benefit to everyone of your countries and businesses.

Thank you.

(end transcript)

United States Honors Eight Female Champions of Human Rights

Washington -- Ambassadors and other diplomats, members of Congress and leaders of nonprofit organizations gathered at the U.S. Department of State March 10 to honor eight women who have risked harassment and death to fight for women’s rights.

“In too many parts of the world, unfortunately, women still struggle for basic rights and liberties in places where discrimination and exploitation and violence against women is all too common and all too often accepted or tolerated,” Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said at the awards ceremony.

The 2008 award recipients, she said, “also represent many other women around the world who fight and sacrifice so that future generations may benefit from human rights protections, access to justice and democracy, and greater prosperity and personal security in their countries.”

This year’s winners are Suraya Pakzad of Afghanistan, Virisila Buadromo of Fiji, Dr. Eaman al-Gobory of Iraq, Valdete Idrizi of Kosovo, Dr. Begum Jan of Pakistan, Nibal Thawabteh of the Palestinian Territories, Cynthia Bendlin of Paraguay and Farhiyo Farah Ibrahim of Somalia.

The Women of Courage Awards were first awarded in March 2007. The initial group of honorees represented Afghanistan, Argentina, Indonesia, Iraq, Latvia, Maldives, Saudi Arabia and Zimbabwe.

Rice said that “no culture, no religion and no tradition of any nation provides license for treating women as objects or instruments to be commanded by another.”

UNITED STATES “DEEPLY COMMITTED” TO WOMEN’S RIGHTS

“The United States remains deeply committed to helping women of courage everywhere to peacefully remove the barriers to political, economic and social empowerment for themselves and for others,” Rice said.

Paula Dobriansky, under secretary of state for democracy and global affairs, presented each woman with a trophy, and noted that “when women stand up for their freedom, all of society benefits.

“When women are educated, have access to health care and are active and productive members of their country’s economy and governments, their countries are better equipped to reach their full potential,” Dobriansky said.

Guests at the awards ceremony included Samir Sumaidaie, the ambassador to the United States from Iraq; Tayeb Jawad, the ambassador to the United States from Afghanistan, and his wife; Representative Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee; Representative Nita Lowey of New York; Ambassador Ellen Sauerbery, the State Department’s assistant secretary for population, refugees and migration; and Ambassador Shirin Tahir-Kheli, senior adviser to the secretary of state for women’s empowerment.

Also in attendance were representatives of American Women for International Understanding, a nonprofit organization that will be holding a dinner to honor the Women of Courage awardees at the National Press Club and will present each recipient with a $1,000 grant.

During their Washington visit, the awardees met at the White House with the president and first lady and with members of the U.S. Congress.

March 10 is International Women’s Day. Among the activities planned at the State Department is a gathering of judges and legal practitioners from around the world to discuss action that can be taken to prevent violations against women such as rape, domestic violence, human trafficking and prostitution.

By Jane Morse
Staff Writer