MEDIA RELEASE:
Activists, refugees & veterans mark 20th anniversary of the start of the Iraq War

On Saturday 15 January, events in London and Washington DC will mark the 20th anniversary of the day the war on Iraq began in 1991.

London
A public meeting at Giuseppe Conlon House in Harringey will be addressed by:
·Iraqi refugees
·British peace activists who were camped on the Saudi/Iraqi border when the war broke out
·an Australian activist jailed in the US for a year for his opposition to the Gulf War
·people who broke the sanctions on Iraq
·a combat veteran of the Iraq War who became a refusenik after first deployment
·elder of the peace movement Bruce Kent.

Giuseppe Conlon Venue is a Catholic Worker community project with the capacity to host 400 people in its disused church space.


*The Moment Bombing Commenced
A midnight vigil at the US embassy in Grosvenor Square will demand an end to the occupation of Iraq. The vigil coincides with the time the first bombs were dropped on Baghdad on 15 January 1991. While Londoners slept, the bombing was timed to suit US prime-time news schedules.

Simultaneous International Protest
Simultaneous protests initiated by Catholic Worker communities will take place at the White House in Washington DC and at other sites related to the war in the United States, Britain, Ireland, Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand.

Catholic Worker spokesperson Ciaron O’Reilly, who spent a year in US prisons for damaging a B-52 Bomber in 1991 and, more recently, was one of 5 Catholic Worker activists acquitted at the historic Four Courts in Dublin of US$2.5 million criminal damage to a US war plane being refueled in Ireland en route to Iraq in 2003, says:

“It has been a 20-year war on the people of Iraq, from the genocidal sanctions to the aerial and naval bombardments and brief ground war of 1991, to outright invasion of 2003 and now, the continuing occupation.

“The event we are hosting on Saturday evening is to remember and mourn the dead, but also to celebrate the continued nonviolent resistance to the war on the people of Iraq. We will hear from Iraqi people and western peace activists who were under the bombing in 1991, a British combat veteran of the war and those who found creative ways to nonviolently resist the bombing, the sanctions and the invasion.

“The Catholic Worker has a near-80-year history of direct, nonviolent resistance to war and war preparations. Our events are inclusive and this one will include folks from Catholic, Protestant, Shiite, Sunni, Buddhist, agnostic and atheist traditions, people who have been in the military and folks who have been in prison for nonviolently resisting the military. As of Saturday morning the 45 people who have RSVP'd come from Europe, North America, South America, Asia, Australia and Tottenham!

The Catholic Worker Movement consists of over 185 communities worldwide committed to nonviolence, voluntary poverty, prayer and hospitality for the homeless.

For comment, contact: Ciaron O’Reilly ph. 079 392 905 76



******INVITATION TO JANUARY 15TH. EVENT - RSVP

* RSVP (asap) If you are coming to Saturday January 15th. events at Giuseppe Conlon House
(so we have idea of how may to cater for!)
Email ciaronx at yahoo.com
Text/Phone 07939 290 576

JANUARY 15th - 20 Years of War on Iraq!
(Martin Luther King Day!)

**LONDON EVENTS sponsored by

- Catholic Worker communities (Giuseppe Conlon House/ London, St Francis House/ Oxford, the CW Farmhouse/ Rickmansworth),
www.londoncatholicworker.org
- Harringey Soldiarity Group
 http://www.haringey.org.uk/content/
and
- Justice not Vengeance
 http://www.j-n-v.org/

An initiative from D.C.  http://dccatholicworker.wordpress.com/2010/12/25/januar...iraq/ taken up in London,spreading across the world!


**INVITATION

To Remember 20 Years of War on the People of Iraq
To Celebrate 20 Years of Nonviolent Resistance to the War on Iraq

* "Gulf War" 1991
* Sanctions 1990-2003
* Invasion and Occupation 2003 - Ongoing
* Millions of Iraqis killed, 2 million exiled, 2 million internally displaced, millions wounded.
* Thousands of U.S. led soldiers killed and maimed.

SATURDAY JANUARY 15TH.
20th. Anniversary of the Start of the Ongoing War on Iraq
1991-2011

GIUSEPPE CONLON HOUSE

***7.30 p.m.
PUBLIC MEETING

Speakers

* Dalia and Widad (from Iraq)

* Bruce Kent
former Chair of CND and vice-president of Pax Christi
Chair of the Movement for the Abolition of War (MAW)
 http://www.abolishwar.org.uk/

* Jimmy Johns
1991 "Iraq Peace Team"

* Ciaron O'Reilly
1991 ANZUS/ B52 Plowshares
 http://www.indymedia.ie/article/98569

* Emily Johns
Sanctions Breaking "Voices in the Wilderness"
 http://www.voices.netuxo.co.uk/

* Ben Griffin
Iraq Veteran Against the War
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Griffin_%28former_Brit...er%29



MUSIC & POETRY

* "Tottenham's Own Living Legend" Razz
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DOR7Ml4XF0

* Plowshares Activist & Poet Stephen Hancock

* Lovers Electric
 http://loverselectric.com/flash.html

*Rod Boucher
 http://goodgodstudio.com/page72.html


WHERE
Giuseppe Conlon Venue
next to 49 Mattison Rd. Harringey, London N4 1BG
- closest tube Manor House
- 29 (bendy bus) from Trafalgar Square to "Mattison Rd." stop on Green Lane

RSVP
if possible (so we have idea of how may to cater for!)
Email ciaronx at yahoo.com
Text/Phone 07939 290 576


GLOBAL PEACE VIGIL AT THE TIME OF THE FIRST ATTACK ON IRAQ

* Midnight January 15th. outside the U.S. Embassy in London
ALSO confirmed midnight vigils - Menwith Hill, U.S. Embassy Dublin

*Also U.S. embassy Wellington and City Square Christchurch (NZ) and flooded West End Brisbane!

* Washington D.C. January 15th. 7 p.m. at the White House

Events planned for Washington D.C.
 http://dccatholicworker.wordpress.com/2010/12/25/januar...iraq/