WW News Service Digest #371
1) Michigan Muslim leader denied bond
by WW
2) Michael Austin: Confession frees Baltimore prisoner
by WW
3) Who killed the postal workers with anthrax?
by WW
4) Germany sued for war crimes in Yugoslavia
by WW
5) Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trias
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Jan. 17, 2002
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
SUPPOTRS BARRED FROM SECRET HEARING:
MICH. MUSLIM LEADER DENIED BOND
By Jane Cutter
and Andrew Freeman
Ann Arbor, Mich.
The public was denied access to the continuation of a bond
hearing for Ann Arbor Muslim leader Rabih Haddad on Jan. 2.
A Lebanese immigrant, Rabih Haddad had been arrested in his
home in front of his wife and four children on Dec. 14. The
pretext for his arrest was an alleged minor tourist visa
violation, for which people are very rarely prosecuted.
Supporters argue that his arrest is part of a wider roundup
of Arab and Muslim men in this country under the guise of
"fighting terrorism." Rabih Haddad is an active and very
well respected member of Ann Arbor's Muslim community. He
has represented his community in numerous public forums
since the Sept. 11 tragedy and has spoken on behalf of the
needs of Afghan refugees.
Haddad is also a co-founder and board member of Global
Relief Foundation, an Islamic charity that has provided aid
to Afghan refugees, as well as widows and orphans in other
parts of the world. The U.S. government has frozen the
assets of the GRF. Government officials allege that the
group "supports terrorism."
Over 300 supporters, including Haddad's immediate family,
were kept out of the Jan. 2 bond hearing, held in Detroit.
They were not even allowed into the parking lot of the
courthouse. So supporters established a spirited picket
line, chanting, "1,2,3,4, justice is what we're here for;
5,6,7,8, all the way to Bush's gate; 9,10, 11,12, free Rabih
from his cell!"
Among those barred from the hearing was U.S. Rep. John
Conyers, a ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee.
Conyers told demonstrators that the treatment of Haddad has
"highlighted everything that is abusive and unconstitutional
about our government's scapegoating of immigrants in the
wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attack."
Other speakers at the support rally outside the hearing
included Michael Steinberg of the Michigan American Civil
Liberties Union, Phillis Englebert of the Ann Arbor Ad Hoc
Committee for Peace, and David Sole of the International
Action Center.
Over 4,000 people have signed petitions or written letters
in support of Haddad's release, including U.S. Rep. Lynn
Rivers, who represents Ann Arbor.
Inside the hearing, Judge Elizabeth Hacker denied bond to
Haddad. In doing so, she accepted the Immigration and
Naturalization Service's unsubstantiated claim that Haddad
is a danger to the community and a flight risk.
According to Haddad's attorney, Ashraf Nubani, the only
evidence presented to the court to "prove" that his client
is a flight risk is the fact that Haddad is the owner of a
legally registered hunting rifle. Salma Al-Rashaid, Haddad's
wife, wept as she heard the news that he had been denied
bond.
Another hearing for Haddad is scheduled for Jan. 8. The
government plans to begin deportation proceedings against
him at that hearing.
Ann Arbor community members plan to introduce a resolution
to the City Council in support of Haddad's release.
- END -
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From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (WW)
Date: keskiviikko 16. tammikuu 2002 02:46
Subject: [WW] Michael Austin: Confession frees Baltimore prisoner
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Jan. 17, 2002
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
MICHAEL AUSTIN: CONFESSION FREES BALTIMORE PRISONER
NOW FREE MUMIA!
By Johnnie Stevens
Baltimore
Michael Austin, an African American man convicted in 1974
for the killing of Black Baltimore security guard Roy
Kellam, was freed from the Maryland House of Correction on
Dec. 27. Forgive and forget was the theme song of the
capitalist media, which weakly apologized for the Maryland
criminal justice system that railroaded Austin to prison 27
years ago.
Judge Carrroll Byrnes of the Baltimore City Circuit Court
said, "No reasonable juror aware of the facts known today
would have convicted Austin." While reversing the
conviction, Byrnes's order left the murder charge filed
against Austin 27 years ago. The judge then set bail at
$10,000.
According to the Baltimore Sun, State Attorney Patrica
Jessamy could challenge the reversal in the State Court of
Special Appeals. If such a challenge were successful, Austin
could once again be returned to prison.
On ABC's Good Morning America show, however, Jessamy said
she would not appeal Judge Byrnes's overturn of Austin's
conviction. As of Jan. 4, Austin is free.
Austin's attorney, Larry Nathans, said that Austin certainly
will not be put on trial again. The prosecution's only
witness is dead and there is no physical evidence linking
Austin to the crime.
The late witness, Jackie Robinson, had originally identified
the killer as 5 feet 8 inches tall and 140 pounds. Later he
identified Austin, who was 6 feet 2 inches tall and 225
pounds, as the killer. After Robinson died in 1994, his
brother, John Robinson, told police his brother had admitted
he helped convict an innocent man.
Jim McCloskey, the president of Centurion Ministries, hired
Nathans in 1994 to represent Austin. The Centurion
Ministries is a New Jersey-based group that investigates
cases of prisoners who claim innocence.
Austin is now 53 years old. While in prison he lost his
mother and brother.
Austin said, "Everything out here is new to me. I would like
to work with youth. I saw so many babies coming in prison.
There has to be a program to keep them out of prison."
On Jan. 4, ABC's Good Morning America show hosted Austin and
Nathans. Another key supporter of Austin was there: Alveria
Kellam, the murder victim's wife.
Kellam said, "This affair will never have complete closure
for me because I lost someone, but I never believed Austin
did it."
Austin publicly thanked Kellam for all her support
throughout the years.
It appears that Kellam is the real hero in this case and the
second victim of racism. If her husband had been white,
would the DA, the cops and the media have handled this case
differently from the start?
The case recalls the recent decision in the case of Mumia
Abu-Jamal, the political prisoner who spent 20 years on
Pennsylvania's death row. Although his death sentence has
been overturned, Abu-Jamal still faces life in prison and
the possibility of another sentencing hearing that could
reinstate his death sentence.
- END -
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From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (WW)
Date: keskiviikko 16. tammikuu 2002 02:47
Subject: [WW] Who killed the postal workers with anthrax?
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Jan. 17, 2002
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
100 LIKELY SUSPECTS:
WHO KILLED THE POSTAL WORKERS WITH ANTHRAX?
By G. Dunkel
After months of hemming and hawing by the media, who have
been trying to cast the blame for the anthrax attacks on
Iraq or Middle Eastern terrorists, it's becoming clear that
they were made in the USA.
In a New York Times column on Jan. 4, Nicholas D. Kristof
concedes, "In fact, many experts believe that the killer is
tied to the American bio-weapons program because the anthrax
he sent out is genetically identical to the anthrax kept by
the United States Army."
He adds that the anthrax in the laced letters is
"astonishingly pure and equivalent (in spore size and
concentration) to the best the American Army ever achieved."
Kristof concludes, "Thus it seems that the murderer had
access not only to the American military germs but also to
some knowledge of the American military method of preparing
it in its dry form."
How many people possess that level of knowledge and access?
Kristof quotes one person "with long experience in the
shadows of the United States bio-defense program." The
expert tells Kristof, "I think there are on the order of 100
people who could have done it, who have the access to the
spores and the technical expertise to have done it."
It shouldn't take long to round up those suspects. More than
a thousand Arab and Muslim males--the exact number is a
state secret--were rounded up in mass detentions, held
incommunicado and threatened with torture, military
tribunals and the death penalty after Sept. 11. Government
officials cynically manipulated public fear about the
anthrax-laden letters to help "justify" these racist
disappearings.
It is now being admitted that trying to make the facts of
the investigation fit the aspirations of war hawks, who
wanted to pin the anthrax attack on Iraq, led government
investigators away from the real bio-terrorists.
At the same time, postal workers were being put in harm's
way. And they still are.
Two postal workers died from anthrax early on, 10 or so
became seriously ill, and tens of thousands were issued
preventive doses of Cipro, an antibiotic with a number of
dangerous side effects, while being told to continue working
in contaminated environments.
A double standard became glaringly obvious in the handling
of the anthrax crisis. When Senator Tom Daschle's office
received a letter filled with anthrax, the building was shut
for cleaning. The building has twice been filled with poison
gas in an attempt to kill all the anthrax spores. Capitol
Hill cops still haven't announced when it will be re-opened.
But Morgan Station in Manhattan is contaminated and despite
postal workers' demands that the facility shut down for
decontamination, the facility has not closed. Morgan Station
moves 12 million pieces of mail a day and 6,000 postal
employees work there.
The New York Metro Area Postal Union sued post office bosses
in October to force them to decontaminate the facility.
After management promised to clean it up, but keep it
running, U.S. District Judge John Keenan ruled against the
union.
Then on Dec. 23, anthrax was found on a machine that had
been cleaned in October. The union went back to court.
Keenan gave both sides two weeks to present briefs.
"The court still doesn't want to deal with this hot potato,"
William Smith, president of the union, said following the
hearing. "The more time that goes by, the more workers are
exposed."
Postal workers are not just relying on legal tactics. In New
York City, Philadelphia and Raleigh, N.C., workers are
wearing pins on the job that are inscribed with the dying
words of a Washington postal worker who had contracted the
inhalation form of anthrax.
"I have a tendency not to believe these people," the pins
read, recalling what Thomas Morris Jr. said to 911
dispatchers when he asked for an ambulance hours before his
death in October. Morris, 55, can be heard on the 911
audiotape saying that he recalled being near a co-worker who
had handled a letter containing powder.
He told the dispatcher, "I was told that it wasn't
[anthrax], but I have a tendency not to believe these
people."
Post office managers, Centers for Disease Control
specialists and federal lawyers have repeatedly told postal
workers that they are in no danger, that the facilities they
work in are clean and safe, that their health and wellbeing
are a major concern.
But their "tendency not to believe these people" keeps being
reinforced.
- END -
(Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to
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From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (WW)
Date: keskiviikko 16. tammikuu 2002 02:47
Subject: [WW] Germany sued for war crimes in Yugoslavia
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Jan. 17, 2002
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
GERMANY SUED FOR WAR CRIMES IN YUGOSLAVIA
By John Catalinotto
The Hague, Netherlands, is not the only place where people
are charged with war crimes committed in the former
Yugoslavia. Berlin is another. But there is a big
difference.
In The Hague, the main defendant is Slobodan Milosevic. His
crime was defending his country against NATO attack and U.S.
domination.
In Berlin, the German government faces a civil suit for war
crimes committed against Yugoslavia. Germany is responsible
for active participation in the U.S.-led NATO war and the
German government supported all NATO's actions.
After more than a year of preparation, Berlin anti-war
lawyer Ulrich Dost filed civil charges Dec. 24 in the Berlin
state court against his government. The suit demands
compensation for war crimes against Yugoslavs victimized by
the May 30, 1999, bombing of a bridge in the town of
Varvarin, about 125 miles south of Belgrade.
On June 2-3, 1999, Dost served as prosecutor for the
European War Crimes Tribunal. That body found NATO leaders
guilty of war crimes against Yugoslavia--including planning
and starting the 1999 war.
Dost intends to show that there were no military targets in
Varvarin, that NATO forces knew it and that they purposely
targeted Yugoslav civilians. Two NATO jets launched rockets
and bombs at the bridge. Then they came back a little later
and struck again at those who had gone to rescue the first
victims. The bombing killed 10 and wounded 30 others--17 of
them severely. Some suffered severe burns or lost limbs.
As the Washington Post admitted in a series of articles
Sept. 19-21, 1999, NATO and U.S. generals purposely ordered
civilian targets bombed in an attempt to demoralize the
civilian population.
- END -
(Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to
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From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (WW)
Date: keskiviikko 16. tammikuu 2002 02:48
Subject: [WW] Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trias
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Jan. 17, 2002
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
DR. HELEN RODRIGUEZ-TRIAS, PRESENTE!
By Sue Davis
Puerto Rican health care activist Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trias,
72, died of complications from lung cancer on Dec. 27 at her
home in Santa Cruz County, Calif.
Her legacy of fighting to better the lives of women and
children through comprehensive, quality health care,
especially for people of color, the poor and the most
oppressed, will be an eternal flame.
Dr. Rodriguez-Trias channeled her profound love for people,
her compassion, her hatred of class inequality and poverty--
which she saw as the primary cause of poor health--and her
passionate commitment to making the world a better place
into her work as a pediatrician. Graduating first in her
class from the University of Puerto Rico's School of
Medicine in 1960, the same year she gave birth to her fourth
child, Dr. Rodriguez-Trias set up the island's first
neonatal care center during her residency.
In 1970 she moved back to New York City, where she had been
born, and became director of Lincoln Hospital's department
of pediatrics. From there she became director of primary
care at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center in 1974 and
then director of its children and youth project from 1978 to
1985. In 1988 she became medical director of the New York
State Department of Health's AIDS Institute, where she
helped develop programs for families affected by HIV. She
continued that work after moving to California in 1989 to be
near her children.
In 1992 Dr. Rodriguez-Trias was elected president of the
American Public Health Association--the first Latina in that
post. She traced her feminism to a women's caucus at the
first APHA meeting she attended in the early 1970s. At about
the same time she became aware of Cuba's community-based
health care system. Recognizing that Cuba provided a model
of universal health care needed the world over, Dr.
Rodriguez-Trias made numerous trips to Cuba, each time
contributing her professional skills and know-how.
But Dr. Rodriguez-Trias didn't stop there. When she became
aware of a problem, she had to be part of the solution. That
meant becoming an activist--a 24/7 commitment. While working
at Lincoln, for instance, she collaborated with the Young
Lords, a revolutionary Puerto Rican group inspired by the
Black Panthers, to promote better health care delivery to
the Bronx community where the hospital was located. A
devoted independentista, Dr. Rodriguez-Trias carried her
Puerto Rican heritage with pride.
A HISTORIC LEGACY
In 1973 Dr. Rodriguez-Trias recognized that a pattern
existed of sterilizing poor women of color. The first
evidence involved the Relf sisters--one 12, the other 14,
both African Americans in Alabama--who had been sterilized
without their knowledge or consent. Their mother, who was on
welfare and couldn't read or write, had been told the girls
were receiving needed health care.
In addition, Dr. Rodriguez-Trias knew first-hand that while
wealthy young women flew from the States to have abortions
in Puerto Rico in the years before it was legal, beginning
in the 1950s poor women in Puerto Rico were pushed into a
government-sponsored program to have their "tubes tied." By
1968, statistics showed that 35.3 percent of women of
childbearing age in Puerto Rico had been sterilized.
The Relf case spurred Dr. Rodriguez-Trias to found the
Committee to End Sterilization Abuse. CESA soon exposed that
over 20 percent of African American women and 25 percent of
Native women had been sterilized in this country. High
levels of abuse also occurred among Spanish-speaking women.
Because of pressure brought to bear by CESA, New York City
adopted guidelines in 1977 regulating sterilization. In 1979
the federal government adopted regulations based on those
guidelines.
After the federal government stopped paying for abortions
for women on welfare in 1977, women activists in New York
City convened a meeting to discuss how to fight back.
Through an educational campaign led by CESA members, the
women came to understand that abortion and sterilization
were linked. If poor women were denied abortions, they could
be forced to undergo sterilization--the only permanent form
of birth control.
That led CARASA--the Committee for Abortion Rights and
Against Sterilization Abuse--to formulate a class analysis
of women's oppression. Out of that came the concept of
reproductive rights--that women need a group of rights,
related both to their reproductive capacity and to their
class, race and sexuality, in order to be liberated. A
leader in the women's health movement, Dr. Rodriguez-Trias
served on the boards of the Boston Women's Health Book
Collective and the National Women's Health Network. She can
truly be called the mother of the movement for reproductive
rights.
Dr. Rodriguez-Trias' enthusiasm, commitment and energy were
as big and broad as her smile was bright. Charming, poised,
gracious, articulate and vivacious, Dr. Rodriguez-Trias was
a mentor and a friend to many whom she met on the various
paths that converged in her full, busy life. Though she will
be sorely missed, her activist example will be carried on by
all who knew and loved her.
Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trias, presente!
[Sue Davis worked closely with
Dr. Rodriguez-Trias in CESA and CARASA from 1974 to the mid-
1980s.]
- END -
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