Arrest the Killers
When Brad was killed, the people photographed firing guns at the
protesters were police, police commanders, and operatives and
bodyguards for the PRI party, including Pedro Carmona, Abel Santiago
Zarate aka “El Chino,” Juan Carlo Soriano aka “El Chapulin,” Commander
Manuel Aguilar Coello, and Juan Sumano. They are directly linked to
the corrupt Governor Ulises Ruiz, and we demand their arrest.

Drop False Charges, Release Political Prisoners
Since Brad’s death, Ulises Ruiz’ government has been attempting to
bring charges for Brad’s killing against Brad’s friends, APPO people,
witnesses, and those who risked their lives trying to get Brad to a
hospital. We join the National Commission on Human Rights, and
Reporters Without Borders in finding these attempts to be an absurd
and outrageous attempt to divert attention from the real killers. We
demand an end to this smokescreen and the punishment of innocent
people including Juan Manuel Martínez Moreno, Hugo Colmenares Leyva,
and Octavio Perez Perez.

Justice for Brad, Freedom for Oaxaca
Brad is only one of dozens of activists, reporters, civilians, and
unarmed people killed by the State response to the Oaxacan movement
for justice and freedom. Friends of Brad Will not only demands
justice for them, but demands what they demand: the end of corrupt
brutal rule by Ulises Ruiz.

No to Femicide
We join in solidarity with the friends and family of Marcella Sali
Grace Eiler, an international solidarity activist working with CIPO,
Colectivo Mujer Nueva and witnesses of Brad’s death, who was found
brutally raped and murdered September 25th in San Jose del Pacifico
in the state of Oaxaca. Her death is part of continued widespread violence
against women in Mexico, and a symptom of the failure of the Mexican
government to address it. As the Calderon government disregards human
rights and attempts to impose military control of everyday life, we
demand justice for all the victims of the femicide and an immediate
end to impunity for the rapes and murders of women throughout Mexico

No to Plan Mexico
A year almost to the day after Brad was murdered, the Bush
Administration announced the Merida Initiative (aka Plan Mexico),
providing at least $1.6 billion in US armament, training, and
resources to the same police and military forces that killed Brad and
many other activists and journalists in Mexico and Central America
under the pretense of stopping narco-trafficking. Already the weapons
have been used in massacres and repression of activists in Morelos and
Chiapas. Along with the AFL-CIO, the United Steelworkers, Tikkun,
Wespac, Witness for Peace, Cispes, and Jews for Racial and Economic
Justice, The Friends of Brad Will demand and end to the Merida
Initiative.

——————–

Nuestras Demandas para el Segundo Aniversario

de la Muerte de Brad

Detenga los Asesinos

Cuando se mataron a Brad, las personas que aparecen en las fotos, disparando pistolas contra las manifestantes, fueron la policía, los comandantes de la policía, y los operativos y las guardaespaldas del partido PRI, como Pedro Carmona, Able Santiago Zarate “El Chino,” Juan Carlo Soriano “El Chapulin,” Commander Manuel Aguilar Coello, y Juan Sumano. Son ellos quien tienen relaciones directos con el corrupto gobernador Ulises Ruiz. Exigimos su detención!

Retire los Cargos Falsos, Libere a los Prisioneros Políticos

Desde la muerte de Brad, el gobierno de Ulises Ruiz ha sido intentando traer cargas para el asesinato de Brad contra los amigos de Brad, la gente de la APPO, los testigos, y aquellos que se arriesgaron su vida tratando de llevarle a Brad al hospital. Unimos con la Comisión Nacional para Derechos Humanos y Periodistas Sin Fronteras en nuestro encuentro de que este intento es una manera absolutamente absurda e intolerable de desviar la atención lejos de los asesinatos verdaderos. Demandamos que se acabe con esta curtina de humo y el castigo de gente inocente como Juan Manuel Martínez Moreno, Hugo Colmenares Leyva, y Octavio Perez Perez.

Justicia para Brad, Liberación para Oaxaca

Brad es sólo uno de docenas de activistas, periodistas, civiles, y personas desarmadas asesinado por la respuesta del Estado contra el movimiento Oaxacana para justicia y liberación. Los amigos de BradWill no sólo demandan justicia para ellos, sino también las mismas demandas que demandan ellos: el fin del gobierno corrupto y cruel de Ulises Ruiz.

No al Neo-Liberalismo y Femicidio

Unimos en solidaridad con los amigos y la familia de Marcella Sali Grace Eiler, una activista de solidaridad international trabajando con CIPO, Colectivo de Mujer Nueva, y con los testigos de la muerte de Brad quien se descubrió violada brutalmente y asesinado el dia 26 de septiembre 2008 en San Jose del Pacífico en el estado de Oaxaca. Su muerte es una parte de la escalación de la violencia contra las mujeres en una época de acuerdos comericales y guerras de drogas. Demandamos que se acabe con el Tratado de Libre Comercio de Norteamérica (TLCAN), el Tratado de Libre Comercio de Centroamérica-República Dominicana-EEUU, y el Plan Puebla Panama (alias el Proyecto Mesoamérica), y los sistemas culturales y políticas que han permitido las violaciones y los asesinatos contra las mujeres.

No al Plan México

Casi un año al día después de que se mataron a Brad, la administración de Bush anunció la Iniciativa Merida alias Plan México, porporcionando por lo menos 1.6 billiones de dólares para el armamento de EEUU, la formación, y los recursos para la misma policía y fuerza militar que se mataron a Brad y otros activistas y periodistas en México y Centroamérica debajo de la pretensión de parar narco-traficantes. Las armas ya han sido usado en matanzas y represiones contra activistas en Morelos y Chiapas. Junto con el AFL-CIO, los Trabajadores Siderúrgico de los EEUU, Tikkun, Wespac, Testigos para Paz, Cispes, Judios para Justicia Económica y Racial, Los Amigos de Brad Will demandan que se acabe con la Iniciativa Merida.

Denouncing the appointments of members of El Yunque, an ultra-right anti-semitic movement, to the highest levels of the Mexican government, Friends of Brad Will has told key Democratic Party leaders to reject the Bush military aid package called the Merida Initiative. Friends of Brad Will is a non-government organization advocating for accountability for the murder of U.S. journalist Brad Will, who was killed by Mexican government paramilitaries in October, 2006.
(more…)

Please join us this Friday for a screening of the new film “Brad, One More Night at the Barricades” (50 min). Brazilian filmmaker and media activist Miguel will be hand to discuss his documentary tribute to a fallen friend.
When Mexican paramilitary forces shot Brad Will in the chest, killing him, his camera fell from his hands. But it didn’t stop recording. (more…)

Update: Friends of Brad Will ejected from public Congressional Hearing on Plan Mexico

For immediate release:

What: Reminding Chairman Engel of the impunity with which U.S. journalist Brad Will was murdered over a year ago, Friends of Brad Will activist Henry Ruben and others are forcefully removed from public hearing.

Time: 10:50 a.m., February 7th

Details:
Congressional Rep. Engels called for Capitol police as Ruben and other activists demanded that opponents of Plan Mexico like the United Steelworkers union, Global Exchange or Witness for Peace be invited to testify. Challenging the series of unbalanced Congressional hearings in which only boosters of the Bush/Calderon ’security pact’ were invited to testify, Ruben warned that Engel’s committee had shown no interest in widespread opposition to Plan Mexico in the U.S. and Mexico and that this risked green-lighting a lethal aid package which would have harmful impacts on human rights activists, workers, and dissidents in Mexico if it were to pass. (more…)

The January 24, 2008 issue of Rolling Stone magazine (on newsstands now — Johnny Depp on the cover) features Jeff Sharlet’s in depth article on Brad Will. It really is an amazing piece.

I don’t see the article available electronically anywhere.
______________________________
Christy Will
www.BradWill.org

Ok, folks. First grassroots ACTION ALERT OF THE YEAR 2008.
Please modify/use it as you would like to forward and post this in
useful locations. Let us know offline that you’ve posted it to
encourage us!!!

January 22, 2008

Hey activists:

Happy MLK Day!!! Bless his memory and his work.

We are Friends of Brad Will, part of a coalition organizing against
Plan Mexico. Friends of Brad WIll was formed by us - friends and family
of the u.s. journalist who was murdered by Mexican government officials
in Oaxaca Mexico in October 2006. Brad was murdered while reporting on
the teachers strike and social movement to end corruption which emerged
from it. Despite a U.S. journalist being killed by Mexican Government
officials in the middle of the day - an incident with numerous
witnesses and which Brad caught on his own camera
(http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=19485) - there has been no
prosecution of those murdered and the government of Mexico has been
protecting the murderers and claiming activists killed Brad.

As many of you know the Bush Administration secretly negotiated with
Mexican President Calderon to expand the ‘drug war’ into Mexico. The
outcome of these negotiations is Plan Mexico.

Stopping Plan Mexico has been named by the Center for International
Policy as one of the top three challenges to protect/defend attempts to
build more just and peaceful societies in Latin America. They write
that it is among “[t]hree challenges [which] come to mind, not because
they are the most transcendent, but because they are viable and
reasonable—and we cannot conceive of a constructive and coherent policy
in the hemisphere without these first steps. In November, the United
Steelworkers declared their opposition to Plan Mexico. Last week, they
demanded Congressional hearings to ensure that the widespread
opposition to Plan Mexico registered with the Democratic Congress.

Friends of Brad Will have been organizing to stop Plan Mexico and need
you to take action to stop Plan Mexico.

Action Steps (please let us know when you’ll be sending out this action
alert so we can issue ours simultaneously)

We are asking activists to call relevant U.S. committee chairs to
demand accountability for Brad’s murder and the murder of many teachers
and their supporters to precede any provision of U.S. taxpayer-funded
lethal aid to the corrupt and brutal Mexican security forces and
government.

Plan Mexico must be made fully public and there must be hearings.
(Engel and Lantos have held hearings only inviting witnesses who were
supportive of the security plan).

Reforms to the Mexican judiciary and police must precede any lethal aid
being given to these corrupt institutions.

Call relevant Congress members to urge that they take a strong position
against Plan Mexico:

Congress member Elliot Engel (Chair of Western Hemispheric Affairs
Subcommittee): 202-225-2464
Congress member Tom Lantos (Chair of Foreign Affairs Committee):
202-225-3531
Congress member Nita Lowey (Chair of Foreign Operations
Subcommittee):202-225-6506

Also - if you have time - please call the offices of candidates for
President to urge that they take a strong position against Plan Mexico:

Senator Hillary Clinton: 212-688-6262
fmr. Senator Edwards: 919 636-3131
Congressman Kucinich: 202-225-5871
Senator Barack Obama: 202-224-2854

If you can make an appointment and meet with these representatives,
that would be very powerful. And if you have activist relatives or
friends ask them to make these calls too!

Thanks.

Robert

Robert Jereski
Congressional Liaison
Friends of Brad Will (NYC-Chapter)
www.friendsofbradwill.org

Lobbying/Meeting suggestions (contact Friends of Brad Will if you would
like support for your lobbying efforts):

Give Engel/Lowey/Lantos’s local office a call and say you’d like to
meet w/her/him or their respective foreign policy staffer.

Get a folder and make a few copies of articles about Plan Mexico and a
statement from the Steelworkers against it. Also a copy of the action
alert on friendsofbradwill targeting lantos (w/his face on it).

Whatever else you can put in there that seems important (some Amnesty
reports on corruption/abuse in Mexico have been particularly damning).

Ask whether they are satisfied with the investigation of U.S.
journalist Brad Will’s murder by the mexican authorities.
Tell them that Bush’s negotiation of plan mexico to give $ and weapons
to the unaccountable mexican police/military is exactly the wrong
signal to give the Mexican Government after a year during which they’ve
refused to arrest and put on trial those seen killing a u.s.
journalist.

Why should it matter that these were police offices and the mayor of a
town who killed him? These members of institutions Bush wants to
support w/’drug war’ money should not be above the law.

Tell them we expect them to be out front of this issue, showing
leadership and making sure other Democrats recognize:

i. Accountability for the murder of a u.s. journalist must precede any
u.s. taxpayer funded military aid/weaponry/training;

ii. The security initiative - Plan Mexico - is part of a failed ‘drug
war’ policy which will spread violence w/out addressing demand. Its
contents should be MADE PUBLIC and it should be introduced as a
stand-alone bill and voted on on its own merits;

iii. Reforms of the Mexican judiciary and police should precede any
lethal aid; otherwise, Bush would be gambling w/people’s lives.

Show us an end to impunity and corruption - the arrest and conviction
of Brad Will’s murderers. Then we’ll consider supporting providing
lethal aid.

January 16, 2008 11:07 AM Eastern Time
News From USW: USW Seeks Hearings After Mexican Police Attack Mine
Workers

Steelworkers President Questions $1.4 Billion Security Funding Package

PITTSBURGH–(BUSINESS WIRE)–News From USW: The United Steelworkers
(USW) today called for congressional hearings on President George W.
Bush’s proposed “Merida Initiative” to provide $1.4 billion to Mexican
security forces after federal and state police attacked striking
workers at Grupo Mexico’s Cananea copper mine in Sonora, where ten
union members were injured. A thousand federal police are now occupying
the mine and the surrounding area.

In a letter to Rep. Tom Lantos, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs
Committee, and Rep. David Obey, chairman of the House Appropriations
Committee, USW International President Leo W. Gerard urged both
committees to convene hearings on labor rights violations in Mexico as
part of their examination of the administration’s funding request; that
they develop specific labor rights benchmarks that Mexico must meet in
order to receive funding; and that the entire funding package be
directed toward strengthening human rights and the rule of law.

“The attack on the Cananea miners is just the most recent in a series
of repressive actions by the Mexican government,” Gerard wrote. “The
Calderón administration’s flagrant violations of workers’ fundamental
rights to organize and bargain and its continuing use of security
forces to assault unarmed workers, raise serious questions about the
desirability of providing Mexico with additional security funding.”

Gerard pointed out that the USW is second to none in defending our
nation’s security, but added that our security is best preserved by
defending human rights before lambasting the Mexican government for its
unnecessary brutality in trying to repress the striking workers.

“Mexico cannot be allowed to violate workers’ human rights with
impunity under the pretense of securing borders and combating
narco-trafficking,” he said.

The USW represents 850,000 workers in the United States and Canada
employed in the metals, rubber, chemicals, paper, oil refining and
other industries as well as the service and public sectors.

Note to Editors: There should be an accent over the “o” in “Calderón”
above.

Contacts

USW
Tony Montana, 412-562-2592

ge di Google

Please spread the word.

Corrugated Films, in collaboration with Mal de Ojo TV, presents the NYC premiere of “A Little Bit of So Much Truth” (Un Poquito de Tanta Verdad).

When the people of Oaxaca decided they’d had enough of bad government, they didn’t take their story to the media… they TOOK the media.

(more…)

Contacts:
Harry Bubbins, Friends of Brad Will, Media Representative,
h.bubbins(at)gmail(dot)com
http://friendsofbradwill.org

Robert Jereski, Friends of Brad Will, Congressional Representative
mutualaid(at)earthlink(dot)net
212 973 1782,
http://friendsofbradwill.org

Download as a pdf

Friends of murdered journalist demand hold on military aid pending investigation into his murder

The Friends of Brad Will, a network of friends and associates of Brad Will, the U.S. journalist, have urged House Speaker Pelosi and Eliot Engels, the Chair of the Western Hemispheric affairs subcommittee to oppose U.S. support for Mexican military and police forces. Mr. Will, the 36 year old reporter, was murdered in Oaxaca, Mexico a year ago, on October 27th, 2006. Witnesses and photographic evidence implicate members of the Mexican government, including a police chief.

(more…)

No to Plan Mexico!!!

‘Please consider this site a resource for your (own) actions to support Brad Will’s memory, his family and friends, and the people of Mexico.’

Contact:

Friends of Brad Will, Media Representative, Harry Bubbins
h.bubbins(at)gmail(dot)com
FriendsofBradWill.org

Friends of Brad Will, a global network pushing for accountability in the murder of US journalist Brad Will in Oaxaca, Mexico, in 2006, denounced plans to fund a “Plan Mexico”.

“One year after the murder of Brad Will, no one has been arrested. Under the guise of stopping drug trafficking, US taxpayers could be funding human rights violations, corrupt local officials and Blackwater-style mercenaries in Oaxaca and elsewhere. This is exactly the wrong message to send at this time.” said Harry Bubbins, a media representative for Friends of Brad Will.

(more…)

Demonstration, Flyering and Press Conference
on
Brad Will’s Murder,
His Family’s Recent Trip to Mexico,
and
Efforts Underway to Obtain Justice

When:

Friday, March 30, 5-6:30 pm.
Press Conference at 6p.m.

Where:

Mexican Mission to the United Nations
Two United Nations
4,5,6, 7, S train to Grand Central
then 10 minute walk

Speakers to be announced.

Rain or shine (there’s an overhang there for participants to stay in out of any precipitation