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Anti-Militarism: News & Updates

News Article
30th Anniversary of Four Women Missionaries Killed In El Salvador on 2nd December 1980
December 2, 2020
Thank you to ClevelandPeople.com for publishing this reflection written by Thérèse Osborne, commemorating the martyrdom of Sisters Maura Clarke M.M., Ita Ford M.M., Dorothy Kazel O.S.U. and lay missionary Jean Donovan on December 2, 1980. "And this is the reason that Maura and Ita, Jean and Dorothy were killed. They had discerned that accompanying refugees was the crying need of the people. You see, all of El Salvador had turned into one huge refugee camp. People were running away from the bombing, and it's as if everyone took one giant step. Those in tiny villages went to the next town and moved in with relatives. We would often meet families walking along the road with just a few cooking pots, maybe a bag of clothes, and their children. Those in the towns would make their way to the next city, and those who could went to the capital, where makeshift refugee centres were set up in the churches. The major seminary of San Salvador had 5,000 people living in tents on the football pitch for five years. Technically we might call these people "displaced persons" rather than refugees because they didn't have the means to leave their own country; but they were internal refugees in every sense of the word. In the media and official government policy, if you stayed in a conflictive zone to harvest your crops you were labeled a subversive and accused of consorting with the guerrilla army; and if you left your village you were considered suspicious because you came from a conflictive area."
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Event
SOA Watch Convergence to End Militarization & Border Imperialism
November 21, 2020 to November 22, 2020
Join us on Saturday, November 21 and Sunday, November 22 for the third event of our SOA Watch 30th Anniversary Rooted in Resistance series! On Saturday, November 21 we will facilitate three virtual panels about the historic and current impacts of US Empire throughout the Americas and the powerful movements organizing to defend autonomy and dignity of our communities. On Sunday, November 22 we will be hosting our annual vigil, including ¡presentes! and litany and featuring the SOA Watch Musicians Collective. The weekend's virtual events and spaces are free, bilingual (Spanish and English, interpretation will be provided) and all are welcome! You will receive an email confirmation with all the links for Saturday's panels and Sunday's litany and ¡presentes! immediately after registering .
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Event
Immigration 105: Border Imperialism
November 20, 2020
Immigrant justice projects that only aim to reform national immigration policies do not fundamentally challenge the role of global capitalism and militarism worldwide in displacing and destabilizing communities. The lens of border imperialism (a term coined by Harsha Walia) can help us reframe our social justice work by addressing a set of interrelated factors: the role of extractive capitalism and militarism in producing refugees, the expansion and externalization of the US-Mexico border, and the criminalization of migration. The transnational nature of the phenomena producing mass dispossession and displacement of communities and the destruction of our natural landscapes require transnational responses and a broad vision for social justice which defends not only the freedom of movement, but also the freedom to remain, and the healing of the consequences of social, political, economic, and environmental violence. To undo border imperialism is to first acknowledge that, while freedom of movement should be a human right, movement is currently restricted by a global system of economic inequities separating the South from the North.
PDF icon immigration_101_an_online_workshop_series.pdf
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Event
Memoria y Resistencia: Commemoration of the Martyrs of Central America and Colombia
November 15, 2020
See the program book from our special online gathering on November 15; recording and other links coming soon....On December 2, 1980, four women from the US working with the poor and displaced in El Salvador were kidnapped, raped and murdered by the US-backed military of El Salvador. Two of those women—Jean Donovan and Ursuline Sister Dorothy Kazel—were from Cleveland. In the end, they, along with Maryknoll Sisters Maura Clarke and Ita Ford, met the same fate as thousands of unnamed poor of El Salvador who were killed or disappeared. Join us on Sunday, November 15 as we commemorate their sacrifice, honor their legacy, and recommit ourselves to act in solidarity with poor and marginalized communities in Central America and Colombia.
PDF icon 2020_irtf_commemoration_program_book.pdf
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Event
Immigration 104: Immigration Detention
November 13, 2020
The US operates the largest immigration detention system in the world, with over 50,000 immigrants imprisoned in for-profit private detention facilities and county jails across the country prior to the pandemic (now approximately 20,000). These facilities, which are often money-making businesses, have been scrutinized for the egregious conditions to which they subject immigrants including poor to non-existent medical care, subpar hygiene and nourishment, and psychological and bodily abuse. This systemic neglect has led to the death of over 200 immigrants in detention since 2003. Despite the efforts of immigration advocates and medical experts to shut down immigration detention facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic, social distancing being an absolute impossibility, immigrants continue to be detained and transferred among facilities. Most recently, reports have emerged that some detainees have been subjected to unwanted hysterectomies and other forms of gendered abuse. This session provides an overview of the US immigration detention system and the social justice actions challenging these horrendous human rights abuses.
PDF icon immigration_101_an_online_workshop_series.pdf
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Event
Immigration 103: Immigration Courts
November 6, 2020
United States immigration courts are not courts of law in the traditional sense, as the term is used in the federal court system. They are part of an administrative office, the Executive Office of Immigration Review (EOIR), housed in the Department of Justice (DOJ). Most often, immigration judges are former attorneys elected and hired by the Attorney General in order to perform the duties and rules prescribed regarding immigrants the government is trying to deport. Studies have shown that decisions made in similar asylum cases by different immigration judges can vary widely, making the immigration court system highly arbitrary and prone to politicization. This session takes a look at the structure of the immigration court system, its general procedures, and main actors. We will also discuss the situation of unaccompanied children forced to appear in immigration courts alone and with little access to legal representation.
PDF icon immigration_101_an_online_workshop_series.pdf
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Event
Immigration 102: The Asylum Process
October 30, 2020
The United States asylum process is an incredibly convoluted system, designed explicitly to involve multiple decision-making actors, with lengthy times of processing and scarce chances of obtaining asylum protections. It is also an adversarial process: instead of being received by specialists trained in international refugee law and being given access to legal and social services, asylum seekers arriving at the US-Mexico border have been forced to endure confrontational and abusive treatment by immigration enforcement agents and immigration judges, the cruelty of an opaque bureaucracy sometimes used as a weapon against them, prolonged detention, and most often deportation. In the past few years, asylum seekers have been stripped of their human rights, placed in expedited removal, detention, and deportation proceedings with little recourse to legal representation or community support. Under the cover of the pandemic, most asylum seekers have been blocked altogether from requesting asylum and forced to wait in makeshift refugee camps on the US-Mexico border. This session will take a look at the history of the US asylum process, the human rights abuses perpetrated against asylum seekers under different administrations, and the latest immigration reform policies that aim to shut down asylum altogether.
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Event

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Immigration 101: The Criminalization of Migration
October 23, 2020
United States border enforcement has historically relied on discriminatory legislation that has criminalized migration and on deliberate practices of deterrence with the purpose of controlling and blocking the movement of poor immigrants of color. This has led to high levels of violence, human rights abuses, and the loss of many lives, making the US-Mexico border in particular one of the most dangerous places for migrants worldwide. This session focuses specifically on the US-Mexico border because it has been both a space for the exploitation of migrant labor and one of the most heavily militarized theaters of violence against immigrants and asylum seekers in the past decades. We will discuss the laws that criminalize entry without documents, the process of expedited removal, and zero tolerance policies, which have led to the arbitrary detention of asylum seekers and migrants, family separation, fast-track deportation, and other human rights abuses.
PDF icon immigration_101_an_online_workshop_series.pdf
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News Article
Second Military Style Raid in Two Months: Border Patrol detains 12 people receiving humanitarian aid
October 6, 2020

In a massive show of armed force, Border Patrol, along with the Border Patrol Tactical Unit (BORTAC), descended on the camp with an armored tank, ATVS, a helicopter, and many marked and unmarked vehicles. Agents armed with assault rifles chased and terrorized those that were receiving care, all while the helicopter hovered low above them kicking up dust and debris, making it nearly impossible to see. Border patrol smashed windows, broke doors, and destroyed essential camp infrastructure as well as supplies.This was after heavily surveilling the camp and patrolling its perimeter, creating an antagonistic and distressing environment for those receiving care, since late Saturday night on the 3rd.

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News Article
How Honduras became one of the most dangerous countries to defend natural resources
October 6, 2020

“Every day that passes we know less about him. He’s weak, he’s had Covid symptoms; we worry about his health and safety in the prison.” Gabriela Sorto expresses great concern for her father Porfirio Sorto Cedillo, a 48-year-old builder and farm worker, who is one of eight protesters from Guapinol held in pre-trial detention since September 2019 for alleged crimes linked to their opposition to an iron oxide mine which threatens to contaminate their water supply. The community of Guapinol (named for its river) is in the fertile, mineral-rich Bajo Agua region, where for years subsistence farmers and indigenous Hondurans have been forcibly displaced, criminalized and killed in conflicts with powerful conglomerates over land and water. “My dad has been jailed for defending a river which gives our community life, for trying to stop the exploitation of natural resources by rich companies who the government helps to terrorize us,” said Gabriela Sorto.

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