Church Women United - Legislative Office
Inform and Act
March 2008
“A TSUNAMI IN THE MIDDLE EAST”
Whereas the refugee problem in the world has been with us so
long that we are tending to become callous; ...Therefore, be it resolved that we
increase our concern by bringing our Christian witness to bear on the problem
and continue to work through responsible agencies, both national and
international, for permanent settlement and rehabilitation.”
CWU Soc.Policy
Bk,, 1950 Action Statement of the Assembly
December, 2002: In a letter to President Bush, Jerrye G Champion, CWU National President, pleaded. “Mr. President, it appears that some people in your administration are looking for an excuse to go to war, when a just solution, without war may be at hand...The United States is perilously close to violating our treaty obligations in the United Nations Charter…The sheer enormity of American military and economic dominance and the preference to ‘go it alone’ in foreign policy creates widespread impressions that Americans are notably violent, irreligious, and untrustworthy. We are not. Americans are notably generous, courageous, religious and trustworthy. We will not follow leadership that leads us into exhibiting for the world the destructive behavior of a militaristic superpower.” (CWU Social Policy Book 1941-2004)
As of today (2/4/08), 4,404 American soldiers have died in Iraq. Figures from 2006 (Lancet medical journal) estimate that between 500,000 and 800,000 Iraqis have died (the vast majority of those were civilians). Also as of today, the war costs $720 million per day. (That is not a typo!) Go to http://support.afsc.org/site/PageNavigator/DefundRefundPetition to sign a petition to use those funds for human needs instead. (This is on the website of the American Friends Service Committee.)
If you google “Iraq War” on the internet you can find in Wikipedia a chilling account of the last five years in the Iraq War: From the failure to discover any Weapons of Mass Destruction to numerous examples of mismangement there are many reasons to protest and advocate against the war.
However, a human tragedy of epic proportions has also been developing over those years. Recently a delegation of Catholic Sisters visited Lebanon and Syria and briefed Congressional staff in the Capitol on the “Tsunami in the Middle East”, the plight of Iraqi refugees. The briefing was sponsored by NETWORK: a Catholic Social Justice Lobby. CWU Legislative Staff attended.
The following information was formulated as a result of a Catholic Sisters 10-day delegation to Lebanon and Syria in January, 2008. The delegation, sponsored by Catholic Relief Services, met with a broad cross section of people in both countries including: UNHCR (UN High Commissioner for Refugees) Regional Representatives, Christian and Islamic leaders, Religious NGOs, civil NGOs, a member of the Syrian Parliament, Iraqi refugees and U.S. diplomatic personnel.
There are more than 2 million Iraqi refugees in the Middle East, with the largest numbers in Syria (1.5 million people), Jordan (700,000 people) and Lebanon (50,000 people). Each country has had a unique response to the crisis and requires separate consideration when addressing the possible response in U.S. policy. A common denominator among all of the countries of the region is that none of the countries have signed the 1951 Convention Related to the Status of Refugees, because they are hosting large numbers of Palestinian refugees. This means that the governments do not formally recognize the UNHCR refugee registration process. (This hinders efforts to help since accurate numbers are hard to come by). Another common factor is that the host countries are severely taxed in their effort to respond to the refugee crisis.
The countries are in great need of economic assistance and increased capacity to relocate the refugees.
ADVOCACY POINTS FOR IRAQI REFUGEES
RESETTLEMENT IN THE UNITED STATES
As reported in the New York Times in February 2008, the State Department has a goal of admitting 12,000 refugees in the fiscal 2008 year. However, four months into the year only 1,400 refugees have been approved. The process appears to be lengthy and difficult, including fingerprinting, job checks, name checks and interviews. The State Department also reports that they are short on resources. In Iraq, it is also a problem that Embassy personnel in Baghdad run the risk of being the targets of attacks because they are associated with the American government.
MIGRATION AND REFUGEE ACCOUNT (MRA):
The Migration and Refugee Assistance Account (MRA), part of the Foreign Operations appropriations bill each year, funds overseas refugee assistance, including the physical and legal protection of refugees and the provision of food, shelter, health services, and other vital assistance. MRA also provides funding for the processing of refugees for admission to the United States and initial resettlement expenses.
UNHCR FUNDING: The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
Encourage the US government to generously fund the UNHCR appeal of $261 million for FY08 operations relating to Iraqi refugees in that region. The US has quickly offered to provide 1/3 of the requested UNHCR funding whenever there has been a request. However, the overall funding at times has gone unmet. The US should increase its contribution to this needed fund.
SAMPLE LETTER
Dear Senator/Representative _______,
I am writing to express my concern for the increasingly dire circumstances
for refugees fleeing Iraq. At this time there are more than 2 million Iraqi
refugees in the Middle East, with the largest numbers in Syria, Jordan, and
Lebanon. In some of these countries they are welcome but the available resources
are dwindling. In others they have had to overcome considerable obstacles to
stay. Most disconcerting of all has been the miniscule numbers of Iraqis allowed
to migrate to this country. It has been reported that the State Department is
understaffed and short on resources to handle even the number of cases they have
set as a goal for fiscal year 2008.
I urge you to do all you can to help Iraqi refugees resettle in the U.S. as they flee a war we began with our invasion in 2003. I also encourage you to support increased funding of the Migration Refugee Assistance Account through FY2009 appropriations and supplemental bills.
It will also help the situation if the US government increases its contribution to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees fund for FY08 operations relating to Iraqi refugees in that region. These are just a few of the ways we can help this circumstance which is affecting the whole region.
Thank you for your consideration of my request.
Sincerely,
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
IRAQ and the IRAQ WAR
Answers compiled by Raed Jarrar, Iraq consultant, AFSC (American Friends Service Committee) Middle East Peacebuilding Program. For more information go to www.afsc.org/iraq . To ask more questions about Iraq, write askaboutiraq@afsc.org (May 2007).
Was life better for Iraqis under Saddam Hussein’s regime? Or is it better under the U.S. occupation?
Iraqis were better off before the U.S.-led interventions and current occupation.
After the expulsion of Iraqi troops from Kuwait in 1991, thirteen years of comprehensive economic sanctions crippled one of the most developed public sectors in the Middle East. Over several decades, pre-dating even the period of Saddam Hussein’s rule, free education, health care, and an outstanding social security system were commonplace.
I was against the war, but now that the US is already there, shouldn’t we just stay until things get better?
The first step in making things better for Iraqis is for the US to pullout its troops and military bases and give Iraq back to the Iraqis and help them rebuild their country.
Staying in Iraq should not be an option. It’s illegal and immoral, it’s against the will of the Iraqis, the majority of Americans, and it is pushing Iraq into more violence. According to credible U.S. polling institutions, less than 1% of the Iraqis polled feel safe around coalition troops. Around three-fourths of both the Iraqis and the US troops in Iraq support setting a timetable for ending the US presence there. More than half of the US population agrees, according to polling data.
Pulling the troops out of Iraq is just the first step to ending foreign intervention and stemming Iraqi-Iraqi violence. Iraqis have thrived as a community for the last 7,000 years, and have survived many wars, occupations and colonial rulers. They know how to heal their wounds and rebuild their country. Nonetheless, the US is still responsible for fixing the humanitarian disasters it has caused in Iraq due to its illegal intervention.
What about Sunni and Shia violence against each other?
The Iraqi-Iraqi conflict is political rather than sectarian, and it started after 2003 because of the occupation, not despite it.
Sunni and Shia Iraqis have never had a civil conflict or war before the US-led occupation. This conflict does not follow strict sectarian lines because it is a political, rather than sectarian, conflict. It’s important to note that it is a secondary conflict happening on the side of the major Iraqi-US occupation fight. After the fall of Baghdad in 2003, the occupation produced a parallel Iraqi-Iraqi conflict. Nationalist Iraqis, regardless of their sect or religion, have been fighting against Separatist Iraqis. Nationalists want a united Iraq with one capital and no occupation forces, while Separatists want to split Iraq into three states, and keep the occupation forces for the long run. The US and other regional powers have been trying their best to portray and make this political Iraqi-Iraqi conflict into a sectarian or religious one.
Are Shia Iraqis loyal to Iran?
No. The majority of Shia Iraqis are nationalists who identify with Iraq.
Iraq had the longest war in its modern history with Iran, the war of eight years that ended in 1988. Shia Iraqis fought alongside fellow Iraqis against Iran. The perception of Iran being the Mecca of Shia Muslims does not make sense for an Iraqi Shia. Iraq is the origin of Shia Islam, and Iraq has all the major Shia Muslim holy sites. Thousands of Iranians come to Iraq each year to visit these places and to bury their loved ones in the holy cemeteries of Iraq. Iranians follow the Shia Iraqi religious clergy and consider it to be the supreme Shia leadership. Iranians have to study Arabic and thus speak the same language as Iraqis to perform their religious ceremonies.
Isn’t pulling out the troops a betrayal of the US personnel and of Iraqis?
No. Both of them want to end the occupation, and there are other ways to support them.
Betraying the troops is sending them to fight a war they don’t believe in. Polls say that 72% of them want to come back home and end the occupation. Betrayal also is not giving them the care they need when they return to the United States. Many Iraq War veterans think that “supporting the troops” should happen by ending the war and taking care of veterans, rather than sending more troops to Iraq. Supporting the war is not supporting our troops.
Ending the occupation and giving Iraq back to the Iraqis is what the Iraqis want. Keeping the US occupation or abandoning Iraq after the occupation ends would be a betrayal of Iraqis. Compensation and reparation are channels the US and the international community must take so that Iraqis successfully can govern and rebuild their country after the last occupation soldier leaves/
“Democratic planning for economic security and the abundant life is an instrument for the realization of our Christian ideals. This means cooperation between industry, labor, and government in planning so that every adult who desires it may exercise the right of working for a livelihood in useful employment, under fair labor standards, and without restrictions based on sex, creed, race, or nationality.” Church Women United Social Policy Book, (General Principles under Positions on Employment—1944)
GOOD NEWS from the National Labor Committee
Workers win victories in Honduras and Jordan:
Anti-sweatshop Legislation now one of the fastest-growing bills in the House
Fifty-eight workers fired for organizing a union at the Star SA factory in Honduras’s El Porvenir free trade zone (owned by the U.S. Anvil t-shirt company) have been reinstated to their jobs with back wages and legal recognition for their union. After the workers were fired in November, they held massive peaceful demonstrations in front of the free trade zone with as many as 600 workers. Factory and zone management called in the police, (many of whom arrived in black ski masks carrying assault rifles.) To Nike’s credit, this time they did the right thing. After receiving a letter from the National Labor Committee, Nike immediately dispatched a representative to Honduras who quickly concluded that the workers were unjustly and illegally fired.
TAKE ACTION: Write to your Senators and Representative and urge them to co-sponsor and support this important legislation.
CWU, I have recently learned from various members of Congress that handwritten or typed letters from their constituents with personal stories are the most effective. I am including here a copy of the letter I have written to my Senator and I urge you to also personalize your letter to your Senator or Representative.
SAMPLE LETTER
Dear Senator Mikulski, (put here the name of your Senator or Representative)
I live in Maryland (put your state here) and I greatly appreciate your concern for workers’ rights. I’m writing to you about a very important piece of legislation that needs your support. The Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act. S 367.
I live in my home in Mount Rainier with a family with two little girls who are like grandchildren for me. They are very aware of right and wrong and are growing up to be concerned about those who have little or who suffer unjustly. Their parents and I buy fair trade products whenever we can and the children know this. They understand that many other children in the world do not have enough to eat and cannot go to school because they must work. We cannot be assured that everything we buy is not made under sweatshop conditions. How many children in developing countries are deprived of school and decent living conditions because of sweatshops? The number of fair trade goods available at this time is very small.
The Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act would, I believe, help address the problem of sweatshops and we could buy the things we need with the assurance that families and children around the world may also have an opportunity to thrive. As Charles Kernaghan of the National Labor Committee says: “when this legislation passes, corporations will, for the first time, be held legally accountable to respect fundamental worker rights—including no child labor, no forced labor, freedom of association and the right to organize independent unions.”
Senator Mikulski, I urge you to consider becoming a co-sponsor of the Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act. S 367.
Thank you for considering my request.
MORE BACKGROUND
The following was taken from the testimony before Congress of Charles Kernaghan, director of the National Labor Committee on February 2007.
A second concrete example I want to raise is that of the Kaisi Metals factory in Guangzhou in the south of China, where 600 to 700 workers toil under dangerous and illegal conditions producing furniture parts for export to U.S. companies. Among those companies is the Knape & Vogt Manufacturing Company—located in Grand Rapids, Michigan—which imported $10.4 million worth of goods from the Kaisi factory in a recent three-month period. Every single labor law in China is routinely violated at the Kaisi factory, along with the International Labor Organization’s core worker rights standards, while the U.S. companies sourcing production there say and do nothing.
Grueling, exhausting, numbing, dangerous and poorly paid would be the only way to describe the workday at the Kaisi Metals factory. Kaisi workers are routinely forced to toil 14 to 15 hours a day, from 8am to 10:30 or 11:30pm often seven days a week. It is not uncommon for the workers to be at the factory 100 hours a week….Much worse still is the fact that the Kaisi factory is a dangerous place to work, where scores of young people have been seriously injured, and some maimed for life...In September 2006 alone, five Kaisi factory workers were seriously injured, resulting in the loss of at least six fingers.
In direct violation of China’s laws, the Kaisi factory failed to inscribe its workers in the mandatory national work injury insurance program...and failed to report these serious work injuries to the local authorities...
U.S. companies could never tolerate such abusive treatment of their products...In fact, the companies give every indication that they care much more about their products than about the human beings in China who make them….
Yesterday, the Star workers held their first official union assembly, elected their new union leaders and held a huge victory party.
One hundred and thirty-five foreign guest workers at the Cotton Craft factory in Jordan—who were routinely cheated of their overtime pay—are each now receiving hundreds of dollars in back wages legally due them. Needless to say, these poor guest workers who never expected to win are not only overjoyed by inspired to continue their struggle for justice.
The anti-sweatshop legislation—thanks to the United Steelworkers union!!—may now be the fastest-growing bill in the House. The Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act—introduced by Senator Byron Dorgan as S 367 and by Congressman Michael Michaud as HR 1992—is up to 160 co-sponsors in the House and 23 in the Senate, including Senators Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Chuck Schumer. When this legislation passes, corporations will, for the first time, be held legally accountable to respect fundamental worker rights—including no child labor, no forced labor, freedom of association and the right to organize independent unions. Products made under illegal sweatshop conditions will be prohibited from entry to the U.S., sale or export from the U.S.
Anti-Sweatshop Legislation provides help and protection for many women and young people who have suffered under cruel and unfair conditions to produce products we all use.
UPDATE ON THE SECOND CHANCE ACT !
In the summer 2007 issue of Inform and Act the Second Chance Act of 2007 was featured and you were encouraged to contact your Senator and send a letter asking for their support. The NAACP sent an action alert to the CWU DC office on March 12, 2008 reporting that on March 11, 2008 the Second Chance Act was passed in the Senate. It had previously passed in the House last fall
It will soon go to the President for his signature and now is the time to send your letters to him. Faxing is best. White House Fax Number is: 202/456-2461.
SAMPLE LETTER
President George W. Bush
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Re: Support for H.R. 1593, the “Second Chance Act”
Dear President Bush,
I strongly urge you to sign H.R. 1593, the “Second Chance Act” into law when it is presented before you in the near future. This much needed legislation, which passed the Senate unanimously on March 11, 2008 and the House on November 13, 2007 by an overwhelming bipartisan vote of 347 yeas to 62 nays is designed to allow states and local communities deal with the ever-increasing problem of assisting ex-offenders in reentering into society and becoming productive members of their communities.
More than 1,700 men and women re-enter our communities every day after a time in prison: many of them are unemployed and untrained, face serious substance abuse or mental health problems, and are homeless. It is because of this lack of training, absence of employment and dearth of adequate housing and support that more than 2/3 of men and women released from prison were rearrested for a felony or serious misdemeanor within 3 years.
Recidivism is not only costly for the victims of crimes and communities, but also for the American taxpayer: The average cost of incarcerating each prisoner exceeds $22,600 per year; expenditures on corrections alone have increased from $9 billion in 1982 to $60 billion in 2002. Thus, the money authorized in the Second Chance Act seems to be a good investment in our communities as well as in the men and women who have served their time in jail or prison.
Please support this legislation and sign it into law when it comes to your desk later this month and help our communities help the men and women who have served their time, as well as their families. It is not only the morally right thing to do, it is also fiscally prudent.
Sincerely,
WOULD YOU LIKE TO SUBSCRIBE to
INFORM AND ACT newsletter?
Please send payment of $12 for one year/$24 for 2 years to cover the production and mailing of Inform and Act (published quarterly) to:
Church Women United
100 Maryland Avenue, NE Rm 100
Washington DC 20002