SWOPblogger

PRESS RELEASE

For Immediate Release: August, 27, 2007
Contact:

Michael Leon Guerrero 310-7676160
Alexa Kasdan 646-400-2657

Grassroots Global Justice Delegation Travels to New Orleans to Support

International Tribunal and Survivor’s Assembly Tribunal Will Bring Together Representatives from Around the World to Hear Testimony from Katrina Survivor’s on US Government’s Human Rights Violations

Two years after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast, Grassroots Global Justice members will travel to New Orleans to provide logistical support for the International Tribunal and 2nd Survivor’s Assembly. The Tribunal, which is being organized by GGJ member group, the People’s Hurricane Relief Fund, with support from other organizations, will bring together hurricane Katrina survivors, international delegations, expert witnesses, a team of human rights and civil rights prosecutors, and a panel of US-based and international judges. The international delegations will include government officials, scholars and advocates from around the world.

The Tribunal is being held to bring charges of racial discrimination and the denial of the right to return for more than 300,000 residents, mostly poor and black who have been unable to return to New Orleans since Katrina hit two years ago. The survivor’s testimony will highlight the discriminatory rebuilding and public assistance efforts post-Katrina, and will call into question government practices before and during the storm.

The Grassroots Global Justice delegation will include representatives from at least six different organizations from around the country including, Direct Action for Rights and Equality (DARE) in Rhode Island, Fuerza Unida from San Antonio, TX, Community Voices Heard from New York City, Southwest Worker’s Union from San Antonio, Project South from Atlanta, GA, and the Labor Community Strategy Center in Los Angeles. The delegation will be providing logistical support for the tribunals and working in solidarity with the People’s Hurricane Relief Fund as well as many other organizations and volunteers from around the country.

This delegation is part of GGJ’s Gulf Coast Support Campaign and will further the campaign’s goals of supporting organizing work in the Gulf Coast and promoting education of GGJ member organizations about the issues in the post-Katrina Gulf Coast. GGJ is comprised of 60 grassroots organizations throughout the U.S. confronting the effects of corporate-led globalization including the elimination of public services, job loss, displacement, and environmental destruction. The alliance promotes human rights, peace and environmental sustainability nationally and internationally.
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Grassroots Global Justice
ggj@ggjalliance.org

424.772.6410
424.675.5419 FAX

Labels: GGJ, globalization, grassroots global justice, Hurricane Katrina, International Tribunal, Katrina, New Orleans