Tonight: NYC Event on Afghan War Anniversary

ENDING OBAMA’S WAR: SOLIDARITY WITH THE PEOPLE OF AFGHANISTAN AND PAKISTAN

When: Wednesday, October 7, 2009 at 7:00pm
Where: Proshansky Auditorium, The Graduate Center, CUNY, 365 Fifth Ave at 34th Street [BDFV & NQRW trains to 34th St, 6 train to 33]

October 7th marks the eighth anniversary of the launch of the US led “War on Terror” in Afghanistan. Defending it as a “war of necessity,” the Obama administration is on the precipice of an enormous troop surge in Afghanistan and an escalation in Pakistan, which has already begun with drone attacks. This strategic dialogue will explore a deeper historic analysis of the realities on the ground in order to inform our resistance in the U.S. and to develop a more effective solidarity with the people of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Speakers Include:

Jeremy Scahill: Independent journalist, author of Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army. He is a frequent contributor to The Nation magazine and a correspondent for the national radio and TV program Democracy Now! He is currently a Puffin Foundation Writing Fellow at The Nation Institute. He has appeared on ABC World News, CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, CNN, MSNBC, PBS’s The NewsHour, Bill Moyers Journal. Rebel Reports

Zoya: a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA). Like many RAWA members, Zoya has witnessed and endured more tragedy and terror than most people do in a lifetime. Zoya grew up during the wars that ravaged Afghanistan and was robbed of her mother and father when they were murdered by fundamentalists - Zoya was only fourteen. Devastated by so much death and destruction, she fled Kabul with her grandmother and started a new life in exile in Pakistan. After attending a school funded by RAWA, she joined the underground women’s organization and continues their work resisting fundamentalism and war today. RAWA

Bill Fletcher: the Executive Editor of The Black Commentator and founder of the Center for Labor Renewal. A longtime labor, racial justice and international activist, he is the immediate past president of TransAfrica Forum. Black Commentator

Adaner Usmani: works with the Labor Party of Pakistan (LPP) and Action for a Progressive Pakistan (APP). With these and other groups, he has been involved in antiwar work, principally in Pakistan but also in the US, as well as assorted campaigns for peasant and worker rights. He is currently pursuing a PhD in Sociology from NYU. Blogspot

Sponsored by the South Asia Solidarity Initiative & Center for Place, Culture and Politics.