February 17: COINTELPRO 101 Screening at Naropa University, Boulder, CO

Rocky Mountain Peace & Justice Center

The Freedom Archives
& the Leonard Peltier Defense Offense Committee

Students for Peace & Justice
Popcorner Film Series

Present

Thurs. Feb. 17th,
8-10pm
Naropa University Main Campus
Goldfarb Student Center
(2130 Arapahoe Ave.)
Boulder, Colorado

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to Justice Everywhere."
Martin Luther King Jr.

During the Civil Rights era of the 50s, 60s and 70s, the F.B.I, under the leadership of J. Edgar Hoover, waged a covert war against minority peoples and progressive movements referred to as, COINTELPRO.

COINTELPRO represents the state’s strategy to prevent movements and communities from overturning white supremacy and creating racial justice. COINTELPRO is both a formal program of the FBI and a term frequently used to describe a conspiracy among government agencies—local, state, and federal—to destroy movements for self-determination and liberation for Black, Brown, Asian, and Indigenous struggles, as well as mount an institutionalized attack against allies of these movements and other progressive organizations.

COINTELPRO 101 is an educational film that will open the door to understanding this history. This documentary will introduce viewers new to this history to the basics and direct them to other resources where they can learn more. The intended audiences are the generations that did not experience the social justice movements of the sixties and seventies.

Interviews in the video include:

Muhammad Ahmad (Max Stanford)—Founder of Revolutionary Action Movement and professor at Temple University.
Bob Boyle—Attorney representing many activists and political prisoners targeted by COINTELPRO.
Kathleen Cleaver—former leader of the Black Panther Party, now Professor of Law at Emory and Yale Universities and an expert on COINTELPRO.
Ward Churchill—just-removed Professor at the University of Colorado who has written extensively about COINTELPRO.
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz—Long-time Native American activist and educator.
Priscilla Falcon—Long-time Mexicana activist and professor whose husband was assassinated for his leadership in the Chicano struggle.
Geronimo Ji-Jaga Pratt—former leader of the Black Panther Party who was falsely imprisoned for 27 years in a COINTELPRO case.
Jose Lopez—Director of the Puerto Rican Cultural Center in Chicago and long-time advocate of Puerto Rican independence.
Francisco 'Kiko' Martinez—long-time Chicano/Mexicano activist and attorney.
Lucy Rodriguez—Puerto Rican Independentista and former Political Prisoner.
Ricardo Romero—long-time Chicano/Mexicano activist and Grand Jury resister
Akinyele Umoja—African American History scholar at Georgia State University.
Laura Whitehorn—radical activist and former political prisoner who was targeted by the federal government.

*Film will be followed by a discussion lead by participants in the film, Ricardo Romero (Chicano/Mexicano Activist) and Ward Churchill (Native American Author & Professor).

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness." - Declaration of Independence

"America, when will you live up to your own principles?" - Leonard Peltier

For more info: www.freedomarchives.org or www.whoisleonardpeltier.info

Contact: silentbear55@yahoo.com or sfpjpopcorner@gmail.com

Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Council Demands Immediate Release of Leonard Peltier

Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Council Resolution Condemning the Illegal Imprisonment of Leonard Peltier and Demanding His Immediate Release

January 29, 2011 – Prairie Winds Casino, Pine Ridge Reservation

WHEREAS, the Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Nation Council assembled in quorum along with representatives of the Lakota, Nakota and Dakota Nations present from January 27‐29 2011 at the Prairie Winds Casino on the Pine Ridge Reservation, and

WHEREAS, the United States has violated Article I and Article II of the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868, by failing to remove and, or, punish “bad men” who commit wrongs against the Lakota people and by failing to remove non‐tribal members illegally residing in the treaty territory, and

WHEREAS, Leonard Peltier was one of a number of warriors who came to the defense of the Oyate and the traditional government after repeated acts of violence by agents of the United States government and others subject to U.S. government jurisdiction, and

WHEREAS, Leonard Peltier’s conviction is built upon fraudulent affidavits coerced by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and bolstered by falsified physical evidence from the F.B.I. lab, and

WHEREAS, Leonard Peltier has been illegally held as a political prisoner by the United States government since 1976,

NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Council declares that the continued imprisonment of Leonard Peltier by the United States government is illegal, immoral and unjust, and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Council demands the immediate release of Leonard Peltier.


C‐E‐R‐T‐I‐F‐C‐A‐T‐I‐O‐N

I, the undersigned Secretary of the Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Council, do hereby certify that the above resolution has been approved by consensus of all delegations of the Black Hills Sioux Nation Treaty Council, effective January 29, 2011.

ATTEST:

Chief Oliver Red Cloud, Itancan

Frederick Cedar Face, Secretary

Upcoming German Events on Behalf of Leonard Peltier

February 5th Demonstration for Leonard Peltier in Frankfurt/Germany
February 6th Worldwide Email-Day to the White House for Peltier
February 8th Black Gold. Documentary about Coffee-Production and zapatistan Coffee in Offenbach
February 25th Support concert for L. Peltier with TM Stevens & ShockaZooloo Band in Offenbach

More details on our website: www.tokata-lpsg.de

Tokata - LPSG RheinMain e. V./Germany
Verein zur Unterstützung indianischer Jugend-, Kultur- und Menschenrechtsprojekte & LPDOC Chapter

NYC: 35 Years is Too Long!

Albuquerque: Benefit Concerts for Leonard Peltier, 05/06 February

February 5
Albuquerque, NM: Peltier Benefit Concert, Peace and Justice Center, 202 Harvard SE. , 5:30-9:30 p.m. $15.00 Admission (Cash Only). Featuring Jim Page, Indigie Femme, Simon Ortiz, Poets & Guest. Special guest: Morning Star Traveling (James Wooden Legs) with ASL interpreting.

And your Super Bowl alternative:

February 6
Albuquerque, NM: Peltier Benefit Concert, The Kosmos, 1715 5th Street, NW, 5:00-10:00 p.m. $15.00 Admission. Jim Page, Indigie Femme, Bill Laymon. For advance tickets, call 505-908-0481.

These events are part of the weekend events in Albuquerque commemorating the 35th anniversary of Leonard Peltier's arrest. Sponsored by the ABQ LPDOC Chapter and the Leonard Peltier Defense Offense Committee, with ABQ-Jericho and the Irish Freedom Committee.

Albuquerque: COINTELPRO 101, 04 Feb.

Screening of COINTELPRO 101, Albuquerque (NM) Peace and Justice Center, 202 Harvard SE. 6:00-10:00 p.m. $5.00 Admission. Followed by a talk with producer Claude Marks and other guests. This event is part of the weekend events in Albuquerque commemorating the 35th anniversary of Leonard Peltier's arrest. Sponsored by ABQ-Jericho. Contact: 646-271-4677 or albqjericho@gmail.com.

150-year-old letters give voice to Dakota prisoners

January 19, 2011

Fargo, N.D. — For nearly 150 years, the voices of Dakota men imprisoned after the Dakota Conflict of 1862 went unheard.

But the details of their imprisonment are starting to emerge, in letters written by those prisoners after six weeks of fighting along the Minnesota River Valley that left hundreds of Indians, settlers and soldiers dead.

In a tiny office at North Dakota State University in Fargo, Clifford Canku has spent 10 years poring over the faint handwriting with a magnifying glass.

"One letter would take about a week," said Canku, a Dakota elder who teaches Dakota language at North Dakota State. Canku is one of three lead translators on the project, which has unearthed never-before revealed details of a turbulent episode in Minnesota history.

Some of the letter writers talk about the war; others describe prison life.

"We're very cold, and they took the stove away from us," one prisoner wrote. "It's way below zero and we're freezing. A lot of people have died."

The letters add important first-person perspective to a troubling time in history, said professor Bruce Maylath, one of Canku's colleagues in the NDSU English Department. They plan to publish 50 of the letters.

Read more

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in His Own Words

Join the National Day of Action on Tuesday, January 25, 2011

In December 2010, under the direction of U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, the FBI delivered 9 new subpoenas in Chicago to anti-war and Palestine solidarity activists - bringing the total number of subpoenaed activists to 23. Patrick Fitzgerald’s office is ordering the 9 to appear at a Grand Jury in Chicago on January 25.


In response, activists are calling for protests across the country and around the world. We endorse this action to show our solidarity. Hundreds of organizations and thousands of people will be protesting at Federal Buildings, FBI offices, and other appropriate places, showing solidarity with the 9 newly subpoenaed activists and with all the activists whose homes were raided by the FBI.

Fitzgerald’s expanding web of repression already includes the 14 subpoenaed when the FBI stormed into homes on September 24th, carting away phones, computers, notebooks, diaries and children’s artwork. In October, all fourteen activists from Chicago, Minneapolis, and Michigan decided to not participate in the secret proceedings of Fitzgerald’s Grand Jury. Each signed a letter invoking their Fifth Amendment rights. However, three women from Minneapolis - Tracy Molm, Anh Pham and Sarah Martin - are facing re-activated subpoenas. They are standing strong and we are asking you to stand with them – and with the newly subpoenaed nine activists – by protesting Patrick Fitzgerald and his use of the Grand Jury and FBI to repress anti-war and international solidarity activists.

Defend free speech! Defend the right to organize! Opposing war and occupation is not a crime!

**Tell Patrick Fitzgerald to call off the Grand Jury!
**Stop FBI raids and repression!

Please organize a local protest or picket in your city or on your campus and e-mail stopfbi@gmail.com to let folks know what you have planned.

Related articles

• FBI delivers subpoenas to 4 more anti-war, solidarity activists (freepeltiernow.blogspot.com)
• FBI Turns Up the Heat on Antiwar Activists: Common Dreams (f33dyourhead.wordpress.com)
• FBI Expands 'Witch Hunt' Against Antiwar Activists (criminaljustice.change.org)
• Activists prepare for emergency protests against subpoenas to grand jury (redantliberationarmy.wordpress.com)
• Three Twin Cities anti-war activists told they must appear in front of Grand Jury (redantliberationarmy.wordpress.com)

Aaron Huey: America's native prisoners of war