13 January 2010
Media Release:

“It’s not OK” protest march against Hillary Clinton – Saturday 11.30am from US Consulate, Customs St East

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Global Peace and Justice Auckland is planning a protest march this Saturday against the visit to New Zealand of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The march will leave from the US Consulate in Customs Street East to the Auckland Town Hall where Clinton is meeting a variety of invited guests from 12noon to 2pm.

The theme of the march will be “It’s not OK” as in –

It’s not OK to wage war for oil!
It’s not OK to torture and assassinate!
It’s not OK to overthrow democratically elected governments!
It’s not OK to wreck the planet!

Protestors will be asked to bring old shoes – women’s shoes especially – to the protest. (Throwing shoes has become an international symbol of protest against US policy in Afghanistan and Iraq - this may become a high-heel protest)

The main issues for the protest will be the escalation of the US war in Afghanistan, in which New Zealand in complicit, and the abandonment of any serious plans to confront global warming.

Further background to the march is detailed in the leaflet prepared by GPJA as follows:

“Despite the hope for change the new Obama administration in the US is proving to be a loyal servant of big business and the wars of empire in which New Zealand is complicit.

Since the election President Obama and his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have overseen a continuation of the war in Iraq, trebling of military forces in Afghanistan, uncritical support for the Israeli regime, the overthrow of a democratically elected President in Honduras and the scuttling of any serious plan to confront global warming.

The economic crisis has seen a further deepening of the grotesque inequalities between and within nations. This is the direct result of policies dubbed the "Washington Consensus" designed to give as much power and freedom to big business as possible. In the ensuing crisis it is the big banks that get bailed out while workers lose their homes and jobs.

Clinton arrives in New Zealand this week pushing her corporate globalisation agenda. She wants a Pacific Free Trade Agreement and closer military ties between the US and New Zealand. The nuclear free policy in NZ is no longer seen as a barrier to closer “intelligence” sharing and military training to allow for even greater integration in the wars of empire. NZ currently has SAS forces in Afghanistan and supports a US-led force that targets North Korea.

The recent “elections” in Afghanistan have revealed the regime to be simply a continuation of the same corrupt, drug running, warlord dominated elites that the US allied itself to in the overthrow of the Taliban. No progress has been made to bring about any real social or economic progress to the country.

The war and occupation of Iraq continues with no end in sight. The US continues to build military bases while promises “eventual” withdrawal. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died and millions been driven into exile.

Opinion polls in both Iraq and Afghanistan show that a substantial majority of the population in both countries want all foreign troops withdrawn.

The US military budget at over $600 billion annually is almost as great as the rest of the world combined. It exports billions of dollars in war equipment to corrupt and brutal regimes around the world. It has military bases in 130 countries.

Despite this expenditure on death and destruction the US and its Western allies have opposed any meaningful expenditure to close the gaps between rich and poor in the world (including in the fight against global warming).

Freedom is under threat around the world with the US exposed as a government that condones torture. Pledges to close Guantanamo and the rendition programmes remain unfulfilled. Warfare gets privatised and outside any democratic control. Drone missiles are used to assassinate anyone deemed an enemy of the state without any accountability. Civilian deaths are deemed “collateral damage”.

Let us make our voices loud and clear!
It’s not OK to wage war for oil!
It’s not OK to torture and assassinate!
It’s not OK to overthrow democratically elected governments!
It’s not OK to wreck the planet!

OBAMA AND CLINTON
IT’S NOT OK
- To wage war for oil
- To kidnap & torture
- To support military coups
- To occupy other countries
- To wreck the planet

ENDS

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