Bush Crimes Commission to Release Verdict Sept. 13

The Commission of Inquiry on Crimes Against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration will release its final verdict on Wednesday, September 13, 2006.

The final verdict will address the five indictments dealing with the Bush administration's wars of aggression, illegal detention and torture, destruction of the global environment through global warming, imposition of abstinence-only on AIDS prevention programs in the Third World, and the abandonment of New Orleans before, during and after Hurricane Katrina.

On September 13, the verdict will be formally served on the White House and the Department of Justice, read over the radio across the country, and released in printed form for national distribution.

Following the release of the verdict, the Commission is calling a national "Bush Crimes Day" on Tuesday, September 19. Inspired by the verdict of the Bush Crimes Commission, campuses and communities across the country will organize public events, from teach-ins to street-theatre, that draw attention to acts of the Bush administration that, by their scope and nature, shock the conscience of humankind -- and bring to the fore our moral and political responsibility to bring these horrific crimes to a halt!

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The release of the verdict fulfils a primary responsibility of this tribunal to deliver findings of fact and a verdict on the central question before the commission: "whether George W. Bush and his administration have committed crimes against humanity." The final verdict and the national Bush Crimes Day continue the Commission's mission "to frame and fuel a discussion that is urgently needed in the United States: Is the administration of George W. Bush guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity?"

The Bush administration's war crimes and crimes against humanity are now mounting on an even wider scale -- with new, even more monstrous, crimes looming. Despite almost universal condemnation, the Bush regime promoted Israel's invasion of Lebanon, the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan continue to wreak havoc on these countries, shocking crimes by U.S. soldiers against civilians continue to come to light, and torture continues in both public and secret locations around the world. The administration is attempting to grant itself immunity -- by rewriting US law -- to commit flagrant violations of Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions. The administration is aggressively beating the drums of war on Iran, which would bring catastrophic consequences to the Middle East and humanity.

At this moment in history, society desperately needs to hear the testimony of Scott Ritter at the Commission on the complete lies of the Bush administration in making the case for war in Iraq, the testimony of Brigadier General Janis Karpinski establishing the chain of command from the torture chambers of Abu Ghraib to the highest offices of the land, and eye-witness testimony from journalists in the killing fields of Iraq to the survivors from the flooded Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans. This is what we aim to bring people in the next few weeks as we expand and intensify the discussion on Bush's war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Society also desperately needs the moral clarity of Craig Murray, the former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan, who declared at the commission hearings, "I would personally rather die than have anyone tortured to save my life."

The need for this tribunal arose from the real and horrendous crimes being committed, and the historical, moral and political responsibility of people of conscience to sit in judgment of this administration: to inquire and assess whether this administration has committed crimes that do in fact rise to the level of crimes against humanity, and to act in a meaningful and commensurate manner, on that knowledge of reality, to bring these crimes to a halt.

As the 2002 Not In Our Name Statement of Conscience, the sponsoring organization of the Bush Commission, stated: "We believe that people of conscience must take responsibility for what their own governments do -- we must first of all oppose the injustice that is done in our own name."

Join us at the White House on September 13; join us across the nation on September 19!

ENDS

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