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<small><font face="Arial"><b></b></font></small><small><font
face="Arial"><b> <big>Stonewall Warriors and Women's
Fightback Network Pride Forum</big></b><br>
<br>
</font></small>
<div align="left"><small><font face="Arial"><a
href="%20http://www.freethefiveny.org/rainboweng.shtml"><img alt=""
src="cid:part1.04050806.06000205@iacboston.org" align="left" border="2"
height="131" width="200"></a><big><b><big>Wednesday, June 13 - 6:30 PM
</big></b></big></font></small><br>
<small><font face="Arial"><b>Action Center</b></font></small><br>
<small><font face="Arial"><b>284 Amory Street (the Brewery), JP </b></font></small><br>
<small><font face="Arial">(steps from Stonybrook T stop on the Orange
Line.</font></small><br>
<br>
<small><font face="Arial">donation refreshments childcare</font></small><br>
</div>
<small><font face="Arial"><br>
<br>
<br>
<i><b>SPEAKERS:</b></i><br>
<br>
<b>LeiLani Dowell</b> - National Organizer F.I.S.T. (Fight Imperialism
Stand Together), Rainbow Solidarity with the Cuban Five <br>
<b>Mia Campbell</b> - Women’s Fight Back Network, Politic'n with the
Sisters<br>
<b>Rev. Franklin Hobbs</b> - Director Boston HIV State of Emergency
Committee<br>
<b>Gerry Scoppettuolo</b> - Stonewall Warriors, International Action
Center<br>
<br>
<big><b>* Rainbow Solidarity for the Cuban Five</b></big><br>
<br>
These U.S.-held political prisoners were jailed merely for having
infiltrated CIA-backed right-wing terrorist commando organizations to
monitor and stop attacks on Cuba from U.S. soil.<br>
<br>
The struggle to win their freedom has galvanized a broad united front
among those who battle oppression based on their gender expression
and/or sex and who they love. Individuals and organizations have signed
on from 45 countries, from every continent and from virtually every
state in the continental U.S. <br>
<br>
<b><big>* Advances in LGBT rights and HIV Care in Cuba</big></b><br>
<br>
hear about the advances in free gender reassignment surgery, medical
care and possible government-endorsed civil unions or marriage. We in
the U.S. and elsewhere need a radical solution to end the HIV epidemic.
<br>
<br>
Discussion to follow</font></small><br>
<br>
<small><font face="Arial">for more information on Rainbow Solidarity
for the Cuban Five - <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="http://www.freethefiveny.org/rainboweng.shtml">http://www.freethefiveny.org/rainboweng.shtml</a></font></small><br>
<hr size="2" width="100%"><small><font face="Arial"></font></small><small><font
face="Arial"> <small></small></font></small><b><big><big><font
face="Arial">LGBT Center hosts meeting for Cuban Five</font></big></big></b>
<!---deck--><!---byline-->
<div class="byline"><small><font face="Arial">By Brenda Sandburg
<br>
New York
<br>
</font></small></div>
<!---page text-->
<!--begin page--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">The lesbian, gay, bi and transgender
community is using its power to help build
the worldwide movement to free the Cuban Five.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin image-->
<table _base_href="http://www.workers.org" align="right" border="0"
cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0">
<tbody _base_href="http://www.workers.org">
<tr _base_href="http://www.workers.org">
<td _base_href="http://www.workers.org"><small><font face="Arial"><img
src="cid:part2.03020008.06030704@iacboston.org"
alt="Helena Wong, Benjamin Ramos, Leslie Feinberg,<br>LeiLani Dowell, Joan Gibs and Teresa Gutierrez<br>applaud Secretary Jorge Luis Dustet
from<br>the U.N. Cuban Mission as he holds up<br>Rainbow Solidarity with the Cuban Five photo. "
_base_href="http://www.workers.org" border="0"></font> </small>
<div class="caption"><small><font face="Arial"><br>
Helena Wong, Benjamin Ramos, Leslie Feinberg,<br>
LeiLani Dowell, Joan Gibs and Teresa Gutierrez<br>
applaud Secretary Jorge Luis Dustet
from<br>
the U.N. Cuban Mission as he holds up<br>
Rainbow Solidarity with the Cuban Five photo. </font></small></div>
<div class="credit"><small><font face="Arial">WW photo: G. Dunkel
</font></small></div>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<!--end image-->
<!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">As part of its effort to forge new ties,
Rainbow Solidarity for the Cuban Five
held a meeting at the Lesbian Gay Bisexual & Transgender Community
Center
in New York City June 2. Leaders from various organizations voiced
their
commitment to work on behalf of the Cuban heroes, noting that the U.S.
government’s persecution of them is connected to its imperialist wars
abroad and attacks on immigrants at home.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">A representative of the Cuban government
welcomed the support of the LGBT
movement. “The Cuban Five represent the altruism and courage of the
Cuban
people,” Jorge Luis Dustet, second secretary to the Cuban Mission of
the
United Nations, told the crowd. “Thank you for the work of the Rainbow
Solidarity. Our message to you will always be: ¡Hasta la victoria
siempre!”</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">The Cuban Five—Gerardo Hernández, Antonio
Guerrero, Ramón
Labañino, Fernando González and René González—were
prosecuted in the U.S. because they infiltrated CIA-backed right-wing
terrorist
organizations operating in the U.S. in order to monitor and stop their
plans to
attack Cuba. Imprisoned for nearly nine years, the five were given
sentences
ranging from 15 years to two consecutive life terms.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">Dustet said the U.S. government’s recent
release of terrorist Luis Posada
Carriles shows the innocence of the Cuban Five and how necessary it was
for the
Cuban government to send them to the U.S. to collect information on
people like
Carriles. Carriles organized the mid-air bombing of a civilian
passenger plane
in 1976, which killed 73 passengers, and directed the bombing of
tourist hotels
in 1997. He escaped from prison in Venezuela in 1985 and secretly
entered the
United States in 2005. The U.S. government arrested him on an
immigration
violation but freed him in April, ignoring calls by the Venezuelan and
Cuban
governments for his extradition.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">Teresa Gutierrez, founder of the New York
Committee to Free the Cuban Five,
said their case is thoroughly political and has everything to do with
U.S./Cuba
relations. The U.S. government imprisoned the five as a way of
attacking Cuba.
She emphasized that the main way to free them is to change public
opinion and
organize pressure on the U.S. government.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">“We’ve almost run out of legal options,”
Gutierrez said.
“That’s why these meetings are so important. We have to reach new
sectors.”</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">Rainbow Solidarity for the Cuban Five was
initiated in January 2007 to build
support among the LGBT communities. The group issued a call that
demands a new
trial and freedom for the Cuban Five, declares the right of the Cuban
people to
sovereignty and self-determination, and demands a halt to U.S. acts of
war
against Cuba, including the economic blockade and CIA-trained and
-funded
attacks by mercenary “contra” armies operating on U.S. soil.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">In four months the call has received
endorsements from more than 1,000 unions,
organizations and individuals in 40 countries, as well as every state
in the
continental U.S.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">Leslie Feinberg, one of the initiators of
the Rainbow Solidarity call and
author of the soon to be released book “Rainbow Solidarity: In Defense
of
Cuba,” presented a framed copy of the call with the first 1,000
signatures to Dustet. The crowd responded by cheering Dustet and giving
him a
standing ovation.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">Feinberg told the crowd that the call has
been translated into Chinese,
Tagalog, Farsi, Turkish, Greek, Croatian, Portuguese, Italian, Danish,
Japanese, French and German, and additional translations are planned in
Swahili, Urdu, Indonesian, Arabic, Korean and Bengali. A streaming
video in
American Sign Language is also in the works.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">“On what basis does this initiative call
for solidarity from communities
struggling against oppression based on sexuality, gender expression and
sex?” Feinberg asked. “In essence, what defined the left wing of
the early gay liberation movement in the United States, and what fueled
its
vitality, was its solidarity on the basis of a common enemy, not a
common
oppression.” The community at that time stood with immigrant workers
organizing the United Farm Workers and with the Black Panther Party and
the
Young Lords.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">“Today, our communities have a particular
responsibility in the United
States to defend the Cuban Five because this country is the aircraft
carrier
from which Wall Street and the Pentagon are launching a covert war
against
Cuba,” she said. “And those who are battling oppression based on
same-sex love are called upon to play a leadership role in this
struggle
because it is our love and our lives that have been used as a political
cover
for this dirty war against a people who have fought enslavement for 500
years.”</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">Ben Ramos, a coordinator of the Popular
Education Project to Free the Cuban
Five and co-chair of the meeting, noted that it was natural for the
LGBT
community to take up the case of the Cuban Five. “We have been integral
in the anti-war movement, we are instrumental in the development of
unions and
workers’ rights campaigns” and in fighting to free political
prisoners, Ramos said. Ramos was also a leading organizer of the event.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">Other speakers proclaimed their support
for the five as well.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">“We have a responsibility to the Cuban
Five because their story is our
story,” said Helena Wong, director of the Committee Against Anti-Asian
Violence. She said immigrants come to this country because of what the
U.S.
government is doing to their homelands and then are locked up in
detention
centers for trying to start a new life here. Likewise, she said, “The
government puts resources into Israel and Iraq and to militarizing the
borders,” while refusing to meet the needs of the Black and Brown
communities devastated by Hurricane Katrina.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">Yancy Mark Gandionco, on the LGBT Desk of
the U.S. Chapter of BAYAN
Philippines, compared the U.S. government’s imprisonment of the five to
the Philippine government’s attempt to quash resistance by arresting
progressive leaders. Charged with sedition and rebellion, they were
held in
prison for two years and freed because the Filipino people stood up.
“The
most powerful weapon is the weapon of resistance,” Gandionco said.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">Joan Gibbs, an attorney and activist who
is focused on freeing political
prisoners, pointed to the success of the Puerto Rican movement in
freeing five
Nationalists who were imprisoned for more than 25 years. She said the
victories
of the civil rights movement were also won in the streets. Gibbs also
paid
tribute to Cuba for fighting apartheid in Africa and giving asylum to
great
fighters like Assata Shakur. “When the African people called, only one
country went without imperialist designs and that was Cuba,” she
said.</font></small></p>
<!--end paragraph--><!--begin paragraph-->
<p><small><font face="Arial">LeiLani Dowell, a leader of Fight
Imperialism, Stand Together (FIST) and
co-chair of the meeting, spoke about the International Youth Conference
on the
Cuban Five that was held in Cuba in April. She said the participants
stressed
over and over that it is primarily the responsibility of the people of
the U.S.
to build awareness of the Cuban Five to win their freedom. She repeated
the
words of Cuban National Assembly President Ricardo Alarcón: “The
U.S. people will find the keys to unlock the gate for the Cuban Five.”</font></small></p>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
*******************************************
International Action Center
Boston:
617-522-6626
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated"
href="mailto:iacboston@iacboston.org">iacboston@iacboston.org</a>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.iacboston.org">http://www.iacboston.org</a>
National Office:
212-633-6646
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.iacenter.org">http://www.iacenter.org</a>
Troops Out Now Coalition
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://troopsoutnow.org">http://troopsoutnow.org</a> </pre>
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