Minutes from Amnesty Philadelphia meeting, August 27
Posted September 2nd, 2009 by April | Philly Center City
MINUTES GROUP 112 MEETING AUGUST 27, 2009
Nine people attended this meeting. One person was a first time attender who requested being put on the ListServe.
Tina Jia and Jason Wang talked on religious persecution of members of Falun Gong in China. Jason told of being imprisoned and tortured after he refused to give up Falun Gong. Tina movingly talked about her mother who was sent to a labor camp for an eighteen month term because of her belief in Falun Gong. In addition, her aunt, cousin and brother-in-law are also in custody. Tina’s talk related to the organ harvesting issue in that she described how inmates had blood drawn and how some inmates just disappeared. Many thanks to Cindy Wang who served as moderator and translator.
Letters were sent: protesting detention of immigrants in the US; an Amnesty International URGENT ACTION letter protesting an arrest of a human rights worker in China; letters protesting religious persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in China; letters protesting abuse of human rights in Mexico.
Because of lack of time the Coordinators report was not given. So I will outline the contents of this report.
1. At our retreat honoring Mark last summer, many suggestions were made about programs of Group 112. One was that we should present instruction on letter writing. I xeroxed such a document and will distribute it at the next meeting. It’s content will be discussed at that time.
2. The first Friday Noon Human Rights Discussion is organized for October 23 at the Ethical Society 12:00 noon to 2PM. The speaker is Gladys Monterroso from Guatemala. She is on a speaker tour organized by the Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA. You can learn all about her at www.latinamericahaiti.com. This will be a light lunch (provided by us, but we will ask for donations) attended by about 15 invited people. Since this talk will stress human rights, Latin America and immigration we need a list of people to invite interested in these areas. So, I am requesting help in developing this list. E-mail me your suggestions, please. Or course all of our members will be invited. We write letters but rarely can see that there are real people out there suffering violations of their human rights. We hope that this event will be as good as our discussion with Tina and Jason where we could sense their desperation and how important our letter writing can be for individual people.
3. Construction of our web site is on hold.
4. Tabling? At our retreat it was emphasized that we must continue Tabling, as an educational and fund raising event. I am working on obtaining permission for us to have an AI table at some of the
Rittenhouse Square events, such as their market, art fair. Other suggestions for Tabling?
5. Our bank account. I suggest that we should require two signatures for each check. Is it OK to ask Dorothee and myself to be signees?
Next meeting: September 24.
Submitted by Ron Coburn