FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Wesley Hannah rwh29@cornell.edu
Students Across America Protest on Third Anniversary of the War
3/13/06-3/18/06
From March 13th to March 18th, students across the nation will join together in coordinated demonstrations in protest of the Iraq war. As an action called for by the Campus Anti-war Network (CAN), dozens of high schools and colleges in all regions of the country will spend the next week in local demonstrations, discussions, marches, and rallies. Three years after the invasion of Iraq, students continue to actively fight for immediate withdrawal from the Middle East and for money to be spent on education, not occupation. The week culminates in the Global Days of Protest, March 18th-19th, where American students join millions around the world in solidarity in a call to end illegal invasion and continued occupation.
From Bennington, VT to Georgia State to San Francisco State, and everywhere in between, students are on the frontline along with other peace activists in calling for an immediate withdrawal and cessation of foreign wars of aggression. Those schools on break for the week will join their peers in solidarity with actions on the following Monday, March 20th. Cornell University student Bryn Roshong, ’08, an active participant in Cornell for Peace and Justice, a CAN affiliate, expressed frustration with the deception of the American people that “Bush claims we’re needed there, but the vast majority of Iraqis want us out! Meanwhile, we are building permanent bases there for our troops and spending more money on fortifications than on the supposed rebuilding of a land the war has destroyed.”
As now a majority of Americans call for withdrawal from Iraq, these protests signal rising resentment within the nation for an unjustified war that has killed of over 2,300 Americans and well over 100,000 Iraqi citizens, and destroyed homes and lives of countless more. Additionally, as president Bush diverts billions of dollars to war, Americans are seeing funding for education and social services drying up as the national deficit is skyrocketing. Abroad, foreign nations nearly unanimously call for withdrawal as the situation in Iraq spins out of control for US troops.
The Campus Anti-War Network began before the invasion of Iraq as a democratic grassroots network of students opposed to foreign wars of aggression and the presence of the military in US schools. It works to aid students in developing anti-war movements and to exchange ideas in order to create a vast national movement. Recently, the coalition has succeeded in barring military recruiters from Seattle Central Community College, City College of New York, San Francisco State University, Southern Connecticut State University, University of Illinois in Chicago, and others.
Endorsers of this week of action include AfterDowningStreet, Bay Area United Against War, Gold Star Families for Peace, Not In Our Name, Progressive Democrats of America, San Juan Peace Network, Stop the War Coalition (U.K.), Texans for Peace, The (California) Peace and Freedom Party, The Peace Majority Report, Traprock Peace Center, and the Washington Peace Center of Washington DC, as well as author Anthony Arnove, war resister Camilo Mejia, peace activist Cindy Sheehan, Kathy Kelly, author Howard Zinn, and Todd Chretien, candidate for US Senate from California.
For more information, see http://www.campusantiwar.net/