| The Letelier-Moffitt Human Rights Awards This year's program will mark the 31st anniversary of the September 21, 1976 car bombing that killed Chilean diplomat Orlando Letelier and American Ronni Karpen Moffitt. Until 9/11, it was the most infamous act of international terrorism ever to take place in our nation's capital. Letelier and Moffitt were colleagues at the Institute for Policy Studies, where Letelier had become one of the most outspoken critics of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. Moffitt was a 25-year-old fundraiser who ran a "Music Carryout" that made musical instruments accessible to all. A massive FBI investigation traced the crime to the highest levels of Pinochet's regime. The Institute for Policy Studies has continued to host the annual human rights award in the names of Letelier and Moffitt to honor these fallen colleagues while celebrating new heroes of the human rights movement from the United States and elsewhere in the Americas. About the 2007 Award Recipients Gustavo Petro is at the forefront of challenging the paramilitary infiltration of Colombian society. Elected to the Colombian Senate after 12 years in Congress, Petro has focused his investigations on the influence of far-right narco-militaries and death squads on the justice system, Congress, the military, and the president's inner circle. His courageous efforts have exposed more than a dozen Colombian legislators, several governors, and other top-ranking political and military figures. Petro has been a leading voice in Colombian human rights and democracy movements since his involvement in the peace process of the 1990s and the re-writing of the country's constitution. Although he is the most threatened person in the country, he is also one of the most popular, receiving the second most votes in the 2006 elections and winning "person of the year" honors for 2006 from the country's most widely circulated magazine. Read more: in Wikipedia (Spanish) or Democracy Now! (English) The Appeal for Redress from the War in Iraq has rapidly become the most influential force within the U.S. armed services to challenge the U.S. occupation of Iraq. The Appeal calls for an immediate military withdrawal from Iraq as a proud, proactive, and patriotic act. Started in January 2007 by Navy Seaman Jonathan Hutto and Marine Corps Sergeant Liam Madden, the Appeal for Redress brings together nearly 2,000 active-duty U.S. military personnel, most of them veterans of the Iraq War. Because of their risk-taking for peace, they have quickly gained the support of both veteran organizations and anti-war organizations. The Appeal, part of a growing surge of support for ending the Iraq War, is also a critically important effort to exercise and guarantee the freedom of speech within the armed services. Read more: AppealForRedress.org DC Vote has been advocating on behalf of full political representation for the residents of Washington, DC for nearly a decade. Under the banner of "no taxation without representation," DC Vote has called attention to the equal rights denied to the more than half a million DC citizens. In 2006, after bringing over 5,000 people into the streets of the nation's capital, DC Vote was instrumental in gaining passage of the DC House Voting Rights Act, the most promising step toward political representation in decades. Read more: DCVote.org * * * Sarah Anderson, Institute for Policy Studies
Fred Azcarate, AFL-CIO
Marie Dennis, Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns
Joe Eldridge, Chaplain, American University
Jill Gay, Activist
Adam Isacson, Center for International Policy
Peter Kornbluh, National Security Archive
Erik Leaver, Institute for Policy Studies
Isabel Morel de Letelier
E. Ethelbert Miller, Howard University
Joy Olson, Washington Office on Latin America
Barbara Shailor, AFL-CIO
Sanho Tree, Institute for Policy Studies |
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