1000 Grandmothers: Close the SOA Fast

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More Information:  athousandgrandmothers @ yahoo.com

1000 Grandmothers are getting rockers greased, and stomachs prepared for the Close the SOA Fast which will occur on April 23-25 in the Downtown City Plaza.  Fasters and supporters will be in the plaza during the hours of 10am – 3pm, on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.  The grannies and others will be in their rocking chairs offering information about the former School of the Americas, collecting quilt squares, and urging citizens to call Congressional District 2 Representative Wally Herger urging him to vote for House Resolution 1707.  The bill before the House budget session this summer will suspend the funding of the school until a full investigation into documented abuses is reported and acted upon.

A walk/caravan to Mr. Herger’s office at Philadelphia Square on Thursday at 11am will include the giant puppet grandmother and companions featured in the city plaza on March 15th.  Trinity Methodist Church pastor David Moss will conduct a teach-in on fasting for social justice at the Congressman’s office.  Rev. Moss fasted at Mr. Herger’s office for over two weeks last fall to call attention to the injustice of the Iraq War.

The Grandmothers organized in 2006 to join the annual protest and vigil at the gates of Ft. Benning, Georgia to demand the closure of a controversial school housed on the U.S. Army base.   At that protest grandmother CathyWebster was arrested for trespassing and served two months in Sacramento County Jail.  In a previous year, another Chico grandmother, Dorothy Parker, trespassed in protest at Ft. Benning and served two months in federal prison at Dublin, CA.

“ Cosmetic changes and slick public relations tactics have not addressed the fundamental issues in its deeply disturbing history, including its use of “torture training manuals” and the records of human rights abuses by many of its graduates. It remains a combat training school that provides dangerous skills to countries with serious on-going human rights problems despite attempts by the congressionally-mandated Board of Visitors to address some of the concerns that have been made over the years,” said Webster.

The School of the Americas, renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation in 2001, is a US-taxpayer funded military training school for Latin American soldiers located in Georgia.

1000 Grandmothers is a national coalition of grandmothers and others taking direct action to close the School of the Americas/WHINSEC.

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