Eritreans in the Bay Area (California) Hold Successful Rally for Truth, Peace, Justice & Eritrea

From: Elias Amare Gebrezgheir <eliasamare_at_yahoo.com_at_dehai.org>
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 2015 20:38:43 +0000 (UTC)

Eritreans in the Bay Area (California)Hold Rally for Truth, Peace, Justice & Eritrea


 
April13, Oakland - Over 500 Eritreans and their friends held a "Rally forTruth, Peace, Justice and Eritrea" demanding an end to the ongoingoccupation of Eritrean territories by Ethiopia; immediate full implementationof the 13-year old Eritrea Ethiopia Boundary Commission's (EEBC) ruling, whoseverdict was rendered on 13 April 2002; and the lifting of the illegal andunjust US-engineered UN sanctions on Eritrea.


 
TheRally participants started at 10:00 AM from the Eritrean Community Cultural& Civic Center and continued their march through the streets of downtownOakland, waving Eritrean flags, and wearing T-shirts with the logo of theEuropean "Cycling Tour for Truth, Peace, Justice and Eritrea." Wavingthe national flag and chanting slogans for "peace and justice","end of sanctions" "end of Ethiopian occupation of sovereignEritrean territories", the Eritreans marched with confidence and defianceof the injustices against their beloved country, attracting lots of attentionfrom passersby and distributing brochures highlighting their cause.


 
TheRally culminated at the Federal Plaza in front of US Congresswoman BarbaraLee's Oakland Office.  A delegation representing the Eritreandemonstrators went up to the office of Congresswoman Barbara Lee and handed heroffice representatives the memorandum that was delivered by the EritreanCyclists in Geneva, Switzerland, to the UN headquarters on the same day.


 
Tworepresentatives of Congresswoman Lee came down and formally received thememorandum and over 5,000 petition signatures collected from Eritreans andtheir friends in the Bay Area. They also heard a brief summary of thememorandum from the representative of the Eritrean organizers of the Rally.Accordingly, in their turn the representatives of Congresswoman Lee addressedthe Rally, thanking them for their concerns and assuring them that theCongresswoman will give due attention to their call for peace and justice inEritrea and the Horn of Africa. Congressman Barbara Lee is the Representativeof the U.S. California 13th district to Congress. The Congresswoman,who is African American, is a staunch independent voiceand supporter of peace and justice causes, and she was the only lawmaker ineither chamber of Congress to vote against the 2001 resolution authorizing theinitial use of force.


 
Eritreansand their friends came to march in this historic rally on the 13th anniversaryof EEBC's final and binding verdict from different cities of California such asOakland, San Francisco, Santa Rosa and San Jose. At the end, the Eritreansdanced to songs of peace, mekhete defiance andsteadfastness in struggle.On this day, besides the European cycling tour,similar protest rallies, online petitions and solidarity events were heldworldwide by Eritreans in what is dubbed as Global ActionDay of Mekhete.


 
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

"The struggle is a long and difficult one.    
Therefore, mask no difficulty, tell no lies  
and claim no easy victory."                  
                      --Amilcar Cabral

"Telling the truth is always revolutionary."
 --Antonio Gramsci
"One must have the pessimism of the intellect and optimism of the will."
 --Antonio Gramsci

"Let me say, at the risk of seeming ridiculous, that the true revolutionary is guided by great feelings of love."
 --Ernesto "Che" Guevara



Received on Tue Apr 14 2015 - 16:38:49 EDT