https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dHZpNXVHN2dnbzl2bVQxXy1iRVlYQnc6MQ

WE CAN DO SOMETHING MORE!

Please, write to your “elected people”: call your mayor, deputy, prime minister, etc. Ask them to write to the Japanese Prime Minister and to the Minister of Justice, according to the Amnesty International instructions http://amnesty.org/en/library/asset/ASA22/001/2012/en/1092e76e-5689-43eb-9c11-64960a4c6fd4/asa220012012en.html http://www.astrangefruit.org/index.php/it/

DO IT NOW, THIS ACTION IS VERY URGENT

Write in your own language, be kind and polite according to our 11 rules.

http://www.astrangefruit.org/index.php/en/act-now/606-eleven-rules-for-writing-letters-against-death-penalty-in-usa

Claudio Giusti

e-mail  giusticlaudio@alice.it

http://www.astrangefruit.org/index.php/it/

Have a good Christmas, stop executions in Japan.

Dear Friends

The Japanese Government has the habit to make executions without notice.

Twice an year three or more inmates are send to the gallows and their relatives are informed later. Very often this happen before New Year’s Eve holidays or in Summer. At the moment the Minister of Justice (an abolitionist) is asked to sign some warrants and permit some executions.

You can help in stopping this!

We are asking you to send more illustrated post cards you can to the Chief Cabinet Secretary and to the Prime Minister with a short abolitionist sentence. Write in your own language. Be polite and remember that we love Japan.  We cannot assure an happy ending, but this is one of the uncommon situation where a pressure from abroad can help.

About the death penalty in Japan

http://www.astrangefruit.org/index.php/en/japan

Chief Cabinet Secretary

Mr. Osamu Fujimura

Shugiin Dai-ni Giin kaikan

Room 1111

Nagata-cho 2-1-2, Chiyoda-ku,
Tokyo 100-8982    Japan

Prime Minister

Mr. Yoshihiko Noda

Shugiin Dai-ichi Giin kaikan

Room 821

Nagata-cho 2-2-1, Chiyoda-ku,
Tokyo  100-8981      Japan

As author of Gitanjali and its «profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse», being the first non-European to win the 1913 Nobel Prize in Literature, Tagore was perhaps the most important literary figure of Bengali literature and a mesmerising representative of the Indian culture whose influence and popularity internationally perhaps could only be compared to that of Gandhi whom Tagore named «Mahatma» out of his deep admiration for him. May 7, 2011 was celebrated 150 anniversary of the birth of Rabindranath Tagore.

August 7 this year will mark the 70th anniversary of the death of this great poet and philosopher. On February-March 2010 in Odessa Roerich House Museum was introduced Photo Exhibition by Yekaterina Kozhukhovskaya «Art Associations with Rabindranath Tagore’s Poetic Miniatures». One of Eastern art principles states: man is a part of nature, and a picture of nature is a reflection of man’s inner world. Contemplation of beauty wakens great sense of compassion and love. Rabindranath Tagore’s poetic miniatures deeply depict the states of nature and soul that last for just slightest seconds. Epigraph exhibition were the words of the outstanding Indian philosopher: «This world is a world of wild storms which tamed through music of beauty» (Rabindranath Tagore). The cognizing the essence of things via beauty and harmony of the Divine, which are reflected in nature – this theme has always been central to Tagore and was the inspiration for the author’s project by photo artist Yekaterina Kozhukhovskaya.

(Reuters) – Governor Andrew Cuomo made same-sex marriages legal in New York on Friday, a key victory for gay rights ahead of the  2012 presidential and congressional elections.

New York will become the  sixth and most populous U.S. state to allow gay marriage. State senators voted  33-29 on Friday evening to approve marriage equality legislation and Cuomo, a  Democrat who had introduced the measure, signed it into law.

“This vote  today will send a message across the country. This is the way to go, the time to  do it is now, and it is achievable; it’s no longer a dream or an aspiration. I  think you’re going to see a rapid evolution,” Cuomo, who is in his first year of  office, told a news conference.

“We reached a new level of social  justice,” he said.

Same-sex weddings can start taking place in New York  in 30 days, though religious institutions and nonprofit groups with religious
affiliations will not be compelled to officiate at such ceremonies. The  legislation also gives gay couples the right to divorce.

“I have to
define doing the right thing as treating all persons with equality and that  equality includes within the definition of marriage,” Republican Senator Stephen Saland said before the bill was passed. He was one of four Republicans to vote  for the legislation.

Cheers erupted in the Senate gallery in the state  capital Albany and among a crowd of several hundred people who gathered outside New York City’s Stonewall Inn, where a police raid in 1969 sparked the modern gay rights movement.

“It’s about time. I want to get married. I want the  same rights as anyone else,” Caroline Jaeger, 36, a student, who was outside the
Stonewall Inn.

But New York’s Catholic bishops said they were “deeply  disappointed and troubled” by the passage of the bill.

“We always treat  our homosexual brothers and sisters with respect, dignity and love. But we just as strongly affirm that marriage is the joining of one man and one woman,” the  state’s Catholic Conference said in a statement.

New York City Mayor
Michael Bloomberg, an advocate for gay marriage who lobbied state lawmakers in recent weeks, said the vote was an “historic triumph for equality and freedom.”

“Together, we have taken the next big step on our national journey toward a more perfect union,” he said in a statement.

ELECTION ISSUE

President Barack Obama, who attended a fund-raiser in New York on  Thursday for Gay Pride Week, has a nuanced stance on gay issues. Experts say he  mcould risk alienating large portions of the electorate if he came out strongly  in favor of such matters as gay marriage before the 2012 elections.

During the 2008 election, Obama picked up important support from Evangelicals, Catholics, Latinos and African-Americans, some of whom oppose gay  marriage, which has become a contentious social issue being fought  mistate-by-state.

In California a judge last year overturned a ban on gay  marriage, but no weddings can take place while the decision is being appealed.  It could set national policy if the case reaches the U.S. Supreme Court.

Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont and the  District of Columbia allow same-sex marriage, and Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois and  New Jersey approved civil unions. The first legal same-sex marriages in the  United States took place in Massachusetts in 2004.

But gay marriage is  banned in 39 states.

In New York a recent Siena poll found 58 percent of  New Yorkers support gay marriage, while nationally the U.S. public is nearly
evenly split, with 45 percent in favor and 46 percent opposed, according to a  Pew Research poll released last month.

New York City’s marketing and  tourism group NYC & Company said it was gearing up to turn the city into  “the gay weddings destination.” “The new legislation is good news for the City’s  $31 billion travel and tourism industry,” said NYC & Company Chief Executive  George Fertitta.

New York’s Democrat-dominated Assembly voted 80-63 in  favor of gay marriage last week and passed the amended legislation on Friday  82-47.

A key sticking point had been over an exemption that would allow  religious officials to refuse to perform services or lend space for same-sex  weddings. Most Republicans were concerned the legal protection was not strong  enough, so legislative leaders worked with Cuomo to amend his original bill.

“God, not Albany, settled the definition of marriage a long time ago,”  said Senator Ruben Diaz Sr., a Pentecostal minister and the only Democrat to  vote against the measure.

However, fears of a slew of litigation arising  from a possible religious exemption to New York’s proposed same-sex marriage law
are not borne out by experience with similar laws in other states, legal experts  say.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/25/us-gaymarriage-newyork-idUSTRE75N5ZA20110625

IWAKI-YUMOTO, Japan — Just after 6 a.m. in this still sleepy hot spring town, bleary-eyed workers emerged from their inns, ready to board buses to return to their daily battle to contain the crisis at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
Some men are local technicians who have worked at the plant for years; others are construction workers who have traveled here from across Japan to clear radioactive debris, fix leaking pipes and fill an ever-growing need for fresh labor at the site, devastated in the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
Despite the dangers at Fukushima, laborers from across Japan are traveling to the plant in search of work during the country’s harsh economic downturn. Some workers at Iwaki-Yumoto traveled here from as far away as Kyushu, over 600 miles away, transforming the little hot spring resort into a major hub for migrant labor.
The prolonged battle to stabilize the power plant has cast a harsh light on the labor practices of an industry that has long relied on informal contract labor for many of its more dangerous and taxing jobs. Of about 2,500 workers at the plant, all but 300 of them are hires of subcontractors and subsubcontractors who receive little job security, benefits or insurance for injuries or the effects of radiation.
Unwinding for the night, workers described the arduous work at the site, constricted by bulky protective suits and suffocating masks.
They constantly check radiation levels on their dosimeters, they said, and are dogged by fears of further accidents at the plant’s still volatile reactors.
Last month, a contract worker in his 60s collapsed after carrying heavy equipment in a waste disposal building at the site. Tokyo Electric, the plant’s operator, said that they did not detect unsafe radiation levels on his body; workers at Iwaki-Yumoto speculated that he might have suffered from heat stroke.
“Underneath your suit and mask, you’re drenched with sweat,” said one 20-year-old worker, still in a pale-blue uniform, washing socks and underwear at a tiny laundromat. He, like other workers, did not give his name or that of his company, which is affiliated with Hitachi, saying he did not want to get his bosses in trouble with Tokyo Electric.
His company puts him up seven to a room at a nearby inn, he said. At Fukushima Daiichi, he helps build scaffolding at the crippled No. 4 reactor. His shift is short, only about three hours long — common for nuclear workers — but the hourlong drive to and from a staging area, where he dons the protective suits, lengthens his working day.
“You wake up, you go to the plant, you come back, you eat, you bathe, you sleep. There’s no time for anything else,” he said. Still, he was glad to have work; there are few good jobs in his native Fukuoka, on the southernmost island of Kyushu, he said. Earlier this month, government figures showed that the Japanese economy had slipped back into recession. Joblessness is on the rise.
Though workers interviewed were reluctant to talk about pay, a search on the Web reveals jobs at Fukushima Daiichi paying as little as 200,000 yen a month for positions like “remote robot operator” and “general workman,” which would come to just under $30,000 a year.
By contrast, the average Tokyo Electric employee makes $94,000 a year, according to Nensyu Labo, an online personnel research company.
This setup has long allowed Tokyo Electric to transfer risk to subcontractors and their poorly paid, poorly trained employees, endangering their health and undermining safety at Japan’s 55 nuclear reactors, said Takeo Kinoshita, a labor expert at the Showa Women’s University.
“There is no work at a nuclear power plant that doesn’t involve radiation risks,” Mr. Kinoshita said. “Tokyo Electric hands off the risk to small subcontractors, who are less likely to be able to adequately ensure their workers’ health.”

Amid the continuing confusion at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, there has been minimal monitoring of radiation exposure. The Radiation Effects Association, a government-affiliated body that is supposed to keep track of radiation exposure levels among Japanese nuclear workers, says that it has not been able to fully track radiation exposure among plant workers past March 11.
Still, the workers keep coming. At Iwaki-Yumoto, a 35-year-old worker said he had traveled here from Hamaoka, in central Japan, where he worked at a nuclear plant recently ordered shut by Prime Minster Naoto Kan over tsunami concerns. He is a veteran in the industry and has already worked at four other nuclear power plants.
“Radiation is just part of the job,” he said. “A fireman doesn’t stay away from a burning house because he’s afraid of fire.”
But increasingly, subcontractors at Fukushima Daiichi must compete with other building jobs as reconstruction begins in areas affected by the tsunami. Recent job listings on the Internet list positions offering as much as 1.2 million yen, or $15,000, a month for work at the plant, though labor officials warn that some postings are fraudulent.
In the scramble to contain the crisis, Tokyo Electric employees have also been sent to the front lines in some cases. Last week, the company said two employees at the plant had been exposed to up to 580 millisieverts in the early days of the crisis, over twice the government’s limit. Higher levels of exposure can correspond to higher cancer risks.
Takeshi Tanigawa, a professor in public health at Ehime University who advises Tokyo Electric, recently described harsh conditions for company employees at the plant in the accident’s early days: 500 people sleeping side by side on tatami mats at a nearby gymnasium, with no showers and meager rations.
Goshi Hosono, an adviser to the prime minister, acknowledged that workers might not have been adequately protected. “In our early response, we did not have a system in place to manage radiation risks,” he said.
In Iwaki-Yumoto, the streets are desolate during the day and even quieter at night, with tourists driven away by radiation fears. A scattering of traditional taverns attract the town’s new nuclear worker population, but many say they prefer to bring beer and cartons of shochu, a cheap distilled liquor, back to their rooms.
Some workers pointed out the perks of their work: they soak in hot springs every night, and the inns sometimes serve sashimi dinners. They have constant work, and camaraderie.
Still, older workers also sigh that they are here because they do not expect to find other lines of work. Others are victims of the tsunami itself, with no homes to return to.
A 60-year-old worker said he was at Fukushima Daiichi’s No. 5 reactor, near the diesel engines, when the tsunami struck. He heard the engines come on; they would later be swamped by the tsunami, starting a chain of events that set off a fuel meltdown at three of the plant’s six reactors.
He fled, not from fear, but from concern about his family home in Ishinomaki, about 100 miles north of the plant. Driving on damaged roads, he finally got back at 10 p.m. His four brothers and sisters were safe. But his house had been washed away.
Now homeless, he boards at Iwaki-Yumoto and works at Tokyo Electric’s Hirono coal power plant, about 10 miles south of Fukushima Daiichi.
But he says he is willing to go back to the nuclear site if he finds a better paying job.
“At this age, it’s too late to do something else,” he said. “And there will be lots of work around here for a long time.”

We strongly believe that healthcare should be a basic human right. Therefore Emergency:
1. guarantees treatment to anyone in need of assistance, without any discrimination as to race, colour, sex, religion, social origin or political opinion;
2. provides high quality assistance, employing standardized therapeutic and work protocols already tested in emergency situations;
3. trains national staff thoroughly, with the intent of handing over all the health facilities to the local health authorities as soon as self-sustainability can be achieved.
Emergency builds:
1. hospitals specifically dedicated to war victims and surgical emergencies;
2. physical and social rehabilitation centres;
3. first aid posts for emergency treatment and referral of patients to our surgical centres;
4. healthcare centres for primary medical assistance;
5. paediatric clinics;
6. centres of medical excellence.
 All Emergency facilities are designed, built and run by specialized international personnel, who provide training for local staff

Quakers to boycott products from Israeli settlements

Quakers in Britain have agreed to boycott products from the Israeli settlements in the West Bank. The settlements are illegal under international law. Quakers consider that this boycott is a nonviolent move for peace for Israelis and Palestinians. The decision makes clear that Quakers are not boycotting Israel.

Half a million Israeli settlers live illegally in the West Bank (including East Jerusalem). The settlements and infrastructure on Palestinian land are protected by the Israeli government and military and prevent or restrict Palestinians access to their land, water supplies, education, health services and more. Extensive settlement infrastructure divides up Palestinian land, creating obstacles to peace.

Palestinian Quakers are calling for Quakers around the world to consider boycott, divestment and sanctions because of the worsening situation caused by Israel’s occupation. The decision was made on Saturday (2 April) by the representative decision-making body for Quakers in Britain, Meeting for Sufferings. The Meeting has not yet considered a Quaker view on divestment and sanctions.

The Meeting heard that most Jewish Israeli peace groups support boycotts of settlement products.

“People matter more than territory” says the minute from the Meeting. And, “We pray fervently for both Israelis and Palestinians, keeping them together in our hearts. We hope they will find an end to their fears and the beginning of their mutual co-existence based on a just peace. And so we look forward to the end of the occupation and the end of the international boycott.”

“In the face of the armed oppression of poor people and the increasing encroachment of the illegal settlements in the West Bank, we cannot do nothing,” the minute continued.

“We are clear then that it would be wrong to support the illegal settlements by purchasing their goods. We therefore ask Friends (Quakers) throughout Britain Yearly Meeting to boycott settlement goods, until such time as the occupation is ended.”

Quakers consider that this boycott builds on their other nonviolent moves for peace in the region. Since 2002 Quakers in Britain have trained human rights observers for the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI). The observers, called ecumenical accompaniers, work with Palestinians and Israelis to promote nonviolence by their protective presence, to monitor human rights abuses and to advocate for an end to the Israeli occupation.

The full text of the minute follows:
Boycott, divestment and sanctions (Israel/Palestine)
Further to minute S/11/02/4 of 5 February 201, we receive minutes on this matter from the following Area Meetings: Southern Marches (paper S/11/04/mc i a), Sussex East (i b), Surrey & Hampshire Border (i c), Swarthmoor (i f), North London (i g), Cambridgeshire (i h), East Cheshire (i i), Ipswich & Diss (i j), North West London (i k), Bristol (i l), Hampshire & Islands (i m), Devon (i n), Manchester & Warrington (i o) and North Cumbria (i p).

Our assistant clerk has summarised the 14 Area Meeting minutes received, and we have returned to our consideration of the issues raised in the papers received at our last meeting (paper S/11/02/A prepared by Marigold Bentley, Assistant General Secretary of Quaker Peace & Social Witness (QPSW), the Kairos Palestine Document A moment of truth (paper S/11/02/B), and the Quaker Council for European Affairs Discussion Paper entitled Responses to the call for boycott, divestment and sanctions (S/11/02/C)).

We have heard of the responses of Jewish Peace Groups within Israel. We hear these Israeli citizens risk being criminalised by their government if they actively support the Palestinian call for cultural and economic boycott. We were informed that most Jewish Israeli Peace Groups support the boycott of settlement goods, and only some support a boycott of Israel.

A just peace for Palestine means security for Israel too, and nonviolent protests by both Israelis and Palestinians for the end of the occupation are heartening to observe.

For nine years Quakers have been witnessing individually and through the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI) to the human rights abuses of the military occupation of the Palestinian Territories. Today we have considered whether we should add nonviolent action to our witnessing – not as punishment or revenge, but as an external pressure to achieve change.

We understand the history and the trauma of the past, but it is Israelis who are the stronger and they need to make the changes.

John Woolman’s words remind us of the powerful sense we have of being brothers and sisters with people of other faiths. There are three main faiths in this part of the world, and we want to proceed in ways which allow dialogue to continue. We consider we should now act publicly, and, well-informed, be able to explain our action to others – because people matter more than territory, and because we approach others with a desire for peace.

Difficult decisions taken by us today can be reversed. The request for boycott comes from those who will suffer most, but a decision for boycott will give hope to Palestinians and support to those in Israel who are working for peace.

In the face of the armed oppression of poor people and the increasing encroachment of the illegal settlements in the West Bank, we cannot do nothing.

Our hearts are full of compassion for Israelis and Palestinians, all of whom are suffering from the effects of the occupation.

We are clear that it would be wrong to support the illegal settlements by purchasing their goods. We therefore ask Friends (Quakers) throughout Britain Yearly Meeting to boycott settlement goods, until such time as the occupation is ended.

We are not at this time proposing to boycott goods from Israel itself, being unwilling to jeopardise continuing dialogue with Israelis and British Jews.

We pray fervently for both Israelis and Palestinians, keeping them together in our hearts. We hope they will find an end to their fears and the beginning of their mutual co-existence based on a just peace. And so we look forward to the end of the occupation and the end of the international boycott. We envisage our future relationship with both peoples as one of loving and generous co-operation.

Although we unite in this decision we recognise that Friends have different views, and we must treat one another tenderly.

ends

Notes to editor:
* For interviews contact Anne van Staveren on 020 7663 1048.
* Approximately 23,000 people attend Quaker Meetings for Worship in Britain, and there are more than 475 Meetings.
* Quakers are known formally as the Religious Society of Friends.
* Meeting for Sufferings has authority to speak on behalf of Quakers in Britain (formally known as Britain Yearly Meeting). It brings together representatives of the 70 Area Meetings across Britain, and the Trustees of Britain Yearly Meeting. About 180 Quakers were present on Saturday.
* The World Council of Churches set up a programme called the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI) in response to a call for international help from church leaders in Jerusalem. The aim of this programme is to end the Israeli occupation and bring a just peace based on international law. Since 2002, on behalf of British and Irish churches and church organisations, Quakers in Britain have trained more than one hundred human rights observers for the EAPPI. Read more on EAPPI at www.quaker.org.uk/eappi<http://www.quaker.org.uk/eappi>
* The minute refers to Quaker John Woolman. In 1762 he said: “There is a principle which is pure, placed in the human mind, which in different places and ages hath different names; it is, however, pure and proceeds from God. It is deep and inward, confined to no forms of religion nor excluded from any where the heart stands in perfect sincerity. In whomsoever this takes root and grows, of what nation soever, they become brethren. (Quaker Faith and Practice 26.41.)

Media Information
Anne van Staveren
0207 663 1048
07958 009703
annev@quaker.org.uk
www.quaker.org.uk

Quakers in Britain have written an open letter to the Prime Minister to raise their concerns over the escalating cycle of violence in Libya.

The text of the letter follows:
Open letter to the Prime Minister from Quakers in Britain on Libya

The Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Britain is dismayed that Britain is again directly involved in military activity, this time in Libya, while it continues with military action in Afghanistan. We grieve at the loss of life and the misery inflicted on all those affected by war.

We see war as intrinsically wrong. It is wrong because it treats people as being expendable. We see each individual as being unique and precious and carrying within them something of God.
We recognise that others do not share this view and that many well-meaning people were willing to see this particular military action begin in the hope that it would save civilian lives. We respect their motives. We have however seen, over and over again, the arguments used that ‘we must do something’ and that this time what is planned will be brief and clinical. But the truth is so often very different – violence tends to escalate, and it is much harder to end a war than to start it.
The bitterness and hatred caused can last for generations. All this we ignore at our peril.

Quakers applaud the efforts made by the United Nations to reach a solution to the satisfaction of all parties in the region of North Africa, and we are deeply disappointed that a nonviolent solution could not be reached in Libya.

This year, 2011, marks 350 years since Quakers first declared our conviction to Charles II that as a Religious Society “all bloody principles and practices we do utterly deny, with all outward wars and strife and fightings with outward weapons for any end or under any pretence…” Since that time Quakers in Britain and around the world have worked for peace and social justice, with the aim of making this world a better place for all. As Quakers in Britain we ask the Government to look critically at the role it plays in increasing instability in the world, particularly through the very substantial support it provides for the arms trade.

We uphold all those in positions of responsibility at this crucial time, praying that they will at least exercise all possible restraint.

The letter was signed by Gwen Schaffer, clerk of Quaker Peace and Social Witness Central Committee.

Innocent Timothy Evans hanged in UK

9 March 2011

Today is a big day.

Illinois is the 17th American abolitionist jurisdiction.

In the next two years four-five American states will join the abolitionist side.

I want to express gratitude to the many who fought with us.

Claudio Giusti

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/FactSheet.pdf

http://newsblogs.chicagotribune.com/clout_st/2011/03/quinn-signs-death-penalty-ban-commutes-15-death-row-sentences-to-life.html

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/local&id=8002832

http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20110309/news/703099952/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/09/AR2011030900319.html

Dott. Claudio Giusti

Via Don Minzoni 40, 47100 Forlì, Italia
Tel.  39/0543/401562     39/340/4872522
e-mail  giusticlaudio@alice.it

http://www.osservatoriosullalegalita.org/special/penam.htm

Member of the Scientific Committee of Osservatorio sulla Legalità e i Diritti, Claudio Giusti had the privilege and the honour to participate in the first congress of the Italian Section of Amnesty International: later he was one of the founders of the World Coalition Against The Death Penalty.