El Frente de Mexicanos en el Exterior and the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement AFL-CIO will hold a press conference on Monday, September 3, at 1 pm at William Land Park in Sacramento to announce national efforts to stop the repressive deportations and raids on immigrant workers.

At the 25th annual convention of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists held in San Jose Governor Schwarzenegger said that to get ahead, Spanish speaking immigrants should avoid Spanish-language newspapers and to “turn off the Spanish language television.”

In response to these remarks, the Lorenzo Patino LULAC Council will present Dr. Charles Puentes, retired educator and former instructor with bilingual education, who will present research findings from second language experts on the acquisition of a second language. Dr Puentes will present for 20 minutes and time will be allowed for questions and answers.

We will meet on July 2, 2007 at Vallejo’s Restaurant at 11th and O at 5:30. Dr. Puentes will present at 5:45. As always our meeting will end at 6:30 sharp.
Time: Monday, July 2, 2007 - 5:30pm PST

Ecuador Seeks Aid Not to Exploit Amazon Oil

By Haider Rizvi
Inter Press Service

Friday 18 May 2007

United Nations - A novel proposal by Ecuador is testing world leaders' commitment to fight global warming and preserve the biodiversity of the Earth.

Ecuadorian officials told an international meeting this week that their government would ban exploitation of huge oil reserves if it was compensated for its effort to save the natural habitat of the Amazon region.

The untapped oil reserves are located in the heart of the Amazon, considered by scientists to be one of the most bio-diverse rainforests in the world. If explored and developed, the fields are expected to deliver more than 900 million barrels of oil.

"If the world truly is interested in saving the planet," said Ecuador's representative Lourdes Tiban, "the government has decided to sell the oil, but keep it in the ground."

Tiban added in her statement that Ecuador would need financial assistance from the international community in exchange for the decision not to exploit the oil. The country will wait up to a year to determine if there has been an adequate response.

Students at embattled McClatchy High School
say they will cancel Cinco de Mayo event, hold Friday
protest after administrators fail to ‘value' annual assembly

SACRAMENTO – Latino students at embattled McClatchy High School – where
administrators are already facing questions after a gun incident – said
today the school has "not valued" the traditional Cinco de Mayo event and
as a result the celebration has been canceled.

Instead, student leaders said they will hold a protest at McClatchy High
School's main entrance Friday at 3:30 p.m. as a "Day of Recognition." They
are asking members of the community to join them.

"For generations, the 5 de Mayo assembly has been an event we have taken
great pride in organizing...to educate our school and community about our
culture. We have been informed that we do not have access to our school
auditorium as usual. This decision by the administration sent the message
our event was not valued," said the Cinco de Mayo Student Committee.

Mexico: Federal Army Troops Harrass the Sixth Commission Delegates
by Narco News (reposted)
Wednesday May 2nd, 2007 7:09 AM

They Aggressively Interrogated Civilians Who Accompanied the Zapatista Delegation
By the Sixth Commission
EZLN (Translated by El Kilombo)
May 1, 2007

Communiqué from the Indigenous Clandestine Revolutionary Committee—General Command of the Zapatista Army for National Liberation
Sixth Commission of the EZLN
Mexico
April 30th, 2007

To the People of Mexico: To the People of the World: To the Other Campaign:
The EZLN makes the following public denouncement:

First: Elements of the Federal Army harassed the delegates of the Sixth Commission of the EZLN that are carrying out the work of the Other Campaign in the Northeast region of our country.

Second: On April 29th at around 7:30p.m., the convoy of adherents of the Other Campaign that is accompanying Comandantas Miriam and Eucaria and Comandante Zebedeo were detained at a military checkpoint stationed on the highway between Montemorelos and Linares, Nuevo Leon.

Maricela Gonzalez / Management Services Officer
UCD Center for Healthy Aging
4800 2nd Ave., Ste. 2600, Sacramento, CA 95817
Ofc: 916.734.0757 / Fax: 916.734.4773/ mcgonzalez@ucdavis.edu

Dear Chicana/o Latino/a Students,

I just wanted to inform everyone on a "game" that the Davis College
Republicans have decided to play tomorrow, May 1st @ 12pm in the MU Quad.
The "game" is titled "Illegal Immigration Capture the Flag" and it's
purpose is to have a team dressed as INS and another dressed as "illegals."

How ironic that they have chosen to play this "game" during La Raza
Cultural Days and on May 1st, the day of the worker and of the Immigrant.
MEChA and many many other student organizations that feel this is a
horrible mockery of everything that immigrants have done for this country,
will be holding a peaceful counter- protest to show that what they think is
"funny" is totally unacceptable. On behalf of MEChA, I invite you to join
us in solidarity. Gracias.

Cinthya Munoz of CAUIL and other activists are sponsoring an immigrants rights forum on Saturday, April 28, 10 am, at the Luther Burbank High School Cafeteria.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, April 27, 2007
Contact: Esmeralda Zendejas, CAUIL (559) 975-5913
Attention: Daybook/WEEKEND News Desk

Community forum for immigrant rights
scheduled for Sacramento this Saturday;
Designed to combat ‘attacks' on immigrants

Former Guatemalan Military Dictator Seeking Immunity by Running for Office

Members of the U.S. House of Representatives called on the Guatemalan Attorney General to subpoena and arrest Ríos Montt and his military high command, accused of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. The charges were originally filed before Guatemalan courts in 2001, and arrest warrants were issued in Spain last year for similar crimes.

Saludos Estudiantes de UCD y Comunidad de Sacramento/Davis,

Have you been sitting around wondering what happened after May 1, 2006?
Have you heard talk about May 1, Part 2?
Have you read about the increase in RAIDS since last year? According to some news articles and statistics from ICE (something like 10-20% increase). What do you think happens when parents get picked up from their homes or places of employment? Where do their children go?

Thursday, April 19th, 2007

Dissent on worker sweeps in Valley rises

Seven rural ag towns may join Mendota in condemning federal immigration raids.
By Vanessa Colón / The Fresno Bee
03/30/07 04:40:09

Mendota's stand against federal immigration sweeps has sparked a movement among Fresno County's small farming towns.

City councils in seven Fresno County cities plan to take up the issue in weeks to come. Most of them are agricultural towns, where undocumented and legal farm laborers work, live and shop. City leaders worry the raids will upend their economies and separate or disrupt families.

Parlier Mayor Armando Lopez, whose council will consider a resolution in April opposing the raids, said farmers already complain about labor shortages. He worries that the raids will further deplete the labor pool and undermine the economy.

"Obviously, without the farm workers, the farmers will be shorthanded," Lopez said.

Dear CAAC Friends,
Central America is rarely in the news these days, yet no lack of life-altering events continue to impact the people there. Following up on our Guatemalan talk last month, this week CAAC is pleased to present a program on the current situation in El Salvador. We hope you can spread the word to anyone who might be interested and make it yourself - and, perhaps, bring a friend.
Yours, Darien


Post-Conflict Reconciliation in El Salvador event set for March 14

WCC MEChA presses college
Students vow strike if progress not made soon on hiring Latinos
By MONICA KRAUTH/Democrat Staff Writer Daily Democrat

For much of the fall semester at Woodland Community College, students from the campus club Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztl n have been reaching out to administrators because of anger over a lack of MexicanAmerican instructors on campus.

But students, unhappy with the lack of progress made at getting Latino instructors are vowing to go on strike March 30 unless their demands are met. They are also considering a legal challenge.

College counselor Jesse Ortiz said there has never been a MexicanAmerican instructor on staff, since the college first opened.

Cucapá Camp Regulations
The Indigenous Peoples in Defense of Life, Culture and Nature: Below and to the Left

By Accreditation Committee of Cucapá Camp
Translated by Zapagringo Blog
February 25, 2007

Encampment Regulations of the Chapey Seisjhiurra Coappá in Maat’cuoak
(Cucapá Fishermen Camp in El Zanjon)

2007 Fishing Season

First Article: This place, Maat’cuoak, is the land and water that we, the Chapey Coappá (Cucapá), have lived on and fished for thousands of years. This place is sacred to us.

We respect it because it is the place where our ancestors, same as us today, found food for our families. In this place, the Ipaa Gentil (Wild Wheat) is found, with which we have fed ourselves, and we have also encountered Jasreiis Cuoau Llu (Corvina, a saltwater fish), that also helps us to feed ourselves and to survive.

What a concept - a government making sure that human rights of protesters are observed!

Ombudsman's Office to Watch Over Human Rights at CAFTA Protest
Published by Tico Times, 2/22/07
http://www.ticotimes.net/daily.htm#story2
By Amanda Roberson | Tico Times Staff | aroberson@ticotimes.net

As opponents of the Central American Free-Trade Agreement with the United States (CAFTA) take to the streets in protest Feb. 26, observers from the Ombudsman's Office will pound the pavement alongside them to watch out human rights violations, announced Ombudswoman Lisbeth Quesada yesterday.

From their posts around the San José area, about 35 of these badge-wearing observers will be ready to accept formal complaints from citizens who feel they haven't been guaranteed their rights.

[I wanted to do a blog on this while this was occurring but didn't have the time: Update Below]

Privatized Immigrant Detention Facilities for Families Revealed to be Modern-Day Concentration Camps

Tuesday December 19, 2006

One of the more disturbing stories that surfaced after the Swift meat plant raids was how many children were left without a parent and/or farmed out to friends and families with no immediate word on how they will be reconnected with their mami and papi.

But if news filtering out of one of the newly designated immigrant detention centers for families is any indication, no undocumented parent is going to open their mouth and claim their children if the whole family is going to be subjected to what is becoming known as the first known concentration camp on American soil in the 21st Century.

[click the pic for video]

The T. Don Hutto Residential Center in Taylor, Texas (on the outskirts of Austin, Texas) is a private detention facility operated by Corrections Corporation of America. It and a smaller center in Pennsylvania are the only two facilities in the country that are authorized to hold non-Mexican immigrant families and children on noncriminal charges.

What does this mean?

It means that at the Taylor facility of the 400 people "held" there, 200 are children. And all are families that can be held there for whatever length of time without due process conducted in a timely manner.

Press Advisory: For Immediate Release, January 24

Contact for Davis Event: Will or Jane Lotter, (530) 756-6795
Contact for Sacramento event: Joanne Castronovo, (916) 480-2105,
email: castronovoj@jhssac.org

Let's compare and contrast

This is where Arnold lives

This is where some of the constituents he's speaking of, live

Arnold Schwarzenegger to TERMINATE aid to Poor Kids

From the Mercury News

A beaming Arnold Schwarzenegger began his final four years as governor Friday with a grand inauguration befitting what he promises will be an ambitious second-term agenda. But ambitious means expensive, and this week the governor will begin to reveal how he plans to pay for a massive expansion of health care for millions of Californians, as well as billions of dollars for new prisons and other infrastructure.

Sunday, the governor offered a glimpse of how he plans to pay for some of it: proposing an end to state welfare payments to poor families with children after five years. Aides said the plan would promote personal responsibility and save nearly $500 million.

For some cool photos of la otra campana en tijuana, check out www.indybay.org/newsitems/2006/12/21/18339281.php

For Immediate Release: December 21, 2006
Contact: Mario Galvan, Zapatista Solidarity Coalition, Sacramento, (916) 443-3424
Zapatista Supporters to Hold Protest in Solidarity with Oaxaca on December 22
by Dan Bacher

The Zapatista Solidarity Coalition (ZSC) will hold a demonstration against the repression in Oaxaca, Mexico this Friday, Dec. 22 in front of the Mexican Consulate in Sacramento, CA. from 3 pm to 6 pm at 1010 8th Street (close to J St.). This action occurs in conjunction with a global day of solidarity with the people of Oaxaca called for by the Zapatista movement in Chiapas.

Here is the announcement about Friday's demonstration in solidarity with Oaxaca from the Zapatista Solidarity Coalition, followed by reports on La Otra Campana and the EZLN communique announcing the Global Mobilization for Oaxaca on December 22.
Please forward!
Dan

Hi Everyone,

There will be a demonstration against the repression in Oaxaca this Friday, Dec. 22 at the Mexican Consulate in Sacramento, CA. from 3 pm to 6 pm at 1010 8th Street (close to J St.)

Afterwards, there will be hot drinks, music, a dvd about Oaxaca, and some friendly fundraising to send Mario Galvan to the Zapatista meeting in Oventic, Chiapas at the end of this month.