Show your support for Bradley Manning
Activists are planning events around the world on March 19-20 to show their support for Bradley Manning, the accused WikiLeaks whistleblower who is being held in appalling conditions by the U.S. government. The issued the following call to support the day of action.
ON MARCH 19-20, activist organizations and individuals will take to the streets to protest the U.S. government's treatment of accused WikiLeaks whistleblower Army Pfc. Bradley Manning.
Manning, 23, has been held in isolation for nearly 300 days, charged with releasing classified documents, including a video that shows American troops shooting and killing 11 people, including two Reuters employees, in 2007.
Organizers are calling on supporters around the world to take public action to protest Manning's inhumane treatment at the Quantico brig, which P.J. Crowley, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's former assistant for public affairs, declaimed last week as "ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid."
The primary rally will take place outside the brig in Quantico where Manning is being held. In addition to the Quantico rally, the Bradley Manning Support Network is pleased to announce events in cities around the world, including Minneapolis, London, Montreal, The Hague, Phoenix, San Diego and Vienna.
"On March 2nd, Manning was stripped of his clothing and forced to spend the night naked, then stand for inspection the next morning without his clothes. This happened again the following night, and we don't know how long this will keep going," said Jeff Paterson, steering committee member of the Bradley Manning Support Network and project director of Courage to Resist. "This pre-trial punishment is inhumane and un-American."
Despite the recommendations of three forensic military psychiatrists, the MCB Quantico Commander refuses to lift Pfc. Manning's Prevention of Injury (POI) status and change his confinement classification from MAX to Medium Custody In (MDI).
Manning's imprisonment has resulted in an international outcry, and his conditions are the subject of an investigation by the UN special rapporteur on torture and a recent campaign by Amnesty International. Famed Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg, who will be speaking at a rally in Quantico on the 20th, has called Mr. Manning "a new hero of mine."
