Charles Brown
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We urge you as an individual, and in your work with your Caucus and with other Congressmembers, to take several actions for the following reasons:
1. Stop the bombing. Bombing makes the situation worse. Already the Milosevic government has used the bombing to justify an intensified campaign against the Albanian population, thereby increasing the refugee problem.
2. In fact, continued bombings has encouraged Russian nationalists and intensified anti-western feeling within Russia. The potential for increased hostilities between Russia and the US including nuclear hostilities has escalated. Military spending will most likely be increased by both Russia and China, as they both feel threatened by NATO.
3. There are choices that would help in opening a corridor for peace, which means returning to the negotiating table; bombing makes the return more difficult for all parties.
4. As the President is appealing to the Geneva Convention and the concept of prisoners-of-war, we urge you to appeal to the commitments the U.S. made in the UN Charter;
5. Some approaches that are called for in the United Nations Charter are negotiations by regional organizations such as the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, (OSCE). Russia must be included in all negotiations for them to be meaningful;
6. It is the prerogative of Congress to declare war;
7. Ultimately the bombing takes the lives of more human beings, including American lives.
Respectfully yours, Ann Fagan Ginger, Exec. Dir., Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute * Carolyn Scarn, Ecumenical Peace Institute * Sandra Schwartz, American Friends Service Committee, Pacific Mountain Region * Peter Ferenbach, Exec. Dir., California Peace Action * East Bay Peace Action Hal Carlstad, Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists * Sister Stella Goodpastor, OP, Justice Promoter, North, Dominican Sisters of Mission San Jose Anuradha Mittal, Food First/Institute for Food and Development Policy * Michael Slaughter, VaiVecchio Press Sister Pamela Clare, CSF, Episcopal Peace Fellowship Riva Enteen, National Lawyers Guild/San Francisco Bay Area James Lafferty, National Lawyers Guild, Los Angeles Bill Balderston, Labor Party, East Bay Candace Kilchemon, Berkeley Gray Panthers Bea Eisman, US-Vietnam Friendship Association Penny Rosenwasser, Middle East Children's Alliance * for identification