Friends of Brad Will is with a widespread coalition of labor and human rights advocates urging House Speaker Pelosi and Eliot Engels, the Chair of the Western Hemispheric affairs subcommittee to oppose U.S. support for Mexican military and police forces. Mr. Will, the 36 year old reporter, was murdered in Oaxaca, Mexico on October 27th, 2006. Witnesses and photographic evidence implicate members of the Mexican government, including a police chief in his death that day.

President Bush announced a $1.5 billion dollar “security cooperation initiative” proposal for Mexico that the President is trying to bury into the Iraq supplemental spending package submitted to Congress. The initiative allows sharing of U.S. military intelligence information with Mexican military counterparts and provides weaponry and training with the notoriously corrupt and brutal Mexican military and police.

Brad Will’s family and friends denounced plans to fund a “Plan Mexico” that would be more costly than the controversial “Plan Colombia”. They pointed to the lack of any credible investigation into the murder of the U.S. journalist, who was in Mexico covering the protests of a popular movement of teachers and their supporters facing paramilitary violence deployed by the Mexican government and the governor of Oaxaca, Ulises Ruiz Ortiz.

“We are confident that Congress will not just rubber stamp this ill-advised military aid package in Bush’s waning days that would lead to further human rights abuses for decades to come.” stated Robert Jereski, a Congressional liaison for Friends of Brad Will.

SECRET DOCUMENTS AT:
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PARTIAL HELICOPTER OUTLAYS PROPOSED:
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http://nyc.indymedia.org/or/2008/03/95692.html
http://friendsofbradwill.org