Pastors for Peace Caravan Stops in Sacramento July 9

Pastors for Peace Caravan to Cuba Arrives in Sacramento July 9

by Faye Kennedy and Dan Bacher

The Pastors for Peace 16th Annual Friendship Caravan to Cuba arrives in Sacramento on Saturday, July 9, 2005, starting at 6:00 pm with a potluck dinner. The event will take place at the Freedom Bound Center, 4104 44th Street, Sacramento (44th Street & 16th Ave in Oak Park).

Please bring a dish to share and help us welcome the caravan on its Sacramento stop. The program will feature poetry, music and speakers. Admission is free, but we will collect donations for the caravan. All are welcome!

The Freedom Bound Center is collecting medical supplies and equipment for the caravan. To support this effort or for more information, please call Carl Pinkston at (916) 736-9843; E-mail: cpinkston@freedomboundcenter.org. The donation site will also be at the Freedom Bound Center, 4104 44th Street.

The Freedom Bound Center, Central America Action Committee and the Birthing Project are coordinating the potluck dinner and co-sponsoring the event. For more info, please call Faye Kennedy at (916) 484-5025, fayek@springmail.com.

The US embargo of Cuba causes shortages of food, medicine and other important supplies for eleven million people. The embargo is an immoral policy that uses hunger and disease as political weapons.

"With Bush talking about ensuring that Cuba is 'liberated' during his second term it's important that we keep up the counter pressure, and it is especially important that we do so this year so that the momentum is flowing our way rather than his," according to Pastors for Peace.

We know that there is a majority in Congress and the country to at least partly lift the blockade and travel ban and that the policy of the Bush administration and its Miami allies to achieve regime change is increasingly isolated in the US and the rest of the world. The European Union this year voted to resume full diplomatic relations with Cuba and even in Miami there is now opposition to Bush following his crackdown last year on the rights of Cuban-Americans to travel to Cuba.

The caravan will be heading south along 13 routes in the US and Canada. The precise dates are below but basically it's about two weeks later than last year. Most routes won't start till July 5th to avoid the July 4th long weekend, though at least two, from British Columbia and Quebec/Maine, will need to be on the road that weekend.

The stay in Cuba will coincide with the July 26th celebrations commemorating the attack on the Moncada Barracks in Santiago in 1953 that marked the beginning of the new struggle to overthrow the dictator Batista. Once again, the IFCO/Pastors For Peace is mounting a joint travel challenge with the Venceremos Brigade. The caravanistas will be in Cuba at the same time as them and return on the same day - August 1st.

The Caravan schedule is as follows:
* July 5-16: Caravan routes with educational presentations and aid collections throughout the US and Canada
* July 17-22: Participant orientation in Texas. Border crossing into Mexico. Travel to Tampico, Mexico and load material aid onto cargo ship
* July 23-30: Fly to Havana for Caravan educational program in Cuba.
* July 31: Return to Tampico, Mexico and travel to Mexico/US border
* August 1: Reverse challenge; cross the Mexican border into the US, delivering aid from the Cuban people to the people of the US

For more info about joining the caravan, please contact IFCO/Pastors for Peace at (212) 926-5757 or carvana@igc.org or visit: http://www.ifconews.org.