December 3rd, 2005 was the first International Day of Solidarity with Political Prisoners. There were a number of events in the Bay Area and internationally during the week before and including that date. Filipino political prisoner Donato Continente suggested initiating an International Day of Solidarity with Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War as a way to challenge the globalization of repression. People in countries around the world including Palestine, the Philippines, Haiti, Brazil, Italy, Switzerland, England, India, and the U.S. marked December 3rd with rallies, marches, and other forms of resistance.

There are tens of thousands of political prisoners held in prisons and jails around the world. The governments that incarcerate and criminalize them hope that the world outside will never know their names or learn why they really are in prison. The United States has some of the longest-held political prisoners in the world – women and men who were part of the American Indian Movement (AIM), the Black Panther Party, MOVE, the Puerto Rican Independence movement and the white anti-imperialist movement, who were fighting for self-determination and social justice in the sixties and seventies. Many were targets of the FBI’s COINTELPRO program which used assassination, disinformation, and frame-ups to crush people’s liberation movements and social dissent. CAPS points out that the same system that has kept these people in prison for over three decades criminalizes and incarcerates over 2 million people in the United States today.

The “Political Convictions: Liberating Political Prisoners” film festival took place on Monday, November 28th and Tuesday, November 29th at the New College of California Cultural Center in San Francisco. The film festival was also held on Wednesday, November 30th and Thursday, December 1st at Laney Community College in Oakland. Films shown on the different evenings included "Behind the Walls," excerpts from "All Power to the People," "Women in Struggle," and more.

There was a Day of Action on Friday, December 2nd at the Oakland Federal Building from 12pm to 2 pm. People hung banners over the 101 Freeway in San Francisco on Friday morning to remind commuters about the hundreds of political prisoners held in Guantanamo Bay for four years without charges. Photos A Day of Solidarity took place on Saturday, December 3rd at the First Unitarian Church in Oakland. This latter event included Kathleen Cleaver (former Black Panther) and Alicia Rodriguez (former Puerto Rican Political Prisoner.) Also on December 3rd, a video screening was held in Sacramento, at 5pm at SOL Collective - Arts & Cultural Center.

The week was sponsored by California Anarchist Prisoner Solidarity, the National Coalition to Free the Cuban Five, Club Knowledge - Laney College, and New College’s Activism and Social Change Program.

Read more about political prisoners and the International Day of Solidarity | California Anarchist Prisoner Solidarity | Bay Area Jericho Movement Statement