FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 9/23/01

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U.S. ACTIVISTS UNFURL PRO-PEACE BANNER FROM CRANE

Denver, CO- Five activists accessed a crane and unfurled a banner that read "Wage Peace Now" under images of Ghandi, Martin Luther King Jr., The Dalai Lama and Jesus Christ yesterday. This is the first high-profile direct action of the budding pro-peace movement in the United States.

Amy Johnson, 27, one of the activists on the crane said "I am willing to be arrested for this non-violent action because I believe that we are a wounded nation, but we are still a people who believe strongly in fairness and compassion. Not everyone in America stands behind the use of military force in Afghanistan. There are many possible avenues to pease and global security. We must act now to voice those possibilities."
In the wake of President Bush's call to Americans to steel themselves for "Operation Infinite Justice", this action represents a courageous voice for peace. Jeff Friesen, 28, stated "I, and many other Americans, will never unify behind a military campaign that holds American life above the lives of those living outside our borders. We will never defeat global terrorism by unifying our own citizens. Only through a true global consensus, and through working for global justice, can we achieve global security."
Other activists arrested were Jaime Bochnight, Yuri Koslen, Harrison Fox and Ginger Cassidy.

The banner drop was organized by the members of an activist collective calling itself La Mitzvah. La Mitzvah, which is Spanish and Hebrew for "The Good Deed", is dedicated to confronting social, environmental and economic injustice with non-violent direct action, art, and humor.

More information, additional photos and video footage will be available soon at: http://www.wagepeacenow.org