[Mitai-announce] 11/13/03 Meeting Minutes

[Emily C Havens]

Hello Everyone,

Tonight's Meeting Minutes:

Members present: Mindy Chao, Shankar Mukherji, David Strozzi, Matt Brooks, 
Shefali Oza, Tarun Agarwal, Ali Meli, and myself.

Main topic of discussion was the upcoming Death Penalty event.  Shefali and
Shankar filled us in on the details:
 -Was planned for 11/20, but is being postponed until sometime over IAP.
 -Having difficulty getting speakers, but discussed possibility of asking a
  family member of a murder victim who is against the death penalty, a 
  prosecutor against the death penalty, someone from the Somerville Chapter,
  a member of the MA Anti-Death Penalty Coalition, etc.
 -Want to organize a petition and lobbying against the death penalty in 
  conjunction with the panel discussion.
 -January will be a good time because the Report by the Romney Commission is
  expected to come out around then.
 *If you would like to hear more details about the event or would like to take
  an active role in organizing it, please contact the exec list 
  (mitai-exec at mit.edu).

***Wrote "Urgent Action" (there was no official Urgent Action this week) 
letters.

If you would like to advocate on behalf of displaced Chechens, visit:
http://web.amnesty.org/pages/rus-021003-action-eng

To send a letter to President Kabila of the DRC to protest the use of child
soldiers, visit: http://web.amnesty.org/pages/cod-061003-action-eng
(animated video can be found here :-)

To advocate against the serious human rights violations occuring in Myanmar,
visit: http://web.amnesty.org/pages/mmr-040603-action-eng

***If you would like to be more informed in general regarding current Amnesty
International concerns, please visit www.amnestyusa.org or www.amnesty.org
They are excellent sources.

(A not-so-up-to-date source is our own website: http://web.mit.edu/amnesty/
Hopefully this will be updated soon.)

Next meeting is TBA (due to Thanksgiving).

That is all.  Have a wonderful weekend!

Emily