CHICAGO, IL — On Tuesday Aug. 21, 2012 the National Alliance of Latin American & Caribbean Communities (NALACC) and their allies aboard the Caravan for Peace with Justice and Dignity will come together for an impromptu rally in front of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) division in El Paso, Texas to protest U.S. drug policy.
Above and beyond the over $1 trillion in U.S. taxpayers’ money wasted on a largely failed U.S. drug policy during the last 40 years, this policy has inflicted irreparable harm to African American communities, and increasingly, on individuals of Latin American origin and their families. The second reason behind the increasing pattern of incarceration of people of Latin American origin in the United States is drug enforcement policy.
“From the perspective of U.S.-based Latin American immigrant communities, U.S. drug policy over the past four decades, as well as U.S. immigration policy over the same period of time, must be radically changed in such a way in which human life is truly valued and the best interest of communities in the United States and abroad are truly placed at the center of policy making,” said Oscar Chacon, Executive Director of NALACC.
WHO: NALACC, along with other 100 U.S. civil society organizations, is joining forces with Mexico’s Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity (MPJD), co-led by Mexican poet and activist Javier Sicilia, on the Caravan as a sign of solidarity with the Mexican people as well as a way to share its “Somos/We Are” initiative, which mirrors the same goal: to humanize the debate of policies that directly affect the immigrant communities in the United States.
WHAT: Peaceful Protest at DEA El Paso Division Office
WHEN: Tuesday Aug. 21, 2012 at 12 PM Central Time
WHERE: 660 Mesa Hills Drive, El Paso, Texas
WHY: The war on drugs has left more than 60,000 dead in Mexico in the last five years, and resulted in over 50,000 Americans behind bars for drug offenses. Blacks and Latinos are vastly overrepresented among those arrested and incarcerated for drug offenses in the United States. The Caravan opens the possibility to initiate a transnational debate among the stakeholders searching for a new model of “human security”, whose main criterion should be the well-being of the people, including the decriminalization of migration.
“Organized Latin American immigrant communities in the United States look forward to working closely with the U.S. government and governments abroad, in exploring a new generation of public policies in areas such as narcotics, immigration, and human security; truly based on human rights respect, common sense and rational dedication and use of public resources,” stated Chacon.
El Paso is the eighth stop of this broad binational coalition traveling 6,000 miles across the United States raising awareness of the human costs of the drug war and the social havoc wreaked by violence in Mexico and the United States. The Caravan will culminate on Sept. 12, 2012 in International Day of Action in Washington, D.C.
About NALACC
The National Alliance of Latin American and Caribbean Communities (NALACC) is a network of community-based, Latino and Caribbean immigrant-led organizations, that seeks to raise the quality of life for immigrant communities in the United States, as well as communities in migrant-sending countries in Latin America. Facebook:facebook.com/NALACC2004 • Twitter: @NALACC_ORG • Web page:www.nalacc.org
