Pride is made very difficult in the Baltic by far-right groups, who turn out to throw insults and debris at the defiant Pride marchers, and have to be held back by police cordons. So, the float will celebrate “Baltic Pride in Birmingham” – it will reflect typical scenes from the Eastern European event, with Baltic flags and slogans overcoming the homophobic groups who oppose it.

The Birmingham Pride organisers will meet with the Mozaika delegates at the Pride Patrons’ Reception at the Malmaison ‘Pink Champagne Marquee’ on Saturday at 13.30, and have offered the them a chance to speak about their experiences on Sunday afternoon, at 14.20 on the Community Stage. AmnestyBrum are working with the organisers of Birmingham Pride and are supporting a campaign to twin Birmingham Pride and Baltic Pride.

Kaspars Zalatis, from Mozaika said: ‘We are delighted to be part of the AmnestyBrum float and are thankful to both them and the organisers of Birmingham Pride 2011 for their support. Our wish is that Baltic Pride can be the celebration of the LGBT community and that we can share the same rights that they have in the UK. To this end we are working in partnership with AmnestyBrum and Birmingham Pride to see if we can develop a twinning arrangement between the two events.’

Pete Doubtfire, from AmnestyBrum said: ‘What Mozaika and all those who organise Baltic Pride have to go through to put on a parade to defend the human rights of the LGBT community is truly inspirational. By taking part in the Birmingham Pride parade we will show our solidarity with them and other LGBT people around the world who are denied their full human rights. We are delighted that that those organising Birmingham Pride 2011 have been supportive of our attempts to forge links with Baltic Pride to show international solidarity with those standing up for LGBT rights there. We hope local people will join us in sending a message of solidarity to the organisers of Baltic Pride by visiting us at our stall in the Community Tent over the weekend.’

The next Baltic Pride will be taking place in Riga in 2012, and members of AmnestyBrum are planning to head out to Latvia to join in the march. We will be showing solidarity, and declaring “Mīlestība arī ir cilvēktiesība!” (“Love is a human right!” in Lativian), defending the right to be proud, which we take for granted here in the UK, and yet is under threat in the Baltic. If other local people wish to join us at Baltic Pride 2012 or find out more about the local group, they should contact us at amnestybrum@gmail.com or visit the AmnestyBrum website at www.amnestybrum.wordpress.com.

For photo opportunities and the chance to speak to AmnestyBrum members or Mozaika please contact Pete Doubtfire at amnestybrum@gmail.com

For full details see:
http://malvern.amnesty.org.uk/events_details.asp?CategoryID=2718&EventID=2460

www.bournville.amnesty.org.uk

A Concert For Human Rights

Given By

Cantemus Chamber Choir

Saturday 9^th October at 7:30pm

Bournville Friends Meeting House

Linden Road, Bournville

By kind permission of Bournville Quakers

Refreshments, cards to sign for prisoners of conscience and a cake sale
 

£5 (Accompanied children free)

To Purchase tickets please call

Martin Bate on 0121 433 3592 or

John Bodycote on 0121 458 2420

Directed by Polly Nash and Andy Worthington, Outside the Law tells the story of Guantánamo (and including sections on extraordinary rendition and secret prisons) with a particular focus on how the Bush administration turned its back on domestic and international laws, how prisoners were rounded up in Afghanistan and Pakistan without adequate screening (and often for bounty payments), and why some of these men may have been in Afghanistan or Pakistan for reasons unconnected with militancy or terrorism (as missionaries or humanitarian aid workers, for example).

The film is based around interviews with former prisoners (Moazzam Begg and, in his first major interview, Omar Deghayes, who was released in December 2007), lawyers for the prisoners (Clive Stafford Smith in the UK and Tom Wilner in the US), and journalist and author Andy Worthington, and also includes appearances from Guantánamo’s former Muslim chaplain James Yee, Shakeel Begg, a London-based Imam, and the British human rights lawyer Gareth Peirce.

Focusing on the stories of three particular prisoners – Shaker Aamer (who is still held), Binyam Mohamed (who was released in February 2009) and Omar Deghayes – Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo provides a powerful rebuke to those who believe that Guantánamo holds ‘the worst of the worst’ and that the Bush administration was justified in responding to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 by holding men neither as prisoners of war, protected by the Geneva Conventions, nor as criminal suspects with habeas corpus rights, but as ‘illegal enemy combatants’ with no rights whatsoever.

The documentary was launched at the Cochrane Theatre, London and has since been screened at the Prince Charles Cinema, London and in New York, Virginia, Washington DC and California.
For excerpts and extras see:

www.spectacle.co.uk/projects_page.php?id=140

www.andyworthington.co.uk/outside-the-law-stories-from-guantanamo/

There are also clips from the Q&A session at the Cochrane Theatre here: www.spectacle.co.uk/projects_page.php?id=345

Tickets are £9.50 (concessions £8.50), on sale from 1 August at Malvern Theatres
(01684 892277; malvern-theatres.co.uk) or Amnesty Bookshop, 3 Edith Walk, Malvern (01684 563507).

Buying tickets from the Bookshop will save you the £2.50 (per transaction) theatre booking fee.
Students can buy tickets for £5 from the Bookshop only. (UPDATE: Since the end of July the Theatres have altered their booking fee from £2.50 flat fee to 6% (or 3% online) of the total transaction, which is in almost every case a reduction.)

For group bookings, please contact Trevor Trueman, oromiasg@waitrose.com, 01684 573722.

Following on from our successful presence at the Birmingham Pride parade I joined the Amnesty contingent at the Pride London parade on Saturday. Well if you thought the Birmingham Pride was fantastic then this was something else altogether. The number of floats, groups, placards, banners and people taking part was amazing. The Amnesty presence in London wasn’t as creative as the local parade so no fabulous outfits. However, there was around 25-30 committed activists plus unconnected people who joined us, crowds asking for our stickers, placards waving, leaflets being handed out and the fantastic float. The float had a huge inflated rainbow in yellow, green and pink (see above), placards all over, flags on the rear and a stereo playing around ten songs with love in the title. The people taking part had great enthusiasm and energy. They came from London, Brighton and Bournmouth and no doubt elsewhere too.

One interesting difference to the Birmingham Pride event is that because it was an LGBT network organised group those taking part were mainly from the LGBT community but not exclusively. For me the low point was a dignified counter-demo organised by a group of Christians. They held placards suggesting the marchers were lets say misguided but the fact they are able to have their freedom of speech is to be applauded and they were outnumbered by the gay Christians in the parade. In some ways this all reinforced that human rights are for all of us whatever our religion or sexual orientation.

I would like to thank Kim Manning-Cooper and the activists from the LGBT Network who organised the Amnesty presence in the parade for their hard work planning what was a fantastic and enjoyable time at Pride London. To find out more about Amnesty International UK’s work on LGBT rights see www.amnesty.org.uk/lgbt

For the report on our presence at Birmingham Pride see the Central Birmingham AI blog at http://amnestybrum.wordpress.com/2010/05/31/proud-about-pride-2010/