29.11.14
Today (November 29), We Stand With Shaker, the new campaign to secure the release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, got a big boost when campaign coordinator Joanne MacInnes and I were invited onto George Galloway’s Sputnik show on RT to discuss the campaign with George — and his co-host Gayatri. Please also follow us on Facebook and Twitter, and watch the campaign video here.
We were on the first half of the show, which was about 13 minutes in total, and as well as giving us the opportunity to promote the campaign and to tell Shaker’s story to a global audience, the interview also featured clips of music legend Roger Waters (ex-Pink Floyd) and human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell speaking at the launch on Monday.
I do hope you have time to watch the show, which is posted below via YouTube:
This is how George described the program on the RT website:
Shaker Aamer is the last British hostage held by our “closest ally” in the cells of Guantánamo, even though the British government has demanded his release and consecutive US governments have conceded that he has no case to answer. President Barack Obama ran for office with a pledge to shut down Guantánamo Bay, the United States’ own Gulag in an occupied corner of Cuba, but six years on it is still there and being expanded at great public expense. And, 12 years and nine months later, Shaker Aamer is still incarcerated. This week, Joanne Maclnnes and Andy Worthington join Sputnik to tell us about the fight for Shaker Aamer to come home.
After our interview, in the rest of the broadcast, George discussed the scandal engulfing Save the Children after Tony Blair was given an award honouring his “global legacy.” As he noted, “The award may well ruin the once admired Save the Children Fund; their staff around the world are in open revolt: a hundred thousand people, and rising, have signed the petition demanding the award be rescinded.”
Also, on Sputnik’s Facebook page, there’s rough footage of the launch of We Stand With Shaker, featuring the end of my speech introducing the campaign, plus — in their entirety — the great speeches made by Clive Stafford Smith of Reprieve, Roger Waters and Caroline Lucas MP, which I’m posting below:
Please keep sharing information about the campaign, on Facebook and Twitter (where we continue to post photos of high-profile supporters standing with the giant inflatable figure of Shaker that is at the heart of our campaign) and please also share it on whatever other platforms you use, and let’s make Shaker’s release a reality. As Joanne MacInnes said on the Sputnik show, when talking about what David Cameron should be doing for Shaker, “Get on the phone and bring him home.”
Details of how to contact the PM, and other UK officials, as well as Barack Obama and other senior US officials, are on the website here. Please also send photos of yourself holding up placards that read, “I Stand With Shaker,” to the campaign email, to be published on the website.
Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer and film-maker. He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).
To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.
Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.
Investigative journalist, author, campaigner, commentator and public speaker. Recognized as an authority on Guantánamo and the “war on terror.” Co-founder, Close Guantánamo and We Stand With Shaker. Also, photo-journalist (The State of London), and singer and songwriter (The Four Fathers).
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7 Responses
Andy Worthington says...
On Facebook, Waris Ali wrote:
Well done Andy and Jo, you managed to get a lot covered on Galloway’s SPUTNIK programme > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSP89DUX5K8
Beyond Natalie Bennett (Green Party leader, standing in Holborn and St Pancras) and Will Martindale (Labour’s Parliamentary Candidate for Battersea), do we have any other parliamentary candidates expressing support for Shaker?
...on November 30th, 2014 at 12:26 am
Andy Worthington says...
Good question, Waris. It would be good to do a study of marginal seats and candidates. Is there anyone out there who’s interested? Sadly, I think that the UKIP-isation of much of the political milieu right now makes a lot of the electoral map something of a waste of time, but it would be good to find areas where, for example, other parties might be in with a chance.
...on November 30th, 2014 at 12:26 am
Andy Worthington says...
Carol Anne Grayson wrote:
Great… it keeps growing and growing 🙂
...on November 30th, 2014 at 12:27 am
Andy Worthington says...
Thanks, Carol. Yes, we’re getting there!
...on November 30th, 2014 at 12:27 am
Andy Worthington says...
Sarah Kay wrote:
I initially thought a couple of MPs would sign on to the campaign; photographing them next to Shaker’s likeness and seeing post after post after post of a MP is incredible. Thank you, Andy . Thank you so much.
...on November 30th, 2014 at 12:28 am
Andy Worthington says...
Thanks for the wonderful, supportive comments, Sarah. I can’t recall now when we took the first photos – probably early October. And Joanne in particular has done a huge amount of work chasing our high-profile supporters. I’m delighted you find the effect so powerful of making them available on a daily basis, as we have been doing since the launch. And I’m delighted too that there’s sustained interest in the photos, with thousands of people seeing each one.
...on November 30th, 2014 at 12:28 am
Andy Worthington says...
Here are the high-profile supporters whose photos have so far been published:
Clive Stafford Smith
George Galloway MP
Roger Waters
Caroline Lucas MP
Shaykh Sulaiman Ghani
Benjamin Zephaniah
John McDonnell MP
Jeremy Hardy
Diane Abbott MP
Nick Davies
Please note that more photos are forthcoming, and that you can find them all here (as well as on our Facebook and Twitter pages): http://standwithshakeraamer.tumblr.com/tagged/inflatables
...on November 30th, 2014 at 12:33 am