CODEPINK Protests Killer Drones in Aftermath of Drone Papers Leak

CODEPINK Press Release

October 20, 2015

Contact: Medea Benjamin, CODEPINK co-founder, Medea@codepink.org

Alli McCracken, CODEPINK National Coordinator, Alli@codepink.org

CODEPINK Protests Killer Drones in Aftermath of Drone Papers Leak; Supports Whistleblower Who Provided Classified Information

Washington, DC –– The peace group CODEPINK is participating in several upcoming protests of drone warfare.

--Today: 3:30pm, Monday, October 20, Niagara Air Base, Niagara Falls. Peacemakers who walked from Hancock Air Base near Syracuse to Niagara Falls Air Base. On that day Medea Benjamin, renowned activist and co-founder of CODEPINK, will speak on Working for Peace in the Age of Weaponized Drones, at Hallwalls, 341 Delaware Ave, Buffalo, NY 14202.

--7:00-8:30pm, Tuesday, October 27th, Air and Space Museum, Washington DC. CODEPINK will be protesting during an event at the museum called “Predator: Transforming Modern Warfare with Drones” with speaker James G. “Snake” Clark, who oversaw killer drone operations while working with the Pentagon. Activists will call on the Air and Space Museum to stop glorifying these gruesome tools of war. Facebook event here.

--Sat. Oct. 24-Sun. Nov. 1, from San Francisco to Nevada. CODEPINK members in the Bay Area, California, are hosting a caravan into the Nevada desert for a women’s retreat and drone resistance week. CODEPINK has been returning annually to Creech Air Force Base in Nevada since 2009 to resist drone warfare through creative actions and civil disobedience at the base entrance. At the retreat, they will host vigils twice daily at the entrance to the base. For more information contact Toby at ratherbenyckeling@comcast.net.

The Drone Papers, recently published by The Intercept, reveal the shocking inaccuracy of the killer drones, which the US government has been touting as “surgically precise” for years. CODEPINK denounces the Obama administration for its use of killer drones and supports the whistleblower who revealed this information.

“For years, we at CODEPINK have claimed that killer drones are used to murder people without even knowing who they are and now we have proof that 88 percent of those killed are not the intended targets,” said CODEPINK cofounder Medea Benjamin. “The terror the killer drones have wrought has spread anti-American sentiment throughout the world, and their use has created a state of perpetual war with minimal transparency and accountability.”

CODEPINK agrees with Edward Snowden, who hailed the new whistleblower, tweeting “In an astonishing act of civil courage, one American just shattered an unspeakable lie.”

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