Call State Dept Emergency Operations Center about Conditions on The Audacity of Hope!

Regina Carey, Jenny Linnell, Ann Wright

ATHENS – The imprisonment of the U.S. Boat to Gaza continues since its seizure July 1, The Audacity of Hope is being held at a U.S. Embassy shared pier near Piraeus, Greece, just outside of Athens.  Three passengers are still on the boat and being held in inhumane conditions.

The U.S. Embassy has done absolutely nothing to help them in 100 + degree heat at a U.S. Government shared pier!  No shore power, no alternatives provided (like another pier). No consular visits to see the conditions for themselves. NOTHING, ABSOULTELY NOTHING!!!

This weekend, please call the State Department 202-647-6575 and ask for the 24 hour Emergency Operations Center. Tell them that 3 people are still enduring the inhumane, dangerous conditions on the boat.

All are women--2 Americans and 1 UK citizen.  They are:

Regina Carey (http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2011/07/06/18683952.php) from San Rafael, California, is a consultant specializing in strategic planning and planned giving. In her lifetime commitment to human rights she has focused her time and energy to the Rights of the Indigenous (original people), Water Rights and Peace. She is a co-founder of the Black/Jewish Dialogue Group in Marin County, California. She has been an active participant in the World Social Forum and the UN Conference Against Racism (Durban, South Africa).

Crew member Jenny Linnell, is a British citizen from Devon, England, and was a Free Gaza crew member in 2008 on the first boat that broke the naval blockade of Gaza.  She stayed in Gaza for a year and worked with the International Solidarity Movement.  Her exit from Gaza into Egypt a year later took more than six weeks because she had arrived by boat. She holds a "Day Skipper" license from the Royal Yachting Association and founded a sailing collective called "Learning the Ropes".

Ann Wright is a former U.S. diplomat with 16 years in the State Department and Deputy Chief of Mission (Deputy Ambassador) at 4 U.S. Embassies (Sierra Leone, Micronesia, Afghanistan and Mongolia) and who got the State Department's award for Heroism for her actions protecting civilians during the civil war in Sierra Leone. She resigned in March, 2003 in opposition to Bush's war on Iraq.