ACTION ALERT

For Immediate Release
August 13, 2005

Demand the US Adopt the 'Pinheiro Principles' on Refugee Rights Without Exception

According to a recent release from COHRE, the United Nations is expected to adopt a sweeping series of principles that urge governments everywhere to ensure all refugees and persons displaced due to conflict and natural disasters are entitled to return to, recover and reside in their original homes, lands and properties.

Prepared by the UN's Special Rapporteur on Housing and Property Restitution, Paulo Sergio Pinheiro of Brazil, the 'Pinheiro Principles' will provide the first consolidated global standard on the housing, land and property rights of the displaced. The right to return is now understood to
encompass not merely returning to one's country, but also to one's original home, should one wish.

Al-Awda, The Palestine Right to Return Coalition, welcomes these developments and urges the United States government in particular to adopt the United Nations 'Pinheiro Principles' as they apply to all refugees.

Specifically, we call on the United States government to stop supporting and funding Israel's denial of the natural, historical and national rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes of origin and to restitution of all their confiscated and destroyed properties. Such actions
by the US are at variance with International Law and numerous United Nations resolutions including and starting with UN resolution 194, first adopted in 1948.

We call on all our members, supporters and people of conscience to call and write to President Bush, Secretary of State Rice, and your Senators and Representatives to urge the US government to adopt the United Nations 'Pinheiro Principles' which ensure that all refugees and persons displaced due to conflict and natural disasters are entitled to return to, recover and reside in their original homes, lands and properties. Ask them to apply such principles to all refugees without exception and to include specifically Palestinian refugees, who today represent the largest and longest suffering refugee population in the world.

Talking Points

1. Urge the US government to adopt the United Nations 'Pinheiro Principles' to ensure that all refugees and persons displaced due to conflict and natural disasters are entitled to return to, recover and reside in their original homes, lands and properties.

2. To apply such principle to all refugees without exception and to specifically include Palestinian refugees, who represent the largest and longest suffering refugee population in the world today.

3. The US government should stop supporting and funding Israel's denial of the natural, historical and national rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes of origin and to restitution of all their confiscated and destroyed property.

4. Such actions by the US government are at variance with International Law and numerous United Nations resolutions including resolution 194, first adopted in 1948 and reaffirmed almost every year since then.

5. If successful, such attempts by the US government would set a disastrous precedent in International Law.

CALL, EMAIL, AND FAX YOUR LETTERS TO

*President George W Bush
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Email: president@whitehouse.gov
Phone: 202-456-1414
Fax: 202-456-2461

*Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
U.S. Department of State
2201 C Street NW
Washington, DC 20520
Email: http://contact-us.state.gov/ask_form_cat/ask_form_secretary.html
or http://contact-us.state.gov/ask_form_cat/ask_form_foreign.html
Tel: 202-647-4000 or 1-800-877-8339 (Federal Relay Service)
Fax: 202-261-8577

* Contact information for your Representatives and Senators, go to: http://www.congress.org/congressorg/directory/congdir.tt?command=congdir
House members can be reached through the Capitol switchboard toll free at: 1-877-331-2000

Letters in the US may be faxed online via: http://www.tpc.int/sendfax.html

Please cc your correspondence to Alerts@Al-Awda.Org

Text of the 'Pinheiro Principles' in pdf format

Al-Awda, The Palestine Right to Return Coalition
PO Box 131352
Carlsbad, CA 92013, USA
Tel: 760-685-3243
Fax: 360-933-3568
E-mail: info@al-awda.org
WWW: http://al-awda.org

Al-Awda, The Palestine Right to Return Coalition (PRRC) is the largest network of grassroots activists and students dedicated to Palestinian human rights. We are a not for profit tax-exempt educational and charitable 501(c)(3) organization as defined by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) of the United States of America. Under IRS guidelines, your donations to PRRC
are tax-deductible.