Community Launches GI Rights Hotline to Serve NM

From the GI Rights Hotline: Veterans, military family members, and other concerned individuals are launching a New Mexico “node” of the national GI Rights Hotline network. The Mission of the New Mexico GI Rights Hotline is to provide information, referrals and support to members of the military and their families regarding discharges, grievances, and other civil rights issues. The Hotline will provide information about military life and war to individuals and families affected by military service, conscription, and recruitment. The target date to open the hotline in NM is February 15, 2008.

Events to raise funds and celebrate the launching of the statewide Hotline will be held in Santa Fe and Albuquerque:

• Santa Fe: Saturday, January 26, from 6:30-9:30 PM at St. Bede’s Episcopal Church Common Room, 1601 S Saint Francis Drive;
• Albuquerque: Sunday, January 27, from 1:00-4:00 PM at the Guild Cinema, 3405 Central NE.

Both events will include a screening of clips from the film Arlington West and speakers Jorge Arroyo, Conscientious Objector to the Iraq War; Tony Garcia, Native New Mexican and veteran of both the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; and Dahlia Wasfi, MD, Iraqi-American.

“With an average of 17 suicides a day in 2005, and more than 120 of our Iraq and Afghanistan veterans having committed a murder since their return, it is clear that our service members have needs the Government can not or will not address. The GI Rights Hotline will provide a desperately needed service to our troops, veterans, and their families,” said Bill Bradley, an organizer of the Hotline.