Tomorrow (August 17), I will celebrate another year ’round the sun. Accordingly, I am asking people, in lieu of a gift or card or anything else, to donate to a cause that I not only feel strongly about but one I work on every day.

As you may know, I work with No Business with Genocide. We work on a number of causes. We seek to raise awareness of the problem of genocide, which is as much a problem today as ever. One way we do this is by working with cities, states and localities to pass resolutions against genocide. Through our work, Gainesville, Florida passed such a resolution earlier this year.

We have also been working to free Hotel Rwanda hero & humanitarian Paul Rusesabagina. We have worked to raise awareness of his plight through traditional and social media; collected 12,000 petitions to President Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and the Rwandan Embassy in the US; got nearly 3,000 people to write their Congressional representatives on his behalf and organized a fundraiser for his legal defense.

Our main goal remains getting companies and governments to divest from nations that perpetrate genocide and other crimes against humanity. Working with a coalition, we were able to get Chevron to cut some of its payments to the brutal Myanmar military (there’s still work to be done here), Kirin Beer to cut its ties to the junta and we remain committed to getting Harry Winston (Swatch) to stop buying Burmese rubies.

For the Uyghurs, we are part of the #forcedlaborfashion coalition that is putting pressure on companies such as Nike to stop using cotton processed by slave labor.

We have a lot of work to do. We need your help. I need your help.

My birthday is tomorrow. If you can donate to this, I am asking you to. If you cannot, I am asking you to share it with your networks.

(No Business with Genocide is a part of the International Campaign for the Rohingya)

https://alysonchadwick.medium.com/the-rusesabagina-sham-trial-comes-to-an-end-54302934404f