CINDY SHEEHAN, HOWARD ZINN AND 40 INTERNATIONAL ACTIVISTS ASK OIL MAJORS TO BOYCOTT THE PENTAGON UNTIL U.S. FORCES LEAVE IRAQ

Contact: Nick Mottern, Director, Consumers for Peace.org
(914) 806-6179

Twelve major suppliers of petroleum products to the Pentagon, including ExxonMobil, Shell, BP and Valero, have been asked by a group of peace organizations and activists, including Cindy Sheehan and Howard Zinn, to stop doing business with the U.S. military until all U.S. troops and mercenary forces are out of Iraq.

ConsumersforPeace.org today sent letters calling for a Pentagon boycott by the following firms that comprised the top ten suppliers of petroleum and petroleum products to the U.S. military in fiscal year 2004 or 2005. This is a list of their total sales to the Pentagon for that period, based on information provided by the Defense Energy Support Center:

BP - $2.2 billion

Royal Dutch Shell - $2.07 billion

ExxonMobil - $1.3 billion

Valero Energy - $898 million

Bahrain Petroleum Co. - $576.8 million

Kuwait Petroleum Corp. - $541.8 million

Ssangyong Oil (Korea) - $498.1 million

Motor Oil (Hellas) (Greece) - $426.4 million

Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. - $276.5 million (2004)

Merlin Petroleum Co. - $226.1 million (2005)

International Oil Trading Co. - $214 million

Refinery Associates of Texas - $121.3 million

"As you may know," the letters state, "the invasion and occupation of Iraq by the United States and other coalition forces are violations of international law." The letters continue: "Additionally, the U.S. has committed numerous war crimes, such as its destruction of cities, bombing of civilians, use of uranium munitions, use of white phosphorus as a chemical weapon and torture."

The letters refer to a 2004 peer-reviewed Lancet study in noting that "over 100,000, and possibly far more, Iraqis have been killed in the invasion and occupation."* The letters also say that the "devastation of Iraqi civil society is beyond calculation."

The letters also cite U.S. and other Coalition casualties and register "grave concerns about U.S. violations of international law " with respect to conduct at Guantanamo, in Afghanistan and toward Iran.

The authors ask the oil companies to stop doing business with the U.S. military: "In view of the illegality of what is happening in Iraq and the enormity of the suffering being caused by this illegal conduct, we ask [each of the above listed firms] to stop selling petroleum products and services to the U.S. military until all U.S. military and mercenary forces leave Iraq."

*The Lancet study - "Mortality before and after the 2003 invasion of Iraq: cluster sample survey" - made "conservative assumptions" per the authors and did not include data from the city of Falluja. The authors wrote that the mortality figures would have been "far more" if Falluja had been included. It was published nearly two years ago and hence covered only the first 18 months or the war and occupation. The Lancet study is available online at http://www.traprockpeace.org/iraq_lancet_october_2004.pdf A February, 2006 article - "The Iraq War: Do Civilian Casualties Matter?" by Les Roberts, lead researcher of the Lancet study, is available at http://web.mit.edu/cis/pdf/Audit_6_05_Roberts.pdf

The letter is signed by:**

Nick Mottern, Director, Consumers for Peace

Charles Jenks, Chair of Advisory Board, Traprock Peace Center
Cindy Sheehan, co-founder of Gold Star Families for Peace and mother of Casey Sheehan, who died in Iraq;

Hadi Jawad, co-founder, Crawford Peace House

Valley Reed, Dallas Peace Center

David Swanson, co-founder, AfterDowningStreet.org;

Kelly Dougherty, co-founder Iraq Veterans Against the War;

Dahr Jamail, indepdendent journalist;

Kathy Kelly, co-founder, Voices for Creative Nonviolence;

Howard Zinn, author and professor emeritus at Boston University;

Anthony Arnove, author of Iraq: the Logic of Withdrawal;

Hans-Christof von Sponeck, former UN Assistant Secretary General who resigned in protest as the UN’s Humanitarian Coordinator for Iraq;

Lindsey German, Convener, Stop the War Coalition (UK);

Sharon Smith, author of Subterranean Fire: A History of Working-Class Radicalism in the United States;

Sunny Miller, Executive Director, Traprock Peace Center;

Tim Carpenter, Executive Director, Progressive Democrats of America;

Elizabeth Wrigley-Field, NYU, national coordinating committee member, Campus Antiwar Network;

Sara Flounders, Co-director, International Action Center;

Don Debar, WBAI New York producer;

Gayle Dunkelberger, Katonah, New York;

Rev. Diane Baker, Dallas, Texas;

Jim Goodnow, Dallas, Texas;

Nada Khader, Executive Director, WESPAC Foundation

Jean Campbell, Moderator, The World Dreams Peace Bridge

Kwame Mahdi, Peekskill, NY

Khury Peterson-Smith, Campus Antiwar Network and student representative to Occupation Watch mission to Iraq;

Dave Zirin, author of What's My Name, Fool?;

Carolyn Fuller, Senior Analyst/ Programmer, Massachusetts Institute of Technology;

Deepa Kumar, Assistant Professor Journalism and Media Studies, Rutgers University;

Alan Maass, Editor, Socialist Worker newspaper;

Snehal Shingavi, PhD candidate, UC Berkeley and a founding member of the Campus Antiwar Network;

Judy Linehan, Military Families Speak Out mother of Iraq War Veteran;

Paola Pisi, professor of religious studies (Italy) and editor of uruknet.info;

Sanford Russell, veteran and moderator of BoycottUS yahoo group;

Dave Stratman, Editor, NewDemocracyWorld.com;

Dennis Kyne, Gulf War veteran and activist;

Dorinda Moreno, IndyIraqAction, Elders Of The 4 Colors 4 Directions

Natylie Baldwin, Mt. Diablo Peace & Justice Center;

Dr. Thomas Fasy, Mt. Sinai School of Medicine;

Thomas F. Barton, editor of “GI Special;”

Ward Reilly, SE National Contact - Vietnam Veterans Against the War, Veterans for Peace, Baton Rouge;

Charlie Jackson, Texans for Peace;

Gabriele Zamparini, independent filmmaker, writer and journalist; co-producer of www.thecatsdream.com

**affiliations are for identification purposes only

For more information, see http://www.consumersforpeace.org