The organizing of a boycott of economic activity targeting a foreign government engaged in Human Rights Abuse is restricted in certain legal frameworks. However, the People can organize a Divestment Campaign which targets those who profit from Human Rights Abuse. For example, coffee drinkers can advocate for the removal of contracts between municipal or private governments and coffee companies who profit from Human Rights Abuse against farmers in Honduras, or Colombia, and advocate for contracts with reputable coffee growers who uphold Human Rights!
Veolia: A successful Divestment Campaign against a militant privatizer
The Veolia corporation has organized, profited, and advocated for the privatization of public services, replacing quality and affordable services for expensive profit-driven services with cut-backs on quality for the benefit of it's private investors. Veolia also supports illegal Human Rights Abuse, regarded as such by the United Nations, among other entities, in the Middle East.
The following list of links contains information about the Divestment Campaign against Veolia, as of 2013-09, and information about Veolia's operations in the San Pablo bay area:
* [wedivest.org/civicrm/mailing/view?reset=1&id=33]
* [glassdoor.com/GD/Job/Veolia-Transportation-Vallejo-Jobs-EI_IE38860.0,21_IL.22,29_IC1147610.htm?filter.radius=50]
* [wedivest.org/c/56/veolia#.UkSn6kAvni8]
* [endtheoccupation.org/downloads/Veolia%20Fact%20Sheet_STL-PSC.pdf]
* [dumpveolia.org/]
* [endtheoccupation.org/article.php?id=3459]
* [endtheoccupation.org/article.php?id=3432]
* [quakerpiag.blogspot.com/2012/09/quakers-divest-from-hewlett-packard-and.html]
* [endtheoccupation.org/article.php?id=3618]
"Veolia Sale of Bus line in Israel considered a BDS victory; Local Palestine BDS group declares major victory"
2013-09-28 message from "North Coast Coalition for Palestine (NCCP)":
Media contact: Lois Pearlman, [lois5@sonic.net] [707-869-0266] [707-494-9127]
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The Santa Rosa-based North Coast Coalition for Palestine (NCCP) is celebrating a major victory today: the French-owned multinational corporation Veolia has sold all of its bus lines linking Jerusalem with illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
For the past two years we have been asking our Sonoma County Board of Supervisors to open the bidding for its bus service rather than extending its contract with Veolia. NCCP has argued that the county deserves a local company that would keep profits and decision-making in the community, and one that does not violate international law by servicing illegal settlements.
But this is not only a victory for us, outside Sonoma County Veolia has been a major target of theBoycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, including in the Sacramento Valley, where Veolia withdrew its bid to run the wastewater system after the Davis Committee of Palestinian Rights protested before the district board.
However, the sale ofVeolia’s contract to run the Israeli bus lines is only a partial victory. The company still runs a light rail system that provides rapid transit to illegal Israeli settlements in Palestinian East Jerusalem. It also operates Tovlan landfill in the occupied Jordan Valley, which receives recycling from Israel and illegal Israeli settlements and Ayalon sewage treatment plant that collects wastewater from the illegal settlement of Modi’in.
So, we are continuing our campaign to open the transit system bidding in 2014 as a nonviolent protestagainst the occupation of Palestine by the Israeli government, and because it’s time to find a local company to do the job. And, our ultimate goal, is to make Boycott, Divestments and Sanctions as successful in ending the occupation of Palestine as it was in bringing South African apartheid to a halt.
For more detailed information I have included the press release from Who Profits, an Israeli organization that verified the sale of the Veolia bus contracts in Jerusalem. Please feel free to contact me for more information about our local campaign, and for interviews with members of NCCP.
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