Please note a corrected release!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE			May 6, 1998

Contact: Max Obuszewski [410] 323-7200 or 410-377-7987
         International Action Center 212-633-6646
              								      MEDIA ALERT

Activists Arrested at White House for Condemning Iraq Sanctions 

Some 40 to 50 activists gathered on the White House side of Pennsylvania
Avenue to call for an end to Iraqi sanctions, which have devastated the
country. The number of children who have died as a result of the sanctions
is estimated to be several hundred thousand. 

Representatives from the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker in Washington, D.C.,
Peace Action, Jonah House, the Baltimore Emergency Response Network, the
American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, Voices in the Wilderness and
the office of House of Representatives member John Conyers, Jr. [Dem.-MI]
spoke at the rally. Photographs taken by Dorothy Day's Art Laffin during his
trip to Iraq were held by participants at the rally.

When the demonstration moved over Pennsylvania Avenue to directly in front
of the White House, the police ordered everyone to leave. Refusing to leave,
while holding graphic photographs of dying Iraqi children, were Art Laffin
and Ben McMullen from Dorothy Day and Sr. Carol Gilbert, Elizabeth McAlister
and Sr. Ardeth Platte, all members of Baltimore's Jonah House. The five
activists were then placed under arrest and charged with demonstrating
without a permit.

The rally was held today as former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark and
Detroit's Bishop Thomas Gumbleton are set to lead a 100-person delegation to
Iraq leaving today at 8 PM from New York City. The Iraq Sanctions Challenge
will take medical aid to Iraq in defiance of the U.S.-led United Nations
sanctions. 

Taking part in the Iraq Sanctions Challenge are religious leaders, medical
professionals, trade unionists, students and anti-war activists. More than
1.5 million people, mostly children and the elderly, have died in Iraq since
1990 as a result of the war and the economic sanctions.