NEWS ADVISORY For immediate release
UBC STUDENTS REMAIN IN JAIL FOR PEACEFUL ACTION AGAINST APEC
TERMS OF RELEASE DEMAND NO MORE PROTESTS AT APEC SITE UNTIL SUMMIT IS OVER
VANCOUVER, Saturday, November 1, 1997 -- Two UBC students, Jonathan Oppenheim and Victoria Scott, both 26, are still being held by the RCMP more than 24 hours after being arrested for a peaceful protest against APEC on Friday afternoon.
The two student-activists were brought before a justice of the peace this afternoon. As a condition of release, they were asked to agree to not protest at the atrium of UBC President Martha Piper's house -- site of a luncheon of the 18 APEC leaders on November 25. Oppenheim and Scott refused these conditions which they regard as intimidation against anti-APEC protesters.
They will remain in custody until Monday morning when they will have their first public court hearing. By that time, they will have spent three nights in custody. Oppenheim, a physics student, has been moved off campus to a jail cell in downtown Vancouver while Scott, an art history student, has been moved to the RCMP detention center in Richmond.
The two members of APEC ALERT, a grassroots campus group opposed to APEC, were arrested yesterday afternoon along with Caleb Sigurgeirson, 26, also a student at UBC. They were participating in a Halloween "Trick or Treat Tour Against APEC" which highlighted corporate influences on campus. The tour ended with students writing slogans such as "BOO APEC" on the windows of the new atrium of Martha Piper's house. The atrium is being built specially for APEC at a cost of $400,000. The students were using non-permanent washable glass chalk to write the slogans.
Thus far, the UBC administration has made no effort to speak out against political intimidation such as the arrests on Friday, the ongoing imprisonment of Oppenheim and Scott and the unacceptable terms of release demanded by the Crown. To members of APEC ALERT, this comes as no surprise given that the administration itself has made its own attempts recently at intimidating students who speak out and protest against APEC.
APEC ALERT members are determined to continue their resistance to APEC and the Leaders' Summit which will take place on campus on November 25. The group will continue their extensive and diverse activities which range from distributing informational materials, educational forums, workshops, class presentations, films and debates to music, street theater, protests and civil disobedience.
For more information, please contact APEC ALERT at 251- 9914 or alert@netinfo.ubc.ca. APEC ALERT will send a notice of the court date, time and place immediately upon learning these details.
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