Truth commissions to gather in Greensboro

[struggle4progress]

Posted on Sat, Jul. 01, 2006
Associated Press

GREENSBORO, N.C. - Members of truth commissions from other countries will gather later this week in Greensboro to help people from U.S. communities that have begun similar projects or hope to do so ...

Among those scheduled to attend is Irving Joyner, vice chairman of the 1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission, which the Legislature created to study and report on the 1898 seizure of power in Wilmington from a democratically elected, majority-black city government. That group's report was released May 31.

Others attending include representatives from:

_ New Orleans, where government inaction during and after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 has raised questions of race, class and politics ...

http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observer/news/local/14948229.htm

[struggle4progress]

1. Members of truth commissions praise work done in Greensboro

Sunday, July 9, 2006
Members of truth commissions praise work done in Greensboro

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

... "People in this city may not realize what a remarkable thing you have here," said Mark McGovern, who represents a truth group in Northern Ireland. "This process is an extraordinary achievement, a beacon to those of us elsewhere. The problem is city officials."

Participants who have worked on similar projects in countries including South Africa, Sierra Leone and Peru also praised the Greensboro commission during the two-day, closed-door meeting at Bennett College, which ended Friday.

Participants in the discussions compared the work of the Greensboro Truth and Community Reconciliation Project, including a spinoff commission's recent report on the fatal Ku Klux Klan shootings of 1979, with the work of similar bodies in other countries.

Work by members of the local project led to the creation of the separate Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission. After two years of study, that seven-member commission issued a report May 25 on the Klan shootings of Nov. 3, 1979, that killed five members of the Communist Workers Party and injured 10 others ...

http://www.journalnow.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=WSJ%2FMGArticle%2FWSJ_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1149189032224&path=!localnews&s=1037645509099