Free Mohammed Nasheed

(from daily kos and Bill McKibben:)


…(this is) about one of our real allies on this planet, the president of the Maldive Islands, Mohammed Nasheed. He’s arguably the Mandela of the Indian Ocean–he spent six years in jail before forcing an election that overthrew the country’s longstanding autocrat. But this morning some kind of sketchy military coup returned the old order to power. Many of Nasheed’s colleagues have fled; he’s under some kind of house arrest.
This is not just a blow to democracy–it’s a huge blow to the climate movement. Nasheed is the epitome of the kind of leadership we need to see the world around. He’s engaged in practical work–the Maldives was, until this morning, on track to become the world’s first carbon-neutral nation by 2020. And he’s been a great political leader–you may recall that he trained his whole cabinet to scuba dive so they could hold an underwater cabinet meeting against their dying coral reef in 2009, in conjunction with 350.org’s first huge global day of action.
This Muslim leader is a great great man. We need to come to his defense. Here’s a quick petition page we’ve set up at 350.org, to let the Maldivian military know the world is watching. I’ll never forget watching Nasheed speak to a huge rally at Copenhagen–it was the high point of that hopeless week. As you can tell, I’m a little frantic.

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