Heroes Among Us

These are stories of people whom we at the Amesbury Friends Peace Center would like to honor for their courage, steadfastness and sense of purpose in sharing themselves with the larger world in ways that promote peace and justice. If you have a hero to suggest, please contact us.

Shannon P. Meehan, an Iraq Veteran

“Distant Wars, Constant Ghosts.” New York Times. February 23, 2010. A soldier remembers ordering an artillery strike on the house of an innocent family in Iraq and the consequences of that act that powerfully affect him today. A powerful reminder of the horrors of war. The writer is a hero for speaking out on this difficult topic.

W. Horace Carter, 88, a Publisher Whose Paper Challenged the Klan, Dies

Mr. Carter’s weekly paper’s four-year campaign against the Ku Klux Klan in North Carolina and South Carolina won it a Pulitzer Prize in 1953. Read how one paper publisher at great personal risk to his family and isolation from those in his community fought to keep the KKK out of his town. (NYTimes Sept. 20

In Harlem, the Rev. Vernon Williams Preaches Peace With a Convert’s Zeal...

A Harlem pastor who spent time in prison before turning his back on drugs and violence has found a calling as a street mediator among Harlem’s teenage gangs. As he says of his former self, “I was not a nice person. I was someone you would cross the street to get away from.” Now, he patrols the streets working to prevent violence among the Harlem gangs. Williams says, “You got to have a cause you are willing to die for. And I’m willing to die to see that these young men make it out.’ (NYTimes, September 7)

2009 Courage Award Winners

from the International Women's Media Foundation

Death threats were common for Maria Jimena Duzan, who covered the Colombian drug trade for a Bogota daily. The threats turned real for crusading Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who was assassinated in Moscow in 2006. These are just two of the 56 valiant women journalists who have received Courage Awards since the IWMF launched the program in 1990. Read their inspiring stories below. Consider nominating a colleague or friend for a Courage Award.

Jila Baniyaghoob, Iran
Jila Baniyaghoob, freelance reporter and editor-in-chief of the website Kanoon Zanan Irani (Iranian Women Center), has fearlessly reported on government and social oppression, particularly as they affect women. She has been fired from several jobs because she refuses to censor the subject matter of her reporting and several of her media outlets have been closed by the government. The topics of her reporting make her a target of the Iranian government. She has been beaten, arrested and imprisoned numerous times.

Iryna Khalip, Belarus
Iryna Khalip, a reporter and editor in the Minsk bureau of Novaya Gazeta, has been a journalist for more than 15 years in Belarus, one of the most oppressive countries toward journalists in the world. After working at a succession of newspapers, only to see them closed by the government, she now works for one of the most independent newspapers in the former Soviet Union. Khalip has been arrested, subjected to all-night interrogations and beaten by police, who keep her under constant surveillance.

Agnes Taile, Cameroon
Agnes Taile has reported on human rights and press freedom, including unflinching stories on the ineffectiveness and corruption of government officials. In 2006, while she was a reporter for Sweet FM, Taile received threats demanding that she stop her pursuit of government corruption. She ignored the threats. Not long afterward, she was abducted from her home at knife point by three hooded men, then beaten and left for dead in a ravine. Her show was cancelled after the attack. After recovering, Taile was determined to keep working as a journalist and landed a new job with Canal 2 covering the northern provinces of Cameroon.