Are your state legislators honoring Azerbaijan?‏

ANC
Dear Friends,
It has been brought to our attention that the California State Senate and the California International Relations Foundation are "honoring" a delegation of members from the Parliament of Azerbaijan on Monday, March 11 in Sacramento. As California is home to countless Armenian refugees from the massacres perpetrated by the Azerbaijani government in Sumgait, Baku, and Kirovabad, and the Azerbaijani government continues to threaten the lives of soldiers and civilians of the Nagorno Karabagh Republic to this day, we must stand up against Azerbaijan's every attempt to influence members of our state government. Call your Assembly member and State Senator. Please join us in taking action on this critical issue by calling your State Assembly and Senate members to discourage them from attending the dinner and to encourage them to make a statement on the massacres against Armenians in Sumgait, Baku, and Kirovabad. Please note that this is a time-sensitive issue, and calls should be made today and on Monday to be effective as the dinner is on Monday, Mach 11. Please see below for a sample phone script, and look up your Assembly member and Senator's contact information by going to http://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov/. Demonstrate against Azerbaijan's brutality. On Monday, March 11, please join us as we gather with the Armenian American community for a peaceful demonstration outside the venue of this dinner in order to educate the public on Azerbaijan's human rights record and to protest the honoring of this brutal government. The protest will take place at 5:30 pm at the Sutter Club located at 1220 9th Street in Sacramento. To connect with others participating in this protest, please visit https://www.facebook.com/events/145341935633986/. To carpool to Sacramento from San Francisco or San Jose, please email your name and phone number to mail@ancsf.org before Sunday. We will do our best to accomodate you. Thank you for your continued activism. Sincerely, Armenian National Committee San Francisco - Bay Area 51 Commonwealth Avenue San Francisco, CA 94118 Tel: 415-387-3433 mail@ancsf.org www.ancsf.org ________________________________________________________ Sample Phone Script

Hello my name is __________ and I am a constituent of Assembly member/Senator _______.
It has come to my attention that the CA Senate will be hosting a dinner with members of the government of Azerbaijan on Monday, March 11. I am calling to discourage my Assembly member/Senator from attending. The State of California and Azerbaijan do not share the same values, and I am disappointed to see this dinner is taking place. Azerbaijan's human rights violations are countless. Armenians living under Azerbaijani rule were subjected to massacres in Sumgait, Baku, and Kirovabad before winning their independence from this brutal regime. Rather than seek to make amends, Azerbaijan's president, Ilham Aliyev, has increased his hateful rhetoric, labeling Armenians as Azerbaijan's "number one enemy." After being found guilty of murdering a fellow Armenian soldier with an axe, an Azerbaijani soldier named Ramil Safarov was pardoned, promoted and publicly made into a national hero by the Azerbaijani government last year. More recently, a famous writer in Azerbaijan, who wrote kindly about Armenians, had a $13,000 bounty put out for his ear. These are just a few of the countless human rights violations committed by the government of Azerbaijan, not only against Armenians, but against its own citizens. On Monday, fact sheets and other information on these issues were provided to your office in Sacramento by the Armenian National Committee of America. I hope you will take a close look at this, and I encourage the Assembly member/Senator to make a statement on Azerbaijan's ethnic cleansing campaign committed against Armenians in Sumgait, Baku, and Kirovabad.
Thank you for your time and consideration.