Read Angela Pinchero's reports from Sri Lanka here

Angela Pinchero, Ottawa, is a member of the first Nonviolent Peaceforce (NP) field team in Sri Lanka. Angela has a science degree from the school of Mathematics at Carleton and has also studied ecology. Formerly a policy analyst for an agency in the federal government of Canada mandated to prevent excessive patented medicine prices, Angela joined NP in Sri Lanka in September 2003. For the last couple of years, Angela has been focusing her efforts on resistance to war, racism and attacks on civil liberties, immigrant and refugee rights in Canada. Angela believes community engagement is the key to a just change and decided to join the NP because of its approach of respectfully supporting local struggles for peace and social justice. Angela sees a large-scale peaceforce of international civilians of the kind that NP is building as a viable alternative to the killing and destruction of war. She believes that the methods of nonpartisan, non-violent intervention used by NP are a legitimate means of direct action for change and solidarity. Angela has worked with groups doing networking, coalition building, education, mobilization and direct action in Ottawa. Angela hopes to learn from the communities in Sri Lanka and the members of her international team. She has also been a street-medic, providing first-aid and legal support to social justice activists who experience police/state violence here in Ottawa. She loves camping, all things on four legs, and eating. She can be contacted by email at angelapinchero@yahoo.ca.