About CASMAS

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About CASMAS

The Coalition Against Slavery in Mauritania and Sudan (CASMAS) is a human rights, abolitionist movement started by activists from Mauritania, Sudan and the United States on March 5, 1995. The mission of CASMAS is to bring together abolitionists/human rights groups from Mauritania, South Sudan and North America to collectively fight for the eradication of institutionalized and chattel slavery and other forms of human rights violations in Africa, especially in Mauritania and Sudan.

CASMAS has as its objectives:

	To campaign and mobilize national and international support to stop Arab enslavement of Africans in Sudan and Mauritania.
	To generate and disseminate information about institutionalized and chattel slavery and the gross human rights abuses in Sudan and Mauritania.
	To stimulate America, especially African American, interest and involvement in the struggle to end Arab slavery in Sudan and Mauritania.
	To address misinformation, misrepresentation and misinterpretation of the nature and existence of slavery, genocide and other forms of human rights violations occurring in the Sudan and Mauritania.
	To foster mutual cooperation among Sudanese, Mauritanians, Americans and other human rights activists in the effort to eradicate Arab slavery in the two African nations of Sudan and Mauritania.
	To cooperate with individuals, organizations and governments whose agenda is to bring to an end human bondage in Mauritania and Sudan.
	To facilitate research and to provide for discussion of slavery in Africa, especially in Mauritania and Sudan.

CASMAS has worked consistently to realize these objectives through both political and practical means. The irrefutable documentation of slavery in Mauritania resulted when the executive director of CASMAS, Samuel Cotton, went undercover into Mauritania for 28 days, interviewing Africans who had escaped from slavery, whose families had been enslaved, and whose lives have been defined by a constant struggle against the harsh human rights violations rampant there. In addition, CASMAS delivered over a ton of clothing to refugees as a result of a successful campaign to galvanize material support from the US.

A national summit emerged in October of 1996 as a result of CASMAS, efforts to coordinate the resistance efforts of abolitionist groups across the United States in this struggle; the resulting body formed is the Abolitionist Leadership Council. And CASMAS dedicates much time and energy into constant information-awareness campaigns across the country, from teach-ins to radio-interviews to national and international television appearances. Currently, CASMAS is working on a vital project to deliver desperately needed food and medicines into Sudan and Mauritania.

CASMAS held a second, international summit in New York City in October of 1997 to plan the groundwork for implementing a freedpersons bureau in Mauritania and for developing concrete means of self-sufficiency. This historic conference included attendees from France, Mauritania and throughout the US.

CASMAS is committed to the goal of ending the enslavement of Africans in these countries and aiding the creation of self-determination and independence. We are closer to this goal than ever before, but, as much remains to be done, we are continuing to develop a critical response to this great tragedy.