Peace activist Kathy Kelly was on day 37 of a 40-day fast at U.N. headquarters in New York when the Sept. 11 attacks occurred. She wanted the U.N. to end its economic sanctions on Iraq.

Tuesday night she spoke to a crowd of more than 125 people at the Holmes Student Center’s Capital Room with a modified message: “Don’t attack Iraq.”

Kelly has twice been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize and is the founder of Voices in the Wilderness, a Chicago-based organization dedicated to ending the decade-long economic sanctions on Iraq.

“She’s not only been involved in Iraq,” said Nick Noe, a retired NIU staff member, “but also in peace and justice activities in Haiti, Bosnia and other parts of the world.”

Kelly believes that Americans should feel camaraderie, not animosity, toward the people of Iraq because they can relate to the trauma Americans have felt from Sept. 11.

“The people who could best understand the feelings of those in New York, Pennsylvania, and D.C. … were the [people] I visited in Iraq,” Kelly said.

She also encouraged the crowd to stay educated and take action against perceived injustices.

“Get those alternative points of view,” Kelly said.

Much of her speech concerned issues of democracy here and in Iraq. She’s worried about the outcome of a U.S.-imposed regime change in Iraq.

“You simply can’t impose democracy,” Kelly said. “You can help a society develop its education and social services … that will help build democracy. I think if we had better education here, we’d have a better democracy.”

She thinks the American news media has done a poor job giving a voice to the people of Iraq in the same way that Kuwaiti people were covered during the Gulf War.

“For democracy to work in this country,” Kelly said, “people here need to hear from some Iraqi teenagers … we should hear from the Iraqi doctors.”

Kelly believes that it is unfair for the U.S. government to expect the Iraqi people to democratize their country without assistance.

“The civilian population is brutalized and exhausted,” she said.

The key to relieving their pain, she said, is ending economic sanctions.

“I could show any weapons-inspection team where to find the weapon of mass destruction that’s created the most destruction in [Iraq],” Kelly said. “And the answer is in hospitals across that country. It’s the sanctions.”

After Kelly’s hour-long speech, the crowd stayed to ask questions.

“It was very eye-opening, definitely,” freshman business major Michael Cox said.

“I agree with her totally,” NIU alumnus Magdalena Delicka said. “I’m interested in alternative points of view and I’m looking to take action, so it was a motivational thing.”

The presentation was organized by the DeKalb Interfaith Network for Peace and Justice and hosted by the Northern Coalition for Peace and Justice, as well as NIU’s History Club.