Founder of Christian Peacemaker Teams dies of a heart attack

Gene Stoltzfus, the founding director of Christian Peacemaker Teams (www.cpt.org), which aims to "get in the way" of war and violence, has died at the age of 69, following a heart attack. He is credited with inspiring thousands of people to put their lives on the line in resisting violence and injustice and building peaceful alternatives. Stoltzfus served as CPT director from its inception in 1988 until 2004, when he retired and moved to Fort Frances, Ontario. He died on 10 March 2010. A Mennonite Christian committed to nonviolence as a way of life, not just an 'ethical option', Stoltzfus traveled to Iraq immediately before the first Gulf War in 1991. He spent time with the Iraq CPT Team in 2003 to facilitate consultation with Muslim and Christian clerics, Iraqi human rights leaders, families of Iraqi detainees and talks with American administrators and soldiers. From mid-December 2001 to mid-January 2002, Gene Stoltzfus and the current Christian Peacemaker Teams co-director, Doug Pritchard, were in Pakistan and Afghanistan listening to the victims of bombing and observing the effects of 23 years of violence.