to ask the IGU to change the venue of the next Regional Meeting

The apologism put forth by Ron Abler rings loudly in concert with the refusal of the AAG to consider the issue of holding conferences in venues that respect the rights of labour in the years that he was Executive Director. The failure of the IGU to consider the political implications of decisions it sanctions will only lead to undermining the legitimacy of the organization, unless - as others have pointed out - an explicit aim of the meeting is to interrogate the role of the site and its associated institutions and actors in exercising repression. And to draw a parallel between a meeting of the International Cartographic Association with a meeting of the IGU suggests an astonishing political naivete. To plead bureaucratic expediency in the face of a significant moral lapse like this is egregious. What's to follow? The next meeting at the Pentagon?