WEEKLY NEWS UPDATE ON THE AMERICAS ISSUE #302, NOVEMBER 12, 1995 NICARAGUA SOLIDARITY NETWORK OF GREATER NEW YORK 339 LAFAYETTE ST., NEW YORK, NY 10012 (212) 674-9499 1. Haitian Deputy Murdered as Presidential Race Starts 2. Guatemala: Menchu Nephew Kidnapped, Released 3. Guatemalans Vote in General Elections 4. Law Students Protest Slow Action on 1994 Murder 5. Student Killed, Teachers Strike in Ecuador 6. Mexican Peso Takes a Fall: "Seeds of Revolution"? 7. Salinas, Dow Jones and the Mexican Peso Caper 8. Mexico: Elections and Violence in Southern States 9. Chilean Congress Debates Compromise Human Rights Law 10. Chileans March for Labor and Human Rights 11. Strike Against Privatization in Bolivia 12. US To Declassify Documents on Honduras 13. Nicaragua Election News: Ortega, Pastora & More... 14. Peru: Municipal Elections, Strike & Other News... 15. Dominican Republic: Social Democrats Ratify Candidate 16. In Other News: Argentina, Uruguay, Colombia, Trinidad & More 17. Upcoming Events in the NYC Area and Beyond * ISSN#: 1068-5332. The Weekly News Update on the Americas is published weekly by the Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York. A one-year subscription (52 issues) is $25. Subscriptions to the electronic edition are delivered directly to your email address by our distributor, NY Transfer News. To subscribe, send your email address with a check or money order for US $25 payable to Blythe Systems. Mail to NY Transfer News Collective, 339 Lafayette Street, New York, NY 10012. For more information about electronic subscriptions, contact NY Transfer at nyt@blythe.org. For a subscription to the print edition (via first class mail), please send check or money order for $25 payable to Nicaragua Solidarity Network at 339 Lafayette St., New York, New York 10012. The email and print versions of the Weekly News Update are identical in content. Back issues and source materials are available on request. 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Send us a copy of any publication where we are cited or reprinted. We also welcome your comments and ideas: send them to us at the street address above or via e-mail to nicanet@blythe.org. * 1. HAITIAN DEPUTY MURDERED AS PRESIDENTIAL RACE STARTS Jean Hubert Feuille, a recently elected deputy to the Haitian Parliament for the southwestern town of Port Salut, was assassinated in a commando-style operation as he drove through a residential area of Port-au-Prince on Nov. 7. Another new deputy, Gabriel Fortune from the southwestern city of Les Cayes, near Port Salut, was seriously wounded; a passerby, Fred Flavien, was also wounded. The assailants arrived in two taxis, one blue and one grey, which surrounded the legislators' car. The assailants took cash from the victims, but the crime was in the style of many politically motivated killings by Haitian rightists. Feuille was a cousin of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and had been a member of his security group; he was also related to Haiti's New York consul, Yvon Feuille. [El Daily News (NY) 11/8/95 from Reuter; Haiti Progres (NY) 11/8-11/14/95] Two houses were burned in Les Cayes on Nov. 8 during a demonstration protesting the murder. Haitian police and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) rapid intervention force, part of the United Nations occupation force, were dispatched to the scene. UN spokesperson Eric Falt said: "We sympathize with the grief-stricken population of Les Cayes, but one should not respond with violence to this grief caused by violence." [El Diario-La Prensa (NY) 11/10/95 from AFP] The killing came just hours after the swearing-in of the new prime minister, Claudette Werleigh, and the announcement of a schedule for presidential elections. The candidates are to register by Nov. 15; the campaigns start on Nov. 20, and the vote will be on Dec. 17. If there is a runoff, it will be held on Jan. 21, and the results will be announced on Jan. 31, just seven days before the new president is to be inaugurated on Feb. 7. The tight election schedule, announced at the last minute, may have the effect of delaying a parliamentary vote on the privatization program demanded by international lending institutions as a condition for further loans. "Maybe next year," said Raymond Lafontant, who heads the presidential commission on economic reform. [Haiti en Marche (Miami) 11/8/95] There have been a number of protests against privatization. During October there were also several strikes in government agencies not slated for privatization, including the post office and the national registry office. [HEM 11/8/95 from AHP] On Nov. 4 Inter Press Service quoted an official in the US Agency for International Development (USAID) who admitted that the US was holding up $4.6 million because the privatization had been delayed. "We are still waiting for them to approve a work plan for broad civil service reform and [to] prepare options for a second round of privatization," the official said. Previously USAID had claimed that budget disputes in the US Congress were delaying the aid, which was supposed to be disbursed by Sept. 30. [IPS 11/4/95] 2. GUATEMALA: MENCHU NEPHEW KIDNAPPED, RELEASED According to a Nov. 12 article in the New York Times, 1992 Nobel peace prize winner and indigenous activist Rigoberta Menchu Tum announced on Nov. 11 that her kidnapped nephew has been found safe. (The 22-month old boy, Juan Carlos Velazquez Menchu, is actually the son of Menchu's niece Cristina Menchu Zapeta.) On Nov. 4 three armed men grabbed the toddler away after hitting his mother as she stepped off a bus with her three-month old son on her back, just 50 meters from the home they share with Menchu Tum. One of the kidnappers then shoved Menchu Zapeta against a wall and warned that if she reported the kidnapping she would never see her son again. Three days earlier, Menchu Tum had asked the Guatemalan government for protection for herself and her family, given her position as a co-plaintiff in the Xaman massacre case [see Update #297, #298]. Her request was denied. [Cerigua Weekly Briefs #43, 11/9/95; Guatemala Human Rights Update (Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA) #20/95, 11/3/95; La Jornada (Mexico) 11/5/95 from AFP, DPA, AP, EFE, Ansa, Cerigua] 3. GUATEMALANS VOTE IN GENERAL ELECTIONS A total of 20 candidates are registered to participate in the Nov. 12 general elections in Guatemala. Besides choosing a president and vice president, voters must decide on candidates for 80 seats in the unicameral Congress, 300 of the nation's 330 mayoral offices, and 20 seats in the Central American Parliament (PARLACEN). Candidates for president must receive more than 50% of the valid ballots cast to win in the first round, otherwise a runoff election will be held on Dec. 7. The winner will take office on Jan. 13, 1996, for a four-year term. In the legislative elections, 64 of the 80 congress members will be elected from the country's 22 departments and from the municipality of Guatemala. The other 16 will be selected from a national list in a complex procedure based on a proportional vote. This method allows some of the smaller parties to win congressional seats even if they are unable to gain enough votes in a specific geographical area. The 20 PARLACEN representatives will also be elected from a national list. The PARLACEN deputies will serve five-year terms, while deputies in the National Congress will serve four years. About 3.7 million people are registered to vote, representing about 73% of the voting-age population. In the 1990 presidential elections, only 2.5 million people were registered to vote. Abstention has traditionally been very high in Guatemala, especially in indigenous communities; on Nov. 12, however, between 55% and 70% of the registered voters are expected to cast ballots, according to election surveys conducted by both official and independent sources. A new survey conducted by the Paradigma polling firm in early November found that 71.6% of the indigenous voters who are registered to vote intend to go to the polls. More than half of Guatemala's 10.5 million people are indigenous Mayans. [Latin America Data Base Notisur 11/10/95 from Report on Guatemala, Guatemala News and Information Bureau, Inforpress Centroamericana, Cerigua Weekly Briefs, Agencia Centroamericana de Noticias-Spanish news service EFE, Notimex, Inter Press Service, AFP, Reuter] Under Guatemala's electoral law, voting booths can only be located in Guatemala City and in the provincial and municipal capitals. For the 30% of the electorate that lives outside these centers, this means a difficult journey of several hours and the loss of at least one day's pay to exercise their vote. A study by the University of San Carlos estimates that voting could cost campesinos as much as five days pay ($13) in lost salaries, transport, and other costs. [Cerigua Weekly Briefs #41, 10/26/95] All recent surveys show that Alvaro Arzu, presidential candidate for the rightwing National Advancement Party (PAN), is leading the race with 40% to 50% of voter intentions. Most recent polls predict that Alfonso Portillo of the far rightwing Guatemalan Republican Front (FRG) will come in second with 10% to 17% of the votes. In third place is Fernando Andrade of the National Alliance, a coalition of three center-right parties. For the first time since the 1954 overthrow of the Jacobo Arbenz government, a coalition of leftist organizations is participating directly in the Guatemalan elections. The New Guatemala Democratic Front (FDNG) is a broad alliance of Mayan, labor, and grassroots organizations [see Update #299]. Of the FDNG's 180 congressional and mayoral candidates, 137 are Mayan. On Nov. 1, FDNG presidential candidate Jorge Gonzalez del Valle accused the army of carrying out a campaign of "intimidation and defamation" against the FDNG. According to Gonzales and other FDNG leaders, army patrols have occupied various rural communities, where they destroyed FDNG propaganda and warned local citizens not to vote for the FDNG. [LADB Notisur 11/10/95 from Report on Guatemala, GNIB, Inforpress Centroamericana, Cerigua Weekly Briefs, ACAN-EFE, Notimex, IPS, AFP, Reuter] In a recent interview with members of the Foreign Press Club in Guatemala City, Rigoberta Menchu stressed that she remains neutral in these elections; rumors that she is backing Arzu or the FDNG are false, she insisted. "In general, I believe none of the parties have managed to win the absolute and general presence of indigenous peoples," Menchu added. "The fact that the majority of the indigenous people who are candidates for congress have been placed in ninth or tenth place on the national lists shows that the parties want them to lose, not win. And I don't think anyone has approached the theme [of indigenous rights] in any depth." [Cerigua Weekly Briefs #43, 11/9/95] 4. LAW STUDENTS PROTEST SLOW ACTION ON 1994 MURDER Nine law students at the University of San Carlos (USAC) in Guatemala City began a hunger strike on Nov. 2 in front of the judicial building. The students, members of the Association of Law Students (AED) at the USAC, are demanding justice for fellow student Mario Alioto Lopez Sanchez, beaten to death by police at a demonstration on Nov. 12, 1994 [see Update #251]. Student leader Gustavo Peralta said neither the judicial nor the executive powers have acted to move the legal process forward and punish those responsible. According to Peralta, those responsible are former interior minister Danilo Parrinello Blanco, former interior vice-minister Col. Mario Alfredo Merida and former National Police director Salvador Figueroa. The hunger strikers say they were harassed by paramilitary forces shortly after starting their protest. On Nov. 9, the students said they would end their hunger strike because they were severely dehydrated. On the same day, a student march was announced in memory of Lopez Sanchez. The student leaders say they have been repeatedly intimidated and threatened with death by unidentified men driving around in vehicles with polarized windows. [Derechos Humanos en Guatemala #46, 11/10/95] According to US lawyer Jennifer Harbury, the AED students have been under non-stop death threats for months. "They are very dedicated and involved in all of the human rights work in Guatemala... such as escorting refugees, supporting the campesino efforts, helping the popular groups with all of their efforts, and even sitting in with me during the vigil in front of Las Cabanas [military base] last summer," writes Harbury. "They are, in short, the new generation." Harbury urges calls to the Guatemalan embassy in Washington (202-745-4952) asking for prompt and adequate legal action on the Lopez Sanchez case and an end to all repression, threats, harassment and brutality against the university students, especially those in the AED. [Letter from Jennifer Harbury, posted by Guatemala Human Rights Commission 11/8/95] In other student-related news, USAC engineering student Josue Manuel Mendez Holl has been missing since Oct. 6. The Association of Families of the Detained and Disappeared of Guatemala (FAMDEGUA) has asked the Guatemalan security forces to investigate... Luis Rodolfo Gaitan, a student who was running for mayor of Guanagazapa, Escuintla, died after being shot three times in the head by unidentified men as he was on his way to the Veterinary School at the USAC. Gaitan was a candidate for the Guatemalan Reform Party (PREG). [Guatemala Human Rights Update (Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA) #20/95 11/3/95]... USAC Communication Sciences student Jeffri Arrighi Ponce and his cousin Gustavo Adolfo Mendizabal, a student accountant, were shot to death in different sectors of Guatemala City after attending a Halloween party, it was reported on Nov. 2. Robbery was discounted as a possible motive. [Noticias de Guatemala Weekly Bulletin 10/28/95-11/3/95; Derechos Humanos en Guatemala #46, 11/10/95] In mid-October, members of the National Police union demonstrated in front of the Supreme Court, requesting the release of 16 police officers serving time for the Apr. 10, 1992 murder of USAC student Julio Cu Quim. The unionists argued that, according to the autopsy report, Cu Quim died from wounds made with a Galil rifle, which only the army uses. The police officers accused the government of covering up for the army. Cu Quim was killed by a joint task force, known as the Hunapu unit [see Update #115]. [Guatemala Human Rights Update (Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA) #20/95 11/3/95] 5. STUDENT KILLED, TEACHERS STRIKE IN ECUADOR Some 110,000 Ecuadoran teachers began a 48-hour strike on Nov. 9 to demand that the government increase funds for education from 14% to 30% of the national budget. The teachers, represented by the National Educators Union (UNE), are also demanding a 20% increase in teachers' minimum salaries, a supplementary bonus, payment of the government's debt with the Ecuadoran Social Security Institute (IESS) and the reopening of 2,000 schools closed for lack of funds. The government says it doesn't have enough money to meet teacher demands; government spokespeople charge that UNE is linked to the leftist Popular Democratic Movement and is using the strikes for political ends. As a prelude to the strike, the teachers held protest marches in various cities on Nov. 8. After the march in Quito, a group of UNE leaders--including some who are congressional deputies-- occupied the Education Ministry headquarters and held Education Minister Fausto Segovia hostage for two hours. The unionists released Segovia after he arranged a meeting for them with Finance Ministry authorities. A union spokesperson said the takeover was peaceful, and that Segovia could have ordered the police to throw out the unionists, but that he chose to maintain a dialogue instead. Segovia had presented his resignation just days earlier after a high school student was killed by a police tear gas canister at a demonstration; the minister is now waiting for President Sixto Duran-Ballen to designate his successor so he can leave his post. High school students in Quito held street demonstrations on Nov. 8, demanding an exhaustive investigation into the student's death. Students claim that police agents threw the tear gas canister directly at a group of people; the canister hit the young student in the head, fracturing her skull. Students clashed with security forces and seized buses as they continued their demonstrations in Quito on Nov. 9, the first day of the teachers strike. [El Diario-La Prensa 11/10/95 from AFP; El Daily News 11/9/95 from Reuter, 11/10/95 from Reuter] 6. MEXICAN PESO TAKES A FALL: "SEEDS OF REVOLUTION"? On Nov. 8 the Mexican peso plunged 4%, ending the day at a new low of 7.80 pesos to the US dollar. The dramatic fall came despite the Mexican government's efforts to shore up the currency by raising Treasury bill rates (which set the pace for most interest rates) to 54.24%, up 10.87%. The day before, the private sector had offered to create a $5 billion fund to protect the peso; the plan was shelved after the events of Nov. 8. The new fall brought the peso down 19% since Sept. 20 and 56% since last December. [Reuter 11/8/95; Financial Times (UK) 11/9/95; New York Times 11/9/95; Wall Street Journal 11/9/95] On Nov. 9 the currency fell even further to 8.25 to the dollar, but intervention by the central bank, Banco de Mexico, rescued it in the last 15 minutes of trading. The peso closed at 7.55 to the dollar, and managed to hold steady until the week closed the next day. [Associated Press 11/9/95; NYT 11/10/95 from Reuter] The peso's latest fall upset the predictions of many economists, who had expected the government's privatization and austerity measures to stabilize the economy by the last quarter of this year, with 20% inflation and a 3% growth rate next year [see Update #301]. Now the experts say the sharp rise in interest rates may "damage any fledgling economic recovery," according to the Financial Times. [FT 11/9/95] The earlier peso crisis and ten months of government austerity had already sharply reduced living standards for the majority of Mexicans. Saying that workers now make as little as $100 a month, Mario Saucedo, general secretary of the center-left Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), warned that the growing gap between the rich and the poor "was what provoked the armed uprising in Chiapas" [the 1994 insurrection by the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) in southeastern Mexico]. "[I]t's not yet the time to be sure that this movement has ended, or others that threaten to arise in [the southern states of] Guerrero, Oaxaca and Michoacan," Saucedo added [Diario Las Americas (Miami) 11/11/95 from AFP] Conservative US senator Alphonse D'Amato (R- NY) gave a similar warning on Nov. 9 to justify his opposition to US efforts to help the peso: "The social fabric of the country [Mexico] is coming apart under the austere conditions. You have the seeds of social turmoil and revolution in place--now you want to invest money in that system?" [NYT 11/10/95] 7. SALINAS, DOW JONES AND THE MEXICAN PESO CAPER The new peso crisis fulfills Mexican economist Carlos Heredia's Oct. 27 warning that President Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de Leon's economic strategy "in and of itself guarantees instability" [see Update #300]. But many in Mexico--both business executives and opposition leaders--also blame international speculators for the crisis, or at least for the coup rumors that brought the peso down by almost 6% for a few hours on Nov. 2 [see Update #301]. On Nov. 6 US ambassador James Jones, a former American Stock Exchange president, said his embassy had started an investigation to see if US sources had planted the rumors. [Inter Press Service 11/6/95; NYT 11/7/95] But the Mexico City daily La Jornada charges that the source of the rumors is already known. Early on Nov. 2 the New York-based AP Dow Jones agency ran an article by Mike Esterl with information from Frank Fernandez, head of the New York firm Global Emerging Markets. The article referred to reports that the Mexican military was "negotiating Ernesto Zedillo's resignation," that there were "confrontations in Chiapas" between the army and the EZLN, that troops were in the streets of Mexico City and that Finance Secretary Guillermo Ortiz Martinez had resigned. Esterl reportedly sent the AP Dow editors a note with the article: "The following is an analysis piece on the peso; please give it to Hammad Jawdat to edit; it needs to go out before the Mexican markets reopen Friday morning [Nov. 2] (stocks at 9:30 AM, New York time, currency exchange at 10 AM); thanks and greetings." [LJ 11/5/95, quotes retranslated from Spanish] AP Dow Jones is a news service of Dow Jones & Company, which publishes the Wall Street Journal. Former Mexican president Carlos Salinas de Gortari is a member of the Dow Jones board of directors [see Update 266]; he was reportedly in New York at the time the article was written, as was former Mexico City mayor and Chiapas peace negotiator Manuel Camacho Solis. On Nov. 4 PRD president Porfirio Munoz Ledo charged that the coup rumor was "another joke on the part of Mr. Salinas," who he said should be investigated and extradited. [LJ 11/5/95] Salinas is reported to be living in Montreal [see Update #301]. 8. MEXICO: ELECTIONS AND VIOLENCE IN SOUTHERN STATES Mexicans will vote in local and state elections on Nov. 12 in Mexico City, Michoacan, Oaxaca, Puebla, Sinaloa, Tamaulipas and Tlaxcala. [Equipo Pueblo Mexico Update, Vol. 2, #55, 11/7/95] The only gubernatorial race will be in the southwestern coastal state of Michoacan, which will also elect 30 deputies to the state legislature and 113 mayors. Some polls give a narrow lead to Victor Manuel Tinoco Rubi, the gubernatorial candidate of the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). The left-leaning PRD is hoping that its candidate, Cristobal Arias Solis, will win the party its first governorship ever. PRD founder Cuauhtemoc Cardenas Solorzano was Michoacan's governor before leaving the PRI, but the state's strong PRD base has been fractured by disputes within the party [see Update #289]. The conservative National Action Party (PAN) candidate, Felipe Calderon Hinojosa, is expected to come in third but with a better showing than the party usually makes in the state. [LJ 11/5/95] In the Federal District (DF), which includes most of Mexico City, voters will choose among candidates for 365 posts in the new "citizens councils," based on the city's colonias (neighborhoods). The DF's PRI-dominated government made the elections non-partisan, although about 75% of the candidates are running for "citizens groups" which are actually fronts for the parties--Citizens United for the PRI, Citizens' Movement for the PRD and Neighborhood Action for the PAN. The confusion is expected to aid the PRI candidates, who have access to PRI funding without the stigma of the party's name. The PAN projects that the PRI will win at least 265 seats; in the "worst scenario," the ruling party would take 349 seats, leaving the PAN with 12 and the PRD with four. [LJ 11/5/95, Mexico Update 11/7/95] On Oct. 30 Chiapas state police found the badly decomposed body of Ausel Sanchez Perez, PRI candidate for president of Angel Albino Corzo municipality (formerly Jaltenango de la Paz) in the Oct. 15 local elections. Sanchez Perez had been missing since he was kidnapped on Sept. 18, one day after the murder of PRD candidate Antelmo Roblero Roblero [see Update #295]. Police had previously arrested three members of the Francisco Villa Popular Peasant Union, a radical campesino group, for the murder of Sanchez Perez, who won the Oct. 15 elections in absentia. [Associated Press 10/31/95] PRD campesino supporters clashed with the police when they arrested the three suspects at the end of October. A fight between PRI and PRD supporters at the Queretaro ejido (communal farm), in the same municipality, led to the death of a child, Warlain Hernandez Velazquez, at about the same time. And on Oct. 28, the Sierra Madre de Motozintla Indigenous People (ISMAM) campesino coffee growers group charged that a member, Javier Galvez Roblero, was murdered in the area while inspecting land for the group. [LJ 10/29/95] As of Oct. 31 PRD supporters were still occupying the offices of five Chiapas municipalities they said the PRI won fraudulently on Oct. 15. [Mexico Update 10/31/95] Makeup elections were scheduled for Nov. 5 in five other municipalities where the October elections were invalid or were prevented by tensions. [LJ 10/22/95] As of Nov. 1, at least one of the makeup elections, in Ocosingo, was again postponed because election officials felt conditions were still not appropriate. [El Diario-La Prensa 11/3/95 from EFE] But the small municipality of Nicolas Ruiz was set to vote. The traditional indigenous assembly had already elected the PRD's Manuel de Jesus Ramirez Lopez mayor over the summer, but what one resident called "the first Chiapaneco municipality free of PRI supporters" at first refused to participate in formal elections. The town finally agreed to the makeup vote, in which the PRD slate ran unopposed. [LJ 11/5/95] Meanwhile, in the southwestern state of Guerrero, 40 Tlapaneco and Mixteco indigenous communities in the Costa Chica-La Montana region decided on Oct. 15 to set up autonomous communal police forces and to demand the dissolution of the state riot police. In Coyuca de Benitez, near Acapulco, the South Sierra Campesino Organization (OCSS) has asked for Amnesty International to intervene in the state; 21 OCSS members have been murdered since May 24, including 17 killed by state police in the June 28 Aguas Blancas massacre [see Updates #283 and 284]. The national PRD is filing a complaint with the governmental National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) over the Oct. 14 shooting of Martha Morales Vazquez, former PRD candidate for mayor of Tecpan de Galeana, Guerrero, and PRD member Baldomero Galeno Lagunas. Morales was hit in the spine and may be paralyzed; Galeno was shot in the liver. [LJ 10/29/95] [Following a source, Update #298 misidentified Galeno Lagunas, the nature of both victims' wounds and the municipality in which Morales was a candidate.] 9. CHILEAN CONGRESS DEBATES COMPROMISE HUMAN RIGHTS LAW On Nov. 7 family members of the disappeared in Chile blocked access to congressional buildings as the Senate began deliberations on a compromise human rights bill. The compromise bill was finalized on Nov. 4 after intense negotiations between the government and the liberal faction of the rightwing National Renovation (RN) party. The RN's hardline factions may still seek changes in the agreement at a congress of party leaders during the weekend of Nov. 12 in Temuco. The rightwing Independent Democratic Union (UDI) opposes the compromise and has threatened to break its alliance with the RN. The Socialist Party, part of the ruling Concertacion coalition, has also rejected the compromise accord. The human rights bill relates to 542 judicial cases still pending for people arrested and disappeared between Sept. 11, 1973 and Mar. 10, 1978, the period covered by the 1978 Amnesty Law. If approved, the law would appoint special civilian judges to investigate cases relating to disappearances. It would guarantee both anonymity and immunity from prosecution for the perpetrator of the crime, and for anyone who provides information on a case. The entire process remains secret, and no records are preserved afterwards. The new law would also give judges the power to close a case even if the victim's fate and whereabouts remain unknown. [La Jornada 11/5/95 from AP, Reuter, EFE; CHIP News 11/6/95, 11/7/95, 11/8/95; EDN 11/6/95 from AP, 11/8/95 from AP, 11/10/95 from AP; Inter Press Service 11/6/95] A proposal for human rights reform presented by President Eduardo Frei on Aug. 21 [see Update #291] would have required cases to remain open until the victims' remains are located, or until the judge rules that the victim is dead and that it is impossible to find the corpse. Frei's original proposal would also have put all cases under the jurisdiction of civilian courts, while the new accord allows some cases already under way to remain under military jurisdiction. Instead of automatically reopening all pending cases as Frei's proposal would have done, the new law would allow a case to be reopened when the plaintiff can show that new evidence exists. [IPS 11/6/95; EDN 11/6/95 from AP] "Human rights issues are just a banner for the communists," said ex-dictator and current army chief Gen. Augusto Pinochet on Nov. 7 in San Carlos de Bariloche, Argentina, where he was attending the 21st Conference of American Armies. Later the same day, Pinochet had to suspend a shopping trip in Bariloche after dozens of people surrounded him shouting "murderer." [CHIP News 11/8/95; EDN 11/8/95 from Reuter] Meanwhile, the National Corporation on Reparation and Reconciliation announced on Nov. 1 a media campaign to obtain information about disappearance victims via a toll-free telephone number. The corporation took over the human rights investigations work of the Rettig Commission established by the first Concertacion government. Fernando Escobar, acting executive director of the corporation, said that phone lines have been tied up with calls since the campaign began, and that his organization had received valuable information from callers. The campaign will last through November, and the information will then be processed and given to the Interior Ministry, which will decide what to do with it. [CHIP News 11/10/95] After five years of arduous investigations, the identities of 13 political prisoners executed on Sept. 19, 1973, in the northern city of Calama were confirmed on Nov. 6 by the Legal Medical Institute. The 13 bodies, buried in the desert area of El Buitre, were found along with four others in 1990. They formed part of a group of 26 disappeared political prisoners, missing since the Sept. 11, 1973 military coup. [CHIP News 11/7/95] 10. CHILEANS MARCH FOR LABOR AND HUMAN RIGHTS About 20,000 people marched on Nov. 9 in Santiago, Chile, to demand improved wages and working conditions and to express their opposition to the government's compromise human rights bill. The march, organized by the Central Union of Workers (CUT), began peacefully but ended with some rioting; 16 people were arrested and three police officers were slightly injured. Police said that none of those arrested were over 23 years old. [CHIP News 11/10/95; El Diario-La Prensa 11/12/95 from Notimex; Diario Las Americas 11/11/95 from AFP] "The march was tarnished by a small group of young people who do not belong to the CUT and came here specifically to provoke," said CUT vice president Arturo Martinez. CUT leaders and Carabineros police had previously agreed that police would not intervene in the march unless the 600 CUT members doing security at the event needed their assistance. Alex Figueroa, intendente of the metropolitan region, finally gave authorization for the march route on Nov. 4 after CUT signed an agreement promising to pay for any property damages incurred during the protest. [CHIP News 11/10/95, 11/6/95] CUT president Manuel Bustos was forced to cut his speech short when a group of about 100 people heckled him and threw coins, cans, stones and other objects, interrupting his comments about labor reforms, one of the main issues of the march. Sola Sierra, president of the Association for Relatives of the Disappeared (AFDD), also spoke at the march, calling the government human rights accord "cowardly." [CHIP News 11/10/95] Sierra is urging human rights supporters to join in a national protest march on Nov. 25, Pinochet's 80th birthday. [ED-LP 11/12/95 from Notimex] Sergio Buschmann, Communist Party leader and ex-member of the Manuel Rodriguez Patriotic Front (FPMR) rebel group, was among those attending the Nov. 9 march. Buschmann was freed on bail on Nov. 7; he faces trial for illegally bringing weapons into Chile nine years ago. Buschmann escaped from prison in 1987 and lived in exile, most recently in Nicaragua. He was arrested upon his return to Chile on June 14, 1994 [see Updates #228, #230]. [CHIP News 11/10/95; El Daily News 11/8/95 from Reuter] 11. STRIKE AGAINST PRIVATIZATION IN BOLIVIA Military troops took over Bolivia's oil installations and police tear gassed demonstrators in several cities as the Bolivian Workers Central (COB) held a 24-hour national general strike on Nov. 6. Called to protest the planned "capitalization" of the state-owned oil company YPFB, the strike was supported by the powerful oil workers union. YPFB employees are not affiliated with the COB, as company personnel is traditionally hand-picked from among ruling party militants. Under Bolivia's "capitalization" program, state-owned firms enter into deals allowing private international consortiums to become owners of 50% of shares and take charge of administration. Three state companies have already been privatized in this way [see Update #300] for a total sum close to $800 million; YPFB's privatization, scheduled for March 1996, could bring more than $2 billion. "The private firms are not going to take money out of their pockets to finance the capitalization: they will do so by raising prices or rates of the products (or services) provided by the capitalized companies," explained COB leader Oscar Salas. The union reported "total adhesion" to the strike, although the government claimed public and private business was carried out "with normality." Labor Ministry spokespeople admitted that the strike had "partial" impact in administrative sectors of YPFB, as well sa in the state education system, the universities and public health services. Oil workers had threatened to block a gas export pipeline to Argentina and to hold up domestic distribution of fuels. But media reports said that YPFB's principal refineries and pipelines were operating under military control without setbacks during the strike, despite the absence of workers. The government of President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada declared the strike illegal and threatened to fire strikers. COB leader Salas said the government responded to the strike with "savage repression" of peaceful demonstrators in La Paz and other cities. [El Daily News 11/7/95 from Reuter; Inter Press Service 11/3/95] 12. US TO DECLASSIFY DOCUMENTS ON HONDURAS The US State Department, National Security Council, Department of Defense and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) will reportedly be declassifying US government documents related to 184 disappearances in Honduras during the 1980s. Based on an appeal by the Honduran governmental human rights commissioner's office, the US decided to consider the matter as a "government-to- government" request, which speeds up the declassification process. Much of the pressure for declassification came from an expose published last June by the Baltimore Sun [see Update #281]. [Latin America Working Group Legislative Update 10/31/95] A representative of the human rights commissioner said on Sept. 23 that he had obtained new documents from US files explaining the role of the Honduran military in the forced disappearances of 184 people. [Inter Press Service 10/8/95] In a new article published in the Baltimore Sun, former US ambassador in Honduras Jack Binns claims that the State Department and the CIA ignored his charges about alleged human rights violations in Honduras. Binns--who served as ambassador from September 1980 to October 1981--said the US never paid attention to his constant reports from the embassy during that time. Binns said both he and the CIA representative in Honduras made at least four reports to the State Department about 12 Salvadorans who were arrested along with five children by the Honduran military in 1981. One of those arrested was Nora Gomez de Barrillas, who had been a secretary for murdered Salvadoran archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero. According to Binns, the Honduran military allowed the Salvadoran military to enter Honduras to interrogate and torture the detainees. The children were then turned over to Salvadoran authorities at a border post, and the 12 adults were put on a Salvadoran air force plane to be repatriated. When the plane landed in El Salvador, the 12 detainees were no longer aboard. "In other words," Binns said, "these people were thrown out of the plane somewhere on the way back to El Salvador, or into the Pacific Ocean, or over the sparsely populated border zone." Binns says the State Department did not react to his reports about the case, except to ask him to stop making the communications over official channels. [El Diario-La Prensa 10/31/95 from AP, quotes retranslated from Spanish] Forensic anthropologists from the private humanitarian organization Doctors for Human Rights announced on Oct. 29 that five bodies excavated from three secret graves in Honduras had been identified as disappearance victims from the 1980s. Among the five were Gustavo Morales Funez, a leader of the union representing state lottery workers, and Rolando Vindel Gonzalez, president of the union representing workers of the state-run electrical energy authority; the two were abducted separately on Mar. 18, 1984. The other victims were identified as Hans Albert Madisson Lopez, a university student who disappeared on July 8, 1982 during an army operation against the residence of journalist Oscar Reyes Bacca (Reyes was accused of transporting arms for the Nicaraguan Sandinistas and was deported to the US); Estanislao Maradiaga Linares; and Salvadoran citizen Carlos Alfredo Martinez, arrested in March 1984 and accused of transporting arms to the Salvadoran guerrillas. [El Daily News 10/30/95 from AP] 13. NICARAGUA ELECTION NEWS... Daniel Ortega Saavedra has been nominated as the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) presidential pre-candidate for Nicaragua's November 1996 elections. Ortega's pre-candidacy must be ratified in grassroots consultations of the party's base in February 1996. According to Radio Ya director Carlos Guadamuz, the nomination came after several months of indecision as the FSLN tried to find an outside candidate who would agree to lead the party in the elections. "The FSLN was knocking on doors, practically kissing the feet of certain elements of the bourgeoisie," Guadamuz complained, "and these people, as the representatives of what they are, slammed the doors in their face." [El Diario-La Prensa 11/12/95 from AFP]... Ex-contra leader Eden Pastora Gomez announced his presidential candidacy on Nov. 5 for the Democratic Action Movement (MAD), a political party he formed two years ago. Pastora was known as Commander Zero when he was a Sandinista fighter; in 1981 he left the FSLN to lead his own contra group on Nicaragua's southern border. Pastora later dedicated himself to industrial fishing in Costa Rica. [El Daily News 11/6/95 from AP]... On Nov. 9 eight former leaders of the National Resistance (RN) contra group joined the National Project (PRONAL) political organization headed by former presidency minister Antonio Lacayo. PRONAL accepted the contra leaders' request to incorporate them as an RN bloc within PRONAL's national coordination council. The eight RN leaders include Oscar Sobalvarro (Commander Ruben). [El Diario-La Prensa 11/10/95 from AFP; EDN 11/10/95 from AP] In January of 1992, Sobalvarro resigned from his position as deputy director of the government's Repatriation Institute, in charge of overseeing the return of contras to Nicaragua [see Update #103]. In other news, Germany has forgiven nearly 81% of Nicaragua's $714.2 million debt and assigned a 23-year term for cancellation of the remainder, Nicaragua's foreign cooperation ministry announced on Nov. 2. The announcement followed two days of negotiations in Managua between a delegation of 10 German officials and a team headed by Foreign Cooperation Minister Erwin Kruger. Most of the debt came from deals made between the Sandinista government and the former East Germany. [Diario Las Americas 11/4/95 from EFE; ED-LP 11/3/95 from AFP] 14. PERU: MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS AND OTHER NEWS... Peruvians will vote in municipal elections on Nov. 12 for 185 provincial mayors and 1,599 burgomaestres, mayors of municipal districts. Many candidates are seeking reelection, and most races are expected to be close. In Lima, independent candidate Alberto Andrade of the "We Are Lima" coalition is facing Jaime Yoshiyama of the ruling "Change 90-New Majority" coalition. [El Diario-La Prensa 11/10/95 from EFE] Seventeen people were injured in Jaen, Cajamarca department, when fireworks exploded prematurely at a campaign rally organized by Jaen mayoral candidate Walter Prieto. [Diario Las Americas 11/11/95 from EFE] The Board of Elections (National Office of Electoral Process) has chosen the multinational IBM corporation to run data processing for the municipal elections. [The New Flag Vol. 2, #3 October/November 1995 from Expreso] On October 25, thousands of teachers and workers from the hospitals, textile, municipals, banks, fishing industry and universities held a massive general strike in Lima. Several demonstrators were wounded with live ammunition fired by the military. The next day the army invaded the campus of San Marcos University and arrested 34 students; the students were later tortured at the headquarters of the intelligence service (DINCOTE). Several students began a hunger strike to protest the arrests. [The New Flag Vol. 2, #3 October/November 1995 from Expreso] Peruvian financier Carlos Manrique was extradited from the US to Peru during the weekend of Oct. 1. Manrique will face trial in Peru for defrauding some 160,000 people of the $300 million they deposited in his financial institution, the Latin American Center of Business Advice (CLAE), before he disappeared in April of 1994. [El Daily News 10/5/95 from Reuter] 15. DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: SOCIAL DEMOCRATS RATIFY CANDIDATE Jose Francisco Pena Gomez was confirmed on Nov. 5 as the presidential candidate for the Dominican Revolutionary Party (PRD) and its seven allies in the Santo Domingo Accord for general elections scheduled for May 16, 1996 in the Dominican Republic. Fernando Alvarez Bogaert of the Unidad Democratica (UD) was confirmed as the vice presidential candidate. The ratification took place at the PRD's 16th national convention; attending along with some 10,000 Dominicans were former Ecuadoran president Rodrigo Borja, Puerto Rican Independentist Party (PIP) senator Ruben Berrios Martinez, and former Nicaraguan interior minister Tomas Borge of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). [El Daily News 11/6/95; El Diario-La Prensa 11/6/95 from AP] Pena Gomez, vice president of the Socialist International, won 58% of the total votes cast in primary elections on Oct. 22 in which all the parties in the Santo Domingo Accord participated. [EDN 10/24/95] 16. IN OTHER NEWS... On Nov. 7, the US military began joint military maneuvers with the armed forces of five Central American nations--Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and Belize--at the Palmerola US air force base in Honduras. The "Allied Forces 96" maneuvers are designed to train 80 Central American civilian and military representatives and 100 US troops in planning tactics for humanitarian assistance, using simulations of natural disasters. [El Diario-La Prensa 11/8/95 from AP]... Demonstrations continued in Argentina's provinces on Nov. 6 [see Updates #297, #300]. Some 10,000 people demonstrated against pay cuts in Mendoza; at least six people were injured when police used tear gas and rubber bullets against a group of demonstrators trying to enter the provincial legislature building. State workers and teachers in Cordoba held noisy street demonstrations in front of the provincial economy ministry to demand back pay. State workers in Jujuy shut down public administration and schools with a three-day strike for back pay; hospitals remained open for emergency services only. In Salta, state workers attacked the mayor's office in the capital. [El Daily News 11/8/95 from AP]... Workers in Uruguay held a four-hour general strike on Nov. 9 to protest the economic policies of the government of President Julio Maria Sanguinetti. The strike was called by the Inter-Union Plenary of Workers--National Workers Convention (PIT-CNT) to protest unemployment and demand a larger budget for education; it coincided with a 24-hour strike held by teachers. Strikers gathered in front of the legislative assembly where the new five-year general budget is being discussed. [El Daily News 11/10/95 from AP]... Leftist rebels killed one guard and freed nearly 80 prisoners from a prison in southwest Colombia in an attack that began just before midnight on Nov. 7. Citing police sources in the southwestern city of Popayan, Caracol radio reported on Nov. 8 that guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) used rocket-propelled grenades to punch gaping holes in the San Isidro prison, allowing 78 inmates to flee. Some of the escapees were subsequently recaptured, the radio reported. The prison was almost completely destroyed in the attack. [Reuter 11/8/95]... Trinidad and Tobago's two main political parties each won 17 parliamentary seats in general elections held Nov. 6. With the black-dominated People's National Movement (PNM) and the Indian-dominated United National Congress (UNC) tied, the two seats won by the National Alliance for Reconstruction (NAR) will determine the next government. Labor leader Basdeo Panday of the UNC is reportedly seeking an alliance with NAR to control the government; if he is successful, he will be the country's first prime minister of Indian origin. Senior officials of the main parties said on Nov. 7 that whether or not a coalition government is formed, another election to resolve the deadlock was likely, and could be called fairly early next year. [Financial Times 11/8/95] 17. UPCOMING EVENTS IN THE NYC AREA AND BEYOND For more information, call NSN at 212-674-9499. Events listed are not necessarily endorsed by the Nicaragua Solidarity Network. IFCO/Pastors for Peace Faith & Reconciliation Brigades to Chiapas, Mexico, 1/5-12/96. Visit indigenous communities, meet w/clergy supporting grassroots mvt. 612-870-7121, fax 612-870- 7209, email p4p@igc.apc.org 11/15 WED, 7:30 PM - "Privatization: No Good for Women, No Cure for the Economy." Mtg. 32 Union Sq East, #907. FREE. Dinner at 7 PM ($6). Radical Women, 212-677-7002. 11/16 THU, 3 & 6 PM - "If the Mango Tree Could Speak." Documentary about children growing up in midst of war in El Salvador & Guatemala, by Patricia Goudvis. Museum of Modern Art, 11 W 53rd St. $8 (students $5). 617-338-4969. 11/16 THU, 7 PM - CREED monthly mtg. Discuss 1996 anti-maquiladora campaign. Location TBA. 212-645-5230. 11/16 THU, 7 PM - Forum on conscientious objectors in Latin America, w/Oscar Duenas (Honduras), Luis Cardenas Vasquez (Chile), Ricardo Pinzon Contreras (Colombia). 81-10 35th Ave, Rm 7, Jackson Hts. In Spanish w/translation. Call 212-674-9499. 11/17 FRI, 7 PM PM & 11/18 SAT, 7 PM - "Target Colombia: Popular Video & Community Voices in Colombia," video series at 4th Annual Colombian Film Festival. 2nd Ave & 2nd St. $5. Colombia Multimedia Project, 212-802-7209. 11/17 FRI, 6:30 PM - A forum on the Carter-Torrijos Treaties and their economic impact on Panama in the year 2000, with Lilia C. Smith and Olier Avila from the Panamanian National Commission on Human Rights and the Service for Peace and Justice (SERPAJ- Panama). Medgar Evers College, Norman B. Johnson lecture hall, 1650 Bedford Ave, Bklyn. For info call Greg Myers at 718-270-5122 or Yvonne Hay at 718-270-5039. 11/18 SAT, 9 AM - International Work-a-thon to refurbish affordable housing for Norwalk area residents while raising funds for Nagarote, Nicaragua. 53/55 Woodward Ave, Norwalk, CT. Register by 11/12 at 203-852-0120. Norwalk/Nagarote Sister City Project & Neighborhood Housing Services of Norwalk. 11/18 SAT, 12 NOON - "March for Social Justice & Rights of Latin American Workers Against Policies of Giuliani & Pataki." 137th & Bway. Coalicion Latina Por la Justicia Social, 212-927-9065. 11/19 SUN, 10:30 AM - CREED subway theater. Loc TBA. 718-349-3148. ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 For more info, e-mail accounts@blythe.org, or gopher://ursula.blythe.org/11/NY-Transfer-News/ =================================================================