WEEKLY NEWS UPDATE ON THE AMERICAS ISSUE #327, MAY 5, 1996 NICARAGUA SOLIDARITY NETWORK OF GREATER NEW YORK 339 LAFAYETTE ST., NEW YORK, NY 10012 (212) 674-9499 1. May Day Roundup 2. Cuban May Day Protests Embargo 3. Mexico May 1: Independent Unions Rule 4. Mexican Video Journalist Sentenced to 13 Years 5. Small May 1 Demo in Haiti Protests Privatization 6. New Union Leadership Celebrates May Day in Chile 7. Venezuelans Protest IMF on May Day 8. Unions Unite for Nicaraguan May Day 9. May 1 Protests in Argentine Provinces 10. Workers Beaten, Arrested in Paraguay General Strike 11. Dominican Republic: Plot to Deport Black Voters? 12. Carter Predicts Trouble in Dominican Vote 13. Brazil: Landowner Paid Police to Massacre Peasants 14. Brazil Ex-Cop Sentenced in Massacre of Street Kids 15. US Papers Show Kennedy Rebuffed 1961 Cuba Offer 16. Activists Sentenced for Protesting US Army School ISSN#: 1084-922X. 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MAY DAY ROUNDUP May 1--International Workers Day--was celebrated throughout Latin America with marches, strike calls and demonstrations against neoliberal policies, privatization, unemployment and low wages. "Privatization will not pass!" was the chant on May 1 in El Salvador, where some 10,000 to 15,000 workers from 60 unions attended a peaceful march called by the United Workers Central (CUT) and the National Union of Salvadoran Workers (UNTS) to protest the planned privatization of the country's telecommunications, water and electricity services. The demonstrators were also protesting the efforts of the business sector to destroy the union movement at any cost. [Diario Las Americas (Miami) 5/3/96 from AFP; El Diario-La Prensa (NY) 5/2/96 from combined services; United Press International 5/1/96] More than 30,000 Hondurans participated in a May 1 march in Tegucigalpa, called by the Unitary Confederation of Honduran Workers (CUTH), General Workers Central (CGT) and the Confederation of Honduran Workers (CTH) to protest the country's economic situation. Another 20,000 workers marched in the city of San Pedro Sula. Banana workers of the Tela Railroad Company Workers Union (SITRATERCO) held their own May 1 march near the plantations of El Progreso and Puerto Cortes, led by some 500 campesinos from the evicted Tacamiche plantation [see Update #314]. Workers chanted slogans against President Carlos Roberto Reina at all the marches; in Tegucigalpa, a cross-bearing, half- starved worker held a sign reading: "This isn't AIDS, it's lack of food." [El Tiempo (Honduras) 5/2/96; UPI 5/1/96] May Day marchers in Guatemala called for the signing of a definitive peace accord between the government and guerrillas; respect for labor rights; and an end to privatizations. [ED-LP 5/2/96 from combined services] May Day marches in Ecuador were focused on campaigning by presidential candidates as the May 19 general elections near [see Update #319]. A large number of workers, students, campesinos-- and particularly women--turned out in Quito to reject the economic policies of the government of President Sixto Duran Ballen, such as privatization, salary "unification" and changes to the social security system. The march was criticized by some as lacking fervor; spectator Jorge Beltran said the marchers "looked like they were forced" to participate. One of the groups with the largest representation at the march was the indigenous Pachakutik Movement. Indigenous leader Luis Macas of the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE) is running for national deputy on the Pachakutik ticket. Macas says he is certain of being elected to the legislature, given his broad backing from the worker, campesino, indigenous, intellectual and professional sectors. [Diario Hoy (Quito, Ecuador) 5/2/96, electronic edition] Bolivia's labor day march turned into a protest against the recently approved privatization of the country's oil industry, with union members declaring "a day of mourning" and workers draping black ribbons over their banners in La Paz. A tearful labor leader described the new hydrocarbons law as a defeat for the unions that fought to keep the company in state hands. "I don't think that any honest Bolivian can be happy about the new oil law, because it is a very serious thing that will weigh on our country for a long time," said Oscar Salas, executive secretary of the Bolivian Workers' Central (COB). [UPI 5/1/96] In Peru, workers threatened to carry out a national civic strike to protest the government's privatization plans. [ED-LP 5/2/96 from combined services] The General Confederation of Peruvian Workers (CGTP) used the May 1 holiday to step up its campaign to collect signatures on a petition calling for a national referendum on the issue of privatization of the state-run oil company, Petroperu. [La Republica (Lima) 5/2/96, electronic edition] In Colombia, marches were held in the principal cities to promote union demands for a national accord to end the country's political crisis. Thousands of workers gathered in Bolivar Plaza in the capital, Bogota, to demand direct worker participation in such an accord. [ED-LP 5/2/96 from combined services] Uruguayan workers held marches on May 1 to reject neoliberal policies. The demonstrations in Montevideo followed a half-day strike by workers on Apr. 30 and a march through the city's poor neighborhoods in which participants drummed on pots and pans, protesting against 11.8% unemployment. Transport workers union leader Ricardo Clavijo said workers faced an "economic, social and ideological war... Today more than ever, the question is between neoliberalism and democracy." [UPI 5/1/96] *2. CUBAN MAY DAY PROTESTS EMBARGO Despite heavy rain, close to a million Cubans--according to official figures--marched on May 1 in Havana in the country's first May Day celebration since Cuba began its so-called "special period" of economic difficulties several years ago. In the provincial capitals, similar marches drew crowds ranging from 200,000 people in Santiago de Cuba to 10,000 in Pinar del Rio, according to official figures. President Fidel Castro presided over the march in Havana, which began after a less than two- minute speech by Pedro Ross Leal, reelected the night before as secretary general of the Cuban Workers Central (CTC) at the close of the labor federation's 17th congress. The principal theme of the march was condemnation of the US embargo and the embargo- tightening Helms-Burton law [see Updates #319, 320] [Diario Las Americas 5/2/96] "Millions of Cubans today reaffirm our unbreakable decision to fight for independence and reject the Helms-Burton law," Ross told the rally. [Reuter 5/1/96] Meanwhile, Florida-based Cuban emigres sent a tiny flotilla of three yachts to the edge of Cuba's territorial waters and tossed flowers and labor rights pamphlets into the sea. US Coast Guard patrol boats were in the area--"surprisingly" according to the crew of one of the yachts--but were said to not be escorting the boats. In Washington, the State Department said it warned flotilla organizers of the "potentially serious consequences" of entering Cuban waters and that it would take action against any US vessels or airplanes that violate Cuban territory. [El Diario- La Prensa 5/2/96 from AFP; Reuter 5/1/96] The Cuban armed forces set up two anti-aircraft batteries on the Havana waterfront, facing north toward the US. [Reuter 5/1/96] Castro called the tiny emigre flotilla "ridiculous." [Diario Los Andes (Mendoza, Argentina) 5/3/96, electronic edition, from Reuter] *3. MEXICO MAY 1: INDEPENDENT UNIONS RULE For the second year in a row Mexico's Congress of Labor (CT), the country's main labor umbrella group, cancelled its traditional May 1 mass march in Mexico City. For most of the century the major unions, dominated by the pro-government Mexican Workers Confederation (CTM), have marked the day with processions of workers thanking the Mexican president and the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) for the year's economic achievements. But with Mexico deep in a recession that started in December 1994, the union leadership chose instead to hold a brief ceremony in which several hundred handpicked union members greeted President Ernest Zedillo Ponce de Leon and 96-year old CTM head Fidel Velazquez Sanchez. Even this select audience gave the president some angry whistles. [New York Times 5/2/96] In 1995 independent unions and other groups took advantage of the CTM's absence to hold their own May 1 demonstration against Mexico's neoliberal economic programs [see Update #275]. This year the same groups--including the Authentic Labor Front (FAT), the leftist Route 100 Urban Passenger Auto Transport Workers Union (SUTAUR 100), various grassroots organizations, the center- left Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) and the El Barzon ("The Yoke") debtors movement--formed the May 1 Inter-Union Coalition to organize the march. But this time 21 CT unions, defying the CT leadership's ban, formed their own May 1 coalition, the Union Forum Before the Nation, which marched in a separate but coordinated anti-neoliberal protest. The Forum unions, which include the powerful Telephone Workers Union (STRM), represent about 2 million of the CT's 12 million members. [Mexican Labor News and Analysis, Vol. 1, #8, 5/2/96; John Ross's Mexico Barbaro #14, 5/5-10/96] Government security forces said the two demonstrations together only turned out 17,000 people; union leaders set the total at 100,000, and the left-of-center Mexico City daily La Jornada estimated 250,000 participants. [MLNA 5/2/96] The New York Times simply described the demonstrations as "huge." [NYT 5/2/96] The two marches took more than five hours to cover 22 blocks from the Monument of the Revolution to the Ninos Heroes Monument and then to the city's mammoth main plaza, the Zocalo. The various rallies and marches went on all day, from about 9 AM until 4 PM. Marchers ranged from housewives in the Francisco Villa Popular Front to women from the September 23 Communist League, a guerrilla group from the 1970s, to the journalists union, including workers from Notimex, the official news agency. Engineers in the Nuclear Energy Workers Union (SUTIN) contingent carried a picture of Albert Einstein and the slogan: "50 Years of Hiroshima, 0 Years of Development," while campesino groups chanted to the government: "If [revolutionary leader Emiliano] Zapata was alive, he'd screw you royally." In the Zocalo PRD founder Cuauhtemoc Cardenas Solorzano called for greater labor unity; earlier in the day Alfredo Dominguez of the FAT read a similar message from "Sub-Commander Marcos," leader of the rebel campesino Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) based in the southern state of Chiapas. In Chiapas itself, 10,000 workers marched in Tuxtla Gutierrez for higher wages and against privatization, while 5,000 EZLN supporters demonstrated in San Cristobal de las Casas; about 300 demonstrators seized XERA, the state radio station, for 50 minutes to broadcast the EZLN May Day message and other statements. Tens of thousands of Mexicans marched in most of the other states, some in official CT ceremonies and others in opposition protests. In the southeastern state of Campeche, even members of the conservative opposition National Action Party (PAN) took to the street to protest federal fiscal policies. [LJ 5/2/96, electronic edition] Protests continued on May 3, when 25,000 teachers demonstrated in Tuxtla Gutierrez to demand a 100% pay raise, blocking state offices for four hours. At the other end of the country, 1,000 teachers occupied state offices in Tijuana, Baja California Norte, to demand back pay. [LJ 5/4/96, electronic edition] *4. MEXICAN VIDEO JOURNALIST SENTENCED TO 13 YEARS On May 2 Judge Juan Manuel Alcantara Moreno of Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, sentenced video journalist Javier Elorriaga Berdegue to 13 years for the crimes of terrorism, rebellion and conspiracy. Indigenous activist Sebastian Entzin was sentenced to six years on the same charges; Enztin speaks so little Spanish that the sentence had to be read to him by a Mayan translator. Elorriaga and Entzin were among about 20 Mexicans seized at the beginning of the federal government's failed February 1995 military offensive against the EZLN; all are charged with being EZLN leaders. The evidence against Elorriaga came from a certain Salvador Morales Garibay, who disappeared after making the charges, and Maria Gloria Benavides, Elorriaga's wife. Benavides says her testimony was obtained through torture; charges against her, based on the same evidence, were dropped on July 14 [see Update #286]. [LJ 5/3/96 electronic edition] Elorriaga and Entzin are appealing the convictions. Legislators from the center-left PRD denounced the judge's decision as a "provocation" and "declaration of war," and at least one legislator from the ruling PRI, Dep. Jaime Martinez Veloz, said the decision was "unfortunate" and "doesn't prepare the road to peace." Federal governance secretary Emilio Chuayffet Chemor is reportedly worried about the decision and looking for a way of resolving the cases. [LJ 5/4/96, electronic edition] The Fray Bartolome Human Rights Center is suggesting faxes to President Ernesto Zedillo (52-5-271-17-64) and Governance Secretary Chuayffet (52-5-703-21-71) asking for freedom for all the prisoners accused of being EZLN members. [Urgent Action Alert 5/3/96] *5. SMALL MAY 1 DEMO IN HAITI PROTESTS PRIVATIZATION A May 1 demonstration in Port-au-Prince by some Haitian unions and grassroots organizations against government privatization plans was a success according to its organizers and a failure according to Haitian president Rene Preval. Only a few hundred people participated in the protest, marching from the National Cathedral to the National Police headquarters with an effigy of "Preval the country-seller" dressed as Uncle Sam. The marchers included several well-known artists and some Parliament members; unionists from Electricite d'Haiti (EDH), one of the nine firms to be sold off, came in 25 trucks. Officials from Preval's left-populist Lavalas movement had organized actively against the anti-privatization mobilization, which had support from some Lavalas sectors. Despite the low attendance, Preval called an unscheduled press conference a half hour after the demonstration ended to tell reporters that the protest had failed, while admitting that there is "anxiety" among public employees. [Haiti Info Vol. 4, #113, 5/4/96] At least one international wire service ran a dramatic photograph of demonstrators carrying signs with slogans like: "The bourgeoisie should pay taxes." [Diario Las Americas 5/3/96, source uncited] Since Apr. 15 the Preval government has been holding a month of negotiations with international lending agencies over the "economic reforms" (including privatization) that would be necessary to obtain new loans. On Apr. 16 US embassy spokesperson Stanley Schrager announced that one half ($44 million) of US aid for the year was suspended because of "insufficient" progress in the investigations into the murders of rightists since October 1994, when US troops restored former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide to power. The cases include the March 1995 murder of rightwing lawyer Mireille Durocher-Bertin [see Update #270] and what the US calls "commando-style executions" of 20 other rightists. Schrager said that the cutoff was due to a foreign aid act amendment introduced by Republican Senate leader Bob Dole (R- KS). "The relaunch of the economy is vital for the country," Schrager noted. "The donors...have several millions of dollars to help the country...but you have to fulfill a set of conditions... [P]rivatization is part of the economic reforms." [Haiti Info Vol. 4, #12, 4/20/96] Although the US government blames the cutoff on Dole, the amendment conditions the aid on certification by US president Bill Clinton that the Haitians are conducting a "thorough" investigation. The State Department made the determination in mid-April that the probe was "insufficient." [New York Times 4/29/96] On Apr. 11 Haitian ambassador Jean Casimir sent the US Congress a letter defending his government's investigations. An accompanying status report notes that Haiti had asked the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) for information on an unnamed "major drug dealer who was also a senior coup regime official," referring to the 1991-94 military government. Durocher-Bertin was in this official's car when she was murdered; another alleged drug dealer, Eugene Baillergeau, was the driver. Haiti has also "requested access to US intelligence intercepts of cellular telephone conversations between Mrs. Durocher-Bertin and her husband just prior to her murder." Casimir notes that Haiti is also trying to have the "suspected mastermind" of the November 1995 murder of Lavalas Dep. Jean-Hubert Feuille extradited from the US. [Republic of Haiti, President's Press Service packet, 4/16/96] Meanwhile, the US has still not given the Haitian government 160,000 pages of documents US troops seized from the Haitian military and other rightwing groups in 1994. [Daily News 5/3/96] In other news, former Haitian official Patrick Elie has reportedly been held in detention in the Alexandria [Virginia] Detention Center for the last two weeks on unknown charges. Elie was responsible for anti-drug operations under the Aristide government and was frequently a source for US reporters about links between Haitian rightists and South American drug cartels [see Update #207]. [Notice posted by jstam@ibm.net 5/5/96] *6. NEW UNION LEADERSHIP CELEBRATES MAY DAY IN CHILE In Chile, some 10,000 people attended the May 1 rally in Santiago organized by the Central Union of Workers (CUT), exceeding the union's expectations of attendance. The CUT used the occasion to make public its demand that the monthly minimum wage be almost doubled to $105,000 pesos ($256). The current minimum wage is $58,900 pesos. The Labor Ministry is proposing that the minimum wage be raised to $64,000 pesos. Socialist Party (PS) member Roberto Alarcon publicly addressed union members for the first time in his new role as CUT president. Last year's May Day celebrations saw CUT president Manuel Bustos of the Christian Democrat (DC) party pelted with eggs and roundly booed [see Update #275]. This year, the crowd listened silently to the new CUT leader, interrupting only to applaud his speech. In addition to the hike in the minimum wage, Alarcon called for the unity of the country's labor unions and emphasized the autonomy of the CUT, Chile's largest national labor federation. Government officials were not formally invited to participate in this year's May Day event; in previous years they occupied the specially reserved front row of chairs at May Day celebrations. Leaders of the ruling Concertacion coalition were absent from the rally, as were DC union leaders Maria Rozas--the DC's candidate for the CUT presidency--and outgoing CUT president Bustos. [CHIP News 5/2/96] The DC lost the CUT leadership in elections two weeks earlier after six years of leading the labor federation. Because none of the three political slates obtained a majority on the 45-member national board, the election of the CUT leadership took more than a week of negotiating for what DC candidate Rozas presumed would be a compromise formula to allow her to become the first woman to head the CUT. But in the end, an alliance between the PS and the Communist Party (PC) managed to defeat the DC. The elections provoked deep conflict within the Concertacion coalition, which includes the DC and the PS but not the PC. The DC, allied with the Radical Social Democrat Party, obtained only 16 seats on the national union council, six less than before. An alliance between the PS and the rightwing Independent Democratic Union (UDI) won 14 council members, and the PC gained four new positions for a total of 13. Two seats went to independent socialists. [CHIP News 4/22/96] On May 2, a strike at the Chuquicamata Division of Chile's state copper corporation (CODELCO) brought all operations to a standstill. Some 96% of the workforce supported the strike call. [CHIP News 5/3/96] *7. VENEZUELANS PROTEST IMF ON MAY DAY The Venezuelan government marked May 1 by announcing further structural adjustment measures, part of an economic plan developed under pressure from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that includes a devaluation, higher fuel prices and an increase in sales taxes [see Update #325]. "We knew the workers would show understanding and a patriotic spirit to receive [the measures] as a commitment by everyone and for everyone," said President Rafael Caldera in a televised message late on Apr. 30. Official estimates place unemployment in Venezuela at 10%, although independent calculations come closer to 20% of the workforce. [UPI 5/1/96] There were disturbances during the week in the cities of Cabimas and San Felipe over the price hikes and resulting drop in worker purchasing power. [UPI 5/1/96] The National Guard arrested about 70 people and injured six in Cabimas, an oil-producing city located on Lake Maracaibo in the far western state of Zulia. The violence reportedly began when some demonstrators broke away from a peaceful protest march and began to loot stores and businesses in the center of Cabimas. [Diario Las Americas 5/2/96 from EFE] Populist leader Hugo Chavez, a former military officer who led a coup attempt in February 1992, headed up a May 1 march in Caracas. Chavez warned that the government's economic adjustment plan "has detonated" any uprising or rebellion that might occur. Chavez insisted that "we wouldn't want another grassroots or military rebellion in Venezuela, because it could lead to a civil war." Instead, the leader of the Bolivarian Revolutionary Movement (MBR) called for the formation of a "national resistance" that would promote a referendum for a transition government. [DLA 5/3/96 from AFP] Demonstrators at the May Day march burned a banner depicting a US flag--decorated with caricatures and references to the IMF, the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and US president Bill Clinton--to protest the structural adjustment. Defense Minister Gen. Moises Orozco Graterol warned that the armed forces are prepared to intervene to reestablish public order whenever police forces are overwhelmed by demonstrations. [DLA 5/4/96 from AFP] In the early hours of May 1, the Venezuelan teachers unions signed an accord with the government that ended a 47-day strike by 180,000 teachers. The accord was signed at 2 am in Miraflores Palace, the government's headquarters, after teachers protesting the pact assaulted the Labor Ministry to block the planned signing ceremony there. Some 5,000 teachers opposed the union accord; as anti-riot police surrounded the Labor Ministry, some of the protesters managed to enter the offices of deputy labor minister Maria de Govea, where they destroyed a door and furniture, and reportedly beat a Labor Ministry official. [DLA 5/1/96 from AFP, 5/2/96 from EFE] *8. UNIONS UNITE FOR NICARAGUAN MAY DAY According to Nicaraguan rightwing daily La Prensa, only 300 people attended this year's May 1 march in Managua. [NICNEWS La Prensa headlines 5/2/96 via email] But this year, for the first time, 10 of the country's 11 union federations joined together for a May Day event, held at the Olof Palme Convention Center in Managua. Some 1,500 representatives were expected to attend the event [a photograph of the meeting ran in Miami daily Diario Las Americas, but the caption did not mention how many people attended]. Among the labor federations involved were the Sandinista Workers Central (CST), linked to the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN); the "socialist" General Workers Confederation (CGT); the "communist" Confederation of Action and Union Unity (CAUS); the Christian democratic Nicaraguan Workers Central Confederation (CTN); the "social democratic" Confederation of Union Unity (CUS); the National Confederation of Nicaraguan Teachers (CNMN); the FSLN-linked National Employees Union (UNE); and the FSLN-linked Farm Workers Association (ATC). The 10 unions--or all 11 of them, according to Spanish news service EFE--signed a document in which they agreed to "work together" and "struggle" against unemployment. In their declaration, the union federation leaders pledged to work "for unity in diversity." [DLA 5/4/96 from EFE, 5/3/96 from AFP] The union leaders also called a strike for May 6 to protest against government plans to privatize the state-owned electricity company. [UPI 5/1/96] Labor Ministry figures place unemployment in Nicaragua at 53.2%, the highest in Latin America; independent analysts and union leaders say the real figure is around 60%. The minimum monthly salary for work considered less skilled is $42, while the cost of a basic basket of goods for the survival of a family was $144.42 in January, according to official figures. [DLA 5/3/96 from AFP] *9. MAY 1 PROTESTS IN ARGENTINE PROVINCES In Argentina, the government-linked union General Workers Confederation (CGT) did not celebrate May 1, although dissident union sectors held protests against the government's neoliberal economic policies. [El Diario-La Prensa 5/2/96 from combined services] Demonstrators from public employee unions in Salta province held protests outside the provincial legislature on May 1 as governor Juan Carlos Romero inaugurated the new legislative session. Angry at a reduction in public spending and the resulting layoffs, the protesters chanted hostile epithets at the governor; union activists threw noise bombs and clashed with police who were guarding the building. The demonstrators were finally dispersed with tear gas by an infantry column. In Neuquen, more than a thousand state workers gathered in front of the legislature building to protest the structural adjustment plan instituted by governor Felipe Sapag, at the same time that Sapag was inaugurating the new parliamentary session and announcing new cuts in public spending. In his speech, Sapag warned that if the financial crisis continues, "beginning in July we will not be able to pay the salaries...because we won't have any more resources and because the credits received will be used up." Among other measures, Sapag announced a "reformulation" of the provincial government with "greater austerity." In Cordoba, governor Ramon Mestre warded off new conflicts and strike threats by promising union leader Jose Pihen of the Public Employees Union (SEP) that he will maintain a 100 peso bonus in public workers' assets. [Diario Los Andes 5/2/96, electronic edition, from Telam] *10. WORKERS BEATEN, ARRESTED IN PARAGUAY GENERAL STRIKE The four principal union federations of Paraguay followed up the May 1 labor day holiday with a 48-hour general strike on May 2 and 3 to protest the government's economic policies and the 10% wage hike decreed in April. The union federations--the leftist Unitary Workers Central (CUT), the Church-based National Workers Central (CNT), the rightwing government-linked CPT, and the rightwing public employees federation Cesitep--are demanding a 31% increase in salaries. According to Reuter, the strike succeeded in shutting down most economic activity in the capital. The new strike followed up on a 24-hour strike on Mar. 28 [see Update #322, 323]. [Diario Los Andes 5/3/96 from Reuter; Diario Hoy 5/2/96 from AFP] More than a hundred people were injured on May 2; the first clash was early in the day, on the outskirts of the capital, where police shot into the air and used nightsticks and shields to beat demonstrators who were blocking primary access roads. Some 100 people were treated for injuries and about 100 were arrested. Police sources claim that at least two police agents were wounded by bullets. [Diario Los Andes 5/3/96 from Reuter] Also among the injured were at least three journalists. [Diario Hoy 5/3/96 from EFE-AFP] Another serious clash took place in the central Plaza of Democracy, where police used clubs and shields to crack down on some 5,000 demonstrators. [Diario Los Andes 5/3/96 from Reuter] Through his spokesperson Edward Bogado, President Juan Carlos Wasmosy denied any responsibility for the police violence. Interior Minister Diogenes Martinez also denied any responsibility, pinning the blame on National Police chief Agustin Sapriza. Sapriza admitted that there had been some excesses, but said they were appropriate under the circumstances. [Diario Las Americas 5/4/96 from EFE] "This is a demonstration of the government's coherence: it offers cabinet posts to seditious military officers, and distributes blows to workers who are demanding better wages," CUT president Alan Flores told Reuters shortly before being arrested. [Flores was referring to a failed coup attempt the previous week by army chief Lino Oviedo--see Update #326.] [Diario Los Andes 5/3/96 from Reuter] Flores has been demanding that Wasmosy resign and be replaced by Vice President Roberto Seifart. Spokespeople of the labor alliance responsible for the strike denied that the action is seeking Wasmosy's ouster, though they admitted that the president's departure would be welcome if it led to an improvement of the situation for workers and campesinos. [Diario Hoy 5/2/96 from AFP] It was rumored that by midday, only the 16 most important union and youth leaders in the country were still being detained at a police security station on the outskirts of Asuncion. The union of the National Electricity Administration (ANDE) warned that if the leaders were not released immediately, they would shut down the Itaipu hydroelectric facility, which supplies electricity to Paraguay and part of Brazil. [Diario Los Andes 5/3/96 from Reuter] Other public sector unions threatened to cut off water and telephone services if the detainees were not freed. [Diario Hoy 5/3/96 from EFE-AFP] The leaders--including CNT president Eduardo Ojeda, who had been injured by police--were released on the evening of May 2, about 12 hours after being arrested. As the detainees were being freed, strike leaders read a statement demanding a political trial for President Wasmosy, charging that he was complicit in last week's coup attempt. [El Diario-La Prensa 5/3/96 from EFE] *11. DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: PLOT TO DEPORT BLACK VOTERS? The social democratic Dominican Revolutionary Party (PRD), which is leading the polls to win the May 16 presidential elections, has charged that the government is conspiring against it. As evidence, the PRD presented Rafael Antonio Pimentel, who claimed to be a member of the ruling Social Christian Reformist Party (PRSC). Pimentel said that a high level official of the presidency and an ultra-nationalist lawyer had given him a large advance on a contract to kill PRD presidential candidate Jose Francisco Pena Gomez. PRD security picked up Pimentel as he was casing out the candidate's campaign route. After presenting Pimentel to the press, the PRD turned him over to the police. Hours earlier, Pena Gomez had charged that people close to the circle of advisers of President Joaquin Balaguer were illegally bringing combat weapons into the country. According to Pena Gomez, these weapons would be used to instigate an armed clash between the PRD and the Dominican Liberation Party (PLD), led by candidate Leonel Fernandez. Pena Gomez also accused Fernandez and the PLD--charged with being in alliance with the ruling PRSC--of preparing a plan to keep black Dominicans from voting. The PLD has charged that there are 170,000 "foreigners"--meaning black Haitians--in the Dominican Republic who are preparing to vote for Pena Gomez, a black Dominican of Haitian descent. Human rights organizations say that more than 3,000 undocumented Haitians and black Dominicans who lack the necessary documents to prove their citizenship have been expelled from the country in the past few days. The PLD has asked its representatives in the electoral colleges to block people suspected of being "foreigners" from voting. Cesar Estrella Sadhala, president of the Central Electoral Board (JCE), has warned that no one who has a legal voting card and is listed on the voter rolls can be prevented from voting on the basis of suspicions, due to their color of skin or condition of foreign origin. [El Diario-La Prensa 5/5/96 from EFE] Estrella told Dominican immigration authorities that they must not expel any Haitian or foreigner who has legally obtained identity documents. Human rights and religious organizations in the Dominican Republic have charged that among 5,000 people deported recently are a number of Dominicans whose documents were stolen by the military so that they could not prove their nationality. [Diario Las Americas 5/4/96 from EFE; ED-LP 5/2/96] The Dominican Human Rights Committee (CDH) and the Center of Coordination and Animation of the Haitian Church (CEDAIL) say that military troops have been stepping up sweeps of Haitians in Santo Domingo and in more than seven provinces, and that those deported also include a large number of Dominican children. CEDAIL added that according to testimony gathered in the religious community, "these government actions have been carried out with bad treatment and lack of respect for the dignity of those people deported." In some cases, charges CEDAIL, there is evidence of "family separation, leaving children abandoned; in others, not allowing the workers to gather their belongings; [and] some [detainees] were held in military fortresses without any personal hygiene facilities." The CDH called the mass deportations "a racist, exclusionary and political action, for purely electoral" reasons. The CDH confirmed that in the northwestern provinces, authorities "have stripped of their identity cards Dominicans whose parents are of Haitian origin." [DLA 5/3/96 from AFP] *12. CARTER PREDICTS TROUBLE IN DOMINICAN VOTE A Gallup polling firm survey in March of this year showed Pena Gomez leading the race for the Domincican presidency with 42%, Fernandez in second place with 37%, and Jacinto Peynado of the PRSC in third place with 15%. [ED-LP 5/2/96] So far in this year's campaign, five activists from the Santo Domingo Accord--the coalition backing Pena Gomez--and one from the PLD have been killed in clashes between the two opposition forces [see Update #315]. In the most recent killing, PRD leader Nelson Cepeda was shot in the back by PLD member Leonidas Martinez in front of the PRD headquarters in La Herradura, Santiago province. [DLA 5/2/96 from EFE] Former US president Jimmy Carter and former Colombian president Belisario Betancur, representing the Carter Center's Council of Freely Elected Heads of State, will be observers in the Dominican elections this year. Both arrived in Santo Domingo on Apr. 24, invited by the JCE and leaders of the three main political parties, for a two-day visit and evalution of the pre-electoral situation. Joining them in the pre-electoral delegation were several representatives of the Carter Center in Atlanta and of a number of regional organizations, as well as former center-left Argentine presidential candidate Jose Bordon. The Carter Center observed the Dominican elections in 1990, judging that there was no evidence "that could have changed the electoral results"; and in 1994, where "the irregularities observed could have affected the results...". On Apr. 19, Organization of American States (OAS) secretary general Cesar Gaviria Trujillo visited the Dominican Republic and met with President Balaguer to inform him that the OAS wished to send a mission immediately to begin observation of the electoral process. Despite the meeting, Balaguer has continued to resist extending the necessary formal invitation to the OAS observers. [ED-LP 4/24/96, 4/26/96] Speaking from Guyana, where he was helping elaborate a national development project during the week of Apr. 22, Carter said it was "very possible that serious difficulties could emerge during the elections because President Balaguer is not running for reelection for the first time in many years." Carter will also be an observer in Nicaragua's general elections on Oct. 20. [DLA 4/26/96 from EFE, quote retranslated from Spanish] In other Dominican Republic news, doctors began to return to work at hospitals run by the Public Health Secretariat on Apr. 30 after a six-month strike [see Update #301]. Doctors working at hospitals run by the Dominican Social Security Institute (IDSS) are continuing their strike, however, because they have not been given three months worth of back pay withheld during the strike. IDSS doctors held a demonstration in front of the agency's offices in Santo Domingo to protest the decision of the IDSS council of directors. [ED-LP 5/1/96 from AP, 5/3/96] *13. BRAZIL: LANDOWNER PAID POLICE TO MASSACRE PEASANTS On May 3, a landowner from Para state told Justice Minister Nelson Jobim and Federal Police director Vicente Chelotti that another local landowner had collected money from among 20 landowners to pay police $100,000 to carry out the Apr. 17 massacre of at least 19 landless protesters [see Update #325]. The witness and his family, whose identities are being kept secret, are currently under the protection of the Federal Police. The witness charged that three days before the massacre, Plinio Pinheiro Neto, owner of the Macaxeira estate, had asked him to make a contribution for the operation. "He told me that [local Military Police (PM) commander] Col. [Mario] Pantoja asked for a bribe of $100,000 to help in the eviction, [and for] arms and ammunition," the witness told TV Globo. (Col. Pantoja has been suspended and is under house arrest.) Each landowner was to contribute $5,000, and Pinheiro had made clear that the objective was to eliminate 10 leaders of the Landless Movement (MST). "Then I told him that I would not take part in this dirty game," said the witness. Pinheiro, interviewed by TV Globo, denied the accusation. The 55,000-hectare Macaxeira estate had been occupied for a year by some 200 landless peasants, who considered it unproductive and therefore eligible for expropriation under agrarian reform laws; Macaxeira was invaded in April by some 1,500 MST members in support of the occupants' demands. [El Diario-La Prensa 5/4/96 from Notimex; La Jornada 5/4/96 (electronic edition) from AFP, AP, DPA, EFE, Reuter] The anonymous witness also confirmed MST accusations that professional gunmen disguised as PM agents participated in the massacre, and he even identified two of them as Gilberto Macedo and Ailton Bispo Dos Santos, names which had been mentioned by the MST members. As the charges were made public, the new agrarian reform minister, Raul Jungmann, announced the suspension of the purchase of Macaxeira, for which the National Institute of Colonization and Agrarian Reform (INCRA) had offered to pay $1.8 million reales. The MST applauded Jungmann's decision, and announced it would step up occupations of unproductive estates in Para near the cities of Maraba, Tucurui, Sao Geraldo, Jacunda and Eldorado Carajas. [LJ 5/4/96 from AFP, AP, DPA, EFE, Reuter] In the meantime, President Fernando Henrique Cardoso seems to be backtracking on promises to accelerate agrarian reform in Brazil. Local press reports allege that Cardoso has decided not to ask Congress to give priority status to the approval of a law that would speed up the expropriation of unproductive land by limiting landowner appeals. [Diario Las Americas 5/3/96 from EFE] Brazilian workers were less than thrilled when the government announced that an increase in the minimum wage would take effect on May 1. The 11.2% increase brings the new monthly wage to 112 reales, about $113. Workers, economists and politicians all protested the small increase, arguing that it should have been raised in proportion to inflation, which was more than 20% over the past 12 months. [DLA 5/2/96 from EFE] *14. BRAZIL EX-COP SENTENCED IN MASSACRE OF STREET KIDS On Apr. 30, after three hours of deliberation, a jury in Rio de Janeiro convicted former state military police (PM) agent Marcus Vinicius Borges Emmanuel on six counts of murder and sentenced him to 309 years in prison. Judge Jose Geraldo Antonio then reduced the sentence to 30 years, the maximum allowable under the Brazilian penal code. Borges Emmanuel had been charged with eight counts of murder for the killing of eight street children on the steps of the Candelaria church in Rio on July 23, 1993; on Apr. 29 of this year, he confessed to one of the killings after two years of denial. His defense lawyer, Sandra Bossio, announced that she will appeal the case and request a new trial. Three others accused in the case--Lt. Marcelo Ferreira Cortes, police agent Claudio Luiz dos Santos and civilian Jurandir Gomes de Franza--are set to be tried on May 27. Another four accused, including PM agent Nelson Oliveira dos Santos, who the previous week confessed his participation in the massacre, are expected to be tried at a later date. [El Diario-La Prensa 5/1/96 from AP; Diario Las Americas 5/1/96 & 5/2/96 from EFE] Wagner Dos Santos, a former street child who survived the massacre, arrived in Rio on Apr. 27, amid heavy security and guarded by 20 federal police agents, to testify in the trial. Dos Santos lives in Switzerland under the protection of Amnesty International (AI). In his testimony before the jury, Dos Santos fingered Lt. Ferreira and another police agent as members of the death squad that carried out the massacre. In their confessions, Oliveira and Borges Emmanuel both insisted that Lt. Ferreira and the other agent are innocent. According to a juvenile court report, 6,033 children and adolescents died violently in the city of Rio betewen 1985 and 1995. According to statistics from human rights groups like AI, minors continue to be murdered in Brazil at the rate of four per day. Even the Brazilian justice system admits that in 95% of the cases of murder of minors, no one is convicted. [DLA 5/1/96 from EFE] *15. US PAPERS SHOW KENNEDY REBUFFED 1961 CUBA OFFER US government documents declassified last month reveal that in 1961 then-US president John Kennedy pushed ahead with economic pressure and covert actions against Cuba despite the Cuban government's willingness to give in to the US on key points, according to a report in the Miami Herald. On Aug. 17, 1961, Argentine-born revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara arranged to meet with Kennedy's assistant special counsel, Richard Goodwin, at a cocktail party while Goodwin was in Uruguay working on the US-sponsored Alliance for Progress. According to a memo Goodwin sent the president, Guevara, who was then part of Cuba's revolutionary government, said Cuba was ready to drop any political alliance with the Soviet bloc and to pay for nationalized US properties; Cuba would also consider cutting support for leftist insurgents in other Latin American countries. In exchange, Goodwin wrote to Kennedy, Guevara "said...they didn't want an understanding with the US because they knew that was impossible," but they "would like a modus vivendi." Goodwin advised the US president to reject the offer. "Pay little public attention to Cuba," he wrote, and "quietly intensify" economic pressure. Kennedy followed Goodwin's advice. In November he authorized Operation Mongoose, a $50 million covert action with 477 full-time employees, headed by the president's brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy. "My idea is to stir things up on the island with espionage, sabotage, general disorder, run and operated by the Cubans themselves with every group but Batista- ites and Communists," the attorney general noted in a handwritten Nov. 7 memo. "Do not know if we will be successful in overthrowing [Cuban leader Fidel] Castro, but we have nothing to lose in my estimate." "[D]iscussion of the assassination of Cuban leaders should not be put in writing," a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) memo warned, but a State Department annotation said that CIA "twice...supplied lethal pills to US gambling syndicate members working on behalf of CIA in a plot to assassinate Fidel Castro" in early 1961 and early 1962, with a third effort in mid- 1962. [Miami Herald 4/29/96] On Apr. 30 of this year the US State Department issued its annual report on terrorism around the world. As it did last year, the State Department included Cuba in a list of seven countries that allegedly sponsor international terrorism. [New York Times 5/1/96 from AP] On Apr. 24 the US enacted the Comprehensive Antiterrorism Act, which makes it a crime for US citizens or residents to raise funds for groups the president designates as "terrorist" [see Update #326]. In New York City, mayor Rudolph Giuliani and rightwing Cuban emigre leader Jose Basulto of the organization Brothers to the Rescue attended a street naming ceremony on May 3 in which the corner of 38th Street and Lexington in Manhattan was named "Hermanos al Rescate Esquina" ("Brothers to the Rescue Corner"). Several politicians argued that Giuliani did not have the authorization of the City Council to name the street. The corner is just outside the Cuban Mission to the United Nations (UN); Cuban diplomats began blasting salsa music out their windows in the middle of Giuliani's speech. "That is the music of the tyrant," said Giuliani. [ED-LP 5/4/96] *16. ACTIVISTS SENTENCED FOR PROTESTING US ARMY SCHOOL On Apr. 29, US District Court Judge J. Robert Elliott sentenced 13 activists to federal prison for protesting at the US Army School of the Americas (SOA) in Columbus, Georgia last Nov. 16. The protest--held annually on Nov. 16 to mark the day when six priests and two coworkers in El Salvador were killed by SOA graduates in 1989--is part of a campaign to close SOA, which trains Latin American soldiers. Rev. Roy Bourgeois, a Maryknoll priest and founder of SOA Watch, was sentenced to the maximum of six months in prison for trespassing. Other protesters were sentenced to terms of four months and two months. Rev. Bourgeois previously served a 15-month prison term after he was sentenced for a protest in 1990. For more information about SOA, visit http://www.derechos.org/soaw/ or contact SOA Watch, PO Box 3330, Columbus, GA 31903, 706-682-5369. [SOA Watch Press Release 5/1/96] END MISS our calendar of events? Check out the CREED NYC calendar at http://homebrew.geo.arizona.edu/creed.html (if you don't have web access, write to nicadlw@nyxfer.blythe.org for info). NOW AVAILABLE: The long-awaited Annual Update Index! Available for each year from 1991 through 1995. Ascii text versions free to subscribers via electronic mail. Send your request to nicanet@nyxfer.blythe.org NOW AVAILABLE: "Immigration in the USA One Year After Proposition 187," a Weekly News Update on the Americas special report, accompanied by a resource list and organizing leaflet. Ascii text version free to subscribers via email. Send your request to nicajg@nyxfer.blythe.org 1996 SOURCE LIST NOW AVAILABLE: A list of sources commonly-used in the Weekly News Update on the Americas, along with abbreviations and contact information. Free to subscribers. Send your request to nicanet@nyxfer.blythe.org