WEEKLY NEWS UPDATE ON THE AMERICAS
                   ISSUE #328, MAY 12, 1996
       NICARAGUA SOLIDARITY NETWORK OF GREATER NEW YORK
     339 LAFAYETTE ST., NEW YORK, NY 10012 (212) 674-9499

1. US Declassifies Guatemala Documents
2. Guatemalan Government and Rebels Sign Agrarian Accord
3. US Soldiers Honored for Combat in El Salvador
4. Mexican Peace Talks Stalled by "Terrorist" Case
5. Mexico: 10 Dead in Chiapas
6. Mexico: Superbarrio at Harvard
7. US Senate Passes Immigration Bill: "Everything but the Rack"
8. Prisoners on Hunger Strike in Chile, Argentina
9. New Massacres in Colombia Banana Region
10. Communist Leaders Attacked in Colombia
11. Colombia to Get UN Human Rights Office?
12. Nicaragua: FSLN Elects Candidates
13. Venezuelan Students Protest Economic Policy
14. People With AIDS Protest Drug Delays in Brazil
15. Fast Against Cuba Embargo Strong at 80 Days
16. Other News: Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Brazil, Dominican Rep.
 
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*1. US DECLASSIFIES GUATEMALA DOCUMENTS

On May 6, the US government declassified and released to the
public thousands of documents on US human rights abuses in
Guatemala. A number of classified documents released to Congress
on May 3 were not included among the papers released. A US
government official leaked the classified papers to the New York
Times, which published excerpts from them on May 12. Unlike the
documents which were released, the classified documents strongly
suggest that Guatemalan Col. Julio Roberto Alpirez, a paid
informant of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), was
implicated in the the 1990 murder of US innkeeper Michael DeVine,
as well as the subsequent cover-up. The excerpts indicate that
Alpirez was also involved in the torture and murder of Guatemalan
guerrilla leader Efrain Bamaca Velasquez, husband of US lawyer
Jennifer Harbury. Rumors of Alpirez' possible involvement in drug
trafficking were also mentioned. [NYT 5/7/96, 5/12/96]
 
Reading a statement at a May 6 press conference, Dianna Ortiz--a
US nun who was abducted and tortured by the Guatemalan military
in 1989--described the several thousand pages of documents
released to her on May 3 by the US State Department as
"disappointing." Ortiz announced she is filing a lawsuit against
the US agencies to which she submitted requests for information
over a year ago. She also announced she was suspending the silent
vigil she had held in front of the White House since March 31,
and the bread and water fast she had begun on Apr. 22 [see
Updates #322, 323, 326].
 
The documents released to Ortiz do not reveal the identity of
"Alejandro," the North American her torturers referred to as
their boss, or the identities of her Guatemalan torturers. Of all
the documents Ortiz received from the State Department, only one,
dated 1990, contains a significant reference to Alejandro. It
reads as follows: "VERY IMPORTANT: We need to close the loop on
the issue of the 'North American' named by Ortiz as being
involved in the case....The EMBASSY IS VERY SENSITIVE ON THIS
ISSUE, but it is an issue we will have to respond to publicly
when the [ABC News `Prime Time'] show airs." The next paragraph
and the whole next page of this document is censored for
"national security reasons." 
 
Ortiz has worked with forensic artist Jean Boylan to produce
sketches of three of her Guatemalan torturers and of "Alejandro".
She unveiled the sketches at the May 6 press conference. The
Washington Post published the sketch of "Alejandro" with an
article on May 12. [Ortiz statement 5/6/96 posted by Guatemala
Human Rights Commission/USA; WP 5/12/96]
 
Over a hundred supporters were arrested for civil disobedience in
front of the White House during the last week of the Ortiz vigil,
including Bishop Thomas Gumbleton of Detroit, Daniel Ellsburg and
Phillip Berrigan. [Ortiz statement 5/6/96] A group of nuns held a
protest in front of the US embassy in El Salvador on Apr. 30,
holding photographs of Ortiz in a solidarity vigil to support her
demands. [Diario Las Americas (Miami) 5/2/96 from AFP]
 
*2. GUATEMALAN GOVERNMENT AND REBELS SIGN AGRARIAN ACCORD

On May 6, rebel commanders of the Guatemalan National
Revolutionary Unity (URNG) and government representatives signed
an "Accord on Socioeconomic Issues and the Agrarian Situation" at
a ceremony in Mexico City. The accord focuses on decentralizing
the state and its services and increasing Guatemalans'
participation in the decisions that affect their lives. The
accord also commits the government to increasing the population's
access to social services such as health care and education and
to the country's resources, especially land. 
 
By the year 2000, the government pledges to increase government
spending on health and education by 50% over 1995; guarantee at
least three years education for all children between the ages of
seven and 12; achieve 70% literacy; cut infant and death during
childbirth by half; and provide job training for 200,000 workers.
The government also agrees to spend 300 million quetzales ($5
million) annually from 1997 to 1999 on basic infrastructure, and
to spend at least 1.5% of tax revenue on subsidized housing.
 
To pay for the state's cost of increased social investment,
higher taxes and improved tax collection are also planned.
By the year 2000 the government must collect at least 10%
of the nation's gross domestic product in taxes, 50% higher than
that collected in 1995, the accord stipulates. Stiffer penalties
for tax evasion are promised but not detailed.
 
On the land issue, the accord provides for the establishment of a
land bank consisting of lands available for purchase and credits
to help those with few financial resources; and a new land
registry. The bank is to redistribute vacant or illegally
obtained state lands--especially those in northern Alta Verapaz
and Peten provinces--to landless campesinos. Funds will be
provided for the bank to buy lands; they can also be acquired
through existing expropriation laws. The registry will determine
what lands are available for redistribution and will help settle
disputes over land titles.
 
Citing the importance of the input and participation of all
Guatemalans in establishing true democracy, the government
pledges to support and give a leading role in the design of
development policy to the Rural and Urban Development Councils.
The government will promote legislation that increases the range
of sectors participating in these councils.
 
With the signing of the socioeconomic accord, the URNG pledged to
end the collection of "war taxes" from rich plantation owners in
areas where the rebels operate.
 
Guatemala's landless campesinos were cautious in their evaluation
of the new accord. "The signed accord does not fulfill the
aspirations of our people. Perhaps it is just barely a step
forward," reads a statement by the Advisory Assembly of the
Displaced Populations (ACPD). The ACPD notes that the accord does
not specify from which year the projected land registry will
date. But the agreement does establish mechanisms that--"if we
struggle"--can be used to begin solving Guatemala's problems, the
ACPD stated. The National Coalition of Campesino Organizations
(CNOC) warned that land occupations will continue despite the
agreement. "The start of an immediate structural solution to the
agrarian problem is still missing," said CNOC leader Juan Tiney.
[Cerigua Weekly Briefs #18, 5/9/96]
 
On the same day the accord was signed, an employee of the
Episcopal Conference of Guatemala (CEG) was robbed, abducted,
interrogated under torture and released on the outskirts of the
capital, according to firefighters who rescued him. Raul
Hernandez Chacon, secretary of CEG's Education Commission, was
apparently not badly injured; neither CEG nor Hernandez have made
statements to the press about the incident. [El Diario-La Prensa
(NY) 5/8/96 from EFE] The CEG, which represents Guatemala's
Catholic bishops, was one of the parties invited to the signing
of the accords. [Cerigua newsfeed 5/5/96]
 
*3. US SOLDIERS HONORED FOR COMBAT IN EL SALVADOR

On May 5, a memorial service was held at Arlington National
Cemetery in Virginia for 21 US soldiers who were killed in action
in El Salvador during the counter-insurgency war against the
leftist guerrilla group Farabundo Marti Front for National
Liberation (FMLN). Later, at an Arlington hotel, about 50 of the
more than 5,000 US veterans of the war in El Salvador were
honored for their service. 
 
"For too long, we have failed to recognize the contributions, the
sacrifices, of those who served with distinction under the most
dangerous conditions," William Walker, US ambassador to El
Salvador from 1988 to 1992, told the cemetery crowd. "Only today,
a full four years after the achievement of peace, are we finally
and officially proclaiming that those who served and those who
died did so for the noblest, the most unselfish of reasons."
 
During the war, the US went to great lengths to deny that US
troops were involved in combat in El Salvador. Officially there
were only 55 US advisers in El Salvador at any one time, and
their rules of engagement prohibited them from participating in
combat actions. But they carried weapons, received combat pay,
and accompanied Salvadoran government troops in the field. The
issue was aired on a CBS "60 Minutes" program last May 21 [see
Update #281]. But official recognition came only this past
February when US president Bill Clinton signed the 1996 defense
authorization act. A provision pushed through by Rep. Robert
Dornan (R-CA) ordered the Pentagon to give Armed Forces
Expeditionary Medals to all who served in El Salvador from
January 1981 to February 1992, when a ceasefire took effect and
the war officially ended. 
 
Even now, the military is reluctant. The May 5 awards ceremonies
were not organized or promoted by the Pentagon but by No Greater
Love, a nonprofit group dedicated to comforting relatives of
those killed in military service or by acts of terrorism. Lt.
Col. David Pickett, commander of an army helicopter assault unit,
is the only soldier killed in El Salvador to be buried at
Arlington. [Washington Post 5/6/96] [The article does not say
when Pickett was killed, but says he was "murdered by
guerrillas."]
 
In a communique, the FMLN praised the US government's decision to
recognize the participation of US soldiers in combat during the
war. During the war, the FMLN continually charged that US troops
were participating in military operations. Former FMLN guerrilla
commander Nidia Diaz (Maria Marta Valladares), now a deputy in
the legislature, has charged that when she was wounded in combat,
she was captured by US troops. [Diario Las Americas 5/10/96 from
AFP]
 
*4. MEXICAN PEACE TALKS STALLED BY "TERRORIST" CASE

Peace talks between the Mexican government and the rebel
Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) may be suspended as the
result of the May 2 sentencing of two alleged EZLN members for
terrorism, rebellion and conspiracy [see Update #327]. The EZLN
will not return to the negotiations, scheduled to resume on June
10, if video journalist Javier Elorriaga Berdegue and indigenous
activist Sebastian Entzin Gomez are not released, according to
Gustavo Esteva, an adviser to the rebels. [La Jornada (Mexico)
5/11/96, electronic edition]
 
Elorriaga was arrested in the southeastern state of Chiapas--the
home of the EZLN's two-year old rebellion--on Feb. 9, 1995 at the
beginning of a federal military offensive against the rebels. A
group of soldiers had seized Entzin at a roadblock near
Altamirano, Chiapas a month earlier on Jan. 7 (not in February,
as the Update's sources reported last week); journalists were
present and verified that he was carrying no arms, contrary to
the charges against him. [LJ 5/5/96] The left-leaning Mexico City
daily La Jornada reported last January that far from working as a
terrorist for the rebels, Elorriaga had carried secret
correspondence back and forth between the EZLN and Mexican
president Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de Leon in an effort to start a
dialogue. [LJ 1/5/96, posted by Elliott Young 5/6/96]
 
Judge Juan Manuel Alcantara Moreno sentenced Elorriaga to 13
years and Entzin to six. He ruled that Elorriaga was "in charge
of press work and propaganda" for the rebels, specifically noting
that Elorriaga had made a video, "Voyage to the Center of the
Jungle," about the EZLN. The video has been distributed
commercially, both in Mexico and internationally. Legal expert
Emilio Krieger dismissed the sentences as "one more atrocity" by
the government. Porfirio Munoz Ledo, president of the center-left
Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), stressed that the two
were convicted of terrorism, even though Mexican attorney general
Antonio Lozano Gracia had recently said in Lima [presumably at
the Apr. 24-7 conference on terrorism; see Update #326] that the
EZLN rebels were not terrorists. "This is the logic of the
government," Munoz Ledo told a May 4 rally in Mexico City. "The
people who form the social bloc for dialogue are terrorists!" [LJ
5/5/96]
 
On May 4 Sen. Heberto Castillo Martinez (PRD-Veracruz) resigned
from the Commission for Concord and Pacification (COCOPA), the
federal Congress's mediation group, over the Elorriaga and Entzin
cases. Castillo, who was the group's president, said he wouldn't
return unless "the boys are set free." [LJ 5/5/96] Castillo, an
engineer and veteran leftist, was a professor at the time of the
1968 student strike and was himself a political prisoner for two
years in the period of repression that followed [see Update
#246]. He is now running to succeed Munoz Ledo as PRD president;
he is probably the most moderate of the four candidates. [LJ
5/5/96]
 
On May 7, some 150 members of the Zapatista National Liberation
Front (FZLN), the rebels' civilian group, seized a radio station
in San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, for 30 minutes to
broadcast a message demanding the prisoners' release. "[T]he real
terrorists are in the government," said the group, headed by
Amado Avendano Figueroa, an independent who was the PRD's
candidate for Chiapas governor in 1994. [El Diario-La Prensa
5/8/96 from EFE]
 
*5. MEXICO: 10 DEAD IN CHIAPAS

Meanwhile, a small-scale civil war has been going on in the
neighboring, mostly Tzeltal towns of Chilon and Bachalon near
Ocosingo in the Chiapas highlands. The "Chinchulines," a
paramilitary group supporting the ruling Institutional
Revolutionary Party (PRI), have been holding the town of Chilon
since last month, patrolling the streets and threatening
inhabitants. The Chinchulines also issued threats against the
Center for Indigenous Rights (CEDIAC) and its president, Rev.
Jose Aviles, SJ. [United Associated Ministries (Tacoma, WA),
5/5/96]
 
The Chinchulines beat and harassed a group of people in Bachalon
on the evening of May 4. Police officials say PRD supporters
retaliated the next day by attacking the home of Chinchulines
head Geronimo Gomez Guzman. Gomez Guzman was killed in the
incident. The Chinchulines then burned some ten houses and set a
convent and a Jesuit house on fire. Four more Chinchulines and
one PRD supporter were killed in fighting that day. [Equipo
Pueblo Mexico Update #71, 5/8/96 from LJ 5/6-7/96; United Press
International 5/6/96] Human rights organizations reported on May
9 that five more bodies were found, apparently PRD supporters
killed in retaliation by the Chinchulines. [Diario Las Americas
5/11/96 from AFP; Press release posted 5/9/96 by
fxsi@uibero.uia.mx]
 
*6. MEXICO: SUPERBARRIO AT HARVARD

On May 10 masked Mexico City activist "Superbarrio Gomez" visited
Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This was the
first US appearance in his campaign for the US presidency. While
supporters chanted "Go, go, Gomez," Superbarrio announced his
platform: a profound reform of the US's "one-party system,"
control over the flow of international capital, and an economic
integration policy that benefits the majority of people on the
continent. In a campaign that combines comedy with serious
political points, the candidate met with leading US intellectuals
such as John Coatsworth, head of Harvard's David Rockefeller
Center for Latin American Studies, and linguist and social critic
Noam Chomsky, who offered to sign Superbarrio's declaration.
 
Asked what he would say to the Harvard economists who had
designed the neoliberal economic model being imposed on Mexico
and other Third World countries, the activist said: "The Harvard
and Yale economists are as dynamic as Batman and Robin: they know
how to destroy everything, but they don't know how to build
anything." [LJ 5/1//96]
 
*7. US SENATE PASSES IMMIGRATION BILL: "EVERYTHING BUT THE RACK"

On May 2 the US Senate voted 97-3 for an immigration bill that
will nearly double the number of Border Patrol agents to almost
10,000 by the year 2000, increase detention space by two thirds
to 9,000 beds, and provide sentences of up to 15 years for
forging documents relating to immigration status. The bill also
sets up several pilot programs for making employers use a
computerized national database to check the immigration status of
all new employees. These programs were promoted by liberal
senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and conservative senator Alan
Simpson (R-WY). The House passed a similar bill in March, and the
two versions have to be reconciled before the final bill is sent
to US president Bill Clinton. [New York Times 5/2/96, 5/3/96]
 
The US political establishment is enthusiastic about the Senate
version, which the New York Times called "sensible." [NYT 5/7/96]
The Washington Post's editors write: "We do not share the fear
that [mandatory job database programs] present major civil
liberties problems." [WP  5/6/96] But Sen. Simpson, the bill's
main author, told reporters: "We have stuff in there that has
everything but the rack and thumbscrews for people who are
violating the laws of the United States." [NYT 5/3/96]
 
The Senate immigration bill removes a provision of the Anti-
Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, signed by
Clinton on Apr. 24, that would allow summary deportations of
people who enter the US without a visa [NYT 5/2/96] This
provision, of questionable Constitutionality, would have made
entry virtually impossible for asylum seekers [see Updates #325
and 326]. Meanwhile, the US Supreme Court has scheduled a hearing
for June 3 on another of the terrorism act's more questionable
provisions, limits on habeas corpus appeals for death-row
prisoners. Four of the nine justices protested the unusual haste
in testing a new law. The New York Times, which opposes the death
penalty, asks: "Why the rush?... The likely answer is that the
conservative majority, which has expressed frustration with the
often-protracted appeals process in death penalty cases, is
racing to validate a new law removing obstacles to executions."
[NYT 5/9/96]
 
*8. PRISONERS ON HUNGER STRIKE IN CHILE, ARGENTINA

Some 45 political prisoners at the Maximum Security Prison in
Santiago, Chile, have been on hunger strike since midnight of
Apr. 30 to protest poor conditions at the facility. The prison,
opened March 1994, was specially built for "high risk" political
prisoners. In the early hours of May 1, seven of the striking
prisoners were transferred to the Colina II prison in northern
Santiago. The seven are all leading members of either the Lautaro
anarchist movement or the armed faction of the Revolutionary Left
Movement (MIR). National prison director Claudio Martinez said on
May 2 that the prison service will not meet the strikers'
demands,  which include improved medical care and extended
visitation privileges. Visits are currently limited to immediate
relatives. [CHIP News 5/3/96; Diario Las Americas 5/3/96 from
AFP]
 
More than 100 Argentine prisoners infected with HIV, the virus
linked to AIDS, are on hunger strike in three prisons in Buenos
Aires province to demand the release of fellow prisoners who are
in the terminal phase of AIDS. The hunger strike began on May 6
with 29 inmates at the La Plata prison and 35 in Mercedes; they
were joined by 58 inmates at Lisandro Olmos prison. Provincial
deputy justice secretary Maria del Carmen Falbo told the local
press that the judges, and not the government, are responsible
for making decisions on the release of terminally ill prisoners;
she added that in the entire Buenos Aires prison system there are
only 12 prisoners in the terminal phase of AIDS. [DLA 5/11/96
from EFE]
 
*9. NEW MASSACRES IN COLOMBIA BANANA REGION

At least 16 people were killed in two massacres on May 5 in the
Colombian banana-growing region of Uraba. Authorities blamed the
58th front of the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia
(FARC) for the massacres in Pueblo Bello and Alto Mulatos, rural
zones located between the municipalities of San Pedro de Uraba
and Turbo, Antioquia department. According to military sources,
the rebels had a clash with local paramilitary "self-defense"
groups and afterwards went to Alto de Mulatos, where they killed
seven people and burned several homes. Later nine unarmed
campesinos were murdered in Pueblo Bello. A training camp for
paramilitary groups operates not far from where the massacres
occurred. [El Diario-La Prensa 5/6/96 from EFE]
 
Antioquia governor Alvaro Uribe Velez has offered a $10 million
peso ($10,000) reward to whoever helps capture the authors of the
massacres. Uribe reiterated his request for the United Nations to
send peacekeeping troops to Uraba--a petition which is not
supported by the Colombian government. [DLA 5/8/96 from EFE]
 
*10. COMMUNIST LEADERS ATTACKED IN COLOMBIA

Colombian communist leader Aida Abella Esquivel, a Bogota
councilperson and president of the Patriotic Union (UP) party,
escaped an assassination attempt unharmed on May 7. Abella was
attacked on a Bogota highway as she was traveling to her office
in an armored vehicle, by three individuals who were dressed in
the uniforms and yellow helmets of aquaduct workers. Abella told
radio network RCN that she survived the attack only because the
armor plating on the vehicle protected her from the machine gun
and bazooka fire, and because her bodyguards returned fire and
repelled the attackers. One person traveling in the car with her
was injured by gunfire. Abella said that she constantly receives
death threats, and that some 3,500 leaders and militants of the
UP have been murdered in the past 10 years. 
The UP is accused of being the political wing of the FARC. Asked
on the radio whether the attack against her could have been a
retaliation for the May 6 massacres allegedly carried out by the
FARC in Uraba, Abella replied, "I get so many threats that we
don't know." [ED-LP 5/8/96 from AP] Interviewed in the weekly
magazine Cambio 16 in September of last year, Abella condemned
massacres attributed to the FARC, reiterated her support for a
regional dialogue to end Uraba's armed conflict, and insisted
that the UP condemns "all acts of violence." [Cambio 16 9/25/95]
Colombian president Ernesto Samper issued a communique condemning
the attack against Abella. [DLA 5/9/96 from EFE] 
 
On May 9, the Caracol radio network reported that UP
councilperson Marcel Burgos and four other people were taken from
their houses and murdered in the municipality of Coloso, Sucre
department. [ED-LP 5/10/96 from EFE]
 
*11. COLOMBIA TO GET UN HUMAN RIGHTS OFFICE?

For the first time, the UN Human Rights Commission (UNHRC)
announced on Apr. 23 its recommendation that High Commissioner
for Human Rights Jose Ayala Lasso establish a human rights office
in Colombia as soon as possible. The High Commissioner currently
has representatives in Rwanda, and the UN Human Rights Center is
present in Cambodia, but the office in Colombia will be the first
permanent one in the world, according to Arturo Carrillo of the
Colombian Commission of Jurists. The office will be mandated to
assist the Colombian government in the development of programs
and policies for the promotion and protection of human rights; it
will also observe human rights violations and report on them to
the High Commissioner. Nongovernmental organizations had
suggested the designation of a special relateur for human rights,
but the Colombian government had pressured in favor of creating
the office so as to avoid the naming of a relateur, which implies
a sanction against the country, according to Uruguayan Alejandro
Artucio of the International Jurists Commission. 
 
Artucio warned that the opening of the new office will depend on
funding. The Colombian government publicly announced that the
European Union (EU) will finance it. "We've checked it out and
they tell us that there is a project presented to the EU but
nothing is approved yet," said Artucio. According to Artucio,
most of the human rights violations in Colombia are committed by
government forces, followed by paramilitary groups, guerrillas
and drug traffickers, in that order. [Inter Press Service
4/25/96]
 
*12. NICARAGUA: FSLN ELECTS CANDIDATES

Delegates at the party congress of the Sandinista National
Liberation Front (FSLN), held May 3-5 in Managua, chose former
Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega as the party's presidential
candidate. Ortega won 471 out of a total 540 valid votes cast by
the 600 delegates at the congress. [Nicaragua Network (DC)
Hotline 5/6/96; Diario Las Americas 5/7/96 from AFP; El Diario-La
Prensa 5/7/96 from EFE] Human rights lawyer Vilma Nunez de
Escorcia, who had run against Ortega in the FSLN's primary
elections on Feb. 18 [see Updates #317, 320], won only 27 votes.
[DLA 5/9/96 from Noticiero Nicaraguense] The FSLN congress also
chose candidates for National Assembly deputies and for the
Central American Parliament (PARLACEN). [NN Hotline 5/6/96; DLA
5/7/96 from AFP; ED-LP 5/7/96 from EFE] FSLN founder Tomas Borge
Martinez tops the list of PARLACEN candidates. [DLA 5/9/96 from
Noticiero Nicaraguense] 
 
In order to fulfill the party pledge to nominate at least 30%
women candidates, half of the FSLN candidates for 20 at-large
National Assembly seats and 20 of the candidates for PARLACEN
delegates will be women. Fewer than 30% women won ballot slots
for departmental nominations to the National Assembly, so the
additional at-large nominations will help make up the difference.
[NN Hotline 4/29/96]
 
The congress chose cattle rancher Juan Manuel Caldera Lacayo--a
"patriotic producer," or large landowner who remained in
Nicaragua during the Sandinista government--as the FSLN's vice
presidential candidate. Caldera was a member of the opposition
Conservative Party during the Somoza dictatorship; he belongs to
the far rightwing Superior Council of Private Enterprise (COSEP).
His candidacy, which must still be approved by the FSLN
directorate, is part of an FSLN strategy to build a broad
electoral coalition for a "government of national unity." [NN
Hotline 5/6/96; DLA 5/7/96 from AFP]
 
The first round of the election is on Oct. 20. If no party wins
at least 45%, the top two candidates will face off in a runoff
election. [NN Hotline 5/6/96] A poll taken by the CID-Gallup firm
during the last week of April shows former Managua mayor Arnoldo
Aleman, presidential candidate of the Liberal Alliance, with 33%
of voter preferences. Daniel Ortega is in second place with 21%.
In third place is banker Alvaro Robelo of Arriba Nicaragua with
6%; former presidency minister Antonio Lacayo is in fourth place
with 5%. Voter disapproval for Ortega and Aleman was nearly
equal, 35% and 36% respectively, while Lacayo's disapproval
rating was 42%. [DLA 5/8/96 from AFP] Although his candidacy is
in doubt because of a constitutional ban on relatives of current
presidents running for high office, Lacayo was the first to
officially register with the Supreme Electoral Council (CSE) as a
presidential candidate for his National Project party. Lacayo is
a son-in-law of President Violeta Barrios de Chamorro; he says he
believes the CSE will not retroactively apply the ban on
relatives. [DLA 5/9/96 from EFE] Meanwhile, the Liberal Alliance
has elected former COSEP president Enrique Bolanos Geyer as its
vice presidential candidate. [DLA 5/10/96 from EFE]
 
*13. VENEZUELAN STUDENTS PROTEST ECONOMIC POLICY

Students protesting economic policies clashed with police on May
8 at the Fermin Toro high school, near the presidential palace of
Miraflores. The clash ended when police agents entered the school
and arrested several students. A day earlier, students at the
Central University of Venezuela (UCV) burned two government
vehicles in protests against the government's economic policies;
there were no injuries or arrests. Meanwhile, Venezuela's 17
universities participated in a 24-hour strike called by the
Association of Venezuelan University Professors (FAPUV) to
protest the government's failure to pay $121 million in funding
due by Apr. 30. [ED-LP 5/9/96 from EFE; Diario Las Americas
5/9/96 from EFE] 
 
*14. PEOPLE WITH AIDS PROTEST DRUG DELAYS IN BRAZIL

Wearing clown faces, a group of people with AIDS staged a
dramatic demonstration in front of the Health Ministry in Rio de
Janeiro, Brazil, to protest delays in the distribution of anti-
AIDS medications. [DLA 5/10/96 from AFP] According to Alexandre
do Valle, member of the Group for Life, the state health ministry
responsible for distributing the anti-viral drugs "keeps
decreasing the number of flasks that arrive at the health
centers, which are receiving just 5% of what is required by
hundreds of patients." Oswaldo Muller, president of the
medications department of the Health Ministry, admitted that
there was a shortage but promised that next week a contract will
be signed with Bristol laboratories, which won a bid to provide
more of the drug. At the end of May, Bristol is to provide half
of the 96,000 boxes of medications requested in the bid; Muller
promised to take the necessary steps to get Bristol to speed up
its delivery. [DLA 5/7/96 from EFE]
 
*15. FAST AGAINST CUBA EMBARGO STRONG AT 80 DAYS

Labor leaders were to travel to Washington on May 10 to join a
broad coalition of congresspeople, church leaders, Cuban-American
organizations and the American Public Health Association in
supporting the "Fast for Life." The fast began on Feb. 21 as part
of an effort to win the release of 400 used medical computers
seized by US Treasury agents [see Updates #314-316, 318, 320,
323, 326]. The computers are destined for delivery to Cuban
churches and health care facilities. As of May 10, activists Rev.
Lucius Walker, Lisa Valanti, Brian Rohatyn and Jim Clifford were
in the 80th day of a liquid-only fast in which they are consuming
only water mixed with lemon juice and a small amount of maple
syrup. 
 
"Clinton should know that more and more people from all walks of
life are working for the release of the medical computers. The
president must act now, before the fasters suffer irreparable
damage to their health," said David Welsh, executive vice
president of the National Association of Letter Carriers in San
Francisco, California. Welsh fasted for 23 days before suffering
from heart palpitations which pulled him off the "Fast for Life."
[IFCO Press Release 5/10/96] 
 
Rev. Walker, the executive director of the Interreligious
Foundation for Community Organization (IFCO), has pledged to
continue the fast "until the computers are released." "I simply
don't want to live any longer in a country that continues to hurt
people the way my country does," said Walker, who had lost 42
pounds as of May 4. [Newsday (NY) 5/5/96] IFCO feels that victory
is within reach and is urging supporters to step up phone calls
to National Security Adviser Anthony Lake (202-456-9481); White
House Chief of Staff Leon Panetta (202-456-6797); and Bob Malley
at the National Security Council (202-456-9146) to urge the
immediate release of the computers. For more information call
IFCO at 212-926-5757 (or by email at ifco@igc.apc.org). [IFCO
phone message 5/12/96]
 
*16. IN OTHER NEWS...

On May 10, Colombian John Harold Mena was sentenced to 18 years
in prison in Federal District Court in Brooklyn for the 1992
murder in New York of Cuban-born journalist Manuel de Dios
Unanue. Mena avoided a life sentence because he became a major
prosecution witness against his co-conspirators in the murder,
and because he gave the US government evidence in other murder
and drug-trafficking cases. Mena's father, uncle and aunt have
all been killed in Colombia in apparent retaliation for his aid
to US prosecutors. [New York Times 5/11/96]... Argentine federal
prosecutor Pablo Quiroga has recommended a sentence of life in
prison for guerrilla leader Enrique Haroldo Gorriaran Merlo,
accused of a 1989 attack on a military barracks. The sentencing
petition also includes Gorriaran's former partner, Ana Maria
Sivori. Gorriaran was a leader of the Trotskyist rebel group
Everyone for the Homeland Movement (MTP); the attack on the La
Tablada barracks on Jan. 23 and 24, 1989, left 39 people dead,
most of them MTP members, and more than 40 wounded. Gorriaran was
arrested in Mexico last Oct. 28 and deported to Argentina [see
Update #301]. [Diario Las Americas 5/8/96 from AFP]... In Chile,
Supreme Court judge Adolfo Banados has agreed to reduce by 50
days the 6-year sentence imposed last May on retired army
brigadier Pedro Espinoza for the 1976 car-bomb murder in
Washington of former Chilean foreign minister Orlando Letelier.
The request was granted based on the time Espinoza spent under
arrest in the military hospital of Santiago in 1978 while
awaiting a court decision on his extradition to the US. The court
finally decided against extradition. [DLA 5/11/96 from EFE]...
Coca producers from the Bolivian region of Chapare have promised
to voluntarily eradicate their coca cultivations in order to
avoid the violence and human rights abuses committed by police in
forced eradication operations. The coca producers' offer,
together with several other proposals, is to be formally
presented in La Paz at a meeting with the National Council
Against Drug Abuse (CONALID). [DLA 5/10/96 from EFE]... A total
of 53 inmates have managed to escape Carandiru prison in Sao
Paulo state, Brazil, through a tunnel nearly 100 meters long that
took nearly a month to dig. Twelve hours after the escape, only
three of the fugitives had been recaptured by police. The success
of the escape was guaranteed by the remaining prisoners, who
staged an uprising to distract the attention of the guards. With
a capacity for 6,700 inmates, Carandiru is considered the largest
prison in Latin America. [Diario Las Americas 5/11/96 from
EFE]... Voters in the Dominican Republic go to the polls on May
16 to choose a new president. The elections will be closely
observed by delegations from such groups as the Organization of
American States (OAS), the US National Democratic Institute and
the Carter Center, the Permanent Conference of Latin American
Political Parties (COPAL) and the Socialist International [see
Update #327]. The elections were moved ahead two years under a
pact with opposition parties after charges of fraud marred the
1994 vote; the pact also provides for a second round runoff if no
candidate wins more than 50% of the vote, establishes a special
shortened two-year term for this election, and bans reelection to
consecutive terms. [DLA 5/10/96 from AFP]

END

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