WEEKLY NEWS UPDATE ON THE AMERICAS ISSUE #458, NOVEMBER 8, 1998 NICARAGUA SOLIDARITY NETWORK OF GREATER NEW YORK 339 LAFAYETTE ST., NEW YORK, NY 10012 (212) 674-9499 1. Central America: Hurricane Deaths in Thousands 2. Questions About Foreign Relief in Honduras and Nicaragua 3. Does the IMF Have a Future in Hurricanes? 4. Spanish Cabinet Calls For Pinochet's Extradition 5. Everyone Wants A Piece Of Pinochet 6. Spain Won't Seek To Try Castro, Banzer 7. Colombian Military Handed "Worst Single Defeat" of Civil War 8. Number Four In Colombia's Cali Cartel Killed 9. Arms Scandal Gets Closer to Argentine President 10. Mexico: Leftist Sentenced, Journalists Murdered 11. Witness To Para Police Massacre Slain 12. Venezuelans To Elect New Legislature 13. US Sweatshop Agreement Blasted By Unions, Human Rights 14. In Other News: Dominican Republic, Quebec ISSN#: 1084-922X. The Weekly News Update on the Americas is published weekly by the Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York. 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If you know someone who might be interested in subscribing, send their email (or regular mail) address to and request a free one-month trial subscription to the Weekly News Update on the Americas. Feel free to reproduce these updates, or reprint or re-post any information from them, but please credit us as "Weekly News Update on the Americas," and include our full contact information so that people will know how to find us. 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 CHECK OUT OUR WEB SITES: http://home.earthlink.net/~dbwilson/wnuhome.html http://home.earthlink.net/~dbwilson/nsnhome.html *1. CENTRAL AMERICA: HURRICANE DEATHS IN THOUSANDS As many as 25,000 people may have died in Central America as a result of heavy rains that Hurricane Mitch poured on the region from Oct. 26 to Oct. 31 [see Update #457]. As of Nov. 6, there were reports of 7,000 people dead and 12,000 missing in Honduras, with 1,932,480 suffering from the effects of the storm; 4,000 dead and 1,817 missing in Nicaragua, with 1 million people affected; 434 dead, 385 missing and 118,788 affected in El Salvador and Guatemala; and eight dead and 12,000 affected in Costa Rica and Panama. Rated as the fourth most powerful Atlantic Ocean hurricane on record, Mitch reportedly destroyed 70% of the rice, bean, corn and sorghum crop in Honduras and Nicaragua, and severely damaged industry and export crops such as coffee and bananas. The total damage to Honduras alone has been estimated at $4 billion. Central America's total population is 33 million; at least half live below the poverty line. [El Diario-La Prensa (NY) 11/8/98 from AFP and EFE] "This is the biggest crisis, the biggest disaster we've faced in this hemisphere," according to Brian Atwood, the head of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and US president Bill Clinton's special coordinator for foreign disasters. Atwood said that floods and landslides caused by the storm wiped out 25 years of investment in the region's infrastructure. [Washington Post 11/5/98] Concepcion Ramos, director of Honduras' Social Housing Fund, estimated that just the cost of reconstructing 160,000 damaged homes in Honduras will reach about $400 million. [La Prensa (San Pedro Sula) 11/8/98 from ACAN-EFE] On Nov. 7 Honduran officials set the number of deaths in Honduras at 6,420 but said the number may be overstated. Nicaraguan president Arnoldo Aleman Lacayo estimated that 3,800 had died in Nicaragua, including 1,848 confirmed dead and 1,267 missing as reported by the country's National Emergency Committee. Honduran prison guards added to the toll on the evening of Nov. 6 when they shot and killed five prisoners trying to escape, according to police spokesperson Capt. Hector Mejilla. About 2,000 prisoners were moved into the prison, which normally holds less than 500, a week earlier when parts of the capital's main prison were flooded. Mejilla said that seven prisoners succeeded in escaping. On Nov. 7 new rains threatened parts of Nicaragua that had escaped damage earlier: the Rama River on Nicaragua's southern Atlantic Coast, and Ometepe island in Lake Nicaragua. [Reuter 11/8/98] [For more information, see special report "Hurricane Mitch's Aftermath in Nicaragua."] *2. QUESTIONS ABOUT FOREIGN RELIEF IN HONDURAS AND NICARAGUA According to the Washington Post, the total international relief promised to Central America for the effects of Hurricane Mitch is now at $150 million. [WP 11/7/98] After initially promising just $3.7 million in aid, on Nov. 5 Clinton suddenly increased the number to $70 million, including $30 million in equipment and $20 million for food and other emergency aid. A US delegation headed by Tipper Gore, wife of US vice president Al Gore, is to visit Central America in the week of Nov. 9. [New York Times 11/6/98 from AP] Other US dignitaries visiting or planning to visit are: former president Jimmy Carter (Nov. 6), former president George Bush (Nov. 8), and President Clinton's wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton (Nov. 16). [Reuter 11/8/98; La Prensa 11/8/98 from ACAN- EFE] Major private relief efforts are also underway, many of them led by immigrants from Central America. In the New York City area, for example, large fundraising events were scheduled in the Bronx and in North Bergen, New Jersey, for Nov. 8, with several more planned for the next two weeks. [ED-LP 11/8/98] But the Council on Hemispheric Affairs (COHA), a DC-based public interest group, questions the ability of relief agencies to get aid to Mitch's victims. COHA notes that a recent evaluation by Transparency International gave Honduras a corruption rating of 81 out of a possible 85; Paraguay, with 83, was the only Latin American country with a worse rating. "Nicaragua scored 61 (along with Argentina, another nation notorious for the corruption of its civic institutions, including its judiciary), while Guatemala placed right ahead of it, with a rating of 59." In Nicaragua, "[i]f outside vigilance is not shown, there is almost a certainty" that President Aleman's government will carry out the sort of theft of relief efforts that occurred after the 1972 earthquake in Managua, "when millions in overseas monetary donations were looted by members of [Gen. Anastasio Somoza Debayle's] regime and the dictator himself... Aid administrators...must take special care that their donations in goods and services are specifically allocated to reliable local NGOs [nongovernmental organizations] experienced in fieldwork operations, and that any funds provided be routed around local government officials rather than through them." [COHA press release 11/5/98] There are also questions about the extent and effectiveness of US government efforts. The New York Times reports that during the week of Nov. 2, "the United States Air Force has distributed 345,000 pounds of food and other supplies with 17 helicopters flying from its base in Palmerola, 30 miles west of the capital." The article does not explain how many aircraft and troops the US military has available at Palmerola and other bases in the region, but it does note that over the same period "Mexico shipped 700 tons of food to Honduras." Despite having bases in Honduras, the US military seems to have shipped only one fourth as much food as Mexico. [NYT 11/8/98] The US used much of Honduras' territory during the 1980s for military operations against leftist guerrillas in El Salvador and for bases for the rightwing contra army fighting to overthrow Nicaragua's then- leftist government; the US gave the Honduran military $1 billion during the period [see Update #456]. According to the Washington Post, the US government is worried about the possibility that thousands of Central Americans may emigrate to Mexico and the US because of the lack of resources and housing in their own countries. This may be one reason for the Clinton administration's sudden push to increase aid on Nov. 5. [La Prensa 11/8/98 from AFP] On Nov. 4, Honduran president Carlos Flores Facusse said in an interview that a useful form of US aid would be a suspension of the deportations of Hondurans back to their country. About 80,000 Hondurans are thought to be living in the US without documents. The US Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) announced on Nov. 5 that it was granting a temporary suspension for both Hondurans and Guatemalans in what INS spokesperson Andrew Lluberes called "a humanitarian gesture" because of the hurricane. Deportations of Nicaraguans and Salvadorans were already suspended last year in an unrelated development. [ED-LP 11/6/98 from EFE] An editorial in the New York Times suggested another motivation for the US relief drive: "Disaster relief is often a political event in Latin America. Nicaragua's dictator Anastasio Somoza was widely accused of stealing most of the relief money after an earthquake leveled Managua in 1972. This was a key element in his fall seven years later. Mexico's difficulties in building houses for those left homeless by the 1985 Mexico City earthquake left millions disillusioned with the ruling party. The governments in the region will lose all popular support if they do not distribute aid fairly or if much of it disappears." [NYT 11/6/98] *3. DOES THE IMF HAVE A FUTURE IN HURRICANES? On Nov. 7 British finance minister Gordon Brown proposed that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) should establish "a new facility for countries that have faced a huge breakdown as a result of national disasters." The IMF funding could be supplemented by a moratorium on debts, he added in an interview with BBC television on Nov. 8. "Side by side with that, I think we can make arrangements in relation to debt relief," he said. But International Development Secretary Clare Short played down the importance of debt relief. "To talk in the midst of the terrible crisis as though debt relief would solve it is to mislead completely," she told BBC radio. [Reuter 11/8/98] Some analysts have pointed out that the Latin American countries most devastated by natural disasters in the past two months-- Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Honduras and Nicaragua-- are in fact the ones that have suffered the most from IMF-style austerity programs [see Update #457]. The Washington Post, a strong supporter of IMF programs, noted in an editorial that "Hurricane Mitch...is a reminder that all such disasters in one sense have their origins in human factors... Anywhere it struck, Mitch would have been deadly. But only poverty can explain why it was so deadly." [WP 11/4/98] The Nicaragua Network Education Fund notes that while "[i]t is poverty that causes natural events such as Mitch to become human tragedies...it is the deliberate policies of the World Bank, IMF, and US government as well as the rape of the environment by transnational timber, mining, and agribusiness that create that poverty, and the conditions for disaster, in the first place." [NNEF posting 11/5/98] Honduras has a long history of exploitation by foreign agribusiness, especially the Dole Food Co. of Westlake Village, California, and Chiquita Brands International Inc. of Cincinnati. Chiquita, which owns about 17,000 acres of the 46,000 acres devoted to banana growing in Honduras, expects to take a $50 million write-down in the fourth quarter because of Mitch; Dole, which says it has 40,000 acres under production in the region, expects a $50-70 million write-down. [Wall Street Journal 11/4/98] Arnaldo Palma, head of Chiquita's Honduras subsidiary, Tela Railroad Company, has told the media that the damage from Mitch will make it impossible to reactivate the banana production--the country's second largest export industry--in the near future. [La Prensa 11/8/98 ACAN-EFE] One US analyst says that US banana growers may move at least some of their plantations from Honduras to an unnamed neighboring country. [WSJ 11/6/98] *4. SPANISH CABINET CALLS FOR PINOCHET'S EXTRADITION On Nov. 6, the Spanish cabinet approved Judge Baltasar Garzon's request to seek the extradition of former Chilean dictator (and current senator-for-life) Gen. Augusto Pinochet Ugarte from the United Kingdom to stand trial for genocide and other crimes against humanity. Foreign Minister Abel Matutes said later that his ministry would begin working on a formal request that same day and hoped to send it to Britain through diplomatic channels by Nov. 10. In response, the Chilean government recalled its ambassador from Madrid for "consultation," but said diplomatic ties with Spain would not be broken or suspended. Pinochet, who was arrested in London on Oct. 16 [see Updates #455-457] in response to a warrant issued by Garzon, was ordered free by England's High Court on Oct. 28 because he was a head of state when the crimes were committed. But he continues to be held under police supervision while the Law Lords, England's highest appeals court made up of five senior judges from the House of Lords, hear an appeal. Lawyers arguing for extradition say Pinochet is not entitled to immunity because the crimes he is accused of--including at least 3,000 killings and disappearances connected with his Sep. 11, 1973 coup against democratically elected socialist president Salvador Allende--are not official functions of a head of state, but rather crimes against international law. In addition, they say Pinochet was not officially declared president of Chile until late in the first day of the coup, but his soldiers had begun killing and torturing civilians hours before. Pinochet's lawyer, Clive Nicholls, argued that whatever Pinochet did must have been official presidential functions, because government officials carried out his instructions. The Law Lords are expected to issue their ruling the week of Nov. 9. [Reuters 11/6/98; Washington Post 11/5/98] Meanwhile, Pinochet released a statement on the evening of Nov. 7 in which he said angrily, "The experience of my arrest has shaken my belief in Britain.... Previously I never doubted that Britain was a country where people may move about freely.... I did not believe that I would be the subject of spurious attempts by foreign prosecutors to convict me on unproven charges." Pinochet said he would demand an apology from Britain if his arrest is overturned, and said that reconciliation was the best path to peace: "Spain left behind the Franco years with no recriminations... Why do they now wish to force us to do differently? I am at peace with myself and the Chilean people. The opening up of old wounds...serves no purpose." He also vociferously thanked rightwing former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher for voicing her support for him after his arrest. [Pinochet's e-mail address is reportedly .] That same day, about 700 Pinochet opponents rallied in London's Trafalgar Square demanding that he be brought to justice for murders, tortures and disappearances during his 17-year rule. Labor Party member of parliament Jeremy Corbyn told the crowd, which included Chilean exiles from as far away as Switzerland, France and Belgium, "It is not revenge, it is justice we are seeking." [Reuters 11/8/98] A Chilean military plane is waiting at an airfield outside London to take Pinochet home if he is allowed to leave Britain, but the plane will not be able to travel the 11,649 kilometers across the Atlantic Ocean without stopping to refuel. Spain and the Canary Islands (a Spanish territory) would not be practical refueling spots because of the extradition order, and the only other way the plane could get to Chile would involve stopping in Recife, Brazil--it is unclear whether Brazil's president Fernando Henrique Cardoso would allow the plane to refuel there either. [Voice Of America 11/3/98] *5. EVERYONE WANTS A PIECE OF PINOCHET The basis of Garzon's original warrant against Pinochet was his alleged participation in the deaths of Spanish nationals. Many other nations whose citizens were killed during the Pinochet regime have either filed requests for Pinochet's extradition, or are considering such requests. France issued a provisional detention order to Britain on Nov. 3 while a formal extradition request is prepared; Switzerland has prepared a formal request but is holding it so that the Spanish request will be processed first. On Oct. 29, Italian Justice Minister Oliviero Diliberto asked the Milan Attorney General's office to open a murder investigation against Pinochet in response to a suit filed by a Chilean exile living in Italy. Four German nationals have filed suit against Pinochet for torture and deprivation of liberty, and similar suits have been filed in Sweden, Belgium and Luxembourg. [ED-LP 11/4/98 from AFP] In the United States, Justice Department officials are reportedly considering seeking Pinochet's extradition so that he can stand trial for the 1976 killings of former Chilean foreign minister Orlando Letelier and his assistant, US national Ronni Moffitt, in Washington DC, and the disappearances of two US citizens, Charles Horman and Frank Teruggi, in Chile in 1973. According to department spokesperson Bert Brandenberg, the possibility was being discussed in the middle ranks of the department, but neither Attorney General Janet Reno nor the White House had formally discussed or approved such a move. Any such suit would be complicated because of deep US government and Central Intelligence Agency involvement in the 1973 coup and Pinochet's subsequent reign of terror--thousands of US government files on the era remain secret. [New York Times 11/7/98] Meanwhile, leftist politicians in Chile are attempting to oust Pinochet from the Senate so that he can stand trial in Chile. That would involve changing the country's Constitution--drawn up during the dictatorship--and it is unlikely the opposition could muster enough votes. The Chilean government is formally opposed to the extradition request as a violation of national sovereignty, but many in the ruling center-left coalition favor Pinochet's extradition as the best chance for bringing him to justice. Sola Sierra, president of the Chilean Association for the Disappeared, said, "I think you could say that many of these [government officials opposing extradition] have lost their principles. They are now successful professionally again and they believe that confronting Pinochet and the right wing would jeopardize everything they have rebuilt for themselves. It's fear, that simple--fear." But according to Foreign Minister Jose Miguel Insulza, "We believe in making sure that he is not tried illegally in Spain-- that makes us different from Pinochet, it shows that we respect the human rights that he disrespected." Insulza has called for Pinochet to resign from his senate seat and retire from political life. Senator Sergio Bitar of the Party for Democracy, who was tortured in a labor camp under Pinochet but now opposes his extradition, says, "We are already looking into ways we can take amnesty away from Pinochet, or find some other mode of justice. I think the tide has turned, and Chileans and the rest of the world are saying together that this man cannot live with impunity. I think he should pay, but he should pay in Chile." [WP 11/5/98; ED-LP 11/5/98] *6. SPAIN WON'T SEEK TO TRY CASTRO, BANZER On Nov. 5, the US-based Cuban American National Foundation (CANF), a powerful lobbying group which opposes Cuba's Communist government, filed a suit with Spain's High Court seeking criminal charges against Cuban president Fidel Castro Ruz, armed forces head Raul Castro Ruz, Cuban tourism minister Osmany Cienfuegos and senior diplomat Carlos Amat. CANF president Francisco Jose Hernandez said, "At the present time, we have documented over 300 cases, but we do have names and specific information on over 18,000 cases that will be presented and these accusations will be expanded over the next few weeks." Most of the people mentioned in the report are Cuban, but Hernandez said 12 US citizens and 5 Spanish citizens are named, and added in reference to charges against Pinochet and members of the junta that ruled Argentine during the "Dirty War" of 1976-1983, "We believe our evidence is a lot stronger than any of these other cases." [Reuters 11/5/98] But Spain's Foreign Minister Abel Matutes told a Madrid daily that attempts to have foreign heads of state tried in Spain have little hope of succeeding. "Spanish law clearly recognizes the jurisdictional immunity of heads of state and senior officials," said Matutes, who is leaving on Nov. 9 for a three-day visit to Cuba. Aside from the CANF suit, requests have been filed for investigations of Bolivian Gen. Hugo Banzer Suarez and Morocco's King Hassan. [AP 11/8/98] *7. COLOMBIAN MILITARY HANDED "WORST SINGLE DEFEAT" OF CIVIL WAR Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) rebels withdrew from Mitu, capital of the southeastern department of Vaupes, on Nov. 3 after holding the city for two days, killing about 150 soldiers and police officers and taking 290 more hostage. The rebels left when 500 soldiers entered the city after landing at a nearby Brazilian airfield and crossing the border. According to Colombian armed forces chief Gen. Fernando Tapias, the army was unable to land in Mitu because of mines. Brazil protested the incursion into its territory and immediately recalled its ambassador. In handing the Colombian military its worst single defeat of the 36-year old civil war, the FARC suffered only five deaths and 15 injuries, according to a communique distributed on the Internet. The fighting began before dawn on Nov. 1 when about 800 rebels blew up a communications tower, seized the city's airport and took the police base; no soldiers were based in the remote city of 15,000. The rebels hope to trade the hostages for 452 imprisoned guerrillas as a precondition for beginning peace talks. [El Diario-La Prensa (NY) 11/4/98 from EFE, 11/5/98 from AP; New York Times 11/5/98 from AP] In accordance with a different rebel demand, about 2,000 armed troops began to withdraw from five southern municipalities covering 15,000 square miles for a 90-day period [see Update #457]. The withdrawal was expected to be complete on Nov. 7. [Washington Post 11/7/98; NYT 11/7/98 from Reuters] Meanwhile, the Sao Paulo Forum, which groups Third World-- primarily Latin American--leftist parties and organizations, accepted a FARC proposal to participate in the Colombian peace process. The Forum will send a high-level commission to Colombia to observe the demobilization of guerrillas and rightwing paramilitaries, but will not act as guarantors of the process. The Forum's eighth meeting was held in Mexico City from Oct. 29 through Nov. 1; as at past forums, delegates spoke of the need to oppose neoliberalism and unrestrained free trade, but offered few tangible alternatives. [La Jornada (Mexico) 11/1/98] *8. NUMBER FOUR IN COLOMBIA'S CALI CARTEL KILLED Elmer "Pacho" Herrera Buitrago, considered fourth in command of Colombia's Cali drug cartel, was shot to death at 9:30 am on Nov. 5 while playing soccer in the maximum security Palmira prison in Valle el Cauca. Herrera Buitrago was serving a 14-year term for illicit enrichment and drug trafficking after turning himself in on Sep. 1, 1996. Once in prison, he fingered some 35 others as being involved in the drug trade. His assailant, who was beaten and captured by other prisoners, was identified as Rafael Angel Uribe Mesa; he evidently gained entry by posing as a lawyer before shooting Herrera Buitrago seven times with a 9-mm pistol. [ED-LP 11/6/98] According to daily El Pais, Uribe told authorities he had been working for the cartel leader for three years, and had killed him because Herrera Buitrago had threatened to kill his family unless he killed one of Herrera Buitrago's brothers. [EL-LP 11/7/98 from EFE] *9. ARMS SCANDAL GETS CLOSER TO ARGENTINE PRESIDENT On Nov. 5 Argentine federal deputy Carlos Alvarez, a leader in the center-left Front for a Country in Solidarity (FREPASO), suggested that President Carlos Saul Menem of the centrist Justicialist Party (PJ, Peronist) might "be part of an illicit association" in the illegal sales of arms to Croatia and Ecuador in the 1991-95 period [see Update #454]. "If this case goes on, it will reach President Menem, who may have not only a political responsibility but also a criminal responsibility." In an interview that evening, the president denounced Alvarez as "a real criminal, perverse, cowardly." [Universo Online (Brazil) 11/8/98 from AP; El Diario-La Prensa 11/6/98 from AP] The accusations against Menem followed a failed attempt by the president to start an investigation of federal prosecutor Carlos Stornelli, who heads the arms sale probe. Argentine arms dealers, apparently with official complicity, sold arms to Croatia at a time when Argentine troops were part of a United Nations peacekeeping mission in the former Yugoslavia, and to Ecuador when Argentina was publicly brokering a settlement of a brief 1995 border war between Ecuador and Peru. Stornelli's case is "a pack of lies, a tale woven by some people to try to create problems in the heart of the government," Menem told reporters on Nov. 1 while on an official visit to Great Britain. [ED-LP 11/2/98 from AP] On Nov. 3, Justice Minister Raul Granillo Ocampo formally asked Attorney General Nicolas Becerra to look into various accusations against Stornelli, including the leaking of material "to the press and some legislators." In an unusual show of independence, 19 of the 24 federal prosecutors--all except Stornelli himself and four who were vacation--immediately signed a letter calling for Becerra to reject the request. Becerra turned Menem down on Nov. 4. [Clarin (Buenos Aires) 11/4/98, 11/5/98] Menem's ex-wife, Zulema Yoma, held a meeting with Stornelli on Nov. 5. Afterwards she told reporters that her son Carlos Facundo Menem--who was also the president's son--told her in early 1995 that "he had learned about supposed irregular operations in the sales of arms and had decided to start an investigation into the matter." Carlos Facundo Menem was killed in a helicopter crash in March 1995. Yoma has always held that the crash was not accidental; now she says that she fears for the safety of her daughter, Zulema Maria Eva Menem. [ED-LP 11/6/98 from AP] *10. MEXICO: LEFTIST SENTENCED, JOURNALISTS MURDERED On Oct. 30 Mexican campesino leader Benigno Guzman Martinez was sentenced to 13 years, 4 months and 15 days for the crimes of riot, sedition and material damage to the municipality of Coyuca de Benitez in the southwestern Mexican state of Guerrero. Guzman was arrested in January 1997 on charges of belonging to the rebel Revolutionary Popular Army (EPR), but he was sentenced on charges stemming from a militant demonstration in Coyuca in August 1994 [see Update #366]. Guzman is a leader of the Southern Sierra Campesino Organization (OCSS), long a target of the Guerrero state government. Seventeen OCSS members were killed by state police in June 1995 at Aguas Blancas, Guerrero. Guzman's harsh sentence contrasts with the treatment of people accused of engineering the Aguas Blancas massacre. On Oct. 31, one day after the sentencing, Ruben Robles Catalan was made president of the Directing Council of Guerrero Notaries; Robles Catalan was suspended from his position as general secretary of the state cabinet in 1996 at the recommendation of the federal National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) because of an alleged connection to the massacre. [La Jornada 11/1/98, 11/2/98] On Nov. 3 federal judge Lucitania Garcia Ortiz granted former Guerrero attorney general Rodolfo Sotomayor Espino an injunction overturning his conviction for homicide, injury and improper exercise of authority in relation to Aguas Blancas. [LJ 11/4/98] On Oct. 28, the Miami-based Inter-American Press Association (IAPA) called for investigations into the murders of Claudio Cortes Garcia, layout editor with the Mexican edition of Le Monde Diplomatique, in Mexico City on Oct. 23, and of reporter Fernando Martinez Ochoa in the city of Chihuahua on Oct. 27. The two murders bring the toll of journalists killed in Mexico in the past decade to 25. IAPA spokesperson Danilo Arbilla said that regardless of the motives, the murders "cast into doubt the media's capacity to carry out its work without feeling threatened by violence." [IAPA alert 11/4/98] Cortes Garcia's family says that the motive for his murder was probably not political, but notes that he was a sympathizer of the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD). [Nuevo Amanecer Press Info 11/2/98 from Cronica de Hoy] *11. WITNESS TO PARA POLICE MASSACRE SLAIN Brazilian photographer Miguel Pereira de Melo was killed on Nov. 6 by a bullet to the chest, shortly after he had been called to testify about the Apr. 17, 1996, police massacre of 19 landless peasants in Eldorado de Carajas, Para state [see Update #325]. Melo witnessed the massacre, in which militarized police opened fire on about 4,000 peasants who were waiting for transportation to a demonstration; his photographs of the corpses were widely published. At least 150 police agents are believed to be involved in the massacre. A police official in Maraba, Para, confirmed that the photographer had been shot, but had no further details. [Brasil Online 11/7/98 from Reuters] *12. VENEZUELANS TO ELECT NEW LEGISLATURE The first round of Venezuela's 1998 elections began on Nov. 8 as voters went to the polls to choose 23 governors, 48 senators, 189 federal deputies, and 391 state deputies. Analysts expect the biggest winners to be the Democratic Action (AD) party, the Christian Democrats (Copei), leftists including the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS), and supporters of presidential candidate Henrique Salas Romer. In the outgoing Congress, AD has 44 federal deputies and 16 senators; Copei 55 and 15; MAS and their allies, the leftist Patria Para Todos (PPT, a split from Causa R) 43 and 5; the ruling Convergence of President Rafael Caldera 16 and 1; Causa R 13 and 5; and the other parties 19 and 4. Among the candidates for Senate is former president Carlos Andres Perez, currently under house arrest on charges of misusing public funds and corruption. Perez has conducted interviews and recorded advertisements from his home; if he won, he would go free due to parliamentary immunity. The MAS and PPT hope to gain seats due to the popularity of their presidential candidate Lt. Col. Hugo Chavez Frias-- leader of two failed coup attempts against Perez--who leads polls with 44.2% of voter intentions. Voters will select the next president in the next round of elections on Dec. 6; a third round will take place in July 1999, where 333 mayors and 2,438 municipal legislators will be selected. Salas Romer, former governor of Carabobo, is second in the race for the presidency with 39.2%; AD candidate Luis Alfaro Ucero trails with 4.8%; and former Chacao mayor and Miss Universe Irene Saez, once the frontrunner, has faded to 4.5% after Copei's endorsement tarnished her independent image. [El Diario-La Prensa 11/8/98 from AFP, AP] *13. US SWEATSHOP AGREEMENT BLASTED BY UNIONS, HUMAN RIGHTS GROUPS On Nov. 2, nine members of the 18-member White House Apparel Industry Partnership presented a proposed pact on working conditions at overseas factories to the other member organizations. But human rights groups and unions immediately criticized the agreement, which would still allow contractors to pay workers as young as 14 less than $1 a day for 60-hour work weeks. The Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees (UNITE!)--the task force's only labor representative-- rejected the agreement and dropped out in protest. Alan Howard, assistant to UNITE president Jay Mazur, told the New York Times on Nov. 5, "We cannot continue to participate in this effort on the basis of this agreement. This has been offered to us on a take it or leave it basis and we can't take it." A day later, another task force member, the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, and two more labor organizations--the AFL-CIO, the main US labor federation, and the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU)--also rejected the agreement. Under the accord, American manufacturers pledge not to do business with companies that use forced labor or require employees to work more than 60 hours a week. Companies will prohibit hiring children younger than 15 except in countries where 14-year-olds can work legally. Contractors will be required to pay the minimum wage mandated by local law or the prevailing industry standard, whichever is higher. A new organization, the Fair Labor Association, would oversee compliance and certify outside monitors--largely accounting firms--to investigate 30% of a company's factories in the three years after the company signs the agreement. The agreement was crafted by Nike, Reebok, Phillips Van Heusen, Liz Claiborne, Business for Social Responsibility, the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, the National Consumers League, the International Labor Rights Fund and the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights. Four other members--Kathie Lee Gifford, L.L. Bean, Patagonia and Nicole Miller--have accepted the agreement. Critics charge that wages earned by workers producing American goods in many Third World countries are far too low to support a family. "This is a step backwards. These companies will be able to market their products as sweatshop-free without actually making changes to sweatshop practices abroad," said Michael Shellenberger, spokesperson for San Francisco-based human rights group Global Exchange. "How can you talk about eliminating sweatshops without making a commitment to pay a living wage?" asked Mark Levinson, UNITE's chief economist. But US President Bill Clinton praised the deal, calling it "an historic step toward reducing sweatshop labor around the world." According to US Labor Secretary Alexis Herman, "[t]he Administration is convinced this agreement lays the foundation to eliminate sweatshop labor, here and abroad. It is workable for business and creates a credible system that will let consumers know the garments they buy are not produced by exploited workers." Michael Posner, executive director of the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, called the monitoring "a first step in establishing accountability that will change how the industry operates. The reality is, minimum wages are generally not high enough." The White House Apparel Industry Partnership was created in 1996 after UNITE and the National Labor Committee revealed that workers in Honduras and Manhattan making clothing for Gifford's Wal-Mart-distributed clothing line were working in sweatshop conditions. [New York Times 11/5/98, 11/8/98; AP 11/5/98] *14. IN OTHER NEWS... Dominican right fielder Sammy Sosa of the Chicago Cubs hit one more home run on Nov. 6 in a warmup game pitting US major leaguers against Japan's Yomiuri Giants. Sosa hit 66 home runs in the regular season this year, becoming the first Latin American baseball player (and only the second player ever) to surpass Roger Maris' 37-year old record of 61 home runs in one season, and is considered certain to win the National League's Most Valuable Player award, to be announced later this month. [AP 11/6/98]... Quebec premier Lucien Bouchard is comfortably ahead of his nearest rival, Liberal leader Jean Charest, in his bid for a second five-year term in Nov. 30 elections. Leader of the separatist Parti Quebecois which promoted a 1995 referendum on secession that failed by 1.2% [see Update #301], Bouchard is soft-pedaling talk of another referendum, which two-thirds of Quebecois oppose, and focusing on economic issues. [Reuters 11/7/98] END Keep the Radio Update alive! Our Radio Update, which is used weekly by alternative radio stations across North America, needs a new editor as of 12/31/98. Long hours/no pay, but the good news is, you don't have to come into our cramped, dingy office--you can work from home! If you're interested, write to . For New York area events, check out the CREED NYC calendar at http://home.earthlink.net/~dbwilson/creed.html (if you don't have web access, write for info). ANNUAL UPDATE INDEX available for each year from 1991 through 1996. Ascii text versions free to subscribers via electronic mail. Send your request to (specify which year or years you want--each is over 100kb). Each index will be sent as a separate text message (not an attached file) unless you request otherwise. STILL AVAILABLE: "Immigration in the USA One Year After Proposition 187," a Weekly News Update on the Americas special report, dated March 1996, accompanied by a resource list and organizing leaflet. Ascii text version free to subscribers via email. Send your request to 1996 SOURCE LIST STILL 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 ======================================================================= Weekly News Update on the Americas * Nicaragua Solidarity Network of NY 339 Lafayette St, New York, NY 10012 * 212-674-9499 fax: 212-674-9139 http://home.earthlink.net/~dbwilson/wnuhome.html * wnu@igc.apc.org =======================================================================