Central America

CENTRAL AMERICA: CAFTA ENDGAME LOOMS

from Weekly News Update on the Americas

DR-CAFTA SHOWDOWN NEARS

On June 30 the US Senate voted 54-45 to approve the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA), a pact largely eliminating tariffs on about $32 billion in annual trade between Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and the US. Also on June 30, the House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee voted 30-11 to send the measure to the full House for a vote. The House debate will probably start on July 11, when Congress returns from its Independence Day recess.

DR-CAFTA, which is strongly backed by the administration of US president George W. Bush, is expected to face serious opposition in the House, especially from Democrats. DR-CAFTA opponents are urging activists to communicate with their representatives during the recess and pressure them to vote against it. The Stop CAFTA Coalition has set up a website (www.stopcafta.org) with talking points and additional background. So far only the legislatures of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras have approved the measure. (Radio Mundo Real, July 1; NYT, July 1; Campaign for Labor Rights Action Alert, June 30)

On June 29, the day before the Senate vote, the Associated Press wire service revealed that for more than a year the US Labor Department suppressed studies it had commissioned from the International Labor Rights Fund on labor conditions in Central American countries. “In practice,” one study said, “labor laws on the books in Central America are not sufficient to deter employers from violations, as actual sanctions for violations of the law are weak or nonexistent.” The Bush administration claims Central America has made progress on working conditions, and is using this as an argument in favor of DR-CAFTA. The Labor Department, which calls the studies “unsubstantiated” and “biased,” initially barred the contractor from distributing them and ordered it to remove them from its website. Under a new agreement, the International Labor Rights Fund can now distribute the studies, but it will not receive $250,000 of the $937,000 it was to be paid for the work. (Miami Herald, June 30 from AP; NYT, July 1)

In the middle of June former Wal-Mart Stores executive James Lynn filed a suit in Arkansas against the company charging that he was fired in 2002 “for truthfully reporting the abysmal working conditions in Central American factories utilized by Wal-Mart and for refusing to comply with Wal-Mart’s demand that he certify the factories in order to get Wal-Mart’s goods to market.” Wal-Mart says it fired Lynn for “having inappropriate contact with a woman who directly reported to him,” but it acknowledges it spied on him. Wal-Mart says several factories that Lynn reported on subsequently corrected their problems. But Charles Kernaghan of the New York-based National Labor Committee told the New York Times that workers at one of the factories, located in Honduras, reported continuing problems as recently as April of this year. (NYT, July 1)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, July 3

GUATEMALA: UNION OFFICE RAIDED

Unknown persons raided the Union of Education Workers of Guatemala (STEG) office in Guatemala City some time between the evening of June 25 and the morning of June 27. The intruders stole a computer with extensive information on the National Assembly of Teachers’ programs and history; destroyed two other computers; spilled red paint on all the files and destroyed other papers; and painted red crosses on walls and desks. A desk drawer containing cash was left open, but the money was not stolen.

Unidentified vehicles began to park outside STEG’s office in March after the union joined other groups in demonstrating against DR-CAFTA. STEG has also opposed the Law of Concessions, a measure for the privatization of public resources, and has protested government corruption and human rights abuses. Social organizations, especially those that oppose DF-CAFTA, have been subject to a large number of break-ins this year. The Guatemala Human Rights Commission-USA (GHRC-USA) is asking for appeals to Guatemalan president Oscar Berger Perdomo (fax +502-2-251-2218, presidente@scspr.gob.gt) and Attorney General Juan Luis Florido (fax +502 251 2218) to insure the safety of STEG members and to carry out a thorough investigation of the break-in. (GHRC-USA Urgent Action 6/28/05; Guatemala Hoy, June 30)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, July 3

HONDURAS: COMMUNITY LEADER SHOT

On June 5, paramilitaries stabbed and wounded Feliciano Pineda, a leader of the Montana Verde community in Gracias municipality, Lempira department in western Honduras. Pineda was left in critical condition with stab wounds to his face, neck, back, sides and hands, and a blow to his spine. Community members took Pineda to a hospital in Tegucigalpa, but despite his precarious state of health, agents from the General Department of Criminal Investigation (DGIC) transferred him in chains to the regional jail in Gracias. (Rights Action, June 10; Consejo Civico de Organizaciones Populares e Indigenas de Honduras-COPINH Urgent Alert, June 10/) The Civic Council of Grassroots and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH) points out that the DGIC is run by Napoleon Nazar, who in the 1980s belonged to an army death squad linked to the disappearance of more than 150 activists. (Prensa Latina, June 10)

The paramilitaries who shot Pineda have been identified by eyewitnesses as Delfino Reyes, Santos Reyes, Pablo Reyes and Cecilio Reyes, some of whom were involved in the Jan. 8, 2003, violent arrest and subsequent torture of Montana Verde Lenca indigenous council members Leonardo and Marcelino Miranda, as well as in legal proceedings as false witnesses against Montana Verde community leaders. The Miranda brothers remain jailed in Gracias since their arrest. (RA, June 10; COPINH Urgent Alert, June 10)

The four paramilitaries were briefly detained but were then granted conditional freedom by Gracias judge Atiliano Vasquez. Vasquez previously served as the private accusing lawyer in two politically motivated cases against Montana Verde community leaders; after becoming a judge, he was put in charge of all the Montana Verde cases and has consistently issued flawed rulings against community members. (RA, June 10)

COPINH is calling for messages of protest to President Ricardo Maduro (fax #504-221-4552, 221-4545, 221-4647); Supreme Court president Vilma Morales (504-233-8089, 234-2367); and Congress president Porfirio Lobo Sosa (504-238-6048, 222-3471, 237-0663). Rights Action also suggests contacting US ambassador to Honduras Larry Palmer (fax #504-236-9037); Honduran ambassador to the US Mario Miguel Canahuati (fax #202-966-9751, embassy@hondurasemb.org); and Human Rights Commissioner Ramon Custodio Lopez (fax #504-232-6894, custodiolopez@conadeh.hn); with copies to COPINH at fax 504-783-0817, copinhonduras@yahoo.es.

On June 8, police and local judicial authorities carried out a violent eviction of the Lenca indigenous community of Golondrinas, in Marcala municipality, La Paz department. Police beat up and arrested dozens of community members, stole work tools and other property and bulldozed the entire community’s homes and property to the ground. The land had been abandoned for 25 years when the community began squatting it in May 2004, and although the National Agrarian Institute (INA) ruled that the lands belonged to the municipality of Marcala, they have now been transferred to a private construction company, ASOTRAMM. (RA, June 10; PL, June 10; Community Member’s Eyewitness Report posted on indigena.nodo50.org, June 15)

In other news, some 500 members of the gay and lesbian community of San Pedro Sula marched on June 4, demanding respect for their rights. (La Prensa, Honduras, June 5)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, June 19

EL SALVADOR: FIRED WORKERS ON HUNGER STRIKE

Eight former employees of the Salvadoran Interior Ministry began a liquids-only hunger strike outside the Metropolitan Cathedral in San Salvador on May 26 to demand severance pay. They were among 106 employees dismissed in December 2004 and denied severance pay because they worked on an annual contract and were not covered under laws against unjustified dismissal. Many had worked for the Salvadoran government for more than 20 years.

On June 23, some of the hunger strikers moved to the Legislative Assembly and occupied the chamber, causing the session to be suspended. William Huezo, president of the General Association of Public and Municipal Employees (AGEPYM), said the hunger strikers were in “critical health,” but he hoped Deputy Archbishop Gregorio Rosa Chavez would mediate so that they could win the payment of one month’s wages for each year they worked. (La Nacion, Costa Rica, June 19 from ACAN-EFE; El Diario de Hoy, San Salvador, June 24)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, June 26

PANAMA: SOCIAL SECURITY REFORM HALTED

Panama’s grassroots movements won a victory on June 27 in their fight against changes to the country’s Social Security Agency (CSS) when President Martin Torrijos and his council of ministers formally asked the National Assembly to approve a bill suspending the reform package for 90 days. The National Front for the Defense of Social Security (FRENADESSO)–representing thousands of construction workers, teachers, doctors and CSS workers, among other sectors–responded by immediately calling off the strike it began on May 27. The National Assembly unanimously approved the 90-day suspension of the CSS reforms on June 30, and Torrijos signed the suspension into law on July 1, exactly a month after he signed the bill enacting the reforms.

FRENADESSO had set suspension of the reforms as a condition for beginning a dialogue with the government over the measure’s more than 180 articles. The talks began on June 28, although FRENADESSO chose not to join them until the suspension of the reforms is officially enacted. Participants in the dialogue include government representatives, business associations, retiree organizations, unions and professional guilds. The Council of Rectors of Panama’s public and private universities is facilitating, with the Panama Bishop’s Conference and the National Ecumenical Committee acting as observers. The talks are scheduled to conclude on Aug. 29. (El Nuevo Herald, Miami, June 28 from AP; EFE, June 30, July 1)

Weekly News Update in the Americas, July 3

Some 6,000 Panamanians (or 2,500 to 3,000, according to police) marched on June 16 in Panama City to demand the repeal of reforms to the Social Security Agency (CSS). During the march, police used tear gas to break up a roadblock set up by students, workers and CSS employees along the trans-isthmus road. Marches also took place in the cities of Colon and David. (EFE, June 16)

Weekly News Update in the Americas, June 19

On June 4, after a six-hour meeting by strike leaders, FRENADESSO urged Panamanians to reject a planned referendum on the broadening of the Panama Canal, free trade agreements and the Puebla-Panama Plan. (La Prensa, Panama, June 5)

Weekly News Update in the Americas, June 5

Weekly News Update on the Americas
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CENTRAL AMERICA: TERROR TARGETS ANTI-CAFTA RESISTANCE

from Weekly News Update on the Americas

GUATEMALA: CAMPESINO LEADER KIDNAPPED

An unidentified group of armed men intercepted and abducted Maria Antonieta Carrillo, a local leader of Guatemala’s Campesino Unity Committee (CUC), on May 28 in the village of La Arenera, Puerto de San Jose municipality, in the southern department of Escuintla, according to a communique the CUC released on May 29. “We hold the government and the business sector responsible,” the CUC said. “This act is part of the repressive policy [Guatemalan president Oscar] Berger has mounted against the indigenous and campesino movement.” According to the CUC, La Arenera is a leading community in the “struggle for land and for campesinos’ labor rights” in an area which has the highest concentration of large sugar plantations in the country.

The kidnapping came at a time when human rights organizations say they are the victims of a wave of intimidation. A little more than a week before, a source in Unity for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders told the Cuban wire service Prensa Latina that 656 threats or attacks against activists and social organizations had been reported from the beginning of the year to May 13. The most frequent targets were groups that oppose privatization, human rights violations, increased mining and the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA), a trade pact pushed by the US. (PL, May 29; El Nuevo Herald, Miami, May 29)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, June 5

HONDURAS: CAMPESINO LEADER MURDERED

On May 24, an unidentified assailant shot to death campesino leader Ericson Roberto Lemus on an urban bus in the Honduran city of San Pedro Sula. The assailant boarded the bus, went straight to Lemus and shot him four times in the head before fleeing. No arrests have been made. Lemus was regional secretary of the National Federation of Agricultural Workers (CNTC) for the northern region of Honduras, a post to which he was elected in March of this year. “We in the CNTC believe Lemus was murdered for reasons linked to his tasks in the organization, since he was following up with several campesino groups in the region which are fighting for a piece of land,” said CNTC finance secretary Ivan Romero in Tegucigalpa. Romero said the CNTC is demanding that the government investigate the murder and punish those responsible. “With the murder of Lemus now there have been 15 comrades who in the past three years have spilled their blood for a piece of land in this country, and none of the cases have been investigated, nor have any of those responsible been punished,” said Romero. (ACAN-EFE, Panama,. May 25)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, May 29

CAFTA CRITICS HARASSED

Unknown persons broke into the office of Guatemala’s National Coordinating Committee of Peasant Organizations (CNOC) on May 8. The intruders stole 15 computers with sensitive information stored in their hard drives, but other valuable equipment was left behind. CNOC is a member of the Indigenous, Campesino, Union and Popular Movement (MICSP), an umbrella organization opposed to the DR-CAFTA; it organized massive demonstrations against the treaty in March. The information stolen included details of MICSP activities against DR-CAFTA, and the way MICSP is organized, as well as CNOC’s records of land conflict cases and its membership database.

After the break-in, CNOC moved into the offices of the Institute of Comparative Studies in Criminal Sciences of Guatemala (ICCPG). This office was broken into on May 10 in an apparent attempt to intimidate the staff of CNOC. Nothing was taken. On the same night two other MICSP member organizations suffered break-ins: the General Confederation of Workers of Guatemala (CGTG) and the Confederation of Labor Unity of Guatemala (CUSG).

There was a break-in at the offices of Children for Identity and Justice, against Forgetting and Silence (HIJOS) the night of May 11. HIJOS works on behalf of children whose parents “disappeared” in armed conflicts, but it has also been actively opposed to DR-CAFTA. The back doors of the office were forced, and the intruders examined the organization’s files and took two computers containing sensitive information about the organization’s work. A brand-new computer with no information stored on it was not taken, and other valuable office equipment was also left behind. In a possibly related incident, two armed men robbed HIJOS member Francisco Sanchez and tried to abduct him; they stopped when he resisted.

There have been 15 break-ins at human rights and social movement offices this year; eight took place between May 7 and May 12. (Amnesty International Alert, May 13; HIJOS Alert, May 12; Servicio Informativo “Alai-amlatina”, May 17)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, May 22

MORE ANTI-CAFTA PROTESTS IN HONDURAS

Some 300 indigenous people and campesinos from the Honduran provinces of Intibuca, Comayagua and Santa Barbara protested on May 11 in front of the US embassy in Tegucigalpa to demand that DR-CAFTA not be ratified. “For the right to health, education and work, no to the TLC [free trade treaty],” read a banner held by the protesters in front of the embassy, which was surrounded by riot police. The demonstration was timed to coincide with a series of protests in the US against DR-CAFTA. According to Salvador Zuniga of the Civic Council of Grassroots and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH), the protesters reject the “servile” role played by the Central American presidents who were meeting in the US to promote DR-CAFTA. “These presidents are offering the riches of the Central American peoples on a silver platter, and in the case of the president of Honduras, asking that an anti-national and anti-Honduran treaty be ratified which will only bring more unemployment and poverty,” Zuniga said. (Tiempo, Honduras, May 12; AP, May 11)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, May 15

PROTESTS GREET U.S. CAFTA TOUR

Three Central American presidents gathered in Miami on May 9 to launch a four-day 10-city US tour by a total of six presidents to promote the Free Trade Agreement, which US president George W. Bush is trying to get approved by Congress before the summer. Oscar Berger of Guatemala, Ricardo Maduro of Honduras and Enrique Bolanos of Nicaragua joined with Florida governor Jeb Bush to speak, under tight security, at the Port of Miami. Dozens of protesters–steel workers, retirees, Latino group representatives and others–stood holding placards on the corner outside behind a line of 18-wheelers waiting to enter the port. “It was hard to do interviews because all the trucks were honking [in support of the protesters],” Eric Rubin, the director of the Florida Fair Trade Coalition, told the Miami Herald. “I think we got our message across.” (Florida FTAA press release, May 8; MH, May 10)

Dominican president Leonel Fernandez visited New York on May 10 to talk up DR-CAFTA at a luncheon at the City College of New York in Harlem. Dozens of members of the 1199/SEIU health care union, Dominican community organizations and Central American solidarity groups marched through the campus chanting “No to CAFTA, yes to life” in Spanish. Sonia Ivany of the New York state AFL-CIO told a rally that DR-CAFTA is based on the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which she said caused the loss of 780,000 jobs nationally in the garment and textile industries, 56,000 of them in New York. (El Nacional, Santo Domingo, May 12; El Diario-La Prensa, NY, May 11)

Salvadoran President Tony Saca visited Los Angeles, San Diego and Santa Fe before arriving in Washington on May 11 to join Fernandez, Berger, Maduro, Bolanos and Costa Rican president Abel Pacheco for what was supposedly the first lobbying action at the US Congress by six presidents at one time. They met with Senate majority leader Bill Frist (R-TN), Senate Foreign Relations Committee chair Richard Lugar (R-IN) and other senators. A meeting with House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) was hastily cancelled when the Capitol was evacuated because a small civilian airplane had wandered off course over downtown Washington. On May 12 the six presidents met with President Bush at the White House, where Bush told reporters that DR-CAFTA meant “stability and security, which can only be achieved with freedom.” (AP, May 10, 11; El Nuevo Herald, Miami, May 1 from AP, quote retranslated from Spanish)

Other Central Americans were in Washington to lobby against DR-CAFTA, including Salvadoran legislative deputy Salvador Arias of the leftist Farabundo Marti Front for National Liberation (FMLN). Arias also took part in anti-CAFTA demonstrations, along with another FMLN deputy, Lourdes Palacios. Salvadoran interior minister Rene Figueroa reportedly said Arias’ participation in the protests was “no more than an act of treason.” Arias told reporters that “in El Salvador this is a death sentence.” He said the FMLN would be taking extra security measures for him when he returned to El Salvador. (ED-LP, May 14 from AP)

The New York Times reports that DR-CAFTA is “the current centerpiece of President Bush’s trade agenda” but that it “is facing unusually united Democratic opposition as well as serious problems in overcoming well-entrenched special interest groups like sugar producers and much of the textile industry.” The UK Financial Times notes that “[i]n a hemisphere where anti-Americanism has become the norm, Central American governments have been among Mr. Bush’s most loyal allies… [I]f Mr. Bush fails to win congressional support, he will let down his closest friends and send a bleak message to pro-US politicians further south. Defeat on CAFTA would also sound the death knell for more ambitious liberalization such as the continent-embracing Free Trade Area of the America (FTAA).” (NYT , May 10; FT, May 13)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, May 15

So far only the legislatures of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras have ratified the agreement. The US Senate Committee on Finance began considering DR-CAFTA on April 6. The administration would like to hold the vote before July 1, the expiration date for the “fast-track” rule which keeps Congress from changing or amending trade agreements. The Senate is expected to approve, but the measure faces problems in the House of Representatives. On May 4, four centrist representatives–Ellen Tauscher (D-CA), Adam Smith (D-WA), Arthur Davis (D-AL) and Ron Kind (D-WI)–announced they were not backing DR-CAFTA. The opposition is “very strong,” Tauscher said, but she couldn’t say whether it would be enough to stop the trade pact.

Weekly News Update on the Americas, May 8

MAY DAY MARCHES BLAST CAFTA

May Day marches in Central America focused on opposition to DR-CAFTA and neoliberal economic policies. (La Jornada, Mexico, May 2 from AFP, DPA, Reuters)

In Guatemala City, nearly 30,000 people marched five kilometers from a labor monument to Constitution Plaza to protest the free trade treaty. The march was organized by the Indigenous, Campesino, Union and Grassroots Movement. Similar protests were held in the departments of Izabal, Quetzaltenango, Suchitepequez, Escuintla and Jutiapa, among others. (EFE, May 1; Guatemala Hoy, May 2)

More than 40,000 workers and students marched in the Salvadoran capital on May Day to protest DR-CAFTA and call for respect for labor rights. Participants were demanding that El Salvador ratify all the International Labor Organization (ILO) conventions, including one which refers to the right of public sector workers to be represented by unions. (EFE, May 1; Argenpress, May 3)

More than 70,000 people marched in 10 Honduran cities to protest DR-CAFTA and Mexico’s Plan Puebla-Panama, as well as government corruption and the high price of basic necessities. The marches in Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula, La Ceiba, Puerto Cortes and six other towns were also commemorating the 51st anniversary of a strike by banana workers against the US multinationals Standard Fruit and Chiquita Brands, which marked the birth of the Honduran labor movement. (Argenpress, May 3)

In Nicaragua, there were two opposing May Day marches, together drawing about 4,000 people. One march was headed by rightwing President Enrique Bolanos; the other was led by leftist Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) founder and leader Tomas Borge. (EFE, May 2; LJ, May 2 from AFP, DPA, Reuters)

For the second year in a row, thousands of workers and students marched on May 1 in San Jose, Costa Rica to demand that the government reject DR-CAFTA. This year there were no clashes or incidents. (La Nacion, Costa Rica, May 2; EFE, May 1)

On April 26, Costa Rican President Abel Pacheco announced that he would designate a commission of five “notables”–supposedly with no political, business or union affiliations–to study DR-CAFTA and make a recommendation which will help him decide whether or not to send the measure to Congress for approval. On May 5, Pacheco designated the commission’s first member, Franklin Chang, a US astronaut of Costa Rican descent. Pacheco said that once he gets the report from the commission he will proceed in accordance with his conscience. (La Republica, Costa Rica, May 6)

Thousands of workers and students marched in Panama City to protest proposed social security “reforms,” demand an increase in the minimum wage, and condemn government corruption. (EFE, May 2) As the march ended, three agents from the National Police arrested Carlos Obaldia, finance secretary of the Single Union of Construction and Similar Workers (SUNTRACS), a combative union which has been active in the struggle against the privatization of social security. Obaldia was released after a half hour; he said police claimed they arrested him for painting graffiti, though he denied doing so. (La Prensa, Panama, May 2)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, May 8

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: MAY DAY AGAINST CAFTA

On May 1 in the northern Dominican Republic city of Santiago, transport workers marched with members of neighborhood and grassroots organizations to protest the government’s economic policies and DR-CAFTA. The march was organized by the Alternative Social Forum of the Northern Region, whose spokesperson, Victor Breton, warned that DR-CAFTA will deepen the economic crisis affecting Dominican farmers. Breton noted that “thousands” of workers have been laid off from the country’s “free trade zones,” tourism is down and unemployment is at its highest rate in years. Fidel Santana, general spokesperson of the Alternative Social Forum, also spoke at the march, saying that DR-CAFTA will make Dominicans poorer. Hundreds of workers from the northern region took part in the march in Santiago, which was joined by a delegation of grassroots leaders from Santo Domingo. (EFE, May 1)

The Dominican Senate has conditioned its approval of DR-CAFTA on a series of compensatory measures for national producers, who will be unable to compete with the other treaty partners. On May 3, a mission of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) which was in the Dominican Republic to evaluate an accord signed with the government last January, recommended a fiscal reform to recover the income which the country will lose when DR-CAFTA takes effect. (Hoy, NY, May 6 from wire services)

The Alternative Social Forum, which groups more than 50 union and grassroots organizations from throughout the Dominican Republic, organized a mass march to the National Palace in Santo Domingo on April 20 to protest DR-CAFTA and put forth alternative economic proposals. The march was blocked by a heavy police and military presence. The Forum also organized a picket on April 28 outside the National Social Security Council to protest the privatization of health care and demand that the government continue to provide medical insurance to Dominican workers. (Hoy, NY, April 29)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, May 8

Weekly News Update on the Americas
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CENTRAL AMERICA: ANTI-CAFTA RESISTANCE AND REPRESSION

from Weekly News Update on the Americas

NOTE: Nearly a year has passed since the leaders of Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa Rica met in Washington DC May 28, 2004 to sign the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). Since then, the national legislatures of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras have approved the treaty, and the Dominican Republic is now also slated to join. But the treaty has been met with militant protest–often put down with bloody repression–throughout the region. As the treaty goes before Nicaragua’s National Assembly, that country is the latest to see the streets of its capital filled with angry farmers, workers and students. Meanwhile, protests continue even in those countries which have already approved the treaty–over its terms, as well as related economic issues, with fresh violence reported in April from El Salvador and Honduras. The treaty is returning instability to the isthmus before it has even taken effect–and the U.S. media are paying little note. Our colleagues at Weekly News Update on the Americas provide details.–WW4 REPORT

NICARAGUA: MOBILIZATION AGAINST CAFTA

Hundreds of Nicaraguans marched in Managua on April 14 against ratification of the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA). The march was sponsored by nongovernmental organizations, unions and agricultural associations as part of an April 10-16 Week of Action to build opposition to the trade accord, which the government of President Enrique Bolanos is pressuring the National Assembly to ratify. Organizers said they were planning sit-ins, assemblies and meetings with cooperatives so that people will be informed about the “asymmetric” effects of the accord, which they say will subject Nicaragua’s small and medium agricultural producers to competition from mammoth US agribusinesses.

Earlier in the day university students marched to the National Assembly to protest CAFTA and an increase in bus fares that took effect on April 4. Some students seized a bus at the campus of the National Engineering University (UNI) and threatened to burn it. Instead, they took it to Avenida Universitaria and smashed the windows. Students from UNI and the Managua campus of the National Autonomous University of Nicaragua (UNAN-Managua) blamed each other for the attack on the bus. Bus drivers said they would go on working normally despite the incident. Ramon Cruz, director of the Parrales Vallejos Cooperative, said the drivers didn’t want confrontations with the students. “We’re united with the students in the struggle; we could even lend them the buses so we can go together to protest before the people who are really responsible for this crisis.” (La Prensa, Nicaragua, April 15)

On April 16 thousands of people rallied in Ticuantepe, 20 km south of Managua, against the trade treaty. Former president Daniel Ortega (1984-1990), now general secretary of the leftist Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), told the crowd the accord will cause “a real social earthquake” by putting “thousands of agricultural producers” out of work. The National Union of Agricultural Producers and Ranchers (UNAG) is strongly backing the campaign against CAFTA. UNAG says its 170,000 members–who produce 75% of the nation’s basic products, according to a national study–“aren’t prepared to compete with the transnationals.” (Prensa Latina, April 16, 17; Notimex, April 17)

Also on April 16, President Bolanos met with a group of US Congress members–Reps. Nita Lowey (D-NY), Sam Farr (D-CA), Carolyn Kilpatrick (D-MI), Jim Kolbe (R-AZ) and John Carter (R-TX). Kolbe said CAFTA “will help harmonize economic relations and improve the standard of living of the people of Nicaragua with more jobs, better prices and access to the US market, to its products. This is what free trade’s about.” (EFE, April 16, quote retranslated from Spanish)

EL SALVADOR: RUBBER BULLETS AT CAFTA MARCH

On April 14 in San Salvador, agents from the Order Maintenance Unit (UMO) used pepper gas and rubber bullets against hundreds of people who were marching against the Dominican Republic-Central American Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA). Photojournalist Borman Marmol from the daily La Prensa Grafica was wounded by a rubber bullet; community radio representative Alexander Aguilar was also hit by a rubber bullet when he came to Marmol’s aid. Organizers of the protest say at least four other people were wounded by rubber bullets fired by the UMO agents. According to La Prensa Grafica, none of the injuries were serious. Delegates from the Human Rights Ombudsperson’s office said the clash erupted when demonstrators tried to remove the police barricades blocking them from reaching the main government building. No arrests were reported. (LPG, April 15)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, April 17

HONDURAS: STUDENTS PROTEST PRICE HIKES

On April 7, Honduran police and soldiers used tear gas and water cannons to break up a demonstration in Tegucigalpa by some 3,000 high school students who were protesting a fuel price hike resulting in bus fare and food price increases. High school students had marched in the capital the previous day, April 6, without incident. The price of fuel was raised on April 3. The students are also demanding prompt payment of a student subsidy, reduction in bus fares and more attention from the Education Ministry for each of the high schools.

The students walked out of their classrooms at 10 public high schools around the capital on the morning of April 7 and marched to the Congress building, blocking roads and throwing rocks at public buildings and buses along the way. The Metropolitan Police said there were no arrests or injuries, although student leaders said a number of students were beaten by police.

At the Congress building, the students met up with a protest by public employees who had been on strike since March 15 to demand a raise promised to them in 2000. (EFE, April 3, 7; AP, April 7; La Prensa, Honduras, April 8; Tiempo, Honduras, April 7, 8) Adding to the chaos, some 400 former employees of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal blocked the entrance to the tribunal building on April 7, demanding the payment they had been promised for their work counting ballots. (Tiempo, April 8)

The government had told the more than 40,000 state workers on April 6 that they had 24 hours to end their strike or they would be fired without compensation. A spokesperson for the National Association of Public Employees of Honduras (ANDEPH) said the strike would continue. Also on April 6, President Ricardo Maduro had decreed a state of emergency in the country’s 28 state hospitals, shut down by some 8,000 striking health workers–mainly auxiliary nurses–who are only treating emergency cases. (AP, April, 7; Prensa Latina, April 7) The state of emergency paves the way for the government to hire some 1,600 replacement workers to staff the hospitals. (La Tribuna, Honduras, April 7)

During or after the April 7 student march, police arrested three 15-year old students from the Saul Zelaya Jimenez Institute and accused them of shooting to death a prison guard, Hernan Ovidio Flores, in Tegucigalpa’s Morazan neighborhood. Police say the students shot Ovidio point blank during the march, then fled in a taxi, but were pursued and arrested by agents, who confiscated a 9mm pistol from them. According to police, one of the students confessed that he planned to shoot someone at the demonstration to draw attention to his high school, after being told to do so by the gang known as “18.” The students said they were innocent and had nothing to do with the shooting, and that they got in the taxi to flee the tear gas. (AP, April 8; LT, April 9)

Thousands of students from the Mixed Teacher Training School (Escuela Normal Mixta) marched again on April 8, amid a heavy presence of riot police. No incidents were reported. (LT, April 9) Students from the National Autonomous University had marched against the fuel price and bus fare hike on April 5. (Tiempo, Honduras, April 6)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, April 10

Weekly News Update on the Americas

CounterVortex

Tag: Central America

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