Pacific Rim Mining held its annual general meeting in downtown Vancouver on August 28. It was attended by a few directors and more than a dozen protesters.
Most of the demonstrators were from the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES) in the US Pacific Northwest. They wore tags describing themselves as shareholders in democracy, human rights, access to clean water and “our future”.
El Salvador
This year marks the 30th anniversary of the murder of San Salvador Archbishop Oscar Romero, who was killed on March 24, 1980 by one of El Salvador’s infamous government-backed “death squads”.
As archbishop, Romero spoke out about economic inequality and violent government repression. The anniversary of his murder always triggers reflection on the nightmare the country experienced during the 1980-’92 civil war, which left 75,000 people (mainly civilians) dead, 8000 “disappeared” and 50,000 permanently disabled.
El Salvador is a country where supermarket prices are comparable to those in developed countries, yet a sugar cane cutter earns $5 a day.
This small, predominantly rural, yet densely populated country has a violent history of colonial oppression and the attempted genocide of the indigenous people. More recently, it went through the 1980-92 civil war.
“La Lucha” is a phrase you hear a lot in El Salvador. It means “the struggle”.
Below is a July 10 statement from the Committees in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES). For more information, visit http://cispes.org.
Hector Antonio Ventura and 13 others, now known as the Suchitoto 14, were arrested in July last year for their participation in an anti-water privatisation forum in the town of Suchitoto.
Below is an abridged sign-on statement initiated by the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador, http://cispes.org. To add you organisation, please email sistercities@gmail.com The context for the violence is the increasing likelihood of a victory in the elections for early next year of the left-wing Farabundo Marti Liberation Front.
Below is an abridged April 30 Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES) article. Visit http://cispes.org.
In what country does protesting against water privatisation or better put, protesting against the removal of your only source of water lead to the police killings of a protesting child, arrests and bashings of protesters and a threatened 60 year jail sentence under the anti-terrorism legislation?
This appeal was issued on July 30 by Public Services International (PSI) following the assassination of Miguel Angel Vasquez Argueta, finance secretary for PSIs affiliate STSEL in the electricity sector. PSI is calling for a full and independent investigation into the matter.
As right-wing death squads reassert their presence and gangs and organised crime with links to the highest levels of government operate freely, campesinos (peasants) and organised youth are being persecuted and beaten in the streets. On February 27, while holding a peaceful and legal protest against the regional free trade agreement CAFTA and the governments crackdown on civil liberties, 27 young activists were detained, charged with civil disobedience and brutally beaten by the civil police. Meanwhile the Popular Youth Bloc is awaiting information on the fate of Edwar Contreras Bonifacio, who was forcibly disappeared when he left college on February 7. An international solidarity campaign is underway and people are urged to write to the nearest Salvadoran consulate or embassy demanding his safe return, as well as the release of the 27 arrested youth. The youth and popular organisations are responding to this campaign of state-sponsored intimidation with the call to Answer more repression with more struggle!
El Salvadoran President Antonio Saca’s right-wing government has proclaimed 2007 the “year of peace”, inaugurating this move with an attempt to nominate the late Roberto D’Aubuisson, founder of Saca’s ARENA party, with the highest human rights award in the country.
On January 22, El Salvador’s main opposition party, the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN), held commemorative activities for the 75th anniversary of the 1932 Nahua-Pipil indigenous peasant revolt led by indigenous leader Jose Feliciano Ama and Agustin Farabundo Martí Rodríguez , leader of the newly formed Communist Party (PCS).
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