Salvador peasants occupy land
Since October 25, hundreds of peasants have been
occupying more than 20 agricultural properties in the
central and western part of El Salvador, according to the
Democratic Peasant Association (ADC), which initiated the
takeovers. The peasants are demanding the government comply
with distribution of land laid out in the peace treaty it
signed with the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front,
which ended the 12-year-old civil war.
The national civil police said antiriot cops were on alert and ready to evict the peasants from land, which is planted with coffee and basic staples. Marcos Salazar, an ADC official, said the peasants are demanding that farms exceeding 171 hectares (1 hectare = 2.47 acres) be turned over to settle 25,000 families. He also said the peasants had occupied another 26 properties in the states of Ahuachapán, Sonsonate, and La Libertad. The peasants rallied on October 26 and planned a demonstration on October 31 in San Salvador to press their demands.
Oil workers protest in Ecuador
Thirteen oil workers in Ecuador have been waging a
hunger strike since October 16 to oppose the government's
privatization plans. The oil workers federation also
threatened a national strike against the government's
policy. Energy Minister Galo Abril said the oil industry
would lose $5 million a day in income and $3 million in
stock profits from a national oil strike.
The country's congress rejected a proposal from the energy ministry to increase the transportation capacity of the trans-Ecuadorian oil pipeline from 320,000 barrels of crude per day to 450,000 barrels. Many in congress say that the estimated $600 million investment, which would presumably facilitate importation of oil from abroad, would affect Ecuador's sovereignty and national interests. Ecuador's oil production amounts to 380,000 barrels per day.
Chief cop in Chile finally jailed
Gen. Manuel Contreras, head of the Chilean government
secret police from 1973 to 1977 under former dictator Gen.
Augusto Pinochet, was escorted to jail October 21.
Contreras was sentenced in 1994 to seven years in prison
for his role in the car bombing murder of former government
minister Orlando Letelier in 1976.
"It is the first time in Latin American history that a secret police chief has ended up in jail," said Sergio Bitar, a leader of the Party for Democracy, which is part of the country's governing coalition. Bitar asserted that the U.S. government leaned on the regime to exclude the Letelier murder from a general amnesty for all other political crimes committed by the secret police from 1973 to 1978, when thousands of political activists disappeared while in military detention.
Thousands protest in Chechnya
Several thousand people assembled October 24 in the
central square in the Chechen capital of Grozny demanding
independence for Chechnya and the removal of Russian
troops. Russian police opened fire on the crowd, killing at
least one person and wounding four others.
Meanwhile, Russian commandos invaded an airport in Ingushetia, a republic bordering Chechnya, killing one person. Both armed assaults came as negotiations between Moscow and Chechen rebels stalled. Some 40,000 Russian troops were sent to Chechnya in December 1994 to crush a movement for independence.
U.S. deal in Okinawa case
The U.S. government agreed October 25 to hand over to
Japanese authorities three servicemen accused of raping a
12-year-old Japanese girl in September. Washington and
Tokyo signed a treaty in 1960 stating that U.S. officials
are not required to turn over military personnel suspected
of crimes until indictments are made. The new agreement
directs the U.S. government to "give sympathetic
consideration" if Japanese authorities request custody of
servicemen who are suspected of rape or murder but have not
yet been indicted.
According to the New York Times, Washington's "concession is intended to defuse the passions provoked" by the assault. Okinawans are outraged that under current agreements the GIs didn't have to be handed over until they were formally charged. The case has fueled protest rallies of tens of thousands demanding the removal of U.S. bases from the island.
No amnesty for racists
South African president Nelson Mandela rejected a
constitutional change that would extend the amnesty cut-off
date of Dec. 5, 1993, for those who admit to political
crimes committed during the apartheid era. Right-wing
leader Constand Viljoen met with Mandela to propose
extending the date to May 10, 1994, when Mandela was
inaugurated.
In the final days before the April 26-28, 1994, election, members of the neo-Nazi Afrikaner Resistance Movement set off bombs that killed 21 people. Some 30 members of the racist group, including some of its top leaders, have been jailed for the bombings.
De Klerk claims nukes destroyed
A spokesperson for South African deputy president F.W.
De Klerk denied claims, stated in the recently released
book The Mini-Nuke Conspiracy: Mandela's Nuclear Nightmare,
that the old apartheid regime had not destroyed its entire
nuclear arsenal. The book, which was released
internationally October 20, asserts that the racist regime
did not destroy all its weapons in 1993.
Cuban president Fidel Castro told a meeting in New York that the apartheid regime considered using nuclear weapons against Cuban and Angolan troops fighting against its aggression in southern Africa. Castro also referred to the claims in the Mini-Nuke Conspiracy that some of the fascist groups in South Africa have been able to keep some of these weapons.
New charges against killer cop
Robert Johnson, the Bronx district attorney in New York,
announced October 18 that he would seek a new indictment
against Francis Livoti, the cop who choked Anthony Baez to
death Dec. 22, 1994. The original indictment against Livoti
was thrown out supposedly because a clerk printed out
incorrect charges in filing the indictment.
Baez's relatives, who were infuriated by the dismissal, staged a sit-in at the district attorney's office October 11 and demanded that the prosecutor present the case to a second grand jury. Johnson conceded. He issued a statement that said, "While I firmly believe the court's decision was wrong, based on legal and practical consideration and with the agreement of the Baez family, I have decided to re- present the charges rather than appeal."
U.S. Congress to slash Medicare
The U.S. House of Representatives approved a budget bill
October 26 that would drastically cut spending on Medicare,
the health-care program for the elderly and disabled. The
bill would also reduce Medicaid benefits, end the federal
requirement to provide subsistence payments to poor
children, cut off welfare cash benefits after five years,
and bar states from giving federal aid to teenage mothers
and children born to single mothers already collecting
welfare benefits.
A similar version of the bill passed in the U.S. Senate on October 28. The Senate version includes provisions on aid to teenage mothers and increased benefits for women who have additional children while on welfare. The differences between the two versions remain to be worked out in a conference committee of the two houses of Congress. U. S. president Bill Clinton, who announced in September strong support for Senate legislation to "end welfare as we know it" that could push an additional 1.1 million children into poverty, said he would veto the bill approved in the House of Representatives.
- MAURICE WILLIAMS