Supporters of civil liberties and workers’ rights in Paraguay celebrated a judge’s denial of a motion by prosecutors demanding that Arrom, a leader of the Free Homeland Movement (Movimiento Patria Libre--MPL), be jailed while they seek to prosecute him on false charges in relation to the kidnapping of María Edith Debernardi, a member of a prominent bourgeois family. Arrom remains free on bail.

The fight against the frame-up of Arrom and four other MPL members and supporters, who six months ago were detained and tortured by cops, has become a focal point in the fight to defend and expand political space and democratic rights in Paraguay. The issue touches a nerve in this country because of the legacy of a 35-year U.S.-backed dictatorship and the current rise in struggles by farmers and workers pressing their rights. In targeting the MPL the government is also seeking to intimidate the peasant movement, whose leadership includes that left-wing party.

In an interview, Arrom explained that on January 17 he and MPL member Anuncio Martí were kidnapped by plainclothes cops. For two weeks the cops tortured them, trying to get them to sign a fake confession that they were responsible for the kidnapping of Debernardi. They interrogated them about supposed MPL ties to guerrilla groups such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and Túpac Amaru of Peru.

On January 30 Arrom’s relatives received an anonymous tip about the prisoners’ whereabouts and, accompanied by the media, discovered them at a house owned by a police official on the outskirts of Asunción, the country’s capital. As the cops fled the premises, Arrom and Martí emerged from the house, showing signs of severe torture. They reported that several top government officials had known about their kidnapping, and that Justice Minister Silvio Ferreira and Interior Minister Julio Fanego had even telephoned them to pressure them into signing the false confession. The case has been front-page news since then.

On February 1, some 2,000 people rallied here to celebrate the release of the political activists and to demand the resignation of the implicated ministers as well as President Luis González Macchi. Under public pressure, Ferreira and Fanego resigned.

Arrom, however, was placed on parole as government prosecutors announced they would press kidnapping charges against him--a frame-up campaign that continues today. In the most recent attempt to revoke his parole and put him in jail, prosecutors had filed a motion claiming he was a "flight risk." Defenders of the MPL leader mobilized public support, and the judge ruled against the prosecutors’ motion. But cops have continued to stand outside his home and try to intimidate him and others.  
 
Interview with political prisoner
Two days after Arrom and Martí’s abduction, cops burst into the home of MPL member Víctor Colman and Ana Samudio and arrested them together with Ana’s brother Jorge Samudio. The three were accused of taking part in the Debernardi kidnapping and remain in detention.

Militant reporters visited Ana Samudio at the women’s prison in Asunción. She reported that up to 20 heavily armed cops, including police official Javier Cazal, had burst into her home on January 19. "They subjected me to verbal and physical abuse. They tortured my husband and my brother, who was living with us. And they planted $50,000 in my house trying to claim it was part of the ransom money."

Samudio, an MPL sympathizer, said that almost six months later the authorities have failed to present any credible evidence to win an indictment against her, so she expected to be released shortly. She added that the abduction of Debernardi, who was released after 64 days when a large ransom was paid, was very murky, with Debernardi changing her story repeatedly.

Defenders of Arrom have launched an international campaign against the frame-up, winning broad support. The MPL is also planning to run Arrom and Martí as candidates in the 2003 elections, taking advantage of the respect they have won as fighters against government repression.  
 
Defeat of ‘antiterrorism’ bill
The frame-up campaign against MPL members has coincided with efforts by the Paraguayan regime to pass an "antiterrorism" law that would target working people and others involved in social and political struggles. César Báez, head of the Human Rights Coordinating Committee of Paraguay, told Militant reporters that the "antiterrorism" bill is modeled on the USA-Patriot Act adopted by the U.S. government. It would give the government wide powers to arrest individuals on vague charges of "terrorism," giving a green light to wiretapping, spying, and other attacks on basic rights.

"The U.S. government carried out an aggressive public campaign in favor of this law," Báez said. "The U.S. embassy’s antiterrorism adviser even met with Paraguayan congresspeople to pressure them to pass the bill."

The undemocratic bill was withdrawn by Congress in June in face of large demonstrations by peasants throughout the country. Interviewed by Militant reporters, several members of the Parliamentary Commission on Human Rights--all of them belonging to the ruling Colorado Party or another capitalist party--complained that many in Paraguay had reacted strongly to the antiterrorist bill because it reminded them of Stroessner’s infamous Law 209, which allowed the regime to arbitrarily detain people without the presumption of innocence. They said they favored an "improved" version of the antiterrorism bill.  
 
Anti-Muslim campaign at Triple Border
One target of the "antiterrorism" campaign has been working people in the area known as the Triple Border, where Paraguay, Brazil, and Argentina meet. This area, which includes Paraguay’s second-largest city, Ciudad del Este, as well as the adjacent Brazilian city of Foz do Iguaçu, has a substantial Arab immigrant community, mostly of Lebanese origin. There are several Muslim cultural centers, two mosques, and two Islamic schools.

On a visit to Ciudad del Este, Militant reporters met with both political activists and Arab residents who described the anti-Muslim campaign of intimidation by the Paraguayan government, backed by Washington.

Two Lebanese-Paraguayan merchants in Ciudad del Este, who asked not to be quoted by name, explained that the anti-Arab campaign in that area was first whipped up after the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires that killed more than 80 people. Government officials and others immediately blamed "Islamic fundamentalists," but years later it turned out rightist Argentine cops had been involved, and today several cops have been jailed in connection with the case.

A few years ago, the merchants noted, the Paraguayan government created an "Antiterrorism Bureau" at Washington’s urging. It began to accuse Arab immigrants of fund-raising for groups tied to the Lebanese resistance organization Hezbollah, and targeted Ahmed Barakat, an acknowledged supporter of Hezbollah, and his fund-raising activities. "Many merchants here had green boxes in their stores to collect donations for Islamic charities, an effort headed by Barakat. But the authorities couldn’t prove Barakat was misusing funds since all the money was accounted for," one merchant said.

After September 11, the U.S. government accelerated its "antiterorism" campaign as a cover for increasing its military intervention around the world, including in South America. Pressed by Washington, the Paraguayan government carried out police raids in Ciudad del Este and other cities in the Triple Border area, arresting 21 people; three remain in jail on minor charges such as expired visas or tax problems, Militant reporters were told. Arabs continue to be harassed by cops who stop them on the street or in their cars.

In late June the Brazilian government arrested Barakat at the request of the Paraguayan government, but released him for lack of evidence. Washington has demanded his extradition, but it doesn’t have an extradition treaty with Brazil, the merchants noted.  
 
Increasing U.S. military presence
Members of the municipal workers union in Ciudad del Este reported that the antiterrorism campaign has also provided a cover for the government to go after unionists and workers trying to organize unions.

The unionists said that Washington has increased its military presence in Paraguay. The Pentagon has established an unofficial military facility near the Triple Border city of Concepción under the pretext of helping peasants build health-care centers and other facilities.

Gen. Gary Speer, head of the U.S. Southern Command, made a high-profile visit to Paraguay in mid-July. He met with Paraguayan president González Macchi and supervised a "joint hostage rescue operation" by an "antiterrorist squad" of Paraguayan troops. An article in the July 11 issue of Noticias reported on Speer’s visit and stated that the U.S. military "offers its counterparts in our country cooperation in training for antidrug, antiterrorist, and peacekeeping operations."

During a visit to the rural town of Caaguazú, farmers described the wave of protests in May and June that pushed back the government’s antiterrorism bill and several economic measures demanded by the International Monetary Fund.

"We knew the antiterrorism law would be used against peasant leaders and unionists," said Diosnel Aguilera, a leader of the peasant settlement near Caaguazú. "It reminded us of the repression under the Stroessner dictatorship, which would terrorize people in the countryside with its system of pyragué" the Guaraní term for "wool feet" or informers.

The peasant demonstrations were the largest political actions in Paraguay in many years. Caaguazú was one of the centers of these protests. Nimio Méndez, a local leader of the National Coordinating Board of Peasant Organizations (Mesa Coordinadora Nacional de Organizaciones Campesinas--MCNOC), one of the two main peasant organizations, said, "We blocked the highway for more than a month. Every day there were between 3,000 and 11,000 peasants gathered on the highway."

In addition to opposing the antiterrorism law, the peasants protested legislation that would authorize the sale of the state-owned telecommunications, railroad, water and sewer companies, and banks, as well as a value-added tax on agricultural products. The peasants marched toward Asunción in face of police and army repression. In one deadly police attack, a peasant was killed in the nearby town of Londres. After weeks of sustained peasant protests, combined with the threat of a general strike by unions, the government backed down and suspended the privatization measures, repealed the tax, and withdrew the antiterrorism bill.

A major factor driving the step-up in peasant struggles is the growing land crisis. While Paraguay has historically been underpopulated, the capitalist development and economic crisis in recent decades has drawn peasants and workers to migrate to the rich agricultural lands of the east. The resulting shortage of land has driven peasants to organize takeovers of idle lands belonging to absentee landlords. Diosnel Aguilera explained that 35 families living in crowded conditions near Caaguazú had crossed the highway in 1999 and occupied land belonging to an absentee German landlord. They are now fighting to legalize the status of their settlement, named Koe-ti, or dawn in Guaraní, the primary language of many of the mestizo farmers of Paraguay.

The increased combativity by farmers and other working people is a sign of the social and political changes in Paraguay since the end of the Stroessner dictatorship, which ruled the country from 1954 to 1989 and suppressed dissent with an iron fist. The previous wave of land struggles, led by the Agrarian Leagues tied to the Catholic Church, was crushed in the 1970s. Many of the farmers leading the Koe-ti occupation are in their 20s, and they do not bear the scars of previous defeats. The successful peasant mobilizations have helped expand political space for working people. As a result, battles for democratic rights such as the campaign against the frame-up of Arrom and other MPL members are in a stronger position.
 
 
Related articles:
Socialists from U.S. address forum in Paraguay  
 
 
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