In Brief
Puerto Rico's New Governor and Vieques Sila Maria Calder6n took office as governor of Puerto Rico on January 2 with calls for greater autonomy and for an end to the U.S. Navy's use of the...
...Families are welcome...
...presidential elections, perhaps not as vigorously as either Democrats or Republicans would have liked, but with an intriguing twitch to Ralph Nader's campaign...
...A record number came out for last November's annual protest, with 3,600 demonstrators risking arrest by crossing onto the base...
...Most observers have extensive Haiti experience, and several have previously observed elections there, as well as in East Timor and Chiapas, Mexico...
...au NACLA REPORT ON THE AMERICAS 50 IN BRIEF With his 35% share, Bush ended up with more Hispanic votes than his father did in 1992 (28...
...Environmentalists fear the potential devastation that the 1,500foot-wide path would have on the Cerro Silva Forest Reserve...
...Not everyone in Nicaragua supports the idea, however...
...LA HERMANDAD EDUCATIVA includes Proyecto Linguistico Quetzalteco in Quetzaltenango, Proyecto Linguistico de Espauiol/Mam in Todos Santos and Escuela de la Montalia near Nuevo San Jos6...
...Jules Boykoff U.S...
...Based on our first-hand observations, we have no reason to doubt this, and we support the right of the Haitian people to have the person they have overwhelmingly chosen, Aristide, to be the next president of Haiti...
...Centro Humboldt, a Nicaraguan nongovernmental organization that promotes sustainable local development and management of the environment, is leading the charge...
...market passing through the country and a judiciary and police force increasingly controlled by the Colombian drug cartels-despite all this, the Clinton Administration was stuck with Aristide...
...CINN has submitted a feasibility and construction proposal to the Nicaraguan National Assembly for consideration...
...Opponents also argue that a dry canal would hurt commercial and subsistence fishing and disrupt the nesting patterns of endangered sea turtles...
...Latinos at the Polls Latino voters flexed some political muscle in the U.S...
...De la Rua initially supported the Supreme Court as the only body that could decide the fate of the 12 La Tablada prisoners near death from a hunger strike begun on September 6. But Belli's cry "The prisoners are dying...
...Indigenous groups from Monkey Point-a settlement along the Atlantic Coasthave mobilized opposition to the dry canal, arguing that they have not been consulted and that the proContinued on page 50 NACIA REPORT ON THE AMERICAS 4tA4 W"44 '4 f44 CEMANAHUAC EDUCATIONAL COMMUNITY *Intensive Study of Spanish language, all ability levels eSmall groups, never more than 5 students *Latin American Studies workshops and seminars *Field study excursions, led by anthropologists, to historic and archeological sites *Rural Studies program in Mexican village eFamily housing in Mexican homes *Year-round program, start any Monday We are happy to work with professors or leaders of social interest groups to offer individualized programs and fees for college students or social action groups with special interests in political and social policies in Mexico...
...Critics of the SOA and members of the movement to close it plan nationwide protests for the January 17 reopening...
...Pico predicts that Calder6n will seek the backing of countries in the region on these issues, noting the prominent place she gave President Hugo ChAvez at her inauguration...
...Like an exhaustive, searchable index specifically designed to locate information on progressive organizations and web sites...
...IN BRIEF to brutal paramilitaries who tortured and dismembered their victims" in Colombia's intensifying war...
...Capital would come from several businesses in the United States, Belgium, Canada, China, England, Japan, the Netherlands and Taiwan...
...In spite of all that has changed in Haiti over the last decade, with Aristide continuing to utter anti-imperialist and antineoliberal slogans even as he and his cronies became the richest men in Haiti, Global Exchange seemed unable to reassess its attachment Apdo...
...The only other international observer group, sent by the Caribbean Community, consisted of only four participants...
...Judith Adler Hellman II...
...Estimates of total voter participation ran from 5 to 10...
...Postal 1.201, C. P. 62000 Cuemavaca, Morelos, MEXICO Tel: (52-7) 317-08501 313-5450 Fax: (52-7) 313-2637 infor@cetlalic.org.mx www.cetlalic.org.mx LA HE AN DA E C1iIil I Study Spanish in Guatemala A not-for profit sisterhood of three collectively-run schools offers one-on-one instruction, family living, field trips and cultural activities...
...filed a petition on behalf of indigenous groups with the Inter-American Human Rights Commission of the Organization of American States (OAS...
...For more information write or call: PO Box 452 Manson, WA 98831 Phone (800) 963-9889 Visit our web site: www.infoserve.net/hermandad/ hermandad.htm VOL XXXIV, No 4 JANUARYIFEBRUARY IN BRIEF to Aristide as popular hero...
...Additionally, the proposed route would give potential plunderers access to Nicaragua's interior resources...
...Thus, the San Francisco-based NGO promoted its mission to Haiti with the exhortation: "Come Witness a People's Election" and then supplied in its press releases figures based on reports from the Haitian Electoral Council, whose members were appointed personally by Aristide in violation of the explicit provisions in the Constitution, and the observations of KOZEPEP, a peasant organization created by Aristide to undercut the influence of the genuinely popular National Peasant Movement (MNP...
...in Colorado the corresponding figures are 6% from Hispanics and 5% from whites...
...President William McKinley...
...Several environmental groups have organized against the building of the canal...
...Weekly News Update on the Americas Haiti Elections: Debate I. Electoral Charade PORT-AU-PRINCE--On November 26, 2000, an eerie silence descended on Port-auPrince and towns and villages throughout Haiti...
...policy in Haiti, progressive opposition leaders found themselves in a bizarre position: hoping for a Bush victory in Florida, and with it, a new team in Washington that would feel no need to defend a failed policy or the man who once embodied Haitians' hopes for democracy-but who now uses electoral fraud, naked repression, and assassination of opponents to sustain absolute control over his country...
...Political analysis from around the world...
...Army issued a misleading press release on December 7 announcing the closing of the notorious School of the Americas (SOA...
...The Democrats and GOP both used Spanish-language media such as Telemundo and Univision in unprecedented quantity to court the Latino vote...
...The U.S...
...Margot Olavarria is associate editor of NACLA Report on the Americas and a doctoral candidate in political science at the New School for Social Research...
...And more - all created exclusively for activists, nonprofit organizations, and politically aware people...
...Still, the younger Bush did no better than Ronald Reagan or Richard Nixon, who also both got 35% of the Hispanic vote...
...The opposition parties' boycott was reinforced by the refusal of international organizations--previously involved in guaranteeing clean elections in Haiti-to send observers to this one...
...Officially, the SOA did close on December 15--but only for a few weeks," commented Panetta...
...But now they stood deserted-mute testimony to the success of the opposition's campaign to sit out an election that promised only a reprise of last May's violent and fraudulent contest that gave Jean-Bertrand Aristide's Fanmi Lavalas party an overwhelming majority in the legislature and municipalities...
...The two corporations -SIT-Global (Intermodal System of Global Transport) and the multinational consortium Nicaraguan Inter-ocean Canal (CINN)--are hailing their plans as Nicaragua's economic salvation and have garnered the endorsement of both Nicaraguan President Amoldo Alemin (who himself has purchased land along the potential dry canal route) and Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) leader Daniel Ortega...
...She was an electoral observer in Mexico in Comalapan, Chiapas in 1994 and in Chalco, Mexico in 2000...
...The report of the ICIO to the press on November 28 estimates voter turnout at an average 64...
...seems to have struck a chord, because on December 29 de la Rua signed a decree reducing the life sentences of 11 of the prisoners, raising hopes for their eventual release from prison...
...ISBN 1-876175-13-3 116 pages $12.95 SALVADOR ALLENDE READER Chile's Voice of Democracy Edited & introduced by James D. Cockcroft A timely new book on Chile and the struggle for social change...
...Having witnessed the sham last May 21, institutions like the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Caribbean Community and Common Market (CARICOM) feared their presence might legitimize the November contest, while the United States, Canada and the European Union declined to underwrite the cost of elections as they had in the past...
...Of those, 2,100 were arrested...
...Most recently, two corporations have advanced similar versions of a "dry canal" projecta cross-country railway with large seaports on both the Pacific and Atlantic coasts...
...The ICIO began monitoring Haiti's democratic process at the beginning of 2000...
...Debbie Nathan is editor of NACLA Report on the Americas...
...Online discussion groups...
...For subscription information: Nicaragua Solidarity Network, 339 Lafayette Street, New York, NY 10012, (212) 674-9499...
...You've come to know IGC Internet as the pioneering nonprofit that first harnessed the power of the Internet for the progressive community...
...Email: wnu@igc.org...
...As the November/December 2000 issue of NACLA Report noted, however, the SOA has graduated more than 500 of the worst human rights abusers in the hemisphere, who are implicated in the murder and torture of countless Latin Americans...
...New from Ocean Press LATIN AMERICA From Colonization to Globalization Noam Chomsky with Heinz Dieterich An indispensable book for those interested in Latin America and the politics and history of the region...
...MANAGUA--Canal proposals for Nicaragua have been considered since at least the sixteenth century by such disparate leaders as King Phillip II of Spain, Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, Cornelius Vanderbilt and U.S...
...Thus, the same people who backed Aristide's return from exile in the United States as the only means to end military rule in Haiti have now banded together to contest his rule...
...The changes are merely cosmetic...
...The sole intention of the ICIO was to offer a non-Haitian independent voice on the elections during the year 2000...
...troops and millions of dollars to restoring Aristide to power in 1994, it became difficult for him to back away from the man he hoped would become his own Nelson Mandela in the hemisphere...
...The largest domestic observer group, KOZEPEP, deployed nearly 6,000 election observers, and they estimated 60 to 65% voter turnout nationally...
...The Haitian Electoral Council has also officially stated that JeanBertrand Aristide received 92% of the popular vote...
...And as Linda Panetta, director of SOA Watch/Northeast, and Randy Serraglio, director of SOA Watch/Southwest, reported in that issue: "A Human Rights Watch report released earlier this year found SOA-trained officers responsible for numerous atrocities from 1997-1999, and directly tied them VoL XXXIV, No 4 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2001 THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF HISPANIC & LATINO STUDIES Is pleased to announce their 2001 conference February 12-17, 2001 Houston Marriott Westside, 13201 Katy Freeway, Houston, Texas 77079 (218) 558-8338 JOIN US FOR MORE THAN 300 SESSIONS AND WORKSHOPS FEATURING SPEAKERS FROM THE US, CHINA, JAPAN, AFRICA, CENTRAL & SOU7H AMERICA & CANADA FEATURED SPEAKERS, SPECIAL MUSICAL EVENTS, INTERNATIONAL BOOK FAIR, EXHIBIT AREA, EMPLOYMENT RECRUITERS FROM COLLEGES & UNIVERSITIES, DAILY RECEPTIONS For more information contact: Dr...
...Despite the increasingly apparent corruption of Aristide and his henchmen, the withdrawal of funds from NGOs that have seen their resources disappear into the pockets of Fanmi Lavalas bosses, the rapid rise in state terror disguised as common criminality, and indisputable evidence that Haiti has become a narcostate with an estimated 14% of all drugs destined for the U.S...
...These reports support the Haitian Electoral Council's official statement that slightly over 60% of registered voters participated in the election...
...Moira Feeney directs the Haiti program at Global Exchange, an international human rights organization based in San Francisco...
...Social dislocation resulting from construction would also wreak environmental havoc...
...Legitimate Landslide PORT-AU-PRINCE - Global Exchange did not act alone in its reports on the Haitian elections...
...When possible, we also met with political party representatives from a wide range of political perspectives and with the staff of international organizations...
...Army's deceptive press release did not fool anyone...
...Army School of the Americas at Fort Benning, Georgia will close its doors permanently December 15," read the release...
...We conducted a fact-finding mission in April, and had a delegation of observers at the May local and legislative elections...
...In the aftermath of the vote, as international attention focused on Bush and Gore in Florida, a great uneasiness gripped the broad range of social forces opposed to Aristide...
...He researches U.S...
...Nationally, Hispanics voteddepending on which poll is consulted-from 62 to 66% for Al Gore, and 29 to 35% for George W. Bush...
...The U.S...
...Once President Clinton committed 20,000 U.S...
...Benning, will still teach basically the same courses, and will still instruct Latin American soldiers...
...She stressed in her inaugural address that "[t]he people of Puerto Rico want an immediate halt to the naval exercises...
...ISBN 1-876175-24-9 300pages $19.95 Forthcoming in 2001: CUBAN REVOLUTION READER FIDEL CASTRO READER Ocean Press, PO Box 834, Hoboken, NJ 07030, USA Tel: 201-617 7247 or Fax: 201-617 0203 * E-mail: info@oceanbooks.com.au www...
...Jules Boykoff is a doctoral candidate in political science at American University...
...Navy's use of the Puerto Rican island of Vieques for bombing exercises...
...Thus, on election day, it was left to the embassy press attaches and four CARICOM officers in Haiti to "unofficially" confirm what the naked eye could see: Even in the poorest neighborhoods, once a bulwark of support for Aristide, turnout consisted of a trickle of the Lavalas faithful...
...Thus, in an ironic turn that underscores the determinant role of U.S...
...Human rights groups have also raised concerns...
...Rediscover us at www.igc.org...
...During each of these trips, ICIO co-coordinators and observers met with leaders from the popular movement representing women's, peasants', labor and human rights groups...
...She's trying to impress on the United States that she has the support of Latin American radicals in order to have a stronger hand in the Vieques question," he told the Miami Herald...
...Recently, the International Human Rights Law Group (IHRLG) in Washington, D.C...
...Glenn Weidner, commandant of the SOA since July 1998, said that in the 16 years since the school moved to Fort Benning, it has helped reduce widespread human rights abuses while fostering democracy...
...On November 26, we deployed observers in four departments, and observed in over 150 Continued on page 6 BUENOS AIRES-Just hours after Argentina's Supreme Court refused to review the sentences of the La Tablada prisoners on December 21, Daughters and Sons for Identity and Justice against Forgetting and Silence (HIJOS) member Ernesto Belli (right), forcefully grabbed President Fernando de la Rua on the popular television show VideoMatch...
...Yet in New Mexico, which has an influential Green Party, only 1% of Hispanics told CNN pollsters they voted for Nader, compared to 4% of whites...
...It will reopen on January 17 under a new name: the 'Western Hemisphere Institute of Security Cooperation.' It is a ploy to try and get the school out of the headlines...
...The streets normally teem with pedestrians, vendors, shoppers, and uniformed school children jostling for space with jitneys, buses, taxis, and SUVs with "Care," "Save the Children," and "United Nations" stamped on the side...
...Though the mass media has barely mentioned it, Hispanics may have voted for Ralph Nader in higher percentages than did whites...
...The OAS presented the petition to the Alemdn government, whose response is pending...
...But their task is not easy...
...Jos6 Garriga Pico, a political science professor at the University of Puerto Rico, suggests that Calder6n will have a hard time fulfilling her campaign promises to stop the bombing on Vieques and to win greater autonomy for Puerto Rico...
...Strikingly, the only authoritative voice to support Aristide's claim that 60% of the electorate gave him 92% of the vote was Global Exchange...
...Environmental concerns with the dry canal project are also numerous...
...Action alerts...
...With the power of the new IGC Internet, there's nothing you can't change...
...The railways would be modern, high-speed lines used to transport cargo containers...
...Today, IGC Internet is shifting resources away from providing Internet access so we can bring you a series of innovative, results-oriented online tools and training programs...
...With that caveat, Nader's reported national share of the Hispanic vote is still noteworthy: It was 4% according to CNN's exit poll, compared to 3% of the white vote (and 1% of the African American total...
...In mid-December, we returned to Haiti with a delegation to observe the post-election situation...
...Army and SOA The U.S...
...Debbie Nathan U.S...
...Event listings...
...President George W. Bush, whose Republican Party supports statehood...
...in New Jersey a whopping 6% versus 3...
...The United States and international organizations such as the Organization of American States did not send observers...
...Judith Adler Hellman is a professor of social and political science at York University in Toronto...
...The Republicans were especially assiduous with efforts and ads, and one poll, conducted in late October, found Bush leading among recently naturalized voters who watch only Spanish newscasts...
...These figures were quite different from white voters' 54 to 42% preference for Bush over Gore--and even more divergent from African-Americans' 90% vote for Gore versus 9% for Bush...
...2 NACL4 REPORT ON THE AMERICAS 2 NACIA REPORT ON THE AMERICAS IN BRIEF CONTINUED FROM PAGE 2 voting bureaus...
...Simultaneously, the IHRLG is pushing its case through the Nicaraguan courts...
...Technology training...
...For information, call 800-247-6651 or write to: Charles P. Goff, Cemanahuac Educational Community Apartado 5.21 Cuernavaca, Morelos MEXICO Tel: (52.73) 18-6407 Fax: (52-73) 12-5418 Internet:74052.2570@compuserve.comn Homepage: http ://www.cemanahuac.com j 6 IN BRIEF CONTINUED FROM PAGE 6 ject does not respect their ancestral land rights...
...As the Internet evolved, the needs of our community changed...
...he expects strong resistance from the Navy and U.S...
...Sixty years of a menace to the health and security of our compatriots is unacceptable for any civilized and peaceful society...
...The school will still be located at Ft...
...Comprised overwhelmingly of former supporters of the priest and his democratic revolution, more than a dozen parties have come together in a "Convergence" to rebuild democracy in Haiti...
...And that's why we're changing, too...
...oceanbooks...
...The Green Party vote was proportionately tiny, and the plus-orminus 3% margin of error in exit polls makes one-digit percentages very hard to interpret...
...The individuals who volunteered to take part in the delegations did so in solidarity with the Haitian people in their quest for a truly participatory democracy...
...It was one of four organizations that comprised the International Coalition of Independent Observers (ICIO)-the others were the Quixote Center, Pax Christi USA and Witness for Peace...
...and more than Bob Dole in 1992 (21...
...Margot Olavarria Sources Weekly News Update on the Americas is published weekly by the Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York...
...In October, we returned to Haiti to gather information for the presidential and senatorial elections...
...foreign policy in Central America and language use in the mass media...
...In Texas, Nader picked up 3% of the Hispanic vote but only 2% of the white vote...
...Lemuel Berry, Jr., Executive Director, NANAS Morehead State University 212 Rader Hall, Morehead, KY 40351 Telephone: (606)783-2650, Fax: (606)783-5046 www.NAAAS.org Held in Association with the following: National Association of Arican American Studies National Association of Native American Studies International Association of Asian Studies /I 51 Just what you'd expect from an Internet site run by progressives- progressives...
...The ICIO is made up of completely self-financed volunteers, and is independent of all government and international structures...
...Moira Feeney Global Exchange Co-Coordinator, ICIO A Man, a Plan, a Canal, Nicaragua...
...Belli's father was an All for the Fatherland (MTP) activist killed during the 1989 assault on the La Tablada military base...
Vol. 34 • January 2001 • No. 4
