In Brief
Sara Mendez Finds her Son MONTEVIDEO-More than 20 years of tireless effort finally paid off for Uruguayan Sara M6ndez on March 19 when she was reunited with her son, Sim6n Riquelo. M6ndez had...
...HRW found pervasive racism, however, in the attitudes of the government's migration department...
...The threats against Zamora add pressure on the government to end the long history of terror campaigns against the Mexican human rights community...
...A breakthrough finally came when a former Argentine military officer told an Uruguayan journalist that the baby had been taken to a clinic and given to an adoptive family...
...Transition President Pedro Carmona, the chair of Venezuela's largest chamber of commerce, immediately agreed to reinstate the Assembly and to the rest of the generals' demands...
...He can be reached at <wilpert@cantv.net...
...Make a change in Guatemala...
...M6ndez says that Uruguayan soldiers broke into her Buenos Aires apartment, arrested her, and abducted her baby...
...Chivez's opposition, which primarily consists of Venezuela's old guard in the media, the union federation, the business sector, the church and the traditionally conservative military, took advantage of their media monopoly to turn his biggest liability, his autocratic and inflammatory style, against him...
...The labor union federation CTV, which saw itself as one of the main actors of the opposition movement to President Chivez, and nearly all moderate opposition parties were excluded from the new "democratic unity" cabinet...
...Frei Montalva, father of the also-former president of Chile, Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle (1994-2000), died January 22, 1982, in a Santiago clinic as the result of a stomach infection he developed as he was recovering from surgery...
...The crowds outside of Miraflores were ecstatic...
...No one would tell her what had happened to Sim6n...
...M6ndez had help from an Uruguayan lawmaker, human rights groups, a journalist and an Argentine judge in locating her son...
...The paper praises the government of President Hip6lito Mejia for showing a much greater willingness than any of its predecessors to ensure fairer treatment and due process for Haitians and Dominico-Haitians who are unable to prove their Dominican citizenship...
...They often face a lifetime of discrimination that includes the effective denial of Dominican citizenship and the constant threat of summary deportation, according to the report...
...M6 this was a victory "in against impunity...
...Next, they decreed that the 1999 constitution, which had been written by a Constitutional Continued on page 55 6 NACIA REPORT ON THE AMERICAS IN BRIEF CONTINUED FROM PAGE 6 Assembly and ratified by vote, following the procedures outlined in the previous constitution, was to be suspended...
...They located the clinic, which provided them with information about the baby...
...About 5,000 CONTINUED FROM PAGE 2 Chavez supporters had gathered by the time the anti-government demonstrators got there...
...Fulbright scholar in Venezuela, and is currently doing independent research on the sociology of development...
...Following the initial shock and demoralization that the coup caused among Chavez supporters, this second miscalculation led to major upheavals and riots in Caracas' sprawling slums, which make up nearly half of the city...
...2, p. 24...
...But the coup leaders made two fundamental miscalculations...
...They have terrible homes...
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...56 NACIA REPORT ON THE AMERICAS IN BRIEF That same year, several of the dictatorship's political prisoners at the Public Prison of Santiago suffered poisoning, which was diagnosed as botulism, though they had not consumed anything, such as poorly canned foods, that could cause that illness...
...The shootings and the subsequent deaths were then used by the coup leaders as the primary reason for ousting Chivez, claiming that Chavez had ordered his supporters to fire on an unarmed crowd...
...In addition, they have "rougher skin" and are "much blacker than we are...
...As the boldness of ChAvez supporters grew, they began taking over several television stations, which had not reported a single word about the uprisings and the demonstrations...
...The new transition president would thus rule by decree until next year, when new elections would be called...
...M6ndez went t Aires March 12 and Sim6n, although the res tests were still not in...
...The following is an eyewitndez said ness account of the coup and the battle countercoup...
...Not only the Mexico City Attorney General's office, but the entire Mexican judicial system is facing an important test of competence...
...Next, as the awareness of the extent of Chivez's support spread, major battalions in the interior of Venezuela began siding with him...
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...In practically all of the barrios of Caracas, spontaneous demonstrations and cacerolazos (pot banging) broke out on April 12 and 13...
...Since her release, M6ndez has searched for her son [See Maria Delgado, "Looking for Sim6n," NACLA, Vol...
...While there certainly are many Chdvez opponents who come from the lower classes and numerous supporters from the upper classes, the division between Chivez supporters who come from the lower dark-skinned classes and the opponents who come from the higher light-skinned classes cannot be denied...
...This change of heart resulted in their call for changes to the sweeping "democratic transition" decree, lest they withdraw their support from the new government...
...Instead, suspected Haitians have been targeted for deportation "based on the color of their skin," according to the 34-page report, "'Illegal People': Haitians and DominicoHaitians in the Dominican Republic," which details a number of cases of people caught in such circumstances and wrongfully deported...
...This first miscalculation led to several generals' protest against the new regime, perhaps under pressure from the excluded sectors of the opposition, or perhaps out of a genuine sense of remorse...
...No one believed that the coup could or would be reversed so rapidly...
...Protests in front of Congress, at the government house and at banks, such as this one at Bank Borton on April 10, are a daily occurrence...
...Gregory Wilpert lives in Caracas...
...Ochoa was found shot to death at her Mexico City office on October 19, 2001...
...NotiSur "Civil society," as the opposition Continued on page 6 BUENOS AIRES-The crisis in Argentina continues to deepen...
...He is also advertising coordinator at NACLA...
...35, No...
...Progressive civil society had either been silenced or demonized as violent Chdvez fanatics...
...www.casaxelaju.comlxelabaj Vol XXXV, No 6 MAY/JUNE 2002 55 IN BRIEF HRW Blasts Dominican Treatment of Haitians WASHINGTON- "Snatched off the street, dragged from their homes, or picked up from their workplaces, 'Haitian-looking' people are rarely given a fair opportunity to challenge their expulsion during these wholesale sweeps," says a Human Rights Watch (HRW) report on Dominicans of Haitian descent released April 3. "They are frequently dropped off at the Haitian border within a matter of hours after their initial detention, sometimes with nothing more than the clothes on their back...
...Coup leaders then proceeded to dissolve the legislature, the Supreme Court, the attorney general's office, the national electoral commission and the state governorships...
...Deportations have been carried out in such a summary fashion, says the report, that parents have been deported to Haiti without having time to collect their Dominicanborn children, leaving entire families separated across borders...
...Generally, this type of regime fits the textbook definition of dictatorship...
...InterPress Service New Clues in Frei Sr.'s Mysterious Death SANTIAGO-A new book released this week reveals information about the alleged participation of chemist Eugenio Berrios in the death of former president Eduardo Frei Montalva, and about the relationship of this agent of the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship with former Peruvian spymaster Vladimiro Montesinos...
...The journalist contacted the Committee for Peace and Uruguayan Sen...
...M6ndez was captured as part of Operation Condor, the coordinated repression by Southern Cone military regimes aimed at eliminating political opponents during the 1970s and 1980s...
...The head of :o Buenos Venezuela's chamber of commerce met with was installed as president, and ults of the Chdvez was held in military custody...
...He is a former U.S...
...Those shared with me during years the hopes, the f have the well-earned r that we have found share the happiness...
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...There are suspicions that the infection was caused by bacteria intentionally introduced by agents of the dictatorship and developed by Berrios, who was murdered in Uruguay in 1995, said Senator Carmen Frei, daughter of the late former president, in an address last October before the Senate...
...Jordi Pius Llopart Sources Notisur is a weekly publication of the Latin America Data Base, an on-line news service available at <http://ladb.unm.edu/> For subscriptions, visit LADB's website or call 1-800-472-0888...
...The sub-director of the department's Haitian affairs bureau, for example, insisted to HRW interviewers that Haitians can be spotted "by their way of living...
...I am not thinking of committing suicide'" Zamora told the Mexican daily La Jornada after reporting the threats...
...M6ndez was arrested July 13, 1976, in Argentina...
...Her abductors took M6ndez to Automotores Orletti, a clandestine jail and torture center, and later returned her to Uruguay, where she was jailed until 1981...
...What Venezuela needs, if social peace is to be preserved, is a more just distribution of its immense wealth...
...Molina established in his investigation that in 1981 the Bacteriology Institute, a government agency to which Berrfos was linked, clandestinely imported botulism toxins and lyophilizators, which allow the processing and disguising of these toxins...
...The waiting ended when the test confirme young man was the M6ndez and Mauricio ( had died from cancer earlier in Europe...
...Such attitudes, says the report, result in the kinds of abuses documented in its pages...
...When Chavez appeared on national television around 4 AM, he too joked that he knew he would be back, but he never imagined it would happen so fast...
...I cannot confirm that Berrfos killed Frei Montalva, but there are now serious assumptions that call for an in-depth investigation," Molina told IPS...
...One has to recognize that, at heart, this conflict is also a class conflict...
...Then, in the early afternoon of April 13, purely by word-of-mouth and the use of cell phones (Venezuela has one of the highest per capita rates of cell phone use in the world), a demonstration in support of Chbvez was called at the Miraflores presidential palace...
...Thousands of depositors are incensed over President Eduardo Duhalde's bill proposing the obligatory exchange of fixed-term deposits for five to ten-year public bonds...
...Venezuelan society is still deeply divided...
...InterPress Service is an alternative source of news and analysis from a Third World perspective...
...On March Sim6n returned from va, family told him that adopted and that he wa the son of political priso child had been taken Sim6n was willing to h testing...
...Doubt about the possible assassination of former Christian Democrat president Frei Montalva (1964-1970) by the DINA 20 years ago has now been elevated to "presumption," in legal terms, says the author of the book, journalist Jorge Molina...
...They're poorer than we are:' he said...
...He did not even have time to rest and write some poetry, as he had hoped to do...
...1, p. 38...
...The day leading up to the march, all private television stations broadcast advertisements for the demonstration, approximately once every ten minutes...
...It was a successful march, peaceful, and without government interference of any kind, even though the march illegally blocked the entire freeway, Caracas' main artery of transportation, for several hours...
...By 6 PM about 100,000 people had gathered in the streets surrounding the presidential palace...
...All sides claim that they were there peacefully and did not want to provoke anyone...
...3, when cation, his he was Coup and Countercoup: An Eyewitness Acount s possibly CARACAS-On April 11, the ner whose Venezuelan military announced from her...
...Michelini then began the painstaking investigation that finally led him to the family who adopted Sim6n, but who had never told him he was adopted...
...For background see who have "Chavismo at the Crossroads" p. these long 8; for a discussion of the U.S...
...2 NACIA REPORT ON THE AMERICAS IN BRIEF here refers to itself, organized a massive demonstration of well over 200,000 people to march to the headquarters of Venezuela's oil company, PDVSA, in defense of its fired management...
...Over the past decade, Dominican authorities have conducted mass expulsions of tens of thousands of Haitians and Dominico-Haitians, without giving them an opportunity to explain their claim to citizenship as native-born Dominicans [See David Howard, "Dominican Republic Spurns Haitian Migrants," NACLA, Vol...
...IPS is a nongovernmental organization structured as a non-profit International Association of Journalists...
...The book, Crimen imperfecto (Imperfect Crime), is being published just as the Chilean Supreme Court is deciding whether to designate a special judge to investigate the case of Berrios, a scientist who worked for the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), the secret police during the first years of the Pinochet dictatorship (1973-1990...
...Eventually the support for the transition regime evaporated among the military, so that transition president Carmona resigned in the name of preventing bloodshed...
...Supposedly at the spur of the moment, the organizers decided to re-route the march to Miraflores, the president's office building, so as to confront the pro-government demonstration, which was called at the last minute...
...that it had overthrown the governhave DNA ment of Hugo Chdvez...
...Her yet unresolved murder was followed by a wave of threats that stunned human rights activists and journalists nationwide...
...The investigation of Ochoa's murder is being closely monitored by national and international human rights organizations and by the Commission on Inter-American Human Rights and the Inter-American Human Rights Court...
...Rafael Michelini, son of an Uruguayan senator assassinated in Buenos Aires in 1976...
...Finally, late at night, around midnight of April 13, it was announced that Chdvez was set free and that he would take over as president again...
...Who started the fight, which involved mostly stones and tear gas, is, as is so often the case in such situations, nearly impossible to tell...
...Social peace and a "class compromise," however, will only be possible if power plays, such as the recent coup attempt, come to an end...
...This precedent reinforces Carmen Frei's denunciation that her father had been injected with a bacteria produced by Benrrfos, who had the means through the Bacteriology Institute (now known as the Institute of Public Health) to develop and disguise toxins...
...At least ten people were killed and nearly 100 wounded in this gun battlealmost all of them demonstrators and about an equal number of Chivez supporters and antiChavistas...
...This account is adapted from a longer article...
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...On April 23, the law was swiftly rejected by Congress, prompting the resignation of Economics Minister Jorge Remes and leaving Duhalde at a loss not only about Remes' replacement, but how to keep the banking system from collapse and how to stop hyperinflation...
...Again, who shot first has become a moot and probably impossible to resolve question...
...First, they started having delusions of grandeur, believing that the support for their coup was so complete that they could simply ignore the other members of their coup coalition and place only their own in the new government...
...34, No...
...http://www.globalinfo.org> Jordi Pius Llopart is a Catal6n human rights lawyer who recently returned from a fact-finding mission in Mexico...
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...The new transition cabinet ended up including only the most conservative elements of Venezuelan society...
...The man said his department's goal was to stem the "invasion" of young Haitian delinquents, "the ones who act like they're in the Haitian capital, drinking and dancing...
...When she was detained, her 20-day-old son was taken from her...
...The threats, which simply read "crashes, accidents, lawyers, urgency" (suspiciously similar to threats received in 1996 by Pilar Noriega, current first inspector of the Federal District Human Rights Commission, and Ochoa herself), followed Zamora's recent criticism of Mexico City's Attorney General Bernardo Bdtiz's statement that the probable cause of Ochoa's death was suicide...
...Gregory Wilpert Vol XXXY No 6 MAYIJUNE 2002 55 GUATEMALA Casa Xelaju offers: Volunteer work, internships...
...The second miscalculation was the belief that Chivez was hopelessly unpopular among the population and among the military and that no one except Cuba and Colombia's guerrilla, the FARC, would regret Chbvez's departure...
...role, rustration, see "Taking Note," p. 7. ight, now Initially, coup leaders said the Sim6n, to main reason for the coup was what happened on April 11 itself...
...At approximately the same time, the paratrooper battalion, to which Chivez used to belong, decided to remain loyal to ChAvez and took over the presidential palace...
...I got there just when the opposition demonstration and the National Guard began fighting each other...
...Between the two demonstrations were the city police, under the control of the oppositional mayor of Caracas, and the National Guard, under control of the president...
...InterPress Service New Threats against Human Rights Defenders in Mexico MEXICO CITY--On March 18, Barbara Zamora, attorney for the family of murdered human rights lawyer Digna Ochoa, received death threats that were e-mailed to her office...
...A little later, shots were fired into the crowds and I clearly saw that there were three parties involved in the shooting: the city police, Chavez supporters and snipers from buildings above...
...Chdvez's supporters, howMarch 19 ever, organized massive demond that the strations and other actions in son of opposition to the coup and by Gatti, who April 14 Chdvez was back as presa decade ident...
Vol. 35 • May 2002 • No. 6
