Also included in this update:

OnFriday, October 22, Cuban national Carlos Alberto Montaner - accused bythe Cuban government of planting bombs in Havana movie theaters - visited San Salvador, prompting protests by the leftist Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) and social movement groups concerned about plots to destabilize the government of Mauricio Funes, El Salvador's first left president. Montaner's presence comes a few months after Honduran coup leader Roberto Micheletti visited San Salvador this past June for closed-door meetings with Salvadoran business leaders and right-wing Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) party leadership, on the invitation of the San Salvador's ARENA party mayor, Norman Quijano.  A number of influential Salvadoran business associations, that vigorously denounced the recent diplomatic visit to Cubaled by President Mauricio Funes, invited Montaner  to give a conferenceentitled "Economic Freedom and Democracy."   Montaner is an outspoken critic of the Cuban government and believed by many on the left in LatinAmerica to be an agent of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Outside the building, members of El Salvador's social movement - unionists, students and FMLN members - participated in the protest coordinated by El Salvador's Cuban Solidarity Committee. The crowd chanted, "Get out terrorist!" and "Coup plotters are the real terrorists!" outside the conference center.

Inside,El Salvador's business elite, right-wing political leaders and new US Ambassador Mari Carmen Aponte attended Montaner's conference. AmbassadorAponte greeted him, shaking his hand and welcomed him to the country, despite the serious accusations by the Cuban government and Montaner's link to a notorious Civil War massacre at El Salvador's Central AmericanUniversity (UCA) in 1989. Recently, declassified US intelligence reports name Montaner as one of the individuals aware of the Salvadoran right's plans to slaughter six Jesuit priests of the UCA, who condemned right-wing repression and rule over El Salvador during the war; their housekeeper and her daughter were also murdered by Salvadoran state-linked forces. 

Montaneralso has close ties to fugitive Cuban criminal Luis Posada Carriles, accused of bombing a Cuban passenger jet in 1976, Salvadoran criminal Francisco Chávez Abarca recently arrested for Havana hotel bombings, andAlejandro Peña Esclusa, who financed the group Fuerza Solidaria and its right-wing fear campaign against the FMLN presidential slate in 2009.  In addition, Montaner wasreportedly present in Honduras in the months before the coup d'étatas well as in Venezuela in 2002, Bolivia in 2008 and most recently in Ecuador in the months prior to coup attempts in these countries.

Environmentalists Denounce Mining-Related Human Rights Abuses before International Commission

OnOctober 25, five environmental defenders from Mexico, Panama, Guatemala, El Salvador and Costa Rica testified before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), a body of the Organization of American States (OAS), on mining-related violence and human rights abusesin their countries.  The thematic hearing touched upon the increasing levels of violence faced by the members of Mesoamerica's anti-mining movements, the serious health impacts facing communities near mines and government complicity in supporting mining-related human rights abuses (see full video footage ofthe hearing in Spanish).  El Salvador’s National Roundtable against Metallic Mining (“the Mesa”) was almost robbed of the opportunity to participate in the hearing, after the US Consulate summarily denied a travel visa to Mesa representative Hector Berríos,invited by the OAS. However, a Mesa member was able to attend the hearing and present on the assassinations and death threats against the mining resistance leaders of Cabañas.

Itremains to be seen what recommendations the IACHR will make following the hearing.  Last June the IACHR made its first ruling against human rights violations by the mining industry in Guatemala, calling for operations to be suspended for Vancouver-based Goldcorp’s Marlin Mine and for steps to be taken to protect the indigenous communities surrounding the mine. In response, the Guatemalan government announced that it would suspend operations at the mine, yet Goldcorp’s Marlin goldmining operations have continued without stoppage. For more news and analysis on the struggle to close the Marlin Mine, visit NISGUA’s blog, Goldcorp out of Guatemala.

Right-wing Protects Tax Evaders

Duringthe October 21 Legislative Assembly session, the right-wing party fractions united to approve a reform to the country's tax code, eliminating the requirement for individuals with a yearly income of morethan $75,000 to submit their property declarations to State tax authorities. The vote reversed a reform approved last year requiring theproperty declaration from high-income earners as part of a fiscal reform packet presented by Minister of the Treasury Carlos Cáceres to increase tax collection by ending evasion. 

TheChristian Democrat Party (PDC), who presented the recently approved reform, claimed it is a measure to protect wealthy families from organized crime and kidnappings by restricting access to information on their property holdings. However, the FMLN legislative fraction - the only to vote against the reform - reminded the Assembly that this information is already available in public registries. The requirement of the property declaration was designed to help the Ministry of the Treasury catch tax evaders as, according to Cáceres, many tax evaders hide their earnings in property holdings.  

ElSalvador currently has some of the lowest tax collection rates in the region, due to liberal tax laws on industries and legal loopholes that allow evasion. During Funes' campaign, he promised to fight evasion to increase government funding for social programs. However, resistance from the right-wing parties that represent the interest of El Salvador'swealthiest, has made progress very difficult.

Commission Pushes Right to Education for Pregnant Students

OnTuesday, October 26, the deputies from the Legislative Assembly’s Culture and Education Commission issued an opinion in favor of requiringeducation centers to protect the right of pregnant or breastfeeding students to an education. Under the recommendation, educational centers would be prohibited from enacting policies that limit or prevent students from beginning, continuing and completing their studies while pregnant or breastfeeding, and would require that such students be granted the medical leave necessary. The reforms were proposed in an effort to end the institutional practice of expelling pregnant students from educational centers. In a country with very high rates of teen pregnancy (between January and April 2010, 30% of children born were registered to adolescents), such policies continuously force young womento abandon their studies, often for good; a 2008 study by the Family Health Poll (FESAL) found that 41% of students who became pregnant neverreturned to their studies after giving birth. 

The proposed reforms were approved by deputies from all parties except ARENA. On Thursday, October 28, the reforms werepresented to the full Assembly and returned to the commission for modifications, after ARENA deputies raised objections that such measuresmight be interpreted as a reward for pregnant students. Independent Deputy Mauricio Rodríguez insisted that, "the spirit of the reform is not to reward or punish the teenagers, but to assert a right.” The measure is expected to be returned to the Assembly at a later date