CISPES - Solidarity with El Salvador

El Salvador Updates

Update: Students Demand Justice on 35th Anniversary of Massacre

Monday, 09 de August de 2010
Also included in this update: * FMLN and Ministry of Health Push for Affordable Medicines * El Salvador and Cuba Increase Cooperation On Friday, July 30, hundreds students from the University of El Salvador took to the streets, accompanied by professors, staff and other sectors of the social movement. The march, filled with street theater, papier-mâché tanks and a 9-foot gorilla, was a commemoration of the university student massacre that occurred on July 30, 1975. Thirty-five years ago, university students took to the streets to protest military incursions on the Santa Ana campus and the repressive policies of the military dictatorship in power at the time. The peaceful march was attacked by Salvadoran army soldiers with gunfire and tanks, perpetrating the attack with other repressive State security forces. While there are no official numbers of how many students were killed and wounded in the massacre, it is estimated at least 30 students died and over a hundred more were wounded. This year, student organizations including the Roque Dalton University Front (FURD), the Revolutionary Student Brigades (BRES) and a number of other groups organized the march and all-night vigil that followed. This year, marchers and organizers demanded trials to bring justice to the victims of the 1975 massacre and a repeal of the country's Amnesty Law - passed just after the end of El Salvador's Civil War in 1993 and considered by many Salvadorans to be the biggest obstacle to respect for human rights in the country.
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Update: Suspects Arrested for Assassinations, Coalition Reasserts Mining Motive

Thursday, 15 de July de 2010
Also included in this update: * Cabañas Community and CISPES Delegation Honor Marcelo Rivera * Right Wing Parties Continue to Scramble and Divide * Domestic Workers Granted Health Care Coverage * Sixteen Killed in Bus Burning, FMLN Suspects Destabilization Plan * Social Movement, FMLN and Funes Denounce Honduran Coup Leader's Visit In a July 13 statement after the arrest of 8 suspects in connection to the murders of anti-mining activists from the rural department of Cabañas, El Salvador, the National Roundtable Against Metallic Mining (the Mesa) criticized the investigation for ignoring glaring ties to gold mining interests in the region. On July 1, the National Civil Police (PNC) and the Attorney General's Special Organized Crime Unit (DECO) announced the arrests of 8 individuals for the murders of Dora Alicia Sorto Recinos and her unborn child, Ramiro Rivera and Felicita Echeverría in December of last year. Rodolfo Delgado, the director of the DECO, announced that the murders were due to a family feud and that two families had contracted gang members to kill members of the rival families. He went on to say that the mining conflict was not the principal motive for the murders and that the Attorney General was satisfied that all the material authors and the two intellectual authors of the crime were in custody.
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Breaking News: Shots fired at car of Vice-President Salvador Sanchez-Ceren

Monday, 07 de June de 2010

On Thursday, June 3rd, shots were fired on one of Vice-President Sanchez-Ceren’s cars. Though initial reports claimed that the Vice-President’s wife and granddaughter were in the car at the moment of the attack, on Friday the Vice-President stated that only the driver, who also serves as his granddaughter’s bodyguard, was in the car. CISPES will continue to monitor this investigation. A translation of Friday’s article in the Diario CoLatino follows or click here to read the article in Spanish.

Colatino Article: "Attempt to rob Vice President's security vehicle"

A Personal Protection agent assigned to the Vice-President of the Republic, Salvador Sánchez Cerén, suffered an attempted armed car robbery, according to agents of the Central La Libertad unit of the National Civilian Police (PNC).

Update: Tropical Storm Agatha Leaves 9 Dead and 8,000 Evacuated

Monday, 07 de June de 2010

From Friday, May 28 through Monday, May 31 intense rains caused by Tropical Storm Agatha dropped over 19 inches of rain, causing flooding, mudslides, killing 9 people and resulting in the evacuation of 8,000 people to shelters; the storm took the lives of at least 146 across Central America. On May 29, President Mauricio Funes and the Director of Civil Protection Jorge Meléndez declared a Red Alert and National State of Emergency. With the Red Alert, Civil Protection began coordinating with local Civil Protection Committees that have been formed in zones at high risk of disasters to begin evacuating residents. Throughout Agatha, President Funes, Meléndez and other government officials travelled around the country, monitoring damages and helping local committees evacuate residents. While Agatha brought greater rainfall in a shorter period of time than last fall's Tropical Storm Ida and Hurricane Mitch of 1998, there were far fewer deaths, a fact attributed to new national emergency response plans that have been recently developed and to the quick response of authorities to evacuate communities. President Funes also announced on Monday that the government would provide homes to families that lost theirs during the storm.

The rains cleared last Monday, but officials warn that very little additional rain could set off destructive landslides, given the water saturation level of the ground soil.

Update: 120,000 Salvadorans March for International Workers’ Day

Friday, 14 de May de 2010
Included in this update: * Metropolitan Police Attack Street Vendors Protesting Forced Removal * FMLN and Social Movement Reject Free Trade Agreement with European Union On May 1st, 120,000 Salvadorans joined with workers around the world to celebrate May Day, or International Workers’ Day (see photos here ). The marchers, including workers, unionists, campesinos, students, feminists, militants of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) party and other sectors expressed the unified message that, “The people achieved the victory, we demand real changes.” This International Workers’ Day celebration, which had the largest turnout in recent years, is also the first since El Salvador’s first leftist president, Mauricio Funes, took office on June 1, 2009. During the campaign, Funes formed a broad alliance with FMLN leadership, other progressive parties and politicians as well as representatives of El Salvador’s private business sectors. Since taking office, he has constructed a “unity government,” where the FMLN plays an important role in many key cabinet positions, along with participation of other sectors in influential cabinet positions.
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