FIFTEEN YEARS aftera peace agreement was signed to end El Salvador's bloody civil war, thegovernment has launched a new wave of repression against the growingsocial movements, including the struggle to stop the privatization ofpublic services.

Last July, 14people participating in a peaceful demonstration against PresidentAntonio Saca's plan to decentralize the municipal water resources inthe town of Suchitoto were arrested after a violent assault by police.National and international pressure led to their release on bail, but13 of the activists still face charges of terrorism--and could go tojail for 60 years if found guilty.

ALEXIS STOUMBELIS,an organizer with the Committee in Solidarity with the People of ElSalvador (CISPES), talked to KEVIN CHOJCZAK about the context of theSalvadoran government's application of the anti-terrorism law, and whatthis means for activists in the U.S.

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WHAT HAPPENED on July 2 of last year in El Salvador?

BEFORE ANSWERING that, I want to talk about the context.

Thestruggle against water privatization had been going on for about twoyears and was extremely well organized and effective. There were massmobilizations of tens of thousands of people consistently demandingthat the government not privatize the national water system. They werefighting some pretty big institutions because one of the loans they gotfrom the IMF in 2003 basically mandated they move toward privatization.

Underthe Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), which passed in2005, transnational corporations have the same rights to the watersystem as the country itself. So, against the odds, the water workersunion and a broad coalition of groups in the social movement led thisgrassroots effort to prevent privatization.

OnJuly 2, there was a really big action in Suchitoto to stop PresidentSaca from making the announcement that the government was going todecentralize the water system, which everyone recognized as the firststep toward privatization. The action was so successful that theyblocked President Saca from making the announcement.

Toretaliate against the social movement showing its strength, theSalvadoran National Police attacked the protest and arrested 14protesters, four of whom were well-known community organizers. Thirteenof those arrested were then charged with acts of terrorism under thenew anti-terrorism law, the Special Law Against Acts of Terrorism,which was implemented in November 2006.

Thisanti-terrorism law is modeled after the USA PATRIOT Act, but it's evenmore extreme. It was really designed to target the social movements andsilence dissent because it defines common protest techniques, likeblocking a road or occupying a building, as acts of terrorism. TheSuchitoto 13 face up to 60 years in prison for taking part in apeaceful protest.

Thesearrests and the upcoming trial are happening in the midst of a new waveof violent repression in El Salvador because the social movements andthe left political party, the FMLN, pose a genuine challenge to theright-wing elite. Historically in El Salvador, the stronger the socialmovement, the more violent repression becomes, and this is just as truetoday.

WHY IS it important that people here in the U.S. know about this case?

ITHINK the three most important reasons are, first, that the U.S. isactively involved in funding and training the police in El Salvador atthe International Law Enforcement Academy (ILEA), and it openlysupported the passage of the anti-terrorism law.

It'ssignificant that ILEA was opened a month before CAFTA was passed in theU.S., and that Condoleezza Rice was very specific that the function ofthe ILEA was to ensure the success of free trade in Latin America.

Sohere you have police being trained to protect capital and transnationalcorporations against the popular movements that are actively claimingtheir rights to land and resources. The U.S. is at least tacitlysupporting, if not openly encouraging, this level of oppression in ElSalvador.

Thesecond reason is that the U.S., in making El Salvador a partner in thewar on terror, wants to see what it, too, can get away with. Can itset a precedent that activists can be tried as terrorists?

Ithink a third reason is that the U.S. wants to use El Salvador as abase in Latin America to counter democratic revolutionary movementslike the one in Venezuela. As Latin America shifts to the left, ElSalvador remains one of the few right-wing governments that Washingtoncan count on.

Sofor all of us in the U.S. who support liberation movements in LatinAmerica, we need to stop the U.S. from using El Salvador as a base toundermine promising social movements across Latin America.

WHAT IS CISPES doing about the Suchitoto 13?

CISPEScommittees across the U.S. have been doing rallies and actions to drawattention to this trial and pressure not only the Salvadoran governmentto drop all charges, but the U.S. State Department to denounce this useof the anti-terrorism law that it publicly endorsed. We had a nationalweek of action in October, which was led by human rights and solidarityorganizations, and got good media coverage and generated calls to theState Department.

Whilethe State Department has not yet come out against this seriousviolation of civil liberties, the trial for the Suchitoto 13 wasdelayed until February. I believe that this international solidarity,along with the massive resistance in El Salvador to the charges, helpedstop the trial last October.

Oneof the reasons the Salvadoran government delayed the trial was becausethey wanted this kind of pressure and international attention to diedown. And we can't let that happen, so we are mobilizing again beforethe trial starts in early February.

HOW DOES what's happening in El Salvador relate to what's happening in the U.S.?

ITHINK it's the same processes at work in the U.S. in many ways. Theneoliberal economic model that the movement in El Salvador is fightingis the same model, and some of the corporations are the same as we arefighting here in the U.S. The economic crisis in El Salvador is causedby the same system that is leading the U.S. deeper into recession.

Atthe same time, we're experiencing similar assaults on civil libertiesand the right to organize--especially against immigrants and people ofcolor.

Furthermore,with regard to the war on terror, the intention to define protestersas terrorists as a way to criminalize dissent is not unique to ElSalvador. The Violent Radicalization and Homegrown TerrorismPrevention Act that passed in the U.S. House of Representatives has alot in common with El Salvador's anti-terrorism law. It leaves a lotopen to interpretation in terms of what constitutes a radicalideology or use of force and could very easily be used to targetactivists of all kinds.

Lastly,if capital knows no borders in the transnational neoliberal model,neither does police and military repression. The iron fist policiesof the right wing in El Salvador are modeled after former New YorkMayor Giuliani's zero-tolerance programs.

TheU.S. is doing a lot of cross border-police initiatives that involveheightened surveillance and tracking of deportees in the name of thewar on gangs. Impunity and police brutality, especially against youthof color, is on the rise from San Francisco to San Salvador.

If their tactics are without borders, then our struggle must also be without borders.