Zapatista Rebels Raise National Issues MExico CITY, FEBRUARY, 1994 Since the start of the armed conflict in the southern Mexi- can state of Chiapas, when the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) led an Indian uprising and seized several towns on New Year's Day, the rebels have used communication through the media as an effec- tive tool to air their grievances. Faced with an armed force that is vastly superior in numbers and weaponry, the insurgents occu- pied San Cristobal de las Casas, Las Margaritas, Ocosingo, Altamirano and six smaller towns on January 1 to draw attention to the injustices and abject poverty endured by the indigenous population of Chia- pas. Three days later, the main guerrilla body withdrew to the mountains and the jungle of Lacandon, where many insur- gents returned to their everyday farming activities. Of the ten municipalities seized by the EZLN, sixas of mid-Febru- aryremain in the hands of councils designated by insurgent popular assemblies. And on Feb- ruary 12, the EZLN began col- lecting a "war tax"a sales tax ranging from 7% to 15%in the areas under their control. The death toll in the conflict up to the January 16 cease-fire is estimated to be somewhat over a thousand, about 45% guerrillas, 35% government so!- diers, and the remainder civil- ians. Probably triple that num- berin about the same proportionshave been wound- ed. A broad spectrum of Mexi- can and international non-gov- ernmental agencies (NGOs) have accused the army and gov- ernment security forces of seri- ous human rights abuses. These include bombings of civilian populations after the cease-fire, arbitrary detentions, torture, summary executions, assassina- tions and disappearances. When the insurgent guns fell silent, the rebels began firing press communiques in almost every direction. Written by the EZLN' s military chief, "Deputy Commander Marcos"appar- ently the only rebel leader who is not an Indianthe rebel com- muniques have included dramat- ic exhortations to all Mexicans to become actively involved in the unfolding situation, and con- vert the peace talks between the EZLN and the government into a dialogue involving the entire nation. The EZLN has dramati- cally raised the national issues of fixed elections, land reform, and growing poverty. Recently, it has adopted a more conciliatory stance, dropping its initial demand that President Salinas resign, releasing the ex-governor of Chiapas, and agreeing to peace negotiations. In direct, somewhat ironic language, the rebel leader has sent long messages to the Mexi- can daily La Jornada expound- ing on the ancestral social inequities in Chiapas. The news- paper has even published special supplements with the EZLN communiques. In a recent com- munique, Marcos said he and his guerrillas were "unmoved by all the military paraphenalia with which the federal govern- ment tries to cover the great sewer of injustice and corrup- tion which our actions have uncovered." In another message, he called the state anti-poverty program PRONASOL "that small speck of social democracy that is now sprinkled on the Mexican state.. .a mocking cari- cature which draws tears of blood among those who struggle under this sun and rain." Marcos has also pointed an accusing finger at all those peo- ple, from government officials to "corrupt indigenous leaders," who have forgotten "that human dignity is not only the preroga- tive of those whose basic living conditions have been satisfied." His messages have struck a pow- erful chord among the poor. "It seems to annoy the powerful senores," he wrote, in a passage that has become well-known, "that poor Indians now go to die in the cities, and stain the streets which have so far only been lit- tered with the discarded wrap- pings of imported goods. They would prefer that Indians die in the mountains, away from good consciences and the tourists." InterPress Service Army Offensive Pushes Recontra Forces To Accept Disarmament Talks MANAGUA, FEBRUARY 11, 1994 T hroughout January, northern Nicaragua was the scene of the heaviest fighting since the end of the Contra war in 1990. At least 51 combatants from both sides were killed after the army launched a fierce offensive against rearmed former Contras from the Frente Norte 3-80 (FN 3-80), the country's last remain- ing rebel group. The fighting during January was described by the Sandinista Popular Army as the heaviest since rearmed combatants from the Contra war first took up arms three years ago. According to Col. Javier Carrion, a top official in the Army high command, a total of 36 clashes during the month of January resulted in the death of 42 rebels from the FN 3- 80, as well as nine Sandinista soldiers. Carrion added that four rebel leaders were killed in the Vol XXVII, No 5 MAR/APRIL 1994 1N EWSBRIEFS fighting, including Elvin Talav- era ("El Chacalin"), brother of the FN 3-80's top commander, Jose Angel Talavera ("El Chacal"). Additional casualties included 18 wounded among rebel ranks, six wounded Army troops, and one wounded civilian. The FN 3-80 is one of several "recontra" groups that were formed by ex-combatants of the 22,000-strong Contra army which disarmed after President Violeta Chamorro took office in 1990. Many demobilized Con- tras, including those who joined the FN 3-80, have complained that the Chamorro government has consistently failed to meet the commitments agreed to as part of the disarmament process. In late 1993, the majority of these recontra groupsplus sev- eral other organizations com- prised of discharged Sandinista troops who also took to the mountains after 1990disarmed under the terms of a govern- ment-sponsored amnesty propos- al. The FN 3-80, however, reject- ed the amnesty, vowing instead to continue its fight. After laying low for several weeks, in late December the rebels appeared to be regrouping their forces in order to launch offensive mili- tary actions again. In response, the Chamorro Administration ordered the army to carry out its huge offensive in January. By the second week in Febru- arywith the recontra forces reeling under the pressure of the offensive, and the government anxious to secure peace in order to facilitate economic recovery in the war zonesthe two sides agreed on a tentative cease-fire, paving the way for negotiations to disarm the FN 3-80. On February tO, mediators from the Catholic Church hierar- chy and the Organization of American States' International Support Commission (ClAy- OEA) departed for the north to seek contact with Talavera' s forces. Sandinista Army chief Gen. Humberto Ortega told reporters he had given the medi- ators a letter to deliver to the FN 3-80 leaders containing the army's proposal for rebel disar- mament. Ortega, clearly encour- aged by the prospects of putting an end to the last remaining rem- nants of the former Contra army, said he was anxious to see peace restored in the north. But he added that if Talavera rejects the proposal, "we will end the truce and attack them with even more force than before." Notisur Sexism and Adultery SANTIAGO, CHILE, JANUARY 7, t994 I n the name of sexual equality, Chilean senators and deputies are locked in a battle over whether to decriminalize or more evenhandedly punish adultery. Under Chile's present law, adul- tery, in which a married person has sexual relations with some- one other than the spouse, is a crime only when committed by a woman. The Chamber of Deputies, controlled by the coun- try's ruling center-Left alliance, voted last May to remove all penal sanctionsreferred to in the Chamber debate as "medieval"against adultery. The Senate, however, which has a Rightist majority, voted this week to punish all adulterers, regardless of sex, with 541 days in prison. The senators said they agreed to end the law's discrimi- nation against women, but not at the cost of breaking up the fami- ly, "the nucleus of society." Due to the disagreement between the houses, a joint commission will meet to reach a consensus. Meanwhile, the present law under which no one has ever been convictedremains in effect. InterPress Service Son of Former President Wins Costa Rican Elections SAN JOSe, FEBRUARY 11, 1994 J ose Maria Figuerespresi- dential candidate of Costa Rica's National Liberation Party (Partido de Liberacion Nacional, PLN)won the February 6 gen- eral elections with 49.7% of the vote over Miguel Angel Rodriguez of the governing Social Christian Unity Party (Partido de Unidad Social Cris- dana, PUSC), who garnered 47.5%. In many ways, Figueres' vic- tory over Rodriguez resembles the electoral process which took place in Honduras just three months earlier. In both the Costa Rican and Honduran elections, social democrats defeated cen- ter-Right candidates who had run on the governing party tick- et. In both cases, the victors had based their campaigns on heavy criticism of the prevailing neoliberal economic policies carried out by the governing par- ties. Figueres and his Honduran counterpartCarlos Roberto Reinaboth promised in their campaigns to greatly increase assistance to the poorest groups, which have been most affected by structural-adjustment pro- grams. Rodriguezan economist and businessman who once served as a deputy in the Legislative Assemblyhad promised to speed up the free-market eco- nomic reforms begun in the 1980s and to channel the addi- tional revenue generated from increased economic growth into health and education programs. In contrast, Figueresan indus- trial engineer who graduated from the West Point Military Academy and Harvard Universi- tywas sharply critical of the "trickle-down" policies of the nil- ing PUSC government, headed by President Rafael Calderon. He promised to immediately reorient government spending priorities in order to substantially boost funding for health care, education, and other social-development projects. Despite Figueres' electoral promises, however, the president- elect will face an uphill battle in the Legislative Assembly to imple- ment his policies, since the PLN failed to win a majority of legisla- tive seats in the February 6 ballot- ing. According to the most recent figures released by the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, the PLN will control 28 of the 57 seats in the new legislature. The PUSC will have 25 representatives, while the remaining four seats will be held by deputies from tiny minority par- ties. With Figueres' victory, the PLNthe party of Nobel Peace Prize-winning ex-president Oscar Ariashas now triumphed in seven of the 11 electoral contests held since Costa Rica's 1948 "rev- olution," which was led by the president-elect's father, Jose "Pepe" Figueres. Notisur Brazilian Congress Hit With Corruption Charges Rio DE JANEIRO, FEBRUARY 1, 1994 A fter a three-month investiga- tion, a special Brazilian con- gressional commission has recom- mended the expulsion of 18 parliamentarians for corruption, in the largest scandal of this type in the history of the Brazilian leg- islature. The Comissao Parlamentar de Inquerito (CPI), specially created for the probe, exposed two enor- mous schemes for the diversion of public funds, both centered in the congressional budgetary commis- sion. In the first, private construc- tion companies paid bribes and gratuities to legislators in exchange for being awarded gov- ernment contracts without compet- itive bidding. In the second, legis- lators gave money to so-called charities, which turned out in the vast majority of cases either not to exist or to have among their direc- tors close relatives of these same lawmakers. The CPI brokewith court authorizationthe secret bank of more than 70 people, investigated many thousands of documents from more than 400 bank accounts, carefully examined the tax returns of the accused over the last 10 years, and studied their assets. The investigation and the rec- ommendations for expulsions had grave consequences for Brazilian legislative power. The entire cor- rupt system for determining the federal budget was abandoned, and several of the country's most influential congressmen had to explain their bank accounts in inquiries broadcast by television throughout the country. Massacre of Cite Soleil Activists PORT-AU-PRINCE, FEBRUARY 4, 1994 A t least 12 young men, all members of popular and democratic organizations, were machine-gunned to death on Feb- ruary 2 in a home near the Haitian capital. Details of the massacre have been slow to emerge because most witnesses and friends have been forced into hiding, and all of the bodies as well as one survivor were taken away by soldiers. Witnesses said four pick-up trucks full of heavily armed sol- diers and men in civilian clothing arrived at Sarthe, a few miles
north of the capital, in search of a group of young men from Cite Soleil, a Port-au-Prince slum. The men, some of them members of OTAKEMPA ("Organization of People Working Together to Com- bat the Misery of the Haitian Peo- ple") and others from similar pro- democracy groups, had been hiding in the house for about a week. They were forced to flee Cite Soleil after being threatened by members of the Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haiti (FRAPH), a right wing para- military group. The next day, the army announced that the young men were "subversives," and were killed by explosives that they kept in the house. "It's part of a systematic repres- sion FRAPH and the army has been carrying out since Issa Paul was killed," said a member of OTAKEMPA, referring to the FRAPH treasurer found dead in Cite Soleil on December 26. "If you are a young man in the area, they say to you 'If you don't join FRAPH, you had better leave or you will be dead.' These guys were always hostile to FRAPH and fought its objectives, and that is why they were killed."Ha iii Info Internal Divisions Within Shining Path LIMA, JANUARY, 1994 F actions of Peru's Shining Path guerrilla movement have launched a somewhat unconven- tional public debate on the peace proposal presented to the Fujimori government last November by their imprisoned leader, Abimael Guzman. One year after being sentenced to life imprisonment, Guzman sent a letter to President Fujimori in which he formally accepted defeat and proposed a peace dialogue. Guzman's apparent surrender dealt a heavy blow to the Shining Path movement and sharply divided its members. GuzmCn held a meeting at his prison with other jailed rebel com- manders to persuade them to back his peace initiative. The rebel com- manders who accepted his proposal began, in turn, establishing con- tacts with the 2,400 Shining Path prisoners held in different jails around the country. The declared purpose of these meetings was to convince the militants that Guzrnan's letter to Fujimon was genuine. In late January, the debate raging within the rebel organization unex- pectedly erupted onto the streets of the capital. Posters appeared call- ing on the organization's dissident faction to support Guzman' s peace initiative. The so-called Prisoners of War Committee, a group of Shining Path militants held at Canto Grande prison, circulated a document urging all Shining Path members to back Guzman and pre- pare for a Second Party Congress, which would promote a change in party line. Days earlier, a new Central Committee of Shining Path released a clandestine communique rejecting the call for a "cease-fire." This new Central Committee is thought to be responsible for the wave of dynamitings, car bombs, and attacks against the armed forces and police which have occurred in January. The level of guerrilla operations is, however, appreciably less. Guzman' s peace proposal has also lead to desertions among Shining Path ranks, according to one Shining Path guerrilla who accepted the government amnesty. In a television interview, the for- mer guerrilla said a number of Shining Path members in clandes- tinity and in prison are abandoning armed struggle. Since Guzman's capture in September, 1992, more than 1,500 members of Shining Path and the Ttipac Amaru Revolu- tionary Movement (MRTA) have chosen to accept the government's so-called Repentance Lawan offer of reduced penalties in exchange for their voluntary sur- render to the authorities. InterPress Service
