IRTF News

[IRTF note: See RRN letter Feb 12 2021 in response to the violence that is addressed in this news article.] Cardinal Gregorio Rosa Chávez of San Salvador asked the country to pray "for liberation from Satan" Feb. 1 after violence erupted following a political rally in the capital of El Salvador late Jan. 31. "The devil is running loose in El Salvador, there are many demons on the loose," Cardinal Rosa Chavez said at the end of his homily at St. Francis Church in San Salvador. He compared the Gospel of the day, about Jesus casting out demons from a man possessed, to the deadly incident that took place the previous night. Gunmen shot and killed two FMLN party activists returning from the rally, injuring others. Some are calling the incident the "most serious act of political violence" in almost three decades since peace accords ended the country's civil war in 1992. Three suspects were captured. The Salvadoran attorney general said those under custody were part of a security team for the minister of health, who belongs to the political party of President Nayib Bukele. "This is serious, the electoral contest cannot become a bloodbath," tweeted Salvadoran Attorney General Raúl Melara, referring to the upcoming elections for mayors and the Legislative Assembly on Feb. 28. "Let's entrust to the Lord, this morning, this country that is, that has so many demons," Cardinal Rosa Chavez said. "This is how the political campaign begins ... Why can't points of view be presented with simplicity, respect, tolerance? Why do they resort to violence, verbal, offenses, insults, threats? May God help us so we can have a civilized campaign, as it should be."

IRTF, Cleveland Jobs with Justice, and the Cleveland Catholic Worker are among 100+ signatories on a letter to President Biden calling on him to close the infamous Guantanamo Bay detention facility once and for all. “Guantánamo is the iconic example of the post-9/11 abandonment of the rule of law. Guantánamo embodies the fact that…the US government has viewed communities of color…through a security threat lens, to devastating consequences… Guantánamo continues to fuel and justify bigotry, stereotyping and stigma. Guantánamo entrenches racial divisions and racism more broadly…”

On the evening of January 31, gunmen opened fire on a group of supporters of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN). The group, traveling in a pickup truck covered with FMLN signs, was returning from a day of campaigning for the upcoming February 28 mayoral and legislative elections in San Salvador. Gloria Rogel del Cid and Juan de Dioz Tejada, veterans of the armed conflict [in the 1970s, 80s, 90s, that pitted the Salvador people against brutal US-backed military regimes], died, and at least two more were injured. This State-linked repression was carried out by yet another military-backed, autocratic regime with full economic, military and political relations with the US and Canada. Like the Honduran and Guatemalan regimes, the El Salvador government is considered a “democratic ally” in support of the United States’ anti-democratic efforts in the region, such as the desire to overthrow the government of Venezuela.

The humanitarian crisis in Honduras found international attention this month as the first and biggest migration caravan since the corona pandemic took off in mid-January. A combination of a pandemic, two hurricanes hitting Honduras in later 2020, an abysmal response by the JOH regime and a lack of perspective among the corruption and human rights violation left again thousands of Honduras without any other option that trying to leave. Congress also showed again how it rather worsens the situation of minorities and vulnerablized groups by changing the constitution to forever ban same-sex marriage and abortions instead of using its power to improve the situation of Honduras. There were also setbacks in the Berta Cáceres case and the Guapinol case. Further corruption cases were undermined, meanwhile Honduras dropped further in an international corruption index. Last but not least, JOH’s drug trafficking links prominently reappeared in the national and international headlines thanks to newly released court documents from New York. Welcome to another month in Honduras.

Civil society and opposition groups are protesting the recent appointment of Judge Mynor Moto to Guatemala’s Constitutional Court. The judge is currently under investigation for obstruction of justice. The Congress put him in place to stack the deck on the country’s highest court. This is the latest salvo by powerful political elites to undermine the country’s judicial institutions. These same elites had lost much of their power over the last decade thanks to high-profile graft investigations by the Attorney General’s Office, the Special Prosecutor’s Office Against Impunity, and the now defunct United Nations-backed International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG). The corruption investigations eventually reached all the way to former President Jimmy Morales, the country’s president between 2016 and 2020. Morales launched a crusade to expel the CICIG and to shutter its investigations, which he finally achieved at the end of 2019. The Biden administration is starting to weigh in. Julie Chung, Biden’s Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, stated in a tweet that Moto’s election to the court “threatens the rule of law … and debilitates the integrity of the court.”

Day One actions by the Biden Administration open the door for migrant justice advocates to push for more inclusive policies over the next four years. Included in Biden’s Executive Actions: DACA (plans to introduce legislation to allow DACA recipients to immediately apply for lawful permanent residence); rescinding the Muslim and African bans (calling them “a stain on our national conscience”); set priorities for immigration enforcement ( focus on those with criminal records) ; reinstating “Deferred Enforced Departure (DED) for Liberians” (extending legal permission to stay in the US and work authorization through June 30, 2022); halt to some border wall construction (terminates national emergency declarations that were invoked to justify this diversion of federal funds for a border wall); stop to “remain in Mexico” for asylum-seekers (but asks current enrollees –tens of thousands of migrants--to remain where they are on the Mexico side of the border, pending further information from the U.S. ); introduced US Citizen Act of 2021 (new pathways to U.S. citizenship for millions of undocumented immigrants). Of concern to IRTF and other human rights organizations: a $4 billion four-year interagency plan that would provide assistance to El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras to address the underlying causes of migration. Previous administrations (including the Obama-Biden Administration) have “addressed underlying causes of migration” with increases in economic exploitation and military repression. Addressing the causes of emigration has meant more money for US corporations to set up sweatshops in “free trade zones” and more money, training, and equipment for police, military , and special joint forces that squash democratic expression on the streets and environmental defense of land and waterways.

In Nicaragua, the US-backed opposition has repeatedly run to the U.S. State Department and Congress to ask for their interference and to advocate for sanctions against their own country so as to accomplish their only objective: to seize power. Their intention and that of the US is to create a situation of chaos and dislocation such that it brings about a violent “regime change.” After two years of US sanctions (Nicaraguan Investment Conditionality Act, or Nica Act), Trump stated in November 2020 that Nicaragua poses “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.” This technically gives the US the green light to take military action against Nicaragua if and when it deems necessary. Equally disturbing was a leaked document from the US State Department (Responsive Assistance in Nicaragua , or RAIN) that lays out how, if President Daniel Ortega does win the presidential election in November 2021, there are plans to overthrow him and his administration through mob violence assisted by US-financed NGOs and any other means possible. In the face of continued US aggression, the Nicaraguan government has asserted its determination not to be a US client state in the region, but to be its own sovereign nation and not dance to the tune of the US. This is a reality which the US refuses to accept. Will things change under President Biden?

As Joe Biden begins his presidency, a majority of Honduran people continue to suffer the violence and oppression of the military-backed, drug-trafficking, ‘open-for-global-business’ Honduran regime brought to power in the US and Cdn-backed military coup of June 28, 2009 - during Biden’s first term as Vice-President during the Obama presidency. A courageous, community-led human rights and environmental defense struggle continues in Guapinol, where local people resist he illegal imposition of an iron oxide mine, suffering violence and criminalization by company-linked operators and the US and Cdn-backed Honduran regime.

On January 21, a coalition of Afro-Colombian, Indigenous, and Campesino communities represented by the Inter-Ecclesial Commission for Justice and Peace (Comisión Intereclesial de Justicia y Paz, CIJP) published a statement addressed to the Biden-Harris administration outlining recommendations for peacebuilding priorities in Colombia. The recommendations include: a full commitment to the agreed terms of the 2016 peace accord with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), resume peace dialogues with the National Liberation Army (ELN) and advance humanitarian minimums, dismantle illegal armed groups following community input, enforce agrarian reform, implement illicit crop substitution programs, and strengthen rural judicial institutions.

Four-year-old María Ángel Molina was recently found dead in rural Colombia, making her one of 18 confirmed cases of femicide this year- with 13 more cases pending verification. Rights groups are concerned about the safety of women and girls, particularly during lockdowns due to coronavirus which forces them indoors with abusive men. Femicide Foundation Colombia, an NGO that provides support for women and tracks gender-based violence, in 2020 confirmed 229 femicides, of which 35 were girls, and is trying to verify a further 260 cases. Horrifying murders of women and girls are not uncommon in Colombia, and are sometimes committed by authority figures. In June 2020, scandal engulfed the military after seven soldiers gang-raped a 13-year-old indigenous girl. “We know that this is not an isolated issue, it is structural,” said Aida Quilcue, at the time a human rights adviser at the National Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC).