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Peace Vigil at the School of the Americas - Nov 17/18

Deacon Dave | 09.11.2001 06:33

88 year old Nun and 20 others remain in Federal Prison for Protesting SOA.

Tens of thousands of citizens from across North America will gather next weekend to protest the School of the Americas (SOA) at Ft. Benning, GA. The SOA is a combat training school for Latin American soldiers and was renamed last January to the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.

Peace Vigil at the School of the Americas - Nov 17/18
Peace Vigil at the School of the Americas - Nov 17/18


88 year old Nun and 20 others remain in Federal Prison for Protesting SOA


Tens of thousands of citizens from across North America will gather next weekend to protest the School of the Americas (SOA) at Ft. Benning, GA. The SOA is a combat training school for Latin American soldiers and was renamed last January to the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.

The November 17 - 18 event marks the anniversary of the brutal 1989 assassination of six Jesuit priests, their housekeeper and her 15- year-old daughter in El Salvador. A United Nations Truth Commission report cited 26 officers responsible for the massacre. Nineteen of the officers cited were graduates of the US Army School of the Americas. The US State Department and Human Rights Watch continue to document atrocities committed by graduates of the School of the Americas.

Last year, an estimated 8000 people gathered in solidarity at Ft. Benning's main entrance. Nearly 3,600 crossed the line onto the base with 1,700 of those people being barred from the base for the next five years. Those barred from the base were attempting to walk to the SOA to deliver the names of the victims of SOA violence. Twenty-four participants in last year's demonstration, including a senior NASA Research Scientist and 88-year old nun, who were sentenced to Federal Prison for protesting the training at the school. Twenty of last year's participants remain in jail.

The US Army School of the Americas has trained over 60,000 Latin American soldiers in commando tactics, military intelligence, psychological operations and other counter-insurgency warfare. The school has been dubbed "School of Assassins" by a major Panamanian newspaper due to the well-documented trail of blood and suffering in every country where SOA graduates have returned. Growing pressure from Congress and Human Right's organizations forced the school to change its name to the Western Hemisphere for Security Cooperation. Currently, bill HR 1810 continues to build momentum to close the school.

The movement to close the SOA remains undeterred by the name change. "The SOA by any other name is still a School of Assassins," said Fr. Roy Bourgeois, founder of SOA Watch, the grassroots group working to close the school. SOA Watch members plan to return to Ft. Benning year after year until the SOA is closed once and for all.

For more info go to the School of the Americas Watch web-page
www.soaw.org

Deacon Dave
- e-mail: deacondavehavard@hotmail.com
- Homepage: soaw.org