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<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><font size=4
face="Times New Roman"><span lang=ES-SV style='font-size:14.0pt;font-weight:
bold'>Political Violence Increases in El Salvador<o:p></o:p></span></font></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><i><font size=3
face="Times New Roman"><span lang=ES-SV style='font-size:12.0pt;font-style:
italic'>(para español <a
href="http://www.cispes.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogcategory&id=35&Itemid=28&lang=es">vaya
aquí</a>)<o:p></o:p></span></font></i></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><font size=3
face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-weight:bold'>CISPES
Update<o:p></o:p></span></font></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><font size=3
face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-weight:bold'>July 29,
2008<o:p></o:p></span></font></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><font size=3
face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-weight:bold'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><font size=3
face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-weight:bold'><img
border=0 width=409 height=337 id="_x0000_i1025"
src="cid:image002.jpg@01C8F15E.D3C2ADB0"><o:p></o:p></span></font></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-weight:bold'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>As student groups prepare to commemorate the anniversary of an infamous
massacre of students by government forces on July 30, 1975, political violence
continues in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">El Salvador</st1:place></st1:country-region>
33 years later. In the last two years, social organizations, human rights
monitors, community groups and the Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación
Nacional (FMLN) political party have publically denounced the alarming increase
in politically-motivated assassinations of their members and leadership.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'> <o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>2008 has been particularly violent for organized sectors of the
population. Since the beginning of the year, there have been more than a half
dozen murders that, though unresolved, seem to be political in nature. The
Salvadoran population in general continues to be affected by the assassinations
of community leaders, including the recent murder of Holman Riva. According to
police reports, Riva, an employee of the FMLN’s municipal government in
the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:PlaceType w:st="on">municipality</st1:PlaceType>
of <st1:PlaceName w:st="on">Ilopango</st1:PlaceName></st1:place>, was killed
on July 2, along with his nephew. The victims were taken from their home in the
middle of the night and shot with nine bullets each.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'> <o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>Student activist <strong><b><font face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-weight:normal'>Ángel Martínez Cerón was killed in a similar fashion
on July 26 in the city of <st1:City w:st="on">Santa Ana</st1:City>, located in
western <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">El Salvador</st1:place></st1:country-region>.
Martínez Cerón, coordinator of the January 24 Revolutionary Socialist Student
Bloc</span></font></b></strong><b><span style='font-weight:bold'>,</span></b>
was shot eight times before his assassins delivered a final bullet to the head.
According to statements made by the Student Bloc, other members of the
organization have been detained and harassed by agents of the National Civilian
Police (PNC). Just days before Martínez Cerón’s death, PNC officers had
searched the youth’s home, arresting him, his brother, and another member
of the organization. Police harassment of the young activists followed a series
of protests against bus far increases in <st1:City w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Santa
Ana</st1:place></st1:City>.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>These recent assassinations come in the wake of a series of murders of
activists and opposition politicians earlier this year. Héctor Ventura, who had
been cleared of terrorism charges in February after participating in a protest
against water privatization last summer, was killed in his home on May 2. In
January, the mayor of Alegría, Wilber Funes, was killed alongside municipal
employee Zulma Rivera. The young, popular mayor had planned to run for
reelection as a member of the FMLN party in 2009. Referring to these assassinations,
FMLN deputy Benito Lara recently stated that “here we have various cases
that remain unresolved, unclear, and it is difficult for us to accept the
theory that these are merely cases of common crime.”<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>In spite of national and international outcry, Salvadoran authorities
have yet to respond to calls for serious investigations into each one of these
cases. To this date, each of the cases remains in impunity.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<h1><b><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman"'>Right-wing parties refuse to audit
comptroller’s office<o:p></o:p></span></font></b></h1>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>Faced with the fact the El Salvador’s <i><span style='font-style:
italic'>Corte de Cuentas</span></i> (comptroller’s office; in charge of
government accountability and oversight) has not been audited since 1995, and
in response to a series of solicitations made the FMLN seeking an explanation
of anomalies in the government’s handling of five international loan
agreements, the Legislative Assembly recently ordered an audit of the entity.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>However, the president of the <i><span style='font-style:italic'>Corte
de Cuentas</span></i>, Hernan Contreras, has publicly refused to cooperate with
such an audit. Contreras is a leader of the right-wing National Conciliation
Party (PCN). “Constitutionally, [the audit] should not be done,”
declared Contreras, whose consecutive appointments as leader of the
comptroller’s office has been vociferously challenged by opposition
parties. Roberto Lorenzana, a legislative deputy representing the FMLN,
countered that “all of the institutions of the state should be audited.”<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoBodyText><b><i><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman";font-weight:normal;
font-style:normal'>According to the legal organization FESPAD, various social
organizations have also called for an audit of the Corte de Cuentas. Following
FESPAD’s analysis of the situation, the Corte’s failure to fulfill
its oversight functions has resulted in widespread distrust of the institution
among the Salvadoran population. <font color=blue><span style='color:blue'><o:p></o:p></span></font></span></font></i></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-weight:bold'>ARENA’s ‘Grad
Crusade’ deemed “absurd”<o:p></o:p></span></font></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-weight:bold'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>On July 6, the governing Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) party
held a campaign event titled the “Grand Nationalist Crusade” in <st1:City
w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">San Salvador</st1:place></st1:City>’s Cuscatlan
Stadium. Facing next year’s elections with a presidential candidate,
Rodrigo Ávila, who still does not have a running mate and who has not been able
to consolidate the party’s supporters, ARENA’s event sought to duplicate
the leftist FMLN’s national convention, which took place in the same
stadium last November, and at which that party’s presidential ticket was
officially introduced to a capacity crowd of 70,000. According to media
reports in the online newspaper <i><span style='font-style:italic'>El Faro</span></i>,
as well as personal testimonies of workers, many government employees were
forced to attend the event in an effort to fill the stadium.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'> <o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>ARENA’s “Grand Crusade” has been strongly criticized
by ARENA’s traditional right-wing allies in the PCN party, whose General
Coordinator, Ciro Cruz Cepeda, judged the activity to be “an absurd
thing.” Cruz Cepeda added that, “when a political institution
forces its employees to attend its campaign rallies, it could generate weakness
within the party.”<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>Several days before the event, employees of various public institutions
began speaking out against pressures they were facing from high-level
government officials to attend the partisan event. Among the government
entities that pressured employees to take part in the “Grand
Crusade” were the Social Security Institute, the public water
administration, and the ministries of education and governance. On the day of
the event, the ARENA party transported attendees to the stadium using
government vehicles.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>In his speech at the event, presidential candidate Ávila urged the
audience to work to defeat the FMLN at the polls, calling on ARENA’s
supporters “to be unified to defend liberty in the face of the threat of
communism.”<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>According to Juan Pablo Durán, legislative deputy from the Democratic
Change (CD) party, ARENA’s event sought “to demonstrate unity in a
moment of weakness.” Many analysts also pointed to signs of continued
internal divisions within ARENA as evidenced by the conspicuous absence of
ARENA’s three ex-presidents, Christiani, Calderon Sol, and Flores.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
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