[cispes-ERN] Update: Teamsters, ILO, and Women's Rights Organizations all Criticize ARENA Government

[CISPES National Office]

Teamsters, ILO, and Women's Rights Organizations all Criticize ARENA
Government for Inaction in Investigating Crime

CISPES UPDATE

November 29, 2006

 

This month ARENA has repeatedly demonstrated its intention of maintaining El
Salvador in a state of generalized impunity, especially for those who commit
political crimes and violence against women.  On Thursday November 16, ARENA
deputy Milena Calderon de Escalon, fierce defender of the Amnesty Law that
protects all those who committed human rights abuses during the war,
offended the memory of all those disappeared during the conflict by making a
show in the Legislative Assembly of tearing up the pronouncement to
officially declare August 30 as the National Victims of Forced
Disappearances Day.  

Those responsible for political crimes of in the past two years also walk
free in El Salvador, including the murders of Gilberto Soto, union leader in
the United States who was murdered while on an organizing trip to El
Salvador two years ago, and the murders of the parents of former Radio
Venceremos announcer "Mariposa" Marina Manzanares.  The Saca administration
has been impeding any real investigation of either of these murders.  After
receiving no response from the government officials charged with
investigating her parents' murder, Mariposa has gone on an international
campaign denouncing the covering up of the government of these crimes.  

This November marks the two year anniversary of Gilberto Soto's murder, and
both the International Labour Organization and the Teamsters have put out
statements this month calling for a real investigation into Soto's murder.
The Teamsters specifically call on Condoleezza Rice and the U.S. State
Department to pressure the Salvadoran government to carry out a real
investigation into Soto's murder.  To support that push, please call your
Congressional Representative (212-224-3121 is the Capitol Hill switchboard)
and the State Department (202-647-5291) to insist that the U.S. push for an
investigation and support the Human Rights office's work on the case. (See
http://www.teamster.org/06news/nr_061122_1.asp for the Teamsters' demands.)

Violence continues to rise in El Salvador, aggravated by the refusal of the
government to address its cause and create real solutions. The FMLN
continues its legal struggle by presenting proposals concentrated on the
prevention of crime and rehabilitation of criminals, which have been ignored
by Saca.  Instead, Saca has used his alliances with right wing catholic and
evangelical churches to put on various spectacles of "Praying for Peace,"
including television ads and a national prayer-for-peace convention.

 

National Day of Action and Awareness about Violence against Women

 

The issue of impunity and a legal system that does not protect victims of
crime has especially affected Salvadoran women.  El Salvador has the second
highest level in Central America, behind Guatemala, of femicides, or murders
of women.  In 1995, the Legislative Assembly ratified the Inter American
Convention for the Prevention, Sanction and Eradication of Violence against
Women Act, which means the Salvadoran government is responsible for its
fulfillment, but in reality it has simply been ignored.

 

Various women right's organizations participated in the November 24 annual
march in protest against the increasing murders and violence against women.
The actions took place around San Salvador and in various cities around the
country. The march was the culmination of the national campaign against
violence towards women in which women's rights organizations called on
different areas of government to start dealing with the problem.  Hundreds
of participants marched to the Presidential House, where they were stopped
by riot police.  The women attempted to present the president with their
demands for a real solution to prevent violence against women, including the
exhaustive investigation of every murder of women, and looking beyond bring
the murderers to justice, but to create policies focused on the eradication
of gender violence.

 

The FMLN participated in the activity and committed to lobbying in the
Legislative Assembly for creation of laws that truly protect women from
violence, since the current laws for the protection of women are not
enforced and the judicial system is failing.  Beatrice de Carrillo, the
Human Rights Ombudsperson, also attended the march, making public her
critique of the failing judicial system, making strong statements blaming
the state for perpetrating systemic and social discrimination and violence
against women.  

 

 

 


 

 

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