El Salvador war continues in spite of 'peace plan'

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"Death Squads" are still active El Salvador, selectively murdering labor and human rights activists.

Subscribe to Socialist Action and get a free pamphlet! And why not send a subscription to a friend as a holiday gif while you're at it! He or she will also be sent a free pamphle Send to: 3435 Army St., Rm. 308, San Francisco, CA 94110. List of latest Socialist Action pamphlets is on page SOCIALIST ACTION DECEMBER 1987 13 On Oct. 26, in a death squad-style assault, gunmen murdered Herbert Ernesto Anaya as he was preparing to take his children to school. Anaya, president of El Salvador's non-governmental Human Rights Commission (CHES), had been repeatedly subjected to death threats.

In May 1986, Anaya had been thrown into Mariona prison for "suspicion of secretly collaborating with the rebels." An accusation of association with the FMLN/FDR opposition is tantamount to a death sentence in El Salvador, but Anaya had chosen to continue his investigation of human-rights abuses.

Anaya's assassination sparked angry protests in El Salvador, where the labor movement has been on the rise. The large labor federation, the National Unity of Salvadoran Workers (UNTS), played a central role, organizing a "day of national indignation" on Oct. 28.

Blaming the murder on "the military high command and the Duarte government, financed and directed by the United States," the UNTS marched in the 5000-10,000 strong funeral procession. There were reports of rotating work stoppages in the capital.

Death squads act "discreetly"

It is a well-established fact that the Salvadoran death squads are an extra-legal arm of the military. Contrary to reports in the U.S. press, there has been a steady increase in their activity in conjunction with the rise in the popular movement.

The death squads have learned to intimidate more "discreetly," kidnapping and torturing instead of killing, or murdering "only" selected leaders instead of 12 months for $6. 6 months for $3.

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Name Address City Zip random workers or peasants.

This "self-restraint" won high praises for the Duarte regime in Washington, and helped win the Salvadoran government human-rights certifications and $1.5 million a day from Congress.

President Duarte's own reaction to Anaya's killing, which culminated what Amnesty International called "a wave of threats and abuses directed against humanrights workers in recent months," " Was hardly what one would expect from a man who (according to Reagan) "created a climate of respect for human rights and the rule of law."

Duarte stated that "the left has been looking for a martyr for a year. And they have one, whether they did it themselves or someone did it for them. They've been parading the body through the streets to create terror."

It is a grim joke to say that a movement that has seen over 60,000 civilians murdered since 1980 would be looking for a martyr or that an unarmed funeral procession facing army units is "creating terror."

The courage of the protestors in the face of such threatening rhetoric can be measured by the fact that it was at Archbishop Romero's funeral in 1980 that a crowd was fired upon, an act which launched a wave of terror.

The FMLN and the Arias Plan The FMLN (Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front) responded sharply to Anaya's killing. A transportation stoppage paralyzed traffic in the entire country, forcing the military to organize convoys. The largest campaign ever of electricalpower sabotage left half the capital blacked out. This did not affect the vast majority of Send me more information about Socialist Action.

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ChrisSteele Perkins Magnum urban dwellers, who are without electricity anyway.

In view of these actions and the independently organized labor protests and strikes, it can be seen that broad strata of the population are defiantly standing up in an hour of crisis. This was also evident in the large rally organized explicitly for the FDR (Revolutionary Democratic Front) and the FMLN at the onset of the latest peace negotiations.

These negotiations began in conjunction with the Arias Plan. This accord, signed by presidents of five Central American nations, calls for talks with opposition groups, steps toward a cease-fire, amnesty for political offenders, an end to outside aid to insurgents, and increased democracy by means of "an authentic, democratic, pluralistic, participatory process."

Designed primarily for Nicaragua, the Arias Plan is being used by Duarte to polish his tarnished image and delegitimize the opposition. But Duarte and the military, despite friction over tactics, have jointly insisted that the FMLN lay down its arms as a precondition of negotiations and that the unions and mass organizations be excluded from talks.

The talks were already stalled when Anaya was murdered. The FMLN/FDR then refused to continue the negotiations, noting in a communique: "It makes no sense to talk about democratization, ceasefire, political participation, etc. when it is the government which continues to implement its dirty war against unarmed civilians through its death squads."

Later, on Nov. 12, eight opposition parties of varied political positions withdrew from the Reconciliation Commission created under the Arias plan, claiming the reforms.

Duarte's peace-plan initiatives President Duarte's two main initiatives in conjunction with the regional peace plan have been smokescreens to strengthen the hand of the government and military.

First, Duarte declared a unilateral "ceasefire." While ceasing its "offensives," however, the army continued to patrol and to occupy new areas. More than a week before the Nov. 20 deadline for the "cease-fire," bombing raids and battles were reported.

The second Duarte initiative concerned amnesty for political prisoners. Several hundred victims of repression have been released, but many more will not be affected.

In El Salvador, authorities are allowed two weeks after making an arrest before charges must be lodged and the prisoner's whereabouts made known. Any confession obtained before that is considered valid testimony.

As a consequence, before they reach the prisons, many are tortured. Some simply are held indefinitely elsewhere. Those who have not been placed in the observable prisons will not be released in this amnesty.

The prisons have been a focus of great political struggle and several key rightwing attacks have occurred there recently. On Aug. 28, National Guard and Army troops opened fire on political prisoners at Mariona prison. They wounded three, including Jose Vladimir Centeno, son of the telephone workers' leader and a prison activist.

Amnesty favors armed forces But the truly grotesque aspect of the amnesty is that it absolves all soldiers who participated in any of the killings or massacres of civilians committed before Oct. 22, 1987. Among those eligible would be the killers of four U.S. churchwomen, those responsible for the 1983 massacre of 70 at Las Hojas, and many other murders, rapes, torturings, and acts of brutality.

As to why the amnesty so favored the armed forces, one government spokesman commented, "if we did not include the military, there would have been a coup or at least the effective end of the Duarte presidency."

Duarte is ultimately loyal to the military and to the United States, which sustains him in power. The most dramatic expression of this subservience was in Washington, D.C., in October, when Duarte literally kissed the stars and stripes at a White House welcoming ceremony.

On the other hand, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega paid a visit to the Vietnam War Memorial during his trip to Washington, D.C., last month. Ortega was not invited to the White House.

The contrasts between the two regimes, one degrading itself in U.S. jingoist "free world" rhetoric, the other sharing the harsh memories of war with people here could not be clearer.

It is the responsibility of the anti-intervention and labor movements in this country to create the widest publicity about the real conditions in El Salvador and to defend embattled human-rights workers and labor activists there. We must rally to stop all U.S. intervention in Central America.