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Twenty Thousand Protest at Ft. Benning:
Eleven Face Federal Criminal Trials
By Bill Quigley
11/19/07 "ICH"
-- -- In what has become the nation’s largest annual gathering for
peace and human rights, over twenty thousand people protested
outside the gates of Fort Benning, GA on November 18, 2007.
Eleven people were arrested on federal criminal charges and face
up to six months in prison.
Fort Benning is the site of the internationally notorious U.S.
Army training school for Latin American military and security
personnel. For decades it was called the School of the Americas
(SOA) - it is now called the Western Hemisphere Institute for
Security Cooperation (WHINSEC). The school has graduated
hundreds of military officers who have lead or participated in
nearly every human rights atrocity in the hemisphere.
Organizations across the world, including Amnesty International
USA, have called for its closure since discovering copies of
torture manuals used at the school. In June 2007, 203 members
of the U.S. House of Representatives voted to close the
scandal-ridden school – six votes shy of the margin of victory.
Thousands listened quietly as Adriana Portillo-Bartow told how
her father, stepmother, sister, sister-in-law and two daughters,
ages nine and eleven, were “disappeared” in Guatemala in a war
directed and carried out by graduates of the U.S. Army School of
the Americas. Thousands moved towards the gates of the Fort and
called out “presente!” as the names of hundreds of other victims
of graduates of the school were sung out.
Veterans of WWII, Korea, Vietnam and the never-ending Gulf Wars
marched side by side with Catholic sisters and Buddhist monks.
Flowers, posters, pictures and thousands of small white crosses
bearing the names of people executed by graduates of the school
were put on the closed padlocked gates topped with barbed wire.
Thousands of college and high school students chanted and prayed
along side Grandmothers for Peace as military loudspeakers
blared warnings and law enforcement helicopters hovered
overhead. Huge puppets, singing children and drum circles
alternated with the spirited calls of priests and rabbis and
ministers of many faiths and races. Songs in many languages,
indigenous chants, guitars, horns and mountain flutes filled the
air.
The eleven people who crossed onto the grounds were arrested by
military police. The eleven, ranging in age from 25 to 76, are
scheduled for federal criminal trial January 28, 2008 for
trespass – punishable up to six months in federal prison. Over
two hundred people have served federal prison time for civil
disobedience at prior protests - dozens of others arrested have
served years of supervised federal probation. The movement to
close the school started in 1990 when about twenty people held
the first protest outside Ft. Benning.
Even if the U.S. government is reluctant to close the school,
Latin American countries look like they will do it themselves.
Argentina, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Uruguay and Venezuela have
announced they are withdrawing their militaries from the school.
Crimes by graduates continue. Colombia recently arrested five
high-ranking military officers who received training at the U.S.
Army School of Americas and two additional officers who were
instructors at WHINSEC. All are charged with providing security
and troops for the major drug cartel in Colombia.
Simultaneous protests occurred in Santiago, Chile; Tucson,
Arizona – outside of Fort Huachuca – where three people were
also arrested and face federal criminal charges; Toronto,
Canada; as well as Berkeley and Monterey California.
For more on the movement to close the School of the Americas
see www.soaw.org
Bill is a human rights lawyer and professor at Loyola
University New Orleans College of Law. Bill is also a member of
the legal collective of School of Americas Watch.
quigley@loyno.edu
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