: A People in Struggle

Puerto Rico in Focus Location: An archipelago located in the Caribbean Sea; smallest of the four major Antilles. Population: 3.5 million, with 2.5 million living in the US. Major cities: San Juan (Capital City), Ponce, Mayagiiez, Caguas and Carolina. Government: A colonial administration elected every four years under the provisions of the Organic Act (Law 600) of 1950; a governor and bi-camaral legislature. Unable to make any decisions concerning war or peace, immigration or emigration, commercial treaties, international relations, customs, transportation, maritime trade, money or postal system, forestry or National Parks. Most judicial decisions made by a federal court in which English is the medium of communication. Military importance: Puerto Rico is one of the most militarized regions in the world, the US controls over 50,000 acres of Puerto Rico's most arable land for which it pays nothing. Roosevelt Roads Naval Base constitutes 1/7 of our national territory, there are 11 military bases on the island. Sovereignty: AD sovereign powers lie in the US Congress; Puerto Ricans are drafted into the US army and have fought in every war since World War l,yet enjoy no representation. (The highest form of taxation is the blood tax exacted from a nation's youth); the US war of independence was fought over the issue that taxation without representation is tyranny. Puerto Rico: A People in Struggle Declaration to the International Community Regarding the Crime of Genocide Against the Puerto Rican People

Since July 25,1898, when the US militarily occupied the autonomous Contents nation of Puerto Rico, US presence on the island has had as its basis the liquidation of the Puerto Rican EDUCATION: national reality. Towards this end, the A Tool for the Destruction of the National Culture 2 US government has redefined every mechanism at its disposal. To facili- FORCED EMIGRATION: tate this barbaric proposition, the US The Dispersion of the Puerto Rican Nation 3 government has transformed the institutions of education and medicine PUBLIC HEALTH: into genocidal tools to be used against A Weapon for the Decimation of the Puerto Rican Nation 4 our people. The destruction of our natural economy, and the develop- A CALL TO CONSCIENCE, A CALL TO ACTION 6-7 ment of a parasitic one, has resulted in a virtual diaspora for the Puerto Rican REPRESSION: nation. This, coupled with the brutal The Physical Destruction of the Independence Movement and naked aggression against those and the Puerto Rican People 8 who have maintained that the enemy of the Puerto Rican people is US im- perialism, must clearly illustrate that a well-orchestrated genocidal plan EDUCATION: against the Puerto Rican people exists. A Tool for the Destruction of the National Culture

Article II of the Convention on the Prevention of the Crime of Genocide, The educational system in are made American and the teach- adopted by the United Nations Gen- Puerto Rico has long been a ers and students are inspired with eral Assembly on December 9,1948 favorite weapon of the colonizer the American spirit.. .the island states that genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy the culture and will become in its sympathies, to destroy, in whole or in part, a na- obscure Puerto Rico's history; views and attitude towards govern- tional, ethnic, racial or religious group: implanting the history of the ment, essentially American. The Killing members of the group; dominating power. The system- Causing serious bodily or mental Puerto Ricans are as yet passive harm to members of the group; atic nature of this plan finds its and plastic.. Their ideals are in our Deliberately inflicting on the group clearest expression in the fol- hands to create and to mold. conditions of life calculated to bring lowing statement by US citizen The disdain for Puerto Rican about its physical destruction in whole or in part; and Victor S. Clark, Commissioner culture and the intention to - Imposing measures intended to of Education of Puerto Rico, in a substitute a bastardized culture prevent births within the group. report to the island's military which would insure tranquility, governor in 1899: If the schools stability and a colonized order

Declaration to the International Community Puerto Rico: A People in Struggle on the island became the guid- Civil Air Patrol, Boy Scouts, government also targeted for ing principle of education in Campfire Girls.. .all the curricu- destruction the Institute of Puerto Rico for the next 50 lum content has been designed to Puerto Rican Culture, which years. create in Puerto Ricans a sense of since 1956 had been in the fore- This policy of cultural geno- total identification with the me- front of preserving and enhanc- cide found its most glaring tropolis... ing Puerto Rican art, literature example in the abolition of Realizing that in order to de- and culture. The government Spanish as the language of stroy the Puerto Rican national mandated a halt in all funding instruction and the attempt to reality, it is necessary to first for this independent cultural substitute English as the lan- destroy all centers of cultural center and its absorption into a guage of education, commerce and intellectual resistance, the single government agency of and the courts. The colonial US government directed the arts, recreation and sports. program also revolved around colonial apparatus to destroy This scheme for the destruc- the promotion of US cultural two pillars of Puerto Rican tion of Puerto Rico's culture de- activities, especially the celebra- national consciousness. In the signed by the US imperialists tion of holidays traditional to 1970s, as a result of the 1971 and their colonial counterparts the US, but with no basis within student strike in which students was a central goal in this period, our reality and culture. • seized the university and built in order to exercise hegemony The US acknowledged its barricades all around San Juan, over every aspect of Puerto failure to eradicate the Spanish the government divided the Rican life. They understand that language, on the island, University of Puerto Rico into 9 the flower of Puerto Rico's lib- through administrative reforms scattered campuses to liquidate eration lies within the seed of in 1948, which restored the use the base of student resistance to Puerto Rico's culture. of Spanish in the schools. But to colonialism in San Juan. The this day, education has as its basis the inculcation of the colonizers7 view of Puerto Rico. FORCED EMIGRATION: History books continue to The Dispersion of the Puerto Rican Nation present this distorted image of the country: references to na- tional heroes and patriots are One of the most devastating with a population density of 62 omitted, the "smallness" of impacts of the US' efforts to inhabitants per square mile—to Puerto Rico is emphasized; liquidate the Puerto Rican the barrios of New York—with "history" begins with the inva- national reality has been the 617 people per square mile. This sion of 1898, and "success" is forced dispersal or emigration supposed concern for the equated with values, standards of over two-fifths of the Puerto crowding of the Puerto Rican and norms. Rican people into the urban population did not prevent the Dr. Aida Negron de Mon- centers of the colonizing power. US from taking over 13% of tilla, Puerto Rican educator, Under the pretext that Puerto Rico's arable land for summed up this education for Puerto Rico was too "over- military bases. It became clear Americanization in 1972: The crowded" to sustain its own that the migration was not in 'careful' selection of reading population, the government fact based on any concern for material.. .the promotion of secon- promoted emigration of Puerto the welfare of the Puerto Rican dary-level student organizations— Ricans from their homeland— people, but on US interests.

Declaration to the International Community Puerto Rico: A People in Struggle

thousands of Cuban exiles and the Mainland: An Uncertain Puerto Ricans in the US North Americans were being future, Puerto Ricans are the (1986-census data) implanted into the island's "poorest of the poor." They 2.5 million; mostly in New population to serve as a have the lowest educational York, New Jersey, Pennsylva- counter-revolutionary force. attainment of any group; the nia and Illinois. As if casting out two-fifths highest drug addiction rate; the • 45.3% of Puerto Ricans in of the population were not highest incidence of mental ill- central cities lived in poverty, enough, the colonial govern- ness, the highest alcoholism compared to 313% of Blacks, ment's total lack of concern for rate; and Puerto Rican women and 11.4% of whites; the emigrated population con- have the highest rate of sterili- • Among children, 59.2% of tinued to manifest itself in the zation of any group in the US. Puerto Ricans lived in pov- infra-human conditions in This is the legacy of colonial- erty; which our people were forced ism for Puerto Ricans in the US • Nearly 89% of Puerto Rican to exist. In cities across the US, who are truly living statehood. children in single parent fami- our people lived in housing A situation which will be exac- lies headed by women lived in unfit for human habitation, erbated as a consequence of poverty; while on the agri-business major demographic changes en- • Nearly 80% of Puerto Rican plantations of the Atlantic visioned as a result of the 2020 youth drop out of school; and seaboard, Puerto Ricans toiled Plan. A plan which calls for the • Puerto Ricans have an unem- in a semi-feudal state. conversion of the island into 11 ployment rate of 14% as op- These conditions are com- large military-industrial parks posed to 6% for whites. pounded by racist and national- with a population reduction chauvinist practices aimed at from the present 3.5 million to In the period immediately ridiculing the language, cus- 1.5 million by the year 2020. following World War II, due to toms and values of the emi- The seizure of our home- the failure of several economic grants. The purpose of this was land, the destruction of our projects instituted by the colo- to create a permanent Puerto national economy and the nial government in Puerto Rico, Rican underclass. One need forced emigration of our people and to the simultaneous re- only examine the reality in to the US mainland, to serve as emergence of the Puerto Rican which the Puerto Rican people a permanent underclass for Nationalist Party as an impor- exist today to understand how North American capital, are the tant force; the government well this plan was executed. results of US colonialism in seized upon forced emigration According to a 1977 govern- Puerto Rico. US colonialism in and depopulation as a safety ment study, Puerto Ricans on Puerto Rico is genocide! valve in order to forestall a potentially revolutionary situ- ation on the island. This plan PUBLIC HEALTH: was carried out without the A Tool for the Decimation of the Puerto Rican Nation least concern for the well-being To enforce its colonial domi- this process clear in a "Circular of the emigrants, who were seen nation, the US has turned every to All Powers" prepared by the as nothing more than human aspect of its supposedly "hu- Nationalist Party: When the cargo to be shipped to the manitarian" efforts in Puerto number of hospitals increases... the metropolis. Between 1950 and Rico into an assault on the epidemics of malaria, anemia, of 1970,615,000 emigrated to the Puerto Rican people. In 1932, tuberculosis and other infectious US, while at the same time, made diseases with fatal effects also Declaration to the International Community Puerto Rico: A People in Struggle increase. For impartial observers, Health" efforts in Puerto Rico ceptive pill, Enovid. And high there exists no paradox. The since the 1920s has been mas- rates of sterilization and other American government repeats in sive sterilization of Puerto Rican medical problems are recorded Puerto Rico the method of extermi- women and men. The San Juan among Puerto Rican workers in nation it put into effect in the Star reported in 1975: "On an US-owned petrochemical and continent against people of color ... international scale, Puerto Rico is pharmaceutical operations in . The Hawaiian nation, which has the world leader in female steriliza- Puerto Rico, which operate been under the American empire tion". The percentage of Puerto without occupational health approximately the same time as Rican women of child-bearing and safety or environmental ours, is practically extinct... age who have been sterilized is protection controls, despoiling This Circular exposed the the highest in the world—over Puerto Rico's land and waters. particular case of medical ex- 40% and still climbing—up Since 1986, nearly 3,000 perimentation in which physi- from 33% in 1974. It is so com- cases of premature thelarche in cians from the Rockefeller mon that it is known simply as children from 8 months to 8 Institute, established under the la operacion. years old have been diagnosed. auspices of US "Public Health" Sterilization was initiated in They have experienced men- efforts at Presbyterian Hospital the 1930s during a period of struation, developed breasts in San Juan, were engaged in in- Nationalist struggle and institu- and pubic hair, this may well be oculating patients with cancer tionalized in the post-World attributed to the large amounts and viral diseases. Albizu War II renewed resistance. of estrogen in the island's at- presented documentary evi- At the same time, Puerto mosphere due to the fact that dence, in the form of a letter to a Rican women have been guinea Puerto Rico produces nearly colleague from a Dr. Cornelius pigs for other forms of contra- 90% of the birth control pills P. Rhoads, a physician con- ception, especially in the early used in the US. nected with the project. Rhoads development of the oral contra- In 1988, several dozen cases said: It would be ideal (here) of "mountain leprosy", among except for the Puerto Ricans—they La Operacion in Focus Puerto Rican soldiers who have are beyond a doubt, the dirtiest, .Over 25% of Puerto Rican men been sent on training exercises have been laziest, most degenerate and thiev- In 1949, 18% to Panama with the Puerto ish race of men ever to inhabit the were followed by sterilization; Rican Army National Guard sphere... what the island needs is today, the percentage is even (PRANG), were reported. not public health, but a tidal wave Symptoms of "mountain lep- or something to totally exterminate « Puerto Rico's birth rosy", as it is called in Central 36% from 1941 to 1970; the population. It might then be * In 1947, 7% of Puerto Rican America, include ulcerated usable. I have done my best to women had been sterilized; sores, constant diarrhea, fever hasten the extermination by killing Ililllllll, the percentage had and itching; while the disease is off eight and transplanting cancer more than clinically "curable" there are into several more" * In 1974 and 1975 , twenty-five free sterilization clinics, each ca- constant relapses. Arecentrevdationindicated pable of a thousand sterilizations This is the benefit which that there exists evidence to a month, opened in Puerto Rico. North American society has prove that Dr. Rhoads killed as * In the last decade, 17 munid||lil| bestowed upon the Puerto many as 15 people. ties in the island's interior have Rican people—a health service experienced zero population This case is no aberration. The growth, ||| ..... which assures the eradication of central thrust of US "Public the Puerto Rican nationality.

Declaration to the International Community A Call to Conscience

IMPRISONED During the UN Decolonization Committee hearings on the colonial case of Puerto Rico held Prisoners of War on August 16-18 1989, the United States insisted Haydee Bcltran that Puerto Rico was an internal affair and that the Committee should eliminate it from its agenda, Eli/am Escobar now that the US and Puerto Rico have embarked Ricardo Jimenez upon the "democratic" and "decolonizing" road to Oscar Lopez Rivera resolve the political status of Puerto Rico. Dylcia Pagan While this is what they hypocritically state, the truth is very differ- Alberto Rodriguez ent. First, the proposed referendum for Puerto Rico does not meet the Alicia Rodriguez minimum international requirements of a democratic and decolonizing Ida Luz Rodriguez plebiscite. Secondly, it is important to note that the referendum will take place in a very disadvantageous and repressive atmosphere for indepen- Carlos Alberto Torres dentistas. At present, there exist over 125,000 files on independentistas in Carmen Valentin the hands of the colonial government's repressive agencies, many thou- Political Prisoners sands more are in the hands of the FBI, dozens of patriots are incarcer- Lucy Berrfos Berrfos ated, persecuted, indicted, exiled and disappeared. Jaime Delgado As a gesture of good faith and conscience, the US should comply Dora Garcia with the following minimum demands, before it embarks on any Antonio Camacho Negron Juan Segarra Palmer "changes" regarding the island's status: INDICTED • Cease all forms of persecution against those who struggle Elias Castro Jorge Farinacci for the independence of Puerto Rico, including the destruc- Hilton Fernandez Diamante Orlando Gonzalez Claudio tion of any and all dossiers and files held by the FBI or other Ivonne Melcndez repressive agencies containing information about independ- Luis Colon Osorio Angel Diaz Ruiz ence activists. Filiberto Ojeda Rios • Cease all legal proceedings against any independence ac- Isaac Camacho Negron tivists; specifically the August 30th patriots. FREE ON BAIL • Grant unconditional amnesty to all Puerto Rican prison- Roberto Jose Maldonado Norman Ramirez Talavera ers of war and political prisoners.

EXILED Guillermo Morales This is the Repressive Picture that PERSECUTED BY THE FBI Independentistas Confront: Luis Rosado Ayala Avelino Gonzalez Claudio Norberto Gonzalez Claudio • There exist 125,000 files of activists that have been sur- Victor Gerena veilled, threatened and harassed by the colonial government Roberto Jose Todd Pagan THREATENED BY THE of Puerto Rico. GRAND JURY • Many thousands more files are in the hands of the FBI, Carlos Alejandro CIA, NSA and other agencies. Samuel Sanchez Linda Backiel • There exist dozens of persecuted, jailed activists, indictees, grand jury resisters, exiled and disappeared. DISAPPEARED Julio Pinto Gandia A Call to Action April 1990: Month of International Solidarity with Puerto Rican POWs and Political Prisoners

The decade of the 1990s will definitively be a watershed for human liberation: the United Nations has proclaimed it (the US being the sole objector) as the Decade to end Colonialism; it will mark the 500th anniversary of the European conquest of the A mericas (which initiates the modern forms of racism and colonialism); it has been ushered in by an extraordinary unfettering of the human spirit all over the world, from Beijing to Johannesburg, from Namibia to El Salvador; this decade has also been inaugurated by the release of'untold numbers of political prisoners; Nelson Mandela, the heroic ANC leader is soon expected to be released from a South African prison. Yet, while all over the planet, prison gates are flying open, in the US the number of political prisoners is increasing; there are currently over 100 political prisoners in the US. Among them are 19 Puerto Rican Patriots incarcerated for their activities related to the internationally recognized struggle for Puerto Rican Independence; of these fourteen have assumed the position of Prisoner of War as recognized by the 1977Additional Protocols land II to the 1949 Geneva Convention. April4,1990 will markten years of incarceration for eleven of these patriots. Ten years of physical and psychological torture; imprisoned thousands of miles away from family and friends; held in isolation through the use of sensory deprivation—whereby a prisoner is deprived of almost all human contact and held in small cells without any sensorial stimulation. This deplorable situation must change. Efforts to demand respect for their human rights and win unconditional release must intensify. Things That Are Being Done: Things You Can Do: Coordinated campaigns are beginning to - ORGANIZE a support committee to work on the case of these come together to expose the existence and the inhu- Puerto Rican Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War, as well man prison conditions of these activists and freedom- as other political prisoners in US jails; ORGANIZE a delegation in your country to attend the Inter- fighters; and to demand general amnesty for them by national Tribunal on Political Prisoners to be held in New 1992. Among these are: York City during the weekend of April 27-29; • a resolution by the 9ih Conference of the Heads of State and CONTACT other human rights, civic or religious groupings in Government of the Non-Aligned Nations in Belgrade, Yugo- your country to discuss the issue of Political Prisoners in the slavia, demanded the "freedom and unconditional amnesty US; for all independence activists (Puerto Rican) incarcerated (in ' ORGANIZE a petition drive to US President George Bush de- US jails) for political reasons/' manding amnesty for the Puerto Rican POWs and political • a special declaration which denounces the human right viola- prisoners, as well as the approximately 100 other political pris- tions of political prisoners in the US adopted by the Interna- oners in US jails; mail letters, cards, telegrams ; tional Conference on Criminology '89 in Havana, Cuba, No- REQUEST a meeting with the US ambassador in your coun- vember 18-24,1989. try to discuss the existence of political prisoners in US jails and • the organization, in the US, of the freedom Now! Cam- demand a general amnesty by 1992; paign for Amnesty and Human Rights for Political " ORGANIZE political actions during the month of April: Prisoners in the United States (a broad coalition of reli- forums, pickets, vigils and other forms of political activity to gious, civic and political groupings), which will sponsor an call attention to the plight of political prisoners in US jails; International Tribunal on Political Prisoners in New ORGANIZE a tour of representatives of the Freedom Now! York City on April 27-29. The purpose of the Tribunal will Campaign (a coalition organized in the US to expose the exis- tence of political prisoners, as well as to work for their release) be to hear the indictment against the US for holding political to visit your country, to talk to church, schools, unions, prisoners; and violating their most basic human rights; and women's groupings, etc; to expose the fact that US jails and prisons have abandoned ORGANIZE press conferences and write articles for your local all pretense at "rehabilitating" inmates and are increasingly press and media around the situation of political prisoners in becoming concentration camps for warehousing the youth the US; from the ghettos and barrios. ORGANIZE a showing of reknown artist and POW Elizam • the National Committee to Free Puerto Rican Prison- Escobar's artwork, which has been exhibited across the US and ers of War and Political Prisoners in the US, and the Puerto Rico. CUCRE (Unitary Committee Against Repression in Puerto In addition you can: Rico) have declared April 1990 as the International Month Write to the Political Prisoners and Libertad and Infonne/ of Solidarity with Puerto Rican Prisoners of War and Update, (publications of the National Committee) Keep us in- Political Prisoners. formed of your work. We call upon all freedom-loving and progressive Get organizations to adopt the Puerto Rican POW who has re- people the world over to join us in the efforts to stop quested political asylum in your country (see page 11). human rights violations in the US by demanding re- -Get to know a POW (family /background) ; spect for the human rights of all political prisoners, as -Demand that your government grant him/her asylum. well as a general amnesty by 1992. Puerto Rico: A People in Struggle

REPRESSION: the defense of their homeland in The Physical Destruction of the Independence the 1950s, on charges which Movement and the Puerto Rican People again included against the US government. In the 1960s, '70s and '80s US imperialism, as we have freedom for Albizu Campos, the bloody list includes the stated, exercises absolute con- and murder of activists in US jails, trol over the principal aspects of other Nationalist Party leaders like Young Lords Party member the political, economic and imprisoned in the US on Julio Roldan and Tito Perez in cultural life of Puerto Ricans. In charges of seditious conspiracy. New York and Manuel Ramos the face of this aggression, The repression continued in Chicago; the frame-up incar- many thousands of patriots through the years, with the cerations of Carlos Feliciano have struggled for generations summary execution of Nation- and Eduardo Cruz on fabricated to free their homeland. To alists Elias Beauchamp and charges of bombings in the US; suppress this struggle and to at police head- the murder of student Antonia terrorize the Puerto Rican quarters in San Juan; the disap- Martinez in Rio Piedras by people, the repressive forces of pearance of the corpse of the police attacking anti-ROTC the US and the colonial,regime patriot Angel Esteban An- protests; the killing of Angel have applied a campaign of tongiorgi; in the torture and Charbonier and Eddie Ramos in naked repression, murdering psychological attacks against Mayagiiez in a bombing carried hundreds of patriots and im- Puerto Ricans imprisoned in the out by right-wing terrorists prisoning and persecuting US for refusing obligatory US organized by the FBI and CIA; thousands. This has been paral- military service in WWII and the lengthy imprisonment of leled by brutal attacks by the Korea; in the enactment of the Martin Sostre for his activities police on Puerto Rican commu- "Muzzle Law" in 1948, which in support of Black and Puerto nities in the US, as well as on made any advocacy of inde- Rican liberation in New York the island, in an effort to crush pendence a crime against the State; the disappearance of resistance and to prevent the US; the mass arrests of Nation- Nationalist Party leader Julio development of a radical inde- alist Party cadres and other in- Pinto Gandia; the frame-up and pendentist base among the dependentistas in the wake of the exile of Humberto Pagan, a Puerto Rican people. Jayuya Rebellion of 1950, in leader of the 1971 student strike The repression of the inde- which many patriots were at the University of Puerto Rico; pendence movement has been killed or wounded by police the arrest of Juan Antonio written in blood, beginning and National Guard forces; and Corretjer, Consuelo Lee Cor- with the invasion of the island in which the civilian population retjer and the entire Central and the subsequent two years of of Puerto Rican towns were Committee of the Puerto Rican military government needed to strafed and bombed by the US Socialist League in 1971 on suppress guerrilla struggle Air Force; in the medical execu- weapons charges, which against the invaders. The list tions by the yankee jailers of dragged on for nearly a decade includes the massacres of Rio Albizu Campos and later of before the last proceedings were Piedras in 1935 and of Ponce in , one dropped against Dona Con- 1937, when 20 independentistas of the Five Puerto Rican Nation- suelo Lee Corretjer; the assassi- were killed and 200 wounded alists imprisoned for a com- nation of Santiago Mari by police at a rally demanding bined total of over 125 years for Pesquiera, son of independence

8 Declaration to the International Community Puerto Rico: A People in Struggle

leader Juan Mari Bras; the Rosado, through the efforts of apartment in 1978. Despite kidnapping, torture and murder a police agent, informer and medical mistreatment and the of Teamster organizer and provocateur, Alejandro loss of fingers of both hands, he independence activist Juan Gonzalez Malave. Testimony by later escaped from Bellevue Rafael Caballero by a death a taxi driver at the scene, and Hospital in New York to Mexico squad within the colonial also by Lieutenant Julio An- in 1979, residing there until his police; the political internment drades, one of the police officers arrest by INTERPOL on May 26, of nearly two dozen Puerto involved in the execution have 1983. After having served a Rican activists and their sup- made it clear that this was a prison sentence of 5 1/2 years, porters by federal Grand Juries cold-blooded murder carried during which time the US used "investigating77 the FALN, and out under the direct instructions every means at its disposal, seeking the persecution of the of the pro-statehood governor (including a plan approved by entire independence movement Carlos Romero Barcelo and National Security Council from US since the mid-1970s to subsequently covered up by a Advisor Oliver North and US the present. white-wash investigation by Attorney General Edwin Meese Even today, several activists for his "escape" and assassina- are being threatened with grand POLITICAL PRISONERS tion) to force his extradition to jury subpoenas, and attorney JAILED FOR 25 YEARS the US. Instead, the Mexican Linda Backiel, a supporter of OR MORE government released Guillermo Puerto Rican independence, is and provided him safe passage facing a possible jail sentence Loli ta Lebron to Havana, Cuba, where he for contempt of grand jury currently resides as a free man. within the next few weeks. Irving Flores In May of 1979,21 indepen- The Grand Jury is only one Andres Figueroa Cordero dentistas were arrested by US aspect of the current wave of (29 years) Military Police for protesting repression, which is directed the genocidal US Navy presence expressly at isolating and de- in Vieques, an inhabited island President Carter's Administra- stroying the revolutionary 75% of whose land is occupied tion. Gonzalez Malave was also independentist forces who by naval bases and whose involved in the arrest of eight stand in the way of US efforts to waters are used for bombing other independentistas whom he further "rationalize77 the status practice and maneuvers. One of accused of participation in an of Puerto Rico in order to deal these 21, Angel Rodriguez armed clandestine formation. with the current political and Cristobal, was singled out for At the same time, Nydia economic crisis of the Common- brutality from the beginning. Esther Cuevas and Pablo Mar- wealth. This period was initi- This leader of the Puerto Rican cano Garcia were arrested and ated immediately on the heels Socialist League, who had taken tried for their takeover of the of a United Nations7 condemna- a POW stance, was found dead, Chilean Consulate in San Juan tion of US repression of the hanged in his isolation cell in and sentenced to long-terms in independence movement. On Tallahassee, Federal Prison in US prisons. Another captured July 25,1978 colonial police Florida on November 11,1979. independence fighter, Guill- entrapped and executed at Physical evidence of blood in ermo Morales, who also took Cerro Maravilla two young his cell and a gash over his eye, the POW stance after his cap- independentistas, Carlos Soto as well as the statements of ture in an unexplained explo- Arrivi and Arnaldo Dario other prisoners, make it clear sion in a Queens, New York Declaration to the International Community Puerto Rico: A People in Struggle stance of refusing to recognize and arresting 16 Puerto Rican called War against Drugs, the jurisdiction of the US court, independentistas and charging which is really a war against and declaring himself a Pris- them with the $7.5 million Third World communities oner of War, the position which expropriation of the Wells within the US, is part of an brought down the govern- Fargo Company in Hartford, attempt to effectuate the bantus- ment's murderous attacks, has Connecticut. One of the ar- tanization of a population also immortalized him. Subse- rested, Filiberto Ojeda Rios, was deemed marginal; transferring quently, many of the other held under the Bail Reform Act them out of the central cities, Vieques defendants served of 1984 for 33 months without where they pose a challenge to prison terms in exile in the US. bail; making him the longest the security of the power struc- The Vieques struggle has con- held political prisoner in US tures of industry and finance, to tinued through the '80s and the history to be held without bail. isolated pockets of population island municipality remains an Police repression in Puerto in a white megapolis. The cases arena of US colonial repression. Rico (the police department has of Rafael Cruz and Julio Osorio The fundamental challenge files on 125,000 people it consid- in Chicago, murdered by police to this repression has been ers subversive), and in Puerto in an attack on the Puerto Rican made by Puerto Rican Prisoners Rican communities in the US, is Day festivities in 1977; of Luis of War, accused of being mem- not restricted to independentistas, Baez, shot 25 times by New bers of the Fuerzas Armadas de but has steadily increased York police; and of the two Liberacion Nacional (FALN), against the people in general, in Puerto Rican men shot by an combatants for Puerto Rican a parallel attempt to terrorize off-duty policeman in New independence who were cap- the population. The attacks on York because he "thought they tured in Evanston, Illinois on Puerto Rican and other Third were in the FALN," are only the April 4,1980, and who have World communities are part of tip of the iceberg. Similarly in refused to recognize US juris- a strategy outlined in the Tri- Puerto Rico, cases like that of diction over themselves. In- lateral Commission's Report, Adolfina Villanueva, killed by stead, they have demanded Crisis of Democracy, which is police carrying out an eviction, their right under international really a blueprint for a develop- is only too common. The 300 law, as anti-colonial freedom ing fascist order in the US families whose community of fighters, to be tried by an inter- directed against Third World Villa Sin Miedo was razed in national tribunal or released. people within US, borders, 1982 and most recently, the US On August 30,1985, over whose human rights struggles Navy, trying to evict hundreds 300 FBI agents undertook, what are judged to represent an of families on the island munici- some have called, the 2nd US "excess of democracy" and a pality of Vieques, are continu- invasion of Puerto Rico; raiding threat to imperialist stability. ing testimony to the vicious 38 homes and organizations, Police terror and Bush's so- attacks on our people.

A publication by the External Affairs Secretariat of the Movimiento de Liberacion Nacional Puertorriqueno (MLN-PR). For more information: Josefina Rodriguez, Secretary of External Affairs Movimiento de Liberacion Nacional Puertorriqueno, PO Box 477194, Chicago, IL 60647 USA

10- Declaration to the International Community Puerto Rico: A People in Struggle

Prisoners of War Political Prisoners ^^^^^ JaimT •_-.e_ DelgadT"\_1^.-_ J_o. #94736-024l(\AT5£. r\^A4 (B-lCQ 1\o) Rodriguez #92150-024 (B-3) Edwin Cortes #92153-024 (B-2) USP Ricardo Jimenez #88967-024 (A-2) P.O. Box 33 P.O. Box 1000 Terre Haute, IN 47808 Lewisburg,PA 17837 Juan Segarra-Palmer Dora Garcia #94735-024 #15357-077 #88969-024 FCI Pleasanton 100 FCI Road FCI Colorado Unit 5701 8th Street, Camp Parks Marianna, FL 32446 P.O. Box 1500 Dublin, CA 94568 El Reno, OK 73036 Luz M. Berrios Berrios #24582-004 Oscar Lopez-Rivera #87651-024 Antaeus Unit P.O. Box 1000 3301 Leestown Road Marion, IL 62959 Lexington, KY 40511

Adolfo Matos #88968-024 Antonio Camacho-Negron 3901 Klein Blvd (Unit J) #03587-069 Lompac, CA 93436 FCIMcKean (Unit 2) PO Box 8000 Alejandrina Torres #92152-024 Bradford, PA 16701 Dylcia Pagan #88971-024 Ida Luz Rodriguez #88973-024 Haydee Torres #88462-024 Carmen Valentin #88974-024 FCI Pleasanton 5701 8th Street, Camp Parks Dublin, CA 94568

Alicia Rodriguez #N07157 P.O. Box 5007 The Puerto Rican Prisoners of War Dwight, IL 60420 submitted a petition each to the Luis Rosa #N02743 following countries officially requesting Box 711 political asylum. This request was Menard,IL 62259 made in August of1988.

Carlos Alberto Torres Carmen Valentin Japan #88976-024 Carlos Alberto Torres Austria FCI-902Renfroe Haydee Beltran Greece (Delta A) Alejandrina Torres Italy Talladega, A Luis Rosa Portugal 35160 Ida Luz Rodriguez Spain Alicia Rodriguez Luxemburg Edwin Cortes Finland Elizam Escobar France Dylcia Pagan Holland Oscar Lopez Rivera Sweeden Ricardo Jimenez Norway Adolfo Matos Denmark Alberto Rodriguez Belgium

Declaration to the International Community Puerto Rico: A People in Struggle

CONCLUSION For More Information:

• National Committee to Free The record of US imperialism in regard to Puerto Rican POWS and Puerto Rico is clear. The facts which we have Political Prisoners PO Box 476698 cited, such as the forced emigration of two-fifths Chicago, 1L 60647, USA of the population; the sterilization of 40% of • Freedom Now! Campaign for Puerto Rican women and one-fourth of the men; Amnesty and Human Rights the jailing and murders of independentistas and for Political Prisoners in the United States. police terror against the community at large, 59 E. Van Buren, #UOO show that the US—not only in the juridical defini- Chicago, 1L 60605 USA tion, but in fact,—is waging a genocidal war (312)663-4399 against the Puerto Rican people to enforce its ille- • CUCRE (Unitary Committee gal colonial domination of our homeland. We call against Repression) Aptdo 20190 upon the international community to render Rio Piedras, Puerto Rico judgement on our claim. 00928

Josefina Rodriguez, Secretary of External Affairs Movimiento de Liberation Nacional Puertorriqueno, PO Box 477194, Chicago, IL 60647 USA

12. Declaration to the International Community