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Press statement from SHARE
Foundation, School of the Americas Watch and
others on the Salvador Option.
For Immediate
Release: January 13, 2005
WHY DOES
THE US GOVERNMENT WANT TO EXPORT SALVADORAN
DEATH SQUADS TO IRAQ?
US-based non-profits are questioning why the
Pentagon has proposed the “Salvador Option”
for Iraq: training paramilitary forces loyal
to the US to carry out intimidation and assassination
campaigns against insurgents (as reported in
Newsweek 1/10/05). Donald Rumsfeld’s denials
of this report have little credibility as the
US government has a long history of such interventions.
Such training in the 1980s in El Salvador prolonged
a bloody civil war that eventually led to 80,000
deaths during 12 years and from which the country
has still not fully recovered. The death squads
there, together with the Salvadoran armed forces,
were responsible for 90% of the deaths and egregious
human rights violations against innocent civilians.
This year, 2005, marks the twenty-fifth anniversary
of the martyrdom of Archbishop Oscar Romero,
who was assassinated by a death squad for his
advocacy on behalf of the poor and oppressed.
His death killed hope for a peaceful solution
and sparked the armed uprising that tore El
Salvador apart for more than a decade. Why would
the United States want this for Iraq?
“US-trained forces in El Salvador brought
suffering, torture and death to more than 80,000
Salvadoran civilians,” said Christy Pardew
of School of the Americas Watch. “The
US should learn from its mistakes. The US should
not repeat the ‘Salvador Option’s’
bloody legacy with the people of Iraq.”
“I can think of one bishop, four U.S.
religious women, six Jesuit priests, and tens
of thousands of innocent civilians who would,
were they alive today, advise against the ‘Salvador
Option,’” notes David Johnson, Policy
Director of The SHARE Foundation.
Michael Ring of U.S.-El Salvador Sister Cities
says: “The communities of our sister organization,
CRIPDES, suffered thousands of deaths, bombings,
disappearances, and tortures by the US-backed
Salvadoran military and death squads. ‘The
Salvador Option,’ in Iraq will cause more
of the same.”
“The occupation of Iraq is a brutal failure,
just like its military intervention in El Salvador,”
said Burke Stansbury, Program Director of CISPES.
“Instead of perpetrating more bloodshed,
the US should end the occupation and formally
apologize to the Salvadoran people for promoting
death squads in the 1980s.”
"I am appalled that the U.S. government
would think of using the same despicable tactics
in Iraq as in Central America,” said TASSC’s
Sister Dianna Ortiz. “The United States
government doesn't know what to do in Iraq and
is so lacking a moral compass, it now advocates
torture and death squads."
"Torture, disappearance, and assassination
are morally indefensible and politically ineffective,"
said Chris Ney, of CRISPAZ. "In El Salvador,
these misguided policies tore lives apart, causing
long-term damage. As a faith-based and nonviolent
organization, we urge respect for human rights
of all people in Iraq."
“The US trained the Salvadoran military
and death squads,” the Foundation for
Self-Sufficiency in Central America’s
Chencho Alas asserts. “Then the US turned
a blind eye when they tortured me and thousands
of others. Their reign of terror forced me and
20% of my country to flee into exile.”
Foundation for
Self-Sufficiency
www.fssca.net
512-388-7957
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