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- Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive
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- From: nyt%nyxfer%igc.apc.org@MIZZOU1.missouri.edu (NY Transfer News)
- Subject: Amers Watch on Latin Amer Rts/ed-lp
- Message-ID: <1992Dec14.195243.9643@mont.cs.missouri.edu>
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- Resent-From: "Rich Winkel" <MATHRICH@MIZZOU1.missouri.edu>
- Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 19:52:43 GMT
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- Via The NY Transfer News Service * All the News that Doesn't Fit
-
- edlp 12/10
-
- Translated and edited by Toby Mailman. "el Diario/La
- Prensa" is a Spanish language newspaper published in New York
- City.
-
- "AMERICAS WATCH" LATIN AMERICAN REPORT RELEASED
-
- The US-based human rights organization "Americas Watch"
- recently released its report on human rights in Latin America.
- The report said that Brazilian president Fernando Collor de Mello
- is giving an example to Latin America by strengthening Brazil's
- democratic institutions. [Note: Collor is currently suspended and
- undergoing a trial for corruption. If he is found guilty he will
- be removed from his post as president.] However, at the same
- time, there continues to be police violence, poor living
- conditions, prison massacres and street children being killed by
- death squads. There is still state tolerance of forced child
- prostitution and inadequate investigation and indictments in
- cases of abuse of women.
-
- In Colombia, says the report, conditions continue to be the
- worst in the hemisphere, but the responsibility is shared by the
- army, guerrillas and drug cartels. In the first eight months of
- 1992 there were 91 massacres and 477 deaths.
-
- In Cuba civil and political rights are systematically
- violated, says the report. In 1992 repression against human
- rights activists increased; fifty are allegedly in prison.
- Cuba "lacks the laws and institutions" which would protect basic
- civil and political rights and its courts are subordinated to the
- executive branch.
-
- The report says the worst abuses in the Dominican Republic
- continue to be committed against the Haitians who are brought in
- for the sugar harvest, although in 1992 unions were legalized and
- measures were taken to slightly improve working and living
- conditions. Forced labor by minors has virtually been eliminated.
-
- El Salvador has undergaone an improvement in its human
- rights record, according to the "Americas Watch" report, thanks
- to the end of the armed conflict. Investigations have begun in
- order to punish those responsible for massacres which occurred
- during the war.
-
- There has supposedly been a reduction of human rights abuses
- by the army in Guatemala; however, some cases of torture and
- political assassination show that the army remains the same as
- ever.
-
- In Haiti the army has been responsible for the deaths of
- more than 1,000 people since the overthrow of Jean-Bertrand
- Aristide in Sept. 1991. The people live in a situation of terror
- comparable only to the Duvalier dictatorship.
-
- Mexico suffered the violence related to the elections,
- street executions, limits on labor rights, the killings of
- journalists and the impunity of those reponsible for the worst
- violations of human rights.
-
- Peru's president Alberto Fujimori dealt a great blow to human
- rights by violating the constitution, dissolving congress,
- suspending the court system, jailing members of the opposition
- and assuming dictatorial powers, says the "Americas Watch."
- The report added that the current situation offers little
- hope that Fujimori will end the abuses or the impunity which
- the Peruvian army has traditionally enjoyed. (edlp 12/10 from
- AFP)
-
-
- NY Transfer News Service * All the News that Doesn't Fit
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