A small community radio station in El Salvador stands up to threats from death squads and rallies the community against violence and degradation of the environment.Part One:
Part Two:
Showing posts with label Radio victoria. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Radio victoria. Show all posts
Saturday, January 8, 2011
Friday, August 20, 2010
Monday, May 17, 2010
Undate on Radio Victoria in El Salvador
First of all i would like to say that we have not received any threats or sabotages since January. And we have received many visits and expressions of support:
- various delegations have come to hear first hand what the Radio has been experiencing and how we have been responding to these difficult situations (Voces on the Border, Sister Cities, the International Solidarity Center, journalists from Spain, Germany and Nicaragua, the School for International Training, researchers from Alaska, university students).
- we have been interviewed on many national radios and some TV and been called for interviews on international radios in USA, Canada, Argentina, Mexico and some in Europe!!
- we received a workshop from Psychologist for the People from Italy.
- we received a workshop on Security and how to make our own Security Plan from UDEFEGUA (the Guatemalan Defense of Human Rights Unit)
- we received a workshop on Informative Technology Security, how to keep our computers and networks safer also from UDEFEGUA.
- we received another workshop from UNDEFEGUA on Mental Health and Political Violence.
- we received an anonymous grant to help with security issues in Cabañas.
- we helped to plan and carry out a "Solidarity with the People of Cabañas and No to Metallic Mining" event in the park of Victoria during the Mons. Romero Anniversary Week in March with many national and international delegations, over a thousand people attended.
- we received a small grant from Journalist Helping Journalists in Munich, Germany
- we applied for and were granted a one year scholarship from the Hamburger Stiftung Foundation for Isabel Gamez to live one year in Hamburg, Germany with her 9 year old son. It is a grant for her to rest and recuperate, she can study or work with organizations if she wants but can also just take time for herself, all expenses paid.
- we are participating in a project directed towards women, youth and alternative communications media in Cabañas, which includes improving the Radio's infrastructure, expanding our broadcasting coverage, re-establishing and re-enforcing skills for our Community Correspondent Network and Community Radio-Listeners Groups, audience surveys and training for the entire Radio team in terms of learning to put into practice the focus areas we have defined (Human Rights, Gender Equality, the Environment, Cultural Identity and Participation).
- we met with the Organization of American States' Freedom of Expression Relator who mentioned our case in her 2009 report and participated in a workshop on freedom of expression with her and people throughout Central and South America.
So, we are doing well, feeling good. Still feel those shadows, still looking over our shoulders, still have some personal guards and police protection at night and on weekends. Still have people who cannot return home to live. I guess you could say our lives have been marked forever. But we are more convinced than ever that Radio Victoria is an important project, that it plays a role in the communities and continues to grow and improve.
AND we still have great needs. We were very excited to learn that we would be participating in the project: "Strengthening Popular Organizations and Local Media's Organizational Capacities and Political Incidence for the Exercise of an Equitative Citizens' Participation". This project comes from the Basque Country Government through an organization called Paz y Solidaridad (Peace and Solidarity).
So, we need to come up with our contribution to the project, which includes the land we have, the office and building, all the equipment we now have, etc. BUT we also have to pay for all the unskilled labor for putting the wall around our property, building a cistern and clean-up area with 2 more bathrooms and the tower to expand our broadcast coverage.
This is around $20,000.00 !!! oh, bejeebers!! so we have around $4,000.00 we can put to that, and our NGO, ADES is trying to come up with a part, but we need to do a campaign to raise money, once again. I mean we are always on a shoestring and fortunately people believe in us and some few send us donations every year, others come and visit and leave a collaboration, we sell t-shirts to others and we are working on a fund-raising plan. Well, one of my tasks in that fund-raising plan is to write this letter with this very petition.
We need:
- 15 people to give a thousand dollars, or
- a thousand people to give $15.00, or
- something in between !!!
To donate to Radio Victoria:
CHECKS DIRECTLY TO RADIO VICTORIA:
Mail your checks made out to Radio Victoria to:
ARPAS
Pasaje El Rosal # 117
Colonia Miramonte Pte.
San Salvador, El Salvador
PAYPAL WITH A CREDIT CARD:
Go to International Partners' website: www.internationalpartners.org
Look under "Step 2: Choose your method of payment" - click where it says "Donate by credit card using Paypal"
Where it says "Designation" use the drop down window and choose Project and in the next window where it says "Name" put "Radio Victoria"
FOR TAX DEDUCTIBLE CHECKS:Mail your check made out to International Partners WITH RADIO VICTORIA ON THE SUBJECT LINE and send to :
International Partners
1320 Fenwick Lane
Suite 400
Silver Spring, Maryland 20910
Friday, January 22, 2010
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Radio Victoria Threatened Once Again
Radio Victoria received a new threat today by email sent out to 17 different people including the priest Padre Luis. The sender's email address is: exterminiorim@gmail.com and it says the sender is exterminio pacificrim.
The threat:
"we sent 2 into the hole, now the question is, who will be the third, maybe Father Luis or one from the radio, not a bad idea to continue with one of those big mouths at radio victoria, we are not playing around we demonstrated that we have the logistic capacity and financing to deal with whoever, it doesn't matter if you have a battalion of police taking care of you like dogs, we will do it when we like, the deaths will continue and no one can stop the vengeance that's begun, we prefer that the 3rd be someone at the "pinche" radio, we are not playing around, this is the new wave of warnings after taking care of Ramiro"
The Ramiro is Ramiro Rivera from the region near Radio Victoria. He was murdered on December 20, 2009.
EL SALVADOR: RAMIRO RIVERA SHOT TO DEATH IN CABAÑAS
Written by Hector Berríos
Monday, 21 December 2009
[Note: UDW first reported on Ramiro Rivera in August, when he miraculously survived an attack where he was shot eight times in the legs and back. A Real News report released at the time aired footage of a Rivera interview. The attack occurred weeks after the assassination of Marcelo Rivera (no relation) in Cabañas, El Salvador and marked the beginning of an open season on activists opposed to mining in the area. Here we re-print the testimony of Hector Berríos of MUFRAS-32, an organization that has accompanied many of the anti-mining groups in their struggle for justice. A longer article on the assassination of R. Rivera and its significance in light of the ongoing struggle against Pacific Rim's mining efforts is forthcoming. --ed.
December 20, 4:00pm - Hitmen gunned down and killed our compañero Ramiro Rivera Gomez, Vice president of the Comité Ambiental de Cabañas, [Cabañas Environmental Committee], in the Canton of Trinidad, city of Ilobasco, Cabañas. Rivera was a leader in the resistance against the Pacific Rim Mining Company.
He was active in raising consciousness about the company’s actions, and was one of the first persons who suffered attacks by Pacific Rim employees. On August 7th, 2009 Rivera was victim of an assassination attempt in which he was shot in the back eight times. It was a miracle, thanks to G-d, that he survived. This latest event can be added to the assassination of Marcelo Rivera, ASIC member, the threats to our colleagues at Radio Victoria, the kidnapping and assassination attempt of Father Luis Alberto Quintanilla, threats made against the director of ADES as well as those against the fellow members of CACA and MUFRAS-32.
It is most striking that two security guards, members of the Witnesses and Victims Protection Unit of the National Civil Police, were accompanying compañero Ramiro Rivera Gomez, and were unable to do anything to evade the death of our colleague.
Furthermore, neither suffered injuries and the assassins injured a fourteen year-old girl that was with Ramiro Rivera. We must remember that earlier this year, on Thursday, June 18, at the “El Molino”cut-off, in the municipality of Ilobasco, Department of Cabañas, environmental activist Gustavo Marcelo Rivera Moreno, was seen for the last time. His lifeless body was rescued from a well on June 30th, with clear signs of torture.
The forced disappearance, followed by torture and assassination of Marcelo Rivera, as well as that of Ramiro Rivera Gomez, is part of an increase in violence in the municipalities in Cabañas, ranging from death threats and kidnapping attempts against the men and women that have organized to halt the Pacific Rim mining project.
The violence that has fallen upon the communities is worrisome, but equally worrisome and outrageous is the disfunctionality of the State institutions that are charged with directing and carrying out criminal investigations, of which we can affirm by the response of the Organized Crime Unit of the Attorney General and the Sub-director of the National Civil Police, Officer Mauricio Landaverde, who in our meeting with him told us that we should stop speaking out and that these were all just common crimes.
The gravest thing that this Officer on various occasions has expressed, including in the presence of the head of the Organized Crime Unit of the FGR, Rodolfo Delgado, in an irresponsible and rushed manner, and without any investigation, was when he stated “that the [Marcelo Rivera murder] was the result of common violence and that there is no indication of intellectual authorship”. These statements have been made without following any other lines of investigation that would establish a true motive for the [Rivera’s] assassination, while the community has turned over sufficient evidence that points to intellectual authorship.
It is essential that we raise our voices to denounce these violent acts against our compañeros who oppose the death project that Pacific Rim is directing. At the same time, we must join in solidarity with the accompaniment actions of the communities that are struggling against Pacific Rim’s mining project, which is backed by various ARENA mayors across Cabañas, and who act with complete impunity as permitted by the authorities.
It is important to state that we have denounced to the PNC and the FGR the increasingly violent terror and harassment campaign that activists in Cabanas have suffered. So much so that the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, in a recent resolution called on the Salvadoran government to provide protection for the lives of the involved environmentalists. In the public event when the Chancellor’s Office was notified of this, I had the chance to observe the unwillingness of the PNC and the Technical Unit, who justified their unwillingness to provide protection.
I want to add here that the FGR last week sent notification to the Radio Victoria reporters that the security measures implemented to protect them were being withdrawn. These journalists have also been subject to threats, just like Ramiro Rivera, who had received public death threats… that were carried out. There is enormous indignation among the various grassroots organizations in Cabañas. The Pacific Rim Mining Company is currently suing the government of El Salvador for 100 million dollars and is initiating a terror campaign against those who oppose the mining project.[ed. Note: the correct amount is $77 million. However, a suit by the US-based mining corp Commerce Group against El Salvador is for $100 million.]
Will the assassinations of Ramiro Rivera Gomez and Marcelo Rivera Moreno go unpunished? Are we going to watch idly as they kill our compañeros and continue to get away with it? And when will the authorities of the “government of change” decide to take action to stop to these attacks?
Héctor Berrios
Movimiento Unificado Francisco Sánchez-1932 MUFRAS-3
This testimony was translated and adapted from the Spanish original by Jason Wallach.
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=4118
RADIO VICTORIA ASKS FOR LETTERS OF SUPPORT
HI EVERYONE, here is information on how to send an email or fax, and CISPES has asked that you send copies to them, PLEASE ADD ON THAT RADIO VICTORIA IS AGAIN BEING THREATENED, we have received 2 email threats and some text messages, so please add that on to this letter or include it in whatever you like, do it as an individual or your organization or both.
keep the pressure on. also a friend in chiapas is suggesting we start a Peace Camp, something they are doing in Chiapas to help protect the autonomous communities, international and national delegations coming and staying with the groups and organizations under threat, something like the old Peace Brigades, something to think about, but more international pressure and presence is needed!!!
thanks for all you support and efforts, take care, c*.
FAX: +503 2523 7170 - Attorney General Romeo Barahona's office
EMAILS:
Señor Rodolfo Delgado, director of the Organized Crime Unit of the Attorney General´s office: radelgado@fgr.gob.sv.
AND please send a copy to the Human Rights Defense Office to Señor Oscar Luna: heidybrizuela@pddh.gob.sv
AND IF YOU CAN a copy to the CISPES office: cispes@cispes.org
The threat:
"we sent 2 into the hole, now the question is, who will be the third, maybe Father Luis or one from the radio, not a bad idea to continue with one of those big mouths at radio victoria, we are not playing around we demonstrated that we have the logistic capacity and financing to deal with whoever, it doesn't matter if you have a battalion of police taking care of you like dogs, we will do it when we like, the deaths will continue and no one can stop the vengeance that's begun, we prefer that the 3rd be someone at the "pinche" radio, we are not playing around, this is the new wave of warnings after taking care of Ramiro"
The Ramiro is Ramiro Rivera from the region near Radio Victoria. He was murdered on December 20, 2009.
EL SALVADOR: RAMIRO RIVERA SHOT TO DEATH IN CABAÑAS
Written by Hector Berríos
Monday, 21 December 2009
[Note: UDW first reported on Ramiro Rivera in August, when he miraculously survived an attack where he was shot eight times in the legs and back. A Real News report released at the time aired footage of a Rivera interview. The attack occurred weeks after the assassination of Marcelo Rivera (no relation) in Cabañas, El Salvador and marked the beginning of an open season on activists opposed to mining in the area. Here we re-print the testimony of Hector Berríos of MUFRAS-32, an organization that has accompanied many of the anti-mining groups in their struggle for justice. A longer article on the assassination of R. Rivera and its significance in light of the ongoing struggle against Pacific Rim's mining efforts is forthcoming. --ed.
December 20, 4:00pm - Hitmen gunned down and killed our compañero Ramiro Rivera Gomez, Vice president of the Comité Ambiental de Cabañas, [Cabañas Environmental Committee], in the Canton of Trinidad, city of Ilobasco, Cabañas. Rivera was a leader in the resistance against the Pacific Rim Mining Company.
He was active in raising consciousness about the company’s actions, and was one of the first persons who suffered attacks by Pacific Rim employees. On August 7th, 2009 Rivera was victim of an assassination attempt in which he was shot in the back eight times. It was a miracle, thanks to G-d, that he survived. This latest event can be added to the assassination of Marcelo Rivera, ASIC member, the threats to our colleagues at Radio Victoria, the kidnapping and assassination attempt of Father Luis Alberto Quintanilla, threats made against the director of ADES as well as those against the fellow members of CACA and MUFRAS-32.
It is most striking that two security guards, members of the Witnesses and Victims Protection Unit of the National Civil Police, were accompanying compañero Ramiro Rivera Gomez, and were unable to do anything to evade the death of our colleague.
Furthermore, neither suffered injuries and the assassins injured a fourteen year-old girl that was with Ramiro Rivera. We must remember that earlier this year, on Thursday, June 18, at the “El Molino”cut-off, in the municipality of Ilobasco, Department of Cabañas, environmental activist Gustavo Marcelo Rivera Moreno, was seen for the last time. His lifeless body was rescued from a well on June 30th, with clear signs of torture.
The forced disappearance, followed by torture and assassination of Marcelo Rivera, as well as that of Ramiro Rivera Gomez, is part of an increase in violence in the municipalities in Cabañas, ranging from death threats and kidnapping attempts against the men and women that have organized to halt the Pacific Rim mining project.
The violence that has fallen upon the communities is worrisome, but equally worrisome and outrageous is the disfunctionality of the State institutions that are charged with directing and carrying out criminal investigations, of which we can affirm by the response of the Organized Crime Unit of the Attorney General and the Sub-director of the National Civil Police, Officer Mauricio Landaverde, who in our meeting with him told us that we should stop speaking out and that these were all just common crimes.
The gravest thing that this Officer on various occasions has expressed, including in the presence of the head of the Organized Crime Unit of the FGR, Rodolfo Delgado, in an irresponsible and rushed manner, and without any investigation, was when he stated “that the [Marcelo Rivera murder] was the result of common violence and that there is no indication of intellectual authorship”. These statements have been made without following any other lines of investigation that would establish a true motive for the [Rivera’s] assassination, while the community has turned over sufficient evidence that points to intellectual authorship.
It is essential that we raise our voices to denounce these violent acts against our compañeros who oppose the death project that Pacific Rim is directing. At the same time, we must join in solidarity with the accompaniment actions of the communities that are struggling against Pacific Rim’s mining project, which is backed by various ARENA mayors across Cabañas, and who act with complete impunity as permitted by the authorities.
It is important to state that we have denounced to the PNC and the FGR the increasingly violent terror and harassment campaign that activists in Cabanas have suffered. So much so that the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, in a recent resolution called on the Salvadoran government to provide protection for the lives of the involved environmentalists. In the public event when the Chancellor’s Office was notified of this, I had the chance to observe the unwillingness of the PNC and the Technical Unit, who justified their unwillingness to provide protection.
I want to add here that the FGR last week sent notification to the Radio Victoria reporters that the security measures implemented to protect them were being withdrawn. These journalists have also been subject to threats, just like Ramiro Rivera, who had received public death threats… that were carried out. There is enormous indignation among the various grassroots organizations in Cabañas. The Pacific Rim Mining Company is currently suing the government of El Salvador for 100 million dollars and is initiating a terror campaign against those who oppose the mining project.[ed. Note: the correct amount is $77 million. However, a suit by the US-based mining corp Commerce Group against El Salvador is for $100 million.]
Will the assassinations of Ramiro Rivera Gomez and Marcelo Rivera Moreno go unpunished? Are we going to watch idly as they kill our compañeros and continue to get away with it? And when will the authorities of the “government of change” decide to take action to stop to these attacks?
Héctor Berrios
Movimiento Unificado Francisco Sánchez-1932 MUFRAS-3
This testimony was translated and adapted from the Spanish original by Jason Wallach.
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=4118
RADIO VICTORIA ASKS FOR LETTERS OF SUPPORT
HI EVERYONE, here is information on how to send an email or fax, and CISPES has asked that you send copies to them, PLEASE ADD ON THAT RADIO VICTORIA IS AGAIN BEING THREATENED, we have received 2 email threats and some text messages, so please add that on to this letter or include it in whatever you like, do it as an individual or your organization or both.
keep the pressure on. also a friend in chiapas is suggesting we start a Peace Camp, something they are doing in Chiapas to help protect the autonomous communities, international and national delegations coming and staying with the groups and organizations under threat, something like the old Peace Brigades, something to think about, but more international pressure and presence is needed!!!
thanks for all you support and efforts, take care, c*.
FAX: +503 2523 7170 - Attorney General Romeo Barahona's office
EMAILS:
Señor Rodolfo Delgado, director of the Organized Crime Unit of the Attorney General´s office: radelgado@fgr.gob.sv.
AND please send a copy to the Human Rights Defense Office to Señor Oscar Luna: heidybrizuela@pddh.gob.sv
AND IF YOU CAN a copy to the CISPES office: cispes@cispes.org
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
New Threats against Radio Victoria in El Salvador
Received October 6, 2009: "This morning one of our community correspondents received a written threat outside the front door of his house, saying they were still around, that he better be careful, that it would be better to leave and mentioning different people in the radio and saying he better stop expressing opinions against mayors and national assembly deputies or we will all be sorry, soon they will kill another and that they receive orders from above.
We are denouncing this new threat and also threats against a young woman around 20 years old from San Isidro who was very close to Marcelo Rivera and Jose Beltran. She has been followed, had men outside her house in the middle of the night pointing to her bedroom and received a threatening phone call.
We ask again that you denounce these threats to the General Attorney´s office, his name is Romeo Barahona, in San Salvador: prensa@fgr.gob.sv
please pass this around!"
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Death Squad Resurgence against Radio Victoria
On July 1st, the tortured body of Marcelo Rivera, an organizer against mining in Cabañas, El Salvador, was found. He had been missing for two weeks. Now, three young radio news reporters from the local community radio station are receiving death threats for their coverage of the case.
Below is an account in English by Wendy Wallas of Radio Victoria. Attached are two pieces of information in Spanish, which explain that Radio Victoria and its sponsor NGO ADES have reported the situation to the Human Rights Ombudsman of El Salvador, who has called on the police to investigate the case and provide enhanced protection.
For more information and to consider possible advocacy action, please contact the SHARE Foundation, http://www.share-elsalvador.org
Tim Crouse, Coordinator
CoCoDA
From: Wendy Wallas
Subject: Alert !!!!
Date: Friday, July 24, 2009, 8:18 PM
Hi Everyone, i am short on time but want to inform you all that we are having some serious problems in Radio Victoria. We have 3 young community correspondents that have received threats, even death threats, and we have had to pull them out of Cabanas and bring them into the capital.
This comes on the heels of the disappearance and later confirmed death of our friend and activist Marcelo Rivera, who lived in the town of San Isidro, Cabanas, which is between Ilobasco and Sensuntepeque. Marcelo was a community artist, a long time anti-goldmine activist, head of the local casa de cultura, active member of the FMLN and member of his hometown association that connected Salvadorans living in the USA with supporting projects in San Isidro. He took a protagonist role in stopping municipal elections last january due to massive fraud in his town.
Marcelo disappeared and his body appeared 2 weeks later in the bottom of a well. He had been brutally tortured.
Now our community correspondents are getting messages that what happened to Marcelo could happen to them. One of them is also from San Isidro, another is from a nearby town and the other is from a rural community.
Obviously we are upset and worried and we are taking precautions. I am working with a group from the States right now but am in touch with the young folks a few times a day.
i just want you all to know and be ready if we need you to call or write letters or whatever. I will try to keep you posted. The young folks are pretty calm right now and in a very safe place, they are so young and such good reporters and i kind of feel like they are my babies!!! Hold them in your hearts and i will be in touch again soon.
"Elvis" the Radio Victoria sound mixer.
Young producers of Radio VictoriaAnd this in from Barry Gilbert:
Coincidentally, my cousin was in El Salvador, working with Marcelo on behalf of an NGO when he disappeared. She was strongly urged to leave the country when her other Salvadoran counterparts started receiving death threats. Thankfully, she's safe at home in NYC and is working with a coalition of NGO's to bring attention to this situation and to try to raise money to get some of Marcelo's friends out of the country. I also just found out that a local Catholic priest has also recently started receiving death threats.
There is a lot of evidence that this is all related to their work trying to bring attention to recent negotiations between the government of El Salvador and a large Canadian mining company that wants to exploit the country's gold, which would likely result in massive contamination of the country's water supplies. Sound familiar?
Barry Gilbert
KGNU
Saturday, July 19, 2008
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