[News] El Salvador’s FMLN Warns US: Stop Supporting Right-Wing Youth

[Anti-Imperialist News]

http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/El-Salvadors-FMLN-Warns-US-Stop-Supporting-Right-Wing-Youth-20170228-0014.html 



  El Salvador’s FMLN Warns US: Stop Supporting Right-Wing Youth

28 February 2017

El Salvador’s ruling Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front, the 
FMLN, warned the U.S. embassy in San Salvador on Monday to stop 
supporting the country’s right-wing Nationalist Republican Alliance, 
ARENA, party.

Socialist FMLN leaders accused the U.S. of meddling in the country’s 
affairs by supporting ARENA youth working to destabilize the incumbent 
government, La Pagina reports.

Earlier this month, for example, U.S. Ambassador to El Salvador Jean 
Manes appointed Erick Ortiz, a far-right ARENA youth leader, to head 
a new U.S.-Salvadoran youth council in the country.

“An embassy cannot do political work,” FMLN Secretary General Medardo 
Gonzalez reminded the U.S. embassy, HispanTV reports.

“We consider that it is an attitude of intrusion, of interference, we 
should not politically accept this type of interference.”

Gonzalez also presented evidence of “clear coordination” between the 
U.S. embassy and ARENA to recruit Salvadoran youth for anti-government, 
anti-socialist campaigns. Criticizing U.S. double standards on national 
sovereignty, Gonzalez said the North American country wouldn’t like it 
if El Salvador or any other country “started creating agencies to 
proselytize American youth toward socialism.”

Manes, who has served as the U.S. Ambassador to El Salvador since 2015, 
frequently calls on private companies and institutions affiliated with 
ARENA to “be part of the change” and to “raise the voices of optimism.” 
“Change” and “optimism,” for Manes, means rolling back the country’s 
socialist gains and implementing neo-liberal economic policies which 
have impoverished El Salvador for decades.

Since the FMLN took power in 2009, El Salvador has increased government 
spending on healthcare, education, housing, and free programs for youth 
at risk of joining gangs. The socialist party has also implemented heavy 
regulations on multinational corporations seeking cheap labor and 
commodity exports.

Earlier this month, the Salvadoran government demanded that 
Canadian-Australian mining company OceanaGold pay a US$8 million fine 
for failing to adhere to environmental standards. ARENA, promoting 
“economic freedom” and environmental deregulation, sided with OceanaGold 
against paying the fine.

The FMLN and the multinational giant are still in arbitration.

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/news_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20170301/a3c39c59/attachment.htm>