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<img src="http://www.nlginternational.org/report/pix/Tania_Elliot.jpg" width=325 height=201 alt="Tania Frontera and Elliot Monteverde Torres speak out">
<br>
</font><font size=1>Tania Frontera and Elliot Monteverde Torres speak out
against subpoenas issued to them<br><br>
</font><h2><b>International Committee appears at UN Decolonization
Hearings on Puerto
Rico</b></h2><font size=3>
<a href="http://www.nlginternational.org/" eudora="autourl">
http://www.nlginternational.org/<br><br>
</a>By Jan Susler<br><br>
June 22, 2008<br><br>
After 400 years of Spanish colonial rule of Puerto Rico, in 1898 Spain
ceded Puerto Rico to the United States, and the U.S. militarily invaded
and established a military government. Over a century later, Puerto Rico
continues to be a U.S. colony one of the few juridical colonies in the
world in spite of the fact that decolonization is a peremptory norm of
international law.<br><br>
</font><h5><font size=5><b>Background</b></font></h5><font size=3>Since
1972, the United Nations Decolonization Committee has approved some 25
resolutions confirming the application of this international law (General
Assembly Resolution 1514(XV)) to the case of Puerto Rico.<br><br>
On June 9, 2008, the U.N. Decolonization Committee convened once again to
consider the case of Puerto Rico. Representatives of some 30 diverse
organizations testified, the majority supporting independence. The Guild
International Committee was one of the few U.S.-based organizations to
participate.<br><br>
</font><h5><font size=5><b>A unique
hearing</b></font></h5>
<img src="http://www.nlginternational.org/report/pix/Jan.jpg" width=210 height=167 alt="Jan Susler offers testimony on behalf of the International Comm">
</b></h5><font size=3><br>
</font><font size=1>Jan Susler offers testimony on behalf of the
International Committee<br>
Credit: Sofía Gallisá Muriente<br><br>
</font><font size=3>This year’s hearings were unique in several ways. For
the first time, a sitting governor participated in the hearings. Also for
the first time, representatives of all three status preferences
(independence, commonwealth and statehood) agreed that Puerto Rico is a
colony which lacks sovereignty. Adding to the uniqueness was testimony
from two young people, Tania Frontera and Elliot Monteverde Torres,
subpoenaed to a current grand jury investigating the independence
movement, who will undoubtedly be jailed if they refuse to cooperate with
the government’s efforts to criminalize the movement.<br><br>
Many of the deponents highlighted the need for the General Assembly to
consider the case of Puerto Rico, pointing to the findings of the U.S.
President’s Task Force on Puerto Rico’s Status that the U.S. lied to the
U.N. when in 1953 it represented that Puerto Rico was a self-governing
territory, and that U.S. Congress could, if it so desired, give Puerto
Rico to another country.<br><br>
</font><h5><font size=5><b>Discussion and official
resolution</b></font></h5><font size=3>U.N. delegates from many Latin
American countries spoke in favor of a resolution endorsing self
determination, including Ecuador, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Panama, Venezuela,
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Cuba; as did delegates from Syria
and Iran, and representatives from the Movement of Non Aligned Nations,
the Socialist International, the Permanent Conference of Political
Parties of Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Workers Party of
Brazil.<br><br>
The Committee passed a resolution adopting measures that the Guild and
many deponents urged: once again affirming the application of Resolution
1514(XV) to the case of Puerto Rico, recognizing that the solution should
emanate from the Puerto Rican people. The resolution also called for the
General Assembly to consider the case of Puerto Rico, requested the
release of long held political prisoners and the clean up of military
toxins left on the island of Vieques when the U.S. Navy vacated, and
expressed serious concern over events such as the extrajudicial execution
of independence leader Filiberto Ojeda Ríos and the U.S. refusal to
cooperate with the investigation of the Puerto Rico Department of Justice
into his death.<br><br>
<br><br>
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