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<a href="http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2007/noviembre/lun5/patriotas.html" eudora="autourl">
http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2007/noviembre/lun5/patriotas.html<br><br>
</a></font><font face="Verdana" size=1><b>Havana. November 5,
2007<br><br>
</font><font size=2>WHILE BUSH TALKS ABOUT HUMAN RIGHTS...<br><br>
</b></font><font size=5>Puerto Rican patriots remain in the empire’s
dungeons after 27 years <br><br>
</font><font size=1 color="#006F93"><b>BY JEAN-GUY ALLARD Granma
International staff writer <br><br>
</b></font><font size=3>WHILE George W. Bush was delivering his lecture
on Cuba on October 24 in the golden rooms of the U.S. State Department,
his office was receiving the text of a resolution from the Puerto Rican
Senate demanding freedom for the Puerto Rican political prisoners held in
the United States for the past 27 years. <br><br>
The island’s senators passed a resolution asking the U.S. president to
immediately release Carlos Alberto Torres, Oscar López and Haydee
Beltrán. <br><br>
Those three Puerto Rican patriots “have been imprisoned for 27 years in
the United States serving sentences for reasons related to the Puerto
Rican independence struggle,” the resolution reads. <br><br>
The resolution states that “other political prisoners who were serving
similarly disproportionate sentences have been released, first under
Jimmy Carter’s presidency and later, in 1999, under that of President
William J. Clinton,” while the Bush regime remains set on keeping the
last three in prison. <br><br>
“The cause for the liberation of these compatriots has united Puerto
Rican men and women of all creeds,” the resolution continues. “Political,
religious and civic institutions have called for Carlos Alberto, Oscar
and Haydee to return home.” <br><br>
Their long imprisonment, “far from serving any purpose, has become a sign
of inhumanity and injustice,” the senators say, noting that international
opinion has joined with the consensus that has formed around this cause
in Puerto Rico. <br><br>
According to Senator María de Lourdes Santiago, the fight for freedom for
Torres, López and Beltrán transcends ideological borders in Puerto Rico,
a country that has been occupied by the imperialist power for more than a
century. <br><br>
The three Puerto Ricans have been in prison since April 4, 1980, when
they were arrested in Illinois (USA), accused of “seditious conspiracy”
and sentenced, in a highly politicized trial, to 70 and 78 years’ prison
time, for Torres and López, respectively, and a life term for Beltrán.
<br><br>
None of the three has been charged with any violent crime. <br><br>
<b>DYNCORP AMONG FILIBERTO’S MURDERERS<br><br>
</b>The Senate resolution was passed in the context of the continuing
controversy in Puerto Rico surrounding the murder of the pro-independence
leader Filiberto Ojeda Ríos by FBI forces. <br><br>
On September 23, 2005, Ojeda Ríos was shot and left to bleed to death in
an attack by hundreds of agents on his home. <br><br>
It was revealed recently that two attack helicopters without registration
numbers that took part in the assault were not FBI property. Spokespeople
for the FBI had to admit to that fact. <br><br>
It is now suspected that paramilitary forces of the private company
DynCorp participated in the operation, which was directed from a command
post on the old Ramey Field Air Force Base in Aguadilla. A private
military base belonging to that company functions on that site. <br><br>
</font><font face="Georgia" size=3>Bush’s diplomats have orders to
oppose, by all means necessary, any UN attention to the colonial case of
Puerto Rico, much less recognition of Puerto Rica as a nation on the part
of the corresponding UN agencies. <br><br>
<br><br>
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<font size=3 color="#FF0000">Freedom Archives<br>
522 Valencia Street<br>
San Francisco, CA 94110<br><br>
</font><font size=3 color="#008000">415 863-9977<br><br>
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