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<font size=3>(presented at the Union Theological Seminary on
4/7)<br><br>
</font><font size=4><b>Puerto Rican Political Prisoners: 30 years in U.S.
prisons<br><br>
</b></font><font size=3>by Jan Susler<br><br>
presented at the Union Theological Seminary on April 7, 2010<br><br>
In the past month, activists in Puerto Rico, New York and Chicago
participated in art installations, voluntarily locking themselves into
store-fronts converted into jail cells, each person spending a long and
lonely 24 hour shift, symbolically deprived of their liberty, privacy,
society, movement, and sensory stimulation.<br><br>
Why on earth would dozens of people voluntarily submit themselves to such
symbolic privations? To reflect on an historic moment: the 30th
anniversary of the arrest of 11 Puerto Rican men and women who would be
accused and convicted of seditious conspiracy, and sentenced to serve the
equivalent of life in U.S. prisons. And to call attention to the fact
that one of them---Carlos Alberto Torres---has been in prison for 30
years, another---Oscar Lopez Rivera---, for 29 years; and
another---Avelino Gonzalez Claudio---, for 2. Of the 2,000 some Puerto
Rican political prisoners since the U.S. invasion of Puerto Rico, Carlos
Alberto is the longest held.<br><br>
What could motivate a Carlos Alberto, an Oscar, or an Avelino, to risk
not symbolic, but real, concrete, privations? What is it about the
situation of the Puerto Rican nation that could lead to people being
accused of conspiracies related to winning independence, including
seditious conspiracy--- conspiring to use force against the “lawful”
authority of the U.S. over Puerto Rico?<br><br>
You may know that in 1898, the U.S. invaded and militarily occupied
Puerto Rico… an occupation which, over the years, has changed and morphed
in some of its details, but which has essentially continued unabated to
this day; an occupation which led the George W. Bush (hijo)’s
Presidential Task Force on Puerto Rico to state that Puerto Rico is a
mere possession of the United States, which the U.S. could give away to
another country, if it so desired.<br><br>
It is more than a little ironic that the U.S. would possess Puerto Rico
as a colony, given that the U.S. was born of a colonial struggle--- an
armed, sometimes clandestine, struggle against British control.<br><br>
Nevertheless, the U.S. expanded its colonial empire to include Puerto
Rico, controlling its borders and its economy; imposing unwanted U.S.
citizenship and consequent eligibility for inscription into the U.S.
military; attempting to destroy Puerto Rico’s language, rich culture and
heritage. The Puerto Rican people resisted U.S. control, just as they had
Spanish control, risking prison and even death to seek to control their
own destiny.<br><br>
Colonized peoples of other empires, particularly in Africa, also resisted
colonial control, similarly risking prison and death. In the 1950’s and
60’s, some fought in their own national territory; others, like the
Algerians, took their struggle to the metropolis. This wave of
anti-colonial struggle led to the formation of a body of international
law, which recognized colonialism as a crime against humanity, and which
also recognized the right of a people to fight to end that crime, and in
the process to use any means at their disposal, including armed
struggle.<br><br>
Once the United Nations was formed, in its efforts to end colonialism
throughout the world, it created a list of non-self governing territories
to monitor. Puerto Rico appeared on this list as a non-self-governing
territory of the U.S. The U.S., having proclaimed itself as the
democratic bastion of the world, was not happy about being on this list…
and so to get off the list, in 1952 created the fiction of the Free
Associated State, or Commonwealth, and lied to the world, claiming that
Puerto Rico was self-governing a lie the Bush Presidential Task Force
would later admit.<br><br>
The Nationalist Party of Puerto Rico, having organized since the 1930’s,
could not abide this lie or the U.S. conduct leading up to it. Not only
did the Party organize armed uprisings and attacks in Puerto Rico, as a
result of which the Party’s members were rounded up and imprisoned, and
its leader, Don Pedro Albizu Campos, tortured.<br><br>
The Party also took its struggle to the source of colonial power…
Washington, D.C., where in 1950, its members attacked the temporary
residence of the U.S. president and in 1954, opened fire in U.S.
Congress. Griselio Torresola was killed; Oscar Collazo given the death
penalty; and others were sentenced to decades in U.S. prisons: Lolita
Lebrón, Andres Figueroa Cordero, Irving Flores, and Rafael Cancel
Miranda.<br><br>
And what does all this have to do with Carlos Alberto Torres and Oscar
López Rivera and 29 and 30 years of imprisonment? Carlos and Oscar’s
families were part of the great forced Puerto Rican migration of 1950’s…
they grew up in Chicago’s barrio, where the Puerto Rican community was
subject to slum housing, insensitive schools, and brutal and racist
police. As Carlos Alberto and Oscar, along with many other young women
and men, organized to improve the lot of the community, they began to
understand that the Puerto Rican people needed to control its own
destiny. They learned Puerto Rican history---even though their teachers
told them Puerto Rico had no history. They learned about the long and
proud history of the resistance of the Puerto Rican people to Spanish and
then U.S. control. They learned about the Nationalist political
prisoners, and participated in the Committee to Free the Five… a campaign
which resulted in President Carter commuting their sentences in 1979
after 25 and 29 long years in U.S. prisons.<br><br>
Carlos Alberto and Oscar understood who they were as a people; they
deeply loved their people and profoundly grasped the wrongness of the
colonial domination of their nation. Like others organizing
contemporaneously in Puerto Rico, they were inspired by their foremothers
and fathers, as well as other peoples thirsty for self-determination, and
out of love for their people, dedicated their lives to righting that
wrong, organizing in clandestine fashion to bring attention to the
colonial case of Puerto Rico. They knew the cost could be great… and
indeed it turned out to be.<br><br>
In 1976, Carlos Alberto and Oscar, along with two companeras, went
underground. Carlos Alberto and 10 others were arrested in 1980; Oscar in
1981; as well as others in 1983; they were accused of belonging to the
FALN, Armed Forces for National Liberation. They invoked international
law, articulating that colonialism is a crime against humanity; that
anti-colonial combatants may use any means at their disposal, including
armed struggle, to end that crime; and that the courts of the colonizing
country may not criminalize captured anti-colonial combatants, but must
turn them over to an impartial international tribunal to have their
status adjudged. The U.S. did not heed international law, and proceeded
to try them and send them to prison for sentences ranging from 35 to
life… this, after the judge stated his regrets that there was no federal
death penalty at the time, for that was the sentence he wanted to give
them.<br><br>
Time does not allow a complete catalog the myriad of human rights
violations they experienced in U.S. prisons… the years of torture,
withholding medical attention, lockdowns, harassment, false accusations
of violations of prison rules and criminal laws. But we must take time
today to consider what 30 years of prison means: Carlos Alberto’s father,
Reverend Jose Torres (el Viejo) retired from his position as pastor of
the United Church of Christ church and later succumbed to prostate
cancer. Carlos was not permitted to go to his father’s deathbed or to the
funeral. Oscar’s parents passed away. His mother, Mita, suffered from
Alzheimer’s, and had difficulty understanding why she was unable to hug
her son, as their visits were through thick plexiglass. Oscar was also
not permitted to attend her funeral. Both Carlos Alberto and Oscar are
now grandfathers… they have known their grandchildren only in prison
visiting rooms, where guards hover closely and limit their physical
contact. <br><br>
In the early 1990’s, people in Puerto Rico and the U.S., who had worked
to defend their human rights since the moment of their arrest, joined to
form a campaign for the release of the Puerto Rican political prisoners.
By the mid 1990’s, the campaign had moved beyond the movement for the
independence of Puerto Rico and expanded to include broad sectors of
Puerto Rican civil society… a most unusual phenomenon in Puerto Rico,
where status preference lines rarely allow for such convergence. The
churches--- in both the U.S. and in Puerto Rico--- were key in this
effort. The campaign created the understanding that the men and women in
prison for independence were Puerto Ricans who were being punished with
disproportionately lengthy sentences and cruel prison conditions because
of who they were, and not for what they had done: if they had been social
prisoners, convicted of crimes not related to the independence of Puerto
Rico, they would never have been given such lengthy sentences, and they
would have been released after serving far less time in prison. And if
they had been political prisoners in any other country of the world--- be
it in South Africa, in France, in Germany, for example, they would have
been released after serving less time in prison.<br><br>
This campaign took on international proportions, garnering support from
Nobel Peace Prize winners, elected officials, church leaders, and
personalities such as Desmond Tutu, archbishop of South Africa.
Archbishop Tutu’s support was not coincidental, given that the Puerto
Rican political prisoners were in prison for precisely the same reason as
Nelson Mandela and other anti-apartheid fighters in South Africa:
clandestine organizing to end illegal domination of one people by
another. Let us recall the worldwide outrage at the 27 years President
Mandela was kept in prison.<br><br>
The vast support for their release led to President Clinton’s 1999
commutation of the sentences of 11 of Carlos Alberto and Oscar’s
compatriots, and after 16 and 20 years in prison, Elizam Escobar, Edwin
Cortes, Dylcia Pagán, Ricardo Jiménez, Lucy Rodríguez, Luis Rosa, Carmen
Valentín, Alicia Rodríguez, Adolfo Matos, Alberto Rodríguez, Alejandrina
Torres, and later Juan Segarra, walked out of the prison doors and into
the waiting arms of the Puerto Rican people and their
supporters.<br><br>
In the ten years since their release, they have received a hero’s welcome
and the universal respect of the people. They work in education, art,
construction, business and law; they support and care for their families;
they are active in ongoing struggles affecting the Puerto Rican people;
and they are a very important part of the ongoing campaign for the
release of Carlos Alberto, Oscar and Avelino.<br><br>
Rather astonishingly, Carlos Alberto and Oscar have served those ten
years behind bars. Yet, like their released compatriots, Carlos Alberto,
Oscar and Avelino are resilient, intelligent, caring men, committed to
the freedom of their people. Their love for their nation has maintained
them through the darkest moments, kept alive their sense of humor, their
thirst for expression through art, and their people’s aspirations, at the
same time it has kept at bay any sense of bitterness or hate.<br><br>
Every year, the U.N. Decolonization Committee adopts a resolution
applying international law to the case of Puerto Rico, reaffirming that
colonialism is a crime against humanity and that the right of
self-determination applies to the Puerto Rican people. And for over a
decade, that international body has called for the release of the Puerto
Rican political prisoners, last year specifically naming Carlos Alberto
and Oscar.<br><br>
President Obama, like many of his predecessors, has stated that the
relationship between the U.S. and Puerto Rico must be resolved. There is
legislation pending in U.S. Congress which purports to address the issue
of status. Any resolution of the status, however, must comply with
international law, and must provide for release of the political
prisoners.<br><br>
Oscar is now 67 years old; Carlos Alberto, 57; Avelino, 67. If they are
made to serve their entire prison sentences, Oscar will be 84 years old;
Carlos Alberto, 71; Avelino, 74. It is up to us… you, me, your
classmates, members of your congregation, your families, your neighbors…
to ensure that doesn’t happen. We can write to the U.S. Parole Commission
to support Carlos Alberto’s bid for parole. We can write to the president
to ask him to commute their sentences. We can join organizations such as
the National Boricua Human Rights Network, el Comité Pro Derechos
Humanos, or Prolibertad, and put our creative energy to work, with
activities like the store-front cell installations. We can sponsor
educational forums like this one, and invite the former political
prisoners to speak. We can write to the prisoners and let them know we
support them.<br><br>
History has taught us that together we are enormously powerful
convincing the empire to cede two historic and unprecedented releases of
Puerto Rican political prisoners, in 1979 and 1999, not to mention to
withdraw the U.S. Navy from Vieques. We must organize to exercise our
collective power once more, and bring Carlos Alberto, Oscar and Avelino
home.<br><br>
And we must work to end U.S. colonial control over Puerto Rico… history
has taught us, not just over the past 30 years, but over the past 111
years of U.S. colonialism and the centuries before that of Spanish
colonialism, like Carlos Alberto, Oscar, Avelino, Don Pedro, Lolita, and
thousands of others, the Puerto Rican people will risk real privations
and even death to win freedom and self-determination.<br><br>
Jan Susler<br>
People’s Law Office<br>
1180 N. Milwaukee<br>
Chicago, IL 60642<br>
773/235-0070 x 118<br>
jsusler@aol.com<br>
<a href="http://www.peopleslawoffice.com/" eudora="autourl">
www.peopleslawoffice.com<br>
</a> <br><br>
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