Protesters sentenced

School of the Americas:
Pastors sentenced to prison

A reminder:

November 15-17, 2002 rally and nonviolent civil resistance actions to close the School of the Americas

from SOA WATCH (202) 234 3440, www.soaw.org

[10-15-02]

Close Down the School of Assassins! Massive Rally and Nonviolent Civil Resistance Actions Fort Benning, GA: November 15-17, 2002

WORK TOWARDS A CULTURE OF JUSTICE AND PEACE AND DEFY THE SYSTEM OF TERROR AND VIOLENCE

The surge of dissent against increasing U.S. military and economic intervention in Latin America and the Caribbean has been met in recent months with violence and repression. Meanwhile plans for US military action in Iraq intensify and the fire of the Bush administration's "war on terrorism" flares with big oil and disregard for real domestic social problems.

Not a month goes by in which we don't learn about civil resistance actions and massive demonstrations by campesinos, union workers, students and others in Latin America. In response to this, we must show our solidarity with our sisters and brothers. The people are standing up against the selling out of their natural resources to US and multinational corporations, to military repression, and to intimidation. Massive organizing has taken place in Ecuador, as the people mobilize civil resistance actions against the Free Trade of the Americas Agreement (FTAA) summit that is going to take place in Quito, the capital of Ecuador from October 27 - November 3. In Colombia, masses of women organized by the Organización Femenina Popular (OFP) and others have taken to the streets in opposition to the deadly US-funded war. In Argentina hundreds of thousands bang on their "caceroles" (pots and pans) against the neoliberal order.

It is obvious and understood that the repression of the poor in order to maintain the status quo - to keep the rich powerful and the poor silent - is unable to happen without the military muscle trained at the SOA. The School of the Americas renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation is playing a crucial part in this project. If we really are serious about eliminating terrorism around the world, it is imperative that we should begin in our own backyard and shut down our own terrorist training camp, the SOA/WHISC.

The Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation/School of the Americas is a US military training school established in Panama in 1946, ostensibly "to bring stability to Latin America." Currently located at Fort Benning, GA, the SOA, often dubbed the "School of Assassins," trains hundreds of soldiers each year, at a cost to US tax payers of millions of dollars annually. Graduates of the SOA training program have done little to promote stability in their countries. In fact, hundreds have already been cited in the rape, "disappearance," torture, and massacre of thousands of Latin Americans. Their primary targets have included educators, union organizers, religious workers, student leaders, indigenous communities and those who speak out on behalf of the poor. A Resistance movement to challenge and change corrupt and oppressive US foreign policy and ultimately to close the School of the Americas/WHISC formed after the truth about the SOA came to light. This movement, which began 10 years ago, is deeply rooted in the spirit of nonviolence and has been able to educate and empower broad sectors of society. As a result of uncompromising nonviolent civil resistance actions on the US Army base, Fort Benning, 70 SOA Watch human rights defenders have cumulatively spent 50 years in prison, serving sentences ranging from one to 24 months. An additional 28 prisoners of conscience are currently serving between 3 and 6 months in prison across the US.

WORK TOWARDS A CULTURE OF JUSTICE AND PEACE AND DEFY THE SYSTEM OF TERROR AND VIOLENCE

On November 15-17 2002, thousands of people of faith and conscience will converge in Georgia at the gates of the Fort Benning military base and engage in nonviolent direct action to say NO to torture, rape and murder in our names and to shut down the School of the Americas (SOA). We will walk along with the spirits of the martyred in remembrance and to demand justice.

For more information about the November 2002 vigil and nonviolence civil resistance actions, visit www.soaw.org

Two Presbyterian pastors sentenced for protest against School of the Americas

Peace protesters get prison terms for trespassing on Army base

[7-19-02]

Update on 9-21-02: The two pastors have begun serving their prison terms, and would welcome letters of support. Here are their addresses.

Update on 8-23-02: The two PC(USA) ministers will be going to prison Sept. 10

Note: PresbyWeb has posted a very different view of this situation. Click here for a summary, and some of the debate following. You may want to join in the discussion.

by Alexa Smith, Presbyterian News Service

LOUISVILLE -- July 16, 2002 -- Two Presbyterian ministers have been sentenced to serve time in a federal penitentiary for participating in a non-violent demonstration at a Georgia military base last November.

The Rev. Chuck Booker-Hirsch, 41, of Ann Arbor, MI, was sentenced to three months in prison and fined $500. The Rev. Erik Johnson, 58, of Maryville, TN, got a six-month sentence and a $1,000 fine.

The sentences are to begin in six to eight weeks.

They were charged with trespassing after they entered Fort Benning, near Columbus, GA, during an annual demonstration against a combat training facility there long known as the School of the Americas, but now called the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHISC). The facility, which offers training to Latin American military officers, is accused of offering instruction in such techniques as extortion and torture.

Training manuals discovered in the early 1990s proved that allegation; since then, the government insists that the school's curriculum has been changed.

More than 10,000 people took part in the protest last Nov. 16-18, which marked the anniversary of the 1989 slaughter of six Jesuit priests in El Salvador. More than 100 entered federal property, inviting arrest. Forty-three were later indicted, and 37 were tried last week in Columbus.

Magistrate G. Mallon Faircloth of the U.S. District Court handed down three-to-six-month sentences for 29 protesters on July 12. One was found not guilty and seven were put on probation.

Booker-Hirsch was a first-time offender, a category that has not been prosecuted in the past.

"The penalties are severe …… when the maximum penalty is six months in prison and-or a $5,000 fine," said Booker-Hirsch, who added that activists are interpreting the decision to prosecute first-time offenders as an attempt to deter future protests. "I'm almost certain it will have a backlash effect," he said.

He added: "I am thankful that the prosecution brought the 37 of us together for this time of intense community-building and testimony-sharing."

Booker-Hirsch said the case dramatized the hypocrisy of the United States in making war on terrorism abroad while refusing to acknowledge its own involvement in terrorism. "It's the log-and-speck analogy all over again," he said.

The prosecutor's office did not return calls from the Presbyterian News Service.

Both Presbyterian ministers are longtime activists for peace in Latin America and for aid to refugees in the United States who fled violence there.

Johnson told the judge that, when he became a baptized Christian, "the whole world became my family through faith in the One who is life," and that, during his 33 years as an ordained PC(USA) minister, he has taught his parishioners to respect the "sanctity of all life" and to expose "injustices, in the hope of making them just."

"I have consistently advocated peacefully against violence and injustices on behalf of the sacred lives of the poor and oppressed in the human family, including my sisters and brothers in Latin America, whose lives have been brutalized and shortened by the violence directed toward them by graduates of the School of the Americas," he said. "These members of my extended family are not obscure and nameless. I see their faces in my heart."

Johnson said his congregation has extended "an outpouring of love" in support him and his family.

"I'm feeling very good about my choice," he said. "I'm living day by day with the knowledge that all of us … have to give some account of ourselves and how we live non-violently in a massively violent world. That's both a comfort and challenge to me. … The One I serve is a crucified Lord."

Johnson, co-chair of the Peacemaking Committee of the Presbytery of East Tennessee, is interim pastor of the Church of the Savior, a United Church of Christ congregation in Knoxville, TN.

Johnson said his time in jail will give him the opportunity to develop deeper spiritual habits and to reflect on alternative ways of living.

Booker-Hirsch is pastor of Northside Presbyterian Church in Ann Arbor. Several ministers in his presbytery have offered to fill his pulpit pro bono during his absence. His wife, Amy, is also a Disciples of Christ minister.

"Ninety days is a small expense to pay," said Booker-Hirsch, given the issues involved. "Our biggest concern is our five-year-old, Drew, being away from his daddy that long."

He said that his indictment has prompted some acquaintances who had little knowledge of the school to begin raising some hard questions. "That's what we want," he said.

Defenders of the school argue that its curriculum no longer includes instruction in abusive practices and that each class includes a human rights component. But the School of the Americas Watch, the organization that stages the annual protest, contends that those changes are only cosmetic.

PresbyWeb defends SOA

PresbyWeb offers a very different "report" on this event by citing a variety of defenses taken directly from the web site of the former School of the Americas (now renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation ). As one might expect, the SOA web site would lead us to believe that there was really no need for protests such as the one for which the two pastors are being sentenced to prison.

The Presbyterian perspective

It may be worth noting that the Presbyterian General Assembly in 1994 adopted a resolution calling on the U.S. government to "eliminate any and all funding for the School of the Americas, and close the school." That position was reaffirmed in 1995 and remains the Assembly's position today.

The Presbyterian Washington Office in July, 1998, issued a helpful paper on the School of the Americas.

Letters to PresbyWeb

The PresbyWeb defense of SOA has generated a few letters. You might want to look at them and add your own comments.

Here are the summaries provided by PresbyWeb; you can link directly to each of the letters.

	Karl S. Landstrom "The two Presbyterian ministers who were convicted of trespassing on government property at Ft. Benning, Georgia may also have committed offenses under the rules of discipline of the church.
	D.J Doherty responding to article about School of the Americas: "Your report on Presbyweb News of July 17 is so misguided. You have completely bought into the rhetoric of the army..."
	Richard A. Cooper "Having read the article concerning the Reverend Chuck Booker-Hirsch and the Reverend Erik Johnson being arrested at Ft. Benning, I continue to be confounded in my attempts to understand what it is about the military which causes such deep hatred in people for the military establishment..."
	Marilyn White "The Reverends Johnson and Booker-Hirsch are to be commended and thanked for their courageous and powerful witness against the School of the Americas, which is known throughout Latin America as the "School of the Assassins."

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Next School of the Americas vigil, Nov. 15-17, 2002

The next annual vigil at Fort Benning, GA, the site of the School of the Americas, is scheduled for November 17-17, 2002.

The Presbyterian Peace Fellowship has reserved a block of rooms at the Holiday Inn North in Columbus for Nov 15-18. If you want to join them group at Fort Benning and want a room for 3 nights, contact Marilyn White. If you want something else, such s a room for 1 or 2 nights only, you’ll need to make your own reservations. The Peace Fellowship will arrange for transportation to and from the Atlanta airport on Friday afternoon (try to arrive by noon) and Monday morning (try to depart after noon).

The SOA web site provides more information and an organizing packet, with fliers and all.