The globalisation of struggle (previously known as international solidarity)

BY FERN LANE

Puerto Rico, La Isla del Encanto - the Enchanted Island - as it is referred to by its people, has a 500-year history of colonialism; 400 years under Spanish rule, when the native Taino people were wiped out and a subsequent 100 years under the rule of the world's last great empire, the United States.

Since the Spanish-American War of 1898, Puerto Ricans have been engaged in a struggle with America over its political, social, economic and cultural domination of the island. The US has used every means at its disposal, including the army, air force, navy, marines, coast guard, FBI, Drug Enforcement Agency, CIA and others to repress the struggle for justice and self-determination.

The US has systematically criminalised those who oppose its presence in Puerto Rico. A 1989 report of the Puerto Rican Commission for Civil Rights outlined the historical pattern of repression by the US government, which dates right back to the 1898 invasion. Throughout the past century the persecution of people in the nationalist movement has ranged from surveillance, harassment, threats, provocations, loss of job opportunities, expulsion from government institutions, to trumped-up criminal charges, torture and assassination.

At the root of this policy of suppression is Puerto Rico's critical geopolitical importance; the island's strategic location ensures military control over the Caribbean and Latin America. Currently, military bases occupy some 13% of Puerto Rican land. There are six military installations and 20 armouries throughout the island. The largest, and by far the most important of these bases, is Roosevelt Roads Naval Station, the US mid-Atlantic submarine port and nuclear weapons arsenal. Six miles off the coast of Roosevelt Roads, and an integral part of this vast Naval complex, is Vieques, the centrepiece of the Atlantic Fleet Weapons Testing and Training Facility.

Referred to by US military high command as ``the crown jewel'' of their naval system in the southern hemisphere, Vieques has been at the centre of the ongoing struggle of the Puerto Rican people against US militarism and thus has become the focal point of the development of a new Puerto Rican national consciousness.

Vieques is an island-municipality off the East Coast of Puerto Rico. Its 9,300 inhabitants are sandwiched between an ammunitions facility on the western end of the island, and the ``inner range'' of the weapons testing and training facility, which includes the 900-acre Live Impact Area, also known as the Firing Zone.

These ``facilities'', occupying 26,000 of the 33,000 acres of Vieques land, were expropriated by the Navy between 1941 and 1947 - without consultation with the people of Vieques. The people were forcibly relocated from the land and moved to the main island of Puerto Rico, to neighbouring Saint Croix, and to the US. As a result, a reduced population of native Viequenses was left occupying only one third of the land. The navy attempted to expropriate the remaining middle part of the island, but strong opposition impeded this process.

Maria Reinat-Pumajero is a Puerto Rican human rights activist and a member of the struggle against American colonialism on her island. She works through the Institute for Latino Empowerment (ILE) and the People's Institute for Survival and Beyond and partly because of this work has become directly interested in the similar struggle for self-determination in Ireland.

This interest led her, as part of an international delegation, to the Garvaghy Road earlier this month, where she spoke to An Phoblacht about both the difficulties Puerto Ricans face and how the islanders have made common cause with the nationalist people in the Six Counties.

``As described by the United Nations and described internationally, Puerto Rico has been a colony since 1898,'' she explains. ``Since then, we have not had the right to self-determination. We have what they call a commonwealth, which implies that we have a relationship with the United States that is really on an equal level, but we don't. That is why Puerto Rico is so similar to some of the colonies which England has - in this case Ireland.''

``Vieques is a little island and, a little like Garvaghy Road, is symbolic of colonial status. In the way that the imposition of the march on the road symbolised something really strong in terms of supremacy - it is the same in my country with Vieques. Vieques is used as a navy installation where they [the US military] bomb, where they do their military practices. But not only do they do their military practices, they invite other states involved in NATO to do it, such as South American states.''

The effect of the US appropriation - or, to be more accurate, theft - of land on Vieques has had a catastrophic effect on the local population. Maria explains:

``The issue is that the population is sick,'' she says; ``they have a high incidence of cancer, children are born ill and their lives are upset. Socially, it is one of the poorest areas of Puerto Rico.'' The psychological effects of the US military activities are also profound, as bombs are exploded both in the air and at sea in the Firing Zone. Children, particularly, suffer severe stress as a result of the fear engendered by such bombing. Further, a recent study showed that many have dangerously high levels of arsenic and other toxins in their systems.

When a civilian, David Sanes, was killed during live firing excercises on 19 April 1999, the local population had had enough. ``That was the last straw'' explains Maria. ``That day that the bomb fell, the people couldn't take it any more, so what we did was go to the Firing Zone and invade it - it's our land but we had to invade it - and we were there for a year. We built camps, we were just ordinary civilians, people just interested in justice and saying no more bombs - actually our slogan was No More Bombs, Peace Now. You know, peace now, not later.'' They succeeded in bringing the live firing to a halt, but on 4 May last year the protestors were forcibly removed from the site. A number of activists, including Maria, then broke back into the site before being arrested, detained and charged with trespassing, a charge that normally attracts a small fine but in this case brought prison sentences for many of those who were charged.

``Here they make it seem as though we are criminals,'' explains Maria, a tale instantly recognisable to many political activists in Ireland. ``Trespassing is a minor offence but for them it is a big offence; it is more like sedition or conspiracy. So far we have had about 1,000 people who have gone through the federal courts. Since then, they they threatened us with having another round of practice bombing and we have been opposing that. Every time they threaten us with the practices, we go in and engage in civil disobedience.''

Asked about her interest in Ireland, Maria explains that it began when she studied the history of the struggle for independence on her own island.

``In the past, the nationalist movement, in the `30s, `40s and `50s, was engaged in armed struggle; actually one of our founders, a man called Pedro Albizu Campos, who was jailed and tortured, he admired Ireland a lot. He went to Harvard University to study and was an organiser for Irish independence between 1916 and 1922. He was a great admirer of the struggle here and some of the concepts motivated him to lead our struggle in Puerto Rico.

``When I was a student I learned about Pedro Albizu Campos and his admiration for the Irish struggle, how much he put of his own being into it. I think he saw it very clearly from the start that there were tremendous similarities both politically but also in terms of religion because Puerto Rico is essentially a Catholic country. It is changing with the US invasion, but he was able to see that there were these two countries which had their own culture, their own language, their own nationality, but they were under the imposition of a country that thought it was superior and could come and master them and could legislate and sanction all kinds of criminal actions against the people. In Puerto Rico we have not lost the language [Spanish] but the threat is always there. But we resist. So many similarities...''

Another of these striking similarities is the issue of flags and the activities of the pro-American organisations on the island, known as the Prostatehood. A church has the focus of attention. Maria takes up the story:

``The ecumenical church was built in the Firing Zone and was destroyed by the US Navy, so what did we do? We go and replicate the same church in front of our capitol building. And that church symbolises the joining of different people and religions coming together for a common purpose, which is to liberate Vieques from the navy. What do the Prostatehood do? They want to fly the US flag in the perimeter. So in that respect you see the same kind of action, the same kind of desperation from the Prostatehood party that I see here, because they know that things are changing and there's nothing that they can do about it except become violent and aggressive. In the last week there were some arrests from their side. So you see, we too have the imposition of symbols which are very loaded.''

``The Prostatehood are a lot like loyalists. These people support the American occupation. They say no, but everything they do points to the fact that they pro United States and also pro the Navy, pro military. They want Puerto Rico to be a state of the United States, but we all know that Puerto Rico cannot because it is a mulatto, mixed community and the racial ideology of the United States, their racial constructs, will not allow a whole state to be like that. The other thing is that they do not want a conflict like Quebec - or like Ireland - and they would have that.''

``At this point we have about 70 people in jail. President Bush has said that the navy should go in two years. They scheduled a referendum for November 2001. One option was that the navy leave in three years. They will give us $40 million and in those three years they will be exercising using inert ammunition. Or they will stay on the island indefinitely and they will add to that $50 million more. The option never put was to stop immediately and leave. We were not happy with and we never abided with that. Our governor at the time did abide by it and he lost total credibility with the people, so much that in the recent election he lost. And now we have our first women governor, who is supporting the struggle.

``The referendum was supposed to happen this November but I think that Bush kind of thought `whoa, we are allowing the people to vote about national security and we know we're going to lose. If the people vote, we know we're going to lose and does the navy want that kind of track record, people voting against them and expelling them from their positions, because there is Okinawa, South Korea, the Philippines - other people are watching our struggle and they might do the same thing'.''

As for Ireland, she says, ``it seems that there is a definite movement towards independence and you can see the desperation of the loyalists. This is a critical but very vulnerable time for you; anything can happen. It could become violent, but also this [the refusal of the march] could become a habit and then the march will no longer been seen as a tradition.''