Peruvian death squad leader Vladimiro Montesinos was sentenced to nine years in prison for abuse of power and crimes against humanity. An SOA-grad, Montesinos was known as the corrupt former President Fujimori’s "most trusted counselor."

Two Salvadoran generals were fined $54.6 million by a U.S. federal jury in Florida for brutal torture of three Salvadoran plaintiffs during the 1980s. Former Minister of Defense and Public Security Jose Guillermo Garcia received counter-insurgency training at the SOA in 1985. As defense minister he refused to investigate the El Mozote massacre and the murder of four U.S. churchwomen. The second defendant in the trial, Carlos Eugenio Vides Casanova, had been a guest speaker at the SOA in 1985. He was cited by the United Nations Truth Commission Report for ordering the murder of the U.S. churchwomen.

In Venezuela, charges were dismissed against the four military officers, two of them SOA grads, who led the failed coup against President Hugo Chavez in April. After months of consultations with U.S. officials, including Otto Reich, who sits on the SOA board of visitors, the coup leaders replaced President Chavez with businessman Pedro Carmona, claiming that Chavez had resigned. Within 48 hours the coup was reversed by military forces loyal to Chavez and overwhelming street demonstrations. Lawmakers have accused the high court justices who dismissed the coup charges of following orders from the pro-business opposition.

Nicaragua recently sent 11 soldiers to be trained at the School of the Americas, with plans to double the number in 2003. Under Somoza’s brutal dictatorship, 4,700 members of the National Guard were trained there. Until this year, no Nicaraguan had been sent to the SOA since Somoza was deposed. In August, a delegation of North Americans visited General Javier Carrion on a mission to persuade him to stop sending military officers to the SOA.

Protestors will return to the gates of Fort Benning, Georgia, from November 15 to 17 to call for a closure of the School of the Americas. See www.soawatch.org for more information.

A Big Step Back for Human Rights in Guatemala

On October 8, Guatemala’s court of appeals overturned the 2001 conviction of three Guatemalan military officers and a Catholic priest in the murder of human rights advocate Bishop Juan Gerardi Conedera. Last year’s verdict had been hailed by human rights advocates around the world as a "huge step forward" for Guatemala’s judicial system. The Gerardi case was the first in which high-ranking officers, whom many believed to be "above the law," received long jail terms for human rights violations. The case will now have to be tried again.

Bombing Exercises Stepped Up on Vieques

The effects of September 11 are having a negative impact on the tiny island of Vieques. Bombing exercises began again last year on September 23, the day Puerto Ricans commemorate El Grito de Lares, the anniversary of the uprising against Spanish colonialism. Since the U.S. colonized Puerto Rico, that day has become a rallying point against Washington’s domination. The second round of bombing exercises took place in April 2002—the same month as the accidental killing of civilian guard David Sanes in 1999 by a Navy bomb. Sanes’s death sparked a new wave of struggle to end the U.S. Navy’s occupation of Vieques. A third round of war exercises began in August of this year.

Environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr., nephew of former president, John F. Kennedy, served 30 days in prison for trespassing on federal land during an attempt to stop the Navy exercises in April and May. Kennedy said he was embarrassed by the Navy’s actions: "I grew up with the Navy and it’s been painful for me to oppose a service that was really an icon of my childhood... But in this case, what the Navy is doing here is wrong, and it’s arrogant and it’s bullying and it’s the worst face of America." After serving his sentence in a federal prison outside San Juan, Kennedy immediately flew to Vieques.