Building a New El Salvador Today

The SHARE Blog has moved

2011-06-07T11:42:00.001-04:00

As part of launching our new website, our blog has moved. Now you can our latest updates from El Salvador and SHARE Counterparts at: www.share-elsalvador.org/blog

Have a look today to see what else is new at SHARE. We'll see you there! (And don’t forget to change your bookmark).

SHARE launches new website!

2011-06-07T11:42:00.000-04:00

SHARE El Salvador is pleased to announce that we have just launched our new website! Besides an exciting new look, the new site makes it easier for you to read project updates, interviews, and action alerts. Take a look now at www.share-elsalvador.org!

Help us out by sharing the website with your friends and telling us what you think!

Threats Continue at Radio Victoria: Please Show Your Solidarity!

2011-05-25T12:11:00.001-04:00

"Since the early 1990s, Radio Victoria has provided a voice for the residents of the northern hills of El Salvador. Founded in the aftermath of the nation's bloody civil war, today Radio Victoria transmits daily local and international news and other programs to communities so poor they often lack telephone and mail services.

The journalists who run the station are mostly 16 to 24 year-olds who grew up in Honduran refugee camps and returned to the area with their families as the civil war raged around them.

And now, someone wants them dead."

Threats to members of the Radio Victoria continue:
Oscar:
1) "extermination > look oscar we aren't kidding shut up this radio or you also die you dog”
Pablo:
1) "extermination > look pablo we are watching you better than your police we are close to you where you go the cameras in the radio will not save anyone get out or what"
Cristy:
1) " exrerminio > griga (exterminio > gringa???) today yes we have to act with the people in your radio now it is too much manuel pablo oscar and maricela are to be assassinated you should leave... "

PLEASE support the radio by sending your messages of support—emails in Spanish and especially voice recordings they can play on the radio. The authorities and people responsible need to continue to hear that the international community is paying attention and in solidarity with the Radio. As Cristina Starr at the Radio says: “We are only little people and we keep getting these nasty things and it scares us and upsets us and wears us down psychologically, so all forms of support are helpful, we are together here, we are in touch with each other, supporting each other and we feel all your support surrounding us too.”

You can also sign the change.org petition: Investigate Death Threats against El Salvador Journalists.

El Salvador Sees Epidemic of Violence Against Women

2011-05-24T12:13:00.000-04:00

This article written by Hannah Stone, talks about femicide in El Salvador and mentions SHARE Counterpart ORMUSA.

A rise in brutal killings of women, known as “femicides,” in El Salvador can be blamed on various factors, from gender inequality to organized crime to a society hollowed out by gang culture, features common to many parts of Central America

Non-governmental organization Salvadoran Women for Peace (Organizacion de Mujeres Salvadoreñas por la Paz - ORMUSA), which tracks violence against women, reported that, according to police statistics, there were 160 such murders committed in the country in the first three months of the year. This would put the country on track for a record 640 such killings in 2011 - higher than any year since the organization began to track the issue in 1999.

Human rights organizations in Latin America use the word “femicide” to refer to the murders of women who are killed because of their gender. Murders defined in this way typically involve sexual violence, mutilation, and torture, with the mangled bodies of victims often left in public places.

El Salvador has one of the highest murder rates in the world, with almost 70 per 100,000 people. This is mostly due to soaring gang violence, with the country an increasingly important transit location for drugs being trafficked into the U.S., and the local “maras” or gangs fighting over the business. Sexualized killings of women make up a relatively minor proportion of the many violent deaths -- of some 4,000 murders the police registered in 2010, 580 were identified as femicides.

Read more

Urgent Action for Radio Victoria: Change.org Petition!

2011-05-13T17:07:00.000-04:00

Change.org recently created an online petition that makes it easy to take action to demand an Investigation of Death Threats Against Radio Victoria Journalists in El Salvador (click here) and spread the word.

Investigate Death Threats Against El Salvador Journalists
SIGN PETITION

Change.org published the following article on Tuesday May, 10th

El Salvador: Protect Independent Radio from Death Threats

by Antonio Ramirez · May 10, 2011

Since the early 1990s, Radio Victoria has provided a voice for the residents of the northern hills of El Salvador. Founded in the aftermath of the nation's bloody civil war, today Radio Victoria transmits daily local and international news and other programs to communities so poor they often lack telephone and mail services.

The journalists who run the station are mostly 16 to 24 year-olds who grew up in Hondruan refugee camps and returned to the area with their families as the civil war raged around them.

And now, someone wants them dead.

Last month, Radio Victoria's workers began receiving a wave of death threats from a shadowy group reminiscent of the macabre rightwing "death squads" active during the civil war.

Demand an Investigation of Death Threats Against Radio Victoria Journalists in El Salvador! (Click Here!)

Local activists believe the threats are linked to the radio's involvement in a struggle against Pacific Rim, a Canadian mining company that hopes to install a massive gold mine in the region. Since 2009, Salvadoran anti-mining activists have been threatened, robbed, kidnapped and murdered while protesting the potential environmental and social damage Pacific Rim's mine would cause the local community. Recently, over 1,000 Change.org members sent letters supporting a full investigation of these murders.

But as the struggle against Pacific Rim has heated up, so has the intimidation against activists.

On the morning of April 30th, someone slipped a note under the Radio Victoria's door threatening the lives of three of the radio's workers if they didn't quit "talking" and leave the station that week.

A few days later, two journalists received death threats in the form of text messages to their personal cell phones; some of the messages mentioned the three year-old daughter of one of the journalists. The threats were signed by a group that calls itself Exterminio, or Extermination.

Then, more death threats came after the radio held a press conference calling for an investigation into the threats.

Unfortunately, such threats are nothing new for the small radio station. Since 2006, young journalists have received so many death threats that two of them are currently provided protection by the International Human Rights Commission.

But despite consistent calls for stronger protections for Radio Victoria staff, the Salvadoran Attorney General Romero Barhona and Director of Human Rights David Morales have done little to investigate the threats.

Now, Salvadoran and US activists are calling on the Attorney General and Director of Human Rights to investigate the threats and take action to provide police protection for Radio Victoria staff.

Salvadoran activists say that messages of international solidarity are important to keeping such activists safe. Click here to Demand an Investigation of Death Threats Against Radio Victoria Journalists in El Salvador!

ACTION ALERT! Support Radio Victoria

2011-05-09T16:25:00.000-04:00

Action Alert! Support Radio Victoria

On May 3rd, World Press Freedom Day, Radio Victoria in Cabañas, once again denounced death threats against their workers.

During the early hours of Saturday April 30th a note was slipped under Radio Victoria´s front entrance naming 3 workers and threatening their lives if they did not leave the Radio by Wednesday May 4th.

On May 2nd during the evening 2 radio journalists received text messages on their cell phones threatening them in different ways including saying that one of the workers´ 3 year old daughter would be the one to pay if they did not change the tone of the radio.

On May 4th, new threats were sent to two of the radio workers. Radio Victoria needs your help and solidarity. Here is who you can contact to ask for an exhaustive investigation, for results of the investigations, for full protection for ALL workers at Radio Victoria, for guarantees of freedom of the press y freedom of expression, for democratic and independent media and whatever else you want to say.

PLEASE CONTACT:

Send an email to the Attorney General Romeo Barahona to demand a full investigation and protection for our workers. The Attorney General of the Republic is the only one who can decide what gets investigated and he is not taking us seriously. Please send an email to his assistant at: hector.burgos@fgr.gob.sv

If you speak Spanish, you could also call Salvadoran Attorney General Romeo Barahona at 011-503-2260-6350 and make your voice heard.

Send an email to David Morales, Director of Human Rights at the Ministry of Foreign Relations to demand specialized police protection for those being threatened: dmorales@rree.gob.sv

The Struggle Against Climate Change in El Corozal

2011-05-04T14:19:00.001-04:00

This update was originally published in our eNewsletter on Earth Day 2011.

The small 60 family community of El Corozal, where SHARE counterpart REDES has been working since 2006, is so remote and tucked away into the hills outside of Berlin, Usulután, that they still do not receive running water or electricity in the community. The school only goes up to fifth grade and with only two teachers and one principal who is also teaching classes, there are two grades of students being taught by one teacher at the same time. Given the distance to the middle school in Berlin, very few students are able to continue studying after the fifth grade. In fact, when the mayor’s office of Berlin offered to train someone from the community as a health promoter with the condition that it be someone with a high school degree, the community realized, upon searching for an eligible person, that nobody in the community had obtained a high school degree.

However, upon meeting with the community leaders in El Corozal, the first thing we noticed was not the lack of resources. We were invited to meet in the newly inaugurated church of El Corozal. We sit down on chairs on the new tile floor and look at the posters that have been hung up on the while in front of us. “Welcome SHARE!” The sign says. “We are a community of 250 men, women, and children. Our biggest concerns are climate change and food security.” Next to the map is a neatly written chart which explains the organization of their community, including what institutions support them and how they have divided themselves into 11 different working committees.

Underneath the welcome sign and organizational structure graphic are two “community resource and risk maps” which detail all the risk zones in the area and all the community resources such as the school, the church, the seed bank, various wells, and the main roads. Every home is included in the map and the homes that are more vulnerable to destruction from natural disasters are drawn in red. Every area on the road from Berlin that is a potential risk area during the raining season is colored in red. As a community that was heavily affected by the 2001 earthquakes, Hurricane Stan in 2005, and Hurricane Ida in 2009, they have learned that preparation and organization is what can save a community from total destruction. The emergency response committee had been trained in first aid techniques and coordinated with the health committee in how to react in a disaster. We are looking at an amazing example of risk management and disaster preparation.

Beyond preparation for disaster, the community knows that the true culprit for the levels of disaster induced destruction in recent years has been climate change. After Hurricane Ida hit El Salvador in 2009 and dumped half as much rain on the country in one night that Hurricane Mitch brought in a whole week in 1998, people began to be more concerned. In El Corozal, people lost up to 40% of their crops for that year. As part of the Hurricane Ida recovery, SHARE sponsored a project through REDES that would teach communities like El Corozal about climate change to raise awareness about what is happening to our environment.

According to the Salvadoran Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources, the temperature in El Salvador in the past forty years has increased up to 5 degrees. Recent studies reported in the Nature Journal connect human activity to an increase in temperature and precipitation. What does this mean in El Salvador? According to REDES, an increase in temperature causes drought and decrease in water sources. Yet, as warm air carries more precipitation, it also means that when it does rain, which can no longer be predicted as it used to be by Salvadoran farmers, it rains so heavily that crops are completely wiped out.

For the community of El Corozal, a community that lives off of agriculture, this can be devastating. In addition to climate change, neo-liberal policies put into place at the end of the Civil War that favor foreign imports have weakened local agriculture. Most farmers who depend on genetically modified seeds and chemical fertilizers find that the growing cost of these products make it nearly impossible for them to have any type of earning from their crop production.

Taking all of this into account, the environmental team and local producers in El Corozal, together with REDES, have begun to experiment with organic seeds that would not have to be bough every year, but rather taken from the former year’s production. Genetically modified seeds are made so that they do not produce new seeds so that farmers have to continue to buy seeds each year. They have also begun a process of making their own organic fertilizer from compost and chicken manure. In an experiment that they did last year by planting different variations of organic corn seeds and chemical versus organic fertilizer, they learned that organic fertilizer worked just as well as chemical fertilizer. They were also able to identify one variation of corn that withstood the drought, heavy rains, and wind characteristic to these hills better than any of the others.

The community leadership in El Corozal continues to work towards solutions to how to deal with the effect of climate change on their crops and on their community. Disaster planning and preparation helps them to be ready for heavy rains and to mitigate risks as much as possible. Working toward organic production and food sovereignty should lessen their dependence on major businesses. “The community is in a state of emergency” says directive president Antonio Funes Campos, “we have to take action and do something.” And indeed the community of El Corozal is doing the best they can do given the gravity of the situation.

Yet if there is one thing that community leaders have learned from their climate change training it is that much of what can be done is out of their hands. Countries like El Salvador are not the countries producing the high levels of greenhouse gases that are causing global warming. Its countries like the United States. More than ev poor in developing countries are suffering from the effects of actions taken by “first world” citizens. So as we celebrate this Earth Day 2011, SHARE, REDES, ander, the the people of El Corozal invite you to start thinking about how to act more as a global citizens and about what steps we can all take to promote global environmental justice.

Radio Victoria Press Release

2011-05-04T11:41:00.000-04:00

Dear SHARE family,

Once again, the Radio Victoria in Victoria, Cabañas is receiving death threats. Threats against many of the young people at this community radio have been going on all year, along with threats to burn down the radio. Numerous anti-mining activists have already lost their lives and many other leaders in this movement have been threatened or attempts have been made on their lives.

Please stay posted for ways to stand in solidarity with these inspiring, dedicate young people at the Radio Victoria.

In solidarity,
Tedde

PRESS RELEASE

Today, May 3rd, is World Press Freedom Day and on this day Radio Victoria is again denouncing death threats against their workers.

During the early hours of Saturday April 30th a note was slipped under Radio Victoria´s front entrance naming 3 workers and threatening their lives if they did not leave the Radio by Wednesday May 4th.

On May 2nd during the evening 2 radio journalists received text messages on their cell phones threatening them in different ways including saying that one of the workers´ 3 year old daughter would be the one to pay if they did not change the tone of the radio.

Tomorrow May 4th Radio Victoria and ADES, Santa Marta´s Social and Economic Development Association, will hold a press conference in front of El Salvador´s Attorney General´s office denouncing the total lack of results from investigations into who are the intellectual and material authors of these continuous threats.

We will send out more information soon on how you all can support the Radio and other human rights defenders in El Salvador.

Thank you for your attention and support.

May 1st: Change Through Mobilized Communities!

2011-05-01T00:01:00.001-04:00

Excerpt from the Pagina de Maiz, a weekly publication put out by SHARE counterpart, Equipo Maiz.

This May 1, 2011, workers, student organizations, farmers, women, and entire communities will come together to mobilize with workers from all around the world in unity for political change to end capitalist exploitation and imperialist domination.

The reality of today is that capitalism is in an economic crisis, and this crisis is causing nations to turn against one another for vital resources such as gas and water.

This May 1st will be the 3rd year in a row that the people of El Salvador will be able to march freely away from the corrupt government of ARENA. Yet they are still battling for historic demands on increased minimum wages, educational rights, healthcare, and more.

Mobilized communities have realized that they cannot simply "sit and wait" for changes to happen. With FMLN they must make these changes happen. They've realized they need to push for more communities, factory workers, wealthy business owners, and the like in order to have a bigger voice in political changes and policies.

The freedom of the working class will not be obtained by anyone but the working class! They must continue their struggle for political rights! To all the workers and organized communities fighting for their rights as people, we thank you for your continued dedication!

Electoral Reform: Multi-Party City Councils

2011-04-27T17:48:00.000-04:00

As part of a number of electoral reforms being proposed by civil society, one that stands out, especially as Legislative and Mayoral elections approach, is the proposal to accept multi-party City Councils.

Local election results 2009

Currently, El Salvador is the only country in Latin America that functions on simple majority elections for city councils. That means that when one party wins the local elections and takes the mayors office, every person on the City Council comes from that political party. Whereas, in most other countries in Latin America, the City Council is made up of representatives from different parties depending on how well they were represented in recent elections.

For example, in the municipality of San Salvador in 2009, the ARENA party won the elections. This means that the mayor, the trustee, the 8 aldermen, and the 8 alternates are from the ARENA party. If this new proposal were to be accepted in El Salvador, the San Salvador City Council in this example would consist of, the ARENA mayor, the ARENA trustee, 8 ARENA aldermen, and instead of 8 ARENA alternates there instead would be 8 more aldermen but from the FMLN party, which correlates directly to their representation in the elections.

Those who support this proposal point out that no change would have to be made to the Salvadoran Constitution as the Constitution states that: “the Government is republican, democratic and representative” and that “the political system is pluralistic and this is expressed through political parties, which are only and instrument to exercise the peoples representation within the government.”

Other arguments in favor of this system are:

It strengthens political representation
It works to depolarize society
There would be more transparency within local governments
More stability among local governments when different political parties win the elections

Overall it is said that this system would strengthen representational democracy. The ARENA party would have representation in 261 out of 262 municipalities, the FMLN in 251, the Christian Democrat party in 104, the National Conciliatory Party in 172, the FDR party in 6 and the Democratic Change party in 12.

One criticism of this system would be that women's participation in local governments would diminish since women are often times included in City Councils as alternates. Some have asked that what will happen when political parties share seats on the City Councils and place mainly men in those seats. A representative of the Social Institute for Democracy (ISD), a former SHARE counterpart, responded to that concern by stating that a comprehensive electoral and political party reform law, that they are working towards, would include a provision that would require equal participation from men and women in all political parties. Currently the Democratic Change party is the only party with that provision. Yet, such a comprehensive reform law is still a long way off.

The ISD and other organizations and institutions working towards the plural party City Council systems hope to implement this change within the next few years. If not by next years elections, then by the 2015 mayor elections.

More Great 2010 Delegation Quotes!

2011-04-14T13:31:00.001-04:00

Churchwomen Delegation
"The delegation experience challenges me to an even greater commitment to the advocacy education work I do. I'm greatly encouraged by the efforts of SHARE with women's empowerment and leadership for young women. This is absolutely necessary for peace in our world."

"I appreciated SHARE not spoon feeding data to us, but rather letting individuals learn from the conversations, the travel, and reflections shared."

"Once again my eyes and heart have been opened to the suffering that has been felt by the Salvadorans. Once again I am impressed with their hope and energy. I was very touched by the stark poverty of Llano Grande, but once again was moved by their hope."

Cretin Derham Hall
“I learned a lot in El Salvador and a lot about myself. I wish I could put it into words, but there are no words powerful enough to explain everything.”

"I learned that as a U.S. citizen, we have an impact on the countries of the world. It is our responsibility to educate ourselves so we can use our knowledge to help the world."

“Through this experience, I've been shown that the world has many issues and you can never be done learning about and questioning them. That is the only way to find solutions.”

I have learned more about the history and current political and economic structure existing in El Salvador. I learned more about the interconnection between El Salvador, the U.S., and other countries. I learned a simple way of life can be an effective and happy way of life. One of the most important lessons I learned is knowledge is power and one of the most important ways to help the poor and vulnerable. I also learned a lot about CAFTA"

St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Parish
“I learned so much: the history of El Salvador, the current issues that are affecting the country, more of the Spanish language, and what it really means to be a community.”

“I think the advocacy was well done – because otherwise the delegation would just be a “show and tell” without allowing groups to take back what they've learned and carry out their sistering relationship.”

“Learned of the challenge many people face in their everyday lives. The things we take for granted can not be afforded, like a high school education, clean water, food, medicine.”

“New perspective on faith and what it means to be a Catholic as described by Father Rutilio Grande and Mons. Romero.”

Eastern Michigan University
“I've learned the truth about the issues here. About CAFTA, mining, immigration, human rights, corruption, impunity, ARENA, FMLN, health, public and private health care, and poverty. I also learned about hope and overcoming all odds. I learned that the USA isn't perfect and that their “aid” often does more harm than good. I learned that the current situation isn't working and things need to change. I've learned about issues that I didn't even know existed. I think SHARE teaching about advocacy is awesome. At the very least I plan on telling everyone who will listen about the truth in El Salvador and of the world.”

“I have learned about the impact of poverty, human rights, and health in El Salvador. Being in the rural community helped me learn the importance of sharing with people and living in solidarity. I have learned the importance of good energy, hard work, struggles, perserverance, and hope. I also learned about the economy and the impact the civil war has on people today. My perspective of the world has changed dramatically. I am more critical of U.S. Foreign policy. I believe in sharing with people and creating a community. I plan on advocating for social justice back at home by creating a sense of awareness about issues in El Salvador and educating myself.”

“I've learned to appreciate the world and people around me more frequently. Also, I've learned to try and keep myself centered in what I want in life. I feel a lot more solidarity with Salvadorans and other Centra Americans after participating in this trip. SHARE does a great job incorporating advocacy issues.”

Georgetown University:
“...Coming out of the trip I feel incredibly enriched. I've grown so much in this past week.”

“I learned that choices I make in the US affect people abroad and I saw that first hand.”

“I want to make my life less materialistic and spread the story about the real El Salvador to my friends and classmates and continue my relationship with Share, Santa Monica and my family.”

Visitation Medical Delegation
“I learned more about the country and people of El Salvador; their politics, beliefs, economic situation, and history. I have increased appreciation for the country and its peoples' needs. I plan to increase awareness for my family and friends. Remain up to date on issues central to El Salvador and its people.”

“A great experience – wonderful fellowship – a very close group relationship. Every time we come, we feel blessed and so respectful for those who have so little and yet are so joyful.”

“It is always a learning experience. Everyone we came into contact with taught us something that we will all carry back.”

“This is my ninth delegation. I continue to come because it grounds me in the greater world.”

Thank you Marina!

2011-04-08T11:53:00.001-04:00

Thank you Marina for many years working with SHARE.

Marina Peña, SHARE’s El Salvador Field Office Director recently decided to leave SHARE in order to accept a position working as an advisor to the Salvadoran Ambassador in Nicaragua. Marina’s dedication, enthusiasm, and expertise will be greatly missed at SHARE.

For over 11 years, we enjoyed Marina’s leadership in accompanying partner communities as they moved from war to reconstruction. The success of the Mujeras Ganaderas, the cooperative of cattle women in the Bajo Lempa, is one example of Marina’s ability to encourage and empower a marginalized group of women. She guided through the process of forming their own women’s cooperative and walked with them until they secured their legal status. Today they are a thriving, successful, and respected women’s organization.

Marina was a champion in supporting the struggle of women and human rights. Last November, with the support of SHARE, a Salvadoran women’s organization passed landmark legislation to protect women from violence. The Romero Coalition, another advocacy effort that Marina championed, was instrumental in pressing Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes to ask for pardon on behalf of the Salvadoran government for violations committed during the war at the 30th anniversary commemoration of Archbishop Oscar Romero.

We are sure Marina will do a superb job working with the Salvadoran community in Nicaragua.

We want to say thank you Marina for her leadership and for her many years advancing the mission of SHARE. We wish her success and hope she will continue to be part of the SHARE family even while she is in Nicaragua.

Un fuerte abrazo and muchas gracias for your love and dedication, Marina!

Jose Artiga

Executive Director

Top Ten 2010 Delegate Quotes

2011-04-07T13:36:00.000-04:00

“Instead of just hearing about poverty and peoples' struggles, we lived it and saw first hand in a way that will affect me forever. SHARE's incorporation of advocacy issues was truly remarkable and inspiring to me. I plan on initiating events and fundraisers on campus to create awareness in the U.S. about issues in El Salvador.”
Eastern Michigan University

"I can now understand how big on an impact the policies of the USA have on the rest of the world. Even though the American people may not realize their power, they are responsible for their actions."
Cretin Derham Hall

"The past week has driven home the need to understand, to a greater degree, the global impact of my way of life. Then change those areas that are harmful to the global community."
Churchwomen Delegation

“We all need to open our eyes and hearts to listen to our brothers and sisters all over the world. Each one of our brothers and sisters has a great story to tell.”
St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Parish

"I have learned so much about the civil war and current economy in El Salvador. I have also learned about the USA's involvement in the war and what advocacy organizations are doing to help the people of El Salvador today. More than anything I have learned about the strength and kindness of the Salvadoran people."
Cretin Derham Hall

"The question should be what didn't move or touch me; every minute was jam-packed--so informative, so motivating, so inspirational. Each leader offered so much in knowledge, joy and giving. Each were very sensitive to the needs and to requests. Never has there been been such giving leadership. The delegates themselves were so inspiring, each bringing and sharing a unique gift." Churchwomen Delegation

“I realize now that it is every person's duty as a human being to help all other human beings, no matter what their circumstance. I plan to tell stories of the people I met, making sure that these people are not forgotten.” Eastern Michigan University

“I have learned how welcoming and loving one community can be and that love is unconditional. I've learned that every name and face has a story. It is important to give dignity to every person.”
Cretin Derham Hall

“I went in with an open mind and I feel like I learned more in a week here than in a semester at school.”
Georgetown University

"I always appreciate having my vision and perspective broadened -- as it was during this trip. With so many Salvadoran immigrants in the US, I appreciate the insights into the pain of their choice to leave El Salvador and the vast challenges for those who stay behind or return."
Churchwomen Delegation

Women's Rights in the Workplace

2011-04-05T17:54:00.000-04:00

Salvadoran Women working in a factory

On March 30th, the International Labor Organization presented their report on Legislation Regarding Women's Work Rights in Central America and the Dominican Republic. The report revealed that the most common types of labor violations in the workplace for women are in regards to maternity and sexual harrasment.

International Labor Organization Representative, Maria Jose Chamorro, presented the report to the audience. Some interesting facts about El Salvador labor laws:

El Salvador ratified the International Agreement on Work Dicrimination in 1995, and the International Agreement on Equal Pay in 2000, while the rest of the Central American countries had ratified those agreements in the 1950's and 1960's.
Article 3 of the Salvadoran constitution states that "All persons are equal under the law. To have access to civil rights there could be no restrictions based on nationality, race, sex or religion."
Both the Convention for the Elimination of All forms of Violance Against Women and the Inter-American Convention to Prevent, Sanction and Erradicate Violance Against Women have been ratified by the Salvadoran government.

Despite fact that these and a number of other laws are in place to protect women in the workplace, there is still a great amount of discrimination and abuse directed towards working women. Here are some examples.

Salvadoran National Assemblywoman, Margarita Velada, gave the example of the maternity law in El Salvador that requires thatt a women be working for an employer for six months to recieve maternity benefits. Ms. Velada posed the question that if a man where to obtain a job and get an an accident a week later and need medical care, no one would doubt that his job would cover him. This is an example of discrimination that pregnant women face
The head of the Ministry of Work, Marina de Aviles, gave the example of how some companies, no longer allowed to give pregnancy tests to women when the apply for a job, now make women take a lie detector test and ask if they are pregnant, if they fail the test, they are not hired.

In El Salvador, in 2009, there were a total of 709 reports of sexual harrassment in the work place.

Presenters acknowledged that this great amount of discrimination still exists because there are few women who actually come forward and denounce it. This could be due to the fact that they are unaware of their rights and believe that the employer has legitimate reasons for discriminating, or it could be because they are in desperate need of their job and fear that by making a denouncement they will lose it. In many cases it is hard to make a denouncement because there are either no witnesses or witnesses are employers who are also afraid of losing their job.

The conclusion was made that something that governments and civil society should work for is a culture where women know their rights and are unafraid to denounce discrimnation. This would also mean promoting a culture where the legal bodies that exist side with the victim and not the employer.

SHARE Counterparts like ORMUSA and the IMU are examples of organizations working to empower women and denounce injustice. We celebrate the passing of the Life Free of Violence Against Women Law, but we know that we must continue to support those organizations in their work to become a society free of discrimination and violence against women.

Remembering María Julia: Defender of Human Rights in El Salvador

2011-04-01T19:51:00.001-04:00

“Our struggle to exercise these rights here in El Salvador continues, we will keep searching for this truth and justice in El Salvador's courts. I don't know when, but one day truth and justice will flourish in our country for the victims who abandoned this utopia with their blood.”
- Dr. María Julia Hernández

Dr. María Julia Hernandez, long-time director of Tutela Legal, The Salvadoran Archdiocese's human rights office, and defender of the victims of horrific human rights violations, died March 30^th four years ago.

SHARE worked with María Julia, Tutela Legal, and the Archdiocese on many human rights initiatives over the years, including human rights campaigns during the war, coordination with the movement of refugees repopulating communities in the late 1980s, and working on the initial design for a memorial wall dedicated to the civilian victims of the war. SHARE brought María Julia on tour in the U.S. to promote and fundraise for the construction of the memorial wall. Says SHARE Executive Director José Artiga, “María Julia is one of our most prominent women leaders in El Salvador. She worked closely with all the Archbishops, and was a defender of human rights who promoted denouncements, justice, and reparations.”

In honor of María Julia Hernández, Wednesday March 30^th 2011 members of Tutela Legal organized a mass and forum in the Crypt of the National Cathedral, where María Julia, Archbishop Oscar Romero, and a number of other priests and religious persons are buried. María Julia is one of the only women buried in the Crypt. A group of forty people gathered to commemorate her life, including members of COMADRES, the Committee of the Mothers of the Disappeared, and many others who knew her. In the spirit of María Julia, during the opening prayer, one of the priests proclaimed, “We are gathered here for the dignity of all, no matter their social class.”

Decorating María Julia's tomb
with flowers

Following the mass, Luis Morales and Dr. Aceda Díaz shared reflections about María Julia's personality, work, and legacy. María Julia first became involved in working for human rights after meeting Archbishop Romero in 1977 at a gathering of student groups. Archbishop Romero called on the students to aid the victims of disappearance and genocide, and María Julia decided to accompany him in this work. She took on a preferential option for the victims, committing the rest of her life to defending human rights.

In 1983, María Julia took leadership of the newly formed Tutela Legal. She and her team worked tirelessly and systematically to investigate, record, and denounce massacres, murders, disappearances, and other human rights violations, and to protect victims. While these atrocities stopped happening systematically with the end of the war, they remained covered by silence, impunity, and the amnesty law. María Julia continued to work for the truth to be known and acknowledged. Together with Tiberio Arnoldo Romero, brother of Archbishop Oscar Romero, she brought the case of Archbishop Romero's assassination to the Inter-American Human Rights Commission. She also played an instrumental role in coordinating the exhumations of the El Mozote Massacre, bringing irrefutable evidence to light. She helped facilitate the planning and construction of the Monument to Truth and Memory as well, a memorial wall with the names of nearly 30,000 civilian victims killed or disappeared during the war.

Lic. Luis Morales, Dr. Díaz, and Ovidio Gonzalez, current
director of Tutela legal. Mexican singer-songwriter and
defender of immigrant rights performs a song.

Luis Morales emphasized the importance of María Julia's work for truth, justice, and reparations, naming each as a fundamental right of victims of grave human rights violations, violations that impact not only individuals or families, but whole communities, countries, and even humanity at large. He referenced a 2004 UN Development Project report declaring that in El Salvador two genocides have been carried out: the mass murder of indigenous rural farmworkers in 1932 known as La Matanza, and the political repression in the 1970s and 1980s. Morales warned of the need for truth, justice, and reparations to keep this piece of history from repeating once more.

Dr. Aceda Díaz, a lawyer and long-time friend and acquaintance of María Julia, shared personal memories of María Julia. She painted a picture of the male-dominated society they both grew up in. At the time María Julia attended the University of Central America, majoring in philosophy, very few women went to university at all and even fewer studied law or philosophy. University was for men, and men filled nearly all seats in the government, and other positions of public authority.

Dr. Díaz first heard of María Julia in the early 1980s. As a young lawyer with a small office during a time of mounting repression, she often received visits from people whose family members had been disappeared or assassinated, and felt completely impotent, with no idea how to help them or where to refer them to. Then she heard of a little office, Tutela Legal, run by María Julia Hernández. Dr. Díaz reminded everyone that to hold the position María Julia held during the war, documenting disappearances, torture, and massacres, and traveling to other countries to share and denounce these cases, meant running risk of her life, yet María Julia showed no fear. During an interview Dr. Diaz once heard, a reporter asked María Julia, “So what have you really achieved? Peoples' human rights continue to be trampled daily.” María Julia responded, “As Christians we do not have the right to give up hope. We must keep working so that one day things will be better.” When Dr. Diaz remarked how impressed she was with María Julia's answer, María Julia replied, “We cannot lose hope.”

Dr. Díaz sees María Julia's life, deep faith, and clear commitment as a reminder that we all have a commitment to transform the place we are at, to put our gifts to the service of others. Long live María Julia!

Congratulations Pro Busqueda: Government Publicy Recognizes Children Disappeared During the Armed Conflict

2011-03-31T02:03:00.001-04:00

A seemingly endless line of children, youth, and the occasional adult gathered outside the Feria Internacional in San Salvador the morning of March 29^th, 2011. Everyone trickled through the gates one by one and rushed toward a huge ampitheatre decorated with kites and crawling with people for the Day of the Children Disappeared During the Armed Conflict. While the Salvadoran Legislative Assembly first named March 29^th the Day of the Children Disappeared During the Armed Conflict in 2007, this Tuesday marked the first time the Salvadoran government participated in the celebration, publicly acknowledging the many children who suffered forced disappearance and separation from their families during the armed conflict. Pro Busqueda coordinated this exciting historic commemorative event together with the Salvadoran Secretariat of Social Inclusion, lead by First Lady Vanda Pignato.

Probusqueda, a Salvadoran non-profit organization dedicated to searching for those disappeared as children during the armed conflict, has spearheaded the fight for truth, justice, and reparations for disappeared children and their families. After seventeen years advocating for families of the disappeared and working with many individuals who were disappeared, for Pro Busqueda to finally hear the government's acknowledgement of responsibility for the many children forcibly taken from their families during the war marked a historical moment. Father Jon Cortina, S.J. started Pro Busqueda together with families from the community of Guarjila shortly after the end of the war. Families have reported over nine hundred cases of disappeared children to the staff of Pro Busqueda, who have found over three hundred people, and continue to search for more than five hundred. Pro Busqueda brought a number of young people who were disappeared and have since been found to the commemoration on Tuesday.

Members of Pro Busqueda opened the event reminding everyone that it was a morning to pause and remember the those children torn from their homes, to share the search so many families and individuals have walked, and through this moment of truth step toward justice and begin to build sanity and reconciliation for El Salvador. They then brought the crowd together chanting “No los olvidamos,” We do not forget them. School groups, individuals, and organizations from all fourteen departments of El Salvador added their voices.

Much of the crowd surged to their feet at the announcement of President Mauricio Funes' entrance. As Funes slowly descended the main staircase with his wife at his side and a trail of dignitaries, members of Pro Busqueda, and victims of forced disappearance behind him, he shook the hand of each of the kids and young adults lined up alongside the stairs, a wide grin lighting his face. Once Presidente Funes and his wife took their seats on the stage, the official commemorative act began. The act included the introduction of a postage stamp for the Day of Children Disappeared During the Armed Conflict, featuring a child's footprints, prizes awarded to university students who wrote essays about disappeared children, and speeches by Ester Alvarenga, Coordinator of Probusqueda, and President Funes. As icing on the cake, those gathered had the pleasure of listening to internationally renowned singer/song-writer Julieta Venegas perform following the commemorative act.

New Stamp

During her speech, Ester Alvarenga noted the Inter-American Human Rights Court's 2005 ruling which declared the Salvadoran government guilty of violating of various human rights in the case of Erlinda and Ernestina Serrano Cruz, sisters disappeared at the ages of 7 and 13 as a breakthrough moment in the fight for justice for the families of disappeared children. The ruling set out various steps for the government to take as acts of reparation, including the creation of a national day of commemoration. In response, in 2006 the Salvadoran Legislative Assembly named March 29^th the Day of the Children Disappeared During the Armed Conflict. As further steps, in 2010 President Funes made an official apology to all the victims of human rights violations committed by the government during the war and signed an executive decree for the formation of a National Search Commission, to search for children disappeared during the war. Ester Alvarenga called on the Attorney General, Supreme Court, and Legislative Assembly to act for justice as well, rather than forestall it, as they have done so far.

President Funes focused on the need for truth and his efforts to work towards reparations in response to atrocities committed during the armed conflict with the complicity of the Salvadoran government. He emphasized truth as a necessary step towards reconciliation, stating that, “a page should not be turned before it has been read.” He negated statements that dredging up the truth would open up wounds or incite hate, saying that truth is necessary for the dignity of the victims, and is an act of love. He called on the Attorney General to carry out full investigations of past grave human rights violations, in the name of a victim's right to the truth.

For Andrea and José Ramirez, a husband and wife who were both disappeared as children near the beginning of the armed conflict, the president's acknowledgement of disappeared children was an incredibly important first step towards reparation. “Clearly it can't repair everything. It can't give her back her arm,” comments José, referring to Andrea, whose right shirt sleeve hangs loose and empty. “I was separated from my family for twelve years, placed in an orphanage. That can never be undone, I can never get those years back,”says Andrea, voice filled with urgency and passion. “Nevertheless, this is a step, and we feel very happy that the government is acknowledging the disappeared. Past governments never took us into account. Thus recognition from the government makes us as victims feel important.”

José and Andrea hope that this is just the first of many steps, and the government will continue taking action and making reparations. They recognize that this effort will need the support of other branches of government, and will require further investment of funds. “This is an effort we have to carry out all together,” declares Andrea. “It must include the Attorney General's office and the Legislative Assembly as well as the president. The president can have all the best of intentions, but if one of the others stands in the way, nothing will happen. Objectives have been set, like the creation of the National Search Commission. The best of professionals should be appointed. Although even with the best of the best, if the commission doesn't have funding, they will not be able to do anything.”

Angela, a young woman also forcibly disappeared during the war and adopted by a family in the United States, shared the Ramirez's sense of the importance of the moment, while remaining critical but hopeful of what may follow. While Angela felt uncertain as to whether Funes is the appropriate official to offer an apology, since it was not his government who committed the disappearances, and the military also holds heavy responsibility, she found the moment very moving. “I cried. This is what you carry around with you for your whole life, and to know that it's not just you, but that it's part of the national history, and the history that's being written today... it was a very emotional moment.” She found it particularly meaningful to share the moment with other young people who had been disappeared during the war. Peter, a young Salvadoran also taken from his family and adopted by a family in the U.S. wholeheartedly agreed. “One of the most meaningful parts was meeting other people who have been through the same thing. Hopefully we can be role models or provide a support network for others trying to find their families. Each person has a different story, but to be able to talk to someone that has been through something similar is huge.”

Congratulations to Pro Busqueda and to the many families and individuals who searched many months and years for their loved ones! While words can sometimes seem empty, it is the first time that the Salvadoran government has officially and publicly recognized the many children death squads and members of the armed forces snatched from their families and homes during the war, and the deep emotional and psychological pain this caused these individuals, families, and communities – words with weight and meaning. May the ongoing struggle for justice bring many more moments to celebrate.

In the Words of Romero...

2011-03-24T15:15:00.000-04:00

On all of our delegations that travel to El Salvador, we take the time to visit the Divina Providencia, run by the Carmelite nuns, and also the place where Oscar Romero lived and died. In a recent visit to the small house where Romero lived, one of the sisters in talking about Romero's homilies said: "People close to Monseñor used to say: "Be careful with what you say in your homilies!" And Monseñor would respond by saying that in preparing his homilies, he would write down everything that he was going to say, but as soon as he stood up there in front of all the people and the words starting coming out, it was different than what he had prepared. That to say that he felt that it was a power greater than him that was speaking." Here are some of those prophetic words:

"We have never preached violence, except the violence of love, which left Christ nailed to a cross, the violcen that we must each do to ourselves to overcome our selfishness and such cruel inequalities among us. The violence we preach is not the violence of the sword, the violence of hatred. It is the violence of love, of brotherhood, the violence that wills to beat weapons into sickles for work."

"I will not tire of declaring that if we really want an effective end to violence we must remove the violence that lies at the root of all violence: structural violence, social injustice, exclusion of citizens form the management of the country, repression. All this is what constitutes the primal cause, from which the rest flows naturally."

"This is the fundamental thought of my preaching: Nothing is so important to me as human life. Taking life is something so serious, so grave-- more than the violation of any other human right-- because such bloodshed only negates love, awakens new hatreds, makes reconciliation and peace impossible."

"There is one rule by which to judge if God is near us or is far away-- the rule that God's word is giving us today: everyone concerned for the hungry, the naked, the poor, for those who have vanished in police custody, for the tortured, for prisoners, for all flesh that suffers, has God close at hand."

"What good are beautiful highways and airports, beautiful buildings full of spacious apartments, if they are only put together with the blood of the poor, who are not going to enjoy them?"

"Peoples are free to choose the political system they want but not free to do whatever they feel like. They will have to be judged by God's justice in the political or social system they choose. God is the judge of all social systems. Neither the gospel or the church can be monopolized by any political or social movement."

"El Salvador's liberation need not mean so much bloodshed; there is still time. If we all bring to bear the goodwill to renounce material things and seek those of divine worth, we can certainly find the way. Naturally, there must be the courage to yield in regard to what has become an untouchable institution, one at the base of all forms of violence: institutionalized violence, the country's injustice."

Commemorating Father Rutilio Grande

2011-03-24T14:24:00.000-04:00

Saturday March 12th marked the 34th anniversary of Father Rutilio Grande's martyrdom. A priest from El Paisnal, Rutilio Grande spoke against the injustices at the hands of an oppressive government, and dedicated his life's work to organizing the impoverished, marginalized rural farmers of El Salvador as they demanded respect for their rights. Members of the army shot him to death along with two other people, in 1977 on his way to give mass. Community members and social organizations continue to commemorate his life and death every year to hold up his example of commitment to the people and communities, and of speaking out for justice as a model for youth, men, women, and children to follow today, in the midst of continued inequality.

While El Salvador is no longer at war, economic wealth and job opportunities remain concentrated in the hands of a few. A culture of violence continues, manifesting itself in one of the highest murder rates on the continent. In the midst of these and other challenges, it is essential to build an identity Salvadorans are proud of, and remember people who touched and transformed the lives of many to believe in themselves and to work for love and justice.

This year over 800 people gathered in Aguilares to commemorate Father Grande, in an event coordinated by UCRES and the local government. Most people came from neighboring communities, though some came from other areas of El Salvador, and even a few from other countries. From Aguilares, everyone joined in walking to The Three Crosses, the monument constructed in memory of Father Rutilio Grande, Nelson Rutilio Lemus (16), and Manuel Solórzano (72), at the site they were gunned down at on March 12, 1977. Today a paved road surrounded by dusty, tranquil looking fields runs past the monument.

The monument consists of three black crosses in memory of the three people killed, framed by a wall, with one of Father Grande's most well known quotes: Let's all go to the banquet, to the table of creation. Each of us has a bench, a place, and a mission.” Guillermo Cuellar based the words of the opening song for the Salvadoran Popular Mass on Father Grande's words. This Saturday, everyone joined in singing Let's All Go to the Banquet” to begin a commemorative mass just across from The Three Crosses. Music from the popular mass, and other songs born out of Christian Base Communities and the liberation theology Father Rutilio practiced and preached, filled the mass. Songs with words like “When the poor believe in the poor, we can shout, “liberty,” When the poor believe in the poor, we can build brotherhood... At the Lord's table we all committed ourselves to sowing love” and “The Bible is the word of life, the Bible is the word of God.”

As mass came to a close, the morning sun sat overhead in a brilliant blue sky, filling the air with clinging heat and baking the road. Everyone re-grouped in the center of the road, holding posters and banners commemorating Father Rutilio, and joined in the Caminata, a slow, mindful walk from the Three Crosses to El Paisnal. Rutilio, Nelson and Manuel are buried in El Paisnal, and the central plaza is named after Rutilio Grande. All along the walk, UCRES high school and university scholarship students helped pass out bags of water to the walkers, and collected trash. One university student, Heidy Santamaría, said she comes to the commemoration every year. For her Father Rutilio is important because of the way he stood up for people's rights and because of the profound impact his life and death had on Monseñor Romero.

In El Paisnal following the caminata, one young woman commented, “Rutilio Grande was a defender of human rights and a friend of the people. I wish I could have met him.” She said she heard that when he first came to El Paisnal, the people would always serve him chicken, a real luxury for the economically impoverished families of the area. However, he told them that he did not want to be seen as more than anyone else just because he was a priest, and that he wanted to eat whatever the people ate. If the people ate beans, then he would eat beans too.

The many gathered sent a strong clear message that Father Rutilio Grande's acts and message of love for the people and for justice continue to move and inspire today's women, men, children, elderly, and youth to keep walking with love and demanding their rights.

More info. about Father Rutilio Grande

A beautiful piece in Spanish about the commemoration published in the Salvadoran newspaper the CoLatino: http://www.diariocolatino.com/es/20110314/nacionales/90418/El-padre-Rutilio-Grande-el-pastor-de-la-juventud.htm?tpl=69

Perspectives on Obama's Visit to El Salvador

2011-03-24T12:18:00.001-04:00

For two days this week, El Salvador was in the world media spotlight when US President Obama visited. Various news outlets did a wonderful job highlighting a variety of important, and often controversial, issues regarding Obama’s visit and US-ES relations more generally. Here is a selection of those thought-provoking perspectives in their own words:

A Missed Opportunity at Romero's Tomb
For Maryknoll Fr. Roy Bourgeois, the visit was at best a missed opportunity. His organization, SOA Watch, revealed that Romero’s killers were trained at the U.S. Army School of the Americas, now named the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC).
"I and many other human rights activists were hopeful," he said, that Obama would acknowledge "that Romero and thousands of others were killed, tortured and disappeared by graduates of this school."
"Obama didn’t even acknowledge, let alone apologize for, the U.S. role in El Salvador," Bourgeois said.
Read more at: http://ncronline.org/news/obama-romeros-grave-missed-opportunity

US Funds for Security Initiatives: Human Rights and Sovereignty?
During his visit to El Salvador, President Obama announced $200 million to finance “ security and anti-narco trafficking in Central America at a joint press conference held on Tuesday, March 22nd with his Salvadoran homologue, President Funes. Among other issues, there are serious human rights concerns:

Obama in Latin America: Another Missed Opportunity
And in El Salvador Obama declared his commitment to comprehensive immigration reform in the United States but blamed the impasse on the lack of support from the Republicans in Congress. Obama and Salvadoran president Mauricio Funes announced a set of confusingly overlapping initiatives for “prosperity,” with euphemistic labels like Partnership for Growth, Cross Roads Partnership, and New Pathways to Prosperity.

However as Funes himself explained, these are basically aimed at boosting "economic predictability," increase “trust with investors,” and “send a message to investors that they can invest in El Salvador.” Obama also announced $200 million for a new Central American Citizen's Security Partnership, which only appears to be repackaging the Central American Regional Security Initiative based on extending the Merida Initiative in Mexico that has failed to curb drug cartels and has produced more than 35,000 deaths since 2006.

http://www.fpif.org/articles/obama_in_latin_america_another_missed_opportunity

“The Mexico-to-Colombia Security Corridor Advances” in The Nation
The origin of this security corridor is Plan Colombia—Bill Clinton’s multibillion-dollar aid program to one of the worst human-rights violators in the world. The main effect of Plan Colombia has been to diversify the violence and corruption endemic to the cocaine trade, with Central American and Mexican cartels and military factions taking over export of the drug to the United States. This, along with the economic disruptions caused by NAFTA and the CAFTA, kicked off the cycle of criminal and gang violence that today engulfs the region.

In other words, as the rest of South America pulls out of the US orbit (which I would argue ranks as a world historical event as consequential as the fall of the Berlin Wall, though less noticed since it has taken place over a decade rather than all on one night), Washington is retrenching in what's left of its backyard.

http://www.thenation.com/blog/158492/building-perfect-machine-perpetual-war-mexico-colombia-security-corridor-advances

Salvadoran Civil Society Demands of Obama
Mr. President, during your upcoming trip, you have an important opportunity to make good on your campaign commitments by offering concrete support to the people of El Salvador in the continued exercise of their sovereign right to develop economic, environmental and social policy that promotes sustainable development.

Read the demands in this letter here, http://thesharefoundation.blogspot.com/2011/03/dear-mr-president-please-renegotiate.html, or watch this youtube video, http://www.youtube.com/user/SHAREFoundationES, to see and hear Salvadoran civil society march for these demands on the day President Obama arrived to El Salvador.

Obama, CAFTA and Mining
Obama has to decide where he stands. El Salvador's bishops oppose Pacific Rim, and 19 Democratic members of Congress and more than 140 organizations including the Sierra Club have asked the President to defend El Salvador in the Pacific Rim case--and to use this outrage as a template for reform of the "investor rights" provisions in CAFTA, NAFTA, and other pending U.S. trade agreements.  I hope the President tells his trade staff to read his campaign pledges--and pages 44-45 of Dreams From My Father. That would remind them that this President uniquely understands what a foreign policy that puts greed over decency means to people on the other side of the equation.

http://sierraclub.typepad.com/carlpope/2011/03/oh-well-whats-a-poor-canadian-corporation-to-do.html

Dear Mr President: Please Renegotiate CAFTA

2011-03-23T18:27:00.001-04:00

Dear President Obama:

On your upcoming trip to Latin America, we ask that you state your support for renegotiation of the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) and for El Salvador’s request to have dismissed a pending CAFTA investor-state arbitration suit challenging El Salvador’s environmental and safety policies relating to metals mining concessions.

Pacific Rim Mining Corp. and Commerce Group Corp. CAFTA cases

As the unfortunate record of mining in Guatemala and Honduras has demonstrated, certain forms of metals mining can irreparably pollute fresh drinking water, contaminate water used for crop irrigation, and pose grave threats to fishing livelihoods, thus permanently endangering the health and well-being of generations. El Salvador, the smallest and most densely populated country in Central America, already grapples with severe shortages of clean water, as 90 percent of its surface water is contaminated.

The environmental damage caused by mining in neighboring countries largely motivated El Salvador to reform its mining laws. The failure of two companies, Pacific Rim Mining Corp. and Commerce Group Corp., to fulfill the requirements of El Salvador’s mining law is at the crux of two recent CAFTA investor-state attacks. According to legal filings, Pacific Rim Mining Corp. failed to submit an adequate environmental feasibility study and thus did not obtain the environmental permit required to qualify for an exploitation concession. With respect to Commerce Group Corp., the firm’s environmental permit was revoked in 2006 for failure to comply with clean-up and other obligations of the permit, according to Salvadoran court documents. While the Commerce Group Corp. claim was recently dismissed on a technicality – the company’s failure to withdraw a concurrent claim from the Salvadoran judicial system – the preliminary stage of the case alone has cost El Salvador over $800,000 in legal fees.

Rather than supporting El Salvador’s commitment to protecting its citizens and environment, the United States, through its current trade policy, is allowing companies to punish the people of El Salvador for pursing those objectives. In addition to what El Salvador has already spent defending its policies against the Commerce Group Corp. claim, Pacific Rim Mining Corp. is demanding over $100 million dollars in compensation from the Salvadoran state – on top of legal fees the government will incur during the process. This is equivalent to approximately .46 percent of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The U.S. equivalent, relative to GDP, is over $67 billion. The Salvadoran government could better spend the millions of dollars at stake by investing in the infrastructure and other development programs needed to promote economic growth and improve fundamental health and education.

It is especially egregious that Pacific Rim Mining Corp. is not even based in a CAFTA-signatory country, but rather in Canada. That the firm was able to file a CAFTA investor-state arbitration case against El Salvador simply by transferring a subsidiary (Pac Rim Cayman LLC) from the Cayman Islands to Nevada sets a dangerous precedent for the environment, public health, and labor rights in all CAFTA signatory countries.

CAFTA undermines democracy

The environmental regulations at stake in El Salvador are precisely the type of policies that, as a Presidential candidate, you pledged to protect in trade agreements. While campaigning, you stated, “With regards to provisions in several FTAs that give foreign investors the right to sue governments directly in foreign tribunals, I will ensure that foreign investor rights are strictly limited and will fully exempt any law or regulation written to protect public safety or promote the public interest.” ^¹

When trade pacts grant expansive corporate rights that impede governments’ abilities to respond to the call of their people for positive environmental and economic policy, they threaten the very principle and practice of democracy and human rights. El Salvador is currently considering whether to protect its natural resources by enacting a national ban on metals mining, similar to the ban recently passed by Costa Rica. The people of El Salvador must be guaranteed the right to determine their country’s environmental policy through the democratic process without threat of retaliation by foreign investors.

Violence against anti-mining activists has been on the rise, with three community leaders who opposed mining assassinated in 2009. While some of the perpetrators of these crimes have been prosecuted, the intellectual authors and financers of these crimes have not yet been identified. Death threats and kidnapping attempts against environmental defenders, journalists and religious leaders in El Salvador who oppose mining continue today.

The Administration should submit an Article 10.22 submission in the Pacific Rim Mining Corp. case

On March 2^nd2011, the communities and member organizations of the Mesa Nacional frente a la Minería Metálica (National Roundtable against Metals Mining), who have been organizing to defend their land and water from the threat of metals mining, presented an amicus curiae brief to the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes tribunal hearing the Pacific Rim Mining Corp. case. As these civil society organizations explained in their brief: “at the heart of this arbitration: the attempt by Pac Rim Cayman to extract compensation as a result of its dissatisfaction with the government’s legitimate exercise on political democracy.”

We believe that the tribunal should take their amicus brief into account, and call on your Administration to similarly weigh in. The State Department’s Office of Legal Affairs has the legal right under CAFTA Chapter 10 to formally intervene and submit a brief in the case as well. We strongly encourage the Administration to file a brief in support of your stated campaign position that the investor rights in trade pacts must not be allowed to undermine public safety and the public interest.

Conclusion

Mr. President, during your upcoming trip, you have an important opportunity to make good on your campaign commitments by offering concrete support to the people of El Salvador in the continued exercise of their sovereign right to develop economic, environmental and social policy that promotes sustainable development. We call on you to:

Publicly state your support for dismissal of the case brought by Pacific Rim Mining Corp. challenging El Salvador’s environmental and safety policies relating to metals mining.

Publicly state your support for the efforts of President Funes and the National Civilian Police to fully investigate the 2009 murders of community activists Marcelo Rivera, Ramiro Rivera, and Dora Sorto, including the extent to which individuals linked to Pacific Rim Mining Corp. were involved; to bring the intellectual authors to justice; and to end the on-going human rights violations against journalists, community organizers and religious leaders in relation to the mining debate in El Salvador.

Publicly state your support for revisions to the existing CAFTA text so as to eliminate the investor-state enforcement mechanism that provides rights for foreign investors to sue sovereign governments and replace the investor-state system with a democratic, transparent, state-state enforcement mechanism that will protect environmental and human rights, rather than endanger them.

Prevent repeating mistakes by eliminating the investor-state private enforcement mechanism in pending free trade agreements with Korea, Panama and Colombia and replace it with a more democratic government- government mechanism, and commit to ensuring that any trade pact that results from Trans-Pacific Partnership Free Trade Agreement negotiations underway similarly does not include investor-state enforcement. The Korea FTA alone would empower over 2,000 cross-registered U.S. and Korean corporate affiliates to challenge U.S. and Korean state and federal environmental policies.

We urge you to act quickly and concretely to support El Salvador’s position with regard to the current CAFTA arbitration and to address the underlying policy issues in CAFTA that threaten the exercise of democracy in our hemisphere.

1 Response to a Pennsylvania Fair Trade Coalition questionnaire, April 2, 2008

Letters From El Salvador: Final day in Huisisilapa

2011-03-23T10:45:00.000-04:00

The next day we awoke to the realization that we were about to
encounter an extremely enthusiastic and talented group of soccer players. A game was scheduled for 9:30 am on the cancha, or field, seemingly the hottest place in the entire
community. A team of Northwest Students (and a few guest players) and a
team of Huisisilapan community members were formed, and the game began,
with many excited spectators. Numerous people, from both sides, opted not to
play, and sat, talking and mingling, in the shade next to the field.
This was preferable, as each time a player would come off the field,
both the sunburn, and sweat soaked clothing was extremely apparent.
However, by some miracle, or by the kindness on behalf of the
Huisisilapan team, the Northwest School prevailed, winning by one goal.

During the game, some of the students documented the finished
photography projects that the families had brought with them down to the
field, because we were going to leave them all behind for the community
to keep. Everyone was curious to see what others had written or drawn,
so a good time was had both on the field, and off.

The rest of the afternoon was primarily dedicated to spending a
few last hours with our families, which at this point, we had gotten to
know quite well. It was a good afternoon spent chatting, going to the
river, and appreciating, for potentially the last time we would ever be
there, our surroundings. I didn’t want to leave my family, and at 2:45,
when I told them I had to go, but didn’t want to, they simply said
“queda”, or “stay”. I wanted to take their offering, to remain, even
for just a few days longer, but obviously that wasn’t an option. We said
goodbye to the majority of our family, and headed off with one of our
new sisters for a farewell gathering on the footbridge near the school.

It was apparent that everyone, from both Northwest and
Huisisilapa, were incredibly grateful and appreciative of their
experience. It was hard to articulate exactly what was learned, what was
gained, but what came naturally was the gratitude, and the many, many
thanks given by all. “No tengo las palabras para este experiencia en
ingles, ni español. Puedo decir solo este: gracias, muchas gracias, para
todo.” (Translation: I don’t have the words for this experience in
English, or in Spanish. I can only say this: thank you, thank you so
much.) The goodbyes were long, and we left about forty minutes later
than planned. It was a great example of what was said at the beginning
of the trip. You may need to accommodate, to remain flexible in the face
of change. We had been changed by our new families, by our experiences,
and the time needed to say goodbye, and to express our thanks, was
taken. All were flexible, all were exhausted, and all were content.

And now, I sit here in the hotel lobby, after a brief dinner and
reflection, myself exhausted, emotionally drained, and excited for
tomorrow. I am so incredibly happy to be here, and as far as I know, as
are all of your children. Upon spending time with our second families,
we remember our own. You are so incredibly important in each of our
lives, and I, on behalf of everyone, thank you. We miss you all!

Sincerely,

A senior, a traveler, an observer

Members of Congress call on Obama to support environmental protection and trade reform in El Salvador

2011-03-22T18:32:00.001-04:00

A press release from CISPES regarding Obama's stay in El Salvador.

Members of Congress, policy experts call on President Obama

to support environmental protection and trade reform in El Salvador

Washington, D.C. & San Salvador - As President Obama travels to El Salvador, leaders in Congress and national policy organizations are calling on him to support the Salvadoran government in protecting the country’s environmental and social rights rather than succumbing to pressure from multinational mining corporations.

Nineteen House Democrats and over 140 environmental, religious, and human rights organizations signed letters to the President asking him to amend investment rules in U.S. trade policy, to prevent corporations from challenging other countries’ regulations through private arbitration. The letters also ask Obama to denounce a $100 million lawsuit by a Canadian mining company, Pacific Rim, against the government of El Salvador for allegedly violating the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA).

“I urge President Obama to offer support for El Salvador’s legitimate right to develop policies protecting human rights and the environment,” said Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), who co-sponsored the congressional letter. “The U.S. should applaud El Salvador’s commitment to promoting the health and well-being of its citizens, and the protection of the environment. Instead, our trade policies enable North American mining companies to sue the Salvadoran government for upholding its legitimate right to protect its air, water, and soil. This is unacceptable; I’m grateful to my colleagues for joining me in calling on the President to raise this issue during his upcoming visit to El Salvador.”

“CAFTA’s flawed investment provisions allow companies to attack common-sense public health and environmental laws as we have witnessed in El Salvador,” said Rachel Ackoff, Sierra Club's Associate Washington Representative for Trade. “As the Obama administration negotiates its first trade deal, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, it must steer away from the failed investment provisions of the past and ensure that future trade agreements live up to the President’s promise of a ‘smart, fair and strong’ trade policy.”

“CAFTA violates the security and sovereignty of our people, as it generates legal conditions under which transnational corporations can sue in an unjust manner,” said Héctor Berríos, with the National Roundtable Against Metallic Mining. “We are asking President Obama to modify the clauses that relate to investment, among others, for all the damage they have caused our population.” Berríos lives in the rural department of Cabañas, where three environmental defenders were murdered in 2009.

Thousands of protestors marched Monday and today in San Salvador, demanding greater respect for Central American sovereignty. Video footage is available.

A copy of the Congressional letter is available here. A copy of the organizational letter is available here.

Social Movement Presents Demands to Obama

2011-03-22T14:03:00.000-04:00

Protest in front of the Salvador del Mundo monument

The MPR-12 Movement along with a number of other groups in the social movement held a march this morning to present their demands to President Obama during his visit to El Salvador. Those demands include:

-Close the U.S. military bases in Central America

-Close the ILEA (U.S. run police training academy in El Salvador)

-Revoke CAFTA

-Respect the rights of immigrants

-Freedom for the 5 Cuban political prisoners in the United States

-Not allow the reintegration of the Coup Government in Honduras into the OAS

-Stop the military agression in Libya

Some photos and quotes from the march:

We are here as the MPR-12 Movement to denouce the Free Trade Agreement, and also so that people know how militarized this whole region is. Obama said that he would demilitarize the region and instead he has increased military presence here, we are here so that people know that.

-Carmen from the Dimas Rodriguez Community in El Paisnal

Repeal CAFTA

For us it is a contradiction that the leftist government here is being so servile to the U.S. government when we still have many great challenges like the Free Trade Agreement that allows North American mining companies to come in and exploit El Salvador. We think that the Free Trade Agreement should be revoked because it has made the situation for farmers in the country much worse.

-Guiselle, from the UST (United Workers Union)

Respect for immigrant rights!!!

One of the reasons that we are here is to ask Obama to respect the rights of immigrants living in the United States. We think that the Salvadorans living in the United States for many years have the right to be there so that they can continue to support their family members. We have the right to be here to peacefully protest since El Salvador is a democracy that allows for these type of gatherings.

-Protester

Stop Bombing Libya!

We think that it is a disgrace that while Obama is visiting Central America, Libya is currently being bombed....These photos that we have here with us are of our martyrs in Honduras. Many of them were disappeared and killed during the coup in Honduras. They were our friends and companians and that is why we remember them.

-Honduran protester

Hondurans killed in the conflict following the 2009 coup

Letter From El Salvador: Day Three- Return to Huisisilapa

2011-03-21T12:27:00.001-04:00

During the delegation, Northwest students and teachers participated in two one-night homestays in the community of Huisisilapa. Families returning from refugee camps in Honduras in 1991 founded the community, starting with a swath of overgrown land, and the few belongings they had brought with them. In the initial years, community members taught students to read under the trees. Today Huisisilapa has elementary school all the way through high school, a dream few rural communities have realized. This next excerpt describes returning to Huisisilapa for the second homestay.   
The next day we arrived earlier than usual, around 9:30 am, after a decent distance traveled to the soundtrack of “The Sound of Music”. We got off the short bus, throats hoarse from a good group sing-a-long, and dispersed to go to our various home stays. That morning the plan was to participate in the Polaroid photography project, in which each family, as well as those who were staying there, had their picture taken. Then each person photographed was asked to attach their image to a piece of paper and write about their personal hopes and dreams, as a form of intercultural and personal exchange within the household. For this morning activity, however, we were only taking the images.

 The large group was split up into three smaller ones, based on where within Huisisilapa you lived. The separate groups walked from house to house, taking images, as well as being able to see the various homes in which their friends were staying. It was a fun opportunity to tour the community, as well as share with those who participated. Walking and talking took up a good portion of the morning, and by the time we returned to our various homes, it was time for lunch.  The food in Huisisilapa is incredibly fresh and delicious. It’s surprisingly inspiring to be sitting in the backyard one minute, looking at the bananas in the trees, and the next minute, seeing it on your plate as you sit for the meal. The families are incredibly kind and observant as to what you like and what you don’t, what you’ve been eyeing, or talking about, and what you haven’t. It reinforces their generosity and kindness.  The afternoon, which initially was chock full of meetings with various groups from within the community, was made more relaxing when many of those meetings were canceled, in favor of rest and time with families during the height of the afternoon heat. Personally, as well as many other students, I spent time with my family by doing the “Hopes and Dreams” Polaroid project with them. Paper was also given to those members in the family who didn’t participate in the photo project, and together we all drew. We had a really good time drawing, writing, and talking together, and before we knew it, it was time for dinner. The project, in my eyes, was very successful in that it brought our family to a level of higher interaction and comprehension. The final products were beautiful to see.  That night, an intercultural exchange was planned for the entire community. We had spent the night before in the hotel rehearsing for our miniature talent show. We brought a wide range of talents to view, such as miming, singing, and various forms of dancing. In Huisisilapa, we all gathered in the courtyard of the school in a large circle. It was a huge turnout from the community, with even a few dogs getting a bit stuck in the crowds, curious to see where everyone was going. The acts were presented in such a way that the students from our group would go, and then those from the community, so that it really was a shuffled presentation of culture. The performances given by the community were great, many dancers performed, including a team of break dancers. A community based rap group also presented a few of their originally written pieces, to which many of the youth knew the words by heart.  The most popular act of our group was the impromptu solo mime performance given by our own mime extraordinaire, Scott Davis. The children were going crazy for the funny guy pushing down an invisible wall and pulling at a rope that wasn’t there. Scott lead the rope to a confused dog, trapped in the center of the circle of spectators. It was funny until the dog stopped running away, and started to come at him. In any case, it was popular with almost everyone, as were the other student performances.  Afterwards, another dance was held in the same courtyard. I don’t know what was said about the first dance, but I’ll just say that it’s pretty hard to have a dance when you’re the only one dancing, and there’s about fifty people staring at you. In any case, this time it was extremely different. Everyone in the community, especially the youth, joined us in dancing for hours. Many students found a nightlong dance partner, whether in another student, a community student, or one of the many young children who really, REALLY love to dance. It was an incredibly fun event that relaxed some of the social stiffness that we had encountered during the prior visit/dance.

First Success Against Commerce Group!

2011-03-16T00:44:00.003-04:00

Great news everyone! The ICSID (International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes) has discarded one of the suits filed against El Salvador by Commerce Group! This is a small but important success for the government and people of El Salvador in keeping mining and its negative health and environmental effects out of its country. We want to send a huge thank you to all of those who called, sent letters, e-mails, and faxes to the Commerce Group- you have helped the Salvadoran people win one part of the battle, but it still not over! The urgency against other mining companies like Pacific Rim continues! Please continue your support as we continue our support of the Salvador people against mining.

For more information see the Decision here

Letter From El Salvador: Day Two- Sihua Batucada

2011-03-16T00:31:00.000-04:00

In the afternoon of the 26th, Northwest students and teachers met with an empowered group of young women receives trainings in sexual and reproductive health from the Institute of the Woman, IMU. These young women have also formed their own drum band, the Sihua Batucada. SHARE supports these women with partial high school scholarships.

After a full morning of exchange, we continued to Suchitoto,

where we shared a particularly good lunch with a group of young

Salvadoran women who, not only go from town to town talking about sexual

and reproductive rights in the face of criticism, but also have their

own drum and dance group called Sihua Batucada. We got to know a little

bit about them through intermingling between chewing at the lunch table,

but even more so when they presented their cause through a presentation.

This was a particularly interesting meeting, primarily because El

Salvador is a notoriously religious country; the country’s name means

“The Savior”, or Jesus Christ. In such a strong presence of religion,

talking about sexual and reproductive rights, as well as sexuality, can

be considered “taboo”. Abortion is illegal here, and re-emphasized as

such many times in the national constitution. The women talked about

this challenge, and how they have been criticized on numerous occasions.

At one point, the criticism and lies being spread about them were so

strong that they thought the group would have to stop meeting.

Fortunately, they overcame the negative attention, and now pride in informing women (and men) all over about their sexual rights, pregnancy prevention, sexuality, and the issue of violence toward women. At one point, a member of our group brought up the question of

homosexuality: Is it illegal? If not, is the gay lesbian population as

marginalized as it is in the US? The answer was that no, homosexuality

is not illegal, but the population is most definitely marginalized, and

even more so, targeted. Last year, there were a number of assassinations

within the gay and lesbian community, which has rightly prompted a

stronger movement for sexual rights. The group fully supports this

movement, informing and assisting communities about the rights of all,

straight, lesbian, gay, or otherwise.

Unfortunately, the group is prohibited to speak at a number of

schools; some older members of communities frown on their work, saying,

quite falsely, that the girls only want to go from town to town so that

they can have many boyfriends at once. Of course this isn’t true, but

sadly, it is what they face in light of their work. After being

inspired by their perseverance, they honored us with a drum/dance

performance in the grass behind the restaurant. It was great; various

students learned to play the drums and participated with the group,

while other members of the delegation danced along. It was a very good

time had by all. What was really amazing was to think that the majority

of these girls are only 16 or 17 years old. They have an incredibly

clear vision and sense of self worth, an incredible talent for the drum,

and are quite an inspiration in the face of adversity.

Letter from El Salvdor: Day One- Scholarship Youth Assembly

2011-03-11T13:55:00.001-05:00

February 20th to March 4th, twenty-four high school juniors and seniors along with five teachers from the Northwest School in Seattle Washington joined SHARE for a thirteen-day delegation. The Northwest School has strong roots in social justice, and has been in partnership with SHARE and our sister organization UCRES for several years now. For the past two weeks, Northwest students had the opportunity to interact with Salvadorans their age who are active leaders in their communities, to meet with members of various organizations working towards justice in many areas, to visit the community of Huisisilapa and stay with families, and to travel to Cabañas to learn the latest in the struggle against mining, amongst other things. During the delegation, the teachers wrote home to the students' parents every couple of nights to share events and emotions. One night, one of the students wrote the letter home. Over the next few days we will share excerpts of her letter.

For the first excerpt, on February 26th, the delegation spent the morning with high school and college students who SHARE and sistering groups like Northwest support in their studies and leadership development lead by UCRES, one of SHARE's counterparts.

UCRES, or the Union of Rural Communities of Northern San Salvador and La Libertad, UCRES was founded in March of 1991 when refugees and displaced communities living in the neighboring countries of Honduras and Nicaragua and in other areas of El Salvador decided to return to their places of origin. UCRES became the representative of these communities in the Northern zone of San Salvador and La Libertad. These communities organized with the goal of advocating for respect for civil and political rights and to be considered for development programs. UCRES works with 34 communities in the municipalities of San Pablo Tacachico, El Paisnal, Aguilares, and Guazapa.

UCRES scholarship youth assembly

Hello all-

     For the first time this trip, the email sent to all curious and potentially worried parents is written from the perspective of a student traveler, one of your very own children. Many others besides myself I’m sure would be very excited to write to you all, and I am honored to be doing so now.

     The past three days have been rich; full of cultural, personal, and factual exchange. On the 27th (Saturday), our group was allowed the honor of attending the UCRES student scholarship gathering in Augilares. We had been hosting two of the very same students for the previous two days, and it was very interesting to see their peers, many of whom are close to us in age. Beyond simply seeing the other students, we did a variety of activities that allowed us to all get to know one another. In small groups of various students, from both Northwest and El Salvador, we shared what we enjoy doing, what challenges we face day to day, and our hopes for the future.

     I especially enjoyed this part of the activity because I found, like many others, that our group and the scholarship students shared many of the same dreams: to go to university, have a family, and to learn as much as possible, among others. After the exchange, each small group presented to everyone present. It became obvious that we found ourselves reflected within these students that we had never met before, that spoke a different language, and more obviously, we found our differences. It is our differences that make us unique, and sharing some of the variation in activities we enjoy, as well as challenges we face in our everyday lives, was enlightening.

Amicus Brief: Environmental and Human Rights Impacts of Mining

2011-03-11T12:45:00.003-05:00

Dear SHARE community,

We continue our support of the anti-mining groups in El Salvador. Many of our delegations have witnessed first hand the health risks, human rights violations, and environmental impacts that mining can cause. We realize the importance this issue has to our base of supporters and would like to share with you all what could be a very helpful case against mining in El Salvador.
(If you would like to read this and other articles in Spanish, please visit our Spanish Blog)

Amicus Brief Highlights the Environmental and Human Rights Impacts of Mining in $77 Million Investment Arbitration Case

Washington, DC: On March 2, 2011, the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), on behalf of civil society organizations of the Mesa Nacional Frente a la Minería Metálica (Mesa), filed an amicus curiae brief in the Pac Rim Cayman LLC v. Republic of El Salvador case, currently being heard at the International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID). The Mesa is a coalition of human rights and environmental organizations working to ban metals mining in El Salvador.

The amicus curiae brief emphasizes the devastating impact on the local environment and on the human rights of the people that depend upon that environment. Moreover, the investor failed to adequately assess the environmental impacts of the mine. Widespread community opposition to mining has led the government of El Salvador to recognize the destructive environmental and social impacts that metals mining poses. This recognition has spurred the country to impose a moratorium on new mining permits.

The ICSID Tribunal will decide whether the government of El Salvador will be forced to pay $77 million to an investor for denying a permit for its El Dorado Mine. Pac Rim Cayman LLC, a U.S. subsidiary of a Canadian mining company, filed claims against El Salvador under the Dominican Republic-Central American Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA).

The amicus brief notes that the Canadian Pacific Rim company relocated its subsidiary from the Cayman Islands to Reno, Nevada, to bring the claim after the permit was denied. According to Saúl Baños from FESPAD in El Salvador, “This relocation fundamentally invalidates the company’s claim.”

The amicus brief points out that the case does not involve a “legal dispute” under the ICSID Convention, or a “measure” under DR-CAFTA, but rather simply reflects the investor’s dissatisfaction with the democratic political process concerning mining’s deleterious impacts and sustainable development in El Salvador. “Pac Rim is trying to dictate El Salvador’s environment and social policy using CAFTA’s arbitration mechanism,” said CIEL’s Dr. Marcos Orellana, “Pac Rim’s claim amounts to an abuse of process.”

The civil society member organizations of the Mesa that filed the amicus brief include: Asociación Amigos de San Isidro Cabañas(ASIC); Asociación de Comunidades para el Desarrollo de Chalatenango (CCR); Asociación de Desarrollo Económico Y Social (ADES); Asociación para El Desarrollo de El Salvador (CRIPDES); Comité Ambiental de Cabañas (CAC); Fundación de Estudios para la Aplicación del Derecho (FESPAD); Unidad Ecológica Salvadoreña (UNES); and Movimiento Unificado Francisco Sánchez 1932 (MUFRAS 32).

About Mesa

The Mesa Nacional Frente a la Minería (known as the National Roundtable on Mining) is a broad-based coalition of community-based organizations, research institutes, environmental and faith-based groups at the forefront of a national campaign to ban metals mining in El Salvador. In 2005, after learning about the negative impacts of mining to communities in Honduras and Guatemala, communities from Cabañas and Chalatenango organized themselves as the "Mesa" against the Canadian mining corporation, Pacific Rim. Local and national environmental, religious, legal, and grassroots organizations have joined as they became aware of the environmental degradation, health problems, and labor rights abuses that come with mining. As a result of their fight against mining in El Salvador, the Mesa members have received violent threats, some resulting into death, in order to stop their activism.

About CIEL

Founded in 1989, the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), www.ciel.org, is committed to strengthening and using international law and institutions to protect the environment, promote human health, and ensure a just and sustainable society. With offices in Washington, DC and Geneva, CIEL’s staff of international attorneys work in the areas of human rights and the environment, climate change, law and communities, chemicals, trade and the environment, international environmental governance, biodiversity and wildlife and international financial institutions by providing legal counsel and advocacy, policy research and capacity building. CIEL also directs a joint research and teaching program with The American University’s Washington College of Law, focused on international and comparative environmental law, as well as offering internships and fellowships to educate the next generation of international environmental advocates.

Contact: Dr. Marcos Orellana, Center for International Environmental Law, (202) 742-5847, or morellana@ciel.org.

Romero Justice Week 2011

2011-03-01T11:55:00.000-05:00

Dear friends,

As February comes to a close and we enter into March, here at the SHARE Foundation we remind ourselves to pause, to fully appreciate the living, breathing legacy of Archbishop Oscar Romero. We invite you to join us by planning an event or space to come together in solidarity with the Salvadoran people in celebration of Romero's life, his dedication to the poor and marginalized of El Salvador and the world, and his untiring denouncement of the structures of injustice and oppression. To offer ideas and materials for commemoration and reflection, we have created the Romero Week Packet, They Must Be Educated for Love; Romero's Legacy and the Right to Education. (click the link to download the packet)

On this 31st anniversary of Monseñor Romero's death, we have an opportunity to honor his legacy and recognize those that continue to walk in his footsteps. In honoring the incredible example of love and justice that he laid his life down for, we can celebrate Romero's life by raising awareness around one of the keys to creating sustainable development in El Salvador today: access to education. The Romero Week Packet includes information on Romero's legacy; the struggle to access quality education; examples of transformative education in El Salvador today, a sample spiritual service; quotes, prayers, reflections, discussion questions and ideas for action.

We would love to hear what kind of events you are planning in your area and how we can support you. If you have any questions or would like accompaniment in planning and carrying out your gathering, please contact me at bethany@share-elsalvador.org. Please distribute this packet as widely as possible to all those you think may be interested in learning about Romero, supporting transformative education in El Salvador, or planning an event or activity of their own.

With the organized poor of El Salvador, SHARE continues to seek sustainable alternatives and citizen empowerment to support the struggle against continued economic repression and political violence. We hope you will continue with us this year and for many years to come. “We must train children and youth to analyze the reality of their country. May we prepare them to be agents of transformation… They must be educated for love.”

Blessings y abrazos,

Bethany Loberg

Solidarity Accompaniment Coordinator

Sugar Cane Burning, Pesticide Use and Organizing in the Bajo Lempa Make the International News!

2011-02-22T18:55:00.002-05:00

Dear SHARE Friends and Community,

As many of you know, years of chemical pesticides and sugar cane burning in the Bajo Lempa region of El Salvador have put the health and lives of thousands of families at risk. Renal failure is a serious problem that has taken the lives of countless community leaders and friends and until very recently, this situation wasn't national news in El Salvador, despite community organizing against chemical pesticides and alarming rates of dialysis and death. The Bajo Lempa is one of the areas most devastatingly affected by flooding on an almost yearly basis; a two-decades effort for prevention and mitigation projects has finally resulted in concrete actions on the part of the government, but the struggle continues.

Given this situation, we're excited to share with you all this great in-depth article on Al-Jazeera English about the situation in the Bajo Lempa. While the article is focused on one of the many community-based organizations working for environmental protection, advocacy for public works, healthcare rights, education, and organic agriculture, it does a great talking about the general situation in an area where SHARE has worked for many, many years: with the Women's Cattle Cooperative and CRIPDES San Vicente.

Following is a short excerpt; please read Climate: Putting People Over Money for more!

A movement with teeth
Alonzo Sosa with the environmental unit of the Mayor's office of the Municipality of Tecoluca is part of the Movement for the Defence of Life and Natural Resources.

"We started this movement two and a half years ago because of the rampant health problems people in our communities were experiencing due to the unsafe farming practises of the industrial farmers, like the sugarcane producers," Sosa told Al Jazeera.

"The chemicals they use, contaminating our water, overuse of land and widespread kidney failure, this is all very serious. So now, we are pushing for better farming practises, trying to eliminate these chemicals and burning, because it damages our biodiversity."

According to Sosa, "It's not just environmental units in local governments that will solve this crisis. We need local governments, journalists, communities, everyone. The only requirement to join our movement is for you to care for the environment and our resources."

Needless to say, the larger producers of sugarcane in El Salvador have not met the movement's requests with open arms.

"The bigger producers are carrying out these atrocious practises, because they are only interested in their own capital and profit," Sosa added, "We are in a constant struggle with the cane operators who desire perpetual expansion."

Public Opinion Poll in El Salvador

2011-02-10T12:17:00.001-05:00

The University of Technology in El Salvador has conducted its public opinion poll through the Center of Investigations covering political, economic, and social aspects (February 4-6, 2011)

According to the opinion polls taken this month in El Salvador, about 70% of the population agrees that the most typical forms of crime are juvenile delinquency, theft, and extortion. However, even though a large portion of the population believes the country is dominated by crime (82.3%), only 30% of the population has ever been a victim of such crimes. Another pressing issue for the Salvadoran community is their economic situation. 58% of families have at least one person of age that is currently unemployed, and of those 58%, 58% have not held a job in over a year. Most Salvadorans agree that crime and their economic status are the most difficult situations they currently facing.
When dealing with these crimes, the Salvadoran community chooses to trust more in the Armed Forces for protection that the PNC alone. 60% of the population agrees that either the Armed Forces alone, or the Armed Forces patrolling along side of the PNC is more favorable to the PNC patrolling on their own. This shows that the Salvadoran community is responding well to suggestions made by President Mauricio Funes.
As to who Salvadorans will vote for in upcoming elections, 70% of the population agrees that Mauricio Funes is popular due to his style of governing. However, when asked whether he is taking the country in the right direction, almost half say yes and the other half say he is not. When looking at who the population will potentially vote for during the elections for mayor and other representatives, there is about a 10% difference in favor of FMLN over ARENA.

To read this opinion poll and for more information, please visit the Center of Investigations for the Public Opinion of El Salvador

Social Panorama of Latin America

2011-02-08T14:31:00.001-05:00

Cesar Villalona, a prestigious international economist, gives us a breakdown of the reports done by CEPAL (Economic Commission for Latin American, of the United Nations) covering the social panorama in Latin America for 2010.

The report discusses the changing rates of poverty in Latin America, the factors leading to these changes, and the economic effects these changes are having. The growing inequality between countries is one of the biggest findings in this report. As one will notice, graph 1.2 (p. 4) shows the variation in the cost of food increase, which has been relatively low for El Salvador, and relatively high in countries like Bolivia and Chile. However, when we compare the rates of poverty change from 2002 to 2009 on graph 1.3 (p. 9), countries like Chile, Bolivia, but especially those of Argentina and Venezuela have been able to decrease their poverty levels by large percentages. In 2002, Argentina's poverty rates were about 45%, whereas now in 2009 they are at a low of only about 11%.
El Salvador, on the other hand, has only decreased its poverty rates by 1% (48.9% in 2002 to 47.9% in 2009); the lowest change in all of Latina America! So we can see that, even though the cost of food has not increased dramatically in El Salvador, the rates of poverty are also not changing, but are in fact staying relatively high in comparison to other countries.

To read the report and for more information please click HERE

Action Alert: Support Anti-Mining Activists

2011-02-02T17:00:00.000-05:00

Our allies in the Cabañas environmental movement as well as the National Roundtable Against Metallic Mining (the Mesa) are very concerned about a recent wave of death threats and crimes against members of El Salvador’s anti-mining movement as well as other violent crimes recently committed in Cabañas. Similar crimes in 2009 that went uninvestigated, including robberies, kidnappings, and death threats against members of Radio Victoria, ADES, ASIC, and the CAC – all active organizations in Cabañas’ mining resistance –were a prelude to the murders of three activists, Marcelo Rivera, Ramiro Rivera and Dora Alicia Sorto Recinos. Please read more in-depth reports here and here.

Therefore, our allies are extremely concerned that the on-going state of impunity not only encourages the recent threats and crimes but could lead to more violence and murders in the near future.

Current situation:
•    In the middle of the night on January 11, a written death threat was pushed under the front door of community radio station Radio Victoria despite supposed 24-hour police security. The authors claim to be an “extermination group” and offer large sums of money to the radio if they “stop making trouble,” including to stop reporting on mining. If they don’t, the group says they will murder the radio’s three “loudest mouths,” Elvis Zavala, Pablo Ayala, and Manuel Navarrete.

•    On January 23, Mesa member and activist from MUFRAS-32 Hector Berríos received phone calls to his home and his cell phone from an unidentified person who claimed to have been hired to kill Hector or a member of his family.

•    This month, employees of CEICOM, a member organization of the Mesa, have been victims of two robberies in which a vehicle and important organizational documents were stolen. In 2010, while traveling to regional anti-mining conferences, CEICOM employees were robbed on one occasion and kidnapped, robbed and left tied up on a separate occasion in Guatemala.

•    Two young people in Cabañas who were connected to the June 2009 murder of Marcelo Rivera have been killed. Darwin Serrano, who participated in the murder but was released from prison as a minor, was attacked and killed on December 20. Gerardo Abrego León, who testified in the trial that convicted and sentenced the material authors of Marcelo Rivera’s murder, was killed on January 2. Read more analysis here.

Background:
All of the death threats, kidnappings, robberies from 2009 remain in impunity. While material authors have been found guilty and sentenced in the murder cases, there have been no investigations of the intellectual authors of the murders or the relationship of the crimes to the victims’ involvement in the anti-mining movement.

Our allies in El Salvador believe the negligence of El Salvador’s Office of the Attorney General, particularly the lack of investigation into who is ordering the attacks, has created a climate of impunity that empowers the structures carrying out this systematic campaign against the social movement to continue with their threats, violence, and potentially murders.

Please join us in taking action now to demand that the Attorney General properly investigate these crimes and that the government provide sufficient protection for members of the anti-mining movement.

TAKE ACTION TODAY!

1)    Send an email to Salvadoran Attorney General Romeo Barahona to demand an immediate and exhaustive investigation.
2)    Send an email to David Morales, Director of Human Rights at the Ministry of Foreign Relations to demand specialized police protection for those being threatened.
If you speak Spanish, please also call Lic. Barahona to call for an exhastive investigation and Lic. Morales to call for adequate police protection today.
Call Script for Attorney General Barahona, Fiscal General de la República at 011-503-2230-6350 (direct number of his assistant, Hector Burgos)
Buenos días/tardes. Mi nombre es_______________________ y llamo para expresar mi preocupación sobre las nuevas amenazas contra líderes sociales y la violencia en Cabañas. Los casos de la Radio Victoria, Hector Berrios, y CEICOM son realmente asombrosos. Urge una investigación profunda sobre las amenazas de unos que se ha identificado como “un grupo de exterminio,” así que también que es necesario re-abrir los casos de Marcelo Rivera, Dora Alicia Sorto y Ramiro Rivera para investigar vínculos entre estos caso, las nuevas amenazas y los asesinatos de Darwin Serrano y Gerardo Abrego León. El hecho de que la violencia y amenazas anteriores quedaron en impunidad ha permitido que surgieran los nuevos casos de violencia. Pido que el Fiscal General tome las medidas necesarias para asegurar justicia y protección para los afectados.
Call Script for David Morales, Director of Human Rights at Foreign Affairs Ministry, 011-503-2231-1143

Buenos días/tardes. Mi nombre es_______________________ y llamo para expresar mi profunda preocupación sobre las amenazas al personal de la Radio Victoria. Por esta razón le pido que tome todas las medidas necesarias para cambiar la clasificación de las medidas cautelares para el personal de la Radio Victoria de Protección de Victimas a Protección de Personas Importantes. También, pido que extiendan las medidas cautelares a Pablo Ayala, Manuel Navarrete y Elvis Zabala, quienes han sido identificados como blancos en las últimas amenazas. Gracias.

Thank you for standing in solidarity with the Salvadoran people.

Drew Theological Seminary in El Salvador

2011-02-01T16:51:00.000-05:00

For the first few weeks of 2011, SHARE received a delegation from the Drew Theological Seminary in Madison, New Jersey. Nine students and two professors spent two weeks learning about communities express their faith here in El Salvador. Listed below are some of their favorite quotes taken from the various individuals and groups we met with while they were here.

"We cannot do this without people in our community."

-Radio Victoria talking about continuing their work despite recieving death threats

"People are not looking for the American dream, they are fleeing the Central American nightmare."

-Dean Brackley S.J. about immigration

"We must keep fighting."

-Lupe, a women from San Ramon whose community is at high risk of mudslides from the San Salvador volcano

"I pray to God to open the doors for you and bless you everywhere you go because if he blesses you it is like blessing us."

-Women from the Emmanuel squatter community in Santa Ana

"Before we knew who the enemy was but now we don't have any idea of who the enemy is or where it is. That takes away our capacity to be united because we don't know who is with us and who is against us."

-Member of San Ramon base community talking about the difference between violence in the war and now

"No country or church can develop with ignorant or sick people."

-Anglican Bishop Martin Barahona

"The pastoral importance of availability is that we must be defenders of life."

-Member of San Ramon base community

"Attacking the environment is attacking humanity."

-Reporter from Radio Victory

"Another America is possible."

-Worker at ASIC in San Isidro, Cabañas

"How are we going to be community if we don't know what community is?"

-Head of Baptist Seminary in Santa Ana

"God's creation is reclaiming us to work for this justice."

-Lutheran Bishop Medardo Gomez

"The price of food communicates that we do not all have the right to eat."

-Member of San Ramon base community

"We are a church that dreams."

-Baptist minister Ruth de Orantes in Santa Ana

"The kingdom of God isn't something far off in the future, it is a way of living."

-Rick Jones, from Catholic Relief Services

Spotlighting Sisters: St. Sebastian and Teosinte

2011-01-31T11:11:00.000-05:00

Garden of Love Deeply Planted: St. Sebastian Parish and Teosinte

by Phelia Lorenzen, SHARE Supporter

To think that in 1991, a citywide delegation from Milwaukee to El Salvador planted the first seed for St. Sebastian Parish to partner with Teosinte — a small, isolated village high in the hills of Chalatenago.

At the time, Teosinte, a repatriated community from a refugee camp in Honduras, was only three years old. In great need. Fifty-two families, starting from scratch to farm the mountainous hills of the area, had begun a long journey to create a viable, sustainable, cohesive community. St. Sebastian people’s hearts were touched, and a strong, loving partnership began and continues to strengthen. The garden flourishes.

St. Sebastian immediately adopted the “three pillars of accompaniment” that were the guidelines of The SHARE Foundation (coordinator for sistering programs in El Salvador): physical accompaniment, spiritual accompaniment, and financial support.

Physical accompaniment takes form in many ways with St. Sebastian. They arrange regular delegations to the community so delegates can walk the garden — live in home stays with the families, play with the children, dialogue with the Directiva, taste new foods, hang out with the kids, and share mass, along with general community fiestas. At home in Milwaukee, the Teosinte/El Salvador Committee prints a quarterly newsletter for all parishioners that includes events in Teosinte and personal letters from community members and scholarship recipients. It provides information on national events in El Salvador that affect Teosinte, such as human rights, mining issues, trade issues, and elections. In advocacy, the parish devotes time to Romero week, and it embraces U.S. issues such as shutting down the School of the Americas where so many graduates murdered and disappeared Salvadorans during the hateful civil war of the 1980’s. This is an active parish, ready to walk with the residents of Teosinte on whatever level is needed. Nothing seems to diminish the nurturing of this garden.

St. Sebastian walks a very spiritual path with Teosinte. Their faith is deep, and they share common beliefs with the Salvadorans. When in Teosinte, they share songs and services in the parish, they pray with the community, and they share their hearts and deep hopes for the community with everyone. At home in Milwaukee, there are steady reminders of this partnership. They have a special “Teosinte Corner” in their gathering place where letters and photos are posted. They write weekly petitions of current news of Teosinte and El Salvador in general for all to read. And what is especially beautiful? Each year during Lent in their parish in Milwaukee, they walk the “Salvadoran Stations of the Cross” at exactly the same time Teosinte is walking the Stations of the Cross in their little parish! This garden is steadily fertilized with faith and love.

Along with faith, St. Sebastian is very practical. They know that financial support is imperative to help the community grow in dignity and empowerment. Therefore, over the years they have supported the building of homes for the residents to live comfortably, and they have completed the building of a new church, which is a center piece/community gathering place for all. In addition, St. Sebastian helps to support a sewing enterprise. They help provide a U.S. market for a variety of sewn goods, with the profits being fed back into Teosinte as material aid or used to support delegations. Importantly, the parish feeds into a provision of the Archdiocese of Milwaukee that allows their Mission Sunday donations to be used for projects in Teosinte and within the region through SHARE’s regional projects. Finally, one of the greatest gifts of all is financial support for education, both in the form of scholarships and advocacy training for the community. They have celebrated students graduating in computers, teaching, nursing, business, and law! The garden grows and spreads across the region.

One cannot “report” the existence of the heart and soul of this relationship. In fact, the rewards and effects of this partnership can best be expressed by the parishioners themselves. Below are a few quotes that capture the depth of this relationship:

Father Dick Allen, priest of St. Sebastian who was profoundly affected by the general poverty in spite of having basic necessities: “…but usually just the barest minimum and always on the brink of falling apart. The challenge for me right now and out into the future of my ministry is to continue to confront the injustices in El Salvador…and to bring about justice wherever and however I can.”

Rhonda VanPembrook, recent delegate: “What came as a surprise, however, was the realization that truly more important to the people of Teosinte are the gifts of our solidarity, friendship and shared faith. They are like pillars of joy, inspiration and strength that lift and support the spirit and work of the Teosinte community.”

David Goehner, reflection from 1999 visit: At a mass in a then war-damaged Parish, the delegates were to sing to the congregation “Pan de Vida.” But night fell quickly, the church was dark, and they could not read the words. “The high school girls and women of the choir picked up the candles around the altar and stood among us, shining the light and helping us sing. I will never forget that connection…I believe sometimes God reaches down and touches us directly with His/Her finger…and I’m pretty sure God touched me in Teosinte.”

Jackie Swietlik, Senior, University of Wisconsin-Madison: “This trip reinforced my belief in the importance of living life as a global citizen. One cannot live life fully if they are stuck in the belief that what they do here and now does not affect other people around the globe and in the future.”

Karly Swietlik, Junior, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, captures the spontaneity and fun of it all! “All of us arrived (at Teosinte) in the back of an open air pick up truck! The entire village was waiting, cheering, and sending off firecracker(s) with welcome signs hanging. I had no idea I could feel so much love from people that I had never met before. I celebrated my 17^th birthday in Teosinte and never had such a great birthday as the community gave me!”

Beth Hammer, former delegate: “Often times people go to various parts of the world on mission trips to build something (homes/churches) or provide a specific service (i.e. Healthcare). People traveling to and from Teosinte are building something more fragile yet more enduring than any building. They, we, are focused on building relationships. Our work is driven by the commitment to sustain a relationship that is reciprocal in which we all learn from each other.”

This garden of love is deeply planted. It spreads throughout Teosinte and the parish of St. Sebastian. It is planted and nurtured with so much faith and love every day, month, and year, that it yields harvests of bonded hearts year after year after year. To St. Sebastian, we shout, “Hurrah!”

------------------------------------------------

Many thanks to Beth Hammer who provided most of the material, along with sending quotes from delegates, and arranging for newsletters to be read for background and information.

Photos

1) St. Sebastian Delegation by the Teosinte River in 2007

2) Monica from Teosinte visiting the Saint Sebastian food pantry in Milwaukee

3) St. Sebastian students in front of a banner they made for Teosinte

4) Teosinte students welcoming the St. Sebastian delegation

5) St. Sebastian Delegation in Teosinte

Action Alert: Activist receives death threat

2011-01-25T16:23:00.000-05:00

Amnesty International Action Alert

Hector Berríos, a community activist and human rights lawyer in Cabañas, a department of El Salvador, received death threats by phone on 23 January. Amnesty International believes he is being targeted for his human rights work, and is at risk.

On 23 January, at 12.20 pm Hector Berríos received a phone call on his landline from an unknown man who claimed to be a friend, and asked where Hector was. Around a minute later, the same person called Hector Berríos’ mobile phone, saying that they had been paid a lot of money to kill him, or a member of his family “Nos han pagado mucho dinero para asesinarte…ya sea a vos o a uno de tu familia”. The man continued by saying “We have been watching you in San Isidro and Mejicanos, we have got you close, look, we know you work for the people” (“…Te hemos estado observando en San Isidro y Mejicanos, te tenemos cerca, mira sabemos que trabajas para la gente…”). The caller made an offer to Hector Berríos: if Hector withdrew from his work, they would not kill him. At this point Hector Berríos put the phone down.

The previous day, on 22 January, starting at 10.00 pm Hector Berríos received ten anonymous phone calls. He has not received further calls.

Hector Berríos' activism in his community has resulted in threats and intimidation before, due to his campaigns against mining, impunity and his legal defence of human rights activists. Hector Berríos has received threats on previous occasions. On 7 October 2009, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) ruled that El Salvador should provide protection to Hector Berríos. However, despite the demands from the IACHR, Hector Berríos has not yet received appropriate protection, and remains at risk.

PLEASE ACT QUICKLY. Use Spanish or your own language to create a personal appeal.

* Urge the authorities to take immediate steps to fully comply with the IACHR order of 7 October 2009. The form of protection provided to Hector Berríos must be agreed with him and reflect his own wishes.
* Call for an independent, thorough and impartial investigation into the threats against Hector Berríos, with the results made public and those responsible brought to justice.

ADDRESS YOUR MESSAGES TO:

Attorney General:

Romeo Benjamín Barahona Meléndez
Fiscal General de la República
Fiscalía General de la República
Final 4ª Calle Oriente y 19ª Avenida Sur, Residencial Primavera,
Santa Tecla, La Libertad
San Salvador, El Salvador
Fax: 011 503 2523 7409
Salutation: Estimado Sr. Fiscal / Dear Attorney General

Human Rights Director, Ministry of Foreign Affairs:

David Morales
Director General de Derechos Humanos
Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores
Calle El Pedregal, Blvd. Cancillería
Ciudad Merliot, Antiguo Cuscatlan
El Salvador
Fax: 011 503 2231 1152
Salutation: Estimado Director / Dear Director

AND PLEASE SEND A COPY TO

Sra Ana Coralia Mejía de Morot-Gaudry
Chargé d'Affaires, Embassy of El Salvador
209 Kent Street
Ottawa, Ontario K2P 1Z8
Fax: (613) 238-6940
E-mail: embajada@elsalvador-ca.org

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Amnesty International has issued various Urgent Actions on the situation of human rights defenders in the Cabañas department of El Salvador in 2009 and 2010.

Gustavo Marcelo Rivera, an environmental activist, was killed on 30 June 2009. Later on that year, his brother Ramiro Rivera, a community leader who campaigned against mining in the area and against impunity in his brother’s case, survived an armed attack in August and was eventually killed in December. Also in August 2009, Héctor Antonio Garcia Berríos was warned by a man he knew that if he and Gustavo Marcelo Rivera's brother, Miguel Rivera continued campaigning for justice for the murder, their lives would be at risk. (UA 223/09 Index: AMR 29/001/2009 of 27 August 2009).

On 26 December 2009, another member of the Cabañas Environment Committee was killed. Dora Alicia Recinos Sorto, who was eight months pregnant, was shot dead, and her two-year-old child was wounded. (UA 223/09 Index: AMR 29/001/2010 Update of 4 January 2010).

<><><><><><><><>
Optional action: You may wish to sign the Stop Secret Trials in Canada petition at http://www.harkatstatement.com/

If you’re between 15 and 25 and interested in attending Amnesty’s Human Rights College and Annual Meeting in Montreal from May 25-29, request the application form.
<><><><><><><><>
Urgent Action Office Amnesty International Canada
1992 Yonge St, 3rd floor Toronto, Ontario M4S 1Z7
(416) 363 9933 ext 325 / Fax (416) 363 3103 / About the Urgent Action Network
<><><><><><><><>

If you can't get through, EMAIL the COMMERCE GROUP TODAY!

2011-01-14T12:01:00.000-05:00

It seems the ICSID tribunal has asked for more time before deciding about whether the Commerce Group case will move forward. The decision will be issued this month. That is why it's important to send a clear message demanding that the company to drop the suit.

If you can't get through on the phone, please send email to: info@commercegroupcorp.com.

SAMPLE EMAIL
Hello.

My name is _______________(if you are a Milwaukee or Wisconsin resident, say so up front!) and I have been following Commerce Group's lawsuit against the government of El Salvador.

I am calling on Ed Machulak and the Board of Directors to respect the right of the government of El Salvador to protect the environment and the health of the people near the San Sebastian mine by immediately withdrawing your lawsuit against the government of El Salvador.

It is deplorable that the government of El Salvador is under attack for protecting the health and safety of its people. If anything, it is Commerce Group who should be paying for the toxic legacy that has been left behind

I will be telling my friends and neighbors about the damage you are causing, as well as calling on my Congressional Representatives to take action.

Thank you.

Action Alert: Call on the Commerce Group to Withdraw their Shameful Lawsuit against El Salvador!

2011-01-10T16:43:00.000-05:00

On January 13 the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) of the World Bank will announce their decision about whether the lawsuit brought by the Commerce Group will proceed to the next phase.

On JANUARY 14, 2011:

Let's send a clear message to the Commerce Group: Withdraw your shameful lawsuit against El Salvador!

On Wednesday, December 29, 2010, four members (Steve Watrous, Al Gedicks, Babette Grunow and Dan Kasun) of the Midwest Coalition Against Lethal Mining (MCALM) met with John Machulak, an attorney with Machulak, Robertson & Sodos, and brother of Commerce Group's Chairman and CEO Edward Machulak to ask him to withdraw the $100 million lawsuit against El Salvador. He refused.

As Dan Kasun observed, "It appeared obvious that the comments by John Machulak throughout the meeting either attempted to minimize culpability or prove willfully ignorant of the obvious environmental and health impact of the Commerce Group's mining operations."

At the conclusion of the meeting, we promised that if they did not withdraw the lawsuit brought against El Salvador under the foreign investor "protections" of the U.S.-Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA) that we would continue our campaign of public education and political pressure.

We need you to stand in solidarity with El Salvador's struggle against corporate extortion, neocolonialism, and environmental racism.

Please call the Commerce Group's Milwaukee office phone (414) 462-5310 on Friday, January 14, 2011 and tell them to drop the lawsuit against the government of El Salvador.

SAMPLE CALL SCRIPT:

Hello. My name is _______________(if you are a Milwaukee or Wisconsin resident, say so up front!) and I have been following Commerce Group's lawsuit against the government of El Salvador. I am calling on Ed Machulak and the Board of Directors to respect the right of the government of El Salvador to protect the environment and the health of the people near the San Sebastian mine by immediately withdrawing your lawsuit against the government of El Salvador.

I will be telling my friends and neighbors about the damage you are causing, as well as calling on my Congressional Representatives to take action. Thank you.

Celebrating a successful 2010!

2010-12-31T10:00:00.026-05:00

As 2010 comes to a close, SHARE is excited to be celebrating another successful year. 2010 has been full of events worth celebrating. In addition to successfully implementing eighteen projects for youth leadership development and scholarships, women’s empowerment, organic agriculture, environmental protection, and advocacy initiatives, SHARE celebrated several major advocacy victories and kept the legacy of social justice alive with two major delegations commemorating Archbishop Romero and the 4 US Churchwomen.

Here are just a few highlights from 2010:

SHARE played key role in pressuring the Salvadoran state to apologize to the civilian victims of the civil war and ask for forgiveness for its role in Romero’s assassination for the first time since the signing of the Peace Accords in 1992.

In March, over 50 people accompanied SHARE on a delegation commemorating the 30th Anniversary of Archbishop Romero’s assassination. Romero continues to be a pivotal figure in the fight for social justice in El Salvador.

SHARE responded to Tropical Storm Agatha by supporting local organizations with over $7,000 for emergency relief.

In October, SHARE celebrated the conviction of the material assassins who kidnapped, tortured, and assassinated anti-mining activist and community leader Marcelo Rivera in June 2009. SHARE played a crucial role in supporting, both financially and morally, the lawyers who successfully prosecuted the case.

The “Law for a Life Free of Violence for Women” was passed by the Salvadoran legislature on November 25^th. SHARE and local counterpart ORMUSA advocated for this law, which includes violence prevention programs, resources for victims of violence, and provisions for strengthening the legal system.

In early December, SHARE led nearly 50 delegates on a week long journey to commemorate the four US Churchwomen who were killed in El Salvador 30 years ago. The delegation focused on remembering the legacy of social justice these courageous women left and on issues effecting women in El Salvador today.

In 2011, SHARE is celebrating its 30^th Anniversary. With 30 years of solidarity under our belts, we are excited to keep our momentum working to build a new El Salvador. Thank you again for you support and contributions this year. We look forward to hearing from you in 2011!

Happy New Year from all of us at SHARE!

Want to get more involved? Sign up for our eNewsletter list by emailing laura@share-elsalvador.org or join our Facebook group. Help make 2011 a success by making a donation to SHARE today.

Remembering the Martyred of El Salvador

2010-12-23T12:18:00.000-05:00

A reflection by delegates, Sisters Julia Keegan and Jean Rupertus, who accompanied SHARE on the delegation honoring the 4 US Churchwomen.

On November 29, we went to El Salvador with a 50-person delegation from SHARE to honor the 30th anniversary of the martyrdom of Maryknoll Missionaries Maura Clark and Ita Ford, Ursuline Sister Dorothy Kazel, and lay volunteer Jean Donovan. Our first stop was Divina Providencia where Archbishop Oscar Romero lived and where he was killed while saying Mass. We laid our hands on the altar and united in solidarity with the people of El Salvador. It was fitting to go there first because his conversion and commitment to the poor inspired and strengthened the commitment of these four women.

On the anniversary of the rape and murder of the four women, we traveled to San Pedro Nonhualco which is where their bodies were found...

Read the rest of the reflection here.

Need a last minute gift idea?

2010-12-20T19:10:00.001-05:00

SHARE solidarity gifts are a great way to make your donation to SHARE a gift for someone special. Just pick a project, enter the recipient’s contact info and we’ll send a card that tells them you made a gift to SHARE in his or her honor. It’s that simple.

See the projects here: http://bit.ly/fwuF2q

And you can have the peace of mind, that this holiday season you helped support the struggle for economic and social justice in El Salvador.

Purchase your gift before 12/23 to ensure that we can email the card before Christmas. Let us know if you have any questions!

Why the Four US Churchwomen are Important Today

2010-12-15T18:58:00.001-05:00

On December 5th, St John Francis Regis, a long-time SHARE sister in Kansas City, MO, hosted a prayer service in commemoration of the four US churchwomen killed in El Salvador 30 years ago. Over 200 people attended a service that included processions, prayers and a powerful reflection by Sr. Mary McGlone. You can read the story about the event on a local newspaper's website.

Photo thanks to The Catholic Key Online.

Father Tom Holder reflects on the date:

I believe there are several reasons why the commemoration is still important today. There is still work to be done and we need to remember the commitment and courage of the four churchwomen to give us strength to do the hard work of justice. We need to make sure the younger generation has a sense of the real history of the region and the ability our country has to influence things, both in good and bad ways. In the Kansas City area, there are growing numbers of Salvadoran immigrants. They are here because they still suffer hardship and persecution. We need to hear the stories so that we can continue to be in solidarity with the people of El Salvador. The four churchwomen teach us the importance of putting a face on the issues. They inspire us by their example and call us to see the people of El Salvador as our brothers and sisters.

Churchwomen Delegation Photo Album is up!

2010-12-09T13:08:00.007-05:00

The SHARE delegation in front of the church built on the site
where the bodies of the 4 Churchwomen were found.

Check out our Flickr Album from the delegation here: http://bit.ly/gSTdE5 Have some fantastic photos from the delegation that you want to SHARE. Let us know. Or if you want more updates from SHARE join our Facebook group or follow us on Twitter @SHAREelsalvador.

Quotes from the final weekend of the Churchwomen Delegation

2010-12-06T18:49:00.000-05:00

With the delegation coming to a close, delegates shared many interesting and profound responses to the experience with SHARE. We've compiled a few quotes here to provide food for thought to those of you who weren't able to join us in El Salvador for this memorable occasion.

The delegation spent the first part of Saturday in San Salvador’s main Cathedral and in the crypt below, which is the final resting place of Archbishop Romero. After this experience one delegate commented:

"The contrast between the ornateness of the main cathedral and the simplicity with which Romero lived his life was startling and very disturbing. It makes you question the role of the Catholic Church in the social issue of our times." -Belinda Monahan, OSB

Delegates at Archbishop Romero's tomb

On Sunday, the final day of the delegation, delegates met with representatives from the Women’s Secretariat of the CCR. They spoke to the delegation about community gardens, one of SHARE’s projects in the region. The objective of these gardens is to preserve organic agricultural techniques, to provide additional nourishment for their families, and to give the women a mechanism for earning additional income by selling surplus crops. It was a wonderful exchange that inspired this reflection from one delegate:

"I am always impressed by the way people are taking hold of their own life and space. The empowerment that they have chosen for themselves. That was true both here today and in other parts of our journey. And I think the other piece for me is the resilience of the people. It's certainly an example for me, and its a challenge to me, to be open-handed in all that I do in life. And being willing to be that resilient in my part when I go back to the United States." -Marcelline Koch, OP

On Sunday the group also visited the cementary in Chalatenango where the 4 Churchwomen are buried. Here are two powerful quotes from that experience:

"Our sisters, Maura, Ita, Carla, are in death as they were in life: among the people. At their simple grave site, they are surrounded by the Salvadoran people for whom they gave their lives over with love and courage. Gracias, hermanas! May the witness of your lives live SIEMPRE." -Chris Koellhoffer, IHM

"The experience of El Salvador this week was profound, heartwarming, hopeful and life giving. The sacred act of remembering the lives of the churchwomen and Romero, and the thousands of martyrs whose names we do not know, is the beginning of re-membering a community, a country, and a people. For all of the victims of the violence in our world, we say: PRESENTE!" -Donna Korba, IHM

Over the next several days, we will be posting a slideshow and a few more reflections from delegates. We also welcome your comments and reflections on these weeks events. What did you do to commemorate the anniversary of the deaths of the 4 US Churchwomen?

Additionally, for more information about SHARE join us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter @SHAREelsalvador or visit our website www.share-elsalvador.org!

A Delegate Reflection

2010-12-05T13:49:00.020-05:00

A reflection from Patricia Crowley, OSB:

I keep tripping across Dostoyevsky's quote about our being saved by beauty (if by nothing else). In the midst of present stories of violence, pain, struggle, loss and with memories of fear and anger and suspicion frm my time here in 1990, I feel overwhelmed by peace and hope and the beauty of Salvadoran faces. Life is hard here. Poverty is deep. Yesterday we visited the community of Llano Grande in Tecoluca-- a group of 45 families who have claimed a piece of land here and built a home (of cardboard and branches and old tin) with a small garden and washlines and love.

To learn more about how you can visit El Salvador on a SHARE delegation visit our website or email us at sharesf@share-elsalvador.org. For more updates from SHARE follow us on Twitter @SHAREelsalvador or join our group on Facebook.

Delegate Reflection: Mercy Touches Wounds of El Salvadoran People

2010-12-04T11:00:00.017-05:00

This account was written after the first day of the delegation for the Sisters of Mercy blog by Jean Stokan, a SHARE Board Member and representative of the Institute Justice Team of the Sisters of Mercy,.

Mercy Touches Wounds of El Salvadoran People

Written by Jean Stokan, Institute Justice Team
December 02, 2010
Nine members of our Mercy family are traveling to El Salvador Nov. 29-Dec. 6 as part of a 50-person delegation commemorating the 30th anniversary of the martyrdom of four U.S. churchwomen who were working with those who are poor and oppressed in that Central American country. The following is their first blog post from El Salvador: We started our first full day in El Salvador going to the chapel where Archbishop Oscar Romero was assassinated. On a wall leading up to the chapel is a powerful mural of Romero surrounded by his beloved people. Some are depicted as under weights of oppression, others are smiling. Romero in holding a child with one hand and the other hand is raised, with a striking blood-red stigmata in the center. His feet as well are imaged with the stigmata. Read the rest of the account on the Sisters of Mercy blog.

First Hand Account of Churchwomen Commemoration Events in El Salvador

2010-12-03T13:34:00.000-05:00

Written on December 2, 2010 by Chantal de Alcuaz, this is a firsthand account of the activities SHARE delegates participated in on the 30th Anniversary of the deaths of the 4 US Churchwomen in El Salvador.

The Congregation for Mass

Today, the anniversary of the martyrdom of the four North American Churchwomen, we began by journeying to the place where the bodies of Ita, Maura, Jean and Dorothy were found. A church and memorial have since been constructed on the site. As the SHARE delegation neared the site, our three vehicles entered into prayerful silence to consider the life and legacy of the women we came to celebrate. We gathered, overflowing from the church, with an international community, Maryknoll sisters, fathers, and lay missionaries, Ursuline Sisters, high school delegations from the US, and even family members of Maura Clark, and many more, to pray and celebrate the Eucharist.

The mass was jubilant, thanks in large part to the incredible musicians and singing. After the mass we gathered at the memorial in front of the church for a short prayer service.

"I've been looking forward to having mass in El Salvador for a long, long time, and to have my very first mass in El Salvador in this most sacred place where the four women perished was beyond my expectations and more than I can take in," said Janet McLaughlin, one of the SHARE delegates.

After a delicious lunch at Maya Cafe the delegates traveled to Parque Cuscatlan to view the Monument of Memory and Truth and to listen to Madre Guadalupe Mejia, President of CODEFAM (Commitee for Family Members of the Disappeared). "Yes, I knew them [the North American Churchwomen]... Their bodies were killed, but their spirits are in each of us... as we continue the struggle," said Madre Guadalupe.

Delegates making rubbings of names

After hearing of Madre Guadalupe's inspiring words of personal struggles and about the struggle to construct the monument we were given roses and made our way to the monument. Delegates spoke of the courage and bravery of Madre Guadalupe, who's husband was murdered, in her life-long struggle to accompany those who's loved one's have been murdered and disappeared. Delegates moved slowly down the wall, taking photos, making rubbings of names (many of the churchwomen) and in reflection and prayer.

Its not too late to honor the 4 US Churchwomen: use our celebration guide to plan a small event this weekend or make a donation to SHARE to help us empower the next generation of women in El Salvador. For more updates from SHARE follow us on Twitter @SHAREelsalvador or join our group on Facebook.

Remembering the 4 US Churchwomen

2010-12-02T19:20:00.002-05:00

"It’s been a very big positive event. For people who have been doing this work for years, it is a great chance to share and remember. All of our groups are involved in this work and the struggle somehow," said Jose Artiga, SHARE Executive Director, from the event honoring the 4 US Churchwomen at the site where they were killed in El Salvador.

The women, who dedicated their lives to walking with poor and marginalized communities in El Salvador, were killed 30 years ago today on December 2, 1980.

SHARE launches revamped solidarity gift program

2010-12-02T17:03:00.007-05:00

Let SHARE help with your holiday shopping! Our solidarity gifts programs makes it easy for you to donate to SHARE and give a gift to a friend or loved one at the same time. All you have to do is choose which SHARE project you want to support and enter the name and email address of the person receiving your gift. We will email a customized letter to your friend or loved one to inform them that a solidarity gift was made in his or her honor.

We just updated our solidarity gift page to include 5 exciting, new projects. Ranging from school supplies to seeds for organic gardens, your donation will help SHARE support the people of El Salvador in their struggle for economic and social justice!

Make your donation to SHARE a solidarity gift today!

Have questions? Contact Meg at meg@share-elsalvador.org or 510-848-8487.

Delegation Day 2: Ballet and La Pequena Comunidad

2010-12-02T16:32:00.001-05:00

Delegates joined the Folkloric Ballet in dance

Yesterday delegates visited La Pequena Comunidad, a Christian Base Community of women religious that has been active since the late 1970s. They have walked with poor and persecuted Salvadoran communities before, during and after the war. It was a busy day of bonding, reflection, and expression through song and dance.

Watching a performance of the Folkloric Ballet was a highlight for the group. Shirley Tung from Pax Christi summed up the ballet performance like this: "I thought it was just a wonderful experience because I was able to share the spirit of the people that were dancing as well as all the people that were applauding for them. I have six left feet when it comes to dancing, but who cares. It was sharing in their happiness. "

Delegates held hands in solidarity reflecting as they
sang "Todavia Cantamos"(We Still Sing)

In addition, the delegation spent time in small groups reflecting on topics of hope and faith. "Today was just an awesome day. I think the thing that impressed me most was I'm reminded that you have to walk through the darkness to reach the light and each day we may embrace darkness and yet, each day we also see the light in ourselves and in those we are in contact with, especially the poor. I'm grateful for the opportunity to experience this day. Blessings.," said Claudia Ward, RSM

More updates from todays events at the site where the 4 Churchwomen were killed will be up soon. For ideas of how to honor these women today visit our website for a celebration guide.

Remembering the 4 US Churchwomen: An Article from the National Catholic Reporter

2010-12-02T12:08:00.000-05:00

This article was originally published in the National Catholic Reporter on November 30, 2010. It is a well written commemoration of the 4 US Churchwomen and the impact they have had on generations since their deaths, thirty years ago today on December 2, 1980.

'The women won’t let us go'

Nov. 30, 2010

By Cheryl Wittenauer

Isabel Legarda was only 8 years old when the abduction, rape and shooting death of four American churchwomen 30 years ago in El Salvador drew the world’s attention to the tiny Central American country, raised questions about U.S. support for rightist forces there, and inspired a movement of religious activism.

On Dec. 4, 1980, three Maryknoll sisters pray
beside the bodies of the four American
Catholic women who were kidnapped and
slain two days before in El Salvador. (AP

Legarda has assembled a multiethnic and ecumenical mix of artists to perform next month in Boston the New England premiere of “Missionaries,” award-winning composer Elizabeth Swados’ choral drama based on the women’s letters, journals, lives and work.

Swados’ latest work, “Resilient Souls,” which premieres next month in New York, explores how people were affected by the women’s death, and how it changed their own commitment to the poor.

“This story doesn’t just resonate with Catholics,” said Legarda, whose “Missionaries” cast and crew include a pagan, an atheist, a Jew, a Unitarian and Protestants. She said she wanted a “village of people” to tell a story with universal meaning -- that the women sacrificed everything for their faithfulness to El Salvador’s poor in the early, brutal days of its as-yet-undeclared civil war.

“We still have situations that demand people’s commitment to justice, whether in Sudan or Burma or the Philippines,” Legarda said. “There’s a tinderbox everywhere that requires people to give of themselves, to give everything for love"

Pilgrims still flock to El Salvador... Continue to the rest of the story

"Wow" and "Peace and Wonderment" Among Reactions to Day 1 of Delegation Commemorating 4 US Churchwomen

2010-11-30T19:55:00.004-05:00

A group of delegates at the luncheon

After arriving in El Salvador yesterday, the 46 delegates accompanying SHARE in commemorating the 30th Anniversary of the assassinations of 4 US Churchwomen began their journey today.

First on the agenda was a visit to the house of Archbishop Oscar Romero and the chapel where he was assassinated just nine months before the Churchwomen were also killed. It was an emotional visit for many of the delegates. When asked for her reaction, Sister Donna Wilhelm's short response was "how 'bout, wow." Diane Madden, on the other hand, felt "just peace and wonderment in God's plan and what it's all about, this thing we call life."

Director of SHARE's El Salvador office
addresses the delegation

After attending an afternoon forum sponsored by ORMUSA (Organization of Salvadoran Women for Peace), Joan Reidy from Pax Christi was struck by the importance of forming coalitions and not giving up. While referencing an important piece of labor legislation that took six years for a Salvadoran advocacy group to pass, Joan said, "Six years is a long time to work on something. I think it was an honor this [forum] was put on for us. I think this is something we need to work on at home also."

Come back tomorrow. We'll be posting reflections and photos throughout the week.

It's not too late to plan an event to commemorate the Four US Churchwomen in your community. Check out the Celebration Guide on our website for ideas.

Want more updates from SHARE? Follow us on Twitter @SHAREelsalvador or Facebook

Law passed in El Salvador for a life Free of Violence for Women!

2010-11-27T14:28:00.002-05:00

Women Marchers Triumph:

Salvadoran Legislature Passes Law for a Life Free of Violence Against Women

Thursday November 25^th, International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, over 4,000 Salvadoran women coursed down Juan Pablo II, a busy road en route to the Salvadoran Legislative Assembly.^¹ Women carried banners, thumped lively rhythms on drums, and cried out for an end to violence. In front of the legislative assembly, they demanded respect for current laws guaranteeing women's rights, and passage of the Special Holistic Law for a Life Free of Violence Against Women.

And they were successful!

Later in the day, the Legislative Assembly passed the law with 75 out of 84 votes. The law was formulated by women parliamentarians from all political parties in consultation with government institutions, the National Civilian Police, women's organizations, and other NGOs such as Oxfam America. The law seeks to strengthen prevention, attention to, and sanctioning of violent crimes against women. The law creates a policy of attention to women in situations of violence, including the creation of follow-up teams and shelters for women. Currently only one women's shelter exists in El Salvador. The law also increases sanctions for violent crimes against women.

The law will be implemented by a new Committee of Technical Specialists coordinated by the Institute for the Development of Salvadoran Women (ISDEMU). The committee will include representatives of various relevant government institutions including the Ministry of Health, National Civilian Police, Ministry of Governance, and Ministry of Labor.

The Feminist Network, composed of three key women's organizations: ORMUSA, LAS DIGNAS, and LAS MÉLIDAS, particularly values the recognition of feminicide as a crime. A form of hate crime, feminicide refers to the murder of a woman specifically because of her sex and gender. Feminicides will be punishable with 20-50 years in prison, depending on the form of murder. El Salvador currently has the highest rate of feminicide in the world, with 129.46 assassinations for every 1 million women. In comparison, in Europe, Romania holds the highest femicide rate, with 12 women assassinated per 1 million. The Feminist Network sees the recognition of feminicide as a crime and the passage of this law as essential to visibilizing violence against women and taking steps to change it.

SHARE celebrates the passage of this law, and congratulates the women parliamentarians that put the time and effort into formulating this law and building the will to pass it, to the Feminist Network for all their work to raise awareness, provide responses to women who have experienced violence, and constantly pressuring the government to play the role it ought to, and all the thousands of Salvadoran women who dreamed of this law and worked to see it happen. In a culture seeped in machismo and impunity, the creation of public policies that prevent and respond to violence against women is an inexpressibly important step in changing attitudes, behavior, and actions, and is an achievement that many fought hard to accomplish.

1Magdalena Flores, “Nueva Ley una Luz para Mujeres,” Contrapunto, El Salvador, 25 de nov.: http://www.contrapunto.com.sv/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4457:noticias-de-el-salvador-contrapunto&catid=58:categoria-sociedad-civil&Itemid=64

CDH Students Cry out for the Salvadoran People at SOA Protest

2010-11-24T13:11:00.000-05:00

This past weekend, Cretin Derham Hall (CDH) Spanish teacher Ariana Lowther brought a group of students down to the gates of Fort Benning in Georgia to bear witness to all those killed at the hands of School of the Americas (SOA) graduates.

Photo courtesy of Ariana Lowther

Sunday morning at the vigil, participants carry crosses with the names of those who have been killed by graduates of the SOA. While everyone solemnly processes past the base, leaving crosses, pictures, and peace cranes, they sing out the names and lift their crosses, crying,"Presente," you are here present with us. Above is a picture of senior Akoni García and Ariana with their crosses. Ariana said, "We felt honored to be there and cry out for all the people of El Salvador." Both Akoni and Ariana participated in CDH SHARE delegations this summer, in July and August respectively. Akoni has graciously shared a poem he wrote about his experience at the SOA protest, which you can read below.

The SOA is a U.S. military training school for Latin American military personnel, located on the Ft. Bennining military base. Many graduates have been involved in military dictatorships and the torture, assasination, and disappearance of people in their own countries. In El Salvador, many of those responsible for the worst human rights violations, including the assasination of Monseñor Romero, the six Jesuit priests, and the El Mozote massacre, were trained at the SOA. Since 1990, the SOA Watch has organized an annual vigil and protest of the school outside the gates of Ft. Benning. The vigil is held in November, on or around the anniversary of the assasination of the 6 Jesuit priests in El Salvador November 16th, 1989.

And Then There Were None

They were given guns, When they were kids, not permitted to have fun.
Poor and willing to do anything, some forced, some confused.
We trained them, our foreign policy made them.
Murderers, Rapists, and Drug Lords.
They murder their own, humans.
AND THEN THERE WERE NONE

We were Given Sun, we were allowed to run and gather, to bask in the sun.
We yearn for the day the SOA will close.
But we must pose a question. Which was the best one?
Training to the poor, to kill
So that we can lay on our buns
We can escape our problems.
AND THEN THERE WERE NONE

The Banners were made and hung.
The cross carried and stung - into the military (fence)
The marchers chant and hope for and pray for the day. When the SOA will close.
AND THEN THERE WERE NONE
(c) Akoni Garcia 2010

If you have participated in a SHARE delegation and have a poem, reflection, or picture you would like to share, please send it to laura@share-elsalvador.org

The SHARE Foundation is hiring in El Salvador!

2010-11-23T13:54:00.003-05:00

The SHARE Foundation is looking to hire a GRASSROOTS SOLIDARITY EDUCATION COORDINATOR in our El Salvador office. Interested? Visit http://idealist.org/if/i/en/av/Internship/163467-56. Know someone who might be? Please help us spread the word!

The SHARE Foundation: Building a New El Salvador Today is an international non-profit organization that accompanies historically impoverished and marginalized communities in El Salvador as they strive to meet both their most immediate needs and construct long-term sustainable solutions to the problems of poverty, underdevelopment and social injustice.

“After two years with SHARE as the Grassroots Solidarity Educator, I have gained a deep understanding of what it means to work for international development, of the social, economic and political situation of El Salvador, of the complexities and importance of social movements, and of the need for international solidarity with Latin America. SHARE is part of a long tradition of solidarity and accompaniment that I am honored to be a part of and continues to play a part in El Salvador’s current situation by working with coalitions and movements dedicated to human rights. This is a wonderful opportunity to work for an NGO that strives to build sustainable and equal relationships between its counterparts in the States and in El Salvador. I have grown professionally in this position as I have learned how to plan and carry out events, how to write about El Salvador for a large base in the States and how to work better in a team. I have also grown personally through my first-hand experience with amazing organized communities and social groups here in El Salvador who have a long history of struggle for social justice. I would recommend this job for anyone interested in international development, social justice, writing, theology, women’s issues, the environment and sustainability.” Laura Hershberger, Grassroots Solidarity Education Coordinator 2009-2011

Where Drumming and Sex Ed Meet in El Salvador

2010-11-16T12:53:00.001-05:00

About an hour northwest of San Salvador, in the small community of Ciudadela, a group of high school girls meets to do two things: to discuss sexual and reproductive rights, and to play the drums. They attend trainings on how to educate their female peers about pregnancy prevention, HIV/AIDS, the rights of women to make decisions that affect their bodies, and the right to enjoy one’s sexuality. And then they rehearse as the Sihua Batucada, the only all female youth drum band in the country of El Salvador. The poise, strength, and intelligence of these young women took my breath away and brought me to the edge of tears. A few minutes with these girls will remind even the most cynical that another world is indeed possible.

On my recent trip to

El Salvador

, I had the opportunity to meet with just five of the fifteen of these young women who are part of a youth leadership and development project supported by SHARE and the Salvadoran women’s organization IMU. The girls explained the program to us—they receive training on important sexual and reproductive issues that affect women and girls, and then they commit to training at least 3 other female peers in their community. As an integral part of the leadership development component, they have formed the batucada (drum band). According to the girls, being part of the batucada boosts their confidence and reinforces their sense of belonging to a team. One girl explained that her new self-assurance helps her in talking to the peers she trains. Another stated that playing music is a way to for her to enjoy her sexuality in a safe space. A third said “It feels really good to be really good at something.”

And they are really good! Watch a short clip below:

(To see a longer version of this song, click here.)

But neither drumming nor talking about women’s sexual rights are typical or widely accepted activities for a Salvadoran high school girl. As a result, the girls’ pioneering work has not gone unnoticed—at least one girl has been threatened with expulsion for talking about condoms at school, and critics have called the girls “prostitutes” and started nasty rumors about them. People criticized them for drumming at marches and demonstrations, spreading lies about the causes they were supporting. But amazingly enough, these setbacks have only deepened their commitment to their work and helped to clarify the important reasons behind it. When asked how the rumors and the critics have affected them, one of the girls smiled and responded, “Well, it was hard at first, but really they just made us stronger and brought us together.” Their persistence and dedication has paid off. Now their communities and their families are proud of them, and more young women in their area have knowledge of their rights and choices when it comes to their sexual health.

These young women are an inspiration and a model for girls everywhere. SHARE is lucky to be able to accompany them and learn from them. ¡Viva la Sihua Batucada!

--Sara Schultz, Operations Manager

Help us support these young women again next year by making a donation to SHARE here! Want more information? Email sharesf@share-elsalvador.org to get on our eNewsletter list.

Beyond My Horizons: A Delegate Reflection

2010-11-13T12:07:00.000-05:00

This reflection was graciously shared with us by Andrew Nyberg, a Cretin-Derham Hall senior who participated in a SHARE delegation this past summer.

Beyond My Horizons
We were staring into a mirror, but we just didn’t realize it yet. I had been traveling throughout the country of El Salvador for the past nine days with 17 classmates being filled with knowledge and awareness about the culture and the social injustice that plagues the country. We had spent three days living in the countryside in the village of Santa Cruz II with host families who were literally dirt poor. The house I stayed in was made of mud and sticks and was no bigger than my room at home. When it was full, it housed our host mother, Margarita, her cousin and her three children Josue, Carlos and Karla. There was no grass anywhere, and Margarita was often sweeping loose dirt off the dirt floor to make the house more presentable. These families became burned in our hearts and minds forever. We were fired up. We felt like advocates of justice, and we wanted to make good things happen in the world. Then, this all came crashing down around us in brutal realization.

Driving back from a service site one day, our bus driver Santos took us through the rich part of town. Every place we looked screamed wealth. Big-name car dealerships like Mercedes-Benz, Audi, and Lexus overtook entire blocks. Apartment complexes towered over the city. Suburban-like, cookie-cutter houses sprawled down the hill, each with air conditioning and satellite TV. Up on the hill, looking out over everything, were massive houses and condos, the likes of which are seen in Beverly Hills or Hollywood. Needless to say, the group was outraged when we saw this. “How can they stand to live like this, to live with themselves, when extreme poverty engulfs the rest of the city just below them?” was the general thought on everyone’s minds. It was then that someone made a side comment; “This reminds me of how it is back home.”
Suddenly, our faces grew somber as that thought washed over us, slowly bringing us to the realization that it was our lives that we were staring at. Up to that moment, we chose to ignore that because we had fallen in love with the country and its people, and we were passionate about the unjust social system. The easy thing to do was to get angry with these rich Salvadorans, or to scold them for being so selfish with their wealth and fortune. But now, we realized, to do such things would be hypocritical, as all of us were in the same boat as that wealthy side of town. In the US, I fit in with the middle class so I don’t consider myself to be overly wealthy, as that community seemed to be. But the truth is that I am one of the rich people who live in comfort and convenience, all the while turning a blind eye to the sufferings of the poor in the world as well as in my own country. The only difference between the Salvadorans and me is that I can’t see the other side. I have the option to wake up every morning, look outside my window and tell myself that everything is going right in the world, just because I can’t see how everybody else lives. El Salvador showed me otherwise.
One of the main reasons I wanted to go on this trip was to be put out of my comfort zone and El Salvador did just that. What I wasn’t expecting though, was that upon returning to the US, I would once again be thrust out of my comfort zone in my own home. I no longer have that option to convince myself that the world is fine because I know, first-hand that it most certainly is not. This is no longer just an issue in the news for me, but a little family that I came to love living their lives in a little mud hut. There are so many things that I have been struggling with ever since we got back. How can I go on living like I do when friends who I consider my second family live with hardly a cent to their names? How can I live with myself? Am I to blame for the situation they’re stuck in? Is there anything at all I can do to fix it? If so, what? How?
No, I do not have answers to many of these questions. But I do know that I can change the way I think. El Salvador has deepened and strengthened my values, especially those of life and dignity for all people; and with these, I now look at my life in a whole new light, and I can see the great responsibility that comes with wealth. I have a responsibility to live my life in a way that honors my brothers and sister, Josue, Carlos and Karla and my host mother, Margarita. For, not only did they invite me into their home, but they also invited me to become consciously aware of my place as a global citizen, my wealth, and this newfound responsibility that goes along with it. That, for me, is what living a life of integrity means.

Press Release: Coalition Against Commerce Group Mine

2010-11-13T11:42:00.001-05:00

60 Community organizations call on Commerce Group to drop its $100 million lawsuit against El Salvador

Milwaukee-based firm suing over decision to block its mining operations after evidence of massive water contamination

First hearing set for November 15 in Washington, DC

Milwaukee, WI, Washington, DC:

A coalition of Milwaukee and national organizations called on Commerce Group, a Milwaukee-based mining corporation to drop its controversial $100 million legal case against the government of El Salvador. 58 oorganizations from across the country signed a statement demanding that the case not only be dropped, but that there be cleanup of environmental damages caused by the mine and compensation to victims of mine pollution. In 2006 the Salvadoran government revoked the company’s mining permits, following evidence that its operations were dumping highly toxic poisons into local water. In retaliation, Commerce Group filed a demand before a World Bank trade court (the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes, ICSID) demanding not only payment for its investments but also for tens of millions of dollars in what it claims are “lost profits.” The demand is being filed under the foreign investor “protections” of the U.S.-Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA). The first hearing in the case will take place on November 15 in Washington, D.C.

Miguel Rivera, an environmental organizer with the Association for Economic and Social Development (ADES) in El Salvador, warned that the case and the international trade rules that allow it “limit the government’s ability to defend the lives of the residents” and “put economic rights above the people’s right to life.”

Commerce Group’s mining activity in El Salvador over the past 40 years has resulted in severe environmental and public health problems in the municipality of Santa Rosa de Lima, where the mine is located. The Salvadoran government revoked Commerce Group’s mining permit on September 13, 2006, citing devastating environmental damage that can’t be prevented with any existing modern technology.

A 2006 study by Dr. Flaviano Bianchini found that the San Sebastian River, which runs through the town contains 100,000 times more acid than uncontaminated bodies of water in the same region. The study also found levels of poisonous cyanide more than 10 times higher than the maximum allowed by the World Health Organization. The Investment and Trade Research Center in El Salvador has recently filed a lawsuit against Commerce Group with the Salvadoran Attorney General to investigate the connection between mining activities and disproportionate rates of death due to kidney failure in nearby communities, likely related to elevated levels of heavy metals in the San Sebastian River.

According to Al Gedicks, professor of sociology at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse and author of Resource Rebels, commenting on the case, said “If anything, it is Commerce Group who should be paying for the toxic legacy they have left behind.” Gedicks is one of several scholars who have joined an international coalition of environmental organizations, policy advocates and churches to halt the lawsuit and stop metallic mining in El Salvador. The group, the Midwest Coalition Against Lethal Mining (MCALM), includes several national organizations such as Sister Cities and CISPES, the Committee in Solidarity with the people of El Salvador.

According to Babette Grunow of MCALM, “This lawsuit is a cynical attempt by an unsuccessful company to exploit international trade agreements to make money that they have been unable to make by legitimate means.” Grunow points to Commerce Group’s own filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which shows no earnings since 2002, four years before their permit was revoked. “This lawsuit is nothing but a dishonest ‘get rich quick’ scheme at the expense of an entire nation,” said Grunow.

Chapter 11 of DR-CAFTA, under which Commerce Group has filed its suit, remains one of the most controversial aspects of U.S. trade policy. The equivalent chapter in NAFTA, Chapter 10, has come under fire in recent years, including from President Obama. During his presidential campaign, Obama promised to “strictly limit” foreign investor protections in a renegotiation of NAFTA and to fully exempt any regulation protecting public safety.

In Milwaukee, contact Babette Grunow at (414) 447-8369

In Washington, DC, contact Lisa Fuller at (202) 521-2510

In La Crosse, contact Al Gedicks at (608) 785-6782

In El Salvador, contact (in Spanish) David Pereira at 011 503 2225-1906 Ext. 106

To coordinate translation to English contact Sarah Bishop at 503 785-727-2252

El Salvador Lodges Complaint with the Guatemalan Government About Attack on Environmental Activists

2010-11-05T19:11:00.000-04:00

For the second time in the last three months members of the Center of Investigations into Investment and Commerce (CEICOM), an active member of the National Roundtable against Mineral Mining, have been kidnapped, robbed and left at an abandoned farm while traveling in Guatemala. In both instances the anti-mining activists were traveling to events in Guatemala related to the Cerro Blanco mine.

The Cerro Blanco mine, owned and to be operated by a Guatemalan subsidiary of Gold Corp, is located less than 10 miles from the Salvadoran border in the Guatemalan municipality of Jutiapa. If the project is allowed to continue it poses the risk of contaminated the Guija Lake which is one of the main sources of the Lempa River. The Lempa River supplies water to 65% of El Salvador.

CEICOM has been a leader in forming relationships with local resistance to the mine in Guatemala. During the most recent case they were accompanied by two journalists from the Salvadoran TV station Channel 10.

Picture credit: Diario Co-Latino

Written by Angélica Cárcamo -- Translated by USESSC Staff

SAN SALVADOR - Three Salvadoran environmentalists from Center of Investigations into Investment and Commerce (CEICOM) and two journalist from Channel 10 were kidnapped and later left on an abandoned farm on October 28th, while they were traveling to the capital of Guatemala.

According to the CEICOM representative, Edgardo Mira, they were traveling to the watch the questioning of current officials in the Alvaro Colom government about the mining project Cerro Blanco owned by the company Entremares in Guatemala, a subsidiary of the Canadian company Gold Corp.

Mira mentioned that the environmentalists, along with the journalists, were stopped around 7 pm at kilometer 43 of the highway to Guatemala City where they were intercepted by a group of individuals dressed as police officers who took their belongings and then after searching them left them in a nearby farm, with their hands tied and having been threatened that they shouldn’t go to the police.

“We believe that the government should act immediately and watch over the dignity and security of the Salvadorans that travel in the sister republic of Guatemala,” said the CEICOM representative.

This is not the first time that environmentalists have been victims of violations to their freedoms. On June 30th, a group from CEICOM was traveling to Guatemala when hooded suspects stole their belongings, tied them up and left them on another farm.

“It is clear to us that this is directly related to the first case” added Mira.

The Ministry of Foreign Relations will send a diplomatic letter to Guatemala

For his part, the Minister of Foreign Relations from El Salvador, Hugo Martínez, committed on Wednesday afternoon to sending a diplomatic letter to the Guatemalan government so that the case is investigated.

“Today in the afternoon we are sending a diplomatic letter to the government of Guatemala, by means of their Ministry of Foreign Relations, asking an expedited investigation into the cases,” mentioned the Minister.

Martinez added that this is “a second case that could be part of a pattern of actions,” and for this reason he offered security to members of CEICOM when they decided to travel to Guatemala again.

The official also said that he will set up a meeting in the upcoming days with the National Roundtable against Mineral Mining to listen to their opinions with respect to the case of the Cerro Blanco mine in Guatemala.

For CEICOM the acts of violence against their representatives are related to the work they do against the Cerro Blanco project.

Gold Corp is currently executing the Cerro Blanco project, located in the municipality of Asunción Mita (Guatemala) and according to environmentalists like CEICOM and the National Roundtable against Mineral Mining, the mining project in this region would contaminate the Ostua River and the Guija Lake, both bodies of water shared by El Salvador and Guatemala.

Day of the Dead at the Memorial Wall

2010-11-04T17:03:00.000-04:00

Every November 2nd, Salvadorans celebrate Day of the Dead, where they go to cemeteries to clean, paint and put flowers on the graves of their loved ones. Though for many Salvadorans, their is no grave to visit, as their loved ones were disappeared or murdered during the civil war, their bodies dumped in clandestine graveyards or never found.

For that reason, Human Rights organizations in El Salvador hold a ceremony at the Memorial Wall in Parque Cuscatlan. SHARE Delegates will remember the Memorial Wall as huge monument with 30,000 names of those killed in the Civil War.

The Diario CoLatina published this photo of family members paying tribute to their loved ones at the Memorial Wall this past Tuesday.

The SHARE Board meets with U.S. Ambassador to El Salvador

2010-10-28T19:06:00.000-04:00

The Board of Directors traveled this past week to El Salvador for intense strategic planning discussions. Our new strategic plan is a visionary attempt to position SHARE for its next stage of work. Watch for more information about this as communication is rolled out soon!

To help frame our strategic planning work, the Board met with partner organizations, office staff from the Berkeley and San Salvador offices, and visited a number of grassroots projects that SHARE supports. We met with youth who were a part of a leadership development program. We spoke with women whose coop community had organized a community garden with SHARE’s help. We met with representatives from women’s empowerment, economic development, and climate change organizations. Wednesday morning we had the opportunity to visit the US Embassy and to meet with the newly appointed Ambassador, Mari Carmen Aponte. Only the third woman to have served in this position, Ambassador Aponte warmly greeted our delegation in Spanish. What a delightful surprise, especially after having met with previous office holders who lacked fluency in the language.

But it wasn’t just this change in ability that caught my attention. The political changes in El Salvador and the United States seem to have produced a change in tone and emphasis. Ambassador Aponte and her staff were enthusiastic about the work of SHARE and were interested in creating ways to perhaps partner on future projects. Additionally they seemed interested in finding ways to reach out to the community of El Salvadorans living in the United States and intrigued by some of SHARE’s new outreach among “hometown associations” in the US. Who knows what might be possible with the change in administrations. At the very least, it was a refreshing encounter and one might pave the way for a more open line of communication between the El Salvador Office of SHARE and the embassy.

For more information about the new embassador,

http://sansalvador.usembassy.gov/ambassador2.html

-Contributed by SHARE Board Member, Pastor Jeff Johnson

Youth Assembly in Chalatenango

2010-10-15T13:34:00.001-04:00

This article was written by Grassroots Delegations Leader Bethany about her visit to the CCR youth assembly in September.

Since the end of the summer delegation season, I have continued to deepen my understanding of and appreciation for SHARE's work. I have had several opportunities to visit some of SHARE's counterparts, and see their processes of organizing. I particularly enjoyed attending a regional youth assembly in Arcatao, Chalatenango, organized by the CCR, one of CRIPDES' regional offices. Over 200 youth ages fifteen to thirty filled the community center with clapping, laughter, and encouragement. Well designed to keep the youth engaged, the assembly included brief talks on the current national reality and the history of organizing in Chalatenango, a skit about migration presented by a local youth theatre group, an academic competition, and dinámicas throughout.

Facilitators and presenters often wove in reminders of the roots and reality of organizing in Chalatenango, while maintaining the focus on youth as the light of the present and future. The Assembly opened with the national anthem and the anthem of unity: El Pueblo Unido Jamás Será Vencido. A moment of silence followed to remember all of the students who have died and all migrants currently trying to make their way to the United States. Milton Monge, a representative of the local government in Arcatao, began his brief address stressing the need for doctors, nurses, future mayors and legislators, engineers, priests, nuns, and agronomists. At the same time he called on the youth to remember all those that deserved to be present at the assembly, but continue disappeared since the time of the war. Similarly, at the close of her brief analysis on the current moment in El Salvador, María Ofelia Navarrete, Vice Governor of Chalatenango, spoke of her daughter who died during the 1980s. Her daughter wanted very badly to finish sixth grade, but was not able to. María encouraged the students to study hard not so much because of their scholarships, but for those who were not able to go to school.

In their skit entitled American Dream: Emmigration, local youth depicted various Salvadoran individuals and families talking in their every day Salvadoran slang, making the hard decision of what to do following the loss of a job and the loss of the bean crop. In one family a friend suggested that the father go to “The North.” His wife and daughter begged him to stay, but he maintained his resolve to leave, find a job, and send them money. Eventually a group of eight migrants formed. Each shared his or her dream - “I'll buy the newest model of car.” “You'll see me in the movies soon.” “I'll be rich, because they say they throw away money there.” Their coyote only shook his head and said, “You're daydreaming, the lot of you.” Along the way thy jumped on to a train, crossed a river, ran out of food, and ran afoul of la migra. At the end just three made it across the border and went their separate ways.

The youth particularly enjoyed the academic competition. Current CCR Youth Coordinator Lucio Cruz Anaya divided the youth into four teams based on the regions they hail from. Each team chose a representative to answer questions on their behalf. One young leader had prepared five questions in six different subjects: science, English, math, history, language arts, and organizing work. Each team could switch representatives between subjects. Correct answers won ten points, while incorrect answers deducted ten. Each team cheered on their representative with deafening shouts and whistles as they vied to raise their hands first and answer the questions. Silence reigned only at the moments when youth ventured their answers. One youth answered all the questions from the math section and a self-conscious grin spread across his face.

In the afternoon came my favorite part: elections for three candidates to serve as the new CCR Youth Coordinator for the next two years. Various youth stood up to nominate each other, pointing out Idalia's various leadership qualities, or how hard César had worked as part of his community council. Each time an individual was nominated, everyone would turn to see what his or her reply would be. Idalia declared, “I accept because I like to work with youth, I get along well with everyone, and I consier myself a leader.” César responded, “If the assembly chooses me, I would be happy to serve.” Loud shouts and clapping bounced off the plain concrete walls. However, when Alex declared, “It is an honor to be nominated, but I am currently very dedicated to a project in my community, and will not have the necessary time to give,”everyone cried, “Awwww.”

Once the youth had nominated six individuals from amongst themselves, everyone had a chance to vote. As an impartial individual I had the privilege to serve as part of the electoral committee and helped tally the votes. At the end, three highly motivated youth, César, Idalia, and Salvador, graciously accepted their election as candidates. In late October the final round of voting will be held, with the opportunity for all community members to participate.

During the return ride packed into the back of a pick-up, I asked one young woman if she liked the assembly and the way that the voting was facilitated. She said, “Yes, because everyone has a chance to share his or her opinion.” A true example of democracy. The assembly beautifully illustrated the value, love, and investment that the CCR and the communities of Chalatenango place on their young people.

UCRES Scholarship Students

2010-10-11T12:45:00.000-04:00

Meet José Neftaly Valencia, participant in the SHARE-UCRES High School Scholarship and Integral Youth Development Program in Northern San Salvador. Thanks to SHARE’s accompaniment and the support of our US Grassroots base, Neftaly is able to continue his studies and work for community development.

Neftaly is from the community La Joya, a community repopulated by people who fled their homes during the brutal civil war in El Salvador. He lives with both his parents and two sisters in this small, rural community. Neftaly is currently in his third year of technical high school, studying accounting at the National Institute of El Paisnal, the final resting place of Father Rutilio Grande. He is a very dynamic young man that makes one feel immediately at ease and in confianza. Neftaly is the President of the youth committee and in addition to his studies and work as a youth leader, he loves soccer.

Neftaly identifies to two main benefits of his involvement in the youth program: the financial support he and his family receive so he can continue his studies at the high school level, a feat only the minority in El Salvador are able to achieve (the average Salvadoran is able to complete the sixth grade); and having the opportunity to be more involved in regional organization, being organized as a young person, and in participating in youth development.

Neftaly receives a monthly scholarship that covers the costs of transportation to and from class every day, school materials, and a uniform. The program he participates in places emphasis on integral youth development and provides active support and guidance for his youth organizing work in his community. To make all of this possible, SHARE provides a mere $375 per year per student.

As the President of the youth committee, Neftaly helps in the organization of many community activities. One example: the youth committee organizes community movie nights, and uses the proceeds to hold Mother’s Day and Father’s Day celebrations. Neftaly emphasizes that the funds the youth committee raises are not for their own benefit, but for the benefit of the community.

As an evolving leader, Neftaly was invited to participate in an intense three-day training to become a Culture of Peace facilitator. With a focus on youth development, the main objective of these workshops is to prevent violence in the zone. El Salvador has one of the highest homicide rates in the world, an epidemic according to World Health Organization’s standards. In a country where youth have few options—migrate to the United States in search of work or join the gangs—youth working together to seek alternatives is a powerful statement.

Culture of Peace workshops, true to their name, focus on building skills for conflict resolution and peace building, taking the place of anger and violence. These popular education circles also deal with issues relevant and of interest to youth, including sexual and reproductive rights, STDs, youth organizing. Neftaly now leads youth groups in twelve communities in his municipality through this transformative process.

Because of his work in community and regional development and organizing, Neftaly has been selected to participate in a Catholic Youth Exchange in Austria this November. This has motivated him to continue his work and help others realize their potential. His dream? To study medicine at the university level and work in his community as a health promoter, to provide this basic service to those who need it but cannot offer financial remuneration.

When we ask Neftaly what he likes to do in his free time, he smiles and hesitates. “It’s really hard for me sometimes,” he says. “With my studies, sometimes the clock hits one in the morning and I still haven’t gone to bed.” But despite his own sacrifice and the many challenges he faces as a youth leader, he likes working in organization and supporting others: “so that young people learn, and are able to share their own perspectives, to see that there are benefits to being organized, and that we have no limits as youth.”

With your support, SHARE is able to accompany this amazing young leader, who in turn is able to accompany dozens of other young people as they develop and grow. Please continue to help us make this work possible, which is changing the future of El Salvador and the lives of thousands of people!