1. CALL TO ACTION: Virtual Sit-In for Vieques, Wed. June 13th!(2001/06/13)
  2. Navy to Resume Bombing Vieques(2001/05/31)
  3. Sharpton Gets 90 Days in Jail for Navy Protest(2001/05/24)
  4. Urgent Call from Vieques(2001/06/03)
  5. A CALL TO PARTICIPATE IN CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND SUPPORT ACTIONS(2001/06/04y)
  6. message from one protester:Jail time for Vieques(2001/05/16)

CALL TO ACTION: Virtual Sit-In for Vieques, Wed. June 13th!

On Wednesday, June 13th, 2001, beginning at 9am EST and continuing for 24 hours, join the Virtual Sit-In for Vieques at http://www.freespeech.org/provieques

Why a Virtual Sit-In?

To support the demand that the US Navy cease their wargames and leave Vieques in peace. To add our virtual bodies to the presence of the physical bodies of Puertorican activists who will occupy the bombing ranges of la Isla Nena.
To attract media attention by engaging in a new form of protest action. To send a message to the United States government that we will not be silenced until the people of Vieques can live without the sound of jets screaming overhead, without the destruction of their beaches and coral reefs, without the high cancer rates caused by depleted uranium found in bullets and shell casings, without the 'accidental' deaths of civilians. To add our voices to the cry 'Not one more bomb! Leave Vieques in Peace!'

Navy to Resume Bombing Vieques

Reuters
Thursday, May 31, 2001; Page A07

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico, May 30 -- The U.S. Navy plans to begin its latest round of war games on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques around June 13, the commonwealth's governor said today.
In response, Gov. Sila Maria Calderon (D) will call for an advisory vote by Vieques residents within 90 days on whether they want the island used by the U.S. military as a bombing range, she said.
The Navy's use of the 33,000-acre island off Puerto Rico's east coast for target practice has sparked widespread protests in the U.S. territory since a civilian security guard was killed in a botched bombing run more than two years ago.
Vieques has served as a bombing range for 60 years. The Navy says it is critical to U.S. battle readiness, but residents say the bombing has damaged their health and the island's air and water quality.
Citing a letter from the Navy, Calderon said today that up to 18 days of training on Vieques would begin on or shortly after June 13.
"The notice by the Navy wounds and offends the sensibility of our people," she said. "This struggle is testing our collective spirit of resistance, and now more than ever we have to remain firm in our position."
In a letter to the commonwealth State Department, the Navy said it would undertake aerial bombing practice and marine war games but not ship-to-shore shelling in the latest exercise.
A key element of its Vieques training, ship-to-shore shelling is at the heart of a commonwealth lawsuit against the Navy because it allegedly violates a new law toughening restrictions on noise along Puerto Rico's coast.
Presidential directives and congressional legislation call for a Nov. 6 referendum in which Vieques residents will decide whether they want the Navy to leave by May 1, 2003, or remain indefinitely in return for $50 million in economic aid.
Calderon said she would call a local referendum for Vieques' 9,600 people with those two options plus a third one, the immediate halt of war games.
While the result of the local referendum, which is expected to be held within 90 days, will not be binding on the federal government, Calderon said it was time for the world to hear the opinion of Vieques residents.
Hundreds of Puerto Ricans have been arrested for infiltrating the bombing range during increasingly angry protests against the bombing practice since the death of security guard David Sanes Rodriguez in April 1999.

Sharpton Gets 90 Days in Jail for Navy Protest

By Eileen McNamara
Associated Press
Thursday, May 24, 2001; Page A40

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico, May 23 -- A federal judge sentenced New York activist Al Sharpton to 90 days in jail today for trespassing on U.S. Navy land as part of a protest against military exercises on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques.
"If Martin Luther King were alive, he would have come to Vieques and raised these issues," Sharpton said in an appearance before U.S. District Judge Jose A. Fuste.
Sharpton was taken into custody for transport to the federal prison in suburban Guaynabo.
He was arrested May 1 with a dozen other protesters. At least 180 people were arrested in their attempt to stop the exercises April 27 to May 1, which the demonstrators claimed were a hazard to residents' health. The Navy denies that the exercises have led to any health problems.
The sentencing came one day after Sharpton hinted he might make a run for the White House in 2004. Political analysts said that the jail time wouldn't hurt him, despite the additional notoriety, and that he was likely to gain support.
"He will get a lot of attention, and that's something that he always covets as a community activist," said Lee Miringoff, a pollster at the Marist Institute for Public Opinion in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. "His actions are not necessarily to appeal to all of the electorate. In this instance, this is one that he calculated, or understood, would be intensely supported by some of the electorate."
Sharpton was convicted of a misdemeanor, but because he has been arrested before for civil disobedience in New York, he was sentenced as a repeat offender. He also was fined $500.
His attorney, Sanford A. Rubenstein, said lawyers are working to file an appeal with the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston on Thursday and will ask an appeals judge to allow bail. Fuste did not allow Sharpton a stay of his sentence pending appeal.
Rubenstein complained that Sharpton had only one day's notice of the hearing in Puerto Rico, which prevented him from compiling a proper case.
Eleven other activists who were arrested with Sharpton also appeared in court today. Nine were sentenced to 40 days in prison and fined $500. They included New York City Councilman Adolfo Carrion and Bronx County Democratic Party Chairman Roberto Ramirez.
Two defendants were put on probation because they are ill.
Other high-profile protesters arrested during the demonstrations included environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Rep. Luis V. Gutierrez (D-Ill.), actor Edward James Olmos and New York labor leader Dennis Rivera.
Earlier this month, Puerto Rican independence leader Ruben Berrios was sentenced to four months in jail, the stiffest sentence given to an anti-Navy protester so far.

Urgent Call from Vieques

COMITE PRO RESCATE Y DESARROLLO DE VIEQUES
(Committee for the Rescue and Development of Vieques)
Apartado 1424 Vieques, Puerto 00765
Tel. (787) 741-0716 Email bieke@coqui.net

3 de junio de 2001
Warm greetings from Vieques. We urgently call on all people considering participation in the next round of civil disobedience actions in Vieques to contact us as soon as possible through email or by phone at 787 741-0716
In addition to actions in the restricted areas, there are many support tasks to be done in Vieques as well as on the Main Island and in the US. Please indicate your disposition to 1) come to Vieques starting 13 June to help with work at the Peace and Justice Camp; 2) send donations to the CRDV or 3) send equipment and/or materiales necesarry for the next campaign in defense of Peace on Vieques.

We need - in addition to more people in the bombing zone:
  1. batteries AA, C and D
  2. .. very small flashlights and flashlights of standard and large sizes
  3. .. simple communications equipment (one or two mile range walkie talkies)
  4. .. small binoculars
  5. .. lots of prayer for peace on Vieques
Thanks
In solidarity, on Vieques, in struggle
Robert Rabin,CRDV
4 June, 2001

A CALL TO PARTICIPATE IN CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND SUPPORT ACTIONS

Warm greetings from Vieques. We prepare for the upcoming threat to our security and well being - US Navy bombing announced for the 13th of June. Since the intense campaign of civil disobedience at the end of April we have been working continuously on preparations for the next exercises - those of the Navy as well as ours.
Our people prepare to resist the psychological and physical attack of the military maneuvers here. The Committee for the Rescue and Development of Vieques is convoking a constant dialogue about the process of non violent civil disobedience together with members of the Vieques Youth United, the Vieques Women´s Alliance, Horseriders for Peace, Luisa Guadalupe Camp, local leaders of the Catholic and Methodist churches, the Mayor of Vieques - Dámaso Serrano, the Asst. Commisioner for Vieques and ex mayor - Radamés Tirado, and our fishermen.
Over the past weeks we have worked with the Coordinating Committee All Puerto Rico with Vieques, the Ecumenica Coalition, the Diocese of Caguas, the PR Bar Association, the Socialist Frente, the Carribean Project for Peace and Justice, the National Hostosiano Congress, the Giants of Carolina, the New Independence Movement, labor and student organizations, among other solidarity groups on the main island of Puerto Rico. The CRDV created the Luisa Guadalupe Institute for Civil Disobedience on Vieques to help systematize preparations for our next actions (workshops, orientations, written materiales, coordination between participants and the the Vieques community organizations).
We work on a series of strategies directed at blocking the Navy´s maneuvers in June, in July, in August or whenever, and that way defend the peace of our community. We work in the context of non violent civil disobedience - a tool that has gained us the respect and attention of people throughout the world and that has paralyzed at several momentos, the Navy´s plans to continue their destruction of Vieques with bombs and guns.
Participation in civil disobedience is much more than getting arrested.
Presence and solidarity at the Peace and Justice Camp or in other areas of the struggle here, in Puerto Rico or in other countries during military maneuvers; your help with the multiple tasks of cleanup, maintenance, cooking, discipline, transportation, communications; your economic support and donation of materiales (boxes of water, battery, office materiales, tools for disarming oppresive fences, flashlights..); prayer and messsages of solidarity; promoting the dialogue in your neighborhood, in the churches, at work and in the family about the urgent need for the immediate and permanent cessation of military activity on Vieques - all these actions are an important part of this campaign in favor of life and against military violence.

Support for the prisioners for peace in Vieques in the federal prision in Puerto Rico and in New York is a fundamental task of civil disobedience. Write them! You can find prisoner numbers, addresses and other information about our prisoners on the website viequeslibre.org or contacting us by email or telephone.

We invite all Viequenses, all Puerto Ricans and people everywhere who defend peace and human rights, to participate in this historic process against the most powerful military force in the history of mankind - the US Navy - using our most powerful forces - a firm commitment to love, peace and justice.

Take part in this historic moment! Call us at the Peace and Justice Camp in Vieques 787 741-0716

R. Rabin, CRDV

Fwd: message from one protester:Jail time for Vieques

Date: Wed, 16 May 2001 15:12:47 -0400
From: "Aureo E. Rivera"

The news is out on the jail sentences that the federal court gave to a few of the most recent Vieques protesters. Ruben Berrios, president of the Independance Party, and another member who is also a repeat offender got four months and the first-time offenders got two months. That means that I can probably expect to get two to four months, depending on the judge I get at trial. This, for a minor offense comparable to walking on the grass in Central Park. But we all know that stepping across that fence in Vieques is a quantum leap in the defense of human rights and the sovereignty of Puerto Rico. That is what the US Government wants to stop by trying to scare us into submission. How little they know us after all these years. I am working on my finances to try and leave everything squared away so when the time comes the family won't have to worry about mortgage and food money. Thank God I have enough saved to tide us over for that time. My business will probably go down the tubes but that doesn't matter, I can start over again when I get out. Since the wife also gets her little pension, I don't have to worry about the old saying "If you ain't got the time, don't do the crime". Of course, we protesters have committed no crime but to peacefully trespass on Navy property to stop their abuses, in defense of the rights of our brothers and sisters on Vieques. So, if we have to go to jail for that, so be it.
All of us who went in knew it was not a game. One of the protesters who was arrested with us died last week from kidney failure. Carlos was a 44 year old school teacher from Caguas who belonged to the Teacher's Federation. He went on a hunger strike and the guards at the federal jail refused him water for more than 24 hours, trying to force him to break the strike. Apparently, that had such an effect on his kidneys that he died shortly after being released from jail. They did the same thing to Carlos Ala, a university professor, but he is alive and well up to now.
The price of freedom is high. I hope no one else has to make the supreme sacrifice but I am sure I speak for all the civil disobedients when I say that if that is what it takes to obtain peace for Vieques we are willing to pay it too. Paz para Vieques! Aureo