Reply #2: Killings of 6 Jesuit Priests by US-Backed Salvadoran Forces [View All]

[Judi Lynn]

Killings of 6 Jesuit Priests by US-Backed Salvadoran Forces
Posted on July 6, 2011 by jagadees
Thousands of human rights activists are gathering at Fort Benning, Georgia this weekend for the annual protest to shut down the US Army training center once known as the School of the Americas. The school, now known as the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, or WHISC, is used to train Latin American soldiers in combat, counterinsurgency and counter-narcotics. Critics have dubbed the training center the “School of the Assassins,” because some of its graduates have been responsible for some of the worst human rights abuses in Latin America.

This year’s protest will commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the murder of six Jesuit priests in El Salvador, their housekeeper and her daughter by the US-backed Salvadoran military. The Jesuit priests were killed November 16, 1989, twenty years ago this week, when a military unit entered the Central American University campus and shot them to death—the priests’ housekeeper and her daughter also killed. The Jesuits had been outspoken advocates for the poor and critics of human rights abuses committed by the ARENA government. Many of the soldiers involved in the murders were graduates of the School of the Americas at Fort Benning.

Earlier this week in El Salvador, the Jesuit priests were bestowed the nation’s highest civilian award, marking the first time the Salvadoran government has honored the priests since their deaths. El Salvador’s defense minister announced the military is ready to ask for forgiveness and open its archives to a long-sought investigation.

More:
http://jagadees.wordpress.com/2011/07/06/killings-of-6-jesuit-priests-by-us-backed-salvadoran-forces/

http://cache.daylife.com.nyud.net:8090/imageserve/0702aAXfAXcb6/439x.jpg

A garden has been planted to mark the spots where the assassination targets fell.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com.nyud.net:8090/_e529C8IQH7w/SwH4Krc4emI/AAAAAAAAAyo/BWcF8E8Au-w/s1600/Martyrs+of+El+Salvador.jpg