Imagine for a moment what the Republican Party would do to Sherrod Brown if:
(1) His father in law was an indicted war criminal;
(2) His wife was the political advisor to an indicted war criminal; and,
(3) He met with both to determine US policy on CAFTA
Jerry Weller (R, IL-11), like Sherrod Brown, serves on the US House Committee for International Relations. His father-in-law, Gen. Efriam Rios Montt was just indicted in Spain for his part in war crimes, including torture and extrajudicial executions, during the Guatemalan civil war. Now a US organization has joined in this legal battle. This should be a major issue in the upcoming election in Illinois' 11th Congressional District, where Weller faces challenger John Pavich. More below the fold.
The Center for Justice and Accountability is joining in a historical prosecution brought by Spanish judge Santiago Pedraz, following a complaint initiated by Rigoberto Menchu Tum. Excerpts from a press release follow:
As many of you know, on July 7, in an extraordinary move, Spanish National Court Judge Santiago Pedraz issued arrest warrants for the eight defendants named in the Guatemalan Genocide case, including former president Efraín Rios Montt. The judge also issued an order to freeze the defendants' assets. That order has now been transmitted internationally through INTERPOL. CJA is leading the effort to assure that the warrants are executed and that proper requests for extradition are filed...
The eight defendants named in the arrest warrants are Ríos Montt, General Oscar Humberto Mejía Victores, General Ángel Aníbal Guevara Rodriguez, former Minister of the Interior Donaldo Álvarez Ruiz, Colonel German Chupina Barahona, former National Police director Pedro García Arredondo, General Benedicto Lucas García, and former president Romeo Lucas García, who reportedly died in May but remains a defendant until the judge receives official notification of his death.
In 1999 Nobel laureate Rigoberta Menchú Tum and other victims filed a criminal complaint in the Spanish National Court against the senior Guatemalan government officials charging them with terrorism, genocide and systematic torture. The case, known as the Guatemalan Genocide Case, is modeled on the Pinochet case. CJA, through Almudena Bernabeu, joined the case in 2004 and represents two torture survivors.
For those of you who are not familiar with Guatemalan history in the 1980's, Gen. Rios Montt oversaw a scorched-earth counterinsurgency campaign in the highlands that resulted in widespread massacres and disappearances, resettlement of tens of thousands of persons to "model villages", and confiscation of land and property from anyone who was deemed to oppose the government. More than 200,000 civilians were killed in the 1980's, 90% of them by Guatemalan government forces and the irregular militias they backed. Although conservatives in the US and in Guatemala consider these actions as legitimate tactics against a leftist insurgency, what the war actually most resembled was an Indian uprising against decades of repression and violent racism, such as the major rebellions that occurred in Chiapas in the 1840's. This war had a definite ethnic edge to it, and the victims were mostly indigenous Mayan peoples.
The recent Iraq war has cost something between 80,000 and 150,000 lives in a country of 26 million. The war in Guatemala was much, much worse - 200,000 in a country of only 12 million. To put this in context, imagine if the US had lost 5,000,000 civilians dead, 90% of whom who were killed by the US government. The Report of the Commission for Historical Clarification, produced by the UN in the aftermath of the 1996 Peace Accords, clearly makes the case that Gen. Rios Montt, his associates and his successors, committed genocide in the highlands of Guatemala.
I know I'm preaching to the converted here, but the US bears a great responsibility for the horrendous losses in the Central American civil wars. This grim history is little known in the US, much less in the rural Illinois district represented by Jerry Weller.
Although the judge's move has received little attention in the U.S. media, it is a groundbreaking step in the fight against impunity and has been widely covered throughout Latin America.
You can do something about the information gap.* Jerry Weller represents Joliet and Bloomington-Normal, Illinois. Here's the e-mails of the news staff at these two newspapers. If you feel that Jerry Weller's connections to an indicted war crime suspect should be covered in his own Congressional district, feel free to send them a POLITE e-mail pointing out that these indictments are newsworthy, and that they should follow this story.
Herald News, Joliet: heraldnews@suburbanchicagonews.com
Pantagraph, Bloomington-Normal: newsroom@pantagraph.com
The news story here is not Jerry Weller's choice in women (as grotesque as it is), but his conflict of interest when it comes to issues related to Guatemala. How can Jerry Weller vote on immigration reform issues, when he refuses to acknowledge his own father in law's responsibility for the violence that sent hundreds of thousands of Guatemalans to the US as refugees? Do we trust Jerry Weller's perspective on CAFTA when he is literally wedded to the Guatemalan oligarchy?
People, this is a competitive race. It should disgust all of us that Jerry Weller is in Congress and has neither condemned the extraordinary crimes of his father in-law, nor distanced himself from the political activities of his wife. It's a long time until Dia del Muerto, so feel free to show his opponent John Pavich some financial love now.
Do it to honor of all those buried in Guatemala's unquiet graves.
*I strongly support John Pavich in this race, but I have no affiliation with his campaign.