Congreso Nacional Hostosiano - Press Release

First of all, the Hostosian National Congress (CNH) wishes to salute and congratulate the Puerto Rican people for having maintained themselves firmly in rejecting the plan of the Navy to reinitiate bombings against the Island of Vieques. In spite of the fact that some political leaders have submitted to pressuring by the Navy and by Clinton, we have observed with much pride that the Viequenses and representatives of all sectors of civil society firmly reject the plan presented by the Governor to our country this past Monday.

Governor Pedro Rosselló betrayed the aspirations for peace and liberty of the people of Vieques. Projected before the world, according to the international press, that we Puerto Ricans are corruptible, that we sold out, that we are are willing to trade away issues of dignity and human rights in exchange for money. He put aside the interests of Vieques for the immorality of three more years of bombings, without guarantees for removal of the United States Navy.

Rosselló showed a lack of respect for the Working Commission on Vieques, imposing upon them an unconsulted decision, in open opposition to the public policy adopted by the Government of Puerto Rico. Governor Pedro Rosselló owes an explanation to the Commission members, who represent the people of Puerto Rico.

The real danger of "inert" bombs - alleging that they are "not explosive"- should not be minimized, as the Navy and its allies have tried to do. It has been demonstrated by the Armed Forces' own studies that the impact by so-called "inert bombs" on contaminated terrain - in our case, with (among other toxics) dust from Reduced Uranium - raises a cloud of toxic materials carried by the wind up to 25 miles away. The winds on Vieques are strong and blow from east to west, so that toxic and radioactive materials unavoidably fall on the civilian population, causing major damage to health and provoking more cancer and contamination. One "inert" bomb weighing five hundred or a thousand pounds - falling on barrels filled with toxic waste submerged underwater near the coast in the firing area - would provoke a toxic waste spill with incalculable consequences, affecting the food sources of fish and other sea life and condemning the Viequenses and all of Puerto Rico to more cancer, toxic contamination, and death.

Governor Rosselló alleges that he would assume the consequences of his decsions, but in reality those consequences will again fall, as we have seen on the Viequenses and on all of Puerto Rico.

For our part, since the day of the Rosselló's announcement of his surrender we have been reinforcing the camp of the CNH in the Firing Range, together with the other civil disobedience camps, sending more provisions and people. We are in the process of coordinating visits from international delegations to our camp, including visits of personages such as Jesse Jackson, Congressman Luis Gutiérrez (D-IL), and other leaders and opinion-makers who have been expressing their willingness to participate in acts of civil disobedience. We congratulate the Catholic Church for their determination to construct their own civil disobedience camp. Their presence in the Firing Range will have an incalculable value in fortifying the only strategy that has been demonstratively effective in impeding the resuming of the bombing, and removing the Navy from Vieques forever.

In reference to the proposed Referendum, we support the position assumed by the religious, labor, environmentalist, and cultural sectors, and by the majority of Puerto Ricans, in particular, by the Viequenses: HUMAN RIGHTS are NOT subject to a vote or to negotiations. They are to be defended firmly and with dignity.

We include in this communication a list of at least eighteen (18) elements of deceit found in the Navy's proposal. The Navy's proposal was endorsed by Rosselló and by some leaders of the New Progressive Party (translator's note: This pro-statehood party is currently in power in San Juan.).

REASONS TO REJECT THE "AGREEMENT" BETWEEN THE GOVERNMENT OF PUERTO RICO AND THE UNITED STATES NAVY IN RELATION TO VIEQUES:

1) It permits the Navy to effect for ninety (90) days per year its bombing practices in the Impact Area in the zone denominated as the "Inner Range Atlantic Fleet Weapons Training Facility" (AFWTF), located where at present are the civil disobedience camps in the Eastern part of Vieques. Under this premise, the Navy may perform the exercises of the Atlantic Fleet known as JTFE (Joint Task Force Exercise) twice per year, for 45 days each time. To accept these practices means returning the Eastern part of Vieques to the levels of desolation, destruction and barbarity that we found when we bagen to rescue the area for the benefit and enjoyment of future generations.

2) It would permit the use of the area denominated as the "Eastern Maneuver Area" (EMA), located in the Eastern part of Vieques for conducting amphibious exercises of the Marine Corps.

3) The absence of references to the use of "EMA" in the "agreement" also opens the doors to its utilization by the Special Operations Command of the Southern Command (SOCSOUTH), located in Roosevelt Roads Naval Base (translator's note: Ceiba, Puerto Rico, just opposite the bay from Vieques); it opens the door to use by the Southern Command of the US Army (located in Ft. Buchanan, near San Juan). It also opens the door to military forces from various other countries with whom the United States conducts joint military exercises (note: the US has for years "rented" Vieques to the militaries of its allies in Europe and Latin America.) It is important to mention that as early as March 2000 naval vessels from Colombia, Venezuela, Uruguay, Canada, France, and Holland - together with an additional squadron of US Navy destroyers, will be participating in a "war game", along with the US Navy combat group of the aircraft carrier USS George Washington in waters very close to Vieques in the exercises known as "UNITAS."

4) The negotiated agreement facilitates the transfer and puts at the disposition of the US Southern Command the installations at Roosevelt Roads, in order to make it the headquarters of the Southern Command Naval Forces (NAVYSOUTH).

5) No mechanisms were negotiated by which the Government of Puerto Rico would have some participation in the verification or control of the type of military exercises to be developed on Vieques during the next three years, nor the type of projectiles that would be used.

6) There are neither specifics nor definitions of the of the level of control that the government of Puerto Rico will have in verifying the work of decontamination and cleanup of contaminated waters and lands in the Western part of the Island, where no less than 104 warehouses for explosives for the Atlantic fleet are located; nor of tens of thousands of bombs of different sizes and destructive capacity dispersed over the lands and at the bottom of the sea in the "EMA" and in the "Inner Range AFWTF."

7) Contrary to publicy policy, which demands the "immediate cease and desist of all military operations on Vieques", the so-called "agreement" perpetuates the operations of the ROTHR Radar, the electronic surveillance operations from Mount Pirata in the Western part of the Island of Vieques, and amphibious and firing operations in the Eastern part.

8) The "agreement" constitutes a mechanism for buying off the conscience of the people of Vieques. They offer forty million dollars (to the Viequenses) when, as a matter of fact, through renting Navy-occupied lands in the Eastern part of Vieques to other countries the Navy annually receives double that amount.

9) The "agreement" does not adequately or definitively provide for retroactive economic restitution for those persons who have been harmed (materially or otherwise) as a result of the Navy's activities on Vieques during the past (6) decades, in particular the fishermen.

10) The "agreement" relieves the Navy of responsibility of assuming the economic cost of the urgently needed "Epidemiological Study" on Vieques to deal with the causes of health problems on this Island. Nor does it commit to action or responsibility for the costs of necessary remedial measures in light of (the health problems), much less does it establish a deadline for initiation and conclusion. It only says that such work will be conducted by the US Department of Health.

11) The "agreement" proposes the so-called "referendum" only among the Viequenses, under the Electoral Law of Puerto Rico, throwing a smokescreen to make us suppose that it is the will of the People making the final decision. It is as if to make us forget our experience of electoral processes in Puerto Rico, where the Navy has secretly intervened with activities designed to influence Puerto Rican electoral behavior in our general elections. In fact, with this "agreement" we already see such activities, that the Navy will use (the terms of the "agreement") to create conditions for developing initiatives directed at gaining the support of the population, so that they will support the Navy's presence - and its military exercises - in the Island Municipality when the time comes to vote, leaving in the hands of the Navy to decide when the referendum should be held.

12) The so-called "agreement" is authorized simply at the level of "Executive Order" or "Presidential Directive." Under this premise, nothing would prevent that in the future - even President Clinton before finishing his term, or whoever succeeds him - could unilaterally render this "agreement" inoperative.

13) The decision of the Government of Puerto Rico to renounce use of the judicial processes closes the doors to a so-called "Consent Agreement" to which any agreement would be subject, at least, to compliance by the force of law. This self-restriction, moreover, ties the hands of the Government of Puerto Rico in initiating or continuing in judicial forums any type of proceedings for the Navy's failure to comply with the 1983 Agreements, whereby legally one could argue a new iteration of those agreements as a result of new negotiation.

14) Through this "agreement' the Government of Puerto Rico has placed the Puerto Rico Police as a Pretorian Guard for the Navy, assigning to them the dirty work of removing the protesters in the civil disobedience camps.

15) The "agreement" was negotiated behind the back of the Commission on Vieques and the people of Puerto Rico. The letter from the Governor to the President of the United States was already written when the Commission was "informed" of the achieved agreement. In the process there were no consultations with the members of the Commission, nor with the sectors of the Puerto Rican people which the Commission represents, much less with the institutions representing the people in the Legislative Assembly. It speaks of an antidemocratic exercise of power, which is at least theoretically delegated according to our constitutional structure.

16) The "agreement" permits continuing the bombing of Vieques for no less than three additional years, thus opening the possibility that it might be made permanent by a Pseudo-Referendum. Whether the bombs are "inert" or "unexplosive" bombs is immaterial. First, because public policy has not distinguished between classes of bombs; second, because an "inert" bomb is the same as other types of bombs- except that instead of releasing explosives, the impact of an "inert" bomb releases projectiles of armored concrete, gases, and metals with destructive capacity against structures in the firing range, on the coral reefs, and any other type of nearby life. Regarding so-called "non-explosive bombs", as yet no Government spokesperson that has spoken publicly has been able to describe them. (translator's note: The military has admitted that these types of bombs are less accurate than "live" bombs, which will increase the likelihood of accidents on Vieques.)

17) Contrary to the public policy of the Government, the so-called "agreement" leaves in suspense the transferal "in the shortest possible time" of the Navy-occupied lands on Vieques, particularly all of the lands in the Eastern part of the Island and a portion of the Western part. Let us remember that the exercise will continue for not less than three additional years, within which no transfer of lands will take place in the Eastern part, and the transfer in the Western part will be limited and conditional.

18) In spite of the fact that it speaks of May 1, 2003 as the date that the Navy will leave, the reality is that they have no intention of leaving. The Navy aspires to stay permanently on Vieques by way of a Referendum, and they don't have the slightest intention of abandoning the Western part of the Island, where the ROTHR Radar and the electronic installations of Mount Pirata are located.