From: harelb@math.cornell.edu (misc.activism.progressive co-moderator)
Subject: Human Rights In Nicaragua (I): The Good Old Days
Organization: misc.activism.progressive on UseNet ; ACTIV-L@UMCVMB
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 1992 08:44:06 GMT

Human Rights In Nicaragua (I): The Good Old Days


   "The elder Somoza was shot in 1956 by a poet named Rigoberto Lopez
   Perez who was killed at the scene. THOUSANDS OF NICARAGUAN were
   arrested and tortured in the post-assassination roundup, among them
   _La Prensa_ [the *old* La Prensa, before the CIA/Reagan funded
   entity it became, prompting the resignation of most of its staff]
   publisher Pedro Joaquin Chamorro.

   " ``Chamorro was lucky,'' explained author John Booth, ``for he
   escaped the even more diabolical tortures suffered by his
   companions: electrical shocks...repeated near-drowning, lifting or
   dragging by a cord tied around the genitals, imprisonment in a
   coffin-sized cell, or time in the Somoza family's private zoo. This
   last method incarcerated prisoners, for months in some cases, in
   barred cages open to the weather, next to lions and panthers, in
   the garden of the presidential residence'' Held in a cell at the
   end of the garden, Chamorro observed how ``in front of these animal
   cages often strolled the current president of the dynasty, Luis
   Somoza, and his brother Anastasio, with their wives, relatives, and
   children...carrying their dolls and toys.'' [18] The Somoza
   dictatorship lasted 43 years, until the heirs to Sandino set
   Nicaragua on a different course.

        [See Sklar, page 6 (cited below)]

[18] John Booth, __The End and the Beginning: The Nicaraguan
Revolution_ (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1985, 2nd ed.), p. 72,
citing Pedro Joaquin Chamorro C., _Los Somoza: Una estirpe sangrienta
(Buenos Aires: El Cid  Editores, 1979), p. 77.

Washington's War on Nicaragua, by Holly Sklar
1988, South End Press, Boston

South End Press, 300 Raritan Center Parkway, Edison, NJ 08818
For a free catalog: 1-800-533-8478; see above for GET command.


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    When the Sandinista leaders entered the capital, Managua, they were
    greeted with jubilation. They now had the responsibility of governing,
    but they faced tremendous problems. 50,000 people had been killed and
    100,000 wounded in the revolutionary war. Before fleeing the country,
    Somoza had bombed schools, hospitals, factories, and housing.

    Somoza had looted the national treasure and left the country with
    one of the world's highest per capita debts. The economy was
    stunted by decades of development that favored the rich. It was
    further battered by soaring energy costs and falling world prices
    for export crops.

[From: 1984 Oxfam America report: _Nicaragua: Development Under
Fire_; send the 1-line message GET OXFAM84 NICARAG ACTIV-L to
LISTSERV@MIZZOU1.BITNET for a copy of this report]


            =============================================
            T h e   " N i c a r a g u a   L i b r a r y "
            =============================================

*
* =========
* Nicaragua
* =========
*
  WHO-WERE CONTRAS    Contras' origins; make-up; practices - documented
  FSLN     H-RIGHTS  Documented HRs comparison w/Somoza,Guat,ES,others
  FSLN     MISKITOS  Sandinista treatment of Miskitos;Charges & Realit
  FSLN     NICAJEWS  Debunks charges of Sandinista 'Anti-Semitism'
*
  OXFAM84  NICARAG   Oxfam America's 1984 report on Nicaragua, in full
  FSLN     ACHIEVE   Documented: achievements of the Nica. revolution
*
  NICA-84  ELECTION  Documented: Fair under Sandinistas; US subversion
  FAIRNESS NICA-USA  Flwup:`Is Nicaragua More Democratic than the US?'
  NICRAGUA ELECTION  Study in US subversion of '90 Nicaraguan election

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