Hemispheric Conference against Militarization Says No to Merida Initiative, U.S. Military Bases

More than 800
representatives from organizations throughout the Americas made their
way to the northern city of La Esperanza, Honduras to take a strong
stand against the militarization of their nations and communities.
Following three days of workshops, the participants read their final
declaration in front of the gates of the U.S. Army Base at Palmerola,
Honduras, just hours from the conference site. The first demand on the list was to close down this and all U.S.
military bases in Latin America and the Caribbean. By the end of the
demonstration, the walls of the base sported hundreds of spray-painted
messages and demands that contrasted sharply with their prison-like
austerity.

Palmerola,
formally called the Soto Cano Air Base, brought back some very bad
memories among the hundreds of Central American participants. The U.S.
government installed the base in 1981 and used it to launch the illegal
contra operations against the Nicaraguan government. The base was also
used to airlift support to counterinsurgency operations in Guatemala and El Salvador and train U.S. forces
in counterinsurgency techniques during the dirty wars that left over
100,000 dead, and is now used as a base for the U.S.-sponsored "war on
drugs."

The demilitarization conference also called for an immediate halt to the recently launched "Merida Initiative,"
the Bush administration's new Trojan horse for remilitarization of the
region. The resolution asserts that the measure "expands U.S. military
intervention and contributes to the militarization of our countries"
and representatives from the Central American nations and Mexico
included in the military aid package committed to a process of
monitoring the funds and defeating further appropriations.

The Merida Initiative was announced by President Bush
as a "counter-narcotics, counter-terrorism, and border security"
cooperation initiative in October 2007. The model extends the Bush
administration's infamous national security strategy of 2002 to impose
it as the U.S.-led security model for the hemisphere. The approach
relies on huge defense contracts to U.S. corporations, and military and
police deployment to deal with issues ranging from drug trafficking to
illegal immigration and seeks to extend U.S. military hegemony in
foreign lands. It has been proven in Colombia
and other areas where it has been applied to have the effect of
increasing violence, failing to decrease drug flows, and leading to
extensive human rights violations.

Among the 14
resolutions of the conference, three others reject aspects of the
Initiative: the repeal of anti-terrorist laws that criminalize social
protest and are a direct result of U.S. pressure to impose the
disastrous Bush counter-terrorism paradigm; the demand to replace the
militarized "war on drugs" model with measures of citizen
participation, community heath, etc.; and the demand for full respect
for the rights of migrants.

Although on the
surface, Latin America is experiencing a period of relative calm after
the brutality of the military dictatorships and the dirty wars,
grassroots movement leaders from all over the continent described a
context of increasing aggression. The indigenous and farm organizations
that occupy territories coveted by transnational corporations have
become targets of forced displacement. Social movements that protest
privatization and free trade agreements have been dubbed terrorists and
attacked and imprisoned under new anti-terrorist laws that are a poor
legal facade for outright repression. The use of the military troops in
counter-narcotic activities has become commonplace and often hides
other agendas of the powerful. Police forces have come to deal with
youth as if being young itself were a crime.

In viewing the
threats of militarization in their societies, participants use a
broader definition than just the presence of army bases and troops.
"Militarism," states the Campaign for Demilitarization of the Americas,
is " the daily presence of the military logic in our society, in our
economic forms, in our social links, and in the logic of gender
domination and the supposed natural superiority of men over women."
Using this concept, the conference covered the profound need to change
the educational system and social norms, to work from within
communities, as well as making demands for changes in the external
conditions that affect them.

Despite days of
testimonies that sometimes included tears and anger, delegates to the
conference expressed hope above all else. Ecuador's new constitution
and decision to kick out the U.S. army base at Manta was cited as proof
of progress.

Both concrete
plans for action and an encouraging consensus emerged: the breadth of
the challenge can be overwhelming but the dream of lasting peace
provides an irresistible light at the end of the tunnel.

The declaration
concludes on this note: "... through these campaigns and actions on the
grassroots level, organized within each nation and throughout the
continent, we can reach a day not long from now when we fulfill the
dream of living free of violence, exclusion, and war."

Originally posted on October 17, 2008. Read the full declaration:
http://americas.irc-online.org/am/5605

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