Vieques Resistance Spreads
-Arrests in NYC support deeply rooted Puerto Rican civil disobedience to stop Navy bombing of Vieques

The unambiguous demand "Not one more bullet! Not one more bomb!" continues to echo across the Puerto Rican island of Vieques and resonate among Puerto Rican communities and their supporters in the mainland U.S. A proliferation of cultural events and peaceful demonstrations continue to underscore the islanders' rejection of a deal announced January 31 between the Governor of Puerto Rico and the Clinton administration. The deal proposed an extra $50 million in aid for Vieques, but with strings attached: Puerto Rican authorities must first clear the island bombing range of a dozen or more civil disobedience camps. Bombing would then resume pending a local referendum that, even if approved, offers respite from war games only after May, 2003.

In New York City, ten people were arrested last December 7 during a blockade at the U.N. in support of the Vieques resistance. A month later, January 6, a delegation of eight Puerto Rican women, including the actress Rosie Perez, climbed the steps of the U.S. mission to the U.N. in a show of solidarity and were arrested. As the women went to court February 16, eleven people blockaded the Times Square recruiting station in support, but were not arrested. Charges against the women and the December arrestees were all dismissed.

A few peaceful arrests have also been reported incidental to the ongoing encampments on the bombing range that occupies the eastern third of Vieques, and at the front gate of Camp Garcia, the military base occupying the western third of Vieques. The Peace and Justice Plaza created at the gate of Camp Garcia has become a popular venue for Saturday night solidarity celebrations drawing hundreds of residents, in defiance of increasing evidence that police and special forces are being trained to carry out mass arrests in the near future so bombing can resume.

Puerto Rican religious leaders led the call for a February 21 march in support of an end to the bombing of Vieques. At least 80,000 people - perhaps as many as 150,000 - packed a major highway from side to side for over a mile in San Juan, the largest demonstration ever reported on the island colony.

Two weeks later, in Scotland, U.S. Navy ships diverted from shelling Vieques bombed a Royal Navy range on Cape Wrath. A range control building was briefly occupied by activists waving Scottish and Puerto Rican flags, while others from the Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) and Puerto Rico protested.

April 19 has been declared a National Day of Solidarity with the People of Vieques. It's the first anniversary of the death of David Sanes Rodríguez, killed in Vieques when a Navy F-18 aircraft hit the civilian guard's station with a 500 pound bomb during practice for the war against Yugoslavia. Demonstrators will gather at noon in front of the White House in Washington,. D.C., and for demonstrations in other mainland cities.

For more information on the continuing civil disobedience campaign to prevent the bombing of Vieques, contact the Committee for the Rescue and Development of Vieques, P.O. Box 1424, Vieques, Puerto Rico 00765, (787)741-8651; email bieke@coqui.net ; web http://www.viequeslibre.org
In Washington, contact David Santiago, (202)223-3915x308.