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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 18, 1984)
% Thursday, October 18, 1984/The Battalion/Page 5 d "'here 11 s in "g ovation ‘^"revo Ah yearn ach b ytheaa "nent of oupfe says president distorts facts By KEN DORSEY Reporter A married couple from Washing ton, D.C. returning from Nicaragua daim that the Reagan administra tion has deliberately misrepresented human rights in Central America. Tony Equale and Mary Risacher, both who have been in Nicaragua for 11 months and have previous ex perience in Latin America, told stu dents at an Amnesty International meeting here last week that the accu sations made by the present U.S. ad ministration against Nicaragua are distortions of the daily reality there. The fundamental direction of the Sandinista Revolution is a vigorous response to the two desperate needs of the Nicaraguan people: national independence and an end to poverty of the lowest level, Equale said. Ecptale, a 45-year-old auto me chanic who has a long history of working with poor people, has re cently worked with El Salvadoran refugees in Honduras. He also works with the Nicaraguan Depart ment of Agriculture as an instructor in a mechanics training school, and with state farms in rice and coffee- B regions near the city of pa in Nicaragua. His wife, Mary Risacher, is a li censed practical nurse with previous teaching experience. Risacher was in Chile from 1970- 1973 and worked with the Salvado ran refugee camps from 1981-1982. “We came back to the states spe cifically because we saw the impor tance of our election in the United States for the lives of the people ■ down there,” she said. “We took a | couple of months off and came up to IwL ' et Americans know what’s really happening;.” According to the September 14 is sue of the New York Times, the Rea gan administration has spent more than $1 billion to prop up the Salva doran government and $150 million to overthrow the Sandinistas in Nica ragua. People get confused because the nited States is supporting the gov- :rnment in El Salvador against the ebels and it also is supporting the ebels in Nicaragua against the gov- irnment, Equale said. Generally, )eople cannot remember which is El "Salvador and which is Nicaragua, he added. represen | While in Honduras from 1981- Graiu! 11982, Equale said he learned First in ID yea, not won ists. Anien m 123 pb i2(idieini ■ "we fin winced on gian Noli amed bh, mood Tit inneroft rize for 1 ainst apa I racial» bel.lheeo 1 changing on the nocratic hr people rt the ratic Pam suffrage, eurocrat exastow Warped by Scott McCullar SHOE by Jeff MacNelly hand from Salvadoran refugees he had gotten to know, the kind of tac tics the civilian population faced in El Salvador. “The armies sweeping through the areas killed everything in sight... people, animals, dogs ... anything that lived,” he said. The fundamental tactic is to kill the people in El Salvador, Equale said. One such way is through “en circlement” where the El Salvadoran army drives whoever is fleeing to the the New York Times, 13 individuals, including the commander of a secu rity force unit, were sentenced to up to 17 years for murder, rape, torture and robbery, as a result of one inves tigation and the appointment of a special prosecutor. Equale said a human rights ratio nale for the United States effort to overthrow the Sandinistas hardly squares with efforts by the Reagan administration to shore up the gov ernment of El Salvador, which, tittle people' advise others to learn facts, act as citizens u border up against the Honduran army. When they cannot kill the people in the country or on the border, they arrest them by the thousands and put them in refugee camps along the El Salvadoran border, Equale said. There are 10,000 people in among the camps. In Nicaragua, soldiers have been punished, Equale said. According to iinsc cepheid variable's Equale said, has a horrendous re cord on human rights. “Every historian that reads Ron ald Reagan’s speeches realizes thht the man is lying,” Equale said. “To distort facts the way he is doing is a lie to the American people in order to present a particular politics with regard to these people. “Nicarugua is not perfect ... we didn’t come here to tell you it was,” Equale said. Nicaragua does have problems with their human rights; all the countries of Central America do, he said. “I don’t want to be lied to though,” Risacher said, cutting in. “The deception of the government and the aaministration in the U.S. helped me to realize that my Ameri can values mean a lot to me ... I mean, it’s my right as an American to stand up and say what I really be lieve and what I believe in, and that’s real important to me. “We want to come back to the states, but right now we feel U.S. citi zens need to be down in Nicaragua to show the people that we support what they are trying to do in build ing their own new society and that we don’t agree with the policy of our admi nistration. ” Equale admitted it was frustrating to come back And contradict some body like Reagan who has so much support in this nation. “We’re a couple of little people,” he said. “Who is going to listen to us? My advice is to read as much as you can, don’t just listen to Reagan, don’t just listen to us. 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