Wednesday, October 5, 1988/The Battalion/Page 9
Amnesty International blasts
nations with cruelty charges
LONDON (AP) — Amnesty In- the 159 U.N. member states. But it
ternational on Wednesday accused a said it was encouraged by the emer-
record 135 nations of human rights gence of more than 1,000 human
abuses ranging from the jailing of rights groups in recent years and the
draft evaders in Western Europe to proliferation of laws to protect pris-
the massacre of unarmed civilians in oners’ rights.
Iraq and Sudan. “In at least half the countries of
The international human rights the world, people are locked away
group said the list of offenders in its for speaking their minds, often after
annual survey was the longest it has trials that are no more than a sham,’’
published since its establishment in the 278-page report said.
1961. “In at least a third of the world’s
Amnesty, which won the Nobel nations, men, women and even chil-
Peace Prize in 1977, recorded abuses dren are tortured. In scores of coun
last year in more than 80 percent of tries, governments pursue their
Government plant
covers m
WASHINGTON (AP) — Serious
mishaps over 28 years at a govern
ment plant in South Carolina that
produces materials for nuclear
weapons were kept secret for na
tional security reasons and not re
ported to Washington, federal offi
cials said Tuesday.
But the situation is changing, in
part due to pressure from Congress,
they said.
One senior Energy Department
official has compared the attitude to
ward safety at the Savannah River
facility near Aiken, S.C., to that
which led to the explosion of the
shuttle Challenger on Jan. 28, 1986.
“There has always been a mind
set, a culture, that we are doing work
that is important for national secu
rity and perhaps that may override
any obligation toward public ac-
countablility,” Will Callicott, a
spokesman for the Department of
Energy, said Tuesday.
Since taking office in 1985, said
Callicott, Energy Secretary John
Herrington has called attention to
the area of environmental safety and
health for the first time placing these
issues in the hands of an assistant
secretary.
E.I. du Pont Nemours & Co. runs
the Savannah River facility under
contract for the energy department.
The plant, which has five reactors,
produces plutonium and tritium,
which are used in making nuclear
weapons.
According to a 1985 memoran
dum, 30 “reactor incidents of the
greatest significance” occurred there
and were not disclBsed to the public.
One of the most serious was the
melting in November 1970 of a rod
used to start an atomic chain reac
tion, causing radioactive contami
nation of an adjacent room. It took
900 people three months to clean up
the contamination, according to the
memo, which does not specify
■snaps
whether radioactivity escaped from
the facility.
Energy Department officials said
on Friday that they had not been in
formed of the incidents, but on
Monday senior department spokes
man C. Anson Franklin said those
statements were incorrect and that
the incidents had been reported to
the department’s regional office in
Aiken.
He said that the information ap
parently had not been relayed to
headquarters from the regional of
fice.
The reactors at Savannah River
were closed after the most recent in
cident, in August, and had been
scheduled to reopen on Tuesday.
But Energy Department officials as
sured members of Congress last
week that production would not re
sume until safety was assured, possi
bly after 30 to 45 days.
“If they restart those things with
out having briefed us and without
having convinced us they have
solved the safety and health issues,
they will be in serious trouble in the
Congress,” Rep. Mike Synar, D-
Okla., said.
Synar, chairman of the Energy,
Environment and Natural Resources
subcommittee of the Government
Affairs Committee, held hearings on
the Savannah River facility last Fri
day.
He reacted angrily Tuesday to as
sertions that national security con
siderations ever justified keeping
mishaps secret at Savannah River.
“Just because they claim it is na
tional security doesn’t make it na
tional security,” he said. “I didn’t
know that the health and safety of
the workers and the surrounding cit
izens was a national security issue.”
Synar challenged assertions that
Herrington had improved the En
ergy Department’s system.
goals by kidnapping and murdering
their own citizens.”
It added: “More than ever before
in world history, governments are
exposed to the glare of international
publicity — the greatest weapon we
have.”
The report cited the United
States, where 25 prisoners were put
to death last year, for executing
John Brogdon, a man diagnosed as
mentally retarded, and Edward Earl
Johnson, despite “substantial
doubts” about his guilt. Amnesty op
poses the death penalty.
In China, more than 200 con
victed criminals were put to death,
but that represented “only a fraction
of the total number of death sen
tences and executions,” it said.
The report said at least 760 politi
cal prisoners were executed in 39
countries in 1987 but estimated the
number probably was much higher
because of secret executions.
It said governments used a variety
of methods to deflect criticism, in
cluding death squads in Latin Amer
ica.
It said India, Britain and Israel set
up inquiries into human rights
abuses that were not made public or
that amounted to a whitewash.
Turkey, Czechoslovakia and East
Germany closed channels of infor
mation to hide violations, it said, and
China, Haiti, Syria and South Africa
clamped down on the reporting of
abuses by denying prisoners access
to lawyers or families.
“Today, even one death can set
off waves of anger and protest
worldwide ... It doesn't always hap
pen but it can,” Amnesty said, citing
the death in January 1987 of South
Korean student Park Chong-Chol.
The death sparked widespread pro
tests that resulted in the prosecu
tions of eight police officers and the
resignation of government min
isters.
On the other hand, communist
North Korea didn’t even reply to
Amnesty International’s questions
about legal practices, the report said.
Among other alleged abuses were
reports that Sudanese forces mas
sacred hundreds of unarmed Dinka
tribespeople; the summary execu
tion by Iraq of hundreds of unarmed
Kurds; the disappearance of hun
dreds of Peruvian farmers seized by
government forces; and court-or
dered executions in China, South
Africa and Iran.
The report alleged politically mo
tivated killings by pro-government
assassins in Brazil, El Salvador and
the Philippines, and arbitrary ar
rests, torture and killings in Sri
Lanka, Afghanistan and Uganda.
In Western Europe, Spam was
cited for allegedly torturing Basque
separatist prisoners, Britain for fail
ing to publish a police inquiry into
the killings of six unarmed Irish Re
publican Army guerrillas in 1982,
and Franor jailing draft objectors.
In Israel, the report said, a court
permitted the secret service to use “a
moderate measure ofhysical pres
sure” in interrogating suspects.
Group urges boycott
of Nestle over formula
WASHINGTON (AP) — The
people who engineered a seven-year
boycott against the Nestle company
to fight the promotion of infant for
mula in Third World nations called
on Tuesday for a renewal of the pro
test on an even larger scale.
Douglas A. Johnson, chairman of
Action for Corporate Accountabil
ity, called for a resumption of the
boycott at a news conference, argu
ing that Nestle has failed to live up to
the agreements it signed in 1984 that
ended the original action.
This time, Johnson said, the
group is expanding the boycott to
American Home Products, which it
said is the second largest distributor
of infant formula in developing na
tions.
While urging an across-the-board
boycott of the two companies’ prod
ucts, protest leaders are asking their
followers to focus on two products
from each company: Nestle’s Tast
er’s Choice Instant Coffee and Car
nation Coffee-mate Non-Diary
Creamer, and American Home
Products’ Anacin and Advil across-
the-counter pain relievers.
Action for Corporate Accounta
bility accused both companies of vio
lating at least the spirit — and by
Johnson’s interpretation, also the
letter — of the World Health Orga
nization and UNICEF Code of Mar
keting of Breast-milk Substitutes.
The code — which Nestle agreed
to as a condition of ending the ear
lier protest — permits donations or
sales of formula for distribution to
infants needing breast milk substi
tutes, and says the formula may not
be used for sales promotion.
Abortion activists continue protests
ATLANTA (AP) — Police carried or dragged
about 250 anti-abortion demonstrators away
from three clinics Tuesday, making good on a
threat of gloves-off treatment for a planned week
of similar protests.
Some of the sit-in protesters screamed or cried
as they were hauled off and left in piles by jail bus
doors to be carried aboard by other officers.
Many supporters watching the arrests sobbed or
prayed quietly. Others sang hymns or songs from
the civil rights movement.
Police asked the demonstrators if they would
walk to the buses and dragged them there when
they would not.
Since summer, hundreds of anti-abortion pro
testers in Atlanta have identified themselves
upon arrest as Baby John Doe or Baby Jane Doe.
Since authorities will not release people on bond
without identification, those arrested have
crowded jails. Three summer demonstrators re
main jailed, one for more than 70 days.
The stated aim of the protests Tuesday was to
close the clinics for the day, although some
women entered at least one clinic during the pro
tests. The demonstrators did not enter the build-
ings.
The protests were organized by Operation
Rescue, a New' York-based group that started
demonstrating in Atlanta on July 19 during the
Democratic National Convention and continued
to do so through the summer, landing more than
750 people in jail.
At two locations police used disposable plastic
handcuffs on those arrested and in one case
tackled a man who had been loaded into a van
but tried to escape.
Some were urged along by police putting
thumbs under the ears and lifting. The demon
strators offered no resistance, and most re
mained limp while they were carried off.
A few officers were in riot gear or on horse
back.
Operation Rescue, which has opened what it
says is a permanent office in Atlanta, charged
that excessive force was used.
Gene Guerrero, executive director of the state
chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union,
who watched the arrests, said, “I’ve been to a lot
of demonstrations and I’ve seen a lot of police
brutality. I haven’t seen that today.”
Police officials announced last week that they
would not use the relatively gentle arrest meth
ods they used during the convention.
Police tactics already had grown rougher dur
ing the summer as a series of anti-abortion sit-ins
taxed city and county resources, costing more
than $500,000 in police overtime, jail expenses
and court time.
Late Tuesday, Fulton County Superior Court
Judge Joel Fryer barred Operation Rescue from
harassing or assaulting anyone going to or from
any abortion clinic or from recruiting others to
do so.
4.L
Ar
MSC TOWN HALL PRESENTS
E
R
T
AC
TUESDAY OCTOBER 25. 1988
G. Rollie White Coliseum
8:00 P.M.
Tickets are now on sale.
Good seats still available!
Tickets are available at the MSC Box Office
& Dillards in the Post Oak Mall
For more Information call 845-1234 - Tickets are $14.00
The Sixteenth Annual
Student Book Collectors’
Contest
Sponsored by Friends of the
Sterling C. Evan
Contest rules and entry forms are
available in the Library.
£
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&
jick&Chifil
Next to the Dixie Chicken
The Durango Dog
^45 chili,cheese
onions, mustard
jalapenos,chips
'
Blue Bell
Ice Cream
single scoop with purchase
of any hot dog and this
coupon
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A. Duda & SonsA/alley Onions
Agri. Workers Mutual Auto Insurance Co.
Alpha Gamma Rho Fraternity
Amer. Institute of Real Estate Appraisers
American Cyanamid
American Society of Farm Mgrs. and Rural Appraisers
Association of Texas Real Estate Economists
Barefoot Grasas Lawn Service
Burger King
Cargill Inc.
Chemlawn
City of Dallas-Parks and Recreation Dept.
Clarence Davids & Sons, Inc.
Deere & Co.
Down Chemical USA
DuPont Ag. Products
Environmental Care, Inc.
Excel Corp.
Farm Credit Bank of Texas
Funk Seeds International
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lAM’S Dog Food Co.
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Who will push
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Imaginative, energized people, the kind
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Merck MSD Ag. Vet
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Northrup King Co.
Pfizer
San Joes Cattle Co.
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Society of Real Estate Appraisers
Standard Meat Co.
Synstex Animal Health
Texas Ag. Extension Service
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And Others