>showing solidarity with the arrested activists.
>
>Since they are unable to join the incursions into the
>restricted areas, many prisoners have written "Navy out"
>and "Free Vieques" on huge banners made by knotting
>together several white prison sheets and hung them out the
>windows.
>
>When demonstrators are jailed, the prisoners treat them in
>the gentlest way, trying to make them feel as comfortable
>as possible during their stay.
>
>All community, political and labor organizations fighting
>the U.S. Navy presence are in a state of high alert. While
>the incursions into restricted areas continue, these
>organizations are also regrouping, carrying out
>demonstrations and discussing plans of action.
>
>Their message has been consistent: "These arrests do not
>deter us. We will get the Navy out."
>
>They are putting those words into action, as shown by the
>infiltration into the restricted zone June 27 by 100
>members of the Puerto Rican Independence Party.
>
> - END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service. Everyone is permitted to
>copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
>Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message
>to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
>
>
>From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Date: Wed, 28 Jun 2000 23:01:02 -0400
>Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
>Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT
>Subject: [WW] Free at Last!
>Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the July 6, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>EDITORIAL: FREE AT LAST!
>
>Their long nightmare is over.
>
>Elian Gonzalez and his family--Juan Miguel, Nercy and
>Hianny--are home in Cuba.
>
>The right-wing anti-communists in Miami who held the child
>captive for months were fully defeated. And the policies
>associated with them also suffered a blow.
>
>Almost at the same time Elian and his family were flying
>home to freedom in Cuba, the U.S. Congress was agreeing to
>lift part of the severe blockade on trade with Cuba that
>has been in place for four decades. If enacted, this would
>be the first time since the Cuban Revolution that any anti-
>Cuba legislation has been lifted.
>
>The bill passed by the U.S. House of Representatives is
>far from a complete lifting of the blockade, and it
>includes new restrictions on travel to Cuba. But it is
>nonetheless a concession that the blockade has failed to
>undermine the Cuban Revolution.
>
>Never before has the strength of the Cuban Revolution been
>so clearly displayed on the television screens of the
>United States. The mass outpourings of support for Elian's
>freedom throughout Cuba showed clearly that the island is
>not a dictatorship of a small clique, but rather a
>"dictatorship" of the working class.
>
>Endless attempts were made to bribe Elian and his family
>while they were here in the United States in order to get
>them to stay. But the bribes were rejected. Nothing the
>U.S. government could offer could possibly replace the real
>quality of life that they have in Cuba, Juan Miguel told
>the world.
>
>This was probably a revelation to many in the U.S., who
>have been fed 40 years of anti-communist propaganda by the
>U.S. government and media.
>
>Cuba, in fact, is a wonderful country, as the increasing
>number of visitors from the U.S. are telling their friends
>upon their return.
>
>Most of Cuba's worst problems are brought on by the severe
>blockade enforced by the U.S. government. The blockade is
>not just a trade embargo, which would be damaging enough.
>The blockade is four decades of organized terror against
>that country--bombings, economic sabotage and political
>pressure designed to isolate Cuba.
>
>While the return of Elian and his family is a victory for
>the Cuban people and their supporters in the United States
>and around the world, the U.S. government's war on Cuba is
>not over. After 40 years, the U.S. government may be
>admitting that the blockade has failed. But they have not
>given up on their goal of overthrowing Cuban socialism.
>
>It should not be forgotten that it was the Clinton
>administration and the Immigration and Naturalization
>Service that initially kidnapped Elian, refusing to return
>the child to his father in Cuba as required by
>international law. Instead they turned him over to anti-
>communist counter-revolutionaries in Miami.
>
>When the Clinton administration and Attorney General Janet
>Reno finally took action, it was not for the boy's sake,
>nor out of any concern for parental or other human rights.
>It was the months of mass protests in Cuba, demonstrations
>in the United States and other countries, and overwhelming
>U.S. public opinion that prompted them to finally take
>action.
>
>The kidnapping of Elian had become a problem for the
>Clinton administration's foreign policy. The Miami counter-
>revolutionaries, whose influence even within the Cuban
>community has been fading, were interfering with U.S.
>imperialism's international relations. This became
>intolerable.
>
>The extreme-right Cuban American National Foundation,
>Brothers to the Rescue and others are the ones who were
>calling the shots for the Miami Gonzalez family. CANF
>President Jorge Mas, Brothers to the Rescue thug-in-chief
>Jose Basulto, and other right-wing leaders constantly
>surrounded the child. These are the forces that are
>directly tied to terrorist acts against the people of Cuba,
>usually carried out under the direction of the Central
>Intelligence Agency.
>
>These anti-Cuba terrorists are also the most adamant
>supporters of the U.S. blockade, showing that they care
>nothing about Elian and the other children of Cuba. The
>blockade deprives millions of Cuban children of food,
>medicine and other necessities. For them, Elian was just a
>pawn to revive their declining power and influence. But
>instead of achieving this goal, they have been exposed and
>weakened.
>
>Elian and his family's freedom is a great victory. Any
>partial lifting of the U.S. blockade of Cuba is also a
>welcome victory. The solidarity movement in the U.S. should
>seize on these victories and the new understanding of Cuba
>that has spread across the U.S. to fight for a full lifting
>of the blockade.
>
>After all, Congress is only talking about lifting a small
>part of the blockade. And Washington has not given up on
>its policy of overthrowing socialism in Cuba.
>
> - END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service. Everyone is permitted to
>copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
>Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message
>to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
>
>
>From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Date: Wed, 28 Jun 2000 23:01:03 -0400
>Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
>Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT
>Subject: [WW] Sankofa, Protesters Fight Legal Lynching
>Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the July 6, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>HUNTSVILLE, TEXAS: SANKOFA, PROTESTERS FIGHT LEGAL
>LYNCHING TO LAST MINUTE
>
>By Richard Becker
>Huntsville, Texas
>
>
>At 8:49 p.m. Central Daylight Time on June 22, poison injected into
>his veins by a Texas prison doctor stopped the heart of Shaka
>Sankofa. He fought until the very end.
>
>Strapped to a gurney, Sankofa gave a stirring speech that ended
>only with his last breath.
>
>Sankofa is dead, legally lynched by Gov. George W. Bush and the
>state of Texas. But through his heroic and determined struggle in the
>last days of his life, he dealt a mighty blow to the racist death
>penalty.
>
>Sankofa is dead. But his revolutionary spirit lives on.
>
>In 1981 Shaka Sankofa, then known as Gary Graham, was
>convicted of murder and sentenced to death. He was condemned
>after a two-day legal proceeding so corrupt and farcical that it could
>not be accurately called a trial--even by bourgeois legal standards.
>
>Graham, a 17-year-old African American, was accused of killing
>Bobby Lambert, a reputed drug dealer who was white. Graham's
>conviction rested entirely on the testimony of one eyewitness who
>viewed the killing from 35 to 40 feet away, through a car windshield,
>at night.
>
>His court-paid lawyer, Ronald G. Mock, failed to call any witnesses,
>although there were two at the time who said they were sure the
>shooter was not Graham. Nor did Mock introduce a ballistics test
>that showed that Graham's gun could not have fired the bullet that
>killed Lambert.
>
>
>Five times before, Texas authorities had set execution dates for
>Sankofa. Each time, his new lawyers and public pressure had won a
>stay and a new appeal.
>
>But never in the nearly two decades after his original conviction was
>Sankofa granted a new, real trial.
>
>In early May, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear his final
>appeal. The Texas Department of Corrections immediately set June
>22 as the execution date.
>
>With no appeals left it appeared almost certain that the sentence
>would be carried out. But supporters in Texas, including the Texas
>Death Penalty Abolition Movement, Nation of Islam, SHAPE
>Community Center, National Black United Front, New Black Panther
>Party and others went into high gear.
>
>They demanded that Bush and his appointed Board of Pardons and
>Paroles grant Sankofa clemency and a new trial. The International
>Action Center/Millions for Mumia sent out a call to hold National
>Days of Protest on June 16-20 to stop the execution.
>
>Sankofa himself vowed to resist to the end--as had his comrade
>Ponchai "Kamau" Wilkerson, who was executed in March.
>
>Struggle outside death house
>
>The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles had scheduled the
>announcement of its recommendations in Sankofa's case for noon
>on June 22--just six hours before the time set for his execution.
>
>By that time, 300 anti-death penalty demonstrators had assembled
>outside the red brick prison in Huntsville, about 70 miles north of
>Houston. Several dozen media trucks were parked in an adjacent lot.
>
>Hundreds of state, county and city cops, along with the infamous
>Texas Rangers, surrounded the area. On the other side of the
>prison, a heavy police guard protected about 20 Ku Klux Klan
>members wearing white robes and carrying Confederate flags and
>pro-death-penalty signs.
>
>Noon came and went without an announcement from the board.
>Then, at 1:45 p.m., longtime Sankofa supporter Ashanti Chimurenga
>spoke to the crowd. "The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles has
>denied all relief and clemency," she reported.
>
>The board had not met. Its members simply faxed in their ballots to a
>central office in Austin.
>
>They voted 12 to five against clemency, 14 to three against a 120-
>day reprieve to investigate, and 17 to zero against a conditional
>pardon.
>
>The execution was set to be carried out in just a few hours. Family
>members, friends and supporters were stunned, many in tears. But
>no one was ready to give up.
>
>Despite her evident pain, Sankofa's stepmother, Elnora Graham, told
>reporters and supporters: "He's a very strong man. And he's still
>alive. He's still alive."
>
>A little after 2 p.m., a powerful rally began along the high barricades
>set up less than 25 yards from the prison wall. It was co-chaired by
>Gloria Rubac, a leader of the Texas Death Penalty Abolition
>Movement, and Anthony Freddie of the Shaka Sankofa/Gary
>Graham Justice Coalition.
>
>Rubac, who met with Sankofa and other death-row inmates many
>times, denounced "the slavery that exists today inside the Texas
>prisons."
>
>"Bush the father slaughtered the people in Iraq," Rubac continued.
>"Now George W. is slaughtering the people inside the Texas
>prisons.
>
>"We have to end prison slavery in Texas. We have to stop the Texas
>death machine."
>
>Quanell X of the New Black Muslim Movement said: "We are not
>here to appeal to the conscience of George W. Bush. There is no
>point to that. We are here to appeal to the Black family."
>
>Conrad Worril, chair of the National Black United Front in Chicago,
>termed Texas "a part of the new Confederacy. ... It is George W.
>Bush and the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles who are on trial
>here today."
>
>Larry Holmes, a national leader of the International Action Center
>and Millions for Mumia, said that "the real murderer is not inside
>here in some cell but in the governor's mansion in Austin.
>
>"If they have the arrogance to go through with this assassination, it
>will be a freedom fighter who is martyred here today."
>
>At one point, a group of youths and other activists rushed the line of
>police and prison guards outside the death house. Some broke
>through and ran toward the building. Eight people were arrested.
>
>Minister Robert Muhammad of the Nation of Islam, Sankofa's
>spiritual advisor, emerged from the prison a little before 4 p.m. He
>told the crowd that Sankofa had said that "the board decision comes
>as no surprise."
>
>Muhammad said: "Shaka knows that this struggle is much bigger
>than him as an individual. It is the struggle to end the racist, anti-
>poor death penalty."
>
>He quoted Sankofa as saying: "Death is a complement to life. The
>only way you can avoid dying is by not being born. But what the
>enemy tries to do is to make death something to fear.
>
>"Non-cooperation with evil is an obligation like cooperation with
>righteousness is an obligation."
>
>Muhammad explained that Sankofa "refuses to accept a last meal
>because it would be to accept injustice." He called Sankofa "one of
>the strongest people I've ever met," and said that "he does not seem
>desperate or even anxious."
>
>Around the same time, it was announced that Sankofa's lawyers,
>Jack Zimmerman and Richard Burr, had made last-ditch appeals to
>the Texas Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court.
>
>The Texas high court quickly turned it down. At 5:30 p.m. came the
>news that the U.S. Supreme Court had refused to hear the appeal
>by a vote of five to four.
>
>The multinational crowd outside the prison grew, swelling to as many as 1,000
>between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. After the announcement of the Supreme Court
>decision, the organizers led a march to the downtown Huntsville area, which
>was closed down that day, and into the Black community.
>
>There the New Black Panther Party staged an armed demonstration of support for
>Sankofa. About 200 people, mostly African American, joined the march.
>
>A little before 6 p.m., the execution witnesses--including Sankofa supporters
>the Rev. Jesse Jackson, the Rev. Al Sharpton, Bianca Jagger of Amnesty
>International, and Minister Muhammad--entered the Walls death unit.
>
>Outside, Larry Holmes led the demonstration in chanting, "Shaka Sankofa, live
>like him--dare to struggle, dare to win."
>
>The end seemed near.
>
>Then came another announcement. Law yers Burr and Zimmerman had filed an
>unusual civil action based on the deprivation of Sankofa's constitutional
>rights. If the issues it raised could not be resolved by midnight, an
>automatic 30-day stay of execution would have to be granted.
>
>But at about 8 p.m., word came that the civil action, too, had been thrown out.
>
>In the last minutes of his life, as Sankofa spoke his final words, the
>demonstrators join ed in chanting, "Long live Shaka Sankofa."
>
>With great sadness and deep anger, the demonstrators marched out or slowly
>dispersed.
>
>Deep divisions in ruling class
>
>The acceleration of the movement to stop
>Sankofa's execution and end the death penalty in the weeks before his death
>brought to the surface deep divisions within the U.S. ruling class.
>
>This latest development came only a few months after Illinois Gov. George Ryan
>was forced to declare a moratorium on executions in that state because 13
>innocent people had been released from death row.
>
>Suddenly, the TV screens and editorial pages of leading capitalist media
>outlets--the New York Times, CNN, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, ABC,
>etc.--were filled with calls to stop Shaka Sankofa's execution, grant him a
>new trial, and, in some cases, suspend the death penalty.
>
>A widely reported study of all death sentences in the U.S. between 1973-1995
>by Columbia University showed that 68 percent were overturned due to legal
>flaws, and that many of those retried were found innocent.
>
>pretended champion of human rights and democracy around the world.
>
>Nearly all of the closest U.S. allies have eliminated the death penalty, while
>at home the pace of executions is speeding up. And it's clear that those sent
>to the death house are exclusively poor and overwhelmingly people of color.
>
>Many of Washington's allies, including the European Union, condemned the
>United States for this latest execution, in large part because Gary
>Graham/Shaka Sankofa was a minor in 1981. Executing a person for a crime
>committed while under age 18 years is a violation of international law.
>
>Another factor in the emerging bourgeois opposition to the death penalty is
>fear that the rash of legal lynchings will spur rebellions in the nationally
>oppressed communities.
>
>Execution carried out despite growing opposition
>
>In the days after the execution, condemnation was widespread.
>
>The June 23 Italian daily Il Manifesto carried a big picture of Bush on its
>front page with the headline "The executioner doesn't let up." Many other
>newspapers around the world condemned the execution.
>
>A German legislator, Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, said: "The U.S.
>presents itself as the world police defending human rights, and on the other
>side it carries out the death penalty."
>
>UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson, who had called for a stay
>of execution, said that it "ran counter to widely accepted international
>principles."
>
>In the United States, demonstrations and disruptions of Bush's campaign
>activities took place coast to coast for a week before June 22. In Texas, the
>active movement against the death penalty, especially in the African American
>community, grew to a level not previously seen.
>
>Dozens were arrested during these pro tests. As the clocked ticked down to the
>execution June 22, 18 people were arrested at a militant protest in San
>Francisco and 11 more in New York.
>
> that this could raise expectations and encourage the struggle.
>
>The prison system and the death penalty are weapons of state-sponsored
>terrorism, which have been greatly expanded over the past two decades.
>
>ther struggles.
>
>It is only when those movements grew, became stronger and proved that they
>weren't going away that the ruling class was forced to make some concessions.
>
>l executions and abolish the racist death penalty once and for all.
>
> - END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service. Everyone is permitted to
>copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
>Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message
>to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
>
>
>
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