Indigenous Peoples and Human Rights

February 11, 2010

With courage, they walk into that dark night


By Brenda Norrell
Censored News
http://www.bsnorrell.blogspot.com

Over the years I've had the bounty of meeting many incredibly brave people. People who face off with the military in Chiapas and look down the barrels of AK47s. People who step softly and assuredly into prison time and time again to expose the US reign of terror and torture. People who live on the backroads alone and centered, facing the rangers and herding their sheep, facing the border patrol and tribal police. They are Mayan, Maori, O'odham, Mohawk, Yaqui, Pueblo and Navajo. They are Indigenous, Australian, Canadian and European. They come from all walks of life, rich and poor, young and old.
Still, there are times when the courage of these people stops me into stillness. I am spellbound by their courage. Here is one of these, an invitation and a poster, from a delegation going to El Salvador. It is from the School of Americas Watch, struggling for closure of the US military's training school of assassins in Fort Benning, Ga.:
"Join Fr. Roy in events commemorating the 30th anniversary of MonseƱor Romero´s assassination at the hands of SOA graduates. Walk in the footsteps of martyrs Ita Ford, Maura Clark, Fr. Ignacio Ellacuria, Celia Ramos and others. Accompany SOA Watch's Partnership America Latina (PAL) Coordinator Lisa Sullivan in visiting high level Salvadoran government officials in asking that El Salvador send no more soldiers to this school of assassins."

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