Sixteen arrested in annual Fort Benning protest

Published: 2006-11-22

FORT BENNING, Ga. (CNS) -- At least 15,000 people demonstrated and 16 were arrested trespassing at the 17th annual School of the Americas protest Nov. 17-19 outside the U.S. Army's Fort Benning. Maryknoll Father Roy Bourgeois, who started the protests in 1990, promised participants a celebratory demonstration next year if the new Democratic majority in Congress ends funding of the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation at Fort Benning. The institute -- whose military acronym is WHINSEC -- was formed in 2001 to replace the School of the Americas as a training ground for military, law enforcement and civilian officials from Latin America and the Caribbean. The yearly demonstrations, sponsored by SOA Watch, are held on a weekend in mid-November to commemorate the Nov. 16, 1989, murder of six Jesuits, their housekeeper and her daughter by Salvadoran soldiers. In 1990 a congressional task force found that five of the nine soldiers arrested for the killings had received training at the School of the Americas. When it opened it 2001, the institute was mandated by Congress to include at least eight hours of human rights training in all its courses. Lee A. Rials, the institute's public affairs officer, said that training covers due process, the rule of law, international human rights conventions, the role of the military in society and civilian control of the military. He said the eight-hour minimum applies to two-week courses, but it may rise to as much as 40 hours in yearlong courses. Rials has called it "a ludicrous accusation" that the institute teaches torture methods.

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