Page 12 - aruba-today-20190119

A12 WORLD NEWS
Saturday 19 January 2019
Mothers of April: Relatives of the slain unite in Nicaragua

By CHRISTOPHER SHERMAN fectively used symbols —
MEXICO CITY (AP) — The marching in white kerchiefs
two mothers walked shoul- that suggested children's
der-to-shoulder ahead of a diapers — and leveraged
casket in the northern Nica- alliances with all layers of
raguan city of Esteli, wailing society as well as interna-
in shared grief at the killings tional human rights groups,
of their sons during a wave she said.
of anti-government pro- "In Latin America they stig-
tests. matize the poor, the miss-
Francisca Machado was ing, the students," Agosin
accompanying the casket said. "If you establish an
holding her 24-year-old son alliance of people from
Franco Valdivia Machado's the middle class, the up-
body to the cemetery on per class ... you see that it
that April day. Socorro Cor- happens in every aspect of
rales had just buried her society."
own son, 23-year-old Orlan- It makes it difficult for the
do Perez Corrales, the day government to just dismiss
before. them as terrorists, she add-
From that image of solidar- ed.
ity was born a movement In this May 3, 2018 file photo, a floral arrangement with the words in Spanish "Your wife and chil- The day Socorro Corrales
dren love you" stands during the funeral for Nelson Tellez, who died of gunshot wounds during the
that became the Mothers April 20 protests against the government of President Daniel Ortega, in Ciudad Sandino, Nicara- decided to walk with Fran-
of April, formed by relatives gua. cisca Machado to the
of many of the 325 people Associated Press cemetery she was angry.
killed in the government "It made me furious, it hurt,"
suppression of the student- posed socially conscious rights groups strongly dis- opening a savings account said Corrales, who is now in
led protests. Its members rap music under the name agreed. for the group. The latter the United States seeking
are demanding justice "Renfan" and loved base- A group of independent in- move is complicated by asylum.
from President Daniel Orte- ball; Perez was active in his ternational experts sent by the uncertainty over who Walking with Machado
ga, who has tightened his church's outreach, espe- the Inter-American Com- among the group's leaders "was a way to fight, a way
grip on power and target- cially with the elderly. mission on Human Rights to would still be in Nicaragua. to scream to the four winds
ed voices of dissent, arrest- They did not know each investigate violations wrote The group is also work- about everything they were
ing hundreds and closing other but were standing in its December report that ing toward a cooperation doing to our people, to our
media outlets and human near one another on the the killings were carried out agreement with the Moth- boys, to our children."
rights groups in the after- evening of April 20 during by police and pro-govern- ers of Ayotzinapa, relatives Over the succeeding
math of the protests. a protest against social se- ment gangs unleashed of the 43 students who dis- months, more and more
The group is preparing for a curity cuts in an Esteli park. against the protesters. The appeared in September women came forward to
long struggle for account- Perez fell first. Valdivia start- experts were expelled from 2014 in southern Mexico, support each other in de-
ability for the killers of their ed to move toward him the country before they and establishing a formal manding justice in the kill-
children from a govern- when he was shot in the could publicly release their relationship with the Moth- ings of their relatives. The
ment that has labeled the head. report. ers of the Plaza de Mayo. mothers, sisters and aunts of
protesters criminals and Their families believe they On a recent afternoon, "They have a great record the victims gathered every
coup-plotters. Three of its were both shot by a sniper Francys Valdivia Macha- of fighting to find out all of week at a traffic circle in
nine leaders have fled Ni- firing from City Hall. Fifteen do joined a videoconfer- the different human rights Managua to maintain their
caragua, fearing for their minutes before Valdivia ence with other Mothers of violations, the documen- visibility until such demon-
own safety. was shot, he had de- April executive committee tation, the investigation, strations were prohibited.
"We don't want to think nounced authorities' use of members. their unwavering demand Francys Valdivia said she
about many years passing, force against peaceful pro- The group's president, she for the truth, to demand began hearing from more
but part of our responsibility testers on a Facebook vid- was taking part from a justice and we know those and more mothers who
is to prepare for that sce- eo holding what appeared spare bedroom in a rented are processes that don't sought her legal counsel.
nario," said Francys Valdivia to be a rubber bullet in his house in the Mexican coun- happen overnight," Valdiv- They eventually formed the
Machado, whose younger hand. tryside, where she fled after ia said of the Argentine foundation of the move-
brother was buried on April The nationwide protests receiving threats from Orte- group, which formed dur- ment.
22. began April 18, initially ga's government. In June, ing that country's military With public anti-govern-
Nicaragua's mothers are drawing mostly senior citi- two men dressed in T-shirts dictatorship in the 1970s to ment protests effectively
drawing on the experienc- zens who were the most like those worn by the pro- search for missing relatives. banned in Nicaragua fol-
es of the best-known such directly impacted by the Ortega goons who violently In May, a branch of the Ar- lowing last year's unrest —
group, Argentina's Moth- announced social secu- targeted the student pro- gentine group sent a letter the biggest challenge to
ers of the Plaza de Mayo, rity cuts. When the elderly testers came to her home to their Nicaraguan sisters Ortega's power since he
and the more recently or- protesters were met with and law office looking for expressing their solidar- was re-elected more than
ganized Mothers of Ayotzi- violence from pro-gov- her. She and her family ity and offering their assis- a decade ago — mem-
napa in Mexico. About 150 ernment Sandinista Youth moved around Managua tance. bers of the association held
families are involved in the thugs, students turned out for weeks before eventu- Marjorie Agosin, a Welles- demonstrations in Costa
Nicaraguan movement. in large numbers to defend ally heading to Mexico. ley College professor who Rica and Spain this month.
Valdivia and Perez were them. Her laptop open on a small wrote a book about the "Our relatives started the
both university students, Ortega and his wife, Vice table and Nicaragua's flag Mothers of the Plaza de fight," Valdivia said of her
the former a third-year law President Rosario Murillo, draped over the back of Mayo, said the Nicaraguan slain younger brother. "As
student with a 5-year-old maintained the use of force her chair, the 28-year-old group can learn from the family we're obligated to
daughter, the latter about was justified to fend off an lawyer discussed creating resilience of their Argentine continue the fight indepen-
to complete his engineer- attempted coup. Domestic a virtual museum to docu- counterparts. dent of the pain that each
ing degree. Valdivia com- and international human ment the repression and The Argentine mothers ef- one of us carries."q