Mother fights for civil rights

Press, 3 April 1989, Page 8

Mother fights for civil rights

By

DEBORAH MCPHERSON

New Zealanders should support the work of Amnesty International, says a visiting El Salvadorean, Mrs Ruth Amaya, who has had good cause to thank the human rights organisation.

Mrs Amaya is a member of COMADRES, an organisation of mothers of disappeared or assassinated children.

The organisation also denounces the disappearance, torture and killing of more than 70,000 civilians by military or death squads in political turmoil in El Salvador during the last nine years. Mrs Amaya joined COMADRES in 1983 when her son, one of five children, disappeared after he was captured by the National police for not having his relevant papers. He was not seem again.

Mrs Amaya told her story through an interpreter, Mr Trevor Jackson, the convener of Corso’s international programmes committee. She said many bodies with signs of torture were left lying in the streets. The mothers in COMA-

DRES often had to search the streets for signs of missing family members. She produced photographs of torture victims which said were taken in El Salvador by members of COMADRES and the human rights commission. Mrs Amaya said she was taken in for questioning in January by the police, where she was beaten and forced to remain naked in prison. It was only through the efforts of Amnesty International that she was able to be released relatively quickly, she said. Mrs Amaya was invited to New Zealand by the Latin American Solidarity Network and her trip has been paid for by Corso. She is urging New Zealanders to press the Americans not to provide military arms to El Salvador.

United States military aid was the only obstacle preventing peace in El Salvador, she said. Mrs Amaya will speak through a Spanish interpreter at midday today at the University of Canterbury’s student union building. She will visit Australia before returning to take up the struggle in El Salvador.