Opinion: Funes is chance for fresh start

Earlier this week, Mauricio Funes officially became president of El Salvador, making him the country's first leftist leader. Funes' party, the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN), narrowly defeated the ruling Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA). Although there is still speculation about how left-wing Funes really is, his election is undoubtedly part of the continuing political shift in Latin America.

AP Mauricio Funes, the new president of El Salvador, left, meets with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, right, at the Presidential Palace in San Salvador Monday June 1, 2009. Funes, a former journalist and candidate for Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) party, was sworn in as president of the country on Monday. FMLN emerged in the 1980s as an umbrella group of different left-wing organizations seeking to engage in armed struggle against the government. The move toward armed struggle came after a period of government repression through death squads and can be considered as a response to gross inequalities, poverty, exploitative land relations and the broader history of violence against social movements by the country's military.

The full-scale civil war escalated after the assassination of popular Archbishop Oscar Romero, who spoke against U.S. military assistance for the Salvador military. The United States gave significant support to the Salvador military by way of training and $6 billion in military assistance. The military and right-wing death squads carried out massacres, and more than 70,000 people were killed in the war.

The election of Funes and the recent rise of FMLN represent a repudiation of American foreign policy in the region. Also, it is also an indictment against the School of the Americas (SOA), officially known as Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. SOA is a training facility in Fort Benning, Ga. that has trained more than 60,000 soldiers and police officers from Latin America. A number of death squad members and military personnel who committed egregious human rights abuses are graduates of the School of the Americas. This includes Roberto D'Aubuisson, the founder of the ARENA political party and leader of the death squad responsible for killing Archbishop Romero.

Some leftist governments in South America such as Argentina, Bolivia, Uruguay and Venezuela have decided to stop sending soldiers and police officers to receive training at the School of the Americas. In spite of pressure from specific legislators and organizations like SOA Watch, the training facility continues to operate.

Fortunately, Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., and 42 co-sponsors have re-introduced a bill designed to shut down the SOA and investigate the human rights abuses and manuals describing torture methods. The bill is still in the early stages, so this is a critical time for those opposed to the School of the Americas to contact their representatives.

Not surprisingly, there is already another U.S.-sponsored training facility in El Salvador for police and military personnel from the continent, and some of the training sessions are carried out by DynCorp, a private military company. However, this does not diminish the significance of closing the School of the Americas. It is a first step in a long process for the U.S. to move away from domination, imposition and militarism in order to re-shape its relationship with Latin America.

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Rajeev Ravisankar is a graduate student in public policy. He can be reached at ravisankar.2@osu.edu.

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