The Cuban gusano[1] who called for "independence" for Santa Cruz goes on the attack again
Cuban dissident Amauris Samartino
Amauris Samartino threatens Bolivian journalists
Wilson Garcia Merida
October 29, 2008
Translated by Scott Campbell
[Spanish original]
(Datos & Analisis) - From his new refuge in the United States, the Cuban dissident who, in November 2006, together with a horde from the fascist Santa Cruz Youth Union, tried to assault Vice President Garcia Linera while demanding "independence" for Santa Cruz, is now devoting himself to harassing and bullying the Facts & Analysis News Service (Datos & Analisis). The CIA agent's attacks and threats against autonomous journalism in Bolivia, which has taken a stand by denouncing the corrupt and separatist large landowner system, got worse after the recent popular victory when Congressional agreed to hold a referendum on the new Bolivian Constitution next January.
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"Almost two years after what happened to me, tell me if I wasn't right about what is happening there. I was also taken out of Bolivia by the United Nations and I am also a political refugee. Unlike (Walter) Chavez, I never robbed or extorted anyone, unlike Garcia Lineras (sic) I am not a homosexual, nor a thief. Under this government there have been more deaths than under all previous governments; this is what I'm referring to, not because it was foretold, but because I know well how they behave, this useless group, idiots."
With such insults and abuse, the Cuban dissident Amauris Samartino emailed Datos & Analisis to complain, in a curiously untimely manner, about a report this service issued in the beginning of February 2007 in defense of our Peruvian colleague Walter Chavez, when the most reactionary sectors of the right, connected to the U.S. Embassy, were trying to force the extradition of Chavez, who founded and heads the historic weekly "The Furious Toy."
In the report produced by Datos & Analisis warned that the enemies of Chavez compared his case to that of Samartino, who in November 2006 was caught participating in a neo-fascist action in Santa Cruz, when hordes from the paramilitary group called the Santa Cruz Youth Union barged into a hotel in that city with the intention of attacking Vice President Alvaro Garcia Linera during the opening of a meeting of the Organization of American States' Inter-American Drug Abuse Control Commission.
Samartino was seen, photographed and filmed while violently shouting and making threats between chants demanding "independence" for Santa Cruz. One month after the incident, Samartino was deported from Bolivia for violating migration laws relating to threatening internal peace and national security.
The ultra-right cried to the heavens and tried to turn the Cuban dissident into a victim of Evo Morales' "dictatorship." Samartino's case was taken advantage of by the enemies of Walter Chavez to demand "as well the expulsion of the Peruvian."
At the time, Datos & Analisis reported on the difference between Samartino - who was brought to Bolivia from Guantanamo in 2001 in a move imposed on the government of Tuto Quiroga by the United States, without any proof of being a refugee but a "resident" with a stipend of $2,000 a month from the State Department to keep this new "marielito"[2] far from Cuba - Walter Chavez was welcomed into Bolivia as a genuine political refugee, certified by the UNHCR (the United Nations body for political refugees) that demonstrated the illegal persecution that the Peruvian intellectual suffered in his country under the corrupt dictatorship of Fujimori, allowing him to exercise his right to work in Bolivian territory.
More than one year after this report, and curiously after the Congress' approval of a referendum to ratify the new Bolivian Constitution, Samartino, from his new refuge in the United States, began a sudden attack of intimidation and bullying directed towards Datos & Analisis, whose reports have acquired international influence. Along with obsessively insulting Vice President Garcia Linera, Samartino also referred to the Peredo Leigue brothers and their family as a "group of deadbeat opportunists who went to live in Cuba for many years relying on the name of Inti, who was the only one who fired a shot."[3] He also insulted Alejandro Colanzi, a representative of National Unity[4], calling the legislator from Santa Cruz a "sell-out to Hugo Chavez."
In his aggressive messages, plagued with foul, unprintable terms and threats, successively sent between October 22 and 27, Samartino clarifies that he did not arrive in Bolivia during the presidency of Tuto Quiroga, but during the second presidency of former dictator Hugo Banzer Suarez, in 2000. He also disavowed being friends with Italian mafioso Marco Marino Diodato. "When I arrived in Bolivia he (Diodato) was already in jail and I never visited him there," wrote Samartino, attempting to delimit his relationship with the killer of prosecutor Monica von Borries. However, Datos & Analisis has laid out first-hand accounts about the secret meetings Samartino and Diodato held between 2005 and 2006.
Coinciding with Samartino's attacks against Datos & Analisis, sectors of the racist right in Cochabamba, now headed by lawyer Daniel Humerez Valda, former prosecutor and undercover agent for the DEA, now representing former prefect Manfred Reyes Villa for his deceitful purchase of sophisticated armored vehicles by embezzling funds from the Direct Hydrocarbons Tax, have begun a campaign to intimidate and silence this news service, using a television station owned by a known militant of the MNR, party of former president and fugitive Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada.
Translator's notes:
[1] "Gusano", which literally means "worm" in English, is a pejorative label for Cubans who actively oppose the Cuban revolution.
[2] "Marielito" is a term describing those Cubans who left the island as part of the 1980 Mariel boatlift.
[3] A Bolivian family very involved in the nation's politics. Inti Peredo (1938-1967) fought under Che Guevara in Bolivia.
[4] National Unity (Unidad Nacional) represented those in the constituent assembly for a new constitution that did not belong to MAS (Morales' party - Movement Towards Socialism).
Wilson Garcia Merida is an independent journalist in Cochabamba, Bolivia, Director of the Servicio Informativo Datos & Analisis. His email is [email protected].
Scott Campbell is editor of the blog Angry White Kid and a member of Tlaxcala, the network of translators for linguistic diversity. This translation may be reprinted as long as the content remains unaltered, and the source, author, translator and reviser are cited.
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