Page 6- The Behrend College Beacon - Thursday, October 1, 1998
nother shooting by border
in death
patrol results
By Ken Ellingwood
Los Angeles Times
SAN DIEGO In the second
lethal shooting in 24 hours, a Bor
der Patrol agent on Sunday night
killed a suspected undocumented
immigrant who allegedly threatened
him with a rock, officials said.
The fatal shootings were the
first involving Border Patrol agents
in San Diego County since 1994 and
the first since the Operation
Gatekeeper border crackdown
flooded the region with agents, ac
cording to Mexican consul officials
in San Diego.
U.S. officials said Sunday’s
shooting occurred in Border Field
State Park, a few miles west of the
San Ysidro border crossing. The
agent was checking for footprints
when he was pelted by rocks, offi
cials said. As the agent retreated to
his vehicle, a man emerged from the
Evacuees flock to sports facility
By Susan Saulny
The Washington Post
NEW ORLEANS - As Hurri
cane Georges unleashed its initial
flickers of fury on the New Orleans
area, hundreds of residents rushed to
the Louisiana Superdome, which city
officials opened Sunday morning as
“a shelter of last resort.”
They came in droves pushing
and shoving in a chaotic rush to
safety as winds picked up speed and
rain began to fall. They lugged plas
tic bags overflowing with clothes,
blankets, food, toys and medical sup
plies, and carried jugs of water
enough for days.
Whole families, elderly people
in wheelchairs, mothers nursing ba
bies, screaming children everyone
was on the lookout for a few feet of
space in the cavernous halls and
rampways that just Saturday night
were filled with fans watchingThlane
beat Navy in a college football game.
Joseph Baptiste, 74, a former
housing authority manager, rested his
Guatemalans train with weapons of peace
By Terri Shaw
The Washington Post
CHIMALTENANGO, Guate
mala Francisco Vasquez was 17
when he left his Kaqchikel Indian
village in the Guatemalan highlands
to join guerrillas fighting the mili
tary government. That was in 1984.
Today, Vasquez has set aside his rifle
for carpentry tools, learning wood
working in a United Nations-spon
sored program stemming from the
1996 peace agreement that ended
the 36-year insurgency.
Vasquez’s journey from moun
tain rebel to carpenter is emblem
atic of efforts by the Guatemalan
government and international agen
cies to find a place in society for the
nearly 3,000 onetime guerrillas who
laid down their arms under terms of
the peace agreement. The demobili
zation of the guerrillas, one diplo
mat said, was surprisingly peaceful:
“It went off without a hitch.”
But adjustment to civilian life
has not always gone smoothly for the
former guerrillas or their erstwhile
enemies. Under the peace accords,
one-third of the army is to be dis
charged and the paramilitary forces
allied with it have been disbanded.
Many former combatants returned to
their homes, but others found that
their villages had been virtually de
stroyed during the war or that they
were no longer welcome there.
Several countries and interna
tional agencies have set up programs
to teach the former rebels trades,
such as tailoring and hair styling. But
there are not enough opportunities
for all, and the end of hostilities was
accompanied by what the diplomat
called “a massive, uncontrollable
crime wave.” Many Guatemalans
and foreign observers believe that
some of the armed men who no
darkness wielding a rock and ignored
orders to stop.
“Fearing for his life, (the agent)
brings out the weapon and shoots this
person, striking the person in the torso
area,” Border Patrol spokeswoman
Gloria Chavez said.
San Diego Sheriff Lt. Jerry
Lipscomb, who is investigating the
shooting, said the agent fired “several
shots.” The man died at the scene of
the 8:30 p.m. shooting.
Citing Border Patrol policy,
Chavez did not identify the agent,
who was placed on paid administra
tive leave while the matter is investi
gated.
The shooting came just a day af
ter another agent fatally shot a sus
pected illegal border crasser trying to
aid a fellow immigrant east of the San
Ysidro port of entry. In that incident,
which took place about 9 p.m. Satur
day, U.S. officials said the agent was
struggling with a migrant next to the
head against a wall on the plaza level
as he watched the crowds surge past
him. “Better here than at home,” he
said.
Mayor Marc Morial opened
shelters of last resort - including the
New Orleans Convention Center and
a vacant department store as the
exodus out of New Orleans contin
ued. It became obvious that a lot of
people were going to be trapped in
the city whether they wanted to ride
out the storm at home or not. The
highways closed at noon with the
onset of high-speed winds.
“The dome was built to be a hur
ricane shelter,” Morial said. “There’s
plenty of space and no windows. We
feel we can adequately protect people
there.”
About 10,000 people had taken
refuge by late afternoon in the
Superdome, and 5,000 were in other
shelters.
Officials planned to open the
dome’s seating area 69,000 spaces
- if the hall should fill.
As a last resort, there would be
longer have a war to fight have
turned to robbery and kidnapping to
support themselves.
But the former guerrillas who
have settled in Chimaltenango, in a
fertile farming area about 20 miles
west of Guatemala City, seem to be
People in the village had
never understood. They
looked at me and made
comments. They were
afraid the (army) repres
sion would begin again
Canadian army Capt. Claude Vadeboncoeur
adjusting well. One of them, Sylvia
Arenas, who comes from a poor
family in Guatemala City, began
doing “small jobs” for the insurgents
while studying social work at the
state-run University of San Carlos.
Then a Spanish priest working in
Guatemala recruited her to work
with a peasant organization in the
highlands.
“My dream was to join the
armed struggle,” she said. And so,
at age 19, she became a member of
the Turcios Lima Front of the Guer
rilla Army of the Poor. Now, she and
her partner, Flavio Ruiz, run a mod
est diner not far from the small shop
where Vasquez and six other single
men are learning to be carpenters.
The guerrilla war ended on
March 19, 1996. Vasquez and his
unit received a message saying,
“Military action is suspended.”
Some of his comrades were worried
about what would come next es
pecially those who had been fight
ing for 20 to 25 years, Vasquez re
called. But most reported to demo
bilization camps run by the United
World and Nation
10-foot border fence when ap
proached by a second person clutch
ing a rock. The agent fired after the
man ignored warnings to stop, ac
cording to the Border Patrol and San
Diego police.
But Mexican authorities said
witnesses interviewed by consular of
ficials disputed reports that the man
had a rock.
Mexico’s consul general in San
Diego, Luis Herrera-Lasso, ex
pressed “deep concern” Monday
over the two fatal shootings, plus two
separate incidents last week in which
Border Patrol agents elsewhere in
San Diego County fired weapons at
suspects who allegedly tried to run
them over.
The Mexican diplomat said
cases of rock-throwing are familiar
to border agents and previously have
not been answered with deadly force.
He called for a full investigation.
the football field. “They really don’t
want people on the field, but this is a
dire emergency,” said Buzz
Leininger, 54, who volunteered Sun
day morning. “If water comes in, the
field could be flooded. But nothing’s
out of the question.”
That news excited Joe Veit, 27,
an Air Force captain from Nebraska
who was toting his pillows up an es
calator. “Would they let us get out
there really?” he asked, only to an
swer himself. “I doubt it.”
The accommodations were far
from luxurious. People spread their
blankets and used their bags of sup
plies as dividers. Some came with
nothing. They rested their heads
against the bare floor.
By the escalator near an end
zone, Baptiste and his wife Vivian,
54, said they were just happy to be
out of the storm’s way. “I’m glad to
be here,” she said. “I just hope when
we get out of here that there’s some
thing to go home to.”
Nations and turned in their weap
ons.
Canadian army Capt. Claude
Vadeboncoeur, a member of the
U.N. mission in Chimaltenango, ob
served the demobilization process,
as he had at the end of civil con
flicts in Nicaragua and El Salvador.
He said the guerrillas and their sup
porters spent two months in the
camps, where they received some
training in how to adjust to civilian
life. Many then returned to their
former homes. But some, such as
Vasquez, could not.
“The army had moved my fam
ily from their land to a place inside
the village,” he said. “My brother
had to move to Guatemala City; he
had been threatened. I was the first
(former guerrilla) to come back.
People in the village had never un
derstood. They looked at me and
made comments. They were afraid
the (army) repression would begin
again.”
One source of frustration for the
former guerrillas in Chimaltenango
is a plan to build 100 houses for
them and their families. The land
has been purchased with the assis
tance of European countries and the
United Nations, and the new own
ers plan to provide the unskilled la
bor themselves. But the project has
become mired in bureaucratic and
financial delays. Other residents of
Chimaltenango are sometimes sus
picious of the former guerrillas, said
Juan Carlos Monge, a Costa Rican
who heads the local U.N. office.
“They ask, ‘What are they going to
live on? Where will they get water?
What if the electricity goes out?
What will they plant?’ "
Under the final peace accords
signed in December 1996, local
committees have been formed
throughout Guatemala to ease the
Fathers’ program largely
failed, study shows
By Judith Havemann
The Washington Post
WASHINGTON- The nation’s
most ambitious effort to help the fa
thers of children on welfare failed to
increase the men’s employment or
earnings and had only modest success
at forcing them to make child support
payments, according to a extensive
study to be released Tuesday.
Overall, men enrolled in the $l2
million program did no better in the
job market than similar men who re
ceived no help.
The study represents the most
comprehensive examination of father
hood programs that have developed
into a crucial component of the
nation’s social policy. When Congress
rewrote the federal welfare laws two
years ago, it ushered in a new crack
down on absent fathers, requiring
states to track them down and force
them to help pay for the support of
their children.
As a result, numerous programs
have proliferated around the country
to help carry out this goal. But detailed
results from the largest of these ef
forts offered dispiriting news about
how these programs are working.
Called “Parents Fair Share”, the
program operates in seven cities
across the country and reaches about
2,600 absent fathers. Half of the men
lack a high school diploma and 70
percent have an arrest record.
The program rests on a tripod of
agencies: Child support collection
officials give the men a break on their
monthly payments if they participate
Demonstrators challenge
authority of Malaysian leader
By David Lamb
Los Angeles Times
JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Dem
onstrators demanding reform
clashed with police in Kuala
transition of former guerrillas and
army veterans. While the former re
ceive help from international agen
cies and other countries, there seems
to be little assistance for soldiers
who are leaving the military. The
number of troops is being reduced
by attrition, with soldiers leaving the
service when their enlistments are
up, former defense minister Gen.
Julio Balconi said.
The United Nations, the United
States and Western European na
tions have provided vocational
training for more than 2,000 mem
bers of a military police force that
also was disbanded under the peace
accords.
The former rebels’ official goal
now is to win power through demo
cratic means. The guerrilla coalition
that negotiated the peace accords,
the Guatemalan National Revolu
tionary Unity, is forming a political
party that will participate in next
year’s presidential election.
Arenas, who in her guerrilla
days conducted indoctrination ses
sions for the rebels and propaganda
rallies in highland villages, seems
content for now as the owner of a
diner. The cooking is done by an
older woman who wears traditional
Indian attire. Arenas addresses her
respectfully as companera, which
means “friend” or “comrade.”
Although she earned a teaching
certificate in secondary school, she
does not want to become a school
teacher, Arenas said, because then
she would not be free to express her
political views in the classroom.
“There is no freedom of expression”
now in the schools, she said.
Instead, she plans to offer her
services to the former guerrillas’
new political party.
in the programs, social service agen
cies conduct counseling sessions on
what it takes to be a good father, and
labor agencies offer job clubs and
training classes to help the men land
jobs.
But in its study of the program,
the Manpower Demonstration and
Research Corporation found that 78
percent of the men held jobs at some
point during the 18-month period
studied whether or not they were in
the program. The New York-based
research organization also discovered
that the participants in Parents Fair
Share earned an average of $7,352,
while a group of similar men made
$7,670 during the same period. Over
all, 72 percent of the fathers in Par
ents Fair Share made at least one child
support payment during the 18
months studied, compared with 69
percent of a similar group of fathers
not enrolled in the program.
However, the total amount col
lected from both groups of fathers was
almost the same. Two cities-Grand
Rapids, Mich., and Dayton, Ohio
had stronger results, partly because of
better cooperation among the separate
agencies, according to the report.
Although the services provided
by the program seemed to have no
effect, the screening process by which
applicants were selected ended up
spurring child support collections.
Normally, the system rarely goes af
ter welfare fathers for child support
because states believe they will spend
more going after them than they will
collect in payments.
But when the states began their
Lumpur for a second day Monday,
challenging the authority of
Malaysia’s autocratic prime minis
ter, Mahathir Mohamad, the long
est-serving leader in Southeast Asia.
The clash, which came as
Queen Elizabeth II was presiding
over closing ceremonies at the 16th
Commonwealth Games a few miles
away, upped the ante in a dispute
that started when Mahathir fired and
arrested his deputy, Anwar Ibrahim,
whom the demonstrators support.
Anwar, 51, was dumped Sept.
2 in a power struggle with the 73-
year-old Mahathir amid allegations
of sexual improprieties, attempted
murder and corruption, all of which
Anwar denies. Rather than go qui
etly, Anwar toured the country de
nouncing Mahathir. He was arrested
at his home on Sunday.
Although few diplomats dare
predict how the challenge to
Mahathir’s 17-year rule would play
out in a country where dissent is un
heard of, there was in Malaysia an
unmistakable echo of events in
nearby Indonesia. A popular reform
movement in Indonesia toppled
President Suharto in May after 32
years in power.
In both cases, there was an ag
ing leader who brooked no criticism,
unruly demonstrators on the streets
shouting for reform, and a once-ro
bust economy that had turned sour.
But most political analysts doubt an
Indonesian scenario in Malaysia.
In Indonesia, Suharto’s fate
hung on whose side the army would
take; it ended up abandoning him.
But Malaysia’s military is not po
liticized and will support whomever
is in power. Also, Mahathir’s cor
ruption and nepotism is far less
grievous than Suharto’s, and there
is no groundswell of hatred for
Mahathir as there was for Suharto.
With Mahathir exercising abso
lute control of the media, Anwar has
no public forum to either defend
himself or push his case for reform.
Two men have been arrested for al
legedly engaging in sodomy with
Anwar. Sodomy is a crime in Ma
laysia, a Muslim country, and local
newspapers have been full of
steamy details provided by the gov
ernment.
fatherhood programs, they started
asking more questions of these men,
and ended up distinguishing those
who couldn’t pay from those who
wouldn’t. And overall, child support
payments were about 19 percent
higher for the men screened, whether
or not they were selected to partici
pate in the program.
Ron Mincy, a program officer at
the Ford Foundation, which helps
fund the program, said that while the
men in the program received counsel
ing and support, they received little
actual training that might help them
develop the skills that could land them
better jobs.
A new program being launched
by the foundation will provide tar
geted money for training low-income
men in an effort to see whether this is
more successful.
In all, 38 states have promised to
spend some federal welfare money on
fathers and Congress is considering
whether to increase the money avail
able.
“We don’t have all the answers,”
said Rep. E. Clay Shaw, R-Fla., lead
ing author of the welfare bill, “and we
would have much preferred that the
research told us we were on the right
track. But we can’t give up on these
kids. They need fathers.”
Finding the answer is critical,
said Wendell Primus, director of in
come security at the Center on Bud
get and Policy Priorities. “We can’t
have the women overemployed as
breadwinners, caretakers and parents,
and the men sitting idle,” he said.
Anwar, who had not uttered the
word reform until three weeks ago,
has had a hard time making his ar
gument that the Mahathir govern
ment is corrupt, has mismanaged the
economy and is comparable, as he
charged, to the Nazi Gestapo. As
finance minister and deputy prime
minister until Sept. 2, he played a
major role in shaping official policy.
With police helicopters buzzing
overhead, officers on Monday
chased mobs of protesters down side
streets and blocked roads in Kuala
Lumpur. Several thousand more
demonstrators took to the streets in
other parts of the capital, where they
were chased by riot police.
Although conceding more ar
rests are likely, Western diplomats
said it is impossible to know
whether the call for reform will take
popular root as it did in Indonesia,
or fade away now that its leader is
in jail. Anwar is charged under the
Internal Security Act, which allows
detention without trial. Anwar’s
wife said she doesn’t even know
where he is being held.
But given the widespread strife
in economically troubled Southeast
Asia, the envoys agree that events
in Kuala Lumpur are worrying.
Ever since 1969 riots against
ethnic Chinese in Kuala Lumpur,
Malaysia has worked to maintain
racial harmony by trying to include
its Malay, Chinese and Indian citi
zens in sharing the benefits of na
tional prosperity and peace. Civil
unrest could split that coalition of
Malaysia’s 22 million people.
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