Thread by @RepMcGovern

1/ Today our delegation visited the University of Central America in El Salvador, where 6 Jesuit Priests, their housekeeper Elba Ramos, and her daughter Celina Ramos were brutally murdered on November 16, 1989 by the U.S.-backed Salvadoran military.

2/ We visited the chapel where the priests are buried. Then we visited the rose garden which is the memorial where 4 of the 6 priests were murdered.

We also visited the rooms where Elba and Celina were murdered so there would be no witnesses to these heinous crimes.

3/ Fathers Ignacio Ellacuria, “Nacho” Martin-Baro, Segundo Montes, Juan Ramon Moreno, Joaquin Lopez y Lopez, and Amando Lopez were killed for speaking out against a terrible war and standing up for the poor and marginalized.

4/ After public outrage, Congressman Joe Moakley, who I worked for at the time, asked me to staff a commission to investigate what happened and make recommendations to Congress about U.S. policy toward El Salvador.

5/ What I discovered was deeply disturbing: not only did the high command of the Salvadoran military give the orders, but 19 of the 26 members of the unit that committed the murders had received U.S. taxpayer-funded training at the U.S. Army School of the Americas.

6/ And even worse, it was just the latest atrocity committed by Salvadoran troops who had received extensive U.S. military training, including the El Mozote massacre where over 1,000 people were killed — mostly women and children.
link.medium.com/upw8ssoW1Y

7/ Reagan and Bush Administration officials routinely turned a blind eye to the torture, disappearances and murders like those of the Jesuit priests which were carried out by the Salvadoran military.

8/ To this day, the U.S. has never acknowledged any responsibility for the many assassinations, massacres, disappearances and repression perpetrated by the Salvadoran military and security forces against an innocent and unarmed civilian population.

9/ To understand the violence and poverty in El Salvador that drives families out in search of safety, we need to look through the eyes of those who flee and acknowledge that America has a moral obligation to help them given our history in the region. medium.com/@RepMcGovern/d…