The sordid history of Lewis Amselem, Deputy U.S. Permanent Representative to the OAS

[EFerrari]

In 1989, the Current U.S. Representative to the OAS Covered Up a Case of Torture in Guatemala

By Jean-Guy Allard

Translation: Machetera

Lewis Amselem, the head of the U.S. delegation to the Organization of American States (OAS), who called President Manuel Zelaya’s return to his country “irresponsible” and “foolish” was denounced years ago for having concealed the identities of individuals, one of whom was a U.S. national, who tortured and raped a U.S. nun in Guatemala.

On November 2, 1989, Dianna Ortiz was kidnapped, raped and tortured by members of Guatemalan security forces, supervised by a North American citizen.

Since then, Ortiz has tried, tirelessly, to get the U.S. government to reopen the files of all those who were victims of brutality in Guatemala during the period of the pro-USA dictatorships.

“Zelaya’s return to Honduras is irresponsible and foolish and it doesn’t serve the interests of the people nor those seeking a peaceful reestablishment of democratic order in Honduras,” said Lewis Amselem, with an arrogance correspondent to his role as Deputy U.S. Permanent Representative to the OAS.

http://machetera.wordpress.com/2009/09/29/the-sordid-history-of-lewis-amselem-deputy-u-s-permanent-representative-to-the-oas/

[Downwinder]

1. This is what we are inviting in Honduras.

[EFerrari]

2. I think we should somehow round up everyone who served under Reagan

and shoot them into space because they are still corrupt as hell and still destructive.

[rabs]

4. Lewis Amselem, Friend of Rapists, Scum

?w=240&h=240
Sister Dianna Ortiz


Pampered children enjoy making and viewing horror movies, because it is a safe way of approaching the dark reality of what humans can and will do, I enjoy indulging in them sometimes too. The extreme end of thrill horror, torture porn, Tarantino etc are actually immaturely banal, the real thing will scar you, just reading about it, hearing it will stay with you forever, it should. One such testimony for me is that of Dianna Ortiz, a US nun who was tortured in Guatemala, you can search about, read her writings, or buy her book (click the image) it will not be an easy thing to bear, how she lives with it is true bravery. 200,000 people were killed in Guatemala under torture regimes supported by the US, a Holocaust of its own, US officials were hands on involved with raping and torturing people, US taxpayer’s money paid their wages and met their expense accounts (yet some protest at funding healthcare).

Earlier I posted about Amselem, the second highest ranking US official to the OAS who blamed Zelaya for causing trouble even as the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights in Honduras (CODEH) found 101 killings by the coup regime. This man Lewis Amselem is working for Hillary Clinton, he was a Bush appointee, a fundamentalist right winger. He was political-military officer at the US embassy in Guatemala City (1988-92) Ortiz’s remembers this of him-

Two months later, after a U.S. doctor had counted 111 cigarette burns on my back alone, the story changed. In January 1990, the Guatemalan defense minister publicly announced that I was a lesbian and had staged my abduction to cover up a tryst. The minister of the interior echoed this statement and then said he had heard it first from the U.S. embassy. According to a congressional aide, the political affairs officer at the U.S. embassy, Lew Anselem, was indeed spreading the same rumor.


More on this roveian monster:

http://tenpercent.wordpress.com/2009/09/29/lewis-amselem-friend-of-rapists-scum/

[Judi Lynn]

3. Anyone with the time should read more about this wondeful, strong person, Diana Ortiz.

http://latinousa.kut.org.nyud.net:8090/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/ortiz.png

http://images.barnesandnoble.com.nyud.net:8090/images/14840000/14842602.JPG

The Blindfold's Eyes
My Journey from Torture to Truth


THE CIA AND TORTURE: On the Record, Part 1
by Jon Elliston

~snip~
In March 1995, it was revealed that CIA Guatemalan assets were involved in the murders of American citizen Michael Devine and Efrain Bamaca Velasquez, a guerrilla leader married to an American woman, Jennifer Harbury. Fasts and vigils by Harbury and Sister Diana Ortiz, an American nun who was kidnapped, raped, and tortured by Guatemalan security forces in 1989, built interest in the issue and prompted White House assurances that the CIA's involvement in Guatemala would be closely examined and all relevant government documents on the subject made public. None of the materials released to date have identified "Alejandro," an American who, according to Ortiz, advised the Guatemalan military team who brutalized her.

The ordeal of Sister Ortiz, whose body bears the scars of 111 cigarette burns inflicted during her detention, was experienced by thousands of Guatemalans during the 1980s, when a massive program of political torture and murder gripped the country. The military and police agencies responsible received continual assistance from the CIA. In April 1995, investigative journalist Allan Nairn reported that the CIA "has systematic links to Guatemalan Army death squad operations that go far beyond the disclosures" of the previous month. According to current and former officials from the United States and Guatemala interviewed by Nairn, "CIA operatives work inside a Guatemalan Army unit that maintains a network of torture centers and has killed thousands of Guatemalan civilians," and "at least three of the recent G-2 chiefs have been paid by the CIA." A former U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency official in Guatemala told Nairn the involvement was so extensive that "it would be an embarrassing situation if you ever had a roll call of everybody in the Guatemalan Army who ever collected a CIA paycheck."

More:
http://sonic.net/~doretk/Issues/98-12%20WIN/cia&torture.html

~~~~~~~~~~~
Democracy Now interview:

Introduction to transcript:
October 12, 2005
Sister Dianna Ortiz Details Her Abduction and Torture by U.S.-Backed Guatemalan Military
Sister Dianna Ortiz speaks about her abduction and torture by security forces in Guatemala in 1989, when she worked as a missionary among indigenous peoples. She testifies for a mock trial of Bush administration officials for breaking laws on torture held during the “Call for Justice Weekend” in September.

More:
http://www.democracynow.org/2005/10/12/sister_dianna_ortiz_details_her_abduction

Diana Ortiz' friend and co-author, Jennifer Harbury, whose husband was wildly brutalized, tortured, murdered, having been tortured over a very, very long time first:

http://www.drugwar.com.nyud.net:8090/images/392.gif

http://www.spdbooks.org.nyud.net:8090/images/tnjpeg/tn156751068X.jpg http://www.beaconbroadside.com.nyud.net:8090/broadside/images/2007/12/17/harbury.jpg

[rabs]

5. Diana Ortiz would hold solitary, silent vigils in Lafayette Park outside the White House

to call attention to what had happened to her in Guatemala and the U.S. Embassy coverup.

The homeless people that hang out at the park would protect her at night and take her something to eat.

Read an article last night that says Andy Card, a top Bush white house official would sometimes go to the park at night to check on her.

[EFerrari]

6. When I was at Berkeley in the late 80s, there was a huge display of children's drawings

from Guatemala in Dwinelle Hall -- all over the first floor lobby walls. Death, dismemberment, tanks, guns, soldiers, blood everywhere. It was the saddest, most painful record I've ever seen in my life and it changed my attitude forever about Latin America because it was impossible to see those representations of the lives of children by children and think in abstract terms ever again.

[Judi Lynn]

8. Those images should be shown from time to time again, EFerrari.

Definitely it would tear good people up knowing what those children had been forced to endure.

[EFerrari]

12. They seem to. At dinner a couple of years ago, a politician in SF

told me that he and his date were going to an exhibition and auction later that night. I can't figure out if there is one main installation or more than one big traveling exhibit but they do show up in the SF Bay Area from time to time. A lot of refugees from Central America in our area.

[Judi Lynn]

7. Would never have guessed Andy Card was capable of humane behavior.

Very good to learn about the group of friends she had around her. I hope it helped her in healing her battered spirit, somehow.

[rabs]

9. Guatemalan gorilla general got his own form of painful torture

http://dca.gob.gt:85/archivo/040209/cultural2pag10.jpg
A swarm of africanized bees stung him to death in March 2004.

Army general and defense minister Hector Gramajo was in charge during the massive repression in Guatemala, including the time Sister Diana Ortiz was raped and tortured. in a NYT article he once claimed:

After an American nun, Diana Ortiz, was abducted and -- according to a medical report and Guatemala's Roman Catholic archbishop -- tortured, General Gramajo claimed the abduction was a staged ending to a lesbian love affair gone awry.
-------------------------
After retiring from the army, Gramajo described his "pacification" program by saying: "You needn't kill everyone to complete the job... We instituted Civil Affairs, which provides development for 70% of the population while we kill 30%."

(And then he went on to a fellowship at Harvard)

http://soaw.org/newswire_detail.php?id=418

[EFerrari]

10. There's a book in all the murderers and assorted scumbuckets in the Ivy League. n/t

[Judi Lynn]

11. How a man can be flippant about killing people is evil.

Words just fail to address the viciousness of his grotesque lie about Diana Ortiz.

He got a fitting reward for all his efforts, in the end. I hope he had time to see his evil life pass before his eyes in clarity.