| BRIDGETOWN, Barbados — The detention and
‘ome search of the Tribune’s Caribbean correspondent
Norman Faria here Nov. 1, is part of a vicious witch-

Unt against journalists by the Tom Adams regime which
Tecently permitted the island to be used as a main milit-
aly staging area for the invasion of Grenada.
* Contacted by phone, Faria recounted how in the early
» Morning hours four officers of the Royal Barbados Police
Force burst into his rented home and began ransacking
his personal belongings and files. Three other officers,
€ the rest dressed in civilian clothes, started digging up
back yard garden, he reported.
} Faria said his wife and three children (an 11-year-old
: aughter, a 10-year-old son and a 10-month-old infant
| SON) were present in the house during the search. He
Teported that the police produced a search warrant look-
'ng for “banned literature and explosives’.

Needless to say, they found none of this. I am not

'olved in that sort of thing,”’ he said.
he then explained that they bundled him into the
) ak seat of a marked police car in full view of
‘Reighbours who had gathered outside the house in the
| “Orking class district on the south of the island. The
Police then took him to central police headquarters

———

Free Junior Cottle!

Progressive forces in St. Vincent and the Grenedines
Calling for international pressure on the Cato
80vernment to secure the release of Junior Cottle serving
a: 15-year sentence from charges arising out of a 1973
Meident.
ha Despite the fact that Cottle is suffering from effects of
| * Sullet still lodged in his head and has displayed exem-
1 Plary prison conduct, all efforts to secure his release
| “@Ve been ignored.
a It is clear,” the United People’s Movement argues,
/ t lat Cottle continues to be held solely because of his
fl Political views which he has never renounced despite
,| ‘nts that it may result in his release.”
| a

- Correspondent harassed —
for opposing Grenada invasion

where he was held incommunicado for over three hours,
he explained.

‘‘They never arrested me. When I protested that they
had no right to hold me without being charged, they told
me to shut up. They would not let me phone my lawyer
or my family who by this time was worrying about my
fate. My detention was a clear violation of the island’s
Constitution,’’ argued Faria who holds both Barbadian
and Canadian citizenship.

Faria said others on the island have been similarly
harassed and their rights violated.

‘‘T have learned that several other persons, who like
me have opposed the U.S. intervention of Grenada, have
had their homes searched and some were detained. A
friend of mine said that during the search of his residence
he was lying in bed when a policeman pushed a revolver
through a window and aimed it at him,”’ Faria said.

‘‘T have also learned that a colleague of mine, Rickey
Singh who is the editor of the newspaper of the
Barbados-based Caribbean Conference of Churches,
has had his work permit revoked and will shortly be
expelled back to his native Guyana. The CCC, like the

majority of Canadian churches, was among the first to:

oppose the invasion here. We must remember too that
the Adams government was one of the prime backers of
the move by Washington to violate the sovereignty of
our sister Caribbean island. Indeed, Barbados’ civilian
airport has now become a virtual U.S. airbase, trans-
porting equipment to Grenada,”’ he added.

‘‘What is clearly happening in Barbados now is that
the Adams regime is using the U.S. invasion success to
launch a vicious witch-hunt against democratic opinion,
to play iron man and intimidate the opposition forces,”
he said.

Faria who also writes for a section of the Barbadian
media, revealed that he will take up the search and
detention with the Barbados Association of Journalists
(BAJ) of which he is a member. He has also instructed
his lawyer to seek damages from the police and to have a
number of cassette tapes containing journalistic work
and which were seized by the search party returned to
him immediately.

Faria (left) outside offices of the Grenadian newspaper
Free West Indian in St. George’s, 1982. Today he and
other journalists who opposed the U.S. invasion are sub-
ject to police persecution in Barbados.

Trib cables protest

A cabk of protest has been sent by the Tribune to
the Commissioner of Police in Barbados protesting
the raid on Faria’s home. Copies were also sent to the
Barbados Embassy in Ottawa and the External Af-
fairs Department of the Canadian government:

* * *

Our newspaper has learned of a campaign of
police persecution against journalists in Barbados
which included the house search and detention of our
correspondent Norman Faria. We strongly protest
such actions against journalists in pursuit of their
profession and urge the immediate return of seized
personal belongings. We assure you that such
harassment has and will continue to receive public
exposure in Canada and reflect poorly upon the
attitudes of the Barbadian government toward press
freedoms.

Tom Morris

International Focus

| pa

aaa
—

‘They take him

| and beat him...’

_ They take him in and beat
him and do all kinds of things,”
Orrah Benoit told reporters.
€r son, Alister had been a

| Member of Grenada’s People’s

Revolutionary Army (PRA)
_tWo years earlier. Benoit
added that her son had been

il. Picked up by Jamaican and

1.8. soldiers several times
Since the invasion.
Then, she added, on Nov. 9,
/0 Americans in civilian clo-
thing took her son away. He
S not been seen since.

What is underway in Gre-

| Rada is a sweep of the island.

OUuSe-to-house military
Fombes and repeated arrests
°F people suspected of army

Mbership of left activism”’
Ing carried out, reports

Reuter news agency.

The U.S. occupying army
and its few hundred Caribbean
henchmen are in the process of
‘‘nacifying’’ Grenada. Clearly,
for them the problem is not
only former PRA people —
even the so-called “‘spokes-
man for the peacekeeping
forces’ allowed it ‘‘is not a
crime to have belonged to the
army of your country.”

The problem is much
deeper. Four years of freedom
and independence, four years
of popular activism in all fields
of Grenadian life; the existence
of mass labor, youth, women’s,
civic, educational and other
organizations under the
People’s Revolutionary

Government means the Gre-

nadian people are not the same
as before 1979.

As the occupiers and their
civilian Quislings start to dis-
mantle the social and
economic achievements of the

PRG they will realize more
fully the enormity of their task
— and the futility of it.

Arresting and beating up
people, house-to-house
sweeps, occupation and re-
pression will not be paid for by
American bubble gum. It will
only rekindle and hasten the
struggle for liberation and
independence.

When in Canada recently,
Nicaraguan Minister of Cul-
ture Ernesto Cardenal warned
that the U.S. and its puppet re-
gimes in Central America were
laying down plans for the mili-
tary destruction of the Nicara-
guan revolution.

He made this charge before
the invasion of Grenada and
some, perhaps, may have
thought he was overstating the
danger.

Some two months earlier,
the late Unison Whiteman,
Foreign Minister of the
People’s Revolutionary
Government in Grenada told a
Toronto press conference that
his government was deeply
concerned over U.S. threats
against Grenada. Whiteman,
who died Oct. 19 along with
Prime Minister Bishop and
other PRG leaders, was proven
right.

Ernesto Cardenal’s grave
warning is also deadly serious
and well-founded.

The New York Times, Nov.

2

11, reports the Central Ameri-
can Defence Council, founded
under U.S. sponsorship,
gathered 14 top military lead-
ers. from El Salvador,
Guatemala, Panama and Hon-
duras on Oct. 22-23 to map
plans for Nicaragua’s invasion.

The alliance called “‘Conde-
ca’’ looked into “‘legal’’ ways
to precipitate an invasion by
the group. Their document
provides, ‘‘in case of extreme
crisis, direct participation of
the U.S. with all its resources”
be applied.

““A war situation is pre-
dictable’’, it reads. The plan is
strangely similar to the ‘‘legal”’
method used against Grenada
— ‘neighboring states’’ ap-
pealing to the U.S. to invade a
country with whom they
disagree.

There are differences, too.
Current U.S.-backed military
attacks on Nicaragua will also
be used as ‘“‘proof’’ to show, as
the document reads, that “‘the
intensity of combat merits an
international pacification ac-
tion.”

The danger is real. Plans are
being - finalized. Cardenal’s
warning and his appeal for vigi-
lance and solidarity must be
heeded.

The silence coming from Ot-
tawa is deafening. How can
these ‘‘democrats”’ sit still as
hordes of terrorists daily attack

’ a sovereign nation openly
backed by Washington without

even a question?
Where is Canada’s voice?

Just what is
MacEachen’s job?

Unreal.

External Affairs Minister
MacEachen says he has ‘“‘no
evidence’’ the U.S. or its
Caribbean allies blocked Ot-
tawa’s efforts to get Canadians
off Grenada before the inva-
sion.

Then, says he, he believes
those countries (Antigua, St.
Christopher-Nevis and
Monserrat) when they deny
acting on U.S. orders. If this
isn’t bad enough, MacEachen
then tells the press he did not
and will not ask the U.S. about
the scandal in which Canadian
efforts were thwarted on two
successive days before the in-
vasion. “*(It’s) not my respon-
sibility,’’ he huffs.

The facts are the U.S. and its
knee-jerk allies who
‘‘requested’’ the invasion
didn’t want Canadians being
taken off Grenada on Oct. 23.
It would have blown their
cover of foreign nationals in
danger. What these three
governments (and Barbados)
did was let Canadians sit there
knowing the U.S. Marines
were going to bomb the hell out
of the island two days later.
Some ‘‘allies’’.

It’s a pretty cynical busi-
ness. Being kept in the dark
about the invasion is insulting
enough for External Affairs,
but watching MacEachen fall
over himself covering for
Reagan is just too much.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—NOVEMBER 23, 1983—Page 9