| May 29, 2014 marks 33 years of unjust imprisonment for Puerto Rican patriot Oscar López Rivera. Oscar and several other Puerto Rican political activists were arrested in 1981 in New York and Chicago for participating in Puerto Rico's national liberation struggle. His patriotic activities were deemed seditious conspiracy by the colonial U.S. state and he is serving a 70-year sentence. He is the last of these Puerto Rican patriots who remains imprisoned. Actions are being held in the U.S. and across Puerto Rico to mark this anniversary with the firm demand that Oscar be released NOW! In 1999, Oscar rejected a clemency offer from then U.S. President Bill Clinton. He adamantly refused to be released on the basis that the offer had not been extended to all of his comrades. Since that time, the others have been released. However, despite being a model prisoner, the U.S. government has thus far refused to re-extend the offer of clemency, nor even grant him parole. The U.S. has colonized Puerto Rico since 1898, when Spain illegally transferred the island to the U.S. as a spoil of war in the Spanish-American War. Puerto Rico's fight against Spanish colonialism and for independence then became a fight against U.S. neo-colonialism. Since 1898, the U.S. has made every effort to crush the struggle for independence, using assassinations, jailings and violence against the resistance. Oscar's harsh sentence on a bogus charge of sedition and continued imprisonment are an indication of the vindictive and neo-colonial outlook of the U.S. state towards Puerto Rico and those who fight for its independence. Oscar's steadfastness for 33 years and the broad support for his cause throughout the Americas are the fitting and defiant reply to this injustice and the U.S. intolerable colonization of Puerto Rico. The charge of sedition against Oscar is to turn truth on its head. Oscar and other independentistas have the right to resist U.S. occupation. It is not sedition when the aim is ending colonialism. It is colonialism that is the crime and resistance is the right of those occupied. Moreover, this just stand has been affirmed year after year by resolutions taken by the UN Special Committee on Decolonization that the U.S. end its colonial domination of Puerto Rico, which the U.S. arrogantly continues to flout. TML calls on everyone to support the just struggle of Puerto Ricans for national liberation and demand that U.S. President Obama release Oscar López Rivera immediately! |