Students Protest Salvadoran Aid

A dozen Harvard students joined ranks Saturday afternoon with more than 200 bedraggled opponents of continued U.S. aid to El Salvador in a four-mile protest march through Boston.

Shouting "Stop the bombing, stop the war, U.S. out of El Salvador," and "Money for education, not for war," the protesters braved sporadic rainfall as they proceeded from the Boston Common into the North End and back again.

Organizers said the event raised $15,000 for the groups involved, as well as heightening community consciousness about El Salvador. Similar marches were scheduled nationwide to galvanize support for a 50 percent cut in U.S. aid to El Salvador.

"El Salvador is now an issue and we hope to keep it that way," said protest organizer Debora Gordon.

"I really think it's important to do things like this because the world is becoming so apathetic," said Christina T. Kiely '91, a member of Harvard's Committee on Central America (COCA).

According to Gordon, the U.S. has sent $1.5 million a day in aid to the Salvadoran government since the country's civil war began in 1980.

"I believe that the situation in El Salvador is absolutely appalling and the U.S. government has a lot to do with that," said COCA member Lynn E. Kelley '93.

In front of a Boston branch of the Star Market chain, protesters distributed coffee cups of fake blood to generate support for the ongoing boycott of Folgers coffee, the leading Salvadoran brand.

Later, marchers staged a mock funeral at the John F. Kennedy Building in memory of the 78,000 Salvadorans dead as a result of the war.

COCA member Katherine J. Plummer '91 said that COCA's growing membership indicated that campus awareness of Central American issues is growing. "Hopefully we can at least make a difference in educating people on campus," she said.