PREPARED STATement of Michael Ratner, CENTER FOR CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS The Center for Constitutional Rights is a testified before Congress regarding FBI In In hindsight, the tragic death of Benjamin Linder, a 27-year old American civilian engineer, at the hands of the U.S.-backed "contras" in Nicaragua could have been foreseen. In a lawsuit filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights in September 1986, Ben Linder warned that a continuation of U.S. aid to the contras might well result in the death of U.S. citizens in Nicaragua, including his own. Unfortunately, his plea to end aid to the contras went unheeded. II. SUMMARY OF TESTIMONY Since 1981, the contras have engaged in what independent human rights groups, such as Americas Watch, have described as "deliberate" terror. A key element of that terror, cynically encouraged by the famous CIA "assassination manual," has been to identify and publicly murder civilians working in Nicaraguan government-sponsored education, health, and development programs. Until 1986, the contras only targeted Nicaraguan civilians, apparently fearing that killing foreign workers would cause them to lose support in those countries to whom they were looking for aid. In early 1986, however, development workers from Switzerland, Spain, West Germany and France were killed in situations in which it was apparent to the contras that their victims were non-Nicaraguan civilians. When the contras kidnapped eight West German volunteer construction workers in May 1986, FDN spokesman Frank Arana stated that foreigners working in Nicaragua would be considered "enemy targets" and FDN Commander-in-Chief, Enrique Bermudez, described international assistance workers as "part of the enemy." Why would the contras choose to engage in a tactic so clearly harmful to their public image abroad? The answer lies in the obstacle which foreign workers represent to the effort to economically strangle and internationally isolate Nicaragua. In Nicaragua today, numerous foreign organizations provide assistance in health, education, agrarian development, and small industry to the people of Nicaragua. This aid significantly alleviates the economic difficulties which the contra war and other U.S. measures are intended to create. Ben Linder was directing the installation of small hydroelectric plants to provide electricity and lighting to the remote Cua Valley. In his four years in Nicaragua, he brought light to villages which had never known electricity. He also brought a feeling of joyful optimism to an area wracked by war. When the electric lights went on for the first time in the village of El Cua, Ben celebrated by riding his unicycle down the main street. In addition to permanent workers, hundreds of foreign "brigades" come to Nicaragua through organized "solidarity" organizations to build schools, health centers and houses, and harvest coffee and cotton. These people have the opportunity to get to know the revolutionary process for themselves and have a tremendous impact in their native countries when they return home. While the U.S. portrays Nicaragua in the darkest possible light, these thousands of "internationalists" take a different vision of Nicaragua back with them to their countries where they urge opposition to U.S. support for the contras. The contras are now willing to risk one or two days of bad publicity in order to stem the flow of foreigners to Nicaragua. This policy has paid off. For example, when a Swiss and a West German citizen were killed in an FDN ambush in July 1986, their governments warned that if any more of their nationals were killed, they would have to cut back development activities in Nicaragua. III. COMMITTEE OF U.S. CITIZENS LIVING IN NICARAGUA v. REAGAN Because of the new FDN policy of targeting foreigners, Ben Linder and several other Americans living in Nicaragua filed suit in federal court in Washington, D.C., asking that the Reagan Administration be enjoined from continuing aid to the contras in violation of the June 1986 ruling of the International Court of Justice. The CCR represented the plaintiffs in that lawsuit. In affidavit submitted to the court, Ben spoke of the dangers Nicaraguans and foreigners in his an faced by civilians - - valley, and warned that "the danger to my safety is immediate." Unless an injunction is granted, he said, "I may suffer irreparable physical harm as a result of the unlawful activities of the United States government." A copy of his affidavit is annexed hereto. In February, however, the court ruled that Ben's case raised a "political question" more appropriately addressed to the Congress and the President. Three months later, Ben was killed. IV.. 1981-1985: PATTERNS OF CONTRA ATTACKS In 1983, the CCR filed a lawsuit Sanchez-Espinoza v. Reagan in which we documented the serious human rights violations being committed by the U.S.-backed contras against Nicaraguan civilians. Since that time, our findings have been confirmed by each human rights investigation in Nicaragua. Among the leading such probes: Contra Terror in Nicaragua by CCR Cooperating Attorney Reed Brody, which documented scores of attacks on civilians through the use of eyewitnesses; Violations of the Laws of War by Both Sides in Nicaragua 1981-1985 and First Supplement by Americas Watch which concluded that the contras use terror as a "deliberate" policy; Bitter Witness by Witness for Peace; "Report of Donald T. Fox and Michael Glennon to the International Human Rights Law Group and the Washington Office on Latin America Concerning Abuses against Nicaraguan Civilians by Counterrevolutionaries Operating in Nicaragua." These reports all found that much of the contra strategy has been directed against the civilian population, as opposed to the Nicaraguan military and against civilian targets as opposed to military targets. Specifically, the FDN recognizes that a major reason why many rural Nicaraguans support the Sandinistas is that they are beneficiaries of programs such as rural education, extended |