Human Rights and Genocide

Update - June 19, 2006 Open Letter to the Fox administration from three authors of the draft report (Alberto Lуpez Limуn, Josй Luis Moreno Borbolla and Agustнn Evangelista Muсoz) (in Spanish). After the National Security Archive posted the draft report of the Special Prosecutor for Social and Political Movements of the Past (Fiscalнa Especial para Movimientos Sociales y Polнticos del Pasado - FEMOSPP) on its website, the authors of the draft asked the archive to post this open letter as well.

Washington, D.C., January 24, 2006 - The final report of East Timor's landmark Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation (CAVR) has found that U.S. "political and military support were fundamental to the Indonesian invasion and occupation" of East Timor from 1975 to 1999, according to the "Responsibility" chapter of the report posted today on the Web by the National Security Archive, which assisted the Commission with extensive documentation.

Today, as East Timorese President Xanana Gusmão transmits to East Timor's Parliament the 2,500 page final report of the country's Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation (CAVR) on human rights violations committed in East Timor between 1974 and 1999, the National Security Archive is making available some of the more than 1,000 formerly classified U.S. and British documents that it and British researchers provided to assist the work of the Commission. The CAVR's final report, which has not yet been made public, strongly criticizes the role of the international community in supporting Indonesia's invasion and occupation of East Timor and calls for reparations from the governments of the U.S. and United Kingdom and from Western arms manufacturers.

Washington, D.C., November 28, 2005 - Today, East Timorese President Xanana Gusmгo transmits to Parliament the final report of East Timor's Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation (CAVR) on human rights violations committed in East Timor between 1974 and 1999, and the National Security Archive is making available to the public some of the more than 1,000 formerly classified U.S. documents that it provided to assist the work of the CAVR.

Washington, D.C., November 21, 2005 - On July 5, officials from the Guatemalan government's human rights office (PDH - Procuradurнa de Derechos Humanos) entered a deteriorating, rat-infested munitions depot in downtown Guatemala City to investigate complaints about improperly-stored explosives. During inspection of the site, investigators found a vast collection of documents, stored in five buildings and in an advanced state of decay.

Washington, D.C., November 18, 2005 - Investigative journalist Frank Smyth breaks new ground in documenting links between retired Guatemalan military officers and drug trafficking into the United States in "The Untouchable Narco-State: Guatemala's Military Defies the DEA." Smyth's story, featured in the independent weekly Texas Observer appearing on news stands today, uses declassified U.S. documents from the National Security Archive among other critical evidence.

Washington D.C. October 18, 2005 - The National Security Archive today posted a series of declassified U.S. intelligence documents and other U.S. agency reports on Saddam Hussein's human rights abuses, one of which is the subject of the first trial of Saddam which begins tomorrow in Iraq. The first set of charges concerns Saddam's responsibility, along with seven co-defendants, for the 1982 massacre of 143 Shiites in Dujail, a town 35 miles north of Baghdad, after an unsuccessful assassination attempt against Saddam.

Washington D.C. October 16, 2005 - Today, the Colombia Documentation Project proudly announces the first in a series of articles to be published in collaboration with Semana, Colombia's leading news magazine. The column, which will appear monthly on Semana.com, is the result of a mutual desire to publish and disseminate in Colombia declassified information now emerging from United States files about the major issues in the U.S.-Colombia relationship, including the drug war, security assistance programs, human rights and impunity.

Washington, D.C., September 28, 2005 - Marking International Right to Know Day, the National Security Archive commended the Department of State for including access to government information as one factor evaluated in its annual Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. Transparency and information are essential to allow people to scrutinize and debate the actions of their government, combat corruption, and promote democracy.

Washington, D.C., June 29, 2005 - President Nixon and his national security adviser Henry Kissinger saw India as a "Soviet stooge" during the South Asia crisis of 1971, downplayed reports of Pakistani genocide in what is now Bangladesh, and even suggested that China intervene militarily on Pakistan's side, according to startling new documentation from White House files and tapes contained in the State Department's Foreign Relations of the United States series and reposted today by the National Security Archive.