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The Sanctuary Experience Voices of the Community A Conversation w/ Dorothy Pine

Dorothy Pine and her dear late husband, Cliff, spent years in Tucson conducting refugees from Central America fleeing death squads and displacement to safe havens in el Norte via a contemporary underground railroad - The Sanctuary Movement

With her coauthor Edna Otter, Dorothy details the personal accounts of those in the movement who risked their welfare and federal incarceration to adhere to their commitments to conscience and religious teachings and to bring relief to those driven from their homelands.

The Sanctuary Movement in the US has historic and intellectual roots going back to the middle ages and continuing through slavery in America but, unfortunately, a long path to tred before it triumphs over the continuing criminal and immoral policies of the US government.

The US policy of war against emerging democracies in Central America under the Reagan and Bush père regimes were war crimes of the first order.  Under the instruction and direct support of US agencies, the dictatorial client regimes in El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala used death squads, disappearances, mass arrests, torture and terror to subdue native populations.

In Nicaragua, the Contras were trained and equipped by the CIA to overthrow the popular government of the Sandanistas. The assassinations of Archbishop Romero and the Maryknoll Nuns were only the grim warnings of what was to come.  As the repression expanded and increased in intensity, hundreds of thousands of people were driven from their homes or forced to take up arms to defend themselves from the US instigated and enabled onslaught.

Those seeking escape came to, and across, the borders of the United States where Dorothy & Cliff Pine and thousands of others across the country saw them to safe havens across America and in Canada.

Meanwhile, the criminals that promoted these policies are now even bigger fish in the Bush fils regime,  Elliot Abrams was convicted in the Iran / Contra scandal, only to be pardoned and is now Deputy National Security Adviser.  John Negroponte was ambassador to Honduras - one of the primary training & staging grounds for Contra attacks against Nicaragua and later ambassador to Iraq and Director of National Intelligence.  He is now Deputy Secretary of State. Dick Cheney was ranking minority member of the House committee that investigated Iran Contra but issued a minority report rejecting the proof of White House lawbreaking by the Reagan administration.  As Secretary of Defense under Bush père he directed the assault on Panama in which longtime US client Manuel Noriega came to the end of his useful service life.  As vice president - or king of the 4th branch of government, he will hopefully be impeached, indicted and incarcerated.

Click here to watch or here to listen to the program.