[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 152 (Wednesday, November 16, 2005)]
[House]
[Page H10232]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   REMEMBERING THE 1989 MURDERS OF SIX JESUIT PRIESTS IN EL SALVADOR

  (Mr. McGOVERN asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, 16 years ago today, in the dead of night, 
the Salvadoran Army's U.S.-trained Atalacatl Battalion entered the 
grounds of the University of Central America in San Salvador, pulled 
six Jesuit priests from their beds, marched them out onto the lawn 
behind their residence, put high-powered rifles to their heads and shot 
them dead in cold blood. A few minutes later, these same soldiers 
discovered the Jesuits' housekeeper and her teenager daughter hiding in 
the house and murdered them as well.
  A bipartisan commission appointed by the Speaker of the House and 
chaired by our former colleague, Congressman Joe Moakley, investigated 
this heinous crime, identified the killers, and the Commission's report 
became critical evidence in the prosecution and conviction of the 
priests' killers and, I believe, in creating support for the U.N.-
brokered negotiations that ended El Salvador's 12-year civil war.
  Mr. Speaker, I knew these priests. I was proud to call them my 
friends. Let us take a moment to remember their courage and to remember 
the bipartisan work of this House under the leadership of Joe Moakley 
that helped El Salvador forge a pathway to peace.
  Let us never forget the names of those who were murdered on November 
16, 1989: Father Ignacio Ellacuria, Father Ignacio Martin-Baro, Father 
Segundo Montes, Father Armando Lopez, Father Joaquin Lopez y Lopez, 
Father Juan Ramon Moreno, Celina Maricet Ramos and Elba Julia Ramos.

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