El Salvador: Information on the FECAS group, organized to help peasants get more land and better prices for their produce

Please find attached documents that provide information on the Federación Campesina Cristiana de El Salvador (FECCAS, Christian Peasant Federation of El Salvador), a peasant organization. Information on a group under the name FECAS could not be found among the sources currently available to the DIRB.

One of the attached documents names FECCAS as the first peasant organization to rise independently in the late 1960s, in contrast with other officially sponsored rural organizations (McClintock 1985, 156). The same source describes FECCAS as a nationwide organization that "brought together agricultural day-labourers, subsistence farmers and others, with the support of both the church and Christian Democratic Party activists" (ibid., 156, 174). FECCAS was a member of the Frente de Acción Popular Unificada (FAPU, United Front of Popular Action), formed in 1974, although FECCAS withdrew from this umbrella organization in 1975 (ibid., 174).

FECCAS merged with the Union of Agricultural Workers (UTC) in 1975, "in what was to become the Federación de Trabajadores del Campo (FTC, Federation of Agricultural Workers), both also members of the Popular Revolutionary Block (BPR)" (ibid., 156). However, the text does not clarify whether the merger was a result of their being joined by the BPR that year (ibid., 174).

FECCAS is aid to have been closely associated with the clergy while being involved in "strikes and protests of unprecedented militancy", and to have demonstrated with the BPR against changes in the agrarian law and countryside repression in late 1976 (ibid., 178). The UTC is described as a smaller organization based in San Vicente province, having formed in late 1973 or early 1974 (ibid.).

The attached excerpts from The American Connection provide some accounts of abuses committed against members of FECCAS or persons involved with the union, and at one point describes the town of Osicala in San Miguel department as a stronghold of the organization (ibid., 179, 185-87, 193).

A 1985 list of Salvadorean organizations prepared by the Refugee Status Advisory Committee (RSAC) of Canada in 1985 described FECCAS as "now closely linked to the BPR," adding that it was

originally established as an outgrowth of "liberation theology," with its "Christian Base Communities" becoming the seedbeds of popular organizations throughout the 1970s, and increasingly subject to violent repression from the right (A Glossary 1985, 4).

A 1985 guide to Latin American political movements contains a joint entry for FECCAS and the UTC, describing them as "left-wing Christian peasant unions" (Latin American Political Movements 1985, 117). The document mentions the violent suppression of demonstrations in 1977 in which the UTC and FECCAS were involved, and states that the two organizations "increased their co-operation, partly though the BPR, and by the early 1980s they were regarded as allies of the FDR-FMLN opposition coalition" (ibid.). Finally, the source states that the two unions "campaign for fair wages, the right to organize, and the radical transformation of Salvadorean society to construct a new society where there is no poverty, hunger, repression or exploitation of one group by another" (ibid.).

A study of Salvadorean politics published in 1988 lists only the FTC, not its component organizations, as a member of the BPR, linked to the FDR and FMLN (see attached chart) (Jiménez et al. 1988, n.p.). The same source states that by 1979 the UTC and FECCAS had 20,000 members (ibid., 190).

References to FECCAS more recent than those found in the 1985 publications attached to this Response could not be found among the sources currently available to the DIRB. However, recent references to the FTC can be found in sources such as the Political Handbook of the World: 1992, which states that the FTC has been a well-organized, key component of the BPR (1992, 236).

This response was prepared after researching publicly accessible information currently available to the DIRB within time constraints. This response is not, and does not purport to be, conclusive as to the merit of any particular claim to refugee status or asylum.

References

McClintock, Michael. 1985. The American Connection Volume I: State Terror and Popular Resistance in El Salvador. London: Zed Books.

Jiménez, Edgar et al. 1988. El Salvador: Guerra, Politica y Paz (1979-1988). San Salvador: Centro de Investigación Social (CINAS) and Coordinadora Regional de Investigaciones Económicas y Sociales (CRIES).

Refugee Status Advisory Committee (RSAC), Ottawa. October 1985. "A Glossary of Salvadorean Political Parties, Popular Organizations, Trade Unions, Business, Professional and Educational Associations, the Right-Wing Paramilitary and the Guerrilla Front."

Latin American Political Movements. 1985. Edited by Ciar n O Maol in. London: Longman Publishing Group.

Political Handbook of the World: 1992. 1992. Edited by Arthur S. Banks. Binghamton, NY: CSA Publications.

Attachments

McClintock, Michael. 1985. The American Connection Volume I: State Terror and Popular Resistance in El Salvador. London: Zed Books, pp. 156-57, 172-79, 185-87, 193.

Jiménez, Edgar et al. 1988. El Salvador: Guerra, Politica y Paz (1979-1988). San Salvador: Centro de Investigación Social (CINAS) and Coordinadora Regional de Investigaciones Económicas y Sociales (CRIES), chart of organizations related to the FMLN (unnumbered page).

Refugee Status Advisory Committee (RSAC), Ottawa. October 1985. "A Glossary of Salvadorean Political Parties, Popular Organizations, Trade Unions, Business, Professional and Educational Associations, the Right-Wing Paramilitary and the Guerrilla Front," pp. 1, 4.

Latin American Political Movements. 1985. Edited by Ciar n O Maol in. London: Longman Publishing Group, p. 117.