News Conference and Candlelight Vigil on Lincoln Park Campus at 5 p.m., Nov. 17, Will Kick Off Weekend Protest at Georgia Army Base

WHO: Forty DePaul University students, sponsored by University Ministry.

WHAT: Will hold a news conference featuring addresses by Claire Ong, a DePaul university minister in the Community Service Office of the University Ministry; and the Rev. Andres Rey, a DePaul Vincentian priest. A candlelight vigil will be held after the news conference. The group will then board vans for a 14-hour journey to join 12,000 students from college campuses across the country at a weekend non-violent protest of the U.S. Army School of the Americas (SOA) in Fort Benning, Georgia.

WHERE: The news conference/address will begin at 5 P.M., FRIDAY, NOV. 17, 2000.

WHEN: in DePaul’s Stuart Center Cafeteria, 2311 N. Clifton Ave., followed by the candlelight vigil and van boarding at the corner of Seminary and Belden avenues.

WHY: The DePaul students are part of a national movement that is calling for the closing of the U.S. Army School of the Americas, which trains soldiers in combat, counter insurgency and counter narcotics. The activists believe that graduates of the SOA are responsible for some of the worst human rights abuses in Latin America, including the 1980 assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero and the 1981 El Mozote Massacre of 900 civilians in El Salvador. According to the protesters, the SOA’s 60,000 graduates include notorious dictators Manuel Norriega and Omar Torrijos of Panama; Leopoldo Galtieri and Roberto Viola of Argentenia; Juan Velasco Alvarado of Peru; Guillermo Rodriguez of Ecuador; and Hugo Banzer Suarez of Bolivia. DePaul students have participated annually in the protest of the SOA since 1997.

Contacts: DePaul student contact: Shane Mason: 773/687-1756, smason1@wppost.depaul.edu

DePaul University Ministry contact: Shannon Green: 312/362-5671