Boston Hosts Central American Youths

U.S. foreign policy in Central America and the Caribbean came under attack thus weekend as representatives of several Central American political organizations spoke at area campuses.

Starting off a 42-day U.S. four, three spokesmen from the United Movement of Youth and Students of Central American (MUJECA), representing 3 million Central American youths, addressed college and high school students and members of religious youth organizations in Boston and Cambridge.

Explaning that MUJECA supports "a solution to the Central American crisis through a process of political negotiation." Robert Pineda of El Salvador's anti-government Democratic Revolutionary Front said. "We don't want to fight--we want to build a friendship between the youth of Central America and the youth of the United States."

"But if the U.S. government intervenes, we are the ones who will have to fight," Pineda added.

During a four-day stint in the Boston area that ended Sunday. November 6, the group spoke at Boston, Tufts, and North-eastern Universities, the Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, and two Arlington high schools.

The three, from E1 Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa Rica, also participated in a demonstration Sunday in Boston against the U.S. invasion of Grenada.

Speaking through an interpreter, Gerando Contreras, a representative of 17 youth organizations in Costa Rica, said he hoped to encourage the formation of an organization in the U.S. roughly parallel to MUJECA.

American youths would have to fight if the U.S. government intervened militarily in Central America. Contreras said, adding that students could play an imp ortant role in opposing the Reagan Administration's policy.

The third representative, 22-year-old Laudaro Sandino, is a Nicaraguan medical student and a Sandinista Youth Organization member. He will address a national rally protesting the invasion of Grenada and the Administration's Central American policy in Washington, D.C. on November 12th.