The Towerlight, February 23, 1989

tl19890223-000 "Vol. 82 No. 16 ""Required Reading"" February 23, 1989 The Towed.'4 lished weekly by the students of Towson State Univers, Vancouver Los Angeles Detroit Baltimore Bos ozt Atlanta San Antonio TSU Student Caravans to El Salvador Effort to aid earthquake victims faces political obstacles by Sean Brohawn News editor Latin American Studies major Peter Melberg will help drive a 1973 Toyota Land Cruiser from Maryland to the Central Ameri-can country of El Salvador next week as part of a national cara-van effort to aid victims of the 1986 earthquake there. The dis-aster left 250,000 people homeless. The aid campaign, Building with the Voiceless of El Salvador (BVES), seeks not only to provide a variety of aid to some 22,000 people in and around the capitol, San Salvador, but also ""to open an 'economic corridor' to El Salvador for future caravans."" Melberg says another goal is ""to publicize and Mexico City INSIDE TSU receives $10 million more from State. Page 2 Griffin retires after 19 years. Page 6 Gymnasts win, rank 16th in nation. Page 16 The Black-White Thing. Page 20 draw attention to the fact that our government is intervening with military aid and sponsoring a gov-ernment who wages a military campaign against their people."" Melberg claims that the U.S. government is supporting a Salva-doran group that is not the ma-jority� a group that has used death squads on citizens to help gain power. This group, ARENA, he adds, is expected to defeat the incumbent Christian Democratic Party in an election on March 19. Melberg plans to stay in El Salva-dor for five days following the election, and is responsible for finding his own way home. Three caravans from the East-ern, Midwestern and Western states will meet in San Antonio San Salvador Texas and travel from there gether in at least 18 vehicles �one ot them an 18 wheeler. Melberg adds, ""in numbers there is more protection These vehicles will carry medi-cal supplies, food, and building materials, and will be met at the border of El Salvador by members of the National Union of Earth-quake Victims of El Salvador (UNADES)�the group calling for aid�on the tentative arrival date, March 15. See SALVADOR, page 2 If "