Word: panamas
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...general has made it clear that he is girding for a prolonged battle. In anticipation of the general strike, which for two days closed 90% of all businesses in Panama City, the government imposed a news blackout. Troops seized the offices of the leading opposition newspaper, La Prensa, and shut down two other papers as well. On Friday, Noriega's backers staged a rally of 50,000, many of them government workers, in the capital...
Noriega also took aim at the country's increasingly belligerent students. Early last Wednesday, several hundred students at the University of Panama protested the death of Eduardo Enrique Carrera, 24, a classmate who had been killed by police fire three days earlier. Though the military said Carrera was shot after scuffling with police, relatives claimed that the boy was slain after he shouted, "Down with Noriega!" Riot squads, known as the Dobermans, dispersed the demonstrators with tear gas and bird shot. Classes were suspended for the rest of the week...
What began primarily as a squabble between Noriega's cronies and affluent businessmen has mushroomed into a movement that now includes a large slice of Panama's middle class. Moreover, antagonism toward Noriega is spreading outward from the capital to points up and down the S-shaped isthmus. Last week's general strike closed hundreds of businesses in the provinces. "We were frankly surprised," said Ricardo Arias Calderon, an opposition leader. "The shutdown had a national character we hadn't expected." The protest, however, did not affect activity along the Panama Canal, which grosses up to $500 million a year...
...found the strike encouraging. "Noriega won't be able to return to the status quo," predicted a State Department official. "Panamanians are desirous of legitimate democracy, and we support the move toward democracy." Washington's support has included the suspension of $26 million in economic and military aid to Panama, following a June attack on the U.S. embassy by a pro-Noriega mob. Last week Panama paid $106,000 to compensate for the damage. But by week's end, the U.S. had not yet agreed to thaw the freeze...
Washington officials sound more and more as if they believe Panama can quickly follow the Philippines and South Korea on the march toward democracy. "Noriega's days are numbered," says one official. "He just doesn't know it." Noriega, however, is not a man to be intimidated by the gringos. Panamanians say the general will go when his military staff of 19 colonels advises him that the moment is right -- and not a moment sooner...