Jesuits call on US to unveil Salvador files

JESUITS at San Salvador's Central American University this week asked the L'S government to declassify documents on murders and massacres committed during El Salvador's 12 year civil war.
Fr Miguel Estrada, president of the university, speaking at a Capitol Hill briefing before meeting with State Department officials. said that the CIA, the FBI and the State department have information that "could give some clarity as to what has been going on in the last 10 years." Classified documents, he said. would be able to clarify the ambiguities surrounding the 1980 murder of Archbishop Oscar Romero and the 1989 slaying of six Jesuit priests, their housekeeper and her daughter.
Fr Estrada said that the documents could also shed some light on communication between the US embassy in El Salvador and officials in Washington who made US policy decisions.
The Jesuit central American provincial, Fr Jose Tojeira, said that he knew that. in 1983, the FBI had launched an investigation into the funding of Salvadorean death squads from Miami. There was evidence, he said, that death squad activities still continued.