Social activist seeks help for young journalist

Ian C. Mayer Arizona Daily Wildcat Blase Bonpane, a Latin American scholar and director of the Office of the Americas, speaks at the UA James E. Rogers College of Law last night about Lori Berenson, an American journalist incarcerated in a Peruvian prison. Bonpane has been touring the nation since 1996 speaking on Berenson's behalf.

Bonpane, a Latin American scholar and director of the Office of the Americas, a human rights organization, has been touring the nation since 1996, speaking on behalf of political prisoner Lori Berenson.

"It's an outrage that a young woman would be in a cell for three years in brutal conditions, who is totally innocent," Bonpane told an audience at the University of Arizona's James E. Rogers College of Law.

Berenson, a free-lance reporter, was convicted of treason by a military court after she was caught speaking with Peruvian rebels for her investigation of women's rights and poverty in the impoverished South American country.

The military tribunal that convicted Berenson did not allow for presentation of evidence, cross examination or any other forms of defense. Berenson was convicted as a terrorist by a masked judge and sentenced to life in prison.

The conditions of Berenson's confinement in the high-altitude prison are horrible, Bonpane said.

She is suffering physically and her health is failing, but Bonpane said Berenson can still be saved if President Clinton makes a request.

"It's very easy," Bonpane said. "It's not as though he has a thousand political prisoners overseas. She (Lori) is the only one we know of."

Congressional law states that Clinton is obligated to come to the aid of an American citizen wrongfully held in a foreign country, Bonpane said.

Her release, he added, can be achieved simply if Clinton places a telephone call to Peruvian President Albert Fujimori requesting her return to the United States.

Berenson's predicament hit close to home for 70-year-old Tucson resident Phyliss Mehard.

"I said to my husband - 'this could be our daughter or granddaughter,'" said Mehard, also a long-time political activist who heads the Tucson Free Lori Berenson Committee with her husband Bob. "I kept saying, we've got to do something."

The Mehards became interested in Berenson's plight when they met her family at a fundraiser on her behalf in Los Angeles.

When they relocated to Tucson for their retirement, they decided to devote most of their attention to freeing Berenson.

The Mehards spearhead letter-writing drives to state and federal legislators to create awareness and support amongst lawmakers. Although 235 Congress members signed petitions supporting Berenson's release, none of them were from Arizona, she said.

"We're really hitting our (state) legislators," Mehard said. "We're bombarding them with letters and postcards."

Mehard said Berenson's imprisonment serves as a symbol for injustices suffered by Americans in other countries.

"My fear is that she is going to die in prison," she said. "Then we'd have a martyr on our hands, and that's sad."