UNREST IN PUERTO RICO

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP73-00475R000101610002-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 27, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 6, 2014
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: February 22, 1967
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release @ 50-Yr 2014/01/06:
IA-RDP73-00475R000101610002-7 I-
E. 317,237
S. 250.207
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Sar, Juan, P.R. .
As if the Central ...r..,,.f.elligence Agency didn't
already have enough trouble with students in the
U.S., it has also 'ooen accused ol inciting attacks
here against Puerto P.ican students who are cam-
for inclepencienee of the isaind.
Juan Mari Bras, a \vealthy lawyer who is see-.
:retary-general of the Pro Independence Movement
(PIM), charges that the Assn. 01 UniversIty Stu-
(lents for Statehood (AU'PEl) iS really an "instru-
ment" of tho CIA and that AUP.I.r. is res',2ensible
rocoot rocic.throwIng assault on other y0 \Aths
demonstrating, for independence.
We do not have the slighte.st doubt," said
Mari Bras, "that in back of all this is the infa-
mous CIA, which has been trying through its
San.Juan office to attack the PIM and the incle-
pencionee struggle in general."
Senor .Mari Bras may not have any "doubts,".
but most other Puerzo Ricans. do. :-:is charges
again.st the CIA are not taken seriously, but they
l:ave nevertheless served his purpose of attract-
ing attention to ri?,e emotional new political strug-.
gle that is developing, here.
Since this conflict revolves primarily about the
island's relations with. the U.S., and will probably .
cor.-.e to. a head later . this year through a. plebi-
scite on status, Americans are soon going to be
hearing a great deal about it, especially if Mari
:
:as and his new ally, the one and only Stokely.
Carmichael, have anythin,g to do with it,
; .CarinichacI, whose leadership o the Staclent
Non-Violent. Coo:clihating Committee. so?aroused
Americans last year, has come and gone from
Puerto Rico, but he will be back, and meanwhile
he is busy stirring up things in New York, where.
; 70,000 Puerto Ricans now live.
in fact, Carmichael and Mari Bras have is-
'
sued a joint coran-hinique saying they will work
together ag st the war in Vietnam, the draft
and "police brutality," and for better housing, CGU-
cation and living conditions in urban slums. ..
, C1.1.4%"10::
The Inclependentistas share Castro's view that
Puerto Rico is merely a "perfumed colony" of
U.S. The PIM and SNCC alliance intends to try
.to bring cuestions of Puerto Rican inc.lependence.
and Negro "oppression" in the U.S. before the UN. '!
All this -n-laices headlines, but here in San Juan .
interest centers not on the inde.pendentistas (as
of now a neg14,Yible group), but on the coming
cattle at ,-.e polls oetween the two major parties,
one of which stands for the present common-
wealth status and the othor Qr '5tatehooa.
In the U.S. it Is generally assumed that alt
or nearly all of 'Puerto Rico is happy. and con-
?tented with its existing, status, but a.ctually there
is a substantial dissent. Just how big this is no-
body knows (that's what the plebiscite, if it is
held, is supposed to determine).
.7. .7.
:a any ease, lf.'nerto I.Ziec, is ileither fish nor
fowl. There is no other status quite like it .any-
where else in the. world. It is part of the U.S. i
and ye: isn't. The people escape the income tax
but not the draft. Arid so it goes.
Modern Puerto Rico is really almost the_work
?of one man, the. incomparable Munoz 'Marin, who
founded the Popular Democratic Party and was
'the governor for many years until he retired.
But even in "rezireme.nt" he is Mister Puerto
with an immense popular following, par-?
ticularly a:ion g the workers and peasants. is
the father .of the "commonwealth" arrangement
with thc.? U.S., and as long as he continues to
favor it (aT..1 he. does wholeheartedly), it prob-
ably will persist.
Nevertheless, there seers to be a growing
'sentin-,ent for statehood. Blessed by the strong
leadership of Luis -Terre and 'Miguel Garcia Men-
dez, the Re.publican Statehood Party has shot up
irorn 85,172 votes in 1952 to 2S,i,627
This is still only a little over 34 per cent o:
the total V070, bu the .is a strong belief that
the percentagc., would be considerably larger M
an election where statehood was the only
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release @ 50-Yr 2014/01/06:
CIA-RDP73-00475R000101610002-7