Representatives of left and progressive political organizations from Latin America condemned the occupation on June 29, 2009 for its refusal to allow them to visit with the imprisoned Palestinian national leader, Ahmad Sa’adat, General Secretary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
Jorge Shafik Handal Vega, of El Salvador’s Frente Farabundo Marti de Liberacion Nacional (FMLN), Oscar Vega Camacho, of Bolivia’s Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS), Juan Estaban Centurion, of Paraguay’s Movimento al Socialismo (MAS) and Emir Simao Sadr, of Brazil’s Consejo Latinoamericano de Ciencias Sociales, were in Palestine for a conference on the Palestinian left on June 26-29, 2009. They had sent a letter to the International Committee of the Red Cross asking them to arrange a visit.
The occupation authorities refused to allow the visit to take place. Sa’adat remains in isolation in Asqelan prison, a sentence of isolation that was recently extended to September 17 following his recent nine-day hunger strike in protest of solitary confinement and violation of prisoners’ rights in the Zionist jails.
