Sinister role played by the Gleaner in Tivoli massacre

Dear Editor,
I would like to strenuously object to your continued mischief in regard to the facts of what happened in Tivoli in May 2010. I challenge you to prove that Coke’s “private militia” which gathered “in his Tivoli redoubt to resist the security forces and challenge the State” had anything to do with the overwhelming majority of the 73 residents who were killed by the security forces. This is what you suggest in your June 13 editorial when you write about a "fight that left 74 persons dead, among them a soldier."

The evidence so far is that these killings were the result of cold-blooded executions by the security forces and had nothing to do with this so-called resistance. Some of this testimony has been carried in your own newspaper but obviously you chose to conveniently ignore it.

By creating the false impression of any serious ‘resistance and challenge to the State’ you are complicit in providing a false defence to the charge of crimes against humanity having been committed by the security forces. May I also remind you, that if this charge were to be accepted by the International Criminal Court, which I hope it will, the prime minister, the police commissioner and then head of the JDF would be prime candidates to be charged for such crimes because of their pivotal roles in orchestrating this massacre.

It is most unfortunate that a newspaper that is so piously preaching against political gangs is blind to murder by the same gangs and criminals working for the State. But then again you were egging them on in 2010 with the same false arguments to teach Tivoli a lesson -- weren’t you?

Lloyd D'Aguilar