Sen. Clinton in Puerto Rico in support of Vieques protesters
Clinton has said her one-day visit is a "gesture of solidarity" with protesters.
Kennedy, nephew of former President Kennedy, and labor leader Dennis Rivera
are serving 30-day sentences for trespassing connected to an April 28 protest.
Her visit comes as the Navy has notified local government it will begin
a new
round of exercises on Vieques August 1.
Acting Gov. Ferdinand Mercado, who made the announcement Friday, said the
timing is "insensitive and lacking prudence" because it would follow a
July 29
nonbinding referendum the local government is holding to gauge if and when
Vieques' 9,100 residents want the Navy to leave. One option will be an
immediate end to bombing.
Clinton, a Democrat who supports an immediate halt to the exercises, arrived
in
the capital, San Juan, on Saturday morning. She did not speak to media
at the
airport before leaving in a motorcade for the federal detention center
in
suburban Guaynabo.
Clinton also planned to meet with Archbishop San Juan Roberto Gonzalez
Nieves after leaving the prison on Saturday afternoon.
The former first lady will not travel to Vieques -- an outlying Puerto
Rican
island.
President Bush plans to have the Navy out of Vieques by 2003. But that
promise
has not appeased many Puerto Ricans, who claim six decades of bombing has
harmed the health of islanders. The Navy denies those claims.
Many New York politicians have traveled to Puerto Rico to lend support
to the
Vieques cause -- some say to win votes among New York's estimated 1 million
Puerto Ricans.
On Friday, New York legislator Adam Clayton Powell IV was released after
being sentenced to time served in a San Juan federal court. He was arrested
June 28 for trespassing on Navy land.
In April, Clinton met with New York civil rights leader Al Sharpton at
a
Brooklyn detention center. Sharpton is still serving a 90-day sentence
for
trespassing.
Copyright 2001 The Associated Press.