Audiencia Pública sobre Reparaciones y Costas.
La Corte
Héctor Fix-Zamudio, Presidente
Sonia Picado Sotela, Vicepresidente
Thomas Buergenthal, Juez
Rafael Nieto Navia, Juez
Julio A. Barberis, Juez
Asdrúbal Aguiar-Aranguren, Juez
Antonio A. Cançado Trindade, Juez
Manuel E. Ventura Robles, Secretario
Ana María Reina, Secretaria Adjunta
Por el Gobierno de Suriname
Carlos Vargas Pizarro, Agente
Fred M. Reid, Representante del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores
Jorge Ross Araya, Abogado-Asesor
Por la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos
Oliver H. Jackman, Delegado
David J. Padilla, Delegado
Claudio Grossman, Asesor
Se abrió la sesión a las 10:00 horas y se cerró a las 15:30 horas.
EL PRESIDENTE: Se abre esta audiencia pública.
A los fotógrafos y camarógrafos, tres minutos para estar al frente. Después si ustedes quieren, pueden seguir tomando, pero al fondo del salón.
Se abre esta audiencia pública, citada con el objeto de escuchar el parecer de las partes, sobre la oposición hecha por el Gobierno, a algunos de los testigos y expertos, propuestos para declarar por la Comisión Interamericana.
Antes de comenzar, saludo al agente del Gobierno de Suriname, señor Carlos Vargas Pizarro y las personas que están acreditadas, el señor Fred Reid, representante del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores y el señor Jorge Ross Araya, abogado asesor. También saludo al señor Oliver Jackman, al señor David Padilla, delegados de la Comisión Interamericana y al señor doctor Claudio Grossman, que es asesor de la misma Comisión.
Daré la palabra al señor agente del Gobierno de Suriname, para que haga su exposición sobre los temas y objetos de esta audiencia.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Muchas gracias, señor Presidente.
Señor Presidente, Ilustres señores jueces. En aplicación del procedimiento establecido en la resolución del señor Presidente, de fecha 19 de junio del presente año, lo estipulado en Artículo 37 del Reglamento de la Corte y la solicitud expresa de la República de Suriname que fue hecha manifiesta de la Honorable Corte en nuestro contra-memorial sobre reparaciones y costas, Suriname procede, en vía oral, a recusar la deposición testimonial que puedan brindar en su calidad de expertos, el día de hoy, los señores Richard Price y Stanley Rensch.
En nuestra defensa escrita, recusamos también el testimonio del doctor Federico Alodi y la doctora Sally Price.
Por no estar presentes las citadas personas, en esta sala, no podemos recusar su deposición testimonial y consecuentemente, solicitamos respetuosamente a la Corte, se tome nota de su no asistencia a esta audiencia.
Como es del conocimiento de los señores jueces, la Comisión solicitó a la Honorable Corte, se admitiera el testimonio del doctor Price, con el fin de avalar una solicitud de indemnización, por un monto de 2 millones de Florines de Suriname, a favor de la tribu Saramaca.
Véase en este sentido, página 19 del Memorial presentado por la Comisión, en cuanto reparaciones y costas.
A criterio de la República de Suriname, la deposición testimonial que pueda brindar tal experto, corresponde, en cuanto a su deposición, a la expresión de meras opiniones, que no pueden considerarse como evidencia, por la razón de que no tiene los conocimientos idóneos para fijar y valorar con precisión y criterio científico de perito actuario, que es lo que requiere la Corte en este momento, el monto de la suma antes solicitada, a saber, 2 millones de Florines de Suriname, con lo cual se pretende reparar el supuesto daño moral sufrido.
Señor Presidente, Ilustrísimos señores jueces, Suriname considera que hemos venido aquí a determinar, en forma científica, el monto de las indemnizaciones que por los daños sufridos, la República de Suriname debe de pagar a los familiares de las víctimas, en el presente caso.
Es por esta razón que hemos recurrido a la ayuda de peritos y expertos, los que, por sus estudios y conocimiento, pueden asesorar a este Honorable Tribunal. Sin embargo, el doctor Price, sin desconocer ni menospreciar su gran experiencia y estupendo curriculum aquí presentado ante la Corte anteriormente, carece de los conocimientos para determinar con precisión científica el monto patrimonial del daño moral, que supuestamente, debe de indemnizarse, a la tribu Saramaca.
Es por esta razón, además, de la extemporaneidad que ya hicimos referencia, en nuestro contra-memorial, durante la fase escrita de este proceso, que recusamos el testimonio del doctor Price.
Asimismo, señor Presidente, Ilustres señores jueces, recusamos el testimonio oral que pueda brindar en esta audiencia, el señor Stanley Rensch, en relación con la determinación, como asimismo literalmente expresó a la Comisión, de la magnitud de los daños morales experimentados en el presente caso.
Señor Presidente, reconocemos como digno de elogio, la lucha que en pro de los derechos humanos en Suriname ha venido desempeñando la organización, a la cual pertenece el señor Stanley Rensch. Sin embargo, ello no nos puede facultar para reconocer, ante esta Corte, la idoneidad del testimonio que pueda brindar el señor Rensch y que ayude a determinar, en última instancia, el monto del daño moral, que supuestamente debería de reconocer la República de Suriname, a los familiares de las víctimas y a la tribu Saramaca.
Es plenamente aceptado que todo daño moral deberá de ser demostrado, vía una serie de pruebas psicológicas, que deberían de hacerse a los supuestos perjudicados, por parte de peritos y expertos en ese campo. En la medida en que toda indemnización por daño moral, resulta principalmente, de los efectos psíquicos que han sufrido los familiares de las víctimas, cuyos derechos humanos han sido violentados.
El testimonio del señor Stanley Rensch no es idóneo, ni aporta nada, en cuanto a la magnitud de los daños morales causados, por cuanto él no es perito psicólogo ni psiquiatra, para determinar la existencia de problemas psicológicos, afectando a los familiares de las víctimas por un lado y a la tribu Saramaca por otro.
Es por esta razón, señor Presidente, Ilustrísimos señores jueces, que recusamos su testimonio, en relación con la deposición que pueda brindar para determinar la magnitud de los daños morales experimentados en el presente caso contencioso.
Muchas gracias, señor Presidente.
EL PRESIDENTE: Muchas gracias, señor representante.
Ahora nos dirigimos al señor Oliver Jackman, delegado de la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos para que se refiera a los mismos aspectos que ha abordado el señor representante del Gobierno de Suriname.
SR. OLIVER JACKMAN: Thank you Mr. President.
Mr. President, first of all, I thank you for your welcome to the Delegation of the Commission, and I also personally express my great pleasure and honor of appearing before you again, and I'd like to offer a special word of welcome, on behalf of the Commission, to the new Judge, Mr. Justice Aguiar. It's a great pleasure to see him on the bench.
If it may please the Court, first of all, the Government of Suriname has made passing reference to the question of the timeless, or lack of timeliness, of the presentation of the witnesses, but has not condescended to any detail, in establishing their argument on timeliness, it is mentioned in passing, and I would just mention it in passing, because I think that's all it deserves.
The hearing today is a hearing which arose as a result of the decision of this Court, based on the acknowledgment by the Government of Suriname of its responsibility for the violations charged by the Commission, and this is, therefore, by way of being, a separate hearing, and in presenting it's memorandum, in relation to that separate hearing, the Commission, specifically identified a series of witnesses which it requested the Court to be allowed to present. So, there is no question of timeliness, there is no question of prejudice toward the Government of Suriname by any failure, on the part of the Commission, to provide adequate information about both the identity of the witnesses and the scope of the evidence which it was proposed that they should give.
It is argued by the Government of Suriname that neither Doctor Richard Price nor Mr. Stanley Rensch is the proper person to provide the Court with information concerning the moral damages, and other damages, sustained by the Saramaca people as a result of the massacre at Pokigron.
It is the contention of the Commission that the Court is entitled the fullest possible information about the circumstances surrounding the lives and deaths of the victims, about the societies from which they come, and in particular, since the memorandum of the Commission stipulates that damage has been done, not merely to the immediate relatives of the victims but also to the very special society from which the victims come, it is only proper that the Commission should present to the Court, evidence to substantiate the concepts which are presented in that memorandum. Dr. Price and Mr. Rensch are ideally suited to provide the Court with this evidence, and the Court is fully qualified to accept, or disregard that evidence as it chooses, and to give that evidence its full and proper weight in the context of the overall question of damages sustained by the nearest and dearest of the victims. But, I think that the most important question which the Court has to decide at this stage of the proceedings is whether the presentation of evidence by these witnesses either takes the Government of Suriname by surprise, and that clearly is not the case, or puts the Government of Suriname in an unfair position, at a disadvantage, vis-a-vis the Commission and vis-a-vis the Representatives of the victims. The question is one of prejudice. Nothing that has been said by the Representative of Suriname this morning indicates any possibility of prejudice, much less any likelihood of prejudice.
The Court is perfectly entitled, at any given moment, to say to the witness, that this evidence is not relevant, or at the conclusion of the evidence, to come to it's own conclusion that the evidence is not relevant. Certainly, I would ask the Court, to immediately dismiss any idea of prejudice and to reject any contention of extemporanity. This means that, Mr. President, in view of the fact that the Commission is advised by an attorney, and a professor who represents the victims themselves, I would ask your permission, if indeed Professor Grossman wishes to add anything, I would ask your permission, for him to make a brief addition to this statement.
I thank you very much, Mr. President.
EL PRESIDENTE: Gracias, doctor Jackman. Ahora preguntaríamos al señor representante de Suriname, si tiene algo que replicar a los argumentos de la Comisión.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Muchas gracias, señor Presidente. Sí, sí quisiéramos hacer una breve intervención.
Señor Presidente, Ilustres señores jueces, Suriname considera que lo que estamos discutiendo en esta audiencia ante la Honorable Corte, es referido a la idoneidad de los testigos recusados. No estamos discutiendo nada respecto a perjuicios causados o no. Consideramos que no son idóneos, por cuanto no pueden aportar nada, en cuanto a los daños morales, supuestos daños morales causados, tanto a los familiares de las víctimas como a la tribu Saramaca.
Señor Presidente, señores jueces, Suriname pudo haber presentado aquí una serie de testigos, que se refirieran a la poca inexistencia total de daños morales. Sin embargo, no creímos conveniente referirnos a eso, o presentar pruebas testimoniales en ese sentido, porque no creemos en la existencia de daños morales, en cuanto a la tribu Saramaca.
Aquí pudimos haber traído personas tan capacitadas como el doctor Price o como el doctor Rensch, para que aportaran su testimonio. Sin embargo, ni era el momento, ni era la intención de Suriname. Vuelvo a insistir, lo que estamos discutiendo aquí, es la idoneidad del doctor Price y el señor Rensch para aportar elementos de juicio que demuestren el daño moral causado tanto a los familiares de las víctimas como a la tribu Saramaca.
No consideramos que sean las personas idóneas que nos puedan ayudar a dilucidar este asunto. Muchas gracias.
EL PRESIDENTE: Mr. Jackman.
SR. OLIVER JACKMAN: Mr. President, I would merely say that the arguments of the Commission are in the memorandum which has been presented. The Curriculum Vitae of the two witnesses are available to the Court. It is for the Court to decide whether these are proper persons to present the kind of evidence which is appropriate in this case. As the Court pleases.
EL PRESIDENTE: Ahora pasaríamos a preguntar a los señores jueces si tienen alguna pregunta que hacer a las partes y le pregunto al señor Juez Cançado Trindade. ÀTiene usted alguna pregunta?
ÀEl señor Juez Barberis? ÀEl señor Juez Buergenthal? ÀEl señor Juez Nieto Navia? ÀA la señora Juez Picado Sotela? Ah, perdón, Àel Juez Aguiar? Yo tampoco tengo ninguna pregunta. Entonces, la Corte se retira a deliberar sobre la oposición de los testigos presentados por la Comisión.
En 20 minutos reanudamos la sesión.
EL PRESIDENTE: Se reanuda la sesión pública. La Corte, después de deliberar sobre las objeciones propuestas por el señor representante del Gobierno de Suriname, llegó a la conclusión de que no son aceptables y por lo tanto, llamaríamos a los testigos de la Comisión. Les haremos llegar oportunamente los fundamentos por escrito, de esta decisión.
Entonces, esta parte de la sesión tendrá por objeto, recibir los testimonios de tres personas, el señor Richard Price, el señor Stanley Rensch por parte de la Comisión y el señor Ramón de Freitas, por parte del Gobierno de Suriname.
Entonces, vamos a pedir al señor Richard Price que comparezca. Sr. Richard Price.
Sí, el señor Ramón de Freitas iba a hablar en holandés, pero hay traducción. Entonces, ellos van a hablar en inglés.
Ruego al testigo manifestar ante la Corte su nombre, nacionalidad, número de documento de identidad y lugar de residencia.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: My name is Richard Price, I'm an American citizen, I reside in Martinique, in the Caribbean. Excuse me, did you ask for the number of my passport? The number of my passport is Z-588-0533.
EL PRESIDENTE: Ahora ruego al señor Secretario, lea la prevención que hace la Corte a los declarantes.
SR. MANUEL VENTURA: Primero que todo, quiero informar que solamente el testigo que está declarando podrá estar presente en la audiencia. Los demás testigos, deberán permanecer fuera de la sala de sesiones. Los testigos deberán limitarse a contestar, clara y precisamente, la pregunta que se les formula, ajustándose a los hechos o circunstancias que les consten y evitando dar opiniones personales.
Se informa a los declarantes que, de acuerdo con el Artículo 39.2 del Reglamento, los Estados no podrán enjuiciar a las personas que comparezcan ante la Corte por su testimonio, pero la Corte puede solicitar a los Estados que tomen las medidas que su legislación disponga, contra quienes la Corte decida que han violado el Juramento.
EL PRESIDENTE: Ahora se procede a tomar el juramento al testigo.
ÀJura -o declara solemnemente- con todo honor y con toda conciencia, que dirá la verdad, toda la verdad y nada más que la verdad?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I do.
EL PRESIDENTE: Ruego al señor agente del Gobierno indicar el nombre de la persona que hará el interrogatorio y proceder al mismo. Digo, si usted personalmente, o alguno de sus asesores va a hacer el interrogatorio.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Yo personalmente, señor Presidente.
EL PRESIDENTE: Entonces la Comisión. Perdón, bueno. Perdón la inexperiencia en esta. Entonces a la Comisión que diga quién hace el interrogatorio y quien va a hacerlo.
SR. OLIVER JACKMAN: Mr. President, with the permission of the Court, I would like to ask Professor Grossman to conduct the interrogation of the witness. Before asking him to do so, I would like to make just a few general comments.
EL PRESIDENTE: Please do.
SR. OLIVER JACKMAN: First of all, sir, the Commission feels that the documentation which has been presented to the Court sets out, very fully, the basis on which the Commission wishes the Court to proceed, and on which the Commission would wish the Court to examine this matter. Therefore, I have no long statement to make, but I would like to emphasize just a couple of points.
First of all, on page 17 of the Commission's memorandum, in the English version, the following paragraph appears. I quote: "This Court has identified principles of equity, as the basis for indemnification, as to emotional harm". Velásquez Rodríguez Judgment, of July 21, 1989, paragraph 27. If I may quote from paragraph 27 of that Judgment, it is quite brief. "As to emotional harm", this is not a quotation from the Judgment of this Court. "The Court holds that indemnity may be awarded under International Law, and in particular in the case of Human Rights' violations. Indemnification must be based upon the principles of equity". The end of the quotation from the Judgment.
This is the principle, your honors, which is also uphelled in the practice of the European Court. In the case of compensation, the European Court is ruled by Article 50 of their Convention.
EL PRESIDENTE: Bueno, aquí estamos comentando que realmente, no sería relevante todos estos puntos. Digo, ya sé que está tratando de relacionar los dichos del testigo con los puntos que se están examinando, pero en realidad, sería preferible, salvo que usted tenga algún comentario muy breve, que pasemos al interrogatorio.
SR. OLIVER JACKMAN: As the Court pleases. I thought that it would be helpful in setting the context in which the witnesses are going to appear, to make a few general comments, but the Court is master of its own procedure, and I am certainly in the hands of the Court in this matter.
In that case, if the Court wishes me to proceed in that manner, I would ask Professor Grossman to lead the witness.
EL PRESIDENTE: Please, Professor Grossman.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Dr. Price, could you share with us, please, your educational background?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I was educated at Harvard University as an undergraduate. I spent some time in the Ecolle ......... in Paris, studying Anthropology, and I received my Ph.D. in Social Anthropology from Harvard in 1970.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Could you share with us your expertise on Suriname, and in particularly with the bush-negro of Suriname?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Since 1966, I have spent several years in Suriname, particularly with the Saramaka people, who live along the Suriname River. I have written approximately 15 books, and more than 100 articles about Suriname, and I am generally considered, within the academic community, as perhaps the world's expert on the peoples, the maroons and the cimarrones, who live in the interior of Suriname and neighboring French Guyana.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: You are holding currently an academic position?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: My most recent position was as a fellow in the Department of History at Princeton University, this past year, this current year, excuse me.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: What about fellowships involving the study of bush-negro and maroons and Suriname?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I have probably held about 20 different fellowships from organizations, such as the National Science Foundation, The National Institute of Mental Health, the ....... in France, the Organization for Scientific Research of the Netherlands, a number of others, and Fullbright fellowships twice. I've just been awarded a Guggenheim fellowship and a generous grant from the National Endowment of the Humanities in the United States for the next two years, beginning this July 1st.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Do you speak the language spoken by the Saramakas?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I do.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Could you share with us what's their language, what's the name of it?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: The name of the language is Saramakan. It is a Creole language. That is, it is a language that was formed by the ancestors of the Saramakas in the New World. They were brought as slaves from 40 or 50 different African language groups. They came to Suriname, soon after arriving as slaves. They escaped in small groups, a few times in large rebellions, and they formed a new society and culture in the interior of the country where, for nearly 100 years, they fought a war against the Dutch colonists. In 1762, the Dutch finally sued them for peace and signed a peace treaty with them, giving them their freedom 100 years before slaves in Suriname were emancipated by the Dutch Crown.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Could you tell us, approximately, how many Saramakas are now living is Suriname?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: There are approximately 25,000 Surinamers alive in the world today. There are several hundreds living in the Netherlands, there are probably about 2,000 who are temporarily in French Guyana doing wage labor, who move back and forth to Suriname, primarily men, so that nearly 25,000 Saramakas live in Suriname, in the central part of Suriname, along the same river that runs by Paramaribo, the capital. If you continue all the way up that river, you get to Saramaka territory.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: At this point, I would like to ask the permission of the Court to distribute, the map, and other materials from a book published by Professor Price. I brought copies also for the Honorable Representatives of the Government of Suriname. Por favor.
EL PRESIDENTE: Sí, claro, entiendo.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: If we go to the third page where you see a map, if we count, we see, one, two, the third page and fourth pages have maps. Professor Price, could you indicate approximately where the Saramakas live and show that to the Court and the Honorable Representatives of the Government of Suriname?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Yes, traditional Saramaka territory begins at that point, where the hydroelectric dam is indicated on the second of these two maps.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: If we can see the second of the two maps?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: You see in the center of the picture, there is a lake, and it says hydroelectric dam.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Yes, on top of it.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Right. That is the point at which the Saramakas concluded with the Dutch, in the Treaty of 1762, by cutting their wrists and the white Representatives cut their wrists, and they mixed the blood in the calabash and drank it together, because the Saramakas were not literate, and that was the way Saramakas swore with them. From that point up the river.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Up the Suriname River?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Up the Suriname River, past the lake, all the way up, past where the Galio and the Picalio converge, is Saramaka territory, and if you turn back to the previous map, you will see, which indicates only some Saramaka villages. There are in fact, 55 Saramaka Villages along that river, and you can see at the other end of the lake, which is outlined here, the village of Pokigron, which is where the incident that is being tried today took place.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Have you been there?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Yes, I have.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: O.K. Dr. Price, could you share with us the following please? Who earns income in the Saramaka culture. How would you say a Saramaka family supports itself financially?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: May I give just a little bit of historical background?
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Yes.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: During the wars, in the 18th Century, Saramakas were dependent. Saramaka society, since its very foundation, including those war years, has been dependent upon European manufactured goods, such as, pots, axes, machetes, cloth and also salt and sugar, flour; in other words, during those war years, Saramaka men raided the plantations and stole or liberated those things, depending on your point of view. The 1762 Treaty required the Dutch Crown to give tribute to the Saramakas every year. Those representatives brought boats up to the point that I said was the border with Saramaka, where the hydroelectric dam now stands. They brought large numbers of axes, pots, guns, thread, needles, cloth, all sorts of manufactured goods. And they brought them to the Saramakas, as part of their Treaty agreements, and Saramakas for their part, no longer carded the slave plantations of the coast. And there is on this final page of the xerox. Excuse me, on the pen-ultimate page of the xerox, a chart. It is actually a photo of one of the documents that was signed in 1762, at the Treaty. Excuse me. The list was made on the 16th of September of 1763, and it outlines the goods, with their numbers, brought by the whites, by the Dutch Crown, for each Saramaka village, as part of the Treaty.
Once the slaves were emancipated on the Coast in 1863, Saramaka men were permitted tribute ended. This kind of distribution of goods to the Saramakas ended, and Saramaka men were permitted to come to Coastal Suriname, and Coastal French Guyana, which was a French Colony next door, to work, to earn money in order to buy goods, the same kind of goods that they had received previously in tribute.
In the middle of the 19th Century, every Saramaka men has spent approximately 50% of his adult life outside of Saramaka territory, either in Coastal Suriname, or in Coastal French Guyana, where they go for periods of two, or three or four years, at a time. They save 10 thousand, 15 thousand, 20 thousand dollars, in local currency. They come back to Paramaribo and purchase large quantities of goods.
Today, those would include, outboard motors, gasoline for them, chain saws, cloth, pots, axes, machetes, guns, gunpowder, a number of kinds of food stuffs. They would load a large canoe, or two canoes, and bring them up river, to their Village, where they would then distribute these goods; approximately 50% of what they had earned during those years, would be distributed immediately, to their wives, to their children, to their aunts, to their sisters, to various dependents. The other 50% would be kept by the man, in a house, to be used during the subsequent 3 or 4 years, when they would be living in Saramaka. So, for example, when one of his children or wives of other relatives became ill, and a medicine man needed to be consulted, they would be paid, not in money, but in goods -in lengths of cloth, in bottles of rum. So, Saramakas have, for a 150 years, been used to dealing with money which they earn on the coast and use to buy these necessities of life.
Their economy, to answer more directly Professor Grossman's question, is a dual one. The men cut fields, they cut down forest trees in swidden horticulture, slash and burn horticulture and the men cut down the trees and the women do everything else. The women do all of the planting, all of the weeding, all of the harvesting, and the great bulk of Saramaka food comes from their gardens in which they plant rice, and many other foods, a very large variety of foods, root crops of various sorts, cassava, other tubers, corn and so forth.
Men also hunt and fish, and when a man kills an animal, or makes a large catch of fish, it's always redistributed along kinship lines within the Village.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Dr. Price, is money essential, for the survival of the Saramaka family?
DR. RICHARD PRICE: Since the ending of Tribute from the Government, in the middle of the 19th Century, from moment slaves on the coast were emancipated and Saramakas were free to travel to the coast at will, their lives have been completely dependent upon the ability of men to go out, for periods of several years at a time, earn large sums of money, and then, go back with the goods that money has bought, to be in the Villages. It is an economy, that, since the very beginning (including the war years), was westernized, and was dependent on a large number of western manufacturers.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Until what age, are children supported by the family? Before that even, and I apologize, why don't you share with us something about the structure of the Saramaka family?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Saramaka is a matrilineal society, which means that each person, every child, boy or girl, gets their identity through their mother. The most important relatives for a person are the people to whom he is related, or she is related, through their mother's line, their mother's sisters, their grandparents and their grandmother on that side. The father also plays a very important role in bringing up the children, but legally, the corporate groups that are most important are matrilineal groups.
It is a society in which polygamy is widely practiced, so that men have, most men have, several wives. Every man and every woman has a separate house. People have a house in their own Village, which means their mother's Village, and often, women also have a house in their husband's Village. It is a society which is very much governed by kinship rules and laws, and the matrilineal group is very much of a corporation in a legal sense, as anthropologists think of it, so that, for example, if a man commits a crime, his brother, with the same mother, perhaps his cousin, with his same mother, is held responsible also. And in the Saramaka religious system, if I would kill someone, then, all of my matrilineal descendants forever, would be visited by the vengeance of the ghost of the person who I killed. So, there is a very, very strong sense of family.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Let us go back to my question -the support of children. Until what age are they supported by the family?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Children are supported by the family until they marry, at which time a woman becomes dependent on her husband, more so than on her brothers and other male relatives. Women tend to marry early, at 14, 15, or 16; men a good deal later, usually in the mid 20's.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Who supports the elderly members of the family, aunts, uncles?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Their younger male relatives. Perhaps I shouldn't stress male too much. In terms of food, in terms of eating, the younger women support them, so they are the ones. When an older man or woman is too frail to work, either for a man to go out to the coast and do wage labor, or for a woman too frail to go to the gardens, which are often many hours away from their Villages by canoe, her daughters, younger people would support them. It's a society which reveres its elders. As one gets older, one takes on a moral authority of considerable importance, and in terms of all of the things that money can buy, the support of the elders falls on people's male children, nephews and grandchildren.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: How many years does a man work and earn an income for himself and the family? Usually.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: The general pattern during the 20th Century, has been for men to leave for periods of 2 to 4 years at a time, to earn a substantial sum of money, then in a 1 or 2 week period spend all of that money, buying the various goods that I've outlined before, bringing them back for distribution and staying in his Village for another 3 or 4 years before going out for another 3 or 4 years. We have calculated, using many, many life histories of men, older men, that they have spent approximately 50% of their lives earning money to buy these goods and bringing them back.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: What would be expected to happen to a family supported by the male relative, if such a working age man were to be ill suddenly? What would be the impact on the family?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: In economic terms?
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: In economic terms.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: They would suddenly be in dier poverty. In terms of cloth, so that women, the skirts that women wear, don't last very long. They're made of very thin trade cotton and would become rags. Cooking pots, kerosene for fires, for light at night, salt, sugar, flour, tools, such as machetes, and axes, and hoses, which are necessary for farming, wouldn't be there. A woman who does not have a husband or a bother to support her lives very much in poverty and has to do. She is basically at the mercy of her more distant relatives for these kinds of things.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Dr. Price, is it customary for wives to remarry?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Women. It is advantageous for a woman to be married as early as possible and to be married all her life because the primary supporter of a woman is a husband. When a woman is divorced, or if her husband dies, if she gets into her late 20's, which now is 15 years into the married system, it becomes much more difficult for her to find a husband. Saramaka men, at any age, including the 60's and 70's, very much prefer 16 year-old girls and 18 year-old girls. As men get older and more powerful, they, and men who are in their 60's, are able to get young wives, so women who are in their 30's, and certainly older than that, are often alone for the rest of their lives and have very much lower standard of living than women who are married.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Thank you. If it please the Court, I have here a copy of the brief presented by the Commission and I would like to give Dr. Price a copy with the affidavit of the families and, I would ask permission to do so. I don't have copies for the Court or the Honorable Government, we will present them in due time. These are documents that are in your power. It's the official brief presented by the Commission on compensation, with it's appendixes.
(Discussion of page number in the brief).
This is a copy of our brief in English and we would like you to.(Court telling Claudio Grossman to go back and speak into microphone). Dr. Price, I would like you to take a look at the appendixes, to the Commission's brief that includes questionnaires, involving the situation of families whose sons or husbands were killed. You will see the first annex. I won't go through all the annexes in order to avoid time, probably, but I would like you to take a look at annex 5, page number 16, on the, down, it says, questionnaires, and it says on top, DODE, PAD, ACTIONE, DECEMBER 31, 1987. And then it says, general information, name of victim, Aloeboetoe Dedemanu. Did you find that?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I have that. O.K.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Would you read what's the age, time of death?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: 30 years.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Would you please read there whether Aloeboetoe was married or single?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: It says that the man Aloeboetoe had a common law marriage with 3 wives.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Could you please read the ages of the wives?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Wine Foto it says was 27 years old. Norma was 31 years old, and Asolinda was 30 years old.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: I will ask again, would you find strange and normal that the bush-negro was married to 3 women?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: No, that's absolutely normal and standard for a man of his age.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Could you please read the number of children and the ages, please, and their ages.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: The number of children are 3. Naotia was 3 years old, Jossie was 2 years old, and Chrisiane was less than 1 year old, if I understand the notation. It says 0 years.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Let us move to the second page of that affidavit. This affidavit with sworn statement, list other dependents. Would you consider reasonable that parents and grandfathers be listed in the Suriname bush-negro culture, as dependents?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Absolutely.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Is that something strange, abnormal?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: No.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: You will see that it says here, income of the victim at the time of his death. Based on your own experience and knowledge, is being a construction worker in Paramaribo, something that the bush-negro and maroons do in Suriname?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Yes.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: The estimated annual income here is, 21,600 Surinamese Guilders. Do you have any comment to give to the Court and to ask to the Government, in concerning that estimated amount based on your own experience?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Could you repeat the amount?
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: 21,600.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Yes, that seems quite reasonable to me.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Why, how do you know that?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Well, I have watched the amounts earned by the Saramaka men, with my own eyes and ears, since the middle 1960's. I've collected a very great deal of data on the amounts earned earlier in the 20th Century by older men. We continue to spend a month or two each year with Saramakas who are actually earning wages in French Guyana now, both in Sanamary and at Kouru at the Center Espacial Guyani, and these figures conformed well with what these men are currently earning.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Are there telephones in the Saramaka Villages?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: No, there are not.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Do the Saramaka men use credit cards?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: No, they do not.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Do the Saramaka -do the Banks have houses, offices in Saramaka territory?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: No.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Would you say, since you state here under oath, that there are no banks, no possibilities of receipts, no telephones and no credit cards used by the Saramakas.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: That is correct. I would say that there may be, among the 25,000 Saramakas, several hundred who have moved to the Netherlands, there may be a few in the city who have become educated, there are two or three Saramakas with Ph.D.'s and I would assume that they might have credit cards and so on. But the kinds of people being talked about in this brief would have none of these things.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: What's the level of illiteracy in the Saramaka Villages?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: If I may say, historically, the first thing the Saramakas asked for... when the whites came to make peace with them they said, "please send us teachers." The whites did not, and literacy is pretty much confined to about 4,000 Christian Saramakas who live below the dam, in Villages of their own, and who are not an issue in this case. Among these people, there would be very little illiteracy. And I would imagine, if you asked people to sign their names, for example, that many of them would not be able to sign their name, that they would make a mark or something like that. These people are not used to reading and writing. The Suriname Government has only, very sporadically, put schools in the interior.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: How many years did you spend in Saramaka Villages?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I've been physically present in Saramaka Villages between 3 and 4 years of my life, but stretching from 1966 on to the present I've also spent considerable time with Yucas and Allooko maroons, who are their brothers and sisters, who live along other rivers.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Did you see, when you were in the Saramaka Villages, many receipts, involving payments for issues?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Professor Grossman, I have tried to explain: Saramakas do not read and write; what they do with money that they are very used to handling (when they earn 10 thousand dollars or 20 thousand dollars they go to the city and they buy the same kinds of goods that they've always bought, which they need to live with; pots, for their women to cook in, cloth for their clothes to be made from, for their women to make clothes from, guns to go hunting with, fishhooks to fish with, cartridges to hunt with, machetes to use in doing agriculture, hoses for the same purpose). They also, for the last 20 years, have been buying chain saws, which make the task of tending their gardens, felling trees for their gardens, considerably easier. For the last 20 years they have also been using outboard motors, which have made the trip from Paramaribo to the Villages that are concerned in this brief, they've cut that time from 2 weeks, it used to take 2 weeks to get there 20 years ago, and now it only takes 3 days, or, if you can pay for an airplane, an hour and a half.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Dr. Price, these Saramaka men get money. Do you have some statistics as to alcoholism? How they spend their money? Do they go on a drunken rampage in the city? Do they keep all the money for fun? What's your observation on these matters?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Saramakas are an extremely hard-working, sober people. In Saramaka territory, in Saramaka Villages, I have never ever seen an intoxicated Saramaka, not even one. They buy considerable quantities of rum when they buy the other things they always have, but it's used to pour on the ground in libations to their ancestors. It is not ingested by human beings, it's ingested by ancestors, for whom it is poured, along with water, on the ground. Saramakas do not drink to excess.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: O. K. To avoid time on material damage, I am not going to go one by one on the affidavits, because I think, well, the Court will assess whether we have proven or not, anything, but I would to avoid going through all the statements and taking a look at the annual income, with the permission of the Court, and so forth, and the reasons why you see some similarities on them.
Let me move to other point. You have given testimony so far, Dr. Price, to material issues. Let me now raise a different type of topic.
In the context of the Saramaka culture, what would be the impact of the manner in which the victims were killed, on their families, considering a case like this, where a government, as a matter of fact, has confessed responsibility before this Honorable Court, for the victims that were assaulted, forcibly abducted and forced to dig their own graves, and the families have learned of all of this? What's the impact in terms of pain and suffering, in addition to the material damage?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: It would be very difficult to exaggerate the impact of the nature of these deaths on the families and the Villages of the victims. Saramakas classify deaths into several types. When an old person dies, after a long life, it's considered a natural death, and the person is buried with considerable ceremony. Funerals are the major ceremonies, the major public occasions in Saramaka life. They don't celebrate weddings particularly. They don't celebrate sweet-sixteen parties. Funerals are when hundreds, and often thousands, of Saramakas gather to honor the dead and to help in the transition of that newly deceased person into the roll of an ancestor. Ancestors (the dead), play a very important role in the lives of the living, who, if a child becomes ill, will do divination, and often will find that a dead great-grandmother, or a dead grandfather, or some other dead relative, is causing that illness because he, or she, is unhappy about something. It's then necessary to follow rituals to honor that person, to make that child well again.
The process of bringing a living person through a funeral, a newly deceased person through a funeral, into an ancestor, takes about a year. But there are certain cases, which Saramakas call Ogidede, evil deaths, which demand a great deal of expense and a great deal of special ritual efforts. For example, a woman who dies in pregnancy, that's considered a very evil death. A person who drowns in a river, is a very evil death. A person who dies in the forest. Hunting accident, is an evil death. But the very worst possible kind, the most dangerous kind of death for the family and for the Village is a death in war, a death that in some way reminds them of the wars that they fought and won against the white, a death by soldiers. That is the most evil possible kind of death, and in order to cleanse the family and cleanse the Village, very complex rituals have to be done by specialists from other Villages, and it's a kind of stain that can never be removed. It's a very, very serious difference from someone simply dying of natural causes.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Is this compounded, or would this be compounded by the fact that the families and the Villages could not get the bodies of those killed?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Very much so. Saramakas' funerals depend on having the physical corps, making a coffin and indeed, carrying that coffin on the heads of two men, something that went on all over Afro-America in colonial times, including the Barbados. The spirit of the deceased is asked questions about the world, about sickness, and other things, and not having the body to bury properly, is a tremendous, tremendous violation of the way the world is supposed to work.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Would also this be compounded if a government would not give an explanation, would not investigate or punish those who would be responsible for these deaths? How would this affect the Saramakas, in terms of their pride and dignity?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I think, with your permission, I'll have to again make a historical digression, but I don't think really its a digression.
Saramaka identity as a people. Their sense of what it means to be a Saramaka was forged during a Century of warfare against the colonists. Their religion is based on certain powers. The possibility of curing people who are sick, is based on certain powers that are very closely connected with those years of wars. There are Comantees spirits, which are warrior spirits, that possess people and allow them to cure other people. Those are the same spirits that allow men, Saramaka men, that allow them to be warriors, to be invulnerable to bullets, to make them invulnerable to spears, and bayonets, and machetes, and so on. In the manner in which these young men were killed, which included soldiers humiliating them and torturing them with bayonets, and cutting them up in front of large numbers of other people, is as much of a blow as I can imagine, to what it means to be a man in Saramaka, what it means to be Saramaka.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: What happened to the wives and children of those who were killed in these atrocious ways without acknowledging responsibilities, without delivering the bodies, and so forth? From the point of view of pain and suffering?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I could only speculate about what happened to the wives and children because I've not met any of them, I've not been to Suriname since these events. But I can tell you, I can reiterate again, that the kinds of deaths that these men suffered, in Saramaka terms, the kinds of deaths that no one has suffered since the 18th Century, and in the early pages of this little extract from our 1980 book, on pages 2 and 3, there are engravings by William Brake, the great British engraver, based on water colors made by an eye-witness, to the way maroons, the ancestors of the Saramakas, were tortured in Paramaribo during the 1770's. These kinds of deaths, hangings, were, by the way, these were punishments given by the Court in Paramaribo to recaptured Saramakas during the wars. One of them involves hanging a man by a meat hook, the other involves breaking him on the rack, breaking all his bones, cutting off his limbs until he dies. These deaths, that took place in Pokigron, are in the Saramaka perspective, a direct throw-back to those kinds of tortures and deaths committed by the colonists during the 18th Century.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Dr. Price, how many hospitals are in the Saramaka territory?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: There was one facility that was called a hospital at Juno, near the confluence of the Gran Piquillo, which was run by the Moravian Church, with the Suriname Government. I am not sure if it had financial support, but with their cooperation, and that hospital began. It's called the Yaya Dande Hospital. It began operating in the middle of 1960's, until the Suriname Government soldiers cut off Saramaka from the rest of the world in approximately 1986 or '87. There was always a team of Dutch physicians, were present there and a large team of nurses, some from Holland and some from the City. There were also a couple of clinics lower down the river, one of them run by a Dutch physician, Dr. Decker who was there, as far as I remember, from the 1960's until... I don't know whether she is still there... but almost until the present. So the Saramakas became dependent for many things upon those clinics. In the area where we lived during the 1960's, when we first got there, all babies were born at home. By the end of the 1960's, all babies were being born in that hospital and the infant mortality rate had gone way down.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Doctor, thank you. Are there hospitals now?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: It is my understanding that those units have been closed.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Do you know of psychiatrists or psychologists that practice in the bush in Suriname now, in the Saramaka Villages?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Do you mean western?
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Western or not western. Let us say western, western psychologists with Ph.D.'s as you have?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: To my knowledge there has never been a psychiatrist or psychologist there. The kind of medicine practiced in these hospitals was very basic. It was babies, malaria pills, sort of, it did not involve sophisticated methods. It was very general.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Did you ever meet when you were years in Paramaribo psychologist that would be psychoanalyzing or measuring pain and suffering of Surinamese bush-negros or maroons?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: No.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Never?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Never.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Are you totally sure you never saw a psychologist or psychiatrist in the bush?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I have never met a psychiatrist in Suriname, period.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Is it possible this Saramaka territory is readably accessible? You can take a bus on a highway and get there?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Saramaka territory, since the treaty of 1762, has been controlled by the Saramaka Chief, who is called Grandman. For example, when we first wished to seek permission to do a study in Saramaka in 1966, we took a canoe with a Saramaka boatman, and arrived at the first Saramaka Village above the lake, indeed, the Village of Pokigron, the one where these atrocities took place. We then were asked to stay there for 4 days while a canoe was sent all the way up the river to the Grandman's Village, almost the next to the last Village, where permission was asked for outsiders to enter Saramaka territory. A message came back, 3 days later, and I think on the 4th day we were allowed to proceed. Whenever an outsider comes into Saramaka territory, permission has to be given by the Saramaka people, by the Government authorities of Saramaka, it has retained it's territorial integrity until the violations that took place in approximately 1987, when the army, the national army of Suriname, just suddenly started to march into the place.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Dr. Price, how would being dependent on the charity of non-family villagers affect the Saramaka, in terms of his or her dignity?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: In terms of dignity, did you say?
I would say first that being dependent on the more general Village population would mean a very, very different material standard. I'm really not able to answer that in terms of dignity, but dignity that would be lost in those terms, I think, is the dignity that's lost by being poor, and being dependent.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: I would like to ask you to take a look at our brief appendix where it says moral damage.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: What page would that be on?
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: 39.
(Discussion of page number as it differs between documents).
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Do you see there a report by either psychiatrist or a psychologist assessing pain and suffering? Take a look at it.
SR.RICHARD PRICE: On this page?
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Yea.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: No, I don't.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: O.K. Fine. On the third paragraph is written that traditionally the working men are the main source of social security and dignity. Can you read that, the third paragraph? Do you agree with that?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I'm not sure what it means. I didn't write it.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Well, elaborate on it. Please elaborate on it.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Working men, as I have said, are important in two ways. On the one hand they provide all of the western manufactured goods that are necessary for Saramakas to survive and they bring those goods back on the basis of bringing large amounts of cash through wage labor of different sorts on the Coast, in Suriname and in French Guyana. The other thing that young men do, that is equally important, and they do this not when they are outside earning money, but when they are in the Villages, is cutting fields, cutting gardens for their female dependents. A man may cut three or four different gardens a year, for various of his female dependents of different ages, his wives, his mother, or his mother's sister, depending on whether they have another man to do it for them or not. A woman cannot feed her family, she cannot grow things, she cannot grow all of the things that Saramakas need to eat if a man doesn't cut fields for her, because that's very hard work. It used to be done with axes, now it's often done with chain saws, but it's not work that women in Saramaka can do.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Dr. Price, could you read out loud please, the last paragraph of page 39, with the permission of the Court?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: It says: "This murder, and the absence of Judicial investigation and prosecution, is experienced as an expression of the lesser value attached to the lives of maroons by the Central Government and Government Institutions. The maroons do not feel themselves treated with dignity at all. They are generally subjected to racial insults. This value is generally expressed in the treatment in political, financial, socio-economic matter, and matters concerning education and "medical care."
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Did you write this?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I did not.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: O. K. Did we talk about this?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: No.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Can you comment on this please?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I think I would go considerably farther if I had been given an opportunity to write that paragraph, which again would have talked about the backgrounds in the wars during the 18th Century, the ways in which Saramakas, 'till today, feel themselves in many ways morally superior to the people on the coast. They feel like they fought for their freedom and they won their freedom, and they're the original freedom fighters of the Americas, along with maroons in other places. At the same time they feel as if the city people, who now run the Government of Suriname were people who did not have the courage to rebel and make themselves free, who had to wait for the queen or king to free them in 1863. And they feel, when they are in the city, that they are treated with a great deal of discrimination. Saramakas who have gone to school in Paramaribo, for example, and there are certainly several hundred who have, have told me terrible stories about being called monkey by other people, who to an outsider would look just like them in terms of their pheno-types, that is they're both what in the United States would be called black. They look the same, but because they don't speak the city languages, because they don't speak Dutch, they don't speak Surinametongo, they're very widely discriminated against in Suriname.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Thank you. Let me move to another problem. The killing of a member of a Saramaka family would have also an impact on the Saramaka tribe or it would be only an impact on the Saramaka family?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: The killing of a Saramaka by another Saramaka, in a murder case, for example, which occasionally happens in Saramaka as everywhere else in the world, let's say over a woman, would not be experienced by the tribe as a whole. As a loss, that would be a loss that could ritually be fixed up, and would largely concern the families of the two parties, in that case. The kind of killings that took place in the current case affect the Saramaka people in a very gentile way as a people. It affects their identity as a people, it affects their religion, it affects the powers that they count on to make the world run the way it does. In the Treaties of 1762, there was a demarcation. the territory above the place that is now Brokopondo, that territory was Saramaka territory. It was inviolable, outsiders needed permission, as I've explained, to cross that border, to do anything there, they were guests if they came in. In this particular case, soldiers came in without permission, and not only did they come into a Saramaka Village, but they abducted, tortured publicly and then shot and murdered Saramaka men. For Saramakas as a whole, this represents their greatest night collective nightmare, I was often told. I wrote a book called "First Time" the historical vision of an Afro-American people. It was 1 of 2 books that I wrote about the Saramaka collective-notion of their past, and their identity and their history. Those two books have won three international prizes, between them. The second book, "About this World" has just won the Gordon Lewis Memorial Prize of the Caribbean Studies Association for the best book about the Caribbean in any language for the past three years. And I'm very proud of that, and I've worked for 20 years on that book. It's a book that directs itself directly to this question. Saramakas feel as if this kind of violation, is as if they have been raped as a people, and raped several times. They who are great warriors, who lived in peace with everybody since 1762, suddenly their greatest nightmare, that in their terms they would say, their greatest fear, was that those times, the times of war, the times of the fights against the outsiders, that those times shall come again, and then, in this case, they did come again, and for all of Saramaka, it was experienced as a tremendous, tremendous loss. With your permission, let me just mention that I've spent much of the last 2 weeks speaking with Grandman Sungo Aboiconi, who is the Chief of the Saramaka nation. He was in Washington D.C., along with a group of Saramakas and Yucas and Aluku maroons, from Suriname and French Guyana. They were brought by the Smithsonian Institution and I was there as an interpreter. I spent many evenings speaking with Grandman Sungo Aboiconi about this case, so much of what I am telling you today comes from him it comes from what he wishes me to say. I am saying it, I believe it, I have observed these things, but I feel in a sense, that I'm also speaking very much on behalf of the Saramaka people and on behalf of the Grandman.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Dr. Price, allow me to interrupt you. Why is the Chief of the tribe not here?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: The Grandman of the Saramakas is very much like a secret king in Africa, he has mystical powers, much of what he does is hemmed around by tremendous protocol, a protocol that would make the kind of protocol that you're used to seeing like nothing at all. When approaching him, people have to bend low to the ground. You can never direct, you don't talk to the Grandman directly, if this woman here were the Grandman, I would speak to one of these people, and he would relay the message to the others, and so on. It's a great deal of protocol. The Grandman does not come as a witness ever, when there is a meeting in Saramaka, the Grandman doesn't come and sit down and give testimony, or listen, what he does, is he sends a delegate, and they do their meeting and then they report back to him.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: How do we know that you are a delegate, Dr. Price, of the Grandman?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: You only have my sworn word, that I have spent 10 or 12 hours during the past 11 or 12 days discussing this case with him, in order to try to find out to the best of my ability what he and his people wish.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Thank you. Now, so would you consider then, that this impact of the killing was compounded by the fact that it involved 7 members of the tribe, no punishment, no investigation, no compensation, no apologies?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: All of those things were mentioned by the Grandman as being very important to him. The fact that there had been to his knowledge, and to mine, no investigations at all, on the part of the Government, no punishments for the people who did this, is part of the violation and hurt and suffering felt by the Saramaka people, by the Grandman on behalf of his people.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Dr. Price allow me to move to something else. Under the facts of the case, and with your knowledge on the Saramaka culture, would be a finding of liability, and a cash award be sufficient to repair the damage caused, considering how Saramaka's experienced these injuries, and considering how the Saramaka culture, as a matter of fact, experiences the concept of reparation?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I would say that such a finding would be an important part of what the Saramakas would like to have happen, but it is also very important for them, they feel, in the long run, to try, in any way possible, to influence the national Government of the Republic of Suriname, to treat them with the respect due to all citizens of the country, and in that regard, some sort of public apology, and an investigation, a proper investigation, of why these people were killed, and how that came about, and followed by public apology, would be considered a very important gesture by them. Certainly, the material compensation is more important, but this would be a very important component, and they are certainly concerned about the way in which, not only they've been treated during these past few years, but what the future holds for them.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Dr. Price, if a Saramaka family were awarded a sum in compensation for injuries it suffered, how would such a sum be distributed?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: The corporate unit that I mentioned before, which is called a bay, a matrilineal group, by traditional Saramaka law and custom, would sit down and have meetings, not just one, but several meetings over a number of days, and they would, in their wisdom, in their collective wisdom, distribute the sums to individuals according to the ways that they evaluate, that they evaluate the just distribution, the proper.
For example, in an adultery case, within Saramaka law, when a payment is made to a husband because another man has slept with his wife, which is something that occurs as frequently there, as it does in other societies, a payment is made to this group and this group then distributes it. It's a society which is very accustomed to the redistribution of wealth by this group.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: For another wife, would that be the result of the weight of the grandmother, or it would be proceeded by some type of collective decision-making procedure.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: A grandmother would not say that, such a decision would come out of a collective process, a public meeting of a number of people, who would discuss often over many days, the proper distribution, and its quite possible, that a particular wife, who was a more recent wife, might receive less of a particular amount for distribution, than a wife who had been married and who had been working with these relatives over many years. That's the kind of thing that's completely within the competence with the Saramaka customary law of this kinship group to decide.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Would you honor that was of distributing compensation?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I would, absolutely.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Why wouldn't you? Let me ask you another thing. We have here, wives, grandmothers, grandparents, uncles, aunts, and so forth, the corporation decides what goes to what. Maybe you don't know this, but I will inform you about this. We requested that a special trust fund be created for children, for example. This is something, and there would see a difference. What do you think about that? Would be admissible, acceptable within the Saramaka culture? Would that be equivalent to raping their conviction, setting aside a trust fund for children, for example?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I think it makes a great deal of sense, for the following reason. The men who died, who were killed, were providers for certain children. The way they would provide for them, would be, by going out and working, bringing back goods, and distributing those goods to those children, over time. So, that, if those children were to be given lump sum payments, what happens with lump sum payments in Saramaka, is that goats are bought at once, money that is cash isn't saved, it's spent for the kinds of goods that I've mentioned a number of times. Therefore, what you would want to do, to simulate as much as possible what the deceased would have provided over those children's lives, as minors, the way to simulate that, would be to establish a mechanism by which goods could be given to those children, not all at once, but over the whole period of time, during which they're growing up. And it seems to me, that some kind of trust mechanism, would provide that. And that, on the other hand, it's quite appropriate for lump sums to be given to adults, with which they're going to buy goods, because that's very much what they would have done, had these people been alive.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: The same applies to the tribe?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I've spent a good deal of time talking to the Grandman about this. If I may, let me just tell a brief story. I was walking along the street, in Arlington, Virginia, the other night with the Grandman, near the hotel The Smithsonian Porter's Inn, and a homeless woman came up to us and said to me, could you spare a quarter, and the Grandman said to me, what did she say? And I said she's asking for money, and he immediately reached into his shirt pocket and took out a bill, a dollar, I believe, and put it in her cup, and he explained to me that the Grandman is responsible, one of his titles, this has been Grandman, is Kundemasa, Master of the Round. He is responsible for everyone in the world. Anyone in need. Anyone who is suffering. He has to give people duets. The rule of his office, his responsibility, and what he stated with me about how much Saramaka people have suffered during the last 5 or 6 years. And I have been corroborating testimony from missionaries whom I've met in the last couple of weeks in Washington, who have been in Saramaka. Old people are very thin now, many children and old people have died, because of the fact that the Government cut off medical aid to the interior, because they've cut for many months and years, they cut off the road, so the Saramakas were not able to go and work, and therefore they weren't able to buy goods that they needed. There's been a tremendous amount of suffering, and the Grandman who speaks Dutch, a new Grandman, the old Grandman had been there since 1951, he died in 1989, and Grandman Sungo was installed as Grandman last year, given his stool of office. And Grandman Sungo said that he has to provide such a security, in effect, for his people. Anyone who is in need and comes to him, he gives to, he gives bags of rice, he gives food, so that whatever money were given to the Saramaka people, as a whole, it seems to me, if I may make a suggestion, should in some way, be put in a trust, which would be run by the Grandman, and he, in fact, I now realize I may have, I wasn't thinking of him when you were asking about Saramaka's who had bank accounts and so on. The Grandman has a bank account in Paramaribo. I don't know that he has credit cards. I doubt that. But he does read Dutch and write, and he is fully competent as well as all of his traditional responsibilities. He is fully competent to deal with the Court, or with other western authorities, in terms of handling such a responsibility.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Thank you very much, that's all, Honorable Court and Government, that's all. Your witness.
EL PRESIDENTE: Bueno, muchas gracias. Ahora pediríamos al delegado del representante del ilustrado Gobierno de Suriname, si desea hacer un interrogatorio y que persona la va a hacer?
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Muchas gracias, señor Presidente. Sí, desearíamos referirnos brevemente a la exposición brindada por el doctor Price. Brillante en cuanto a los términos de cultura de Saramaka, personalmente lo felicito.
Sin embargo, tenemos algunas inquietudes, que quisiéramos expresarle, a efectos de tener un panorama más amplio sobre las posibilidades que brinda su testimonio, en cuanto a la determinación de daños materiales y morales.
Quisiéramos inicialmente preguntarle al distinguido doctor Price, Àcuándo fue la última vez que estuvo en Suriname?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: In 1986.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Dice 1986. ÀDesde esa época no ha vuelto a Suriname?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: No, I've not been in Suriname.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Sin embargo, si mal no le entendí, ha tenido conocimiento de la actividad de los Saramaka, vía esta última entrevista que usted tuvo, a la par de usted se hizo referencia, que usted tuvo con el Grandman, representante del pueblo de Saramaka.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I had been meeting with large numbers of Saramakas, I have had contact, all of this week, five hundred Saramakas, during the past several years. Each summer, in French Guyana, there are large numbers of Saramakas living there, who are currently working in Kourou, in French Guyana, they perform various kinds of manual labor at the Center Espacial Guyani. There is there a place called Village Saramaka, where more than a thousand Saramakas live, and they go back and forth to Suriname, all the time, there are people coming and going, going back and forth to Saramaka. In San Lorenzo de Maroni, there are also really, hundreds of Saramakas, who go back and forth. Around Cayene, there are many hundreds of Saramakas, who go back and forth, and during the past several years, Sally Price and I have been working for the Council Regional de ...., on a project which involves the building of a new museum, in Cayene, and we have been collecting artifacts from various maroon groups, and spent a great deal of time with Saramakas and through them we are very aware of what's going on in their home Villages because they come back and forth all the time.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Si mal no le entendí, doctor Price, el Gobierno y quisiera que usted aclarara si se refiere al actual Gobierno de Suriname, al Gobierno del Presidente Venetiaan, que llegó al poder en Suriname, en 1991, en mayo de 1991. Si mal no le entendi, usted dijo que el Gobierno bloqueó, o ha bloqueado las posibilidades de los Saramaka, Àposibilidades económicas y de salir a buscar mejores fuentes de vida? ÀCorrecto?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: That is correct. By the Government, I was not referring to a particular political regime, I was referring in general to the national Government of Suriname, and its military.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Doctor, podría aclarar eso, que no le entendí bien.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: If I understood the question, I was asked whether I was referring to the present Government, the present Administration of Suriname, and I was not particularly referring to the current President and the current Ministers, who change very rapidly in Suriname during the last few years. I was referring to the authority of the Government of the Republic of Suriname, whoever the particular people had been who are in power, and their armed forces. They are the ones who blocked access of Saramakas to the outside world, to the city, to jobs, to food, to medicine, over very long periods, beginning in 1986, or 1987.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Doctor, usted dijo que la incursión del ejército de Suriname, en territorio Saramaka, constituyó una invasión ilegal de territorio Saramaka. Mi pregunta es, Àquiere esto decir que el territorio Saramaka, es soberano e independiente de Suriname? ÀQue en el territorio Saramaka existen leyes internas y un Gobierno independiente del Gobierno Central del Gobierno de Suriname? Mi pregunta es en relación con su conocimiento del territorio mismo y las costumbres del pueblo Saramaka.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: In Saramaka terms, from the Saramaka point of view, the answer to those questions is yes. But I would like to clarify by saying that, the situation is similar to that of many North American Indian Nations, as they are called now in the United States Law, who make treaties with the Central Government during the 18th Century, at various points of the 19th Century. The Saramakas are, as anthropologists have said throughout the 20th Century, a State within a State, and I am not competent to speak to the constitutional issues within the constitution of Suriname. As far as the Saramakas are concerned, their treaties signed during the 18th Century, do give them sovereignty within their territory, and including authority to handle judicial cases which take place within their own territory, including murder and other serious violations, which they have always handled themselves.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Doctor, yo repito la pregunta porque no le entendí bien. ÀQuiere esto decir, que el territorio Saramaka es soberano, independiente, que existen leyes internas, que existe un Gobierno independiente al Gobierno de Suriname, que no se sigue el procedimiento legal, establecido para la República de Suriname, que existen tribunales independientes al estilo tribal en Saramaka?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: There are indeed independent judicial procedures in Saramaka, which have been used since the 18th Century and continued to be used and respected by the Suriname judiciary during the 1960's and 1970's, during the period that I resided in Saramaka territory.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Doctor, usted se refiere, se ha referido en su interrogatorio en muchas ocasiones, a los Tratados de 1762. Los Tratados de 1762, es plenamente reconocido que fueron firmados entre el Gobierno holandés, que en ese momento estaba colonizando Suriname y el pueblo de Saramaka. ÀSe han preservado en el tiempo esos tratados, firmados en 1762? ÀHa reconocido el Gobierno de Suriname la competencia de esos tratados, en cuanto a la soberanía del pueblo Saramaka?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I can't speak to that. I do not know. I can only speak to the practices that I witnessed in the Saramaka understandings.
EL PRESIDENTE: Señor representante, el Juez Barberis quiere hacer una aclaración, sobre la pregunta y la respuesta que se ha hecho.
JUEZ BARBERIS: Muchas gracias, señor Presidente. Señor agente de Suriname: creo que el señor Price ha dicho que él no es un experto en Derecho Internacional. Usted no puede plantearle preguntas de derecho. Por el contrario, le puede preguntar cosas de hecho, cuestiones sobre la realidad. Pero no puede interrogarlo sobre la validez de un tratado, o sobre una sucesión de Estados, porque eso estaría totalmente fuera de lugar. Sólo le puede hacer preguntas acerca de hechos. Muchas gracias, señor Presidente.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Gracias señor Juez. Mi pregunta era en referencia a, si no mal me equivoco, el doctor Price le envió un Fax de fecha 31 de Diciembre. Perdón, no aparece la fecha aquí, pero está aportado como anexo, anexo al memorial presentado por la Comisión, en ese documento él dice expresamente: "El tratado firmado con sangre el 19 de setiembre del 62, véase al mismo tiempo, traducción al inglés que se adjunta, reconoce la libertad de los Saramaka y les reconoce derecho a la soberanía en sus aldeas y territorios". La pregunta era dirigida, más que todo, a que nos aclarara esa afirmación que él expresó en forma escrita, en este documento dirigido al señor Grossman.
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I'm not sure I understand the question.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Si me permite repetirle. Usted en documento que remitió en fecha 29 de Marzo de 1992, al doctor Claudio Grossman, expresamente se refiere, a que el tratado firmado con sangre el 19 de Setiembre de 1762, reconoce al pueblo de Saramaka, derecho a la soberanía en sus aldeas y territorios. Yo entiendo que usted no es experto en derecho internacional ni mucho menos, sin embargo está haciendo una afirmación sobre una obligación establecida en un convenio internacional firmado hace aproximadamente 300 años o más.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Una cosa señor Presidente. Una cosa diferente es hacer una aseveración así y otra cosa es constituirse en experto de derecho internacional y de derecho constitucional y de sucesión de tratados, eso no prueba nada. Yo creo que sería importante utilizar el tiempo de la Corte y de los testigos, pidiéndole que hicieran uso de su conocimiento. Yo creo que una declaración que se haya hecho, mucha gente dice este es mi derecho no es mi derecho, pero el expertise del doctor Price es en la práctica, en la cultura, en la vida. Yo sugeriría que nos atuviéramos a eso con el objeto de avanzar. Respetuosamente.
EL PRESIDENTE: Yo creo que la aclaración del Juez Barberis va en ese sentido, que usted se limitara a hacer preguntas sobre hechos y no sobre apreciaciones que no tienen un sentido jurídico como nosotros los apreciamos. No creo que al hablar de soberanía se refiera a la soberanía internacional, etc. sino cierta autonomía que se da a ciertas comunidades indígenas, entonces más bien, la pregunta sería en ese sentido, es decir, no en el sentido de soberanía internacional, sino en el sentido de ciertas autonomías que ahí se reconocen y como no es experto en Derecho, no podrá decir si, de acuerdo con la nueva constitución de Suriname, se reconoce una autonomía digamos jurídica a esa situación, sino, si de hecho hay cierta autonomía para el pueblo de Saramaka y yo creo que es lo que, el único que puede el experto señalar.
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Creo que también es buena costumbre, de si hay documentos que se van a preguntar al testigo, que se haga una cita de dónde están, de modo que todos los podamos leer y que al testigo también se le entregue una copia del documento, por lo menos y si no hay copia, porque están aquí y que nos haga referencia. La lectura, no sabemos, si el documento al que hace referencia el distinguido Abogado, es el que tenemos en nuestra, delante nuestros ojos, porque es una frase al pasar, entonces, que por favor nos diga dónde está, de qué se trata y se le muestre al testigo también, al margen de la decisión de cualquiera que sea sobre este punto el fondo.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Muchas gracias, señor Presidente.
En aras de no agotar a la Corte y seguir el procedimiento sabiamente dictado por el señor Presidente, retomaremos la pregunta, retomaremos la pregunta en los términos que la hizo el señor Presidente. ÀExiste autonomía del pueblo de Saramaka en relación con la actividad del Gobierno central de Suriname?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: A system was established during the 19th Century that is related and that's related to the system that the British used in Africa, which they call indirect rule, in which by recognizing the Ruler, the Chief and sub Chiefs, of a particular tribe, or ethnic group within a larger colony, they were able to communicate in terms of legal and other matters through that hierarchy, and in very much the same way in Suriname, the central Government of the colony of Suriname, dealt with the Grandmans of each of the maroon groups, the Saramaka, the Yuca, the Mataguay, the Paramacca, and until about 20 years ago, when they became French, the Alouku, there were 5, in the Queenty, there were 6 such groups, the Queenty did not have a Grandman, they had Captains. The Government dealt directly with the Grandman, as the representative of the Saramaka people. Indeed, after the Grandman is chosen by traditionals, Saramaka means, that is by divination, and through also, it's a royal rituals, after he is chosen, he comes to the city, and this has happened since the 18th Century, where he is recognized by the city authorities and since Suriname became independent in 1975, each Grandman is recognized by the city authorities and is given a separate set of clothes, a uniform from the city, so that he serves as the Chief or King of this autonomist group within the nation or Republic of Suriname, formerly within the Colony of Suriname, and also as the Representative, the link between his people and the Central Government, the coastal Government.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Doctor Price, Àvotan en las elecciones políticas de Suriname los Saramaka?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: Beginning in, I believe 1967, some Saramakas have voted. That is in 1967, during the Administration of Johan Paydon, when it was seen that, if I may say, the balance between East Indian and Afro-Surinamer population was shifting in favor of East Indians, Saramakas and the other maroons were encouraged to vote on the assumption that they would vote with the Afro Surinamer parties, and some voting votes were set up, I was there, and I was a witness to that voting. Later I cannot speak to later elections. There are times when the particular parties in power had decided it was useful to them to bring a voting apparatus into the interior, and they did collect a certain number of votes, there had been times when they had not, and that really depends on who has been running the country, in my opinion, and whether they thought they could profit from a black vote of that sort or not.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Doctor, Àusted conoce si votaron durante las últimas elecciones de principios del año 1991 y si conoce algún porcentaje de votantes de Saramaka en esas elecciones?
SR. RICHARD PRICE: I do not.
SR. CARLOS VARGAS: Doctor, hemos escuchado el sentido de responsabilidad de protección de su territorio y sus costumbres de parte del pueblo de Saramaka, brillantemente expuesto por su persona. Yo tengo una pregunta, mi pregunta es la siguiente. En aras de defender sus costumbres y territorio, Àhan guerreado los Saramakas durante los últimos 8 años, han formado parte del conflicto interno que en alguna medida afectó el interior de Suriname?
SR. CLAUDIO GROSSMAN: Yo quisiera objetar esa pregunta porque de acuerdo con la Convención Americana, el Artículo 27, de la Convención Americana, hay algunos derechos que no se pueden violar o derogar, ni siquiera bajo una situación de emergencia. Así que es absolutamente irrelevante la pregunta, porque aquí no se trata además de víctimas caídas en una situación de combate. Ya nos encontramos en la página segunda, ya se reconoció la responsabilidad, entonces esto no agrega nada y confunde las cosas. Yo no entiendo qué tiene que ver esta pregunta con los daños y perjuicios. Si nos pueden explicar, trataríamos de entender, pero no entiendo qué tiene que ver esto con daños materiales, morales o lo que sea. La masacre de gente que no estaban ellos mismos como combatientes, Àno?
EL PRESIDENTE: Bueno, yo digo la opinión es de que puede ser relevante la pregunta y que entonces siga adelante. Trate de decir qué explicación tiene y a qué resultado pued