Oscar López Rivera > Quotes

“it was clear that true freedom meant not just the ability to vote or choose one’s own political representatives, but the ability to build one’s own schools, to have accessible health care and jobs, to have clean air and water and energy in the control of the communities that utilize them. Of course, true freedom and independence also includes a free and fair judicial system, with responsible and accountable policing, fair legal process, and reasoned judgment and sentencing.”
― Oscar López Rivera, Oscar Lopez Rivera: Between Torture and Resistance

“Our awareness in solidarity of this oppression that touches us all is the starting point of a new and necessary impetus for the struggle…. because only struggle will make us free.”
― Oscar López Rivera, Oscar Lopez Rivera: Between Torture and Resistance

“The U.S. government’s refusal during the last three decades to comply with a resolution of the United Nations Decolonization Committee recognizing Puerto Rico’s right to free self-determination and independence. The Committee’s injunction for the United States to initiate the process that would allow Puerto Rico to exercise this right has been ignored. This refusal by the United States violates the right to free self-determination as expressed in the United Nations Charter as well as in the treaties on economic and social rights and civil and political rights.”
― Oscar López Rivera, Oscar Lopez Rivera: Between Torture and Resistance