UPR on Strike Once More
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – Students at the University of Puerto Rico are on strike again. Last spring, students shut down all but one campus in the UPR system for 2 months to fight the $800 fee increase.
Translator’s background note: Even though the UPR students have organized referendums, occupations, and demos against the $800 fee due January all throughout this fall, the administration is going forward with the fee. So students held an assembly and decided on a 48-hour strike for today. Attempts at repression have been at a high these past few weeks, with the university even taking down the campus’s security gates the day before the strike. This is a communique about today written from within the barricades.
It’s worth noting this was released at 8:00 am and much more has happened since, including an altercation at the gates where a student was detained. Also counter-demos have materialized with support from the PNP, the