Navy reports new, more violent protest on Vieques training ground

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - Protesters threw rocks and bottles at U.S. Navy security officers at the disputed training ground on Vieques Island before being chased away by pepper gas, the Navy said Friday. Five people were injured.

The reported attack around midnight Thursday could signal a more violent trend in the 14-month movement to expel the Navy from its prime Atlantic training ground on an outlying Puerto Rican island where 9,400 civilians live.

''This is an outrageous criminal act,'' Navy spokesman Lt. Jeff Gordon told The Associated Press. He said five Navy personnel suffered cuts and bruises and were treated on the spot.

Protest leaders on the island said they knew nothing about such an incident.

Exercises on Vieques stopped in April 1999 after stray bombs killed a civilian security guard, sparking protests laced with anti-American sentiment. In January, President Clinton and Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Rossello agreed bombing could resume - but with non-explosive ordnance. Clinton agreed to a referendum - probably next year - in which Vieques residents would decide whether to evict the Navy by 2003 or allow it to stay and resume live bombings.

Four days of exercises this week - in which the Navy lobbed hundreds of inert bombs and shells onto the range - were the largest since the accident. Scores of protesters responded by invading the Navy area, crawling under its border fence. They were detained, cited for trespassing and released, causing some minor delays in the exercises.

The Navy said four other officers were injured in other protest incidents during the exercises.

In all, the Navy said 183 protesters were arrested for breaking onto the training ground this week. Most were from the Puerto Rico Independence Party, which announced Friday its members would refuse on principle to pay the $1,000 fines - challenging authorities to track them down and make arrests.

On Thursday night, according to Gordon, some 40 to 50 protesters cut a hole in the fence of the training ground and entered it.

Confronted by Navy officers, ''the demonstrators began throwing rocks and bottles,'' Gordon said. Gordon described the officers as a ''significant force (that) had shields and arms but did not draw their weapons so as not to escalate the conflict.'' The windshields of two U.S. government vehicles also were smashed, Gordon said.

Gordon said the officers then fired pepper gas and the protesters fled.