El Comite, or MINP, was a 1960s militant organization that sought independence for Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...

 from the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. Together with several other organizations, it formed the nucleus of the Movimiento Pro-Independencia that formed at a time when the United States was coming under increasing international criticism for holding onto one of the world's last colonies.

History

El Comite was born on the West Side

West Side

-India:* Kanpur* Mumbai* DELHI* Kolkata* Chennai* Bangalore* Hyderabad* Ahmedabad* Pune* Lucknow* Ludhiana* Jaipur* Patna* Indore* Bhopal* Chandigarh* Vadodara* Rajkot* Kochi,India* sagwara-Switzerland:...

 of Manhattan

Manhattan

Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...

 around 1970. It slowly began to spread to other cities, originally as a militant, community-based organization protesting so-called urban renewal programs that were replacing low income housing with high-rise developments El Comite filled the vacuum left by the decline of the Young Lords

Young Lords

The Young Lords, later Young Lords Organization and in New York , Young Lords Party, was a Puerto Rican nationalist group in several United States cities, notably New York City and Chicago.-Founding:...

. In 1975 El Comite was renamed MINP, Movimiento para la Independencia Nacional Puertorriqueña (Movement for Puerto Rican National Independence).

Operational Model

El Comite sought to be a multi-issue organization, offering a comprehensive program for the community. Besides its community roles, the group organized a student sector, the Puerto Rican Student Union (PRSU), and a workers organization, and initiated a process that eventually led to the formation of the Latin Women's Collective. Though iots publication Unidad Latina, it addressed the gamut of issues affecting the community, linking local issues to international forces.