Paramilitary Leaders Extradited

Alvaro Uribe’s decision to extradite Salvatore Mancuso, Rodrigo Tovar Pupo (Jorge 40), Diego Fernando Murillo (’Don Berna’), Hernán Giraldo (’Pablo Sevillano’) and Ramiro ‘Cuco’ Vanoy, to the United States, as well as the extradition of Carlos Jiménez, alias ‘Macaco’ last week is a dramatic development which changes the political landscape in Colombia. According to the International Herald Tribune, 14 high-level paramilitaries were extradited. The paramilitary leaders had previously submitted themselves to judicial processes under Colombia’s “Justice and Peace” law, and were extradited on the grounds that they were continuing their illicit activities from behind bars, and therefore violated the provisions of the law. The justice and peace law provides for lenient sentences in exchange for confessions of crimes committed and restitution to the victims, and was largely seen as a sham, effectively giving the paramilitaries impunity. What is unclear is whether the families of  the thousands of victims massacred by these paramilitaries will ever receive restitution and justice. U.S. authorities have hinted that paramilitaries, who have been extradited primarily for narcotics trafficking, must still answer for their crimes against humanity.

By extraditing the paramilitaries, Uribe effectively removes the cloud of suspicion that he is sympathetic to the paramilitaries. This event will have far-reaching consequences, particularly with respect to the approval of the Colombian Free Trade Agreement by the U.S. Senate. Nevertheless, Uribe must still demonstrate that he is doing something about the harassment and assassination of Colombian union leaders and human rights activists by rearmed paramilitaries.

President Uribe’s Cousin Under Arrest

The Washington Post reported the arrest of president Alvaro Uribe’s cousin. Ex senator Mario Uribe was arrested for suspected ties to paramilitary groups. He is among a quarter of the Colombian congress caught up in the “parapolitica” scandal for alleged involvement with paramilitary death squads. Mario Uribe had entered the Costa Rican embassy and requested political asylum, which was later denied. This led to his subsequent arrest by Colombian authorities. Meanwhile, according to a story in El Tiempo, defense minister (and the son of El Tiempo’s executive editor) Juan Manuel Santos testified before the Colombian Supreme Court yesterday that Raul Reyes’ laptop implicates many in congress of having ties to the Farc guerrillas, though he did not name anyone. El Tiempo’s story claims Santos “assured” the court that the “farcpolitica” scandal could be larger than the “parapolitica” scandal.

Recent News Roundup….

Since the Colombian free trade agreement was tabled by the U.S. House of Representatives, El Tiempo has published a flurry of stories dealing with paramilitary links to the Colombian congress and military, and recent efforts by the Uribe administration to prosecute those individuals with purported ties to the paramilitaries. One story describes an account of an ex DAS employee, Rafael Garcia, who has implicated multiple Colombian government entities of having ties to the paramilitaries, these include the Procuraduría, the Registraduría, the Superintendencia de Vigilancia, the Consejo Superior de la Judicatura, the Dirección Nacional de Estupefacientes, Indumil, the Armada, the DAS and the Ministries of Interior, Transportation, Communications and Foreign Relations. Another story says that the Colombian Supreme Court is investigating the president of the Colombian congress, Nancy Patricia Gutiérrez as part of the “parapolitica” scandal. Yet another story claims that this month alone 29 members of the Colombian military have been investigated for human rights abuses and that a total of 748 members of the military are being investigated. In the same story, defense minister Juan Manuel Santos is quoted as saying “We must be very clear: if in order to defeat the monster we convert ourselves into another monster, we have not won but lost because we will have converted ourselves into what we were trying to stop”. Another story cites an investigation of 7 members of the Colombian army for possible paramilitary links.

Civilians increasingly targeted by Colombian military

The Washington Post ran a story today alleging the Colombian military has been killing civilians and planting weapons on the bodies in order to make them look like guerrillas killed in combat. A recent letter to Secretary of State Rice signed by several U.S. senators warned of this disturbing trend. The military has reportedly taken up the dirty work formerly carried out by paramilitaries, who have demobilized under Uribe’s Justice and Peace Law. Death squad/paramilitary-based counter-terror against civilians has been practiced in Colombia and many other countries around the world since the 1960’s and comes right out of cold-war era U.S. Army counter-insurgency field manuals.

Arrests in San José de Apartadó Massacre

Three years after the massacre of 3 children and 8 adults in the peace community of San José de Apartadó, the arrest of 15 members of the Colombian army has been ordered, according to a story in today’s El Tiempo.

El Tiempo: Dirty Tricks or Just Bad Journalism?

This morning’s El Tiempo published a photo given to it by the Colombian National Police reportedly otained from one of Raul Reyes’ laptops showing a picture of the slain guerrilla leader with a person El Tiempo claimed was Ecuadorian Security Minister Gustavo Larrea. It was later revealed that the man meeting with Reyes is actually Argentinian Communist Party leader Patricio Echegaray. The Ecuadorian government responded with an angry communique asking El Tiempo to respect international journalistic norms. El Tiempo later published an apology. The photo also caused a stir in the Organization of American States meeting in Washington D.C. where Ecuadorian ambassador Cocíos stated that “this is nothing more than a Colombian dirty trick to try to discredit the National Government of Ecuador”.

Once again (see other posts in this blog), El Tiempo has demonstrated a remarkable willingness to publish just about anything the government tells it to, which makes one seriously question the paper’s journalistic integrity and its independence from the Uribe administration. Uribe’s vice president Francisco Santos and defense minister Juan Manuel Santos are close relatives (nephew and son, respectively) of El Tiempo’s editor Enrique Santos.

A Letter from a Human Rights Activist

Bogota, March 14, 2008

Sirs
Presidency of the Republic
Vice-Presidency of the Republic
Bogota

I hereby make public the threats which I have been the object of, along with other organizations and human rights and political leaders, in a letter sent by the “Águilas Negras el Rearme, Bloque Metropolitano de Bogotá” (Black Eagles, the Rearmament, Metropolitan Block of Bogota), last Wednesday, March 12. In this document, we are declared “military objective phase A”, we are accused of being guerrillas and told that we will be killed “one by one. We will be impeccable. We shall leave no stone unturned.”

The threats take place after the protest march on March 6th and an overseas trip made in representation of WOMEN’S, YOUTH, PEACE, VICTIM’S, AND ARTISTIC organizations. The objective of this trip was to recount the vulnerabilities of human rights in Colombia, the levels of impunity, and the complex dimension of the Colombian conflict. It is highly troublesome that after making use of the right to protest, to free speech, to communicate, and to justice and truth, these groups threaten us with death.

It is equally troublesome that this takes place after several personalities within the Colombian government indicated that the protest march on March 6 was organized by the FARC and was meant to support the FARC. Also troubling was the government’s manipulation of the media, and the events that have taken place during the past several months. We have indicated in the most emphatic and permanent way that we are not sympathizers, nor allies, nor part of this guerrilla group, and we reject violence of all types.

We denounce that in Colombia, there are no guarantees for the exercise of opposition, nor for working towards human rights, and much less for surviving victims who demand their rights. It is not the first time that I have been the object of intimidation, which has taken place since the disappearance and assassination of my father JAIME ENRIQUE GÓMEZ VELASQUEZ. In Colombia, the State does not provide security for the realization of our work. Last year, I asked for protective measures which were denied by the Ministers of the Interior and Justice, in spite of evidence of the levels of insecurity and vulnerability.

It should also be indicated that the communique from the “Águilas Negras” states that they have the “support and tolerance of the State and the citizenry in general”. My task, and that of all of the organizations and people who have been singled out, is the exercise of the right to opposition, given by the Political Constitution, which should be guaranteed in any democratic society by the institutions of the State and its representatives, who should strive for a climate of debate and dialogue, rather than exacerbating hate, threats, and polarization, which only contribute to the prolongation of the conflict that the country is living.

I hold the Colombian State, and the president and vice-president of the Republic responsible for guaranteeing our security and for any vulnerability against my role as a citizen, victim, and human rights activist.

DIANA MARCELA GÓMEZ CORREAL

“The theater is here!”

Today’s main editorial in El Tiempo had a clumsy bit of irony in its title “¡Llegó el teatro!” referring to the XI Festival Iberoamericano de Teatro de Bogotá, an annual theater festival about to kick off in Bogota. How can a festival ever surpass the grand theater that played out over the past week? An article by Tim Padgett in Time Magazine got it right….a war would have been too costly for all involved and Chavez and Correa were doing nothing more than a bit of good old-fashioned theatrical saber rattling.

As the story played out during the “Grupo de Rio” summit in Santo Domingo, which produced an agreement which essentially ended the diplomatic stalemate, the Colombian defense ministry announced that another member of the FARC secretariat had been killed, presumably by one of his own men. “Ivan Rios” the youngest member of the 7-man secretariat was killed by his security chief, after having been surrounded by the Colombian army and reportedly running out of food.

This deals yet another serious blow to the FARC leadership and one can only wonder if the FARC will retaliate in some manner against a “soft” civilian target at some point. Let us hope that instead they focus on pursuing a humanitarian accord. Today, Chavez openly asked FARC leader “Manuel Marulanda” to release one of the most high profile hostages, Ingrid Betancourt.

Ortega’s Hypocrisy

In 1988, Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega violated Honduran sovereignty when he attacked “Contra” rebel bases using several thousand Nicaraguan troops. The Nicaraguan Contras were being funded by the Reagan administration, and were waging a guerrilla war against Ortega and the Sandinistas out of bases in Honduras. The attacks killed dozens of contras as well as several Honduran civilians and destroyed the Honduran village of Suji. Yesterday, Daniel Ortega cut diplomatic relations with Colombia over the attack by Colombia against a guerrilla camp located in Ecuador.

How can Ortega’s action yesterday possibly have any credibility given his own history of violating Honduran sovereignty? Regrettably, Ortega appears to be as much a stooge of Chavez as Uribe is of Bush.

Uribe’s Calculus

Since I have started writing this blog, rarely have I noticed any action taken by Colombian president Alvaro Uribe that was not meticulously planned for maximum political effect both at home and in Washington. From record drug seizures just as the U.S. Congress was about to debate another round of funding for Plan Colombia, to the capture of narcotics “capo” Don Diego, just days after the Washington Post published a story detailing high-level infiltration of the Colombian military by Don Diego’s Norte del Valle Drug Cartel, the Uribe administration is keenly aware of the political impact its actions have on pending U.S. legislation.

This weekend’s attack against a guerrilla camp just inside the Ecuadorian border that left “Raul Reyes” the number two leader of the FARC dead, was no exception. Indeed, on the morning of the attack, Uribe met with a U.S. congressional delegation visiting Colombia to discuss the Free Trade Agreement between the US and Colombia (he reportedly arrived late for the meeting, having been delayed by the morning’s events). The Colombian weekly Semana is reporting a new thrust by Uribe to push for a vote on the Free Trade Agreement, commonly referred to by its Spanish initials, TLC. Perhaps more significantly for Uribe, are the positive responses to the attack that have been made not only by the Bush administration, but by the two Democratic candidates Clinton and Obama. Such support is likely to have important payoffs in the future with regard to continued funding for Plan Colombia.

Within Colombia the attack against the FARC has further increased Uribe’s popularity and could spur renewed calls to amend Colombia’s constitution to allow Uribe to run for a third term. So the long-term benefits for Uribe are likely to outweigh the stinging criticism by Ecuador, Venezuela, and the Organization of American States for having violated Ecuador’s sovereignty.