Another shining example of how the United States fosters 'freedom' in other countries can be had by investigating the results of the 'War on Drugs'. It is reported that the president of Colombia is proud of the fact that the killing of union activists is down to only 30 this year as opposed to the 90 that were killed last year according to the Central Workers' Union. Prosecutors in Colombia have ordered that three Colombia Army soldiers (one officer) and one civilian be arrested while the recent death of three union activists is being investigated. The arrest comes after a call for an investigation was made by the Colombian office of U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights and Amnesty International. The New York Times has reported that Colin Powell has warned Colombia that it's aid might be cut off: "It's clear that we were never wrong, saying that they were assassinated by members of the Colombian Army," said Domingo Tovar, who coordinates human rights activities for the Central Workers Union, largest Colombian labor confederation. The attorney general's announcement came days after Secretary of State Colin L. Powell warned the Colombian government that it must curtail rights abuses or risk losing aid. on Tuesday, Vice President Francisco Santos acknowledged that the government had erred in its initial characterization of the killings, saying, "Yes, we were wrong."
The problem is that Colin Powell has been aware of the problem for quite a long time. Here is an excerpt from an article by Nina Englander that appears on Representative Jan Schakowsky's website. The article is almost a year old and the killings continue. A September 22 letter from Representative Jan Schakowsky to Secretary of State Colin Powell (signed by nineteen members of the House) condemns Uribe's statements and urges Powell to make a "strong public statement dissociating the United States from President Uribe's remarks, indicating strong US concern with these statements, and asking him to protect, by his words and actions, human rights defenders and the broader non-governmental community in Colombia." Senators Dodd, Feingold, Leahy and Kerry sent a similar letter to the Secretary of State asking for a public statement from the US ambassador to Colombia and calling for a meeting between Powell and Colombian human rights groups. Neither the State Department nor the US Embassy in Colombia has made any public denouncement.
The Foreign Office of the UK recently considered cutting off military aid to Colombia according to an article in The Guardian: The Foreign Office has examined the possibility of cutting off military aid to Colombia in response to mounting political opposition among trade unions and backbench MPs. More than 210 MPs, predominantly Labour members but many from the other main parties, have signed an early day motion put down by the former Labour Foreign Office minister Tony Lloyd, condemning Britain's involvement and calling for security assistance to be frozen. The motion claims that many of the 184 trade unionists killed in Colombia in 2002 died at the hands of rightwing paramilitary groups "which have documented links to the state security forces".
In a stunning example of the nature of the Colombian government The Guardian also reports that their commitments to Human rights are mere words: Last year, the US gave Colombia $99m to protect the pipeline, to be split between the 18th Brigade and a new mobile unit. President Bush also sent 60 US special forces personnel to Arauca to train the brigade. Given this involvement of the oil companies and the US government in the brigade's activities, perhaps they can explain something the Colombian government does not care to: how does it enhance the security of the people of Arauca when the army, directly or through its collaboration with paramilitary groups, targets health workers, trade unionists, teachers, journalists and human rights defenders and forcibly displaces indigenous and peasant communities who lived near the pipeline? A year ago, in a meeting in London, Colombia's vice-president signed a commitment to implement a long list of recommendations from the UN Human Rights Commission. Twelve months on, the UN reports that there has been almost no progress on most of the recommendations, and on others Colombia has moved backwards. The Colombian government claims that the vice-president's signature did not commit the country to anything - an approach to commitments that Colombia's partners might care to bear in mind in future dealings with the Uribe government. (emphasis added)
Editor's Note: Colombia was originally misspelled and corrected after an astute reader pointed out our glaring error. Hay, we spell czeched it!
Date: Wednesday, September 08, 2004 - 09:25 AM Printer Friendly  Email to a Friend 
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