Colombia This Week

27/04/2007

Fri 20 – Human rights conference calls for peace process; Al Gore shuns Uribe in US forum.

·         ‘The Colombian government should adopt all necessarily means to effectively dismantle the military, political and economic structures of the paramilitaries in Colombia as well as to investigate and prosecute all links between the paramilitary groups and Colombian public servants,  members of the security forces and security organisms’. This is one of the recommendations of the final statement of the Second International Conference for Human Rights held in the European parliament in Brussels this week, Caracol radio reports.

·         US former vice-president Al Gore withdrew from an environmental conference in Miami to avoid appearing with the Colombian president, who is facing the most serious accusations yet that he aided paramilitary death squads. Gore's office said the former vice president did not want to appear at an event with President Alvaro Uribe until "this very serious chapter in history is brought to a close." Uribe said late Thursday that Gore's decision was a sign of the damage caused by a growing scandal linking his political allies to Colombia's paramilitaries, New York Times reports.

·         In a two-hour briefing with a small group of reporters carried live on all Colombia's TV major networks, president Uribe said he would act swiftly to dispel what he called slanderous attacks by Senator Gustavo Petro, a leader of the Democratic Pole party who has helped unearth allegations that have put eight congressmen behind bars. "I have not had political ties with the paramilitary groups, we have not received or looked for the political help of paramilitaries" he said. On Wednesday, three more pro-government congressmen were called to testify before the Supreme Court. One, Senator Ruben Dario Quintero, was the private secretary to Uribe when he was the governor of Antioquia between 1995 and 1997, the Washington Post reports.

Sat 21 – Politicians calls for investigation after allegations that Uribe spies on the opposition.

·         Questions have been raised by former President Cesar Gaviria and other political leaders as President Uribe reported in a press conference that he had evidenced from information gathered by the Colombian secret services that opposition members are lobbying the US Congress against the approval of the free trade agreement, calling them ‘anti-patriots’, El Tiempo reports.

·         After 15 months of incarceration Colombian human rights defender Gabriel Gonzalez has been released from prison after a judge in Bucaramanga (Santander), acquitted him of all charges. The judge found that the rebellion charges against Mr. Gonzalez were baseless and relied on witness evidence and government reports that lacked impartiality and credibility, US-based Human Rights First reports.

·         Patricia Buritica and Maria Teresa Bernal, representatives of Colombian civil society in the National Commission for Reparation supported the proposal of Senator Gustavo Petro for a national agreement for truth and reconciliation aimed at reaching all sectors of the Colombian society, Caracol radio reports.

·         The US State Department suspended the entry visa of Jorge Noguera, Director of the DAS (Colombian Secret Police) until December last year. Colombian Senator Dieb Maloof, also charged in the para-politics scandal, was stopped in Miami airport last December and immediately sent back to Colombia after the US authorities denied him permission to enter the country, El Tiempo reports.

Sun 22 – Damning new evidence of Colombian security services on trade union workers.

·         ‘An investigation by the Attorney General's Office has revealed that the DAS has long been pursuing a policy of secret monitoring and observation of legitimate trade union activities and in particular of union leaders. The new evidence includes the investigation of a list of 22 union leaders and one union advisor, who had been specifically identified by detectives from the National Intelligence Directorate. Seven of those on the list were killed following their identification by the Directorate, The International Labour Organisation reports.

·         A Miami Herald editorial  argues that there are plenty of reasons for members of the [US] Congress to be leery about giving more money to Colombia. A major political scandal surrounding President Alvaro Uribe and his party is growing, and getting closer to the president himself. An amnesty with paramilitary forces has been far too generous to these criminals. Human rights protections need to be strengthened, and too much of Colombia's territory remains beyond the reach of the government. And yet, Congress should approve more aid to Colombia -- with strings. In a way, Colombia has become the Pakistan of Latin America, a strategic US ally in a troubled part of the world, with a government that leaves a lot to be desired’.

·         According to the Colombian Ministry of Social Protection, two million children between 5 and 17 years old are working in Colombia. According to the report the main activities were as domestic servants, in the agricultural sector, as street vendors and in prostitution. The Labour Vice-Minister Jorge Luis Campo also reported that 400,000 children working in the domestic sector are vulnerable to sexual abuse by their employers, El Colombiano reports.

Mon 23 – Activist murdered in Comuna 13 in Medellin; report indicates failure of Plan Colombia.

·         Colombian community leader and human rights activist Judy Vergara Correa has been killed by unidentified armed men. The rights advocate, mother of four, was stabbed to death on a bus in the Comuna 13 of Medellin. Judy Vergara, member of the Alternative Democratic Pole (PDA), was president of the Corporation for Peace and Social Development, which analyses and criticises the phenomenon of paramilitary squadrons, and collaborated with the ‘Mothers of Candelaria’, a women’s association that has long demanded that the leaders of the paramilitary movement confess to the disappearances and assassinations of their sons, husbands or brothers, El Colombiano reports.

·         A new report by the US NGO Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) indicates that the street price per gram of cocaine on US streets fell in 2006, while its purity increased. The report, titled: “Connecting the Dots: ONDCP’s (Reluctant) Update on Cocaine Price and Purity,” suggest that cocaine supplies are stable or even increasing. This is so despite $31 billion spent on drug interdiction and crop control efforts since 1997, including $5.4 billion spent in Colombia since “Plan Colombia” began in 2000.The data fully reverse a short-lived price increase that the US Drug Czar’s office heralded in late 2005.  That rise in prices and decline in purity, which received much media attention at the time, proved to be a less than impressive fluctuation, as sceptics at the time suggested would be the case. The evidence indicates that cocaine’s continued low and falling prices are driven largely by ongoing robust cocaine supply, rather than by a slackening or collapse in demand, offering further evidence that fumigations in Colombia have failed to affect drug supplies in the US.

·         Colombian Minister of Foreign Affairs Fernando Araujo said he did not believe the Venezuelan Government approved of illegal activity, and stressed that "Venezuela's stance regarding subversion involves countering it and commanding respect for the Venezuelan territory." He added that his country does not feel any discomfort in having neighbouring countries with socialist governments, namely Venezuela and Ecuador. However, Araujo was recently at the centre of controversies with both countries. "Ideologies in each country are not a subject matter for our foreign policy. I do respect any ideology in any country around the world, and we expect ours to be respected," Araujo said in an interview with El Tiempo newspaper.

Tues 24 –Senate committee approves transfer bill; Attorney orders ‘inspection’ on Petro’s office.

·         A Colombian Senate committee gave preliminary approval to a bill meant to limit cash transfers to the provinces, keeping the government's fiscal reform plans alive despite tough local opposition. Local mayors and governors are lobbying Congress against the proposed constitutional amendment, which would limit central government cash transfers to a maximum yearly increase of 5 percent above the inflation rate. Colombia's 1991 constitution says the government must transfer nearly half of all tax revenue increases to towns and provinces. "We were happy to see that the bill was supported by the government's allies," Finance Minister Oscar Zuluaga told reporters, promising that the measure would not reduce local health and education budgets. The measure must be approved by both chambers of Congress by the end of the legislative term in June, Reuters reports.

·         Colombian Interior Ministry Luis Holguin said that the presence, accompanied by police, of an official of the Attorney General’s Office in the office of Senator Gustavo Petro was ‘a judicial inspection and not a raid’, raising questions among politicians and journalists after allegations that the government is spying on the Colombian opposition, El Tiempo reports.

Weds 25 – Senator Petro reports plot to kill him; US to shift focus of funds for Colombia.

·          Leading opposition Senator Gustavo Petro went public with an alleged assassination plot, accusing former army colonel Julian Villate -who provides security for coal company Drummond- of conspiring to kill him. He also said that the Public Prosecutor's office learned of the plot from one of the would-be assassins, who testified he met with Villate and others in the city of Santa Marta to plan the killing. The assassination was not carried out, and Petro said he had no more details about the plot. He and his relatives have received a series of death threats since November, when his denunciations of paramilitary infiltration in Colombian politics spurred probes that have landed eight Uribe-allied members of Congress in jail, the Washington Post reports.

·         The US plans to focus more of its aid to Colombia on social, economic and human rights programs, while gradually decreasing its assistance for drug eradication and interdiction programs in the Andean nation, said two State Department officials. Charles Shapiro and Anne Patterson outlined the new phase, called “Strategy to Strengthen Democracy and Promote Social Development.”  The six-year plan, running from 2007-2013, builds on the first phase of the Colombian peace strategy, called Plan Colombia, while responding to new challenges. Shapiro told the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere that these gains included reversing the high rate of growth in the late 1990s of coca and opium poppy cultivation, while significantly reducing poverty and improving Colombia’s justice system, security situation and economy.  Plan Colombia also has helped “demobilize” right-wing paramilitary groups that have been engaged in Colombia’s long-running civil war, the US State Department website reports.

·         Paramilitary commander Francisco Javier Zuluaga, better known as Gordo Lindo, began to give evidence yesterday under the terms of the so called ‘Justice and Peace law’. This former member of the AUC has been accused of drug trafficking and requested in extradition by the US authorities. He announced that he will reveal how he managed the group's finances and was supported by the Colombian armed forces. Another paramilitary commander, Adriano José Cano Arteaga, alias Melaza and former member of the Bananero, Tolima and Libertadores Blocks, also started his confessions. Cano Arteaga is said to have been involved in the death of Carlos Castaño Gil and four of his escorts, El Colombiano reports.

Thurs 26 – Accused former military man worked for US Embassy; blackout in Bogota;

·         Former Colonel Julian Villate accused of conspiring to assassinate Senator Petro worked for the US Embassy in Bogota two years ago. US. Embassy spokesman Marshall Louis confirmed to the press that Villate was employed by the diplomatic post between Dec. 2004 and July 2005, when he resigned. Louis said he was not allowed to reveal what Villate did for the embassy, or why he resigned. Before working for the embassy, Villate was employed by a consulting firm which federal investigators discovered was involved in "Operation Dragon," a spying operation against some 175 union leaders, human rights workers and politicians. "He was leading the plan to exterminate various union leaders, human rights workers, and me," says Alexander Lopez, now an opposition senator, Associated Press reports.

·         Colombia has been hit by a nationwide power cut causing chaos on the roads. Officials said the blackout started at 10:15 local time and was caused by an undetermined technical failure at a substation in Bogota.  More than 80% of Colombia was affected. Luis Alarcon, manager of state-controlled electricity company ISA, said the power cut began at Bogota's substation and confirmed the incident was not caused by a left-wing rebel attack, the BBC reports.

·         A plot to assassinate Rafael Garcia, former official of the Colombian Secret police (DAS) and a key witness in both the Drummond and the ‘Para-politics’ cases, has been  foiled this week by prison authorities, his lawyer said. Jose Strusberg, told the AP that authorities had transferred six prisoners who were plotting to kill his client from nearby cells. "Garcia is a target of dark forces that want to eliminate him," said Strusberg. Prison officials, however, said the transfer was routine, CNN reports.

·         The Ecuadorean government has announced that it will send its ambassador back to Colombia after recalling him in December after a row over Colombia’s fumigation of drug crops along their border. Ecuador decided to return the ambassador after Colombia halted fumigation and created a joint commission to investigate the effects of chemical spraying on border communities, Reuters reports.  

·         US President George Bush will meet with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe on 2^nd of May, amid charges that officials close to Uribe had ties to right-wing paramilitaries. "Colombia is an important strategic partner, and this visit underscores the friendship and extensive cooperation between the United States and Colombia," spokeswoman Dana Perino said in a statement, Agency France Press reports.

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