Colombia's private sector received cut from organized crime profits: warlord
Former AGC chief makes explosive accusations ahead of impending extradition to US
by Adriaan Alsema April 22, 2022
Jailed warlord “Otoniel” told Colombia’s war crimes tribunal that politicians and police commanders are on the payroll of paramilitary organization AGC, local media reported Thursday.
Dario Antonio Usuga, a.k.a. “Otoniel,” additionally said that state officials and security forces in the Antioquia and Cordoba provinces continue to collude with the paramilitary group.
. . .
New allegations about Colombia’s para-economy
Otoniel also provided more alleged details about the so-called “para-economics” model that allowed businesses to increase their profits through terrorism.
Previous court sentences revealed that businesses were able to keep wages low because the AUC would assassinate labor union representatives.
More:
https://colombiareports.com/otoniel-claims-colombias-politicians-received-cut-from-organized-crime-reports/
~ ~ ~
Two US-based companies which have been sued for murdering labor leaders have been the formerly Birmingham, Alabama-based company, Drummond Coal, and the much older company, United Fruit, which more recently became "Chiquita Banana." No doubt United Fruit felt the need to lose the original name which has been associated with a lot of blood for many decades, and needed a new "face."
News already published:
Drummond coal goes on trial over Colombia killings
By Verna Gates
4 MIN READ
BIRMINGHAM, Alabama (Reuters) - The Drummond coal company helped finance a Colombian paramilitary group that murdered three union leaders who opposed company mining policies, a plaintiffs’ attorney told a U.S. court on Wednesday.
Herman Johnson was speaking at the start of a civil trial of the Alabama-based company on charges that it committed a war crime by providing support to a paramilitary group suspected of the 2001 killings.
Privately-held Drummond Company Inc. denies any connection with paramilitary groups in a case considered a landmark because it could, if successful, open the door for other parties to sue transnational companies on human rights abuses.
. . .
Witnesses will testify that Drummond gave cash and cars to the paramilitary groups fighting in a 40-year insurgency in the Latin American country.
More:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1014
~ ~ ~
Banana Massacre
The Banana Massacre (Spanish: Matanza/Masacre de las bananeras[1]) was a massacre of United Fruit Company workers that occurred between December 5 and 6, 1928 in the town of Ciénaga near Santa Marta, Colombia. A strike began on November 12, 1928, when the workers ceased to work until the company would reach an agreement with them to grant them dignified working conditions.[2] After several weeks with no agreement, in which the United Fruit Company refused to negotiate with the workers, the conservative government of Miguel Abadía Méndez sent the Colombian Army in against the strikers, resulting in the massacre of 47 to 2,000 people.
After U.S. officials in Colombia and United Fruit representatives portrayed the workers' strike as "communist" with a "subversive tendency" in telegrams to Frank B. Kellogg, the United States Secretary of State,[3] the United States government threatened to invade with the U.S. Marine Corps if the Colombian government did not act to protect United Fruit’s interests. The Colombian government was also compelled to work for the interests of the company, considering they could cut off trade of Colombian bananas with significant markets such as the United States and Europe.[4]
Gabriel García Márquez depicted a fictional version of the massacre in his novel One Hundred Years of Solitude, as did Álvaro Cepeda Samudio in his La Casa Grande. Although García Márquez references the number of dead as around three thousand, the actual number of dead workers is unknown.
. . .
The troops set up their machine guns on the roofs of the low buildings at the corners of the main square, closed off the access streets,[7] and, after issuing a five-minute warning that people should leave,[1] opened fire into a dense Sunday crowd of workers and their families including children. The people had gathered after Sunday Mass[7] to wait for an anticipated address from the governor.[8]
Number of people dead
General Cortés Vargas, who commanded the troops during the massacre, took responsibility for 47 casualties. In reality, the exact number of casualties has never been confirmed. Herrera Soto, co-author of a comprehensive and detailed study of the 1928 strike, has put together various estimates given by contemporaries and historians, ranging from 47 to as high as 2,000.[1] According to Congressman Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, the killed strikers were thrown into the sea.[1] Other sources claim that the bodies were buried in mass graves.[2]
More:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Massacre
Same company, doing business as "Chiquita" :
Claim against Chiquita for funding Colombian death squads to go to trial in U.S.
30 Nov 2016
Author:
The Wisconsin Gazette (USA)
After almost a decade of litigation, victims of Colombian paramilitary death squads funded by Chiquita are moving forward in a U.S. lawsuit against the banana giant...[F]ederal judge Kenneth Marra rejected Chiquita’s argument that the case should be heard in Colombia rather than the United States...In 2007, EarthRights International and other co-counsel, filed a class action suit against Chiquita Brands International on behalf of the families of thousands of villagers, labor leaders and community organizers murdered by the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia, a paramilitary terrorist organization. The suit alleges that Chiquita made illegal, concealed payments to the AUC...The lawsuit also alleges that the AUC shipped arms and drugs through Chiquita’s ports and on Chiquita boats...Chiquita has pulled out of Colombia and now has no operations or assets there. Still, Chiquita argued that it was more “convenient” to litigate in Colombia than the United States. The court rejected this claim, finding Colombia to be an inadequate forum in light of serious security risks for plaintiffs and their lawyers...
More:
https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/latest-news/claim-against-chiquita-for-funding-colombian-death-squads-to-go-to-trial-in-us/