Strong U.S. ties crucial to Colombia, Uribe says

[Judi Lynn]

Aug. 3, 2005, 11:39PM

Strong U.S. ties crucial to Colombia, Uribe says
Leader tells Chronicle board that only with aid can the drugs and rebels be overcome
By JOHN OTIS
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle

Ben DeSoto / Chronicle
Colombian President Alvaro Uribe says that, while his country sometimes appears to remain stuck in a climate of anarchy, gains are being made for democracy.
On the eve of a visit with President Bush at his Crawford ranch, Colombian leader Alvaro Uribe on Wednesday urged the United States to continue underwriting his government's war on drugs and guerrillas.
(snip)

$4 billion in aid to Colombia, making the Andean nation one of world's top recipients of U.S. assistance.
(snip)

And human rights groups say a new law to persuade paramilitary forces to disarm amounts to a blanket amnesty for fighters accused of drug trafficking and massacres.

In a report released Monday titled "Smoke and Mirrors," Human Rights Watch said that of the nearly 6,000 paramilitaries who have demobilized since 2003, only 25 were detained for atrocities committed against civilians by their organizations. The paramilitaries were formed in the 1980s to battle the rebels and often received support from the Colombian army.
"It is evident this process is rotten to the core," said Jose Miguel Vivanco, Americas director for Human Rights Watch.
(snip/...)

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/headline/world/3295532
(Free registration required)

[Judi Lynn]

1. As leader meets Bush, 'Plan Colombia' on table

As leader meets Bush, 'Plan Colombia' on table

By DAVID ADAMS, Times Latin America Correspondent
Published August 4, 2005

MIAMI - Only special visitors are received at President Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas. So today's visit by Colombian President Alvaro Uribe is all the more significant.

Their meeting comes at a critical moment in U.S. support for the drug war in Colombia. Before Sept. 11, "Plan Colombia" was one of the United States' largest overseas aid programs. Events in Afghanistan and Iraq have pushed Colombia down the agenda.

Even so, now in its fifth year, Plan Colombia has eaten up $4 billion in U.S. taxpayers' money, making it the largest U.S. aid effort outside of the Middle East.

This year the Bush administration is asking for another $742 million for Colombia. Every year the debate is marked by controversy over Colombia's human rights record. Never more so than this year, as Colombia is seeking U.S. support for a controversial demobilization plan for the country's paramilitary forces. These illegal militias are responsible for some of the most heinous crimes in a conflict that has come close to rivalling the Balkans for sheer barbarity.
(snip/...)

http://www.sptimes.com/2005/08/04/Worldandnation/As_leader_meets_Bush_.shtml

[Judi Lynn]

2. Narcotics and Economics Drive U.S. Policy in Latin America

August 4, 2005

Special Report
Narcotics and Economics Drive U.S. Policy in Latin America
Washington

By The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists*


At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on March 5, 1998, Gen. Charles E. Wilhelm, then head of the U.S. Southern Command, laid out the rationale for a large-scale U.S. military aid program unfolding for Colombia.
(snip)

One country—Colombia—was at the center of all potential and peril, and it became the focus of an unprecedented U.S. military and economic aid package to the region. The country is in the grips of a five-decade-old guerrilla war, with powerful left-wing armies—who effectively control about 40 percent of Colombia—countered by a growing right-wing paramilitary movement that uses ghoulish death-squad tactics against its presumed enemies. Colombia continues to be the leading producer of narcotics destined for the U.S. market. In 1999, according to the United Nations, Colombia supplied an estimated 66 percent of the world’s cocaine supply—a staggering 300 metric tons annually. Both the leftist guerrilla groups and the paramilitaries are engorging their armies on the profits of that drug trade.

Colombia also leads the world in violence, with 77.5 murders per 100,000 people each year—more than 13 times the U.S. rate. A third of the world’s terrorist attacks occur in Colombia and more than half the kidnappings. Leftist rebel groups—including the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known by its Spanish acronym FARC, and the National Liberation Army, or ELN—are well-funded, sophisticated insurgencies. In 1998, then-Colombian Defense Minister Gilberto Echeverri estimated that the rebels pulled in $1 billion in revenue that year from kidnapping, extortion and participation in the country’s lucrative drug trade. The paramilitaries, with an estimated 8,000 men and women under arms, are intimately tied to drug-smuggling cartels. Their trademark is wanton disrespect for human life, and they are responsible for two-thirds of the estimated 4,000 annual political murders in Colombia.

Ever since the Monroe Doctrine in 1823, U.S. presidents have asserted their prerogatives in the Americas. From gunboat diplomacy to propping up shaky dictatorships in the Cold War to fighting the war on drugs, the United States has been deeply involved in the affairs of Latin America. To varying degrees, economic motivations have always influenced U.S. policy makers and underlain their approach to the region. Rarely, however, have human rights been of foremost concern in Washington’s involvement in Latin America. Indeed, U.S. military aid to the region has often been implicated in human rights abuses. Clinton even issued a mea culpa in 1999 after a Guatemalan truth commission found that U.S. military and intelligence aid had helped the Guatemalan military commit "acts of genocide" against the Mayans during that country’s 36-year civil war. Yet when Clinton’s own administration—and Congress—confronted the turmoil in Colombia, it took the traditional approach to Latin America. And, though corporate interests, military strategic needs, and law enforcement concerns were all duly taken into account in formulating a policy toward Colombia, respect for human rights could—quite literally—be waived by the president in favor of other priorities.
(snip/...)

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:wn8qTZDP7N4J:www.icij.org/dtaweb/report.asp%3FReportID%3D107+%22Washington+Office+on+Latin+America%22+list+legislators+Cuban+American+contributions&hl=en

[RamblingRose]

4. Thanks for your posts J.L. I have close friends that came here from

Colombia on work visas about a year ago. They love Uribe and hate Chavez. Your posts always give me a new perspective.

[bemildred]

5. Alvaro seems to have mixed feelings about Chavez.

And vice-versa; it's one of the more interesting bi-lateral relationships in Latin America.

I expect this meeting at Crawford is aimed at shoring up congressional support for dumping more money in the "Plan Colombia" hopper despite the lack of measurable progress.

[Judi Lynn]

6. Wonder if it's possible Uribe will someday come to his senses

and realize his loyalties should be with the people of his country rather than the U.S. genocidal right-wing which has already been responsible for laying waste to so very many lives in Latin America.

[ConcernedCanuk]

3. Didn't the US learn anything from Prohibition??

.
.
.

apparently not . .

As long as there is demand for something, there will always be a supplier

Making the "product" illegal only drives the suppliers underground, and makes criminals out of the "users" as well.

Just think of the Billions of $$ of INCOME the governments could rake in from taxes on legal, controlled sales, as opposed to the Billions spent on trying to ineffectively curtail the suppliers and the market. And the countless lives that would be saved from the criminal elements "protecting" their product and supply system.

AS with alcohol, penalties should be meted out for abuse, and crimes related to the use and or distribution outside of legal boundaries

But that makes too much sense

Let's just keep a money grabbing murderous war going

That seems to be SOP for the US these days to solve *cough* any problem . . .

(sigh)