7 killed in paramilitary upsurge in Saravena, Arauca

[Judi Lynn]

Colombia Urgent Action:
7 killed in paramilitary upsurge in Saravena, Arauca
Report by Colombia Solidarity
Published: 14/08/08

“JOEL SIERRA” HUMAN RIGHTS FOUNDATION
EARLY ALERT: NEW CRIMINAL UPSURGE IN SARAVENA
The Joel Sierra Human Rights Foundation presents this Early Alert communiqué to the regional, national and international community, and to the state’s institutions of justice and control, demanding that they take immediate steps with regard to the following:

• Since August seven people have been assassinated in Saravena, Arauca. At the same time graffiti have appeared in the town authored by the paramilitary Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (AUC).
  
  
• 3 August, Puerto Contreras district, Mr. WILSON RODRÍGUEZ MOSQUERA, 31 years old, is assassinated.
  
  
• 5 August, Barrio Cuatro de Diciembre, Mr. OMAR YESID TARAZONA, 29 years old, is assassinated.
  
  
• 8 August, Puerto Contreras district, Mr. URIEL ORTEGA CÁCERES, 31 years, is given the coup de grace. On the same day, Barrio Galán, at approximately 8:30 in the morning, social and political leader LUIS MAYUSA PRADA, 46 years old, is assassinated.
  
  
• 10 August, at approximately 9:20pm LUIS ALEJANDRO DÍAZ VILLAMIZAR, 18 years old is assassinated in the commercial establishment ‘La Chorizada de Papi’, situated 9th avenue with 28th street.
  
  
• Yesterday, 11 August, at approximately 5:00 pm, Mr. ALEXANDER TULIVILA, 29 years old is assassinated on 16th avenue with 19th street, Barrio Seis de Octubre. Also, at approximately 7:00 in the evening, in Puerto Contreras district, an as yet unidentified male between 30 and 35 years old is violently killed.

Graffiti of the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia AUC has been appearing on the front of buildings in the last few days, saying things like “THE AUC HAS ARRIVED”. The panic they generate is furthered by the death threats received by human rights defenders, journalists and tradesmen.

These events bring to mind the recent past when sicarios hitmen acting in the name of the paramilitaries moved freely through the security cordon of the National Police to commit a great many murders, many of them of social leaders.

The upsurge of violent deaths in a region with such security force presence shows that the government policy of ‘democratic security’ is for the economic interests of the transnational corporations, but makes no reference to the life and integrity of araucanos, the people of the region.

More:
http://www.labournet.net/world/0808/colomb1.html

[Judi Lynn]

1. Leading Colombian party chief arrested

Probably an oversight.

Leading Colombian party chief arrested
Jul 25, 2008

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Police have arrested the head of one of Colombia's main governing parties for alleged ties with far-right paramilitaries.

Local television is showing Friday's arrest of Sen. Carlos Garcia on criminal conspiracy charges.

Garcia's National Unity party holds the most seats in Colombia's Senate and it has been promoting efforts to hold a referendum that would let conservative President Alvaro Uribe run for a third consecutive term.

One-tenth of Colombia's Congress has been jailed since early last year on charges of benefitting from far-right death squads that killed thousands and stole land from tens of thousands of others in consolidating control of large swaths of the country.

Most are allies of President Uribe.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5j1QQiY68JMnWpI_yojLeOwcGxjtgD9251KLO0

[Bacchus39]

3. is Colombia doing enough combating the paras and FARC or not enough?

I'll let you debate that with yourself.

[Judi Lynn]

4. The Colombian government doesn't fight the paras at all. You know that.

Why are so many of Uribe's party, and Uribe's cousin all connected to the paras, anyway? Coin-ki-dinks? Probably not.

Both military and paramilitaries have testified that the military has combined with paras in massacres.

Couldn't be easier to grasp.

[Bacchus39]

5. you just posted a story about Colombia arresting the party leader

of Uribe's biggest supporters and you also just posted that numerous congressmen are in prison. it couldn't be easier to grasp that you just contradicted yourself with the title of your post.

who is pursuing these political leaders if not the Colombian government? the Canadian Monties?

the Colombian government also brokered the peace process where paras have demobilized. the FARC refused to participate. it does require that all parties comply. the government alone cannot be held responsible if it doesn't go like its printed on paper. when does it ever??

Colombia's problems won't simply vanish when they make the "correct choice", according to you, in the next election. they haven't in Venezuela, Bolivia, or Ecuador even if you choose to ignore them or simply attack the source of posted information because you don't want to believe it.

[Peace Patriot]

6. The Uribe government is not arresting itself. It is courageous prosecutors,

judges, lawyers, human rights groups, journalists, union leaders and victims' families--all at great risk--who are pursuing these cases.

What you are saying is kind of like saying that the Bush junta is honest because "Duke" Cunningham is in jail. In truth, the Bushwhacks tried to interfere with and limit that case. Or, justice in the U.S. is alive and well, because Gov. Seigelman is out of jail. The fact is that he was unjustly prosecuted for political reasons, and it took heroic efforts to right that wrong--with the Bushites fighting it every step of the way. Just because parts of a government/political order are working as they should doesn't mean that the system's main political leaders aren't goddamned criminals, murderers, torturers and thieves. Over forty union leaders have been assassinated in Colombia this year alone! Is their justice system working? No! Certain people are trying hard--at considerable risk to themselves. But these blatant murders continue. Why? Because Uribe & co. are shitheads, that's why. They don't support the justice system. They hate the justice system. And if Santos has his way, they will entirely eliminate the justice system and create a military dictatorship. That is the sad truth about Colombia. The choice is between a criminal order that maintains the form, but not the substance, of democracy--it is NOT a democracy if you risk death by voicing leftist opinions--and outright military dictatorship.

[Bacchus39]

8. which government is arresting these people then????

and convicting them???

provide evidence that the Colombian government hates the justice system and wants to eliminate it and establish a dictatorship.

[Peace Patriot]

9. It's just an educated guess. I think Santos is a threat to Uribe and to the forms

(but not substance) of democracy--and I think the form is important, actually. I base my guess that a military dictatorship is a threat on several things:

1) On Uribe's erratic behavior during the successful Chavez hostage releases. Uribe's sudden withdrawal of support for that effort, on the eve of the first two hostage releases, may have been the Colombian (and/or U.S. military/Bushites?) pulling Uribe's strings, and the bombing of those two hostages by the Colombian military, while they were in route to their freedom--driving them back into the jungle on a 20-mile hike--may have been Santos treachery against Uribe. I thought for a long while that it was Uribe treachery against Chavez, but I am not so sure of that any more. Uribe's efforts to reconcile with Chavez make me think it was Santos.

2) When Uribe recently visited Chavez to "bury the hatchet," Santos publicly sniped at his own president (something a Defense Minister just doesn't do) and at Chavez, criticizing the meeting. Chavez reacted to this, saying that Santos is "a threat." I wondered what he meant, and guessed that it was the threat of outright military dictatorship.

3) Then, when Santos came begging to Washington, trying to protect Colombia's $6 BILLION in military aid, he said an odd thing. Someone asked him about the Uribe/Chavez accord, and he sarcastically said, "I promised not to use the C word on this trip." Though he meant to be funny (in a Rumsfeldian sort of way), the remark obviously had a history, likely disagreement between Uribe and Santos over Chavez (and other things?). There seems to be friction between them--and, given Bushite plotting in South America, particularly separatist/civil war plotting against Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia--I sense that Santos would easily be involved in this plotting (maybe is already)--and would be gung-ho for helping take over Zulia, for instance--and possibly Uribe doesn't go along with it (prefers diplomatic/political solutions).

3) On the surface, it would appear that a military dictatorship would be frowned upon in Washington and might endanger funding, but I wonder about this. Since the point of the military funding and the "free trade" deal is to serve U.S. corporate interests, and since U.S. corporations have not objected at all to prior military dictatorships in South America (in fact the CIA has arranged them for exploitation purposes), if that is only or best way to serve corporate interests, the U.S. government would support it. (Congress is a pushover--no problem there, I think. A few "liberals" will squawk, but they always cave to corporate interests.) It just depends on what's best for Occidental Petroleum, Exxon Mobil, Monsanto, Blackwater, Dyncorp, et al. And Santos looks like he's chafing to run the country, and has a certain amount of contempt for Uribe (i.e., civilian government).

4) Colombia is such a violent and fascist society--with the Colombian military and associated rightwing paramilitary death squads responsible for 92% of the murders of union leaders--it is not a very big step to a military dictatorship. The Colombian military is much too powerful and out-of-control (can't/doesn't want to control the death squads) for democracy and civilian government. If the justice system continues to make progress with death squad, drug trafficking, election fraud and other investigations, and steps on the wrong toes (Santos? The really big drug traffickers? The Bush Cartel?), Santos and the Colombian military could and would shut it down--suspend the legislature and the courts, the Constitution and civil rights, as the Bush-supported fascists did in Venezuela in 2002 in cahoots with a faction of the Venezuelan military. And if Uribe disagrees, they will get rid of him (or try to bully him into resigning, as they tried to to do Chavez). Also, if the Bushites decide to move on Zulia, and Uribe doesn't agree, I think there will likely be a military coup. (This may be why Chavez called Santos "a threat.")

[Judi Lynn]

7. I've been posting material for ages discussing the fact the death squads most surely have not been

demobilized, not by a long shot.

We'll take another run at it. Obviously it slows you down to have to even glance at the facts, but you sound foolish making up your own as you go along.

Justice & Peace Law and Decree 128
Since 2003, paramilitary groups, responsible for the vast majority of human rights violations in Colombia for over a decade, have been involved in a government-sponsored "demobilization" process. More than 25,000 paramilitaries have supposedly demobilized under a process which has been criticized by AI and other Colombian and international human rights groups, as well as by the OHCHR and the IACHR. The process is lacking in effective mechanisms for justice and in its inability to ensure that paramilitary members actually cease violent activities.

In fact, paramilitarism has not been dismantled, it has simply been "re-engineered." Many demobilized combatants are being encouraged to join "civilian informer networks," to provide military intelligence to the security forces, and to become "civic guards". Since many areas of Colombia have now been wrested from guerrilla control, and paramilitary control established in many of these areas, they no longer see a need to have large numbers of heavily-armed uniformed paramilitaries.

However, evidence suggests that many paramilitary structures remain virtually intact and that paramilitaries continue to kill. Amnesty International continues to document human rights violations committed by paramilitary groups, sometimes operating under new names, and often in collusion with the security forces.

AI would welcome a demobilization process which would lead to the effective dismantling of paramilitarism and end the links between the security forces and paramilitaries. But the current demobilization process is unlikely to guarantee the effective dismantling of such structures. In fact, it is facilitating the re-emergence of paramilitarism and undermining the right of victims to truth, justice and reparation.

Amnesty International is deeply concerned that the law governing the demobilization of armed groups in Colombia is wholly inadequate. It threatens to guarantee the impunity of those responsible for heinous and widespread human rights atrocities, not only paramilitaries, but also those who have backed the paramilitary such as wealthy landowners, and government and military officials. Furthermore, the demobilization law may not rid the country of the scourge of illegal armed activity and human rights abuses against the civilian population. In fact, it may make the situation worse by:

• Providing de facto amnesties for paramilitaries and guerrillas responsible for serious human rights abuses and violations;
  
  
• Perpetuating impunity for human rights abusers and violators thereby undermining the rule of law in Colombia;
  
  
• Failing to guarantee the effective dismantling of paramilitary structures by focusing solely on individual combatants;
  
  
• Failing to expose those Colombian security forces, government officials, and private citizens who have supported and benefited from the activities of the paramilitary;
  
  
• Failing to establish a full and independent judicial process to oversee the demobilization process;
  
  
• Neglecting to respect the rights of victims of human rights violations and abuses to truth, justice and reparation.

The legislation was approved in 2005 with the aim of facilitating the supposed demobilization of army-backed paramilitaries. Yet on May 19, 2006, Colombia's Constitutional Court declared many of the central tenets of the Justice and Peace Law unconstitutional. Today most paramilitaries who have demobilized have benefited from Decree 128 of 2003 under which members of illegal armed groups who are not under investigation for human rights offences receive de facto amnesties. It is precisely because of the endemic problem of impunity in Colombia that most paramilitaries and guerrillas, many of whom are responsible for war crimes, crimes against humanity and other crimes under international law, have never been investigated, let alone been brought to justice for these offences. As such, almost all members of paramilitary groups have already benefited from Decree 128.

Decree 128 grants legal and economic benefits to members of armed groups who have demobilized. These benefits include "pardons, conditional suspension of the execution of a sentence, a cessation of procedure, a resolution of preclusion of the investigation or a resolution of dismissal".

Amnesty International is concerned that the real aim of the Justice and Peace Law is not only to guarantee the impunity of paramilitaries implicated in human rights violations–including war crimes and crimes against humanity–by failing to ensure that they are subject to full and impartial judicial investigations, but also that their security force backers and others responsible for sponsoring their illegal activities will not be identified and held accountable.

Amnesty International calls on the Colombian government to take all the necessary measures to end impunity, break the links between paramilitaries and the security forces, and guarantee the safety of civilian sectors at particular risk. The Government of Colombia must ensure full and impartial investigations into violations of human rights and that those individuals and sectors responsible for supporting paramilitarism – militarily, politically and economically – are brought to justice. The Government should also reverse proposals which drag civilians further into the conflict and "recycle" paramilitaries, such as the civilian informer network and Decree 2767, which authorizes paid collaboration with the security forces.

http://www.amnestyusa.org/Colombia/Justice_and_Peace_Law_and_Decree_128/page.do?id=1101862&n1=3&n2=30&n3=885

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Colombia: Demobilization Scheme Ensures Injustice
International Donors Should Not Fund Sham Paramilitary Demobilizations

(Washington D.C., January 18, 2005) — Colombia’s current demobilization procedures will not dismantle paramilitary groups and will result in widespread impunity for even the worst atrocities, Human Right Watch said in a report released today. At an international donors’ conference in Cartagena on February 3-4, Colombian President Alvaro Uribe plans to unveil a draft law that is likely to reproduce these flaws.

The 17-page report, “Letting Paramilitaries Off the Hook,” details serious deficiencies in the laws and procedures currently governing Colombia’s recent paramilitary demobilizations. Human Rights Watch called on international donors meeting in Cartagena to withhold demobilization aid unless Colombia enacts a law that can effectively dismantle paramilitary groups and hold their members accountable for massacres and other crimes against humanity.

“There is a real risk that this demobilization process will leave the underlying structures of these violent groups intact, their illegally acquired assets untouched, and their abuses unpunished,” said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director of Human Rights Watch. “As it is currently being conducted, this process does not justify the support of the international community.”

Existing law provides substantial economic and judicial benefits to those who demobilize. But the law fails to condition those benefits on any specific action by paramilitaries to dismantle their networks. Paramilitaries can receive benefits even if they refuse to cooperate with any investigations by the authorities, fail to disclose information about their structure or sources of financing, refuse to turn over land and other assets taken by force, and fail to make reparations to their victims.

Moreover, paramilitary leaders can receive benefits under the law even if their group continues to engage in attacks on civilians or other criminal activities such as drug trafficking. As a result, paramilitary leaders have few incentives to ensure a complete demobilization and ceasefire.

Meanwhile, a multiparty group of Colombian senators, led by Senators Rafael Pardo and Gina Parody, has made public a draft bill that would correct most of these problems. This draft would also reflect international standards of justice and accountability.

But the Uribe administration has strongly objected to the Senate draft. Indeed, President Uribe appears poised to propose a substantially weaker bill that would perpetuate most of the problems with the laws and procedures already in place.

Paramilitary groups are tremendously complex organizations, well-financed through years of extortion, forced takings of land, and drug trafficking. They are responsible for some of the most heinous acts of violence ever committed in Colombia, including numerous massacres, extrajudicial executions and kidnappings. In 2001 the U.S. Department of State officially designated the largest paramilitary coalition, the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia, or AUC), as a foreign terrorist organization.

For more than two years, the Colombian government has been engaged in negotiations with paramilitary leaders on demobilization. Negotiations are being conducted in a specially designated area—Santa Fé de Ralito in the country’s northern department of Córdoba—where paramilitary leaders, including notorious drug lords and vicious murderers, are safe from extradition and arrest.

In the last two months of 2004, the Colombian government claimed as a success the purported demobilization of 2,624 paramilitaries. Yet those demobilizations have been conducted in a superficial manner, without the proper safeguards to ensure that the structure of these complex organizations is effectively taken apart and that those responsible for atrocities are brought to justice.

Current law completely fails to require any investigation of the overwhelming majority of paramilitaries. Unless they are already being prosecuted, paramilitaries who have committed crimes against humanity and other abuses will not be investigated. This enormous loophole in the law is likely to result in backdoor impunity for hundreds or thousands of paramilitaries responsible for atrocities.

Whichever bill the Colombian Congress ultimately passes will not apply exclusively to the current paramilitary demobilization. The law would probably also have a tremendous impact on future demobilizations of other illegal armed groups in Colombia, such as the guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, or FARC) or the National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional, or ELN).

“Donors should carefully consider the precedent this process is setting,” said Vivanco. “In future demobilizations, other armed groups will expect to get the same sweetheart deal that the paramilitaries are getting.”

http://www.hrw.org/english/docs/2005/01/18/colomb10032.htm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

COLOMBIA: New Jobs for Paramilitaries
By Constanza Vieira

BOGOTA, Apr 10 (IPS) - A new species can be found in the Magdalena Medio region in central Colombia: men who dress in black from head to toe, despite the tropical heat. Because they carry cell-phones, the local campesinos have nicknamed them "telefonos". And they can be lethal.

The telefonos - also referred to as "black eagles" - emerged from the recent process of disarmament of the extreme-right paramilitary groups in the Magdalena Medio region, an area that has long been under paramilitary control.

They form part of the network of civilian informants created by the government, or of private security firms known as "security cooperatives", which have absorbed many paramilitaries who have laid down their arms since the 2003 start of the demobilisation process that arose from controversial negotiations with the right-wing government of President Álvaro Uribe.

Human rights groups like the Colombian Ecumenical Network have warned that the disarmament process has failed to dismantle the paramilitary structures, which continue to commit serious human rights violations.

The collaboration between the paramilitaries - which are blamed by the United Nations and leading human rights watchdogs for at least 80 percent of the atrocities committed in Colombia's civil war - and the armed forces has been amply documented by the U.S. State Department and United Nations bodies.

In a September 2005 report, "The Paramilitaries in Medellín: Demobilisation or Legalisation?", Amnesty International expressed its concern over the paramilitary disarmament process, stating that "there are no guarantees to ensure that demobilised paramilitaries who might be responsible for serious human rights violations are not being ‘recycled' into the conflict by being integrated into security-related employment, including private security firms".

More:
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=32842

~~~~~~~~~~

Colombia’s Right-Wing Paramilitaries and Splinter Groups
Author: Stephanie Hanson, News Editor

January 11, 2008

~snip~
Human rights groups have long accused Colombian security forces of working in tandem with paramilitary units (Declassified U.S. government documents requested by the National Security Archive confirm this connection). But in 2006 and 2007, a series of scandals broke that implicated top public figures. The former foreign minister, at least one state governor, several legislators, and the head of the national police have all been tainted by the “parapolitics” scandal. In March 2007, the Los Angeles Times reported that the head of the army collaborated with paramilitary groups on military sweeps to eradicate left-wing militias.

As of April 2007, fifty politicians had been implicated. The widening scandal has cast doubts on President Alvaro Uribe, but some say it is the natural byproduct of the paramilitary demobilization process. “The charges underscore the remarkable independence that Colombia’s newly reformed judiciary is exercising,” says a report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Funding for the judiciary has increased markedly under President Uribe.

Multinational corporations have also been linked to the paramilitaries. In 2007, Chiquita Brands admitted in U.S. court that it paid nearly $1.7 million to paramilitary group over eight years. Other corporations including Coca-Cola and Drummond are now under investigation.

Evolution and Fragmentation
In September 2007, Colombian President Alvaro Uribe told the United Nations that in Colombia, “today there is no paramilitarism. There are guerrillas and drug traffickers.” Many observers—from the United Nations to Colombian analysts—disagree. On the contrary, they say, the paramilitaries are smaller, more clandestine, and operating with just as much impunity as before the AUC’s demobilization.

The Colombian government admits that there is a problem with “criminal organizations,” but it does not identify these groups with the paramilitaries. In a May 2007 report on Colombia’s armed groups, the International Crisis Group says that regardless of what one labels these groups, they all have ties to drug trafficking and criminal networks.

It documents three types of armed groups: paramilitaries that did not demobilize; groups in collusion with drug cartels; and criminal gangs that have arisen to fight for a share of the drug trade. Sergio Caramagna, head of the OAS mission in Colombia, told NPR, “the danger is that these groups have a big fountain of revenue that comes from narcotrafficking that allows them to develop and recruit people and continue affecting the population.”

The new groups, however, do not seem to have infiltrated regional politics to the same degree as the paramilitaries, and lack a strong command structure or ideological bent. Some analysts suggest that public opinion in Colombia has forced the paramilitaries to develop new strategies; whereas the population used to be sympathetic to their counterinsurgency cause, most no longer are. Gustavo Duncan of Colombia’s Security and Democracy Foundation, author of a book on the paramilitaries, predicts in a column in El Pais the rise of “more discrete armed structures, focused on the control of specific spaces and transactions, appealing to the logic of clandestine infiltrations into power structures, instead of an overt military and political dominion.”

With AUC demobilization far from complete, concluding that the paramilitaries have reformed would be premature. In its most recent mission report, the Organization of American States expressed concern that some mid-level paramilitary commanders remain in hiding and continue to exert influence. Further, armed units have seized control of areas formerly controlled by paramilitaries in a process known as paramilitary “recycling.” The current proliferation of groups may “presage an atomization of criminal organizations” similar to what happened after Colombia’s drug cartels were destroyed, says the International Crisis Group report. The Center for International Policy’s Colombia blog uses Google maps to display the rise of the new armed groups.

More:
http://www.cfr.org/publication/15239/colombias_rightwing_paramilitaries_and_splinter_groups.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

NEED FOR CAREFUL CONGRESSIONAL MONITORING OF PARAMILITARY DEMOBILIZATION IN COLOMBIA

~snip~
Are demobilized paramilitaries forming new illegal groups?The February 2006 report of the Organization of American States (OAS) monitoring mission in Colombia indicates that these illegal structures may be taking new forms rather than disappearing. This has led many to ask if the demobilization process will be effective at eliminating these groups, or if the process will simply allow the groups to legalize their activities. In at least five of Colombia’s thirty-two departments, the OAS has documented that demobilized paramilitaries have continued participation in armed activities. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights office in Colombia reports that there is recruitment of youth (boys and girls) in Antioquia, Arauca and Norte de Santander. In at least eight Colombian departments, the OAS has found evidence of the formation of new paramilitary groups and the strengthening of existing armed structures.

Will ex-paramilitaries escape justice?The “Justice and Peace” law, passed by the Colombian Congress in 2005, offers reduced sentencing for paramilitaries who opt to participate in the demobilization. Unfortunately, it does not require full confession of past crimes and human rights violations, and does not require individuals to turn over all illegally obtained assets. The law gives the Attorney General’s office an unfeasibly short amount of time to bring charges and to bring cases to trial. Despite modifications made in December 2005 in the codes governing the application of the law, serious flaws remain. On May 18, the Colombian Constitutional Court took the positive step of issuing a ruling that will modify several of the law’s most troubling provisions. However, implementing these newly toughened provisions – for instance, requiring full confessions of former paramilitaries, and seizing their leaders’ assets, both legal and illegal – will demand that Colombian authorities demonstrate an inordinate amount of political will. Monitoring by the U.S. Congress is needed to ensure the new provisions are implemented. What will happen to the victims?According to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Colombia’s estimated 2-3 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) rank number two after the Sudan as the world’s largest internally displaced population. CODHES estimates the actual number of IDPs at 3.6 million, reporting that from 1995 to 2003 Colombians were forced to abandon an estimated 4.8 million hectares of land. A just demobilization process would guarantee that lands obtained through use of force will be returned to their rightful owners. To date, however, there have been no significant recoveries of illegally obtained land, and the Commission set up as part of the demobilization has not officially established internally displaced persons as a population deserving specific consideration.

http://www.lawg.org/docs/wolausocdemob.pdf.

[Judi Lynn]

2. Ally of Colombia's Uribe arrested in "para" scandal

Ally of Colombia's Uribe arrested in "para" scandal
25 Jul 2008 19:25:10 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Hugh Bronstein

BOGOTA, July 25 (Reuters) - The architect of the effort to allow Colombian President Alvaro Uribe to run for a third term in 2010 was arrested on Friday on charges of using paramilitary death squads to intimidate voters.

Sen. Carlos Garcia, head of Uribe's main coalition party, was seized in a hotel in the Caribbean resort city of Santa Marta. He was the 31st politician to be jailed in a scandal over links between the paramilitaries and lawmakers.

Thirty other members of Congress, most from Uribe-friendly parties, are under investigation over links to the right-wing militias formed in the 1980s to help cattle-ranchers, cocaine smugglers and other wealthy Colombians combat leftist rebels.

Garcia is president of the Party of National Social Unity, or "Partido de la U", which is the main political force pushing to let Uribe run for a third term to carry on his popular fight against Marxist guerrillas fighting a 44-year-old insurgency.

More:
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N25424059.htm

http://s3.amazonaws.com.nyud.net:8090/elespectador/files/images/d07fd5de97de8b7da9ef6216b66a54a7.jpg

Senator Carlos Garcia, headed under the bus.