Reply #10: Court tell-alls tie the elite to Colombia's paramilitary killings [View All]

[Judi Lynn]

May 19, 2007, 11:27PM
Court tell-alls tie the elite to Colombia's paramilitary killings

By JOHN OTIS
South America Bureau

~snip~
Mancuso accused small-town mayors, big-time congress members and Uribe's vice president and defense minister of collaborating with the gunmen.

He described active-duty police officers piloting paramilitary helicopters packed with cocaine. He said businesses ranging from Colombia's state-run oil company to U.S. banana exporters regularly paid the paramilitaries for protection from the guerrillas.

What's more, Mancuso laid much of the blame for the outlawed militias' expansion at the Colombian government's feet.

His accusations will be investigated by Colombian authorities, but political analysts say many seem accurate.

In March, Chiquita Brands International pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to paying $1.7 million to the paramilitaries. Thirteen Colombian congressmen — 12 of whom are political allies of Uribe — have been jailed on charges of collaborating with the militias, and dozens of current and former government officials are under investigation.

"The government always said that we were making these things up," said Omaira Gomez of the Colombian Commission of Jurists, a human rights group that has long accused government officials of links with the paramilitaries. "What Mancuso did was to confirm what we've been saying for the past 10 years."
(snip)

Last week, five Congress members were arrested for attending a 2001 meeting with paramilitary leaders where they signed a document pledging to "refound" the nation. Some of the legislators later insisted they were forced at gunpoint to attend, a claim that provoked a belly laugh from Duque.

"There was total collaboration," Duque said. "Some politicians were complaining because they weren't invited to the meeting."
(snip)

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4819513.html