Colombia: multinationals involved with drug runners, paramilitaries

Hello again

From articles in the LA Times and the International Herald Tribune last week it transpires that several multinational companies have been cooperating with Colombian drug runners and paramilitary leaders.

Read more at

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/07/23/america/NA-GEN-US-Colombia-Coal-Killings.php
and

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-chiquita22jul22,0,4175184,full.story?coll=la-home-center

Brave New World -- the two-facedness of the US government just keeps getting uglier and uglier (not that European governments, or the Swiss government are that much better). Our system of international trade is in dire need of a sea change!

"Colombia: the dead bear witness" (Le monde diplomatique)

Hiya again

Today I want to draw your attention to a background article on the scandalously high likelihood that the Colombian government has long been intimately connected with right-wing death squads.

See Le Monde diplomatique (English), June 2007, pp. 6-7. Available to subscribers at http://www.mondediplo.com

Here's the lead of Launce Mazure's article, "Colombia: the dead bear witness":

"Colombia has been shaken by a series of revelations that have linked leading politicians and businessmen to death squads run by the rightwing United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia. The opposition has now accused President Alvaro Uribe of contacts with the paramilitaries."

Personally, I have very good reason to believe that the current president of Colombia is corrupt, fascist, power hungry, despotic and dangerous because he's also very intelligent and has managed not only to change the constitution to gain another four-year term of office but also to evade probing into election frauds by manipulating local community leaders into voting for him well before any election monitors arrived in the country. What I have heard of his years as governor of Antioquia makes me think of him as a cold-blooded criminal. He may not have blood on his hands personally, but I am certain that he pulled the strings behind many assassinations and atrocities. I am hoping that someone will soon arraign him and drag him into an international court. The sad thing is that the EU has fallen prey to his sweet talking and does not see beyond the wealthy areas of Bogotá.

Plenty more information on Colombia (parapolitics, drugs, human rights) is available, for example, at
http://www.askonline.ch (in German only, but with lots of links to Spanish and English-language sites)
http://www.peacebrigades.org
http://www.humanrightswatch.org/doc/?t=americas
http://www.tni.org -> issues -> Colombia

Channel 4: "War and money in Colombia"

PS added on June 6, 2007: Sadly, the link very soon led nowhere. Thanks, anonymous, for pointing this out to me -- I'd overlooked to pull the link. Am leaving the post standing, though..

Hiya again

Today I want to share with you a link and a short report from Channel 4, International Politics. Some of you may already have seen the programme, but those of you who have not may find it of interest.

Those of you who know me know that my interest in Colombia is passionate, personal but, I hope, objective. I find the article disturbing but, to my knowledge, the facts presented are accurate. The issue is a thorny one: how do you operate in a country that is so riven by conflict and whose government has completely failed the vast majority of its population? There are no easy solutions, but I know that paying protection money to criminals cannot be the way.

Below I'm quoting from the Channel 4 website between the **** (http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/politics/international_politics/war%20and%20money%20in%20columbia/514547#fold)

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Last Modified: 16 May 2007
By: Channel 4 News

The global brands who stand accused of turning a blind eye - or even worse - when it comes to paramilitary murder.

Tens of thousands of people have died in Colombia's four-decade long civil war between left-wing guerrillas, the armed forces, and right-wing paramilitary groups.

In the last 15 years alone, paramilitaries have killed more than 10,000 people, according to the country's attorney general. Many of those were trade unionists and local activists.

And the unions and their supporters say that many of those died because they stood in the way of multinational companies, who are accused of profiting from the actions of the killers - and even of directly funding the paramilitaries.

Guillermo Galdós brings [his] special report from the Urabá region of Colombia.

BP and Chiquita Statements

We asked BP for an interview. They declined, but said in a statement:

"BP absolutely denies any suggestion of association with violence or the criminal activities of illegal armed groups in Casanare or Colombia. BP has never funded nor collaborated with paramilitary organisations in Colombia or elsewhere. Any suggestion to the contrary is completely untruthful.

"We have worked closely with regional and national authorities and civil society to promote the rule of law, human rights and peaceful conflict resolution. Private contractors and government security forces protecting our facilities ... are monitored regularly".

Chiquita, in its 2006 annual report, said that:

"In order to protect the lives and safety of its employees, its banana-producing subsidiary in Colombia had been forced to make protection payments to local right- and left-wing paramilitary groups ...

"Since disclosing this information four years ago, Chiquita has cooperated with the DOJ investigation, sold its Colombian operations and enhanced its compliance programs and procedures".
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