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News :: Miscellaneous |
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Death Squads - Integral Part of "Plan Colombia"? |
Current rating: 0 |
by Commandante Lucas
(No verified email address) |
29 Mar 2001
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Washington claims it is helping the Colombian military learn to respect human rights. Now that it looks like Colombian right-wing death squads are an acknowledged, integral part of the politico/military campaign to "eradicate" drugs, will so-called training be provided to these notoriuosly ruthless forces to make them appear civilized to the American public? The last time something like this was tried, it was the "civilization" of the Contras, a CIA project that was a remarkable failure if it wasmeasured by respect for human rights. And then there was the torture manual that was what they were really trained with... |
Outlaw role seen in Colombia effort
By Karl Penhaul, Globe Correspondent, 3/28/2001
UAMUEZ VALLEY, Colombia - While Colombia insists it is cracking down on outlawed
paramilitary groups, commanders of the right-wing units boast that they are actually
spearheading the government\'s US-funded offensive to wipe out the booming cocaine industry in
guerrilla-held jungles in the south.
President Andres Pastrana and the military\'s top brass have repeatedly vowed to crackdown on the
burgeoning paramilitary forces and on officers and soldiers found collaborating with them. But there
is credible evidence to back the paramilitary commanders\' assertions that they are actually
functioning as the vanguard of \'\'Plan Colombia\'\' - the campaign to eradicate illicit drug crops that
Washington is financing with $1.3 billion in mostly military aid.
In months of covert operations in large swaths of Putumayo province in remote southern Colombia,
both sides say, the right-wing forces have driven out leftist guerrilla units and killed suspected leftist
sympathizers. That cleared the way for the army\'s US-trained antinarcotics battalions to move in
without fear of ambush and with less risk of having their helicopters and defoliant-spraying aircraft
shot down.
The army\'s 24th Brigade and Anti-Narcotics Brigade \'\'know where we are, and they draw up
sketches and decide to spray where they know we have consolidated those zones. They have
depended entirely on us,\'\' said a paramilitary chieftain known by the nom de guerre \'\'Commando
Wilson.\'\' A former member of an army antiguerrilla unit, he now runs paramilitary operations in
Putumayo.
\'\'Plan Colombia would be almost impossible without the help of the [paramilitary] self-defense
forces. If we did not take control of zones ahead of the army, then the guerrillas would shoot down
their planes,\'\' he added, speaking on condition that the village that houses the paramilitary regional
headquarters not be identified.
He said overall strategy was planned between his \'\'superiors\'\' and the military, and he swaps the
coordinates of his fighters\' positions with the army daily.
There are army detachments 20 minutes away on either side of the paramilitary command post. The
dirt road through the valley is pockmarked with foxholes manned by paramilitary sentries. Trucks
packed with up to 40 camouflage-clad fighters, bristling with machine guns and rocket launchers,
rumble along the road regularly as they head out on search-and-destroy missions.
Since mid-December, US-donated cropduster planes and Vietnam-era Huey helicopters have been
buzzing over the Guamuez Valley, dumping a powerful herbicide on illegal plantations of coca leaf -
the raw material for cocaine.
Putumayo province, until now a stronghold of the Marxist Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia guerrillas, accounts for almost 300 tons of Colombia\'s production of some 520 tons of
cocaine per year. Revenue from taxing the illicit trade has become a central pillar of the rebel war
economy.
In just 21/2 months, however, the spray planes eradicated almost 75,000 acres of coca leaf - the
goal set for the first two years. But senior US military authorities concede that the bulk of that -
about 62,000 acres - was carried out around a cluster of four towns controlled by paramilitary
forces: La Hormiga, El Placer, La Dorada, and San Miguel.
\'\'Between Dec. 25 and Jan. 15, aerial eradication operations were focused primarily in that area of
the Valle de Guamuez considered to be under paramilitary influence,\'\' said a US military officer,
speaking on condition of anonymity. He rejected suggestions that the army and paramilitary are
colluding but said, \'\'It was anticipated spray operations directed against paramilitary coca fields
would experience fewer hostile fire incidents.\'\'
Many paramilitary fighters say they are former soldiers, and some wear the insignia of their former
army battalions.
On a recent day, one gunman, dressed in plain clothes and standing guard in a village, picked
through a pack of US Army C-rations, hunting for chewing gum and pound cake. He shrugged off
questions about where he got the supplies, issued to the three Colombian Army antidrug units that
have been trained by US Special Forces advisers.
In its annual human rights report, the Defense Ministry said its forces had killed 89 paramilitary
fighters and arrested 315 others last year, compared with 970 guerrillas killed and 1,556 captured.
But the report does not convince German Martinez, the former human rights ombudsman for the
town of Puerto Asis, who quit this month after repeated death threats.
\'\'The paramilitary phenomenon in Putumayo is the spearhead of Plan Colombia to create territorial
control for the areas to be sprayed and to control the civilian population,\'\' he said.
In recent reports, the US State Department and United Nations have also outlined evidence of
complicity between security forces and paramilitary troops.
Last September, complaints of military collaboration with paramilitary forces by the UN\'s High
Commission for Human Rights in Colombia prompted the attorney general\'s office to launch an
investigation. In confidential documents, investigators recommended prosecuting at least five army
and police commanders, including former 24th Brigade commander Colonel Gabriel Diaz. But the
inquiry is bogged down at the preliminary stage, and Diaz is in line for promotion to general.
As a result of alleged rights violations, the 24th Brigade is currently banned from receiving US
assistance. In an effort to spruce up its image, incoming commander General Jose Antonio Ladron
de Guevara sent the brigade\'s entire 31st Counterguerrilla Battalion to Bogota for \'\'retraining.\'\'
He estimated that 30 former members of the unit had quit to join the paramilitary forces. Wilson put
the figure closer to 100 and said his men would continue to back Plan Colombia. \'\'We\'re ready to
risk everything,\'\' he said.
This story ran on page 8 of the Boston Globe on 3/28/2001. |
