Colombia Support Network: Human Rights for Colombia

Monday, June 23, 2008

THE FAILURE OF FUMIGATION

(English/Espanol)

By John I. Laun

Madison, June 23, 2008

A news item in the U.S. press this past week calls for some comment. It involves U..S policy toward Colombia. A United Nations study reported that Colombia’s coca crop grew 27% last year. This after several years and billions of dollars of U.S. aid focused upon aerial eradication of Colombia’s coca crop by spraying the Monsanto-produced herbicide Round Up Ultra, highly concentrated glyphosate. The spraying, or fumigation, is carried out at much higher altitudes than Monsanto recommends ( their labels for Round- Up sold in the U.S. have suggested aerial spraying at the height of 4 feet, whereas spraying in Colombia is done at levels 10 or more times that height). The spray kills food crops, decimating the subsistence economy of peasants, indigenous communities and Afro-Colombian communities where the indiscriminate spraying takes place. While the manufacturer warns that farm animals and humans should not enter the spraying area for several hours after spraying takes place, the U.S. embassy, which several Colombia Support Network delegations have been told determines when and where fumigation will occur, refuses to provide advance warning to land owners, or even to mayors and other municipal officials, when spraying is to be conducted in their area. Moreover, the chemical spray has even drifted across the Colombian border into Ecuador, causing crop damage and injury to animals and men, women and children exposed to the spray.

Throughout the years of Plan Colombia and Plan Patriota, from the mid-1990’s through the present, the communities suffering from spraying have demonstrated that it causes health problems and is ineffective to control coca. Now there is indisputable evidence that the fumigation does not effectively reduce the coca crop. Noam Chomsky suggested at a Colombia Support Network conference in 1997 that the real purpose of the U.S.‘s anti-drug campaign, of which fumigation in Colombia is a part, is not to eliminate the coca crop, but rather to exercise social control over the poor and under-privilegend in Colombia and in the U.S. Whatever the real purpose, it is time to demand an end to the spraying and that those who sponsor the spraying campaign be held accountable for the damage their decision has caused. A part of the education this column has suggested the aspirants to the U.S. Presidency must receive is this : the coca spraying campaign has caused grievous damage; it must be ended and those harmed by it must receive reparations.

LAS FALLAS DE LAS FUMIGACIONES
Por John I. Laun

Madison, 23 de Junio de 2008

Noticias de la semana pasada en la prensa norteamericana me invitan a hacer un comentario. Un estudio de las Naciones Unidas reporta que los cultivos de coca en Colombia crecieron en un 27% el ano pasado. Esto luego de de varios anos y billones de dolares de ayuda de los Estados Unidos enfocados en la erradicacion aerea de los cultivos de coca en Colombia, regandoles el herbicida Round-Up Ultra producido por Monsanto, el cual es variedad que contiene una alta concentracion de glifosato. La fumigacion, llevada a cabo a mucha mayor altura de la recomendada por Monsanto (los niveles de altura segun las instrucciones para el Round-Up vendido en los Estados Unidos han sugierido regarlo a una altura de 120 centimetros mientras que en Colombia se fumiga a una altura de 10 veces la altura recomendada). La fumigacion mata las siembras de pancoger destruyendo asi la economia de subsistencia de campesinos, comunidades indigenas y afrocolombianas en donde tiene lugar la fumigacion indiscriminada. Mientras que los fabricantes advirten que tanto los animales de una finca como las personas no deben entrar a la zona fumigada por varias horas luego de que la fumigacion ha tenido lugar, la embajada de los Estados Unidos, segun se lo ha declarado a varias delegaciones de Colombia Support Network, determina cuando y donde ocurrira la fumigacion, rehusa avisar con suficiente tiempo a los duenos de la tierra o a los alcaldes u otras autoridades oficiales cuando va a fumigarse en su respectiva area. Mas aun. las fumigaciones se desvian en el aire y han cruzado la frontera colombiana hacia el Ecuador, causando dano a las cosechas, enfermando a los animales y a hombres,mujeres y ninos expuestos a la fumigacion.

Luego de anos del Plan Colombia y del Plan Patriota. desde mitad de los 90 hasta hoy, las comunidades que han sufrido las fumigaciones han demostrado que estas causan problemas de salud y que son inefectivas para controlar la coca. Ahora hay una evidencia indiscutible de que la fumigacion no reduce efectivamente las cosechas de coca. Noam Chomsky, en una conferencia organizada por Colombia Support Network en 1997, sugirio que el proposito real de la campana anti-droga de los Estados Unidos y de la cual forman parte las fumigaciones en Colombia, no es para eliminar las cosechas de coca, pero si lo es para ejercer un control social sobre los pobres y desamparados tanto en Colombia como en los Estados Unidos. Cualquiera que sea el proposito, se llego la hora de demandar el fin de las fumigaciones y que aquiellos que patrocinaron las fumigaciones sean responsabilizados por el dano que sus decisiones costaron. Esto es parte de la educacion que esta columna ha sugerido deben recibir los aspirantes a la presidencia de los Estados Unidos : la campana de las fumigaciones de las plantaciones de coca ha causado muy serios perjuicios. Estas deben acabarse y se debe compensar a los perjudicados.

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csn@igc.org

Colombia Support Network
P.O. Box 1505
Madison, WI 53701-1505
phone: (608) 257-8753
fax: (608) 255-6621
e-mail: csn@igc.org
http://www.colombiasupport.net

Monday, June 16, 2008

Putting a hold on Hope

                                                                                           PUTTING A HOLD ON HOPE*
                                                                                   By John I. Laun*
Madison, June 16,08


Barack Obama promises change. His campaign focuses on him as a real agent of change. Yet those of us who concentrate our attention on Latin America must have serious doubts about his commitment to real change after his remarks in Miami before the Cuban American National Foundation a few days ago.

In his remarks, after embracing the son of Jorge Mas Canosa, strident opponent of the Castro government, he declared his support for the U.S. embargo against Cuba. Even many Cuban exiles in Florida want the embargo to end, since it has hurt the Cuban people and stifled contacts and commerce between the U.S. and Cuba, which could help reduce tensions and promote understanding between our countries.

And with respect to Colombia, Mr. Obama expressed his support for the Colombian government pursuing “terrorists” across national borders, in effect approving Alvaro Uribe’s recent cross-border raid into Ecuador. Colombia’s invasion of Ecuador to attack a FARC guerrilla camp there was contrary to international law. Alvaro Uribe knew it was, which is why he told Ecuadorian President Correa that the Colombians were in “hot pursuit” of the FARC, which Uribe knew to be false. We are disappointed that Obama, who prides himself on having been a constitutional law professor, should be promoting a violation of international law. Latin American observers have criticized the Bush administration for seeking to use Alvaro Uribe’s actions as a wedge against the South American unity which several progressive leaders of Latin American governments have been pursuing. Mr. Obama’s apparently unquestioning support for President Uribe’s actions suggests his uncritical adoption of the Bush administration’s shortsighted policies toward Latin America.

Mr Obama expresses his support for the Colombian government of Alvaro Uribe. How is it that a President under whose watch millions of people have been internally displaced ( at present the number of displaced is more than 4 million, more that 9% of Colombia’s population) can be considered an effective President? To put it in terms a U.S. leader might recognize, if during 6 years of a U.S. President ‘s term in office there came to be 25 million U.S. citizens who had been forced out of their homes, would we consider that President to be a success? How can Mr. Obama support a President in Colombia who bought the votes for his own re-election by bribing members of Colombia’s Congress with public funds to vote in his favor? And what about the close ties of Alvaro Uribe and his political supporters, including his cousin Mario Uribe, to illegal paramilitaries and to corrupt military officers such as retired general Rito Alejo del Rio, who collaborated with paramilitaries in campaigns to “cleanse” (as Del Rio himself put it to a Colombia Support Network delegation several years ago) the region of union leaders, Patriotic Union elected officials, and others who worked for better conditions for peasants, indigenous communities and Afro-Colombians in the countryside?

Former Vice President Al Gore was right to refuse to share a stage in Florida with President Uribe. If Mr. Obama wishes to avoid carrying out a third term of George W. Bush’s presidency with respect to Latin America, he needs to pay attention to the condition and the wishes of the great majority of the people there. He needs to respect the effort of coordination among Latin American administrations who are focusing on the poor and underprivileged, because those countries-- not the militaristic Uribe regime-- are laying the ground work for real stability.

Those of us who refuse to concede that Obama’s presidency would be like a third term for George W. Bush as to Latin America have a lot of educating to do. We hope that Mr. Obama will seek the guidance of Members of Congress of his own party who have been to Colombia and who understand the issues there, such as Jan Schakowski of Illinois, Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin and Jim McGovern of Massachussetts.

Mr. Obama needs to understand the reality of the situation in Colombia and follow a course that will support real democracy and human rights there, not the sham “democratic security” and human rights abuses of the Uribe Administration and its military and paramilitary allies.

*President of the Colombia Support Network

Colombia Support Network
P.O. Box 1505
Madison, WI 53701-1505
phone: (608) 257-8753
fax: (608) 255-6621
e-mail: csn@igc.org
http://www.colombiasupport.net

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

A PLEA FOR ACCOUNTABILITY

By John I. Laun                    Madison, June 10, 2008


    The necessary predicate of justice is accountability.In Colombia today an important question is whether Army officers who ordered torture and murder of civilian workers in the Palace of Justice 24 years ago will finally be held accountable for their unlawful and abusive conduct. The Colombia Support Network ( CSN) was privileged to assist an attorney for the families of the victims of the Palace of Justice in obtaining a visa and transportation to the United States to attend a deposition of one or more of the soldiers who apparently participated in the Palace of Justice torture and killings. The upshot, we hope, will be to hold those who planned and carried out this henious attack on innocent bystanders accountable for their acions.

    The first step in such accountability is admission of the role they played. Then identification of those who gave the orders. And finally evidence of how these events were covered up for more than two decades and establishing who was responsible for the cover-up.

    Tremendous credit goes to relatives of those murdered in the Palace of Justice events - Rene Guarin, Alejandra Rodriguez, Cecilia Cabrera and a few others - who courageously kept seeking an explanation for the disappearance and murder of their loved ones. Rene’s example in doggedly pursuing the truth at peril to his own life is an inspiration for us all. We hope the truth will now emerge, with punishment for those responsible for the criminal acts perpetrated against the Palace of Justice workers and reparations by the state for the families.



Colombia Support Network
P.O. Box 1505
Madison, WI 53701-1505
phone: (608) 257-8753
fax: (608) 255-6621
e-mail: csn@igc.org
http://www.colombiasupport.net

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