Paramilitaries as Proxies
Declassified evidence on the Colombian army's anti-guerrilla "allies"
by Michael Evans, director, Colombia documentation project
The question of the Colombian military's complicity with paramilitary atrocities will probably not be addressed by the National Commission on Reparation and Reconciliation, which convened last week to sort through the legal and compensatory issues involved in the deactivation of the country's right-wing militias. The law governing the demobilization process provides sweeping amnesty for most paramilitary members and requires little more than good faith and modest reparations payments from those guilty of more serious "crimes against humanity." The Justice and Peace Unit of the Attorney General's office-which operates alongside the commission-has only 60 days to prepare cases, and even those found guilty of serious charges can expect to serve relatively light sentences. The measure also does not compel paramilitary commanders to provide information about the operations and financing of their organizations-what President Álvaro Uribe calls "a balance between justice and peace."
Fortunately, recently declassified U.S. documents, including the first-hand accounts of senior Colombian army officers, are beginning to lift the veil of secrecy. Obtained under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act by the National Security Archive, these records provide important new details about military involvement in paramilitary attacks and offer a unique and intimate perspective on the institutional pressures that encouraged a wide range of cooperation with paramilitary forces-from the tacit acquiescence of senior commanders to the direct participation of field officers and their troops.
One case sure to be examined by the commission concerns the infamous series of paramilitary massacres in and around the towns of La Gabarra and Tibú in the summer of 1999. Paramilitaries from the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) moved into the lucrative coca growing region in May 1999 to "cleanse" guerrilla influence from the area, killing some 150 people in more than a dozen attacks over that next three months. In most cases, local military forces simply did not react to the paramilitary incursions.
In the midst of this brutal offensive, the Colombian vice president's office "privately reported" to the U.S. embassy that Colombian army soldiers "had donned AUC armbands and participated directly" in one of the massacres. "The string of mass killings since May without security force response is appalling," U.S. Ambassador Curtis Kamman reported in a cable to Washington. "How did seven massacres occur without interference under the noses of several hundred security force members?"
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http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB166/index.htm
Carlos CastañoGiving Colombia's Paramilitaries What They Want
By JOANNE MARINER
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Wednesday, Feb. 16, 2005
When Alvaro Uribe campaigned for Colombia's presidency in 2002, he advocated a strong military response to the country's illegal armed groups. Many Colombians, frustrated by the outgoing Pastrana administration's largely fruitless talks with guerrilla negotiators, were persuaded by Uribe's more hard-line approach.
Yet Uribe's record, in the nearly three years since his election, has been characterized by a worrying indulgence toward violent groups. While the Uribe administration has indeed stepped up military action against Colombia's main guerrilla army, its most striking initiative has taken place at the negotiating table, not on the battlefield. There, rather than toughness, the government has shown an appalling willingness to accede to the other side's demands.
Since late 2002, senior government officials have been meeting with leaders of violent paramilitary groups to discuss the demobilization of paramilitary troops. These paramilitary leaders--who include some of Colombia's most notorious drug kingpins and most vicious murderers--are seeking to escape responsibility for their crimes. Their goals are to avoid extradition to the United States, minimize potential prison terms in Colombia, and retain as much of their illegally obtained wealth as possible.
To date, there is little reason to believe that they won't get what they want.
Massacres, Killings, Kidnappings and Negotiations
Colombia is a human rights disaster, in large part due to violent abuses committed by paramilitary groups. Some paramilitary leaders have more than a dozen outstanding arrest warrants against them in Colombia for massacres, killings, kidnappings and other crimes.
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http://writ.news.findlaw.com/mariner/20050216.html