Colombia Retains Position as the Most Dangerous Country in Latin America

[Judi Lynn]

Posted: June 9, 2010 11:41 AM
Colombia Retains Position as the Most Dangerous Country in Latin America

As it has for many successive years now, Colombia continues to be the union murder capital of the world. The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), which keeps track of such statistics, issued its Annual Report yesterday, and reported that Colombia (with its small population of about 44 million people) accounted for 48 of the 100 union assassinations which took place in the world in 2009. That is, nearly one-half of all murders of unionists took place in Colombia.

As Guy Ryder, the ITUC General Secretary, opined: defending workers rights in Colombia is a "death sentence." The ITUC further reported that, of the 48 unionists killed in Colombia, "22 were senior union leaders, of whom five were women."

The country with the second worst record in terms of anti-union violence, Guatemala, fell far short of Colombia's record, with 16 union assassinations last year. Also, quite notably, as U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton argues for Honduras' readmission to the OAS, Honduras came in at number 3, with 12 union assassinations last year. Nearly all of these killings in Honduras took place after the militiary coup last summer which resulted in Honduras' expulsion from the OAS in the first place.

Notably, the nations usually vilified by the mainstream press in this country -- China, Cuba and Venezuela -- did not make the ITUC list at all, for they suffered no assassination of unionists last year.

What's more, the ITUC's report on Colombia's abysmal anti-union violence record comes just as Colombia was ranked the most violent country in Latin America, and the top 11th most violent country in the world in the 2010 Global Peace Index.

More:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dan-kovalik/colombia-retains-position_b_605970.html