Uribe probe loses 5th member

[gbscar]

Uribe probe loses 5th member
Wednesday, 17 August 2011 20:28
Adriaan Alsema

The congressional commission in charge of investigating former President Alvaro Uribe will continue with two members after its chairman resigned Wednesday and no other lawmaker was found willing to replace the representative.

The resignation of Representative Heriberto Escobar comes one day before the commission is to continue hearing Uribe about his alleged role in the illegal wiretapping of government critics, journalists and Supreme Court judges by intelligence agency DAS.

Uribe is accused by victims of the wiretapping of being the mastermind behind the scandal that already sent his former chief of staff to jail while facing criminal charges. The former president said Wednesday he and members of his government under criminal investigation are victim of a "criminal revenge" against his administration.

The commission investigating the charges against the former president was formed in October with three members of the House of Representatives' 15-member Investigation and Accusation Committee, but has been plagued by resignations since then.

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http://www.colombiareports.com/colombia-news/news/18404-uribe-investigation-commission-loses-5th-member.html

[Peace Patriot]

1. At least two of these resigned members admitted they resigned because of death threats.

It's likely that all four resigned for that reason. And that is not a surprise, really, with Mob boss Uribe under investigation. It just reinforces all the other evidence--and there is lots of it--that Uribe was running Colombia like a criminal organization and that that criminal organization still has its lethal tentacles in Colombia's rightwing political establishment.

Some 70 of Uribe's closest political cronies are under investigation or already in jail for ties to the death squads, drug trafficking, bribery, election fraud, land theft, ponzi schemes and other crimes. I think what Uribe was doing with his illegal spying on judges and prosecutors (among others) was running interference for the big drug operations as well as protecting himself and his top officials (Mob lieutenants)--that is, finding out who and what Colombia's prosecutors were investigating and what they knew, and anticipating their legal moves. Thus, he was able to pull off sudden midnight extraditions of 30 death squad witnesses to the U.S., on mere drug charges, with the help of the U.S. ambassador, the U.S. Department of Justice, the U.S. federal court in Washington DC and the U.S. federal prison system (and who knows who else? --the CIA, the DEA, the FBI?). These prisoners were buried in the U.S. federal prison system, by complete sealing of their cases--out of the reach of Colombian prosecutors and over their vociferous objections.

Why the U.S. government would do this is a good question--and the likely answer is that either these witnesses know something about Bush Junta crimes in Colombia, or Uribe does, and it was a favor to him, to keep his lip zipped. (Around the same time, he and the U.S. ambassador secretly negotiated and secretly signed a U.S./Colombia military agreement giving "total diplomatic immunity" to all U.S. military personnel and all U.S. military 'contractors' in Colombia.)

It is probable that the U.S. also helped him get his spy chief, Maria Hurtado, out of Colombia and given instant asylum in Panama--out of the reach of Colombian prosecutors, and again, over their vociferous objections. This very controversial asylum has caused no end of political troubles to Panama's rightwing president, and it likely took some serious clout to get him to do it. (I really don't think it could have been done without a U.S. okay.*) Colombian prosecutors recently arrested Uribe's second in command of the spying operation, but he probably doesn't know much since he's still in Colombia.

Uribe has meanwhile been given cushy academic sinecures, teaching law to our future leaders at Georgetown and Harvard. That must be a pretty interesting curriculum: Very Special Cases of Immunity from Prosecution 1-A. (But weren't they teaching that at Harvard already?)

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*(There is a fascinating Wikileak cable about Panama's president asking the U.S. ambassador for U.S. help in spying on his "enemies." Where did he get the idea that the U.S. might do this except from his RW pal in neighboring Colombia? The U.S. ambassador is all shocked and everything, in her cable. So this could be the Dark Secret that is being covered up. Bear it mind that it is very likely that Uribe was using his spying apparatus to feed "hit lists" to the death squads, for death threats and assassination. Thus, if the Bush Junta was providing "training" and "technical assistance" (as the U.S. military mission in Colombia is described), for Uribe's illegal domestic spying operation, whoever authorized it could be liable for murder. Many trade unionists were murdered during this time, and they were among those being spied upon. There are other possibilities for Bush Junta crimes in Colombia, but this one is like a can opener to the rest of it--which is another reason to keep Uribe and his spy chief out from under prosecutorial pressure.)