The AFL-CIO and Colombia

[Judi Lynn]

January 05, 2012
The Wikileaks Revelations
The AFL-CIO and Colombia
by ALBERTO C. RUIZ

Ernesto Guevara “feels that in social and political matters the role of Latin America has been one of neglect. As an example of this, he remarked on one occasion, ‘Five thousand workers are shot down in the Bolivian highlands, and maybe there is one line in the New York papers, which mentions that there is labor unrest in Bolivia.’ He wonders if the United States so-called international labor unions would take an interest in the South American worker and if it might help to raise the living standards of the Latin Americans to a level which might come closer to that of the North Americans.”

–CIA biographical report on Che, 1958

~snip~
Many of us have wondered the very same thing about “the so-called international labor unions” in the U.S. and whether they would take a real, sincere interest in the workers of Latin America. For some time, it has appeared that, for whatever its faults in other countries such as Venezuela, the AFL-CIO has taken a bona fide interest in the workers of Colombia. Specifically, it has seemed that the AFL-CIO has taken a good line in opposing the unprecedented anti-union violence in that country – “the most dangerous country in the world to be a trade unionist” as the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) has opined each year for the past many years. The diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks, however, show a more equivocal role.

First, some background on Colombia. Since 1986, around 2900 unionists have been killed in that country. According to the ITUC, which itself relies upon the well-respected National Labor School of Colombia (ENS), 51 unionists (out of 90 worldwide) were killed in 2010. In 2011, there were at least 28 labor leaders assassinated, while hundreds more (including 600 teachers) were threatened with physical harm, including death. The Colombian government, in an attempt to paint itself in the best light and to win Congressional passage of the Colombia Free Trade Agreement (which it successfully did this past October) has tried to take issue with these figures. It has done so by claiming that some of the unionists in these figures were killed, not because they were trade unionists, but rather, for other reasons – e.g., as the result of common crime or crimes of passion.

And so, for example, the Colombian government took the position that in 2010, only 37 of the unionists killed in Colombia (out of the 51 total) were killed because they were unionists, and that this should be the figure used when tallying up the victims. However, even if we took this as the correct number of unionists qua unionists killed in Colombia in 2010, this would still mean that Colombia accounted for over 40% of the entire world’s trade union killings – hardly anything for the Colombian government to brag about. Still, the fight over these numbers is highly contentious, and for serious reasons of policy.

More:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/01/05/the-afl-cio-and-the-colombia/