Colombia Paramilitary Victims Fight Banana Giant in US Court
Colombia Paramilitary Victims Fight Banana Giant in US Court
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Paramilitary agents of the AUC stand armed in Colombia. | Photo: AFP
Published 3 June 2016 [/font]
Chiquita poured US$1.7 million between 1997 and 2004 into the outlawed far-right paramilitary group AUC, which operated as a death squad in Colombia.
Families of victims murdered by Colombian paramilitaries are one step closer to achieving justice for their loved ones as a United States judge gave the green light for a federal lawsuit against former executives of the U.S. fruit company Chiquita, the organization Earth Rights International announced on Thursday.
The ruling in favor of moving forward with the case comes as a victory in the fight for corporate accountability for human rights abuses, giving rights defenders and the families of victims a chance to see justice served against the backers of death squad violence in Colombia.
“Corporations do not act without individuals,” ERI General Counsel Marco Simons said in a statement Thursday. “The court’s decision ensures that these individuals, whose alleged conduct helped enable a reign of terror, cannot hide from their wrongdoing.”
The lawsuit, launched in 2007 on behalf of the families of victims, seeks charges against Chiquita for supporting the now-defunct far-right paramilitary group United Self Defence Forces of Colombia, better known as AUC. Despite the banana giant’s arguments that the case should be thrown out of U.S. courts on arguments that it doesn’t belong in the U.S. justice system and should be dismissed, the court has ruled in plaintiffs’ favor.
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http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Colombia-Paramilitary-Victims-Fight-Banana-Giant-in-US-Court-20160603-0009.html