I read this. He apologizes and says
"We committed some really painful acts in our past." No kidding!! And this POS now wants to enter politics!! Bad enough that US lap dog Uribe's government insists that there were no criminals, the paras that disarmed in November get a stipend of $6,300 a year!! Human Rights Watch called it a
showcase for impunity.
ciponline.org has a report that describes Nutibara Bloc, the AUC unit that politician wannabe Giovanni Marin commanded as "Commandante R".
<clips>
The New Face of “Peace” in Colombia, by Adam Isacson, January 2, 2004
...The AUC, formed to defend landowners against Colombia’s FARC and ELN guerrillas, is known worldwide for its brutality. While the guerrillas have committed untold outrages – thousands of kidnappings and attacks on civilian populations – the AUC counter-attacked with mass killings and displacement of defenseless populations, selective assassinations of civilian leaders, and “social cleansing” campaigns to exterminate prostitutes, drug addicts, street children and petty thieves. Its bloodthirsty record earned the AUC a place on the United States’ list of international terrorist groups. Its rise and expansion owed much to support from Colombia’s U.S.-backed military, a pattern of aiding and abetting that has yet to be stamped out.
Taking the nom de guerre of “Adolfo Paz,” don Berna rose quickly, assuming the title of “inspector general,” then in 2001 forming the Nutibara Bloc, a Medellín-based unit of the AUC. His influence eased the paramilitaries’ almost seamless merger with the drug trade, a merger so profitable that proceeds from drug shipments to the United States and elsewhere allowed the militias to triple in size from 1998 to 2002. In mid-2003, a Colombian government document recognized that “it is impossible to distinguish between the self-defense groups and narcotrafficking organizations.” <2>
In this narco-paramilitary nexus, don Berna is now by some accounts the most powerful paramilitary figure, more feared than the AUC’s titular leaders, Carlos Castaño and Salvatore Mancuso (both of whom face U.S. Justice Department extradition requests for sending drugs to our shores). “Don Berna is the man … who says who can work and who can’t, the man who decides who dies and who lives,” a major Medellín narcotrafficker told a U.S. reporter in 2002. <3>
But now don Berna and the paramilitaries are talking peace. Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, an archconservative elected on a pledge of an all-out anti-guerrilla fight, offered to negotiate the AUC’s demobilization if the group first declared a cease-fire. The paramilitaries, many of whom openly supported Uribe’s campaign, complied in late 2002, even though their guerrilla enemies remain strong. Talks began in earnest in June 2003.
http://ciponline.org/colombia/040105isac.htm
November article from the Economist
<clips>
Forgiving and forgetting
A dubious disarmament plan
...But there are many obstacles. The biggest is what to do with AUC members who have committed heinous crimes. Mr Uribe proposes that killers and drug traffickers—the AUC is thought to derive 40% of its income from drugs—should be allowed to pay unspecified reparations to their victims, instead of going to jail. The government insists that there were no criminals among those who disarmed this week. They were sent to live under supervision in a Medellín suburb for a mere three weeks. They will get a government stipend of $6,300 a year.
Critics of this approach, such as Jorge Alberto Uribe (no relation), the new defence minister, argue that pardons before political negotiations have begun are inadvisable. It is feared that common criminals may have bribed their way into the AUC, to benefit from the mooted amnesty. Human Rights Watch, a lobby group, says the AUC's leaders should be arrested. The United States wants to extradite several.
Luis Guillermo Pardo, once Medellín's own peace commissioner, worries about security in the areas that the paramilitaries used to control. The mayor of Medellín dispatched 600 policemen to fill the void, but that might not be enough to maintain order. Mr Pardo also warily recalls what happened in 1994, when 650 other renegades were demobilised. Then, the militias were allowed to keep their arms and form private security forces, which resulted in at least 100 deaths.
Entering politics is now the ambition of Comandante R: he wants to go back to law school, and perhaps run for Congress. But, as it stands, the president's proposed amnesty law, which Congress might not get round to considering until next year, would prevent him from seeking political office. Pardoning killers, then limiting their chances to resolve their grievances peacefully, might be unwise.
http://www.economist.com/world/la/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2256242
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
