UN experts urge Colombia to try to stop killings

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Reuters

UN experts urge Colombia to try to stop killings
Wed Apr 30, 2008 1:28pm EDT

GENEVA, April 30 (Reuters) - Three U.N. investigators called on the Colombian government on Wednesday to take immediate measures to protect rights defenders against killings, harassment and intimidation.

They said that since the start of this year 21 trade union officials and civil society leaders had been murdered while dozens others have reportedly received death threats, including lawyers representing victims.

"We ... call upon the (Colombian) government to provide more effective and consistent protection measures for defenders at risk as a matter of urgency," declared the investigators in a statement issued through the U.N.'s Geneva office.
(snip)

U.S. trade unionists have been urging Democrats in Congress to block the U.S.-Colombia free trade agreement because of concerns about human rights in the Latin American country.
(snip)

They said recent threats and killings had largely been directed against people who organised or took part in a March 6 rally in Bogota that was intended to honour victims of paramilitary groups as well as of police and the armed forces.



Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSL30761396

[Judi Lynn]

1. Colombia: UN experts call for ending violence against human rights defenders

Colombia: UN experts call for ending violence against human rights defenders

30 April 2008 – A group of independent United Nations experts have called for urgent measures to protect those defending human rights in Colombia, following a recent surge in violence that includes killings, harassment and intimidation of civil society activists, trade union leaders and lawyers representing victims.

“We are deeply concerned by recent developments in Colombia indicating the deteriorating situation of human rights defenders in recent months,” the experts said in a statement issued today in Geneva.

The group reports that so far this year there have been 21 killings of trade unionists and civil society leaders and dozens of reports of death threats against activists and defenders allegedly perpetrated by new illegal armed groups.

The recent escalation in violence against human rights defenders “confirms the need for a vigorous and immediate reaction from the Government for the protection of defenders in Colombia,” they added.

While recognizing the measures taken by the Government to improve the security of human rights defenders, the group called for “more effective and consistent protection measures for defenders at risk as a matter of urgency.”

These include effective protection of defenders at risk, more efficient investigations and conclusive prosecutions of perpetrators, and more open and firm cross-party political support and recognition to defenders and their work.

“Concrete and concerted action is needed to stop the endemic impunity for the crimes and violations committed against human rights defenders,” said the experts, all of whom report to the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council.

http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=26515&Cr=colombia&Cr1=

[Peace Patriot]

2. And all the countries that DON'T murder union leaders, protesters, human rights workers,

peasant farmers, journalists and others, and who uphold the rule of law, and respect civil and human rights, are reviled by the Bush Junta, and its corporate news monopoly lapdogs (including Reuters). Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and Argentina are in particular reviled, slandered and subjected to psyops campaigns and worse, because they are in fact the MOST lawful, and the MOST respectful of human life and human rights, on the entire South American continent, and, indeed, throughout the western hemisphere and the world.

What an "Alice in Wonderland" corporate media, Bushite skewed, upside down world we live in!

I suppose we should be glad that Reuters reports even a small percentage of the truth about Colombia. I can't help but feel it's just part of a mafia-like dumping of Uribe, by the global corporate predators who run the Bush Junta, because he hasn't delivered on certain jobs they gave them (starting a war with Ecuador and Venezuela, for instance). We have reason to be skeptical.

[Judi Lynn]

3. Please check the charges, 3rd paragraph, by the BBC against the death squads. Alarming.

Anti-Uribe Protest
May, 01 2008 By James Brittain



Massive demonstration on March 6 in Bogotá, Colombia—photo from colombia.indymedia.org

~snip~

While a consistent disdain toward the Colombian state continues to resonate throughout various Latin American countries, so, too, has opposition within Colombia. On Thursday, March 6, Colombians from all walks of life not only protested the illegal incursion of their country's forces on Ecuador's territory, but denounced human rights abuses against sectors of the Colombian populace by the Uribe and Santos administration and their links to the Colombian paramilitary.

Promoted by the National Movement of Victims of State-Sponsored Crimes (Movimiento Nacional de Víctimas de Crímenes de Estado or MOVICE) and various social justice-based organizations, March 6 was a day of remembrance, homage, and protest. For months, human rights groups, sectors of organized labor, and politically conscious civilians worked together to create a domestic and international response to the atrocities. Journalist Luis Alberto Matta pointed out that 270 cities, medium sized towns, and large villages within Colombia had connected with each other. Outside Colombia, an estimated 140 cities in 23 countries across Asia, Australia, Europe, and North and Latin America coordinated events outside Colombian embassies in conjunction with protest.

After months of preparation and days of travel, Colombians peacefully demonstrated their opposition. Radio reporter Manuel Rueda described how hundreds of thousands of people came to condemn the state. The BBC documented that over 40,000 Colombians surrounded the Casa de Nariño and the Plaza de Bolívar in Bogotá to indirectly confront paramilitaries who had forced communities and individuals to vote for the Uribe administration or face torture and death; who publicly raped and molested children, women, and men and executed and/or mutilated civilians with chainsaws; forced live castrations; cut off the limbs of non-combatants; murdered the mentally and physically challenged; suffocated children in front of their parents; committed acts of cannibalism; and decapitated suspected guerrillas and subsequently used their skulls during soccer games with the Colombian army.

In the past year just under 80 governors, mayors, and Congressional politicians have been alleged or found guilty of having direct connections, meetings, and/or contracts with the paramilitary group United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Auto- defensas Unidas de Colombia or AUC). The AUC has targeted, threatened, and disappeared trade unionists and various community organizers. Included in the list of those linked to the AUC are Vice President Francisco Santos Calderón, his cousin Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos, President Uribe's brother Santiago, and their cousin, former Senator Mario Uribe.

More:
http://www.zcommunications.org/zmag/viewArticle/17484

[Judi Lynn]

4. The Labor Movement's Principled Position on Colombia FTA

The Labor Movement's Principled Position on Colombia FTA
Posted April 30, 2008 | 09:10 PM (EST)

Lately, in numerous news sources, including the New York Times, Miami Herald, and New York Post, the U.S. labor movement has been accused of "lying" about the violence confronting unionists in Colombia.

Really, while the articles in these papers claim the union movement is telling untruths, the heart of their argument is that labor is overstating the problem. Thus, their argument goes, "only" 39 unionists were killed last year in Colombia, a much better figure than previous years.

The commentators in these articles claim that the union movement, to make its case about how bad the labor situation in Colombia is, relies upon "outdated" statistics, such as numbers from prior years which, when totaled, show that over 2,300 unionists have been killed since 1991.
As an initial matter, the U.S. labor movement believes, not incredibly, that 39 unionists killed in a year is way too many. It remains the worst level of anti-union violence in the world.

Commentators who use "only" and "merely" to describe 39 murders, we believe, do not value the sanctity of human life.

In addition, they ignore the important fact that, even while union killings declined in 2007, the Colombian military's share of such killings actually rose. Thus, while only two unionists were killed by the military in 2006, the Colombian military was responsible for at least five union killings in 2007.

More:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dan-kovalik/the-labor-movements-princ_b_99521.html

[Judi Lynn]

5. Colombian government continues attack on rights defenders

Colombian government continues attack on rights defenders
Submitted by WW4 Report on Sat, 05/03/2008 - 01:06.

Jesús Caballero is one of the latest trade union leaders to be assassinated in Colombia. A labor unionist with the State Training Institute in the Caribbean town of Sabanalarga, Caballero disappeared on April 16 and his body was found two days later, with signs of torture. He was also one of the organizers of the March 6 international demonstrations against state-sponsored and paramilitary violence and in solidarity with all victims. That made him the sixth person involved in the March 6 mobilization to be murdered. Such frontal targeting of the March 6 organizers has been linked to remarks made by President Alvaro Uribe's advisor José Obdulio Gaviria in Colombian media that protest organizers were guerrillas. {Semana, April 23}

In response to the remarks and subsequent attacks, 63 members of {US} Congress told President Uribe in an April 14 letter: "We respectfully ask that you personally reiterate the prohibition on public servants making disparaging remarks about human right defenders... We urge you to publicly reject Gaviria's statements and reaffirm your
government's commitment to the protection of human rights defenders."

So far, the request seems to have fallen in deaf ears. Instead of showing signs of support for labor and human rights work, Uribe's government went into attack mode. On April 18, as Vice President Francisco Santos was touring the US in a desperate attempt to save the Colombia-US Free Trade Agreement, he complained that the Congressional letter was part of a defamation campaign mounted by human rights organizations and labor to sink the FTA. Vice President Santos went on: "The Congress members are lied to. They don't know. We are investigating the murders and there will be a response to the letter. {The killings} were not related to the mobilization nor with what they claimed happened. They are using José Obdulio's statements to make a bigger fuss." His comments were made the same day that Jesús Caballero's body was found. {El Tiempo, April 18}

President Uribe himself accused human rights defenders of inciting attacks against his family. His accusations referred to a highly embarrassing episode in which the president's cousin and close political ally, Mario Uribe, tried to avoid arrest by requesting political asylum at the Costa Rican Embassy in Bogota. Uribe is the most influential politician under criminal investigation for links to right-wing dead squads, in what is known as the "para-politics" scandal. {AFP, April 22}

Soon after the word got out that Uribe was requesting asylum to avoid arrest, dozens of human rights defenders and members of the National Movement of Victims of State Crimes assembled in front of the Costa Rican Embassy—bringing pictures of well-known and less known persons killed by the paramilitaries, a coffin, and even a mariachi band. They demanded that Uribe turn himself in to the Colombian courts and respond to the crimes for which he is being investigated.

More:
http://ww4report.com/node/5434