Colombia militia leader confesses to milking public treasuries

[bemildred]

Source: LA Times

Reporting from Barranquilla, Colombia -- Having gotten 602 killings off his chest, paramilitary leader Edgar Ignacio Fierro has moved on to dollars and cents: how he and other leaders looted municipal treasuries, hospitals and even schools to finance their armies and enrich themselves.

Like thousands of other leaders of the right-wing militias, Fierro is testifying in compliance with a 2005 disarmament accord under which the commanders were promised light sentences in exchange for their surrender, full confessions and a promise not to return to a life of war and terrorism.

---

Now the former Colombian army captain is just as scrupulously detailing how paramilitaries bled dry not just businesses and landowners, large and small, but public officials who either turned over chunks of their government budgets and revenue or were killed.

"They justify it by saying they were defending the fatherland, but most of these people ended up behaving like any other common criminal," said one prosecutor, who like other officials interviewed for this story spoke anonymously for fear of reprisal.


Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-colombia-looting19-2009feb19,0,5239511.story

[Judi Lynn]

1. He admits to killing 602 people, including professors, union leaders, peasants accused of giving

aid to leftist guerrillas. For that, he'll be released back into his country, free to do it all over again. This program has been a colossal joke, as human rights organizations have stated these death squads never were really out of business, they merely reorganized, and adopted new names for themselves.

http://www.elheraldo.com.co.nyud.net:8090/ELHERALDO/BancoMedios/Imagenes/don17.jpg

Edgar Ignacio Fierro Florez, alias "Don
Antonio" or "Isaac Bolivar, was
commander of the Front Jose Pablo Diaz,
of the Northern Bloc of the AUC.

The article doesn't mention this clown also was in the habit of killing human rights advocates. Here's a statement on one of his intended victims,
Jose Humberto Torres:

Protect Colombian Lawyer from Assassination
http://www.humanrightsfirst.org.nyud.net:8090/images/megaphone/mega-05/mega-case-diaz.jpg

Date Issued: November 29, 2007

UPDATE: Less than two weeks after this alert was issued, Jose Humberto Torres Diaz was granted protective measures by the Colombian government.

Jose Humberto Torres is a leading Colombian human rights lawyer working in one of Colombia’s most dangerous regions. Recently, an infamous paramilitary leader admitted that he had ordered his subordinates to kill Torres. The order to kill Torres has not been withdrawn and one of the people tasked with killing him remains at large.

Torres has twice been forced to live in exile out of fear for his life and is now considering fleeing the country again with his family. The recent publicity surrounding the paramilitary order to assassinate Torres puts his life in grave danger.

Take action now to demand that the Colombian Interior Ministry urgently provide Torres with adequate protection, namely an armored car and bodyguards, to allow him to continue his important work.

Background

Jose Humberto Torres is a lawyer in Barranquilla, a city in northern Colombia, who has defended the rights of others for nearly 30 years. Working with the Political Prisoners Solidarity Committee (Fundacion Comité de Solidaridad con los Presos Políticos (FCSPP)), he represents many human rights defenders who are subject to specious criminal investigations such as Principe Gabriel Gonzalez Arango.

In 2004 a Regional Military Intelligence unit (RIME) requested that the local prosecutor charge Torres with rebellion and other offences. After investigating the allegations, the prosecutor closed the case, citing a lack of facts to support the charges. Human Rights First recently visited Colombia and met with government officials to discuss the problem of prosecutors bringing false charges against human rights defenders. Read our latest document about this issue.

On November 15 2007, the ex-paramilitary commander Edgar Ignacio Fierro Florez (alias “Don Antonio”) admitted to the 3rd Justice and Peace Prosecutor in Barranquilla that in 2004 he ordered the assassination of Torres. In the order, he identified Torres as a “legitimate military target” for supposedly being involved with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Torres has no links to the FARC ‑ his human rights advocacy has been recognized by the Colombian Interior and Justice Ministry and the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights. Don Antonio stated that they had been unable to kill Torres because Torres traveled considerably.

Don Antonio admitted that the order to assassinate Torres remains in force. Disturbingly, one of the paramilitary members tasked with carrying it out, “El Zarco” (alias), has not demobilized. On the contrary, El Zarco reputedly remains one of the leaders of the paramilitary successor group the “Black Eagles,” which continue to threaten human rights defenders.

http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/defenders/hrd_colombia/alert112907_torres.htm

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Clearly, anyone they believe doesn't support their murderous habits is simply designated a "FARC supporter," and they kill them.

You may be familiar with the proclivity you've seen in right-wingers in the U.S. toward labeling people whose ideas and opinions and observations aren't acceptable to them as "communists," or, on some message boards, "FARC supporters." In Colombia, when you have the audacity to remain independent of the right wing, it can get you killed.

"*February 16, 2008. A demobilized paramilitary, Edgar Ignacio Fierro Florez was found
guilty of the murder of a Colombian union official, the president of the union at
Electricaribe. A witness testified that the killing was part of a plan worked out between
paramilitaries and the DAS (Colombian FBI).

http://www.colombiasupport.net/2008/CSN_Aug_Col_Army_Atrocities.pdf

As you see in this example, sometimes the death squads simply carried out the wishes of the administration, working as an adjunct of the Colombian military. Many documentted cases.