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Anncol, for "sympathy" toward "the drug-funded group." (Would they say that about the New York Slimes--"a news agency sympathetic to--indeed, publisher of many known LIES about--the war on Iraq; sympathetic toward the thugs and thieves of the Bush Junta"? No, they wouldn't.)
What's interesting is that the U.S./Colombia, under twin monsters Bush Jr and A. Uribe, sabotaged the last peace effort in Colombia's 40+ year civil war, in 2008, when they dropped ten 500 lb U.S. "smart bombs" on the FARC's hostage and peace negotiator, Raul Reyes, killing him and 24 other sleeping people, at a camp just inside Ecuador's border. Chavez had been trying to segue his hostage negotiations with the FARC (which Uribe, that treacherous little shit, asked him to undertake) into a peace agreement. But the Colombian military sent rocket fire at the location of the first two hostages that Chavez got released, and it became too dangerous for Chavez to continue. (He got six hostages released, all told.) The effort shifted to Ecuador. Other Latin American leaders and European leaders were lending a hand. Swiss, Spanish and French envoys were in Ecuador, when the bombing/raid on Ecuador's territory occurred. They were there to receive Ingrid Betancourt, the FARC's most high profile hostage. I figure that the Bushwhacks wanted to, in one fell swoop, hand Chavez a diplomatic disaster with dead hostages, end all hope for peace in Colombia's civil war and start a war between Colombia/the U.S. and Venezuela/Ecuador, then and there--a plan that I believe was designed by Donald Rumsfeld, who maintained an interest in it at least through December 1, 2007 (when he published an op-ed in the Washington Post stating that Chavez's help in hostage negotiations "is not welcome in Colombia," though it had been days before).
Fast forward to today: The FARC are once again trying to negotiate a peace in this long civil war. They are an indigenous, political organization, with an armed guerilla force which has inflicted far, far, FAR less harm on the Colombian people than the Colombian military and its closely tied rightwing paramilitary death squads have inflicted. Now that Uribe is gone--and Bush and Rumsfeld are gone--and Hillary Clinton wants to put some democracy cosmetics on Colombia, to get her "free trade for the rich" agreement with Colombia through Congress (where labor Democrats have held it up, because of the Colombian military's murders of trade unionists), and they seem to have sent Manuel Santos--the new president of Colombia and one of Uribe's former Defense Ministers--to "Smile School" (all smiles meeting with Chavez), maybe there is a new opening for peace. The U.S. and Colombia are pariahs in Latin America--for multiple and very good reasons. Clinton is no doubt finding it very hard to "sell" corporate rule and the hideous, failed, corrupt, murderous U.S. "war on drugs" to a region that has pretty much had it with U.S. domination, exploitation and interference. Peace in Colombia would be quite a feather in her cap. And I don't think that the FARC would be making this announcement if they didn't have some indication that it might be possible.
It's also interesting that, if this is the U.S. plan--to mop all the blood in Colombia off the floor and pretend that it is a democracy--it was prefaced by a big U.S. military buildup in the region, and by the rightwing coup d'etat in Honduras. Threat, then carrot.
I'm pretty much still convinced that the U.S. means very ill, indeed, in Latin America. Our government's intention remains toppling the Venezuelan and Ecuadoran governments and regaining control of their oil. They also very much want to fracture and destroy UNASUR--South America's prototype Common Market (which very pointedly does not include the U.S.). Santos refused UNASUR mediation in the shit that Uribe stirred up with Venezuela, in his last days in office. And UNASUR, though dominated by the left, was not exactly unified in its handling of that matter. But individual leaders--such as UNASUR president Nestor Kirchner (former president of Argentina) were quite involved. I doubt that Santos will agree to UNASUR mediation, but he might agree to Kirchner mediation or Lula da Silva mediation--especially if he is pressured by the U.S. to at least appear to have peaceful intent, at least for now. He will want the U.S. "at the table"--backing him up with its bully power--and that is not possible if it is an official UNASUR mission.
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