Dear cj, The world cheered when NATO storm troopers kidnapped a "war criminal" recently, shooting his colleague, and brought him to the Hague to face "justice". I personally find the whole development utterly repulsive. Not only because the US and Germany set up the whole Yugoslav destabilization process in the first place, not only because they watched it fester with callous disregard for human suffering, not only because they engineered the outcome to their own advantage, and not only because the atrocities of one side in the conflict are publicised while those of the other are overlooked - although these should be more than enough - but even more because of the many crimes-against-humanity committed - and still being committed today - by Uncle Sam, who has the gall to then stand up before the world as champion of justice. How does the US get by with it?? It's as if Al Capone were to be elected Police Chief. The mind boggles. I had another look at "Panama Deception" the other day, the excellent documentary of the Panama invasion (thanks to Joshua2 for my copy). Eyewitnesses described how prisoners were set out on the lawn, hands tied behind their backs, and then machine-gunned in front of onlooking citizens. Eyewitnesses described how GIs went from house to house, systematically burning down entire neighborhoods. Eyewitnesses told how people were pulled out of cars at roadblocks, laid down on the pavement, and shot. The camera showed mass graves being dug up, and the tears of those uncovering the shame of "Operation Just Cause". Meanwhile, the only thing on US television regarding the invasion was "the hunt for Noriega the drug dealer" - a phony cover-story sideshow. Panama continues its role in the CIA-managed world drug trade - as a financial center of money laundering and drug brokering. Noriega's actual "crime" was his opposition to US policy in Central America, which brings us to another episode of US crimes against humanity. The "School of the Americas" continues to operate to this day - the training center for torture and brutal police suppression which is directly responsible for decades of death squads and hundreds of thousands of "disappearances" throughout Latin America. What greater crime against humanity than to systematically subject an entire continent to Gestapo-tactics police-state regimes? The above are of course only random examples. A full indictment of Uncle Sam for crimes against humanity would also include Hiroshima and Vietnam, and would mention such episodes as burying-alive three thousand Iraqi soldiers with bulldozers, and engineering the starvation of Iraqi civilians. Until the likes of Haig, MacNamara, Kissinger, Bush, Schwartzkopf, and Clinton are in the docks of the tribunal, I for one reject the legitimacy of the court. It is making a show trial of a minor pawn, so that the major criminals can remain free, so the world can seduce itself into believing that progress toward justice is being made, and so that the Judge Dredd US/NATO strike force can continue the dismantlement of national sovereignty. It is a sham and a disaster. --- Incidentally, as regards Latin America, here may seem to have been a retrenchment recently from suppression/death-squad tactics, what with the peace settlement in El Salvador, etc. But, as the article below reveals, the old-style operations are not gone (nor is the School for the Americas closed down), and the only significant consequence of El-Salvador-style settlements may turn out to be the disarming of the guerillas, which they may yet come to regret. rkm ~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~-~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~ From: •••@••.••• To: "Workers World News Service" <•••@••.•••> Subject: Colombian death squads Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 ------------------------- Via Workers World News Service Reprinted from the August 7, 1997 issue of Workers World newspaper ------------------------- BACKED BY U.S. MILITARY AID: COLUMBIAN DEATH SQUADS TARGET WORKERS, PEASANTS By Andy McInerney Following a series of highly publicized defeats at the hands of the revolutionary forces in Colombia, the ruling class is striking back with a vengeance. Death squads backed by the Colombian armed forces have massacred scores of civilians, tortured others and forced thousands to flee in recent weeks. Some 150 thugs entered the Mapiripan department of the southeastern Meta province on July 20. According to the New Colombia News Agency (ANNCOL), over 30 people were killed outright in a bloody killing spree that lasted some five days. The death squads decapitated six people and hung heads on lampposts in the town square. Twenty-seven others were tortured in the assault. At least 500 of the municipality's 2,500 residents have fled. "It wasn't an indiscriminate massacre," according to ANNCOL, quoting human-rights organizations. "It was a plan developed almost three years ago. The authors are sectors of the military high command, economic groups of the Colombian oligarchy, fascist political sectors, and known paramilitary groups." The Mapiripan massacre was not an isolated incident. On July 17 Mauricio T=A2pias and Camilo Suarez, two leaders of the banana workers in the coastal region of Ci=82naga, were kidnapped. They were found dead three days later. The FECODE union federation representing Colombian professors launched a four-day general strike on July 22 to demand an end to threats against educators. Twenty-two professors have been killed by death squads in the past six months. "The situation of threats and murders of Colombian teachers has no comparison in other countries and must stop," said Fred Van Leewen, secretary general of the world labor body Educational International. On July 25, death squads planted a 130-pound bomb in front of the national headquarters of the Patriotic Union (UP) party. Over 4,000 members of the UP, a broad leftist front, and the Communist Party of Colombia have been assassinated in the past 10 years. Death-squad activity has increased since a 1994 conference of paramilitary groups like the misnamed "Peasant Self- defense Group of C=A2rdoba and Urab=A0." The conference created "special vigilance and private security services," known as CONVIVIR. These are essentially legalized death squads. They coordinate their activities with the Colombian armed forces. The results have been deadly. Since the 1994 elections, death squads have assassinated 226 councilors and 20 mayors. Seven hundred Communist Party members have been killed in the northern Urab=A0 region alone. In the San Alberto region, a stronghold for the militant oil workers' union, only 300 of an original 1,700 members remain. SOCIAL CRISIS SHARPENS Right-wing violence has been a constant factor in Colombia for the past 10 years. But the recent escalation is a direct product of the same social crisis that has provoked vast mass mobilizations over the past year. In September 1996 hundreds of thousands of people-- workers, peasants, students--took part in massive street demonstrations against President Ernesto Samper's government. At the same time the armed revolutionary movement led by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia- People's Army (FARC-EP) launched its most sustained offensive in decades. On June 15, the FARC gained world attention by peacefully handing over 70 government troops captured in battle. The negotiations preceding the prisoner turnover drove a political wedge between Samper and military hawks like Gen. Harold Bedoya. Samper fired Bedoya on July 24, reportedly over Bedoya's refusal to consider any type of negotiation with the FARC. But Bedoya--who has close ties to the Pentagon and was trained at the infamous School of the Americas--has hinted strongly that he will run for the presidency in the 1998 election. The Colombian military is the biggest recipient of U.S. military aid in the Western Hemisphere. A November 1996 Human Rights Watch report, "Colombia's Killer Networks," documented the role of the Pentagon and Central Intelligence Agency in organizing and training death squads. In early June the London-based Guardian newspaper reported on the multinational conglomerate British Petroleum's efforts to use former elite Special Air Service commandos to train Colombian police and a private army to protect BP's investments in Colombia. - END - (Copyright Workers World Service: Permission to reprint granted if source is cited. For more information contact Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail: •••@••.•••. For subscription info send message to: •••@••.•••. Web: http://workers.org) ~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~-~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~ ~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~--~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~ Posted by Richard K. Moore - •••@••.••• - PO Box 26 Wexford, Ireland Browse (not FTP): ftp://ftp.iol.ie/users/rkmoore/cyberlib | (USA Citizen) * Non-commercial republication encouraged - Please include this sig * ~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~--~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=~
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