 |
SPECIAL REPORTS |
| |
COLOMBIA:
U.S. Aid Must Leverage Reforms, Rights
Groups Urge
By Matthew Berger
WASHINGTON (IPS) - Defending human
rights in Colombia – never an especially
safe endeavour – has become even more
dangerous lately, several NGO leaders and
Colombian human rights defenders testified
on Capitol Hill Tuesday.
Human rights defenders in the country "have
noticed a surge in threats against defenders
and their family members, as well as a
number of physical attacks and
assassinations, and unexplained break-ins of
defenders' offices", said Kelly Nichols,
executive director of the U.S. Office on
Colombia, an NGO that has helped organise a
campaign to promote recommendations for how
to protect Colombian human rights defenders.
"Colombian activists are subject to the full
gamut of human rights violations," said
Andrew Hudson of Human Rights First,
"including torture, threats, misuse of state
intelligence, systematic stigmatisation,
unfounded criminal proceedings and impunity
for violations of defenders."
The testimony came before the Tom Lantos
Human Rights Commission and follows on the
heels of a scandal that has unfolded over
the past year in Colombia in which
recordings of the wire-tapped conversations
of people supposed to be critics of
President Álvaro Uribe – including human
rights defenders, politicians, journalists
and even Supreme Court justices – have
become public.
The majority of blame for the eavesdropping
activities, illegal under Colombian law, has
been directed at the Department of
Administrative Services, or DAS, an
intelligence agency under the president's
authority.
DAS has grown considerably in size and scope
since it was founded in the 1950s, but
following the wiretapping scandals, and
especially the discovery of a recording of a
conversation between a Supreme Court justice
and a U.S. embassy attaché, Uribe ordered
the dismantling of DAS.
Uribe, a right-leaning politician who is
highly popular in Colombia and is
considering trying to amend the constitution
to allow him to run for a third term, has
also announced that a new intelligence
agency linked to the presidency would be
created.
At the hearing Tuesday, Nicholls commended
the decision to disband DAS, but cautioned
that "the capacity of the president and his
advisors to order intelligence operations
without safeguards or oversight" must be
removed.
She called on the U.S. government, an ally
of the Uribe government, to encourage and
ensure these reforms.
Further U.S. oversight was a major theme of
the afternoon, as the fact that the U.S. is
giving 545 million dollars in aid to
Colombia this year makes it, in the
speakers' eyes, a key force for reform in
the country.
A recent deal to increase the U.S. military
presence on Colombian bases in order to
combat narcotics trafficking has only
increased the perceived strength of ties
between Washington and Bogotá, while also
bringing condemnation from Colombia's
left-leaning neighbour governments.
While most of the attention has been
directed at DAS, Nicholls pointed out that
other agencies, such as military and police
intelligence units, have also spied on human
rights defenders in the country. "Many of
these units have received U.S. support,
training and equipment," she added.
Other speakers included Principe Gabriel
González, an advocate for better treatment
of Colombian political prisoners, who was
himself imprisoned for a year after falsely
being accused commanding a guerrilla force
linked to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia, or FARC.
After being acquitted in 2007, he was
sentenced to seven years in prison for the
same charges in March, though that decision
has since been appealed to the Colombian
Supreme Court and the arrest warrant
suspended.
This is one of many cases of baseless
accusations being made against human rights
defenders in Colombia with the aim of
limiting and undermining their work,
repeated several speakers. Another effect,
according to Human Rights First, is that
being charged with being a guerrilla can
often draw attacks from right-wing
paramilitary groups, even after the charges
have been dropped.
Reynaldo Villalba Vargas, president of the
José Alvear Restrepo Lawyers' Collective,
also testified. His organisation has been
particularly critical of the right-wing
Uribe government and has been one of the
main organisations targeted by operations
like those of DAS.
Alirio Uribe, a human rights lawyer with the
group, told The New York Times in September,
"Chills went down my spine when I discovered
the lengths that DAS went through to watch
my every movement." The file he obtained of
the espionage included photos of his
children and evidence DAS had gone so far as
to rent an apartment across from his home,
according to the Times.
Files such as these should be destroyed,
Margaret Sekaggya, U.N. Special Rapporteur
on Human Rights Defenders, told the hearing
Tuesday.
Rep. James McGovern, co-chairman of the
committee, then pointed out that these files
had been shared with the U.S. and other
governments and that they had led to the
delays in obtaining visas for the speakers
from Colombia. González's visa had taken
four months to obtain, according to Hudson,
and then only with the influence of
McGovern.
Sekaggya visited Colombia on a fact-finding
mission from Sep. 7 to 18, after which she
said "much remains to be done to ensure a
safe and conducive environment for human
rights defenders" in Colombia.
"The government should investigate and
prosecute those who have threatened [the
defenders]", she said Tuesday, and
emphasised the systematic stigmatisation of
defenders by government officials accuse
them of being guerrillas.
Following a meeting with Sekaggya on her
earlier trip, Álvaro Uribe said "The defense
of human rights is a necessary and
legitimate action for democracy in a country
like Colombia which is proud to be
completely open to international scrutiny in
this field".
Tuesday, she said, "Now the government must
keep its promise."
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
