Tuesday 23 December 2008, San José, Costa
Rica
Mercenaries At Large
in Colombia
By Gustavo Capdevila
GENEVA (IPS) -
Mercenaries hired by
private military and
security companies are
playing an increasingly
broad range of roles in
Latin America, such as
guarding mines, borders,
prisons, and now
humanitarian aid, said
the members of the
United Nations Working
Group on the use of
mercenaries at a meeting
in this Swiss city.
At the same time, some
3,000 Latin Americans,
mainly Chileans,
Peruvians, Colombians
and Hondurans, are
serving as mercenaries
in conflict zones in
Iraq.
Assistance provided by a
commando made up of
former Israeli military
intelligence experts has
also helped the
Colombian government
deal heavy blows to the
left-wing guerrillas,
said Amada Benavídes de
Pérez from Colombia, one
of the five members of
the U.N. Working Group
on the use of
mercenaries as a means
of violating human
rights and impeding the
exercise of the right of
peoples to
self-determination.
The Working Group,
created in 2005 by the
U.N. Human Rights
Commission (subsequently
replaced by the U.N.
Council on Human
Rights), discussed the
possibility of drawing
up new international
legal instruments to
regulate the growing
activities of private
military and security
companies, at their
meeting last week.
The use of mercenaries
contravenes the United
Nations International
Convention against the
Recruitment, Use,
Financing and Training
of Mercenaries, which
entered into force in
2001.
Colombia is the most
critical case of the use
of mercenaries in Latin
America, said Benavídes,
the former dean of the
Human Rights Faculty at
the Higher School of
Public Administration in
her country.
Information gathered by
a group of Colombian
academics from several
universities and by
non-governmental
organisations has
produced data from the
victims themselves about
what is really happening
with regard to the use
of mercenaries in
Colombia, Benavídes
said.
Services provided by
private military and
security companies cover
a variety of roles.
First, there are the
companies working
in-country within the
framework of the
U.S.-financed and
designed Plan Colombia,
a counterinsurgency and
anti-drug strategy.
Under Plan Colombia, 25
foreign companies are
active in the country,
employing 800 people as
"private contractors" --
mainly U.S. citizens of
Latin American origin,
said Benavídes.
Personnel numbers are at
times even greater,
perhaps even double that
figure, because every 15
days a rotation takes
place and a new
contingent arrives from
the United States, the
U.N. expert said.
The curious thing about
this operation is that
the private contractors
enjoy the same
diplomatic immunity as
the members of the U.S.
embassy in Colombia,
which exempts them from
scrutiny under national
laws.
"We have documented
illegal acts and crimes
committed by this group
of contractors, but
Bogotá cannot even
investigate them because
the bilateral agreement
with Washington forbids
it," Benavídes said.
There are, therefore, at
least 800 people in
Colombian territory whom
the government has no
control over whatsoever,
and who are working for
Plan Colombia.
These people, who do not
stand out among the
population because of
their Latin American
origins, live at U.S.
military bases.
Benavídes recalled that
when politician Ingrid
Betancourt was freed in
July after more than six
years as a captive of
the Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia (FARC),
three U.S. contractors
who were "crop-spraying
experts" were also
released.
The press reported at
the time that the three
U.S. contractors, Thomas
Howes, Keith Stansell
and Marc Gonsalves, who
were captured by the
guerrillas in 2003,
worked for California
Microwave Systems, a
subsidiary of Northrop
Grumman which provided
services to the U.S.
Department of Defence
collecting information
on drug crops.
The same sources said
that the FARC maintained
that Howes, Stansell and
Gonsalves were foreign
spies working for the
U.S. Central
Intelligence Agency
(CIA).
A second type of
mercenary presence in
Colombia is the mostly
U.S. and British
companies that provide
security services for
foreign extractive
industries, mainly oil
firms but also mining
companies.
There are risks involved
in these activities
because they are often
carried out on lands
belonging to indigenous
or other local
communities. The private
security companies
prevent access to these
lands, and even access
to water, Benavídes
said.
The U.N. Working Group
on the use of
mercenaries has
documented similar cases
in Peru and Ecuador,
where the actions of
private security
companies have seriously
harmed communities
living close to mining
areas, she said.
The third form of
mercenary intervention
in Colombia is the
already mentioned
participation by
logistics experts from
Israel, who work for the
Colombian Defence
Ministry.
Many of the military
successes by government
forces against the
guerrillas have depended
on military intelligence
provided by the Israeli
mercenaries, Benavídes
said.
Fourth and last of the
issues involving
mercenaries and Colombia
is the 500 people from
this country who are in
Iraq. There are no
official statistics,
"but our own information
and that collected by
foreign academics who
have done research in
Colombia" suggest this
figure, the expert said.
Close to 3,000 Latin
Americans now in Iraq
are from Chile, Peru,
Colombia and Honduras.
Recently, however, they
have been joined by
others from El Salvador
and Guatemala, she said.
There are no indications
that any Argentines,
Brazilians or Uruguayans
are in Iraq, she added.
But it may happen that a
Chilean recruitment
agency sending
mercenaries to Iraq is
legally registered in
Uruguay. Therefore if
there is a legal problem
with one of the
"contractors", it will
not be settled in a
Chilean court, Benavídes
said.
Neither would it come
before the Uruguayan
justice system, because
the contract would not
have been signed there
but, say, in the U.S.
state of Virginia. But
the U.S. would not take
the case under its
responsibility because
the alleged crime was
committed in Iraq.
This example illustrates
the legal vacuum
existing in
international law, which
the U.N. Working Group
is endeavouring to fill
with the new, universal
instrument they are
studying, that is
intended to cover the
gaps in national
legislations.
Colombia is a case in
point, because it has
regulations for national
private security
companies, but none at
all for foreign
companies of the same
kind, Benavides told IPS.
An outstanding problem
related to mercenaries
is how to classify
members of the far-right
paramilitary groups that
have been heavily active
in Colombia in recent
decades.
Benavídes told IPS that
strictly speaking,
paramilitaries cannot be
mercenaries because they
are not foreigners.
However, she
acknowledged that the
majority of contractors
working for private
companies providing
security to oil and
mining firms are
Colombian nationals. |
|
|
|
|
|
