|
|
| Colombia's Chief Wants More US Help |
|
Posted by FoM on April 15, 2002 at 08:59:52 PT By Ken Guggenheim, Associated Press Writer Source: Associated Press 
Colombia's coca production climbs and efforts to cultivate substitute crops fail. New planes for drug spraying are not delivered. European contributions have been much less than expected. The South American country's commitment to human rights is in question.Members of Congress are looking at what has been done with the $1.7 billion in aid they've given to Colombia over the last two years. They don't like what they see. Colombian President Andres Pastrana will hear their complaints firsthand during his visit this week to Washington as he seeks broader U.S. support for his war against guerrillas. "We're talking about a lot of money going to a very small area that is making zero progress," Rep. Sonny Callahan, R-Ala., said at a House Appropriations foreign operations subcommittee hearing last week. As the panel's chairman in 2000, Callahan was pivotal in getting the initial $1.3 billion aid package approved. The criticism will make it difficult for Pastrana to win support for President Bush's proposal to expand U.S. aid beyond fighting drugs. "You have to look at the past to make a decision for the future," said Rep. Ike Skelton of Missouri, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee. Administration officials acknowledge problems but say it's unfair to judge a six-year program after less than two years. They also claim some successes. Fumigation of coca has increased, drug laboratories have been dismantled and traffickers have been extradited to the United States. Alternative development programs have been changed to correct problems. "To call things an abysmal failure, I think, is looking at the glass and saying it is half empty rather than looking at it and saying it's half full," said Mike Johnson, policy director at the Pentagon's counternarcotics office. Administration officials say the United States needs to defend democracy in a pivotal part of South America. They warn that continued instability in Colombia may lead to more drug trafficking and terrorism. The United States considers Colombia's main guerrilla and paramilitary groups to be terrorist organizations. Some of the biggest impediments to success in Colombia, aid supporters say, have been the very restrictions that Bush wants to eliminate. The president, who meets with Pastrana on Thursday, wants to end rules that limit Colombia's use of helicopters and other U.S.-provided equipment to drug-fighting operations. He also has proposed $35 million in anti-terrorism aid this year. "I think it was not realistic to think that you could separate the drug problem from the national security problem," said Sen. Mike DeWine, R-Ohio. The distinction between fighting drugs and fighting rebels is murky in Colombia. Guerrillas and paramilitaries partly finance their forces through the drug trade. Lawmakers placed the restrictions hoping the United States could fight drugs in Colombia, the world's largest producer of cocaine, without getting bogged down in its civil war. They were also wary of the Colombian army's links to human rights abuses. The $1.3 billion package was the U.S. contribution to Pastrana's $7.5 billion Plan Colombia, intended to fight drugs, bring peace and boost the economy. Major contributions were also expected from Europe. Problems developed right away. The European support was much less than expected. New spray planes didn't arrive because the manufacturer went bankrupt. Many Colombians opposed the spraying, saying it threatened their legal crops and health. The Bogota government suspended spraying operations several times. Colombians also made little progress in taking full control of the program, which depends heavily on State Department contractors to fly and maintain aircraft. U.S. lawmakers have questioned Colombia's commitment not only to fighting drugs, but fighting guerrillas. They say the country doesn't spend enough on defense and shouldn't expect the United States to pick up the slack. Reports emerged last month of problems in the crop-substitution program. A U.S.-funded study found that few farmers who had agreed to abandon coca, the raw material for cocaine, had done so. The White House announced last month that coca production actually rose by about 25 percent last year. Colombia has denied this, saying its statistics show a 16 percent decrease. "I don't think anybody is happy with where Plan Colombia is today," John Walters, the White House drug policy director, said. "The question is where do we go from here?" Administration officials have said the best way to fight drugs in Colombia is to help the country end the threat from guerrillas. Fighting has increased since peace talks with the main rebel group collapsed in February. Walters acknowledged that diverting helicopters from anti-drug operations could weaken spraying programs, at least temporarily. That could prevent the United States from meeting its original goals of cutting Colombian drug production in half over six years. But, Walters said, U.S. plans must be adapted to changing circumstances. The rebels "have dramatically increased their challenge to the government and that has to be met head on," he said. On the Net: State Department - Colombia: http://state.gov/p/wha/ci/co/ Office of National Drug Control Policy: http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/ Source: Associated Press Related Articles & Web Sites: Colombia Mobilization Colombia Drug War News High Stakes in Colombia The War on Drugs and the Implosion of Colombia DEA Sees Colombian Rebel Link To Cocaine Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help |
 |
| Comment #5 posted by FoM on April 18, 2002 at 08:44:10 PT |
| Organizers of IMF Protest Object to Route http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread12563.shtml [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #4 posted by Lehder on April 15, 2002 at 23:35:46 PT |
| nah...the people behind Bush may have a few technical skills but truly are fundamentally stupid as well as evil. They've already lost in Afghanistan by failing to find Osama, and they're going to lose every war they hold. They'll cause a lot more damage, they'll bomb a few more countries and try to legitimize the use of nuclear weapons - they may even launch another terror attack on the US, but their plans for God and the rest of us will fail. More and more they are being exposed, and now Cynthia McKinney(?), Congresswoman from Georgia, has openly accused the government of complicity in the terror attack as I and others did months ago. Other countries are getting sick of Bush even faster than Americans, and he and his evildoers will soon be unwelcome anywhere except to be put into handcuffs and tried for their crimes. Already I dare them to enter Venezuela. It's not a pipedream at all: Even though the US will not ratify the treaty for a World Criminal Court, I have read that under its terms American war criminals can nevertheless be arrested and prosecuted. I'll relish the day when our criminal "leaders" are unable to travel freely for fear of arrest and must hide in the world's corners like Nazis. Sweet dreams, George and Dick. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #3 posted by Lehder on April 15, 2002 at 18:35:47 PT |
| Hugo Chavez was toppled, for a day or two, because he befriended Castro, sold oil to Cuba in defiance of the US embargo, visited OPEC leaders in Iraq, Libya, Iran (Venezuela is an OPEC member), and because he has been sympathetic to FARC. He also effected huge recductions in illiteracy and unemployment in Venezuela and was twice elected by wide margins. Commenting on a separate article, SoberStoner called Chavez a 'dead man,' and, sadly, I and others agree: The history of US-backed military coups in Latin America is replete with false starts, like this past weekend’s events in Caracas. An armed uprising that failed preceded the September 1973 military coup that brought down the Popular Unity government of Salvador Allende and inaugurated General Augusto Pinochet’s reign of terror against the Chilean working class. That abortive action, just like the recent move against Chavez, showed how vulnerable the government was to a coup. It also provided a dress rehearsal for a real confrontation with the masses and allowed the principal figures in the military to determine which units could be relied upon and which could not. ... social and class contradictions are joined by Washington’s increasing resort to militarism to further the profit interests of the US-based multinationals that operate in Latin America. One prominent example is the Bush administration’s proposal to turn what ostensibly began as a “war on drugs” in Colombia into an open counterinsurgency campaign, linked to asserting tighter US control over US oil companies’ pipelines and oilfields. The events in Venezuela indicate that the past period of civilian rule in Latin America will prove a historical interlude, giving way to a new eruption of revolution and counterrevolution. http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/apr2002/vene-a15.shtml The wars on drugs and terror and other repressive measures serve only to exacerbate the same social and economic polarizations in the US that hobble South America, and that is exactly what our leaders want: Our ignorance and our poverty is their strength. I dislike looking into our future in this country because we have seen how every advance made against the war on drugs is met with ever stiffening repression and more brutal force and more severe media censorship. There is no appealing to reason, humanity or justice. I hope that the marches on Saturday will bring more people to our cause and to the general cause of peace, but we know that there will be very little if any TV coverage and that what is shown will be villified and ridiculed. The war on drugs will end only when sufficient numbers - huge numbers - of Americans have been driven from their homes and utterly impoverished with many millions more disenfranchised and destroyed. Even then, I am not so sure that the war on drugs will end. The citizens of Imperial Rome and Nazi Germany did not see their rights restored until their civilizations collapsed, and I think that the people behind Bush are capable of learning from history and of coldly and competently calculating the degree of widespread misery that can be inflicted on American society without effecting a collapse of federal power. The biggest issue for each of us and all our children into the future will be not the war on drugs but personal survival under the rule of the ignorant and the brutal. I am sorry to be so grim and wish I saw things differently. [ Post Comment ] |
| Comment #2 posted by mr greengenes on April 15, 2002 at 14:25:19 PT |
| I made an interesting observation today,(even if it's only interesting to me). While driving past the AM General plant earlier today, where they manufacture Hummers in Mishawaka IN, I noticed that every single one of the military Hummers sitting in the lot waiting to be shipped, (and there were a lot of them) were painted with forest camouflage instead of desert camo like they have been since desert storm. I thought afganistan, Iraq...etc. were mostly mountains, desert, and scrub brush. Anybody wanna lay odds on where their bound for? Hmmmmmmmmmmm? [ Post Comment ] |
|
Comment #1 posted by 2Spooky on April 15, 2002 at 12:20:23 PT:
|
| Finally the press is starting to wake up a bit and criticize GWB a bit. Hope the papers pick it up. [ Post Comment ] |
| Post Comment |  |
 |  |