Soldiers at roadblock kill husband of Colombian indigenous leader

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

Updated: 51 minutes ago

Soldiers at roadblock kill husband of Colombian indigenous leader
By VIVIAN SEQUERA | Associated Press Writer
3:40 PM EST, December 16, 2008

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Soldiers at a rural roadblock on Tuesday shot and killed the husband of an indigenous leader who has organized anti-government marches.

Edwin Legarda, 34, was driving a Toyota SUV at about 4 a.m. near an indigenous reserve in western Colombia when the soldiers opened fire. One of four other people in the vehicle was lightly wounded, said Vicente Otero, a spokesman for the Cauca Regional Indigenous Council.

~snip~
Legarda was married to Aida Quilcue, a top leader of the Cauca council, who helped organize marches in October and November to demand justice for hundreds of killings of indigenous activists that are blamed on illegal armed groups and to insist on the return of allegedly stolen lands.

Indigenous groups demand that the government return 2 million hectares (4.9 million acres) of land they claim was misappropriated, mostly by right-wing militias in the service of large landholders.



Read more: http://www.courant.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-lt-colombia-indian-leader,0,7077236.story

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[Judi Lynn]

1. Husband of Colombian protest leader killed

updated 2 hours, 27 minutes ago
Husband of Colombian protest leader killed

BOGOTA, Colombia (CNN) -- Colombian soldiers on Tuesday killed the husband of a Colombian Indian protest leader, an army source said.

Edwin Legarda was at a military checkpoint in the country's southwestern region when soldiers shot and killed him, the source said. He was the husband of Aida Quilcue.

Legarda was killed when the military fired at his car some distance away from the checkpoint, a native Colombian Indian source said.

Legarda's death comes not long after tens of thousands of Indians marched from the mountains of southwest Colombia to Cali, a city of 2 million, to demand more land, better education, health care and protection from corporations encroaching on their ancestral land. Protesters and police have clashed as well.

More:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/12/16/colombia.shooting/index.html

[Tempest]

2. A roadblock at 4am near the entrance of an indigenous reserve?

Sure sounds like the soldiers were lying in wait for a specific target.

Apparently the Columbian government isn't satisfied with just murdering labor union leaders, now they're going after peasant leaders as well.

[Judi Lynn]

7. A translation from a Spanish source, in posts #4, after yours, said the car was identiable

as their car, had darkened glass so it was easily possible they thought she was in the car, herself when they fired at it from both sides of the road.

She was well known in Colombia, and was on her way to a United Nations meeting in Geneva.

You Tube, Aida Quilque speaking with indigenous people at a gathering, march, watched by government soldiers:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFa1VeBMIQM

Here's an article from early this year regarding the hostility and violence against the native Colombians:

History Repeats Itself For Indigenous Communities in Colombia
Written by Mario A. Murillo
Wednesday, 15 October 2008
Mass Mobilization Facing Government Backlash in Northern Cauca Amidst "State of Internal Commotion"

Bogotá, Colombia—As I write this, over 12,000 indigenous activists and representatives of other popular and social sectors of southern Colombia are urgently congregating in the "Territory of Peace and Coexistence" in La Maria Piendamó, in Cauca, confronting a massive presence of state security forces who have been ordered to dislodge them.

The popular mobilization began on Oct. 12, and was called to protest the militarization of their territories, the US-Colombia Free Trade Agreement, and the failure of the government of President Alvaro Uribe to fulfill various accords with the indigenous communities relating to land, education, and health.

On Monday, as expected, the communities participating in the indigenous protest blocked a portion of the Pan American Highway that connects the cities of Popayán and Santander de Quilichao, in the department of Cauca, in an act of civil disobedience meant to force the government to meet with them to discuss some of their demands.

Instead, what we've seen over the last two days are serious confrontations between special-forces police units and the communities assembled, with several indigenous activists severely wounded, one possibly fatally, in the ensuing clashes. These unfolding developments come just days after two other Nasa Indians – Nicolás Valencia Lemus and Celestino Rivera - were assassinated by unidentified gunmen late Saturday night and into Sunday morning, a few hours before the start of the mobilization, bringing the total number of indigenous activists killed in the last three weeks throughout Colombia to 11.

Dirty War with Many Sources

Eyewitnesses say the assassins of Lemus and Rivera were members of the Aguilas Negras, or Black Eagles, a newly formed paramilitary group that has emerged throughout Colombia in recent months.

The 39-year-old Lemus, the brother of two well-known Nasa activists, was driving his car on the road from the town of El Palo to the indigenous reserve of Toribio, in the mountainous region of northern Cauca. He was accompanied by his wife and son. According to eyewitnesses, Lemus was ordered to stop and get out of his car by two hooded gunmen, who proceeded to drill him with bullets in front of his family. The assassins, before leaving the site of the attack, wrote "Águilas Negras" on the window of Valencia Lemus' vehicle.

However, the current governor of Cauca, Guillermo Alberto Gonzalez, denies there are any new paramilitary groups operating in the department.

Regardless, it appears that a dirty war against the indigenous and popular movement in Colombia is well underway, and it is emanating from many different sources.

More:
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/1527/1/

[Peace Patriot]

3. 'Lamenting the death..."

Same article: "Police say Legarda apparently didn't heed orders to stop at the roadblock. Lamenting the death, the Defense Ministry said in a statement that 'for the moment, sufficient clarity is lacking about what happened. // It said it was investigating the killing and would ask the chief prosecutor's office to do the same."

:puke:

[Judi Lynn]

4. Google translation of account from Spanish source:

YVKE World:: Articles
Was shot at the vehicle which was carrying
Military checkpoint killed in the husband of Colombian indigenous leader



The indigenous leader Quilcué Aida, along with
Edwin Legarda, her husband, who was assassinated
in a military checkpoint. Three bullets hit his
body, of the 17 shots that were made.



Aida Quilcué has been one of the leaders of the
National Indigenous Minga, in marches that have
mobilized thousands of Indians across the length
and breadth of the country.



The Indians have been denouncing the breach of
the agreements reached with the government,
seeing persecuted its leaders, affected communities
and their land seized.


He was killed at a military checkpoint on indigenous Edwin Legarda, husband of Aida Quilcué leader, a leader of the recent "Mingas of Indigenous Resistance", demonstrations and mass marches that were in trouble recently, the government of President Álvaro Uribe. Interior Minister Fabio Valencia Cossio, has recognized the responsibility of the army in this "mistake". Indigenous communities claim that it was an attack on the counselor Quilcué.

While in Salvador de Bahia the 12 presidents who make up the UNASUR included in the document of approval by the Security Council and Defense UNASUR an article condemning the FARC and ELN as terrorist groups, violators of international humanitarian law, at a military checkpoint was assassinated husband's recognized indigenous leader Quilcué Aida, one of the most important leaders of the recent "Mingas of Indigenous Resistance."

Army members shot to Edwin Legarda while on his way to Popayan, department of Cauca, south west of the country, to pick up his wife, Aida Marina Mayor Councilor Quilcué Vivas, who was returning to participate in the Council's Human Rights UN in Geneva.

The vehicle he was driving Mr Legarda was attached to the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca, CRIC, and was the vehicle of mobilization of the indigenous leader. Some sources report that the vehicle also was traveling nurse's Hospital Level 1 Belalcázar, who also was injured in the incident.

Daniel Pinacue, Paez indigenous governor, said that the site had a military checkpoint and that is not explained why it fired at the car, properly identified.

An attack on the counselor

"This was an attack against the minister," said Ernesto Perafán, CRIC's lawyer, who described what happened: "The army shot from various angles, from the two sides have impacts the car. Do not help them. He managed to escape. He received several bullet wounds in the chest in the leg, and reached out, was in leg upward, but the Army did not helped but started to let some vanilla and things on the floor, and when we came here with the Battalion commander, said that since the car had shot them. Version already refuting, accepting that it was they who fired into the car of the minister, but as that was the original version. "

The commander of the Third Division, Justo Eliseo Pena, who went to the area in a helicopter, said that "everything went wrong when a group of peasant soldiers conducted a roadblock." The official maintained that the car did not stop but continued its march to the town of reeds.

The version of the Indian community is that the attack was an attack against Quilcué, because that was the vehicle in which she used to mobilize. As the vehicle has semipolarizados glasses, there was no way to check if she was traveling there or not.

"This is a retaliation against the Indian minga," added the lawyer Perafán. "This is in addition to the decision to issue a warrant for the arrest of the coordinators of the guard."

Need for justice

The soldiers who participated in the checkpoint from which they were fired at the vehicle, would be retained in the rural municipality of reeds, by the guard and the indigenous community.

"If the military justice system does not issue an arrest warrant against the soldiers involved, the indigenous guard is going to catch, because the fact occurred on the territory of the community," said Ernesto also Perafán.

The Defense Ministry acknowledged in a statement that members of the army fired at Legarda, indicating that there is no clarity on how the incidents occurred.

"It was established that Battalion troops José Hilario López belonging to the Division III National Army fired at the car he was driving Mr Legarda, but so far there is sufficient clarity on how the incidents occurred," said the communique.

The ministry announced an internal investigation, headed by Commander of the Third Division and the Inspector General of the Armed Forces, and asked Attorney and Attorney send a special commission to the area to forward the necessary investigations in criminal and disciplinary.

The leader Aida Quilcué just going to participate today in a meeting of leaders of the indigenous.

Totoro without ... Salvador de Bahia.

While the vice president of Colombia, Francisco "Pachito" Santos came out victorious in Salvador de Bahia, arguing that the paper UNASUR "there is an explicit rejection of any illegal armed group that seeks to overturn the order, regardless of where is and wherever it comes from, we see that it is a breakthrough and a very important step, "the question, given the evidence of the facts and the subsequent violation of human rights by the Colombian state, it is not necessary if the subscription of articulito another, who also reject and condemn the state terrorism practiced by the Colombian government.

Or is that what then is this fair blood of the infamous "false positives", the assassination of interlocutor who thinks differently and I said, unbelievable numbers of trade unionists killed, or the ruthless persecution of minorities, and their annihilation, as in Here, of course, "by mistake". Or is it that this is the order you want and that people should not subvert?

The blood spilled today by the indigenous in a swampy path and lost one of the many sites that are called Totoro, in Colombia, has to attract attention. They can not invoke the dead unless the state who are Indians who are poor, who are the forgotten, that the FARC or the ELN. Events like this are not a simple avatar. A coincidence after another fail to be chance, to be anything else. A strategy deplorable, for example.

http://www.radiomundial.com.ve/yvke/noticia.php?t=16322

[Judi Lynn]

5. More, google translated on the assassination:

YVKE World: International
Popayan, this Tuesday
Colombian army killed the husband of an indigenous leader who led minga
Although the Army said it had fired at the vehicle 'by mistake' by failing to stop at the checkpoint, the version of the Indian community is that the attack was an attack against Quilcué, since she used to move in that vehicle

Press YVKE, TNR.
Tuesday, December 16, 2008. 12:53 p.m.

The husband of Aida Quilcue, native who led the march of thousands of Colombians Aboriginal last November, was killed Tuesday in an attack attributed to the army of that country, his family reported.

Edwin Legarda, husband of Quilcue, who is Maximum authority of the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC), died at a hospital in the city of Popayan (650 km southwest of Bogota) where he was taken after the attack.

Legarda, aged 28 and who received three bullet wounds, died when he was undergoing surgery, said his family, stating that "they were shot by rifle."

Legarda was reportedly killed while traveling to Popayan to pick up his wife, who was participating in the meeting of the UN Human Rights in Geneva.

Minutes earlier, when her husband was still operated, the leader of the CRIC said that the attack was against him, albeit not with him, and attributed to the Army.

"It is confirmed that the National Army," declared then to local media.

"According to initial information I get, at four o'clock passed a vehicle on that sector and what I am informed by the commander and soldiers who are there is they made a high, the vehicle did not stop and the soldiers fired," said The official radio Caracol.

"It was confused and unfortunately shot," he added, stressing that there was "no attack" and that he regretted the incident.

Although the Army said it had fired at the vehicle 'by mistake' by failing to stop at the checkpoint, the version of the Indian community is that the attack was an attack against Quilcue, since she used to move in that vehicle.

According to Ernesto Perafán, counsel for the CRIC, it was a retaliation against the Indian minga, because this is in addition to the decision to issue a warrant for the arrest of the Coordinator of the guard.

Perafán said that if the military justice system does not issue an arrest warrant against the soldiers involved, the indigenous guard is going to capture because the fact took place in territory of the community.

"He ran from the shelter of Paez to Popayan to pick up the counselor. The Army shot from several angles. Since both sides have impacts the car. Do not ancillary, but that left some vanilla and things on the floor," said Perafán.

The leader Quilcue in November led a protest by thousands of Indians in the department of Cauca, which included a march to Bogota, for the enforcement of agreements on surrender of lands and respect for their rights.

http://www.radiomundial.com.ve/yvke/noticia.php?16297



The indigenous leader, Aida Quilcue, denounced an
attack on her husband (Photo: File)

[Judi Lynn]

6. Separate story, published yesterday: Colombia's interior minister under investigation

Colombia's interior minister under investigation
Gonzalo Guillen
December 14, 2008 2:24 PM

McClatchy Newspapers

(MCT)

BOGOTA, Colombia - Colombia's Minister of the Interior and Justice Fabio Valencia Cossio is being investigated by the attorney general's office for allegedly enlisting the help of a paramilitary leader in winning a seat on the Conservative Party's leadership in 1995.

Valencia Cossio acknowledged he was ''notified by the Attorney General's Office, of the opening of a preliminary investigation,'' but denied any wrongdoing.

A 1995 letter allegedly signed by paramilitary leader Ramon Isaza, currently in a U.S. prison awaiting trial on cocaine trafficking charges, referred to Valencia Cossio's request. El Nuevo Herald gained access to the letter, a copy of which was sent at the time to Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, who was then serving as governor of the state of Antioquia.

The letter was addressed to Valencia Cossio, who was a senator at the time, and notes, ''I received the visit of doctors Gilberto Toro, former private secretary of the Government of Antioquia, and Pascual Agudelo, former representative from Antioquia.''

Isaza states that the two ''were sent by you to give me the message to tell the conservative councilmen who are my friends to vote for you during the upcoming National Conservative Convention.''

http://www.newspress.com/Top/Article/article.jsp?Section=WORLD&ID=565420938570891408

[Judi Lynn]

8. Story by Agence France-Presse, translated: Husband of indigenous protest leader shot dead by Colombi

Husband of indigenous protest leader shot dead by Colombian army
5 hours ago

BOGOTA (AFP) - The husband of an Indian who led protest marches of thousands of Colombians Aboriginal between October and November on Tuesday shot dead by the army, which he attributed the incident to an error and denied that he had been an attack.

Edwin Legarda, husband of Aida Quilque, the highest authority of the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC), was shot when traveling in a vehicle on the town of Totoro (southwest) and, according to the official version, not served a stop order in an army roadblock.

The Ministry of Defense "regretted" the deaths and said that there is "sufficient clarity on how the incidents occurred" in a press release, which also reported that requested the Office in Colombia of the high commissioner of the United Nations for Human Rights investigate the case.

Legarda of 28 years, reaching to be brought to life by other natives to a hospital in the city of Popayan (650 km southwest of Bogota), but died while being spoken, told AFP Quilque Giovanni, the brother of the leader.

The man, who worked in the preparations for a meeting of the CRIC on Tuesday in Totoro, received three impacts rifle, added the source.

Earlier, when her husband was still spoken, Quilque said it was an "assassination attempt" against him, albeit not with him, and attributed to the Army.

"It is confirmed that the National Army," he told radio Caracol.

But Gen. Justo Eliseo Pena, chief of the Division III military, said that Legarda, who was driving the car, was shot by failing to obey orders to his men.

"At four o'clock passed a vehicle on that sector and what I am informed by the commander and soldiers who are there is they made a high, the vehicle did not stop and the soldiers fired," said the official.

"It was confused and unfortunately shot," he added, stressing that there was "no attack" and that he regretted the incident.

Quilque led the protest of some 30,000 indigenous people in the department of Cauca, which included a march to Bogota, for the enforcement of agreements on surrender of land (in reparation for a slaughter) and respect for their rights.

In the first two weeks of the 'minga' (Resistance Movement) there were three Aboriginal riots that left hundreds dead and two wounded between natives and police.

Also as part of the mobilization, the Army claimed that an attack attributed to the FARC guerrillas, killing two soldiers on Nov. 10, was committed from an Indian reservation in Cauca, so I thought suspend the delivery of Aboriginal land to the then marched toward the capital.

Quilque had returned to Colombia on Monday, after attending in Geneva to review the status of the fundamental guarantees in his country by the Human Rights Council of the United Nations (UN).

The death of the Chaldean Legarda mood among the natives concentrated in Totoro for the assembly of the CRIC.

About 200 members of the civil guard of the association surrounded about 40 soldiers in the checkpoint where the fact occurred to stop them, they said.

"We have surrounded the army, we are not going to move," he said by telephone to AFP Albeiro Calambaz, a member of the CRIC, noting that an attack was "premeditated" and that the order "has 17 impacts," even in the windshield.

"We are moving our people to catch the murderers," he said in turn Luis Acosta, coordinator of the indigenous guard.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iIyU7K-rWe73YgghysvQkzQQKLVA

[MasonJar]

9. Hopefully that ends any contract with the current government of Columbia.

[tomp]

10. yeah, right. nt

[judasdisney]

11. Does Chavez kill his citizens? No. Yet Uribe is our ally, and Chavez is an "enemy"?

[Judi Lynn]

12. Colombia: A Day That Will Live in Infamy (Once Again)

Colombia: A Day That Will Live in Infamy (Once Again)
Written by Mario A. Murillo
Wednesday, 17 December 2008

Army's Killing of CRIC Member Tragically Marks 17th Anniversary of Nilo Massacre. Episode Coincides with Latest Act of Sabotage Against Nasa Community Radio Station in Northern Cauca.

December 16th is supposed to be a special day for most Colombians.
It’s the day that marks the start of what is called “La Novena,” the traditional nine-day countdown to Christmas.

~snip~
But this December 16th will not be one of joy for Aida Quilcué and her family. Indeed, December 16th is once again being marked as a day of violence and terror for the indigenous communities of Cauca, and for the entire country.

This morning, at about 4:00am, on the road between Inzá, Tierradentro, and Totoró, on indigenous territory, the official car of the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca, CRIC, was shot at 19 times by a column of the Third Division of the Army, fatally wounding the driver, Edwin Legarda Vázquez, Quilcué’s husband. Quilcué is the Chief Counsel of CRIC, and one of the most visible leaders of the recent Indigenous and Popular Minga that began on October 11th, culminating in a massive march and rally in downtown Bogotá on November 21st.

Three bullets penetrated Legarda, who did not survive the emergency surgery he was given after being rushed to San José Hospital in Popayán, the departmental capital.

But most people close to CRIC believe the bullets were really meant for his wife, who apparently was just returning from Geneva where she had been participating in the United Nations Human Rights Commission sessions on Colombia. She was not in the car when the attack occurred.

Ernesto Parafán, the lawyer for CRIC, believes it was a deliberate act committed against the organization, and specifically an attempt on Quilcués life by the government’s security apparatus. According to the indigenous leadership, Quilcué, along with other prominent leaders, has received numerous death threats in recent months, especially during the six weeks of mobilization and protests that captured the attention of both national and international public opinion.

General Justo Eliceo Peña, commander of the Army’s Third Division in Cauca, acknowledged on Caracol Radio that various members of the Army did indeed fire at CRIC’s car, a vehicle recognized throughout the area for its tinted windows, and for its countless trips throughout the mountainous terrain regularly carrying the movement’s leadership, particularly Quilcué. According to the General, his troops fired because the car did not stop at the military roadblock set up in the area. General Peña later expressed regrets for the attack, recognizing that even if they had not obeyed orders to stop, the excessive volley of bullets was not appropriate, and violated the Army’s protocol.

~snip~
"I think the attack was for me,” Quilcué later told Caracol Radio, in reference to her role in the MINGA social.

The Association of Indigenous Councils of Northern Cauca, ACIN, pointed out on its website that the area where Legarda was killed was near the Finca San Miguel in the village of Gabriel López in Totoró, “a property where there is a permanent presence of the National Army,” making it highly unlikely that the soldiers did not recognize the vehicle as being that of CRIC, one of the most prominent social organizations in the country.

Meanwhile, Perafán was quoted in El Tiempo saying that if the military does not thoroughly investigate, capture the perpetrators and bring them to justice, the Indigenous Guard of the community will do so “because these crimes were carried out within the territory of the (indigenous) community.”

~snip~
If one considers the long track record of the government’s deliberately lackluster investigations into crimes committed by state actors against the indigenous movement, there is considerable reason for the community to be concerned. Today’s tragic incident ironically comes on the 17th anniversary of one of the most brutal episodes of Colombia's violent history against indigenous people, and perhaps its most despicable account of criminal cover up and public deception.

On Dec. 16, 1991, 20 indigenous people from the Huellas-Caloto community, including five women and four children, were murdered as they met to discuss a struggle over land rights in the estate of El Nilo in northern Cauca. Some 60 hooded gunmen stormed into the building where the community was meeting and opened fire. Initial news reports indicated that the gunmen were drug traffickers who had been seizing land in the region to grow opium poppies to produce heroin, but it soon became apparent that the culprits of the massacre were much more than simple narco-traffickers operating outside of the law. The killings had followed a relentless pattern of harassment and threats against the indigenous community by gunmen loyal to local landowners who were disputing the indigenous community’s claim to ownership of the land. In many ways, it was a massacre foretold.

According to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the Special Investigations Unit of the Office of the Attorney General, which handled the first stages of the investigation into the massacre, uncovered evidence of the involvement of members of the National Police, both before and during the execution of these horrific events. They were working hand in hand with drug traffickers and wealthy landowners, who were not comfortable with the organizing and mobilizing capacity of CRIC and the local communities.

~snip~
Silencing the Truth in Northern Cauca

The senseless tragedy befalling Quilcué, her family, CRIC and the entire indigenous community of Colombia is currently being reported peripherally by the corporate national news media such as El Tiempo, Caracol Radio and other sources. However, one media outlet where it is not currently being reported is on the community radio station of the Nasa people of northern cauca, Radio Pa’yumat, licensed to the ACIN.

Over the weekend, the station’s transmitter equipment, and antenna were severely damaged in an act of sabotage by as of yet unnamed actors, although the community refers to the perpetrators as the same forces of terror that continue to try to silence the indigenous movement with acts of violence.

More:
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/1634/68/

[Judi Lynn]

13. Colombia: Amnesty International condemns killing by security forces of husband of indigenous leader

Colombia: Amnesty International condemns killing by security forces of husband of indigenous leader
Source: Amnesty International (AI)

Date: 17 Dec 2008


Indigenous Peoples in Colombia are once again paying the price of a seemingly never-ending armed conflict, said Amnesty International today after the killing yesterday, by army troops, of Edwin Legarda, the husband of Indigenous leader Aida Quilcué.

Edwin Legarda was fatally injured after being shot by the security forces while travelling to the city of Popayán in Cauca Department, in the south of the country, to pick up his wife, Aída Quilcué, leader of the Indigenous organization, Consejo Regional Indígena del Cauca (CRIC). The vehicle he was travelling in was hit 17 times and Edwin Legarda, who was injured in the shooting, later died in hospital.

Aida Quilcué was returning from Geneva, after attending the Human Rights Council's (HRC) Universal Periodic Review session on Colombia. At the HRC she had publicly raised concerns about human rights violations against Indigenous Peoples, including killings by the security forces. In Colombia, she had also played a prominent role in recent demonstrations by Indigenous people in support of land rights and in protest at human rights violations.

"The killing of Edwin Legarda once again puts a spotlight on growing concerns about the killing of civilians by the security forces and on the precarious security situation of Indigenous Peoples in Colombia. The Colombian authorities must carry out an immediate, exhaustive and impartial investigation into this killing and bring to justice in the civilian courts all those responsible," said Amnesty International.

More:
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900SID/VDUX-7MESWB?OpenDocument

[Judi Lynn]

14. Q&A: Killing of Native Leader’s Husband "Was a Planned Operation"

Q&A: Killing of Native Leader’s Husband "Was a Planned Operation"
Constanza Vieira interviews indigenous leader DARÍO TOTE

BOGOTÁ, Dec 17 (IPS) - At 5.30 AM the fog was just starting to lift in the freezing cold mountains of eastern Cauca, in southwest Colombia, when indigenous leader Darío Tote came across the red pickup truck riddled with bullet holes. At the wheel was Edwin Legarda, who was critically wounded.

The lights of the double cabin pickup truck used by the leadership of the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC) were still on. Two of the 17 bullets that hit the car went through the windshield.

When Tote opened the door of the vehicle, which had come to a stop on the road, Legarda, the husband of CRIC leader Ayda Quilcué, "was unconscious," Tote told IPS in this interview.

Tote and his companions drove Legarda and the nurse who was accompanying him, who was also wounded, to the hospital in the town of Totoró.

From there, an ambulance took them to Popayán, the capital of the southwestern department (province) of Cauca, where Legarda died in the hospital at 8:00 AM Tuesday morning, nearly four hours after he was shot.

The authorities did not release Legarda’s body until 12 hours later, said Tote.

"We are going to hold a wake for him in the CRIC offices in Popayán, and on Wednesday we will hold a public hearing and a march" in this city, he added.

On Thursday, Legarda’s remains will be taken to the remote rural hamlet of Itaibe in the foothills of the Andes mountains, on the border between the provinces of Huila and Cauca.

Legarda’s widow, Quilcué, is the leader of the National Minga of Indigenous and Popular Resistance, which began in October as a massive protest movement against killings of native people and in defence of indigenous rights. ("Minga" means a traditional indigenous gathering for a collective purpose).

The leaders of the Minga have received death threats from the far-right paramilitary Águilas Negras (Black Eagles) and from a group supposedly created by landowners, which goes by the name of "Campesinos Embejucados del Cauca" (Furious Farmers of Cauca).

More:
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=45150

[Delphinus]

15. This is so sad.

I have no doubt this was meant for her.

Thank you, Judi Lynn, for all the translation.

[Judi Lynn]

17. Thanks for your comment. Here's a short article:

Colombia: army kills indigenous leader
Submitted by WW4 Report on Sun, 12/21/2008 - 05:24.

At 4 AM on Dec. 16, indigenous leader Edwin Legarda Vázquez was killed by the Colombian army as he was driving a pickup truck belonging to the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC), in which his partner, Aida Quilcué often traveled in. CRIC leader Quilcué gained national stature for her role in the indigenous rights campaign that mobilized thousands throughout Colombia this fall.

The Defense Ministry has admitted that Legarda was killed by soldiers, who shot 17 bullets into the car. While the government says he failed to stop at a checkpoint, indigenous organizations say the killing was politically motivated. Hilario Sánchez, the indigenous mayor of the town of Totoró, where the injured Legarda was first taken, said "there is no indication of the existence of a military checkpoint in that area," and the pickup truck "was shot at from all sides." (The Dominion, Canada, Dec. 17; IPS, Dec. 16)

The killing comes on the 17th anniversary of one of the massacre at El Nilo estate in northern Cauca department, where some 60 hooded gunmen opened fire on an meeting of indigenous activists engaged in a land occupation. (Upside Down World, Dec. 17)

On the day of the assassination, indigenous leaders from Cauca were attending an Andean indigenous summit in La Paz, Bolivia, where they reported on the campaign of "extermination" being waged by the Colombian state.

http://www.ww4report.com/node/6550

So many incidents like this have remained "unsolved," meaning they're not going to do a damned thing, since it's what they wanted. Indigenous people, African-Colombian, union workers, human rights workers, would-be investigative journalists who haven't fled the country or haven't been assassinated yet, and publicly known "leftists" are all in jeopardy.

So ugly knowing our hard-earned tax-dollars are being used to prop up this violent, fascist, corrupt administration, and 3rd largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid in the world.

[gratuitous]

16. Aw, jeez

Okay, by the numbers:

1. Car was speeding.
2. Didn't obey an order to stop.
3. Ignored warning shots through the windshield.
4. It was comin' right at us!
5. Military investigation exonerates military accused.
6. Case closed.

There. All better now?