Bush Continues to Support Colombia’s Para-State

[struggle4progress]

March 5, 2007

y Garry Leech

As the Colombian government becomes increasingly engulfed by the rapidly evolving “para-politics” scandal, the Bush administration refuses to question the legitimacy of democracy in Colombia. The US government continues to stand firmly behind Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, Washington’s closest ally in Latin America, despite the fact that dozens of pro-Uribe legislators, the president’s former campaign advisor and head of Colombia’s secret police, the family of his foreign minister, and several top military officials have all been implicated in the scandal linking government representatives to right-wing paramilitary death squads. Despite all the overwhelming evidence suggesting a significant democratic deficit, the Bush administration has not once questioned the legitimacy of Colombia’s democracy or re-evaluated its massive funding of a government and military closely linked to paramilitaries on the US State Department’s list of terrorist organizations.

... when AUC leader Salvatore Mancuso confessed his crimes in order to obtain a reduced sentence under the Justice and Peace Law, the only government and military officials he named as collaborators with the paramilitaries were either dead or already in prison, thereby posing no threat to ongoing collusion.

Most of the information that led to the para-politics investigation was retrieved from the laptop of paramilitary leader Rodrigo Tovar Pupo, also known as Jorge 40, who is also participating in the demobilization process. However, neither the laptop nor the information it contained were delivered to authorities as part of the demobilization process. The laptop was discovered in the possession of Jorge 40’s right-hand man when he was arrested last year. Investigators got their hands on this information following a criminal arrest that had nothing to do with the demobilization of the paramilitaries ...

President Uribe has responded to legislators who have used the revelations to criticize his government’s links to the paramilitaries by accusing them of being terrorists ...

http://www.colombiajournal.org/colombia252.htm