Colombia Free Trade Deal Could Boost Cocaine Exports

[Judi Lynn]

Published on Monday, May 9, 2011
by OtherWords
Colombia Free Trade Deal Could Boost Cocaine Exports
There's only one Colombian industry that can potentially employ workers who would lose their job in the wake of a free trade deal.
by Jess Hunter-Bowman

Manuel Esteban Tejada was a teacher in the Colombian province of Cordoba, near the Panamanian border. Unfortunately for him, he was also a union member. On January 10, paramilitary gunmen broke into his house at 6 a.m. and shot him multiple times, killing him.

Tejada was the first trade unionist killed in Colombia in 2011, but not the last. At least five more have already been killed this year. Colombian and international labor officials report that 51 unionized workers in Colombia were killed in 2010--25 of them teachers. More union members were killed in Colombia last year than in the rest of the world combined.

The fact that Colombia is the most dangerous country in the world to belong to a union hasn't kept President Barack Obama from backing a free-trade deal with the South American nation that would further erode labor rights and wages.

Obama and Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos recently announced a labor rights "action plan" as a ploy to gain congressional votes in favor of the controversial deal. The Obama administration hopes this effort, which would do virtually nothing to deal with the violence targeting labor leaders, will convince some Democrats to hold their noses and vote for the trade deal, despite Colombia's deadly labor track record.

More:
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/05/09-11

Editorials:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x601863

[Peace Patriot]

1. See my comment at...

Editorials
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x601863

They are going to destroy millions of small farmers in Colombia, with U.S. "free trade for the rich", and these will be driven into coca leaf production to boost the trillion+ dollar cocaine revenue stream to U.S. banksters, the CIA and the Bush Cartel.

The horror of what our transglobal corporate/war profiteer rulers have done to Colombia never ends.