BOLIVIA: GAS BILL PASSES, PROTESTS EXPLODE

from Weekly News Update on the Americas

PREZ FAILS TO EASE PROTESTS

Some 15,000 campesinos, students and other protesters filled the Plaza Murillo in La Paz on May 30 to demand nationalization of Bolivia’s natural gas resources and the seating of a constitutional assembly. Police did not repress the protests, which on May 30 were mainly limited to La Paz and the adjoining city of El Alto. (La Jornada, Mexico, May 31 from AFP, DPA)

The next day, May 31, more than 50,000 people gathered in La Paz for what Associated Press called the biggest demonstration since the latest round of protests began on May 16. Rural school teachers, members of El Alto’s neighborhood organizations, Aymara indigenous campesinos from the Altiplano region of La Paz department and other protesters closed off access to the center of the capital, blowing up sticks of dynamite and blocking all the major intersections with burning tires. Police used tear gas and clashed with the marchers, especially El Alto university students. In El Alto itself, everything was closed by a civic strike which began May 23. As night fell, thousands of protesters remained in La Paz, and police used more tear gas and rubber bullets to try to disperse them. At least 10 people were wounded by rubber bullets and seven people were arrested. (LJ, June 1 from correspondent; El Nuevo Herald, Miami, June 1 from AP)

On June 1, more than 10,000 rural and urban public school teachers marched again through La Paz, as did a huge contingent of small business owners and vendors from El Alto and Aymara campesinos from the Altiplano. By the afternoon of June 1, the protests in La Paz had calmed, but in the communities of Ayo Ayo and El Tholar in the Altiplano, Aymara campesinos began blockading the roads that connect the capital with cities to the south and east. The roads linking La Paz with Chile and Peru to the north and west had already been blocked since May 28. In Cochabamba, campesinos and factory workers led a massive march through the center of the city on June 1 for the same consensus demands of nationalization and a constitutional assembly. In Santa Cruz de la Sierra, where the wealthy business class has been pushing demands for regional autonomy, rightwing paramilitary thugs from the Union of Crucenista Youth attacked a campesino march arriving from the north of Santa Cruz department. Local police broke up the fight with tear gas. (LJ, June 2 from correspondent)

Transport workers in La Paz began a two-day strike on June 2. (Miami Herald , June 4)

At 11 PM on June 2, after the Bolivian Congress failed for the second consecutive day to reach agreement on bills to convoke a constitutional assembly and a national referendum on regional autonomy, President Carlos Mesa Gisbert announced he was issuing Supreme Decree 28195, which sets Oct. 16 as the date when Bolivians will elect representatives for the constitutional assembly and decide the regional autonomy question in a referendum. The decree must be ratified by Congress in order to be valid. In his televised announcement, Mesa emphasized that the constitutional assembly is the best forum to reconsider the hydrocarbons law which took effect on May 17 and to take up the issue of nationalization. La Paz mayor Juan del Granado, a former leftist, played a key role by meeting with Mesa earlier in the day and pressing him to issue the decree. “If this decision is not ratified by Congress,” announced Del Granado, “all the institutions of La Paz will go on hunger strike.” (LJ, June 3)

Abel Mamani of the El Alto Federation of Neighborhood Committees (FEJUVE) said on June 3 that the decree is “illegal” and fails to address “the main demand of the social organizations, which is the nationalization of the hydrocarbons.” (AP, June 3) Movement to Socialism (MAS) leader Evo Morales also blasted Mesa’s decree as “absolutely anti-constitutional” and called it a “show” with which the president seeks to “demobilize the people.” (LJ, June 3) Leaders of the Santa Cruz business class are likewise dissatisfied with Mesa’s decree; they insist the autonomy vote be held on Aug. 12. (Miami Herald, June 4)

Earlier on June 2, Morales and other MAS deputies had blocked Congress from simultaneously considering the bills on regional autonomy and the constitutional assembly, as it had agreed to do the night before. MAS said Congress must first pass the constitutional assembly bill. Congress president Hormando Vaca Diez, a senator from Santa Cruz, blasted the move by MAS, and citing inadequate conditions, suspended legislative sessions until June 7. Hundreds of campesino coca growers (cocaleros) from the Chapare region of Cochabamba department–Morales’ base of support–gathered outside the Congress building and tried to keep the legislators from leaving. They managed to beat up one senator, Gonzalo Chirveches. (LJ, June 3)

On June 3, as the transport strike paralyzed La Paz for a second day and protesters blockaded more than 40 highways in eight of Bolivia’s nine departments, leaders of the Catholic Church announced they would seek to mediate a solution to the conflict. (AP, June 3) Also on June 3, the Confederation of Urban Teachers of Bolivia announced it was rejecting the government’s latest salary offer and would maintain the open-ended national general strike which started May 6. The same day, La Paz teachers took Deputy Education Minister Celestino Choque hostage in an effort to force him to explain why the Education Ministry claimed that unionized teachers earn high salaries and bonuses. (Los Tiempos de Cochabamba, June 4)

In Santa Cruz department, Radio Erbol reported that nearly 2,000 campesinos had seized the gas wells of the Chaco company to demand nationalization and the constitutional assembly. (Resumen Latinoamericano, June 3 from Bolpress)

In San Pablo, Trinidad, a group of military and police agents were attacked with gunfire as they tried to dismantle a blockade from the San Pablo bridge on the highway linking Trinidad to Santa Cruz. Three people were killed. Presidency Minister Jose Galindo said the troops were ambushed by hired professionals. (Los Tiempos, June 4)

As of June 4, highways were blocked at more than 55 points in seven Bolivian departments, with La Paz and Oruro departments having the most blockades. Early on June 4, the Assembly of the Guarani People (APG) set up a blockade along the Camiri-Santa Cruz route, joining the demands for a constitutional assembly and nationalization of the gas. The APG is also demanding the creation of a 10th department in the Chaco region of Bolivia, to include four provinces currently located in Santa Cruz, Chuq uisaca and Tarija departments. In Cochabamba department, cocaleros say they will blockade a main highway through the Chapare on June 6 if the nationalization issue is not resolved. (La Razon, La Paz, June 5; Resumen Latinoamericano, June 3 from Bolpress]

In other news, in a May 25 operation organized by the Santa Cruz departmental government, military troops and police agents forcibly evicted members of the Bolivian Movement of Landless Rural Workers (MST) from the Los Yuquises estate in Santiesteban province, Santa Cruz department. No injuries were reported. From May 8 to 12, the Los Yuquises squatters had held hostage a group of 60 people who were hired to attack them. (Bolivia Press, from Centro de Documentacion e Informacion Bolivia, CEDIB, May 27; Alai-amlatina, May 25; Bolpress, May 25)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, June 5

On May 23, some 5,000 Bolivian coca growers (cocaleros) from the Chapare region of Cochabamba department arrived in La Paz after a four-day, 200-kilometer march from the town of Caracollo in Oruro department to press for national control of oil and natural gas resources and the convening of a constitutional assembly. The Federation of Neighborhood Committees (FEJUVE) in El Alto began an open-ended general strike the same day. As the cocaleros passed through El Alto into La Paz, El Alto’s organized indigenous majority chanted demands for “not 30%, nor 50% royalties–nationalization!” Bolivia’s popular movements are pressing for full nationalization of hydrocarbons resources, while MAS leader Evo Morales, who headed the cocalero march, has reaped harsh criticism for his compromise proposal that the government increase gas royalties to 50%.

American Airlines cancelled all its flights to the La Paz international airport–located in El Alto–and other airlines cancelled some flights. As many as 50,000 street vendors and other small-scale merchants joined the cocalero marchers and El Alto residents in mobilizations in La Paz, culminating in a massive rally in San Francisco Plaza. As Morales spoke, some people in the crowd shouted “nationalization” and “close the parliament.” Morales, who is a legislative deputy, insisted that Congress should not be shut down. Other speakers included Bolivian Workers Central (COB) executive secretary Jaime Solares, who called for nationalization, the closing of the parliament and the resignation of President Carlos Mesa Gisbert, and urged the military to join the people in defeating the oligarchy.

Weekly News Update on the Americas, May 29

GAS LAW SPARKS PROTEST WAVE

On May 16, some 10,000 Bolivian workers, campesinos and unemployed people marched into the center of La Paz from El Alto to press for the nationalization of oil and gas resources, the convening of a constitutional assembly and other demands. The protesters tried to topple security fences and push past a heavy contingent of agents from the Special Security Group to reach the Plaza Murillo and seize the national legislature; police barely managed to keep them back using tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannons. The tear gas drifted into nearby schools, forcing teachers to abruptly cancel classes and children to flee through the streets in a panic. (El Diario, La Paz; AP, May 17)

At the same time, thousands of miners set up road blockades on May 16 at numerous points in the center of Bolivia, halting transportation between the departments of La Paz, Oruro, Potosi and Cochabamba. The action was organized by the National Federation of Mining Cooperatives (FENCOMIN) to draw attention to specific demands relating to the mining sector, and to push for nationalization of hydrocarbons resources. (ED, May 17)

The same day, May 16, 5,000 campesinos and workers began marching to La Paz from Caracollo, in Oruro department, to demand the nationalization of hydrocarbons and the immediate convening of a constitutional assembly. The marchers included members of the Only Union Confederation of Bolivian Campesino Workers (CSUTCB) and the COB, as well as campesino coca growers from the Cochabamba tropics, oil workers, irrigation workers and members of the MST. ([ED, May 17, 18)

On May 17, Senate president Hormando Vaca Diez signed into law a controversial hydrocarbons bill which maintains royalties on gas production at 18% but creates a new 32% direct tax on production and requires companies to renegotiate their existing contracts with the government to comply with the new rules. Congress passed the bill late on May 5, and Mesa declined to either sign it, return it Congress with recommended changes or veto it outright. Vaca Diez apparently had no choice but to sign the bill; article 78 of the Bolivian Constitution dictates that if the president fails to act on a law within 10 days of receiving it from Congress, the president of the Congress must promulgate it. The law was published and took effect on May 18. (AP, May 17)

On May 17, as soon as Vaca Diez signed the law, the Bolivian Chamber of Hydrocarbons (CBH), a business group of oil and gas companies with investments in Bolivia, issued a communique blasting the new legislation. The CBH said that while the gas companies would remain in Bolivia, they would freeze their investments. “We believe this law has a confiscatory character which affects rights recognized by the contracts, laws and the Political Constitution of the state and international treaties,” said the communique. The main players in CBH are the Spanish company Repsol YPF, British Gas and British Petroleum, Brazil’s Petrobras and the French company Total. (AP, May 18)

On May 17, after Vaca Diez signed the law, Mesa gave a lengthy address on television and radio announcing a new economic and social program called “Bolivia, Productive and in Solidarity,” for the period from 2005 to 2007. Most of the country’s social sectors seem to have ignored Mesa’s plan or dismissed it as a feeble attempt to stem popular protests. “Carlos Mesa is trying, once more, to fool Bolivians; but the simple working people, from the country and the city, have a clear idea that at this moment we have to nationalize the hydrocarbons and call a constitutional assembly to avoid a social uprising with unpredictable consequences,” said Cochabamba factory workers’ leader Oscar Olivera, spokesperson for the Gas Coordinating Committee. (ED, May 18; Servicio Informativo “Alai-amlatina”, May 19) MAS leader Evo Morales called Mesa’s plan a “distractionist maneuver.” (El Nuevo Herald, May 21 from AP)

On May 18, some 1,000 miners and El Alto residents marched into La Paz, firing off sticks of dynamite and demanding Mesa’s resignation; police used tear gas and water cannons to disperse them. (ENH, May 19 from AP)

Later on May 18, the government signed an agreement with the leaders of the mining cooperatives to end the blockades which had kept inter-city transportation in Bolivia almost completely shut down for three days. The government agreed to assign more of the new gas tax revenues to the departments of La Paz, Oruro and Potosi; provide some $7 million in credits and financial assistance, along with help in purchasing equipment and building homes; extend rent agreements between the state-run Bolivian Mining Corporation (Comibol) and mining cooperatives; limit taxes imposed on mining cooperatives; and regulate the companies which buy ore from the cooperatives. (ED, AP, May 19)

On May 19 nearly 2,000 miners, together with campesinos, unionists and El Alto residents, shut down the center of La Paz and forced Congress to suspend debate over a law authorizing a referendum on local autonomy being promoted by the rightwing oligarchies of Santa Cruz–the country’s wealthiest department–and the gas-rich southern department of Tarija. Despite conflicts among the legislators, the Chamber of Deputies gave initial approval to the autonomy referendum and was set to begin debate over each of the bill’s articles when COB leader Jaime Solares and El Alto council members Roberto de la Cruz and Wilson Soria, together with a group of workers, tried to occupy the legislative chamber. Police used tear gas to block their entry, but after Solares threatened to bring in “500 miners with dynamite to close the Parliament” the session was abruptly suspended and the Santa Cruz deputies fled out the back door. (LJ, May 20; ED, May 19)

Thousands of people marched again in La Paz on May 20 to press the same demands for nationalization of the gas, against the autonomy referendum and for a constitutional assembly. The march brought together campesinos, miners and unionists from the COB with university students, teachers and state health workers. Also on May 20, police arrested two people and confiscated 4,589 sticks of dynamite and other explosives in El Alto which they said might be used in protests. (LJ, May 21 from AFP, DPA)

On May 21, the Santa Cruz Provisional Autonomy Assembly (APA) announced it would not wait for Congress to approve the autonomy measure but would instead call its own binding referendum on autonomy to be held on Aug. 12. Tarija has reportedly joined in the call for the Aug. 12 referendum, as have the departments of Beni and Pando in the Bolivian Amazon. (LJ, May 22 from DPA, AFP, Reuters)

La Paz got a break from protests on May 21 and 22 as the city celebrated an important traditional folkloric dance festival in honor of the “Lord of Great Power.” (ENH, May 22 from AP)

Weekly News Update on the Ameicas, May 22

According to the Miami Herald, some of Mesa’s advisers had told him to reject the bill because foreign lenders had made clear that if the bill passed, Bolivia risked a cutoff of credits. High-ranking officials in Argentina, France, Spain and Brazil–home to companies with oil or gas investments in Bolivia–privately told the Mesa administration that if he signed the gas bill Bolivia would face reprisals, including billion-dollar lawsuits by the companies, according to an unnamed Western diplomat cited by the Miami Herald.

Other advisers had reportedly urged Mesa to sign the bill, saying that rejecting it would prompt new protests and perhaps force Congress to consider imposing even higher taxes on corporations. (Miami Herald, May 12 from correspondent)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, May 15

SQUATTERS TAKE HOSTAGES

On May 8, a group of armed assailants hired by local landowners, accompanied by Ayoreo indigenous people they had contracted as thugs, attacked the Pueblos Unidos (United Peoples) rural squatter encampment on the Los Yuquises estate in Santiesteban province in the eastern Bolivian department of Santa Cruz. According to Bolivia’s Movement of Landless Rural Workers (MST) and the Unity Pact, an eastern region coalition of indigenous, campesino and grassroots groups, at least three squatters were disappeared in the attack and a number of people were beaten. Two people were wounded, one squatter and one assailant. The assailants also burned rice and pineapple crops and several homes. (Bolivia Press, May 10; Adita, May 13)

MST members responded by taking 60 assailants hostage. On May 10, a delegation headed by Minister of Goverment Saul Lara and national police commander David Aramayo went to the area to try to negotiate the release of the hostages. The delegation included representatives from the Ministry of Sustainable Development, the Permanent Assembly for Human Rights of Bolivia (APDHB), the Catholic Church and the International Committee of the Red Cross. On May 12, the squatters agreed to release the hostages after the government promised to prioritize making a determination on ownership of the Los Yuquises estate, and distributed land to MST members. (Adital, May 13; El Diario, La Paz, May 11, 12)

The assailants said they were hired to harvest rice for 50 bolivianos ($6.18) a day, but when they arrived to work they were given weapons and told to violently evict the squatters. Local residents said landowners send recruiters to impoverished neighborhoods on the outskirts of the city of Santa Cruz to hire members for their “shock troops.”

MST leader Silverio Vera said the conflict at Los Yuquises concerns an estate which has no owner, but which is being sought by businessperson Rafael Paz and his brother. The land conflicts in Santa Cruz intensified after the MST exposed the illegal appropriation by business owners of properties in the north of the department which the government had promised to distribute to landless families. Both the squatters and the business owners blame the National Agrarian Reform Institute (INRA) for being too slow in assessing and distributing land. (Adital, May 13)

Bolivia’s conservative media mainly covered the incident at Los Yuquises from the perspective of Santa Cruz business owners who called the MST a “subversive” and “terrorist” group and demanded that the military forcibly evict all squatters in the region. Jose Cespedes, president of the Agricultural Chamber of the East (CAO), said that if authorities don’t stop the MST, “we will be obliged to make use of the legitimate right to defense, with measures proportionate to the constant aggressions we suffer at the hands of the invaders.” Cespedes claimed the MST is using its encampments as training camps for an armed movement. (ED, May 11; Adital, May 13)

Weekly News Update on the Americas, May 15

Weekly News Update on the Americas
http://home.earthlink.net/~nicadlw/wnuhome.html

See also WW4 REPORT #108
/boliviagasbill

——————-

Reprinted by WORLD WAR 4 REPORT, June 10, 2005
Reprinting permissible with attribution

http://WW4Report.com

PLASTIC TOTALITARIANISM

Bankruptcy, “Anti-Terror” Laws Make Americans Captive Wards of Credit Industry

by Chesley Hicks

“Bankruptcy should always be a last resort in our legal system. If someone does not pay his or her debts, the rest of society ends up paying them. In recent years, too many people have abused the bankruptcy laws. They’ve walked away from debts even when they had the ability to repay them. This has made credit less affordable and less accessible, especially for low-income workers who already face financial obstacles.”

If someone other than Dubya, who uttered these words upon signing the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005, had said that, I might’ve thought, Yes, you must pay for what you buy. My mind might’ve switched away from our country’s shrinking wild forests and shriveling civil liberties to images of absconded executives drinking mimosas in their Caribbean mansions after sinking a company and leaving behind employees without jobs, health care, and earned pensions. I might’ve thought of a deadbeat Dad on the lam with his new girlfriend in the sports car they bought and put in her name; or remembered the girl I knew in college who came from a wealthy family, spent her hearty cash allowance on drugs, and ran up credit card bills buying booze, clothes, and all the records I ever wanted before defaulting on her credit cards when her parents wouldn’t pay the bills.

“The law will also allow us to clamp down on bankruptcy mills that make their money by advising abusers on how to game the system.” Bush also said. Yeah, screw the slimy swindlers! I might say.

But this was Bush talking. So instead I assume that the would-be ire roused in the self-righteous, bill-paying part of me probably reflects what a portion of the rest of the country believes when they hear Bush decree.

The Republicans are masters at making you look with indictment over your shoulder to see if your neighbor might be getting over with your tax money or having ungodly sex in your country, while they go whole-hog with your money, land, and freedom. Though the Bush administration will blithely propound the most preposterous of subterfuges to keep you glaring in the wrong direction, there’s usually some grain of truth in their ruse to give it enough traction to stand for as long as they need the public to look away from reality.

In reality, the new bankruptcy law might very well put the breaks on the deadbeat dad, and teach the profligate college student a hard lesson in fiscal responsibility. But the percentage of bankruptcy filers who got there through wanton indulgence is not representative. A study published in February by the Harvard Medical and Law Schools found that “Half of personal bankruptcies are predated by medical problems, even among the insured–75.7% had insurance at the onset of illness. Even middle class, insured families often fall prey to financial catastrophe when sick. In 2001, 1.458 million American families filed for bankruptcy.” Anyone who is honestly interested in understanding the current dynamics of bankruptcy should look foremost at our volatile economy and a woefully imbalanced health care system.

“America is a nation of personal responsibility where people are expected to meet their obligations. We’re also a nation of fairness and compassion where those who need it most are afforded a fresh start,” Bush also said. Help the truly needy and keep everyone honest, I might’ve said… except:

As for those abusing the system, while Repubs are bearing down on low- and middle-income debtors, the mimosa-sucking executive can keep sucking because there’s a nifty little loophole in the bill that allows the protection of substantial assets from creditors even after a bankruptcy filing. It’s called the asset-trust provision, and according to a March 2 New York Times article, “For years, wealthy people looking to keep their money out of the reach of domestic creditors have set up [offshore asset protection trusts]. But since 1997, lawmakers in five states–Alaska, Delaware, Nevada, Rhode Island and Utah–have passed legislation exempting assets held domestically in such trusts from the federal bankruptcy code. People who want to establish one of these trusts do not have to reside in any of the five states; they need only set it up through an institution located there.” The trusts cost thousands of dollars to establish and maintain, making them an option only for wealthy people, earning the asset-trust provision the title “millionaires loophole.” Bush is sooo predictable.

With that in mind, go online and look over the list of amendments that were rejected during the Senate hearing that ultimately passed the new bankruptcy bill: amendments with names like “To exempt debtors whose financial problems were caused by failure to receive alimony or child support, or both, from means testing,” or “To modify the bill to protect families.” Reading the list of amendments clearly intended to make the bill more equitable but cynically rejected, you’ll see that the “millionaire loophole” was no oversight. Read between the lines and you’ll also see who really benefits from the new bill: the country’s largely unregulated credit industry.

The supporters of the new bankruptcy bill, including credit behemoth MBNA, the sixth highest contributor to Bush’s 2004 campaign, claim that by tightening bankruptcy laws, more money will be made available to a broad spectrum of people seeking credit and loans. While this might sound good in theory, the reality is that the credit industry is helping to create an underclass of people permanently stuck the debt cycle.

According to Business Daily Bulletin of May 15, citing data from the Federal Reserve, “A year ago, approximately 1.59 million people filed for personal bankruptcy, 700,000 more filings than a decade ago. Consumer debt also continues to rise, currently hovering at $2.12 trillion, 100 percent greater than a decade ago.”

We live in a debt culture. Many Americans begin their young adult lives in debt, paying back school loans. Over the last decade, most of us have probably noticed the proliferation of credit card culture. Credit card companies offer feeless cards, free airline miles, student accounts that don’t require a parental cosign, retail tie-ins, and zero-percent introduction rates. For the financially secure, this has been an opportunity to sometimes get something for nothing. For the growing numbers of financially insecure Americans, it’s been a lure into debt indenture. For the credit companies it’s been a windfall.

In 1996, the credit card industry made $1.7 billion dollars on late fees. In 2002, it made $7.3 billion. With the inclusion of other new fees: balance transfer fees, over-the-limit fees, cash advance fees, and foreign exchange fees, the number rises. In 1995 the industry made $8.3 billion in collected fees. In 2004 it made $24 billion.

Add to this the spoils collected via unchecked usury–that is, arbitrarily applying fees to any transaction, and inflating the fees every chance it gets–and you’ve got an industry that’s so far in the black, it’s benighted the entire system.

For those of you with cards, scrutinize the fine print. You’ll find that payment periods have shrunk from 30 to 20 days; grace periods have been eliminated, and a single late payment will result in the raising of your rates to 18, 29, or 35 percent. Some reports say that creditors are sending bills closer to their due dates in order to increase the odds of the bills being paid late. Creditors can also arbitrarily raise the rates on your non-delinquent accounts if they find out you were late paying off another account owned by another creditor.

Despite laws, including 1971’s Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), which protect consumers from unfair and inaccurate collection of personal information to form credit profiles, or “scores,” it is only within the last year that consumers have been allowed unfettered access to these reports (see www.annualcreditreport.com).

Still, information can be traded between credit card companies, insurance companies, landlords and other entities that handle your money. Even the recent privacy act (the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999) hasn’t been able to entirely lift the black veil. Insurance credit-evaluation policies, in particular, remain inscrutable. While the collection of credit data for risk-assessment is meant to provide for judicious lending that will ultimately supply more money to more people who will benefit from it, its flaws assist in keeping low- to mid-income people in debt. For instance, an employed mother who uses a credit card to get through a medical crisis, and misses or pays late one credit card bill, might find rates for other cards, with which she has not been late, rise due to those creditors having checked her updated credit score. If she subsequently should try to get her sixteen year-old son car insurance, she might find she is only offered high insurance rates, due to her now flawed record. So she’s now not only paying off her original medical bills, she’s now been sucked into a higher monthly overhead than she ever had. One that includes a credit card debt that exponentially grows, thereby insuring that she will owe more and more money every month. In this way, debtors become trapped.

For instance, with minimum (2%) monthly payments, a debt of $5000 with an 18 percent interest rate will take 46 years to pay off, having accrued $13, 931 in interest. Chances are, the mother, having missed a payment or two, will have even higher rates. But because she and her husband have jobs that place them at or above the median income level in their state, they are ineligible under the new law for chapter 7, or clean-slate bankruptcy. Instead, they have to file chapter 13, which requires, among many other things, that the mother take a course in debt management–at her expense. That mother is probably not going to get too excited about the free airline miles she’s earned.

The implications of this scenario have raised red flags everywhere. On the one hand it is recognized as beating down regular Americans during a time of financial uncertainty. It also places a glaring spotlight–for those looking anyway–on the runaway power of consolidated credit agencies.

Some credit card companies, like Citigroup, now create their own internal credit reports. And as companies such as Citigroup and Chase own so many other companies that handle money across the culture spectrum, they’re allowed access to more information than most consumers realize. With such groups acting as lenders, creditors, and insurers, one wonders how far off we are from finding our health insurance rates raised because there are too many liquor-store, steakhouse, or whitewater-rafting trip purchases on our bills. In a climate where companies are allowed to deny health insurance to–or even fire–employees who smoke, this doesn’t seem so remote.

So my inner fiscal pragmatist and conceder to capitalism says: credit is a good that you don’t have to purchase. I know people who don’t use credit at all, ever. But these are people who either have a spouse who does use credit or have made the choice to not own anything for which they can’t pay in full upfront–a tall order for most people just starting out, as the credit experts say that having no credit history is as bad as having bad credit history. It also assumes a certain degree of cultural detachment: no online tickets, show bookings, payments, or retail, etc. Should you choose to use only a debit card instead, you’ll still be subject to the same kind of tracking and lack of credit history; and for folks seeking to buy a home or car or invest in beginning a new business–the embodiment of the American entrepreneurial spirit–buying with a loan or credit is usually the only option, and one upon which our economy relies. That someone drawing upon these resources should be setting themselves up for the extreme, fiscally fatal punishment allowed in the event they even lightly transgress is deeply insidious. That the government is going to such lengths to sanction and protect this voracious, totalitarian practice is cause for revolt.

…

And speaking of Senate bills: On May 10, the Senate passed legislation, subsequently signed into law by Dubya, called the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense, the Global War on Terror, and Tsunami Relief, 2005. It is, indeed, an emergency appropriations bill that approves funds for, among other items, the Iraq war and tsunami relief. However, rolled into this rushed-to-pass legislation was also the REAL ID Act of 2005, which seeks “to establish and rapidly implement regulations” for a national ID system, ostensibly, of course, to protect Americans from terrorists.

However, among the Act’s stacks of flaws is the reality that there is little evidence to suggest harder-to-forge legal IDs would do anything to deter people already working outside law.

Proposals for the ID include using RFID tags–which can be read from several feet away–to store personal information on the card. Supporters say the REAL ID isn’t a national ID card, because states can refuse to follow the law. Yet the ID law states that federal agencies must require the card–and federal agencies control air travel, post offices, banking and other daily life institutions.

It’s tough to say what is more disturbing: the historically redolent implications of having to carry “papers” with you everywhere, all the time; or the fact that there was little debate over the bill before it slithered through the House and Senate. Though convincing arguments against the ID’s efficacy abound, it could be the threat of common criminals that most thwart its implementation, as critics say such a digitized, info-packed ID will provide one-stop shopping for identity thieves. Of course the threat of identity-theft hasn’t slowed the crush of credit hegemony.

So where is it going to end? Maybe here: During the recent Senate session, the Washington Post reported May 18 that both Dems and Repubs resoundingly agreed on one thing: “With startling unanimity, they agreed that without some combination of big tax increases and major cuts in Medicare, Social Security and most other spending, the country will fall victim to the huge debt and soaring interest rates that collapsed Argentina’s economy and caused riots in its streets a few years ago.” Of course reports say that the money lost in tax cuts for the rich could cover the amount needed to repair the deficit, but we don’t tend to riot over that sort of thing here. We’ll see.

In the meantime, I know that Chicken Little never helped anyone. There are numerous websites that will connect you to people and organizations offering detailed information on the bankruptcy law, the credit industry, and REAL ID. These measures will probably face challenge in the courts, where their final outcomes will be defined by attrition. So staying informed and active can only help.

RESOURCES:

Info on the credit industry:

Consumer Reports
http://www.consumerreports.org

Demos, a nonpartisan think-tank
http://www.demos-usa.org/pub125.cfm

Credit Card Nation, a Web-based financial literacy group
http://www.creditcardnation.com

Detailed breakdowns of the bancruptcy law:

A CommonDreams article by David Swanson
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0331-33.htm

Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) page on the law
http://www.pirg.org/consumer/bankrupt/index.htm#intro

PBS article on credit scores
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/credit/more/scores.html

Why the REAL ID won’t work:

Security technologist and blogger Bruce Schneier
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/05/real_id.html

——————-

Special to WORLD WAR 4 REPORT, June 10, 2005
Reprinting permissible with attribution

http://WW4Report.com

INDONESIA: THE TSUNAMI’S DEADLY FALLOUT

Pentagon Exploits Humanitarian Mission to Rebuild Military Ties

by John M. Miller

In the immediate aftermath of the massive tsunami that swept through the Indian Ocean on Dec. 26, George W. Bush, safe on his Texas ranch, offered a paltry $35 million in aid to the affected countries. Bush was widely criticized for his hesitation. One U.N. official called the United States “stingy,” prompting Bush to up the aid to approximately a billion dollars.

The U.S. military showed no such hesitation, immediately dispatching ships loaded with aid from its own budget. But in the process the Pentagon seized a number of opportunities that in long run may harm the very people it was purportedly helping. Within days, a Navy strike force with initial orders to head to the Persian Gulf instead loaded up with humanitarian supplies in Guam and was soon diverted to tsunami relief duty. U.S. forces were quickly on the move, anchoring off the coast of Aceh, the area most devastated by the disaster.

The relief mission provided an opportunity to conduct an operation without land bases through “sea-basing,” a strategy designed to allow U.S. forces to operate free from the constraints of land bases and allies. The effort in Aceh was mainly confined to helicopter transport of relief to villages cut off by the disaster. U.S. troops spent very little time on the ground. Indonesia was wary of too many foreign eyes in Aceh, where a decades-long counter-insurgency war continues despite the crisis. In addition, nationalist Indonesians were reluctant to allow the deployment of U.S. troops on any Indonesian soil.

Nonetheless, the Pentagon leadership seized the opportunity to rebuild relations with officers of the Indonesian military forces, called TNI, for Tentara Nasional Indonesia (National Army of Indonesia). Contacts have been limited since the early 1990s, when Congress began to restrict U.S. military assistance to Indonesia because of serious human rights violations in occupied East Timor. The Pentagon also saw in the relief efforts a new excuse to campaign to lift remaining restrictions and fully restore military ties.

The U.S. Air Force flew in mechanics to repair several of Indonesia’s aging C-130 military cargo planes. In announcing the supply of parts, Secretary of State Colin Powell said Jan. 6 that he hoped that “if we can get this taken care of, the government of Indonesia will use the planes for the intended purpose … and would not use them in a way not intended, i.e. going after the GAM.” The GAM is Gerakan Aceh Merdeka, the Free Aceh Movement, which has been conducting a guerrilla war for independence from Indonesia since the 1970s.

Indonesian officials portrayed the supply of spare parts as a major shift in U.S. policy, but Indonesia has been allowed to purchase C-130 parts at least since 2002. Instead of buying the parts, Indonesia preferred to repeatedly misrepresent their availability in an effort to get the United States to remove all restrictions on weapons sales. Sharing the goal, the Bush administration rarely bothered to correct the misrepresentation publicly. Throughout the joint relief effort, senior administration officials, led by then-Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz described the Indonesian government and military as fully cooperative in the relief effort but argued that the operation would have gone more smoothly if only military relations were normal. What was needed, they said, was restoration of the International Military Education and Training (IMET) program.

Wolfowitz, Indonesia and IMET

Congress first voted to restrict IMET for Indonesia after Indonesian troops wielding U.S.-supplied M-16 rifles massacred East Timorese protesters in Santa Cruz cemetery, Dili, on November 12, 1991. That was the first cut in military aid to Indonesia. Through the 1990s, decisions by Congress and the Clinton administration gradually restricted other forms of assistance to Indonesia in a rare instance of human rights concerns affecting weapons sales. During that decade, as restrictions on Indonesia tightened, Wolfowitz, a former ambassador to Indonesia, help lead the charge against the restrictions, defending the Indonesian regime and exaggerating its very limited efforts to prosecute some mainly low-ranking soldiers, usually in response to intense international pressure.

All military ties with Indonesia were severed in September 1999 as the TNI and its militia proxies razed East Timor after the East Timorese voted overwhelmingly for independence. At that time, Congress placed some of these restrictions into law. Renewable annually were bans on IMET and sales of lethal military equipment. Conditions for lifting these bans have varied, but have largely focused on transparency in Indonesia’s military budget and accountability for human rights violations, as all senior Indonesian officials responsible for crimes against humanity in East Timor have escaped successful prosecution. Under the Congressional restrictions, IMET could be restored with State Department “certification” that Indonesia was meeting conditions.

Then, when George W. Bush assumed the presidency, Wolfowitz was appointed to the Pentagon. One of his goals was normalization of military relations with Indonesia. The Pentagon saw an opening after the attack of September 11, 2001, arguing that Indonesia, as the country with the largest Muslim population, was an important front in the war on terror and the Indonesian military was needed to fight terror in the region.

Yet under most definitions, the TNI itself conducts terrorist activities; using violence against civilians for political ends has been its modus operandi for decades. A 2002 study for the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA, notes that the Indonesian army has become “a major facilitator of terrorism” due to “radical Muslim militias they… organized, trained, and financed.” In the wake of the tsunami, the Indonesian military helped transport some of these militia to Aceh, ostensibly to help with the relief effort, but handy if needed to intimidate foreigners or create an impression of internecine conflict to deflect blame from their own operations. Both are tried and true tactics from East Timor and elsewhere. But the Pentagon’s allies in Congress were willing to set aside those criticisms, authorizing a post-9-11 Pentagon counter-terrorism training program open to Indonesian officers with no restrictions, although IMET and the sale of weapons remains banned.

The Papua Killings

Congress balked at completely lifting the IMET ban after three teachers, two from the United States and one from Indonesia, were murdered on land operated as a mineral concession of the U.S. multinational Freeport MacMoran (and under the control of TNI forces) in West Papua in August 2002. Instead, Congress declared that the ban could be lifted conditioned on certification of Indonesian cooperation in solving the crime. This past February 26, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice certified that Indonesia was cooperating with the FBI and was therefore eligible for full IMET. The certification came just days before the State Department issued its annual human rights report, which detailed how in 2004 Indonesia’s “security force members murdered, tortured, raped, beat, and arbitrarily detained civilians.”

The main argument for certification was an indictment for the murders drawn by a U.S. grand jury (under a legal doctrine retaining jurisdiction over the murder of U.S. citizens abroad) in June 2004 against Anthonius Wamang, an Indonesian. The FBI has said the investigation remains open but has essentially ignored any evidence that implicates the TNI in the killings, and instead blames Free West Papua Movement (or OPM for Organisesi Papua Merdeka), the local pro-independence guerrillas. But according to local human rights investigators, Wamang has extensive ties to the Indonesian military as a business partner of Kopassus, the Indonesian army’s notorious special forces. The TNI is largely funded by profit-making enterprises, and Wamang markets timber and gold in a joint venture with Kopassus. In August 2004, Wamang told Australian television that he obtained the ammunition for the attack from members of the Indonesian military. He has also said that these officers knew that he was about to carry out an attack in the Freeport concession. The TNI routinely uses proxies to stage attacks, in hopes of covering up their role. Furthermore, for the first six months after the indictment was unsealed, Indonesian police did not update U.S. investigators, nor has Wamang been indicted or apprehended in Indonesia. Nonetheless, Indonesia claims to be cooperating with U.S. authorities in the case. Given this lack of progress, rights organizations say the State Department’s certification of cooperation is false and misleading.

In announcing the restoration of IMET, the State Department said it “expects that Indonesia’s resumption of full International Military Education and Training will strengthen its ongoing democratic progress.” It is hard to see how bolstering Indonesia’s least democratic institution can do this. Even Indonesia’s “reformist” Minister of Defense Juwono Sudarsono told the New York Times Feb. 7, 2005 that the military “retains the real levers of power” and “from the political point of view, the military remains the fulcrum of Indonesia.” On June 23, 2004, while serving as Jakarta’s ambassador in London, Sudarsono wrote in the Jakarta Post, “Six years of civilian-based party politics has not resulted in any measurable degree of effective ‘civilian supremacy,’ much less ‘civilian control.'”

Revolt in Aceh

Aceh, on the northern tip of the island of Sumatra, is the site of one of Asia’s longest-running wars. For three decades, the GAM has fought for independence from Indonesia. On Dec. 9, 2002, an internationally-brokered cease-fire agreement was signed between Indonesia and the GAM, but it collapsed on the following May 19, when then-Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri declared martial law in Aceh. A few hours later Indonesia launched its largest military operation since the 1975 invasion of East Timor. Aceh’s status was changed to “civil emergency” one year later, but the TNI remains in charge, and the reality on the ground has not changed. Hercules C-130 military transports, OV-10 Broncos, F-16 fighters, and other U.S. equipment have all been used during military operations in Aceh.

Support in Aceh for independence from Indonesia is widespread and growing because of the brutality of Indonesian security forces, as well as the desire for a fair share of Aceh’s vast natural resource wealth. The TNI generally assumes the average Acehnese is pro-independence and supports the guerrillas. For the notoriously corrupt TNI, the tsunami is an opportunity to assert further its control, as well as make some money–by pilfering aid, charging fees at road checkpoints, et cetera.

Despite the natural disaster, Indonesia has continued the civil emergency and offensive operations. Prior to the tsunami, Indonesia severely restricted the presence of foreigners in the territory. After the disaster it delayed for several days allowing foreign aid agencies in. The government regularly sets deadlines for most of them to leave. While so far, it has backed down from these threats, Indonesia did force out the UN’s refugee agency in March, arguing that there are no “refugees,” only “displaced persons.”

Norbert Vollertsen, a German doctor who has worked in North Korea, gave a strong sense of the repressive atmosphere in Aceh in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, in which he wrote, “I feel almost as if I am back in North Korea again. The military road blocks, heavily armed police tanks at every street corner and thousands of soldiers everywhere all remind me of the 18 months I spent in the Stalinist state.”

Abuses of humanitarian assistance by the TNI–including withholding food and other relief from civilians who lack proper identification or are alleged to support independence–are regularly reported. Reports also describe the TNI as creating obstacles to local organizations and volunteers who are trying to distribute humanitarian assistance. The Indonesian government says it has killed hundreds of rebels since the tsunami hit. Human rights groups say most of the dead were unarmed civilians. The GAM says that they have seen little let-up in military activity, despite declared post-tsunami ceasefires by both sides.

The Indonesian military also transported fundamentalist Islamic militias into Aceh, ostensibly to help with the relief effort. The groups, the Islamic Defenders Front and the Laskar Mujahidin (the military wing of the Indonesian Mujahidin Council), have a history of attacking opponents of the military, threatening foreigners and exacerbating conflicts, including the Christian-Muslim inter-religious conflict in Indonesia’s Moluccan Islands.

Lessons Learned

Most Acehnese have welcomed the foreign help, civilian and military. Many see the outsiders as far more efficient and less corrupt than the oppressive Indonesian government and military they so distrust. They also hope that the outside presence will temper the TNI’s worst abuses and shed light on the brutal repression in the province.

Most of the US, Australian and other foreign militaries allowed into Aceh after the disaster are now gone, except for a brief return after a massive aftershock hit in March. What remains is an intense debate over who will control the reconstruction and how long outside aid agencies will be allowed to remain, as the TNI awaits a full return to business as usual.

As Aceh moves from the disaster relief phase to reconstruction, the struggle has begun over who will control the planning and the vast sums pledged internationally. Acehnese and Indonesians monitoring the effort fully expect any money given directly to the government to be stolen. They doubt the TNI will be shut out of the lucrative rebuilding effort. History tells them that much aid will be siphoned off, despite government pledges to the contrary. “Every disaster in Indonesia is always colored by corruption, with lots of aid disappearing,” one Acehnese corruption watcher told Australia’s Courier Mail.

The U.S. Navy sees their intervention as much more than a successful effort in helping the disaster-stricken people of Aceh. Rear Admiral Christopher Ames, the commander of the Expeditionary Strike Group that arrived so quickly off the coast of Aceh, told the New Yorker Feb. 7, “We’ve talked about this idea of sea-basing for several years, of being able to project power anywhere in the world without asking permission.” He added, “What we’re doing here validates the beauty of it.”

For the Bush administration, the campaign to restore military assistance to Indonesia clearly received a real boost from the relief effort. Added to their rotating arguments for re-engagement is the need to support the TNI in humanitarian missions. This comes even as some in Indonesia are questioning the dependence on the TNI in dealing with Indonesia’s frequent natural disasters–floods, forest fires, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions. Indonesia’s Coordinating Minister for People’s Welfare recently announced a plan to create an alternative capacity by creating a “a ready-for-dispatch team, such as the National Guard in the United States, whose members are trained like troops, so we don’t need to disturb the military.”

Despite renewed peace talks now underway, the Acehnese and others in Indonesia may end up regretting the long-term impact of the U.S. military help. The restoration of military training and the expansion of other contacts can only serve to embolden the Indonesian military and increase their suffering.

———

John M. Miller is Media and Outreach Coordinator of the East Timor Action Network and Treasurer of the War Resisters League. This article is adopted from a version appearing in the April edition of the Non-Violent Activist, the magazine of the War Resisters League

RESOURCES:

For more information on Aceh and Indonesia: East Timor Action Network (ETAN), (718)596-7668, etan@etan.org; www.etan.org. Opposes U.S. assistance to the Indonesian military. For news and analysis of the situation in Aceh, see Aceh Eye (www.acheh-eye.org) and AcehKita (www.acehkita.com/en/). For information on human rights throughout Indonesia, see TAPOL (http://tapol.gn.apc.org/) and IndonesiaAlert! (www.indonesiaalert.org/).2900000

See also:

WW4 REPORT’s March 31 post on Indonesian army atrocities in West Papua
/node/348

WW4 REPORT’s last updates on Aceh:

/94.html#southeast1

/93.html#subcontinent2

/92.html#southeast2

/91.htm1#southeast1

/90.html#southeast1

——————-

Adopted for WORLD WAR 4 REPORT, June 10, 2005
Reprinting permissible with attribution

http://WW4Report.com

COLOMBIA: PEACE INITIATIVES UNDER ATTACK

Uribe’s “Counter-Guerilla” Campaign Targets Indigenous Models for Demilitarization

by Bill Weinberg

The carnage in Iraq has pushed several other US military commitments from the headlines. Afghanistan, with 18,000 US troops, jumps to mind. But nearly forgotten is Colombia, where the US has 800 military troops and 600 more private contractors on the ground. The troops, largely advisors from Army Special Forces, are ostensibly barred from combat missions, but they intimately direct Colombian army operations. And the parallels with Iraq are increasingly obvious for those who care to look.

As in Iraq, US forces have been implicated in torture and attacks on civilian communities. As in Iraq, US-backed forces and increasingly ruthless insurgents alike are making life unsustainable for local people caught between both sides. And perhaps even more so than in Iraq, civilian initiatives for peace and local autonomy are themselves being targeted by all sides in the conflict.

In recent weeks, the government of President Alvaro Uribe has launched a major counter-guerilla offensive, a showcase of his Orwellian “democratic security” program. The offensive itself is called the Patriot Plan, in apparent emulation of the US anti-terrorist legislation. One frontline in this contest is Toribio, a Nasa Indian village in the mountains of conflicted Cauca department, where residents have proclaimed their own right not to participate in the war.

Toribio maintained a precarious autonomy until it was occupied by government troops in August 2003, and secured from guerilla attempts to take the town after several weeks of fighting. This April, the guerillas again mounted an offensive to drive the army from Toribio, and the town has since been a war zone once again.

Ezequiel Vitonas, a former mayor of Toribio and a leading voice in the Association of Indigenous Councils of North Cauca (ACIN), was in New York City in May for the annual meeting of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. “We have a policy of not involving ourselves in the conflict of country,” Vitonas says. “We seek to protect our form of self-government and self-determination. We have our own forms of participation in which everyone in the community is consulted. We have our own health and education systems, and solidarity economics based on collective work. But this project is not liked by either the left or the right. Our community process doesn’t fit their ideologies and interests.”

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) attacked Toribio on April 14, and the government sent in the new US-trained High Mountain Battalion, an elite force of battle-hardened troops, backed up by a larger force of regular troops from the army’s Third Brigade based in Cali. Military planes and helicopters circled above. On the following day, Uribe himself arrived in Toribio, accompanied by Cauca governor Juan Jose Chaux Mosquera–the latest in a series of grand-standing moves to govern from the war zones.

Over the next two weeks, bullets flew through the village intermittently. A young child was killed, some 20 residents wounded and as many homes destroyed. Hundreds of residents have been forced to flee, and many are now being held in public buildings converted into makeshift refugee centers in Santander de Quilichao, a town some 50 kilometers down winding mountain roads on the Pan-American Highway. Vitonas claims residents saw North American soldiers in camouflage directing the Colombian troops on the operations.

Residents also reported mysterious black-uniformed troops–probably special anti-guerilla units of the National Police in the fighting. And the neighboring villages of Silvia, Jambaló, Caloto were also occupied by government forces.

Despite guarantees for indigenous self-government in the Colombian constitution, the Nasa’s model for autonomy is under attack by the government nearly explicitly. Toibio’s indigenous-language community station, Radio Nasa, was ordered closed by the government last August. Army troops invaded the premises and took away the equipment. A narrow bureaucratic rationale was used, but Vitonas has no doubt of the real reasons.

Says Vitonas: “The government demands we broadcast army statements with their war language. We refuse, and they threaten us. And then the armed insurgents do the same and demand that we present their position, instead of respecting our position. So we also refuse to do that. We don’t want to express their views, we want to express our own and expect them to support that. And this brings about the difficulties.”

The move also came three weeks before last September’s historic cross-country march of 60,000 Indians and their supporters on Cali to demand armed groups respect their autonomy. But indigenous technicians devised mobile bicycle-powered transmitters that actually broadcast live from the march, with the signal bounced throughout the region by Radio Payumat, a bilingual Spanish-Nasa community station in Santander de Quilichao. (Payumat is a Nasa salutation.) Then, students in Cali put the live transmissions on the Internet.

The march called for the establishment of a popular congress, with representatives from indigenous and campesino councils from throughout the country to determine a way our of the war and advance a new economic model. Uribe has staked his future to Colombia’s entry into the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), with concomitant privatization of the nation’s oil, mineral and energy sectors. Uribe accused the marchers of “putting forth lies” and having a hidden “political objective”–a barely-veiled reference to the guerillas.

In early March, indigenous communities in Cauca held a consulta, or series of community meetings, in which they overwhelmingly rejected FTAA. This move precipitated further tension over the Nasas’ independent radio initiative. Uribe’s agriculture minister, Andres Felipe Arias Leiva, again responded to the consulta with a veiled accusation that it originated with the guerillas: “certain sectors are taking advantage of fears,” and thereby undermining “our struggle against terrorism.”

On March 9, Arias Leiva arrived at Radio Payumat to tell the “truth” about the FTAA. The station responded with a letter from the indigenous councils demanding an apology and retraction for his earlier statements. The statement also noted that the councils had invited government representatives to debate on the FTAA since the September march on Cali, to no avail. Arias Leiva refused to back down, and Radio Payumat refused to grant him access to their airwaves.

Violence continues in Toribio and surrounding communities. On May 21, DAS–the Administrative Security Department, or secret police–raided home of Vicente Otero, ex-mayor of Caldono village and a key organizer of the consulta that rejected the FTAA. Otero wasn’t home, but his home was roughly searched, a child there threatened–and some 20 other residents of Caldono arrested on suspicion of guerilla collaboration. They are now being held by the Third Brigade in Cali. DAS has announced it has arrest orders for some 200 residents of Caldono.

Vitonas brought three demands to UN in May. The first was for international recognition of the indigenous guard, an unarmed civil defense body made up of village residents. In the prelude to the September march, Toribio’s Mayor Arquimedes Vitonas–Ezequiel’s cousin, who has been officially honored by the UNDP for his efforts to preserve indigenous knowledge–was kidnapped by the FARC with other Nasa leaders. They were released days later when hundreds of indigenous guard members marched on the guerilla camp where they were being held.

His other demands were for a UN special rapporteur to monitor indigenous rights in Colombia, and Colombian government reparations for war damage to indigenous communities.

Peasant peace initiatives are under attack throughout Colombia. In February, eight civilians, including community leader Luis Eduardo Guerra and three children, were massacred in the Peace Community of San Jose de Apartado, a village in northern Uraba region which eight years ago declared its lands as a neutral and demilitarized zone. Witnesses identified the killers as members of the Colombian military, and peace community members saw the army’s 17th and 11th Brigades in the area around the time of the murders.

Since the massacre, Uribe’s administration has done little to investigate the murders, but the president wasted no time in accusing the peace community leaders of being “auxiliaries of the FARC.” Army and National Police forces have flooded San Jose. All but five of the 100 families that formed the Peace Community have been forced to abandon their homes and land. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees is helping to manage a camp which has been formed by displaced residents.

Uribe has still not replied to demands from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to secure the safety of San Jose’s residents. Statements such as Uribe’s make the residents a target not only for the army, but its own (ostensibly outlawed) paramilitary auxiliaries. Gloria Cuartas, an advocate for the peace community and ex-mayor of the local municipality of Apartado, reports receiving threatening telephone messages since she has been publicly demanding justice for the massacre. On May 23, Colombia’s attorney general did announce charges against four army commanders for failure to prevent paramilitary incursions into San Jose de Apartado. Paramilitaries have carried out numerous attacks on village residents over the past two years.

After the massacre, SOA Watch, the group that monitors the US Army’s School of the Americas (now officially the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation), reported that the commander of the 17th Brigade of the Colombian army received training at the SOA. Gen. Hector Jaime Fandiño Rincon attended the “Small-Unit Infantry Tactics” course in 1976.

Tolemaida, a key military base outside Bogota, has taken on a reputation as Colombia’s Abu Ghraib. The Bogota daily El Espectador reported claims January 8 that last October US military officers and private contractors had overseen a session at the base in which three young girls from a nearby village were tortured and raped. The sessions were apparently videotaped, and the tapes then distributed in the local village of Melgar, where the girls were from. They were subsequently ostracized and forced to flee the village with their families. The most disturbing thing about the allegations is that the girls were not even suspected of anything; they had been lured to the base in exchange for money and a promise of visas to enter the US, and apparently used in a simple torture demonstration.

El Espectador wrote in an editorial: “The recording of these acts of sadism and the public diffusion of the images is part of the message the invaders must establish that the subjugated people are inferior and deserve any kind of inhuman treatment.” The piece also noted that even if Uribe were to pursue the case, Colombia has no recourse to the International Criminal Court, having signed on to an agreement with the United States not to recognize its jurisdiction over any US personnel.

“The marginal of the planet must find a way to unite to promote our own methods of development,” Ezequiel Vitonas says. But this is becoming a greater challenge every day as Colombia’s war escalates, with Pentagon direction, in a strategy which seeks to polarize and eliminate any political space not beholden to armed factions.

RESOURCES:

Association of Indigenous Councils of North Cauca (ACIN)
http://nasaacin.net/noticias.htm

Peace Community of San Jose de Apartado
http://www.cdpsanjose.org/

SOA Watch on the San Jose de Apartado massacre
http://www.soaw.org/new/article.php?id=1024

El Espectador on torture at Tolemaida
http://www.elcorreo.eu.org/esp/article.php3?id_article=4747

See also:

“Colombia: Peace Community Under Occupation” by Virginia McGlone, WW4 REPORT #108 /peacesanjosedeapartado

For more on Gen. Fandiño Rincon see WW4 REPORT #107
/node/284

————–

Special to WORLD WAR 4 REPORT, June 10, 2005
Reprinting permissible with attribution

http://WW4Report.com