US may fund Colombia's AUC disarmament - August 18, 2005
Carmen Gentile
ISN Security Watch
SN SECURITY WATCH (12/08/05) - The Bush administration appears keen on lending financial support to Colombia's controversial efforts to disarm right-wing paramilitaries.
Washington's initiative could, however, come up against opposition in the US Congress from lawmakers who accuse Colombia of being too lenient with paramilitaries that traffic in cocaine and heroin to fund their operations, while committing egregious human rights violations along the way.
For decades, the paramilitary United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia(AUC) have battled with left-wing rebel groups in a war that kills an estimated 3,500 a year. Now, the Colombian government is offering the AUC paramilitaries amnesty or short prison sentences in return for laying down their arms, and hopes to disarm the group's 15,000 remaining combatants by the end of next year.
So far, Colombia says it has disarmed some 8,000 AUC fighters since 2003, when disarmament talks began.
Now it appears that the US Justice Department has cleared the way for Washington to help Colombia with the disarmament measures, after having poured over the legal ramifications for more than a year, Reuters news agency reported this week, citing unnamed Bush administration and congressional sources.
According to the US Justice Department, the sticking point was a US law strictly forbidding the granting of federal funds to any group considered a terrorist organization.
The US State Department put the AUC on its list of terrorist organizations in 2001.
But Justice Department officials determined after a lengthy review that aid could legally flow to Colombia for paramilitary disarmament as long as certain conditions were met, namely a firm commitment to lay down their arms once and for all.
Just how much additional money Colombia will receive, if any, remains to be seen as the US Congress is out of session for the remainder of the month and President George Bush is spending the majority of his time on his ranch in Crawford, Texas.
If a recent meeting in Crawford between Bush and his Colombian counterpart, Alvaro Uribe, is any indication, the US appears willing to trust Colombia to its own devices to disarm the paramilitaries - no matter what the means.
"Our two nations are working together to fight drug trafficking and terrorism, and to promote security, democracy, and the rule of law throughout the Americas," said Bush.
Comments also out of the State Department this month would seem to indicate that the Bush administration is ready to write yet another check for Colombia, the largest recipient of US aid outside the Middle East.
The US already has provided Colombia with some US$4 billion in aid since 2000 for drug eradication and its fight against the Marxist rebels.
Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns said last week that Colombia's paramilitary disarmament initiative, known as the "Peace and Justice Law", has been instrumental in lowering the levels of violence in the country.
"Colombia's Justice and Peace Law establishes a mechanism that, if implemented vigorously, will help dismantle the criminal structures of demobilized illegal armed groups, provide for peace with justice and permit continued extradition," said Burns.
Critics of the Peace and Justice Law both in Colombia and abroad say it allows the majority of AUC leaders and fighters to go free even though many of them have been accused of orchestrating countless deaths over the years. The initiative, says its detractors, allows the paramilitaries to take with them the spoils of their war including money earned trafficking drugs.
"The government's failure to conduct the demobilization in a serious manner is helping paramilitary leaders launder their wealth and legitimize their political power," Jose Miguel Vivanco, the Americas director of Human Rights Watch told ISN Security Watch. "It is evident this process is rotten to the core."
Burns conceded that the paramilitary disarmament may seem soft to the outside observer, but he maintains that it is up to Colombia to determine the means to bring peace to the country.
"Some have argued that the law is not tough enough on members of paramilitary forces," he said. "Ultimately, however, the balance between peace and justice is a decision for Colombians to make for themselves."