Kerry maintains support for Plan Colombia

[Freddie Stubbs]

Colombian President Uribe was encouraged by John Kerry's planned statement that he would continue to support Plan Colombia.

BY PABLO BACHELET

[e-mail]


WASHINGTON - Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry will issue a statement today reiterating his support for Plan Colombia, a U.S.-funded multibillion-dollar effort to help Colombia combat drug trafficking and armed insurgents.

Kerry's announcement gives Colombian President Alvaro Uribe a boost in his efforts to secure an extension of the plan beyond its expiration at the end of 2005.

''As a senator I have consistently supported Plan Colombia,'' Kerry said, ``and, as president, I will work with President Uribe to keep the bipartisan spirit in Washington alive in support of Plan Colombia, while insisting on progress on ending the violence against civilians.''

Colombia has received more than $3 billion since 2000 under Plan Colombia, originally crafted by the Clinton administration and actively supported by President Bush. Colombian and U.S. officials point to statistics, from declining kidnapping rates to fewer acres planted with coca, as proof that the program has been a success.

more: http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/politics/9922825.htm

[Minstrel Boy]

1. Dec 2, 2000: Senator Paul Wellstone Takes The Lead Against 'Plan Colombia'

Senator Paul Wellstone Takes The Lead Against 'Plan Colombia'

December 2, 2000
by Andrew Selsky

BARRANCABERMEJA, Colombia (AP) - Hard-eyed men with Uzis stood guard as Sen. Paul Wellstone stepped out of a helicopter and into a bulletproof car and drove to a meeting with human rights activists. Hours earlier, police said they discovered a bomb along the airport road.

U.S. and Colombian authorities Friday downplayed the possibility that Wellstone and U.S. Ambassador Anne Patterson, who accompanied the Minnesota Democrat, were the intended targets of the bomb. Their visit marked the first time a U.S. lawmaker or ambassador had come to the deadliest town in all the Americas - a sweltering cluster of cinderblock homes on the banks of the muddy Magdalena River.

...

"I don't know whether I was targeted, but I certainly know that the human rights activists are targeted," Wellstone told an airport news conference on his return to Minneapolis on Friday.

For Wellstone, a former civil rights activist and college professor, his two-day visit to Colombia also was aimed at making a stand against Plan Colombia, a drug-eradication effort being funded by $1.3 billion from Washington. Under the plan, dozens of U.S.-donated combat helicopters will ferry U.S.-trained Colombian troops into cocaine-producing plantations to seize them from insurgents.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines/120200-01.htm

[Freddie Stubbs]

2. He wasn't very successful

In June, Wellstone blasted the Clinton Administration's "Push into Southern Colombia" military plan during Senate debate, and offered an amendment to the Foreign Operations Appropriations Bill that sought to transfer $225 million from aid earmarked for the Colombian military into U.S. domestic drug treatment programs. The Wellstone amendment failed by a vote of 89-11 following an intensive lobbying effort against it by the Administration.

http://www.ciponline.org/colombia/071402.htm

[MrPrax]

9. Maybe two attempts on that same trip...

Toxic Drift:
Monsanto and the Drug War in Columbia
By Jeremy Bigwood

<snip>

"They had said that by using satellite images they could hit very precisely targets without any chance of danger to surrounding crops" said Jim Farrell, Wellstone's spokesperson, who was also there. However that turned out not to be the case. "On the very first flyover by the cropduster, the U.S. Senator, the U.S. Ambassador to Colombia, the Lieutenant Colonel of the Colombian National Police, and other Embassy and congressional staffers were fully doused -- drenched, in fact -- with the sticky, possibly dangerous (herbicide) Roundup."

"Imagine what is happening when a high-level congressional delegation is not present," Farrell noted, pointing out that careful preparation had gone into the botched flyover. Wellstone left Colombia completely unconvinced by the Embassy.

The United States has sprayed tons of Roundup and Roundup Ultra, produced by the St. Louis-based chemical and biotechnology giant, Monsanto, during the 24 year-long drug war in Colombia. The use of these herbicides (both of which we refer to as Roundup in this story) has consistently produced health complaints from campesinos in the Colombian countryside. Those complaints have gone largely ignored by government officials in Washington and corporate honchos within Monsanto. Meanwhile, Monsanto's sordid history as the manufacturer of Agent Orange, a defoliant used during the Vietnam war, raises serious questions about its role in Colombia's drug war and the need for transparency in its dealings with Washington.

http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/inequal/labor/monsanto0626.htm


Colombia...

Colombia
January 2004

Colombia leads the Western hemisphere in reported human rights and international humanitarian law violations. In 2003, the government claimed as a success a decrease in the worst categories of political violence. These decreases are genuine; yet a close inspection reveals that they are due to many factors, among them the consolidation of control by illegal paramilitaries in some regions. So far, President �lvaro Uribe has failed to break continuing ties between units of the security forces and paramilitaries and has failed to ensure that the perpetrators of crimes against humanity and serious human rights violations are brought to justice.
http://hrw.org/english/docs/2004/01/21/colomb6978.htm

Colombia and Human Rights
by Nina Englander

Despite the extremely dangerous climate for social activism, the Colombian government continues to blatantly disregard human rights. Recent inflammatory statements by President Alvaro Uribe drive this point home. Speaking on September 8 before leaders of the armed forces at the inauguration of the new head of the airforce, Uribe condemned human rights defenders as terrorist sympathizers and cowards. He derided unspecified groups for supporting terrorism "under the pretext of defending human rights," and for hiding "their political ideas behind human rights." He called human rights workers "spokespeople" for terrorists, and he challenged them to "take off their masks."
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml%3Fi=20031124&s=englander

[Judi Lynn]

15. After the discovery of the bomb planted roadside, and the Roundup soaking

the Senator may have wondered if his politics rubbed some people the wrong way. This is one filthy bidness, and not going to get better with the Republicans in charge, no matter HOW many tubes point at Bill Clinton. The Republicans have a LOOOOONG history of demons both from our country, as in the torturer, Dan Mitrone, and Operation Condor, and backing and building Latin American pure evil tyrants, and molding their armies of killers.

Please check article at http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=901988

if you're interested in reading about _Bush's administration bringing the wife of a vicious, bloodthirsty, right-wing drug dealer/murderer, Carlos Castaño, here to enter the U.S. as a refugee this week. Also, discussed is the belief that the "man of the house" has been accepted into a witness protection program.



Carlos Castaño
Hey, now he's officially on OUR side. Thanks, _Dubya!

[emulatorloo]

3. Sorry, this is not a reason to leave Bush in power.

Bush will not listen to you about Plan Columbia. He hasn't listened about anything else.
Kerry will be more responsive.

[Freddie Stubbs]

5. Kerry will likely continue the policy that Clinton started

He has shown no indication that he would do otherwise.

[emulatorloo]

7. Still not a reason to leave Bush in power

Hoping for the best from Bush is a losing proposition.
Hoping for the best and working for it w Kerry has more possibility.

[Freddie Stubbs]

8. I agree 100% about Bush reamining in power

But I wouldn't get my hopes up about this issue with Kerry if I were you. He supported this during both Clinton and Bush's administrations, as have a majority of Democrats in Congress.

[Ezlivin]

4. Mr. Kerry, please re-evaluate this whole wasteful program

Plan Columbia has not yet met a single one of its touted goals.

John Walters, the head of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, recently startled the media by admitting that the $3.3 billion Plan Colombia, now in its fourth year, has failed to make a significant dent in the amount of cocaine flowing out of that country. Walters added hastily, however, that he expected to see substantial progress in the next year or so.

His comments are the latest in a familiar and dreary pattern. Each new initiative in Washington's international campaign to stem the supply of illegal drugs is launched with great fanfare. During the early phases, isolated examples of success are touted as evidence that the overall strategy is working. Ultimately, though, reality intrudes and it becomes clear that the drug supply is as plentiful as ever. Thrown on the defensive, drug warriors admit that the task has proven more difficult than anticipated but argue that if we stay the course, success is just around the corner. When such predictions prove faulty often enough, the existing initiative is quietly buried and a new one is launched with the appropriate fanfare.

Source: Cato Institute (emphasis added)

[Freddie Stubbs]

6. I'm not too sure if Kerry would take advice from libertarian org like Cato

:shrug:

[Zhade]

10. Great, Kerry. Keep making it harder to vote for you. It's so reassuring.

Fucking insanity, this.

[Algorem]

11. Death Squads R US,more so thanks to Bush:

http://mke.indymedia.org/en/2004/04/200854.shtml http://www.killercoke.org

[gulfcoastliberal]

12. Following internal RNC "Alienate the dem base from Kerry" strategy?

Posts like this are not at all necessary or helpful in the days leading up to the election. Once Kerry is inaugurated without incident, go ahead and complain.

[Freddie Stubbs]

13. Kerry is stinking with the same position that he had when Clinton was Pres

I do not recall anyone attacking him during the primary for his long-standing position on this issue.

[Zhade]

14. "Kerry is stinking with the same position".

Your Freudian slip is showing.