'Army complicit in Arauca paramilitary crimes' .

[Judi Lynn]

'Army complicit in Arauca paramilitary crimes' .
Thursday, 22 July 2010 08:19 Leo Palmer

http://colombiareports.com.nyud.net:8090/pics/paramilitary/miguel_angel_mejia.jpg

Former paramilitary leader Miguel Angel Mejia Munera, alias "El Mezillo," (the Twin) alleged that Colombian politicians, oil companies and the Colombian army had links with the paramilitaries in the eastern Colombian border department Arauca.

Speaking from the Colombian Court in Washington in the U.S, El Mezillo voluntarily provided testimony on Colombia's paramilitary organizations.

Mejia was extradited to the United States on drug trafficking charges in 2009 and was a leader of the "Vencedores de Arauca" paramilitary bloc

Collaboration with the Colombia Army

According to Mejia, the Colombian army was involved in the murder of Angel Chaparro, who was gunned down on January 25 in 2002 along with Mario Ruiz Gonzalez Delgado Heliberto in Tame, Arauca only four blocks from the police station.

Chaparro was the key witness in the case against the Colombian Air Force and American pilots working for Oxy oil, who were implicated in the 1998 bombing of Santo Domingo in Arauca which left 17 farmers dead. Chaparro died in the shooting but Delgado was kidnapped.

According to the ex paramilitary Samuel Saavedra, the paramilitaries chased after Delgado when he tried to escape. When they encountered a military road block, the Colombian Army gave the paramilitaries five minutes to find and kill Delgado.

"El Mezillo" also said the Colombian Army was involved in the murder of taxi driver Alexis Wilson Pedraza in 2001. Mejia said the paramilitaries got into the taxi and told him to drive to an address near the Naranjitos Army Base.

A shoot out started when the vehicle approached an army check point but quickly stopped after the paramilitary "Boris" shouted to the army "It's us."

Allegedly "Boris" then killed the taxi driver by smashing his skull with a large rock. A few months later the paramilitaries contacted Pedraza's widow to apologise after they realised they had mistaken him for a guerrilla collaborator.

Parapolitics

Referring to "parapolitics" in the region, Mejia said that "Many trade unionists were killed thanks to information given by the governor of Arauca or by the mayor ."

Mejia admitted to the murder of Nubia Jaime Cantor, a member of the union of health care workers, who worked as a receptionist at the Arauca Institute of Health.

The ex paramilitary "Cucuta" testified that Cantor was killed because Julio Acosta, former governor of Arauca, was "interested" in her and because she was on the list of targets that Acosta had given to the paramilitaries.

Mejia also took responsibility for the murder of the trade unionists Luis Alfonso Grisales Palaez and Professor Ana Rubiano Elizabeth Toledo, both killed in March 2003.

According to the Justice and Peace program, 28 trade unionists were killed in the area over the four years that the "Vencedores de Arauca" paramilitary bloc were active.

More:
http://colombiareports.com/colombia-news/news/10935-army-complicit-in-arauca-paramilitary-crimes-the-twin.html