BOGOTA, Colombia - Top Democratic lawmakers, including presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and Chris Dodd, have urged Colombia to reverse the "infiltration" of murderous paramilitary groups at high government levels or risk losing $700 million a year in aid.
In a strongly worded letter sent last month to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, eight senators expressed "grave concern regarding the infiltration of important Colombian state institutions by terrorists and drug traffickers." A copy of the letter was released by Sen. Dodd's office on Friday, just before President Alvaro Uribe was to appear in New York for a dinner honoring former President Clinton, part of a lobbying campaign by Colombia to counter Democrats' intense scrutiny of its human rights record.
| Ick, but I guess you do what you gotta do. |
Dodd's office said the letter was made public in a May 22 press release, a day after it was sent, but most Colombians — including Uribe himself — only learned about its existence on Friday, when a copy was published in a front-page story by Colombia's main daily, El Tiempo.
Since gaining control of Congress in November, Democrats have refused to pass a trade deal with Colombia and are threatening to cut military assistance as a scandal linking government allies to right-wing militias creeps closer to the president. The lawmakers said they were "particularly troubled" by the case of former intelligence chief Jorge Noguera, who is under investigation for allegedly providing the militias with names of trade unionists who were later murdered.
Noguera, who was hand-picked for the spy job by Uribe after running his 2002 campaign along the Caribbean coast, was jailed for a month and then released March 23 because of a procedural error by prosecutors. Another 13 congressmen, all but one Uribe allies, have been arrested as part of the widening scandal.
| Never mind that Uribe has virtually ended the nastiness in Columbia. |
The Democrats' letter called on Colombia to take "vigorous measures" to hold the right-wing militias accountable, including the removal of mobile phones and Internet access for jailed warlords and their extradition to the United States to face drug-trafficking charges. It also wants the government to confiscate stolen land holdings and combat 22 new or rearmed paramilitary groups identified by an Organization of American States peace mission.
"Without such concrete actions and results, maintaining current levels of assistance will be difficult to justify," the senators wrote.
| Suppress left wing rebels and the Dhimmicrats are all over you. |
At a news conference Friday in Washington, Uribe said he had no knowledge of the letter, also signed by Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, who froze $55 million in aid to Colombia's military in April as head of the subcommittee overseeing foreign aid. "(Thursday) I met with Sen. Leahy for about an hour and he didn't tell me anything about this," Uribe said before departing for New York.
| Pat's really good with a shiv, as you've noticed by now. |
| Y'never even feel it slide between your ribs, until the point touches your heart |
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