Pubdate: Sun, 01 Sep 2002
Source: Seattle Times (WA)
Copyright: 2002 The Seattle Times Company
Contact:  http://www.seattletimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/409
Author: Andrew Selsky, The Associated Press

COLOMBIAN TOWN AT MERCY OF PARAMILITARY DEATH SQUADS

PUERTO ASIS, Colombia - Black spirals of buzzards mark the fresh corpses 
that turn up in this frontier town and in the nearby coca fields, jungle 
and pastures.

Despite patrols by Colombian soldiers and police, paramilitary death squads 
roam freely, killing suspected rebel collaborators or anyone else who gets 
in their way. The carnage is mounting, and terrified residents don't know 
where to turn for help.

"We are in Puerto Asis, where there is no justice, no law," snapped a 
medical worker, who asked not to be named for fear he might be killed for 
speaking out.

The paramilitary United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia has waged a war of 
terror across Colombia in its zeal to combat the Revolutionary Armed Forces 
of Colombia, or FARC, and a smaller rebel group engaged in a 38-year-old 
war against the government.

In the meantime, Colombian civilians - like the residents of Puerto Asis - 
are caught in the middle.

In only a few months, more than 100 civilians, including two mayoral 
candidates, have been shot dead in this town in the steamy southern 
lowlands of Colombia's cocaine heartland. Many wind up buried in body bags 
in the trash-strewn "nameless" section of the town cemetery.

Police and soldiers set up checkpoints and patrol streets filled with 
snarling motorcycles, smog-belching buses and horse-drawn carts. But they 
seem unable to stop the bloodshed.

Members of the outlawed paramilitary prowl through town, wearing baseball 
caps over close-cropped hair, pistols stuck into jeans beneath 
loose-fitting shirts.

Residents admit they're terrified of being targeted but also suspect the 
police and army turn a blind eye to the killings.

Authorities say the killers get away scot-free because few witnesses are 
brave enough to point fingers.

"Those who make an accusation against the killers better have their plane 
ticket ready to fly to another country," the medical worker said.

Says Puerto Asis Mayor Manuel Alzate, who survived an assassination attempt 
last year: "They are afraid to report the killings, because they think 
there will be reprisals against them."

The paramilitaries moved into Puerto Asis about three years ago, while FARC 
guerrillas occupy rural areas outside the town. The guerrillas are known to 
commit their own killings in areas they control.

On the evening of July 28, Leonidas Yague, a municipal official until he 
resigned in May to run for mayor, left his mother at home and headed to a 
nearby store, only to be slain on the street.

"He said, 'Mom, I'll be back in a little while,' " his mother, Rosa 
Benavides, recalled as tears sprang to her eyes. "Twenty minutes later he 
was dead."

One of the few who takes the carnage in stride is funeral director Maria Cruz.

"Business is great, thank God," she told a reporter without a hint of 
irony, sitting amid empty coffins trimmed with purple velvet. "Sometimes 
there are bodies everywhere."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Tom