Pubdate: Mon, 30 Apr 2007
Source: New York Times (NY)
Copyright: 2007 The New York Times Company
Contact:  http://www.nytimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298
Author: Simon Romero
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topics/Colombia
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?236 (Corruption - Outside U.S.)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/walters.htm (Walters, John)

COLOMBIAN SEEKS TO PERSUADE CONGRESS TO CONTINUE AID

CARACAS, Venezuela -- Faced with allegations of government ties to 
paramilitary death squads and criticism from prominent Democrats, 
President Alvaro Uribe of Colombia is heading to Washington this week 
to try to unlock frozen American aid and salvage a trade agreement 
with the United States.

It is not clear whether Mr. Uribe will succeed, despite having the 
best relations with President Bush of any South American leader. Mr. 
Uribe boasts high approval ratings in Colombia, but a scandal over 
links between outlawed paramilitary groups and his close political 
allies has eroded his credibility in Washington.

"We need vigilance by our own government and assurances that our aid 
is not going to anyone linked to illegal groups," said Senator 
Patrick J. Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who is the leader of the 
Senate panel that oversees aid to Colombia. After the Middle East and 
Afghanistan, Colombia is the largest recipient of American 
assistance, with more than $4 billion disbursed this decade.

Mr. Leahy put a hold on $55.2 million in military aid to Colombia 
this month while awaiting clarification on intelligence claims of 
collaboration between Colombia's army and paramilitaries, which have 
been classified as terrorist groups by the State Department.

Both the paramilitaries and guerrilla insurgents have committed 
atrocities against Colombians and shipped large amounts of cocaine to 
the United States during an internal war that has lasted decades.

Mr. Uribe's reaction to the scandal may have worsened his standing in 
the United States Congress since control passed to the Democrats. He 
has lashed out at domestic political opponents, saying he had placed 
opposition lawmakers who had met with Democratic leaders in 
Washington under surveillance.

Much of Mr. Uribe's ire has been directed at Senator Gustavo Petro, a 
lawmaker and former member of the M-19 rebel movement who has pushed 
for investigations of paramilitary groups. In testimony before 
Colombia's Congress this month, Mr. Petro asserted that 
paramilitaries held meetings on ranches owned by Mr. Uribe and his 
brother in the late 1980s before embarking on nighttime killing raids.

Senior Colombian officials and Mr. Uribe himself have vehemently 
denied the accusations. Still, investigators are looking into 
paramilitary ties of more than a dozen allies of Mr. Uribe, including 
his former domestic intelligence chief, who is accused of supplying 
the militias with details on academics and union officials who were 
chosen for assassination.

Mr. Uribe, who is scheduled to be in Washington from Tuesday through 
Thursday to meet with President Bush, Democratic lawmakers and human 
rights groups, declined requests for an interview.

Vice President Francisco Santos expressed concern that deteriorating 
relations with Democratic leaders could endanger advances Colombia 
has made in reducing urban violence, demobilizing thousands of 
paramilitary fighters and economic growth. "There is friendly fire 
from the Democrats of which Colombia is becoming the casualty," Mr. 
Santos said in a telephone interview.

"We stabilized a country that was going to shambles," Mr. Santos 
said, noting that Washington's large assistance project for Colombia 
was conceived under President Clinton. Mr. Santos said paramilitary 
ties were coming to light because of the resilience of institutions 
carrying out independent investigations.

Mr. Uribe is popular in Colombia after limiting the reach of the war 
into large cities while riding an economic growth wave. "He received 
a country with 21 percent unemployment and today has it at 13 
percent," said Rafael Nieto, a political analyst in Bogota.

Mr. Uribe's critics say he is doing relatively little to move the 
investigations forward and ensure the safety of his opponents. Mr. 
Petro, the opposition lawmaker, said he had uncovered a plot to kill 
him led by Juan Villate, a security official for the Drummond 
Company, an American coal producer with operations in Colombia.

Drummond said in a statement that the accusations against Mr. 
Villate, who had previously worked as a security official at the 
United States Embassy in Bogota, were "politically motivated."

"I have had an avalanche of hostile actions against me," Mr. Petro 
said in a telephone interview, adding that family members had also 
received death threats.

Human rights groups have criticized the killings of trade union 
officials and violations by Colombia's armed forces, creating another 
obstacle to securing Congressional approval of new military aid and 
the trade agreement, which has already been signed by Mr. Bush and 
Mr. Uribe. Fifty-eight trade unionists were killed in 2006, up from 
40 the previous year, though labor groups say government estimates of 
the homicides are too low.

"Colombia has no real answer to these killings," said Maria 
McFarland, a researcher for Human Rights Watch.

Colombian business leaders argue that a trade agreement is needed to 
open new markets for Colombian goods. But critics say it could 
increase American agribusiness exports like soybeans, effectively 
restricting access to the important Colombian market for relatively 
poor neighboring countries like Bolivia.

The Bush administration, meanwhile, has requested $3.9 billion in 
additional aid for Colombia, which is still the world's largest 
supplier of cocaine. John P. Walters, the director of the White House 
Office of National Drug Control Policy, acknowledged in a recent 
letter to Senator Charles E. Grassley, an Iowa Republican, that 
street prices of cocaine in the United States had dropped more than 
10 percent from 2005 to 2006 and that the drug's purity levels had 
also increased.

Mr. Uribe's unwavering support of Mr. Bush, meanwhile, seems to have 
won him little respect among leading Democrats. Former Vice President 
Al Gore, for instance, recently canceled an appearance at a Miami 
conference attended by Mr. Uribe because of concerns over the claims 
of his paramilitary ties.

Political analysts in Washington and Bogota do not expect the United 
States to cut off aid to Colombia. Rather, they see Washington 
retooling aid to strengthen judicial institutions that carry out 
investigations while still supporting Colombia's military. But to 
reach that point, they say, Mr. Uribe needs to aggressively advance 
investigations of the reach of paramilitary groups. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake