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Recent
Stories
June
19, 2003
Saul
Landau
Lying, Flag Waving and Redefining
Conservative Values
June
18, 2003
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
Elaine
Cassel
Dark Star Chambers: Secret Trials,
Nameless Defendents, Veiled Threats to Defense Lawyers
Col.
Daniel Smith
Iraq's WMDs: Integrity, Ethics and
Intelligence
Chris
Fagen
Ignoring the World's Bloodiest War
Rick
Fantasia and Kim Voss
Bush's Low Intensity War on Labor
Sam
Hamod
Theater of Deception: Bush, Sharon,
Abbas
M.
Shahid Alam
Illuminating Tom Friedman
Jon
Brown
Greens & Dems: a Reply to Publius
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars
Web Log, 6/18
June
17, 2003
Dr.
Susan Block
Sex, Lies and WMDs
Elaine
Cassel
Scalia, the Rumsfeld of the Supremes
Roger Burbach
Brazil Under Lula
Dan
Bacher
The WTO's War on Salmon
Peter
Phillips and Jason Spencer
Entertainment Media 2003
Nuclear
Age Peace Foundation
The Challenge of Nuclear Weapons in the 21st Century
Wayne Madsen
Outting Ashcroft's Latest Hypocrisy
Larry
Kearney
Starlight
Steve
Perry
The Bush Administration
Lies Marathon, Day 3
June
16, 2003
Frida
Berrigan
Death in Aceh: US Weapon Aid the
Repression
Publius
Candidate Dem and Citizen Green
Tarif
Abboushi
Roadmap or Roadkill?
Rep. John
Conyers
Bush's Deceptions about Iraq Threaten Democracy at Home
Julian
Samuel
A Review of Pilger's The New Rulers of the World
Uri
Avnery
The Children of Death
Steve
Perry
Bush's Lies,
Part 2
June
14 / 15, 2003
Edward
Said
A Roadmap to What and Where?
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Pryor Unrestraint: Killer Bill Pryor's
Mad Quest for the Federal Bench
David Lindorff
Rumsfeld v. Belgium
Jennifer
Loewenstein
Suicide's Most Willing Accomplice
Lee Sustar
US Tax System: Rigged for the Rich
Ben
Tripp
Of Dissidents and Dissonance
William
S. Lind
Lies, Damned Lies and Military Intelligence
Joanne
Mariner
Rebellious Judges
Gila Svirsky
A Macabre Alliance
Mickey
Z.
Where We Are
Chris Floyd
Metaphysics as a Guide to Murder
Noah
Leavitt
Peru as Our Crystal Ball?
Yves Engler
and Bianca Mugyenyi
The G8 and Africa
Dr.
Gerry Lower
Dear Rudy, Let's Get Those Damned Liberals
Ted Dace
A Review of Kovel's The Enemy of Nature
Adam
Engel
Midnight at the Apocalyptic Pancake
Poets'
Basement
Smith, Greeder, Albert, and O'Hayer
Website
of the Weekend
AEI: Starts Wars; Creates
Poverty
June
13, 2003
David
Vest
Bush
Roadmap to What?
Ron Jacobs
The Iranian Revolution, Reloaded?
John
Chuckman
The Man Who Wasn't There
Jason Leopold
Six Months Before War White House Silenced Critics of WMD Intelligence
Michael
Leon
Missing Weapons, Shrinking Bush and the Media
Negar Azimi
Ashcroft's Cruel Version of America
Saul
Landau
Shiite Happens
Hammond
Guthrie
Then and Now
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars
Web Log 6/13
June
12, 2003
Gary
Leupp
The Intel-gate Row in Britain: a Chronology
Ahmad Faruqui
The Tragic Legacy of the Six Day
War
Wayne
Madsen
Unfit for Office: Time for Rumsfeld to Resign
Laura Carlsen
Hunger and Security
Tarif
Abboushi
Warm and Fuzzy in Aqaba
Ray
McGovern
Deceived into War: Reflections of
a Former CIA Analyst
Steve
Perry
Counting Bush's
Lies, part 2
Hot Stories
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Elaine
Cassel
Civil Liberties
Watch
Michel
Guerrin
Embedded Photographer Says: "I
Saw Marines Kill Civilians"
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Paul de Rooij
Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
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June
19, 2003
Bloodbath in Colombia
The
Army and the Paramilitary Death Squads
By ALFREDO CASTRO
A series of joint operations by the Colombian
army and right-wing paramilitary death squads have resulted in
scores of civilians being killed. Whilst the Colombian government
claims that they are working to cut the links between state security
forces and illegal paramilitaries human rights organisations
say that the reality on the ground proves otherwise.
In the most recent example of collaboration
between the Colombian army and right-wing death squads at least
eight civilians have been killed in a brutal massacre carried
out by a joint unit of paramilitaries and soldiers. Such operations
are not unusual although, according to human rights organisations,
the relationship between the two forces appears to be getting
stronger.
In the most recent case, on June 15th,
soldiers attached to the 3rd Brigade of the Colombian army and
paramilitaries of the notorious 'Bloque Calima' simultaneously
entered the community of Zabaletas in the municipality of Buenaventura,
Valle de Cauca department. The troops proceeded to massacre Julio
Vallejo Montoya, Luz Matilde Rentería, Walberto Riascos,
Ledy Valencia, Jonier Valencia and Angel Valencia, all unarmed
civilians whom they accused of being sympathetic towards the
FARC rebel organisation. Many other civilians, including Elvira
Vallecilla, Juan Valencia, Luz Mery Ibargüen, Teodoro Valencia
and Henry Arboleda were beaten, shot or attacked with knives
during the incursion.
According to Washington-based Human Rights
Watch, the 3rd Brigade of the army set up the so-called 'Bloque
Calima' paramilitary unit some years ago and local investigators
report that they have been jointly responsible for thousands
of assassinations and disappearances since then. The senior officer
responsible for organising, arming and financing the death squad
was General Jaime Ernesto Canal, now a member of the Colombian
Congress and a strong supporter of President Uribe Velez--himself
suspected of links to the death squads.
In an interview last week Marta Altolaguirre,
the President of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights
of the Organisation of American States (OAS), pointed out that
links between the armed forces and the paramilitaries continue
and other international organisations, such as Amnesty International,
have also recently reported on the worrying increase in the scope
and frequency of joint military/paramilitary operations. Last
month Amnesty also reported on the "direct involvement by
the security forces in serious human rights violations, including
arbitrary arrests, torture, 'disappearances' and killings"
Other recent reports have documented
how a large paramilitary death squad is operating with Colombian
army battalions in the region between Bolivar and Antioquia departments.
According to locals this combined unit has been terrorising civilians,
murdering community leaders and massacring peasant farmers.
The more serious abuses perpetrated in
the region include:
* June 9th, the assassination of a 69-year-old
woman in the community of Aguas Blancas in San Pablo municipality,
* June 6th, the massacre of four farmers
(including Ligia Cardona, Reynaldo Canchila and Víctor
Carreritas) accused of sympathising with rebels in the community
of Canaveral in Sergovia municipality--where soldiers and death
squad members also set fire to numerous homes and farms forcibly
displacing hundreds of civilians.
* May 25th, the torture and murder of
the leader of the community of Santa Marta de Remedios in northeast
Antioquia.
Alfredo Castro
writes about Colombian politics for Anncol.
Yesterday's Features
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
Elaine
Cassel
Dark Star Chambers: Secret Trials,
Nameless Defendents, Veiled Threats to Defense Lawyers
Col.
Daniel Smith
Iraq's WMDs: Integrity, Ethics and
Intelligence
Chris
Fagen
Ignoring the World's Bloodiest War
Rick
Fantasia and Kim Voss
Bush's Low Intensity War on Labor
Sam
Hamod
Theater of Deception: Bush, Sharon,
Abbas
M.
Shahid Alam
Illuminating Tom Friedman
Jon
Brown
Greens & Dems: a Reply to Publius
Steve
Perry
Bush's Wars
Web Log, 6/18
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