arch/ive/ief (2000 - 2005)

In a statement issued February 10, 2001 the U.S. Out of
Colombia Committee of the International Action Center
demanded that President George W. Bush immediately drop
all plans to intervene in Colombia and repeal Plan Colombia
without delay.

Teresa Gutierrez, Chairperson of the IAC's U.S. Out of
Colombia Committee stated: "All the news agencies this
weekend are focusing on the outcome of the meetings
between Pastrana and Marulanda that took place this past
week. Our committee is also paying a great deal of attention
to this meeting."

"The reality," Gutierrez continued, "is that the U.S.
government is the chief obstacle to genuine peace in
Colombia. Its interventionist scheme called Plan Colombia is
designed to accelerate U.S. support for the Colombian military
and its para-military adjuncts. The U.S.'s Plan Colombia is the
real problem in Colombia today. As long as the paramilitaries of
Colombia are allowed to continue to operate in the manner
they have been operating, an end to the conflict cannot be
expected. As long as the Colombian and U.S. government
utilize the death squads, the people of Colombia will find no
real peace."

A number of human rights organizations, including Amnesty
International and Human Rights Watch have documented in
detail that the death squads are behind the vast majority of
the killings in Colombia. Yet they are allowed to operate in
Colombia with impunity and function as an unofficial army
fighting alongside the Colombian military.

"All the demands to resolve the conflict in Colombia today are
being made to the FARC and the ELN," Gutierrez continued.
"Yet it is right-wing paramilitaries like the AUC [Self Defense
Units] that carry out the vast majority of the murders and
tortures. Why doesn't the U.S. and the Colombia impose a
plan in Colombia that will put an end to the right-wing death
squads?"

The backdrop to the negotiations currently taking place in
Colombia are social conditions that are becoming more critical
each day. Colombia faces an unemployment rate of over
20%. Homelessness and hunger is common. Despite the fact
that there is an abundance of wealth in the country, the
Colombian government is doing nothing to resolve this situation.

As long as the people of Colombia face these kinds of
conditions, then real peace in society will not happen.
Plan Colombia will only aggravate these social conditions. Plan
Colombia will only draw the U.S. government and the
Pentagon into another Vietnam. It must be stopped.

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