Pubdate: Fri, 02 Mar 2001
Source: Providence Journal, The (RI)
Copyright: 2001 The Providence Journal Company
Contact:  75 Fountain St., Providence RI   02902
Website: http://www.projo.com/
Author: Tom Mooney
Bookmark: Reports about Colombia  http://www.mapinc.org/area/colombia

REED, CHAFEE SAY U.S. AID HELPING COLOMBIA'S WAR ON DRUGS

Both Rhode Island senators, who just returned from the South American 
nation, are upbeat that the $1.3-billion aid package is making a 
difference in cutting cocaine production.

Rhode Island's two U.S. senators say they're confident a $1.3-billion 
aid package to Colombia is fighting the drug trade as intended and 
might help to resolve the decades-old civil war between the 
government and guerrilla groups.

Both Democrat Sen. Jack Reed and Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee 
returned recently from separate trips to the South American country, 
where intensifying violence has spawned a new exodus of refugees to 
places such as Rhode Island, with large Colombian populations.

The drug trade and Colombia's civil war are intricately woven. In the 
years since the fall of the Soviet Union, the country's two major 
Marxist guerrilla groups have turned to drug trafficking as their 
principle means of financing their war.

Last year Congress approved sending $1.3 billion in mostly military 
aid to Colombia to help cut cocaine production (most of which is used 
in the United States) and, in turn, dry up the guerrillas' primary 
source of money.

Both Reed and Chafee voted in favor of "Plan Colombia," which is 
supplying dozens of U.S. helicopters and 800 military and civilian 
advisers. About 300 Special Forces soldiers train the Colombian 
military in destroying cocaine-producing labs in the jungle, while 
the helicopters fly protection for Colombian planes fumigating coca 
fields.

Colombia produces about 80 percent of the world's cocaine.

Reed, who serves on the Senate Armed Services Committee, returned 
Sunday from two days in Colombia. There, he and several other 
senators met with Colombian President Andres Pastrana and visited 
training encampments.

The Colombian soldiers "are serious about dealing with the issue of 
depressing coca production," Reed said, "and are highly motivated."

In recent years, Colombia's military has also been harshly criticized 
for human-rights violations on its own countrymen. The allegations 
include working in collusion with private armies -- known as 
paramilitary groups -- which hunt down guerrillas and their 
sympathizers and have been responsible for brutal killings.

"Through the training of American Special Forces," Reed said, "the 
military's sensitivity to human rights has increased. They are not 
perfect, but they understand they have to follow the law.

"What we've done is try to assure that no American aid goes to any 
Colombian military unit with human-rights violations," Reed said. And 
all Colombian soldiers participating in Plan Colombia must have 
similar clean records, he said.

Senator Chafee returned last week from three days in Colombia. A 
member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and chairman of the 
Western Hemisphere Subcommittee, Chafee supported passage of Plan 
Colombia "with reservations as to how it was going to be spent."

Chafee was concerned the aid money would "end up in some Swiss bank 
account" rather than for its intended purpose.

His recent trip reassured him.

"It was surprising the commitment we were making down there and the 
enthusiasm for the challenge. I went with some skepticism that we 
would get the spin -- would be taken only to where the good things 
were happening. But in talking to as many people as possible on the 
periphery, I just got good feelings that because of the commitment we 
are making, [the guerrillas] are starting to negotiate.

"I'm never one to relish getting involved in someone else's violent 
dispute," Chafee said, "but I think the good people of Colombia are 
looking for someone to help them."

Some critics of Plan Colombia say further U.S. involvement within 
Colombia raises the potential of "another Vietnam." But neither 
Chafee nor Reed see that as a real danger.

"I think the big difference here is the people of Colombia want the 
conflict ended," Chafee said. "They see other countries around them 
where democracy has taken root, economies are flourishing, and they 
want a piece of that and this is certainly an impediment to 
investment -- this anarchy that presently exists with kidnappings and 
bombings."

Colombia has become the world's kidnap capital -- more than 3,100 
reported last year -- as the guerrilla groups turn to kidnapping for 
ransom members of the nation's middle- and upper-classes.

While a Vietnam scenario is one to be mindful of, Reed said, several 
differences exist that prevent it from happening.

"First, the Colombian military force is a credible military force 
that is willing to conduct these operations themselves. Secondly, 
this is a country that has a history over several hundred years of 
democracy. They freely elect their president and leaders. They also 
have high rates of literacy and this is not a nation that doesn't 
have the institutions you need to operate independently."

Colombian President Pastrana, in a meeting with U.S. governors 
Tuesday in Washington, promised that the United States would "never 
get bogged down" in Colombia's conflict.

Pastrana said neither the people in Colombia or the United States 
would support U.S. troop involvement. "In short," he said, "it is not 
on the table, not now or in the future."
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MAP posted-by: Kirk Bauer