Pubdate: Fri, 01 Mar 2002
Source: News & Observer (NC)
Copyright: 2002 The News and Observer Publishing Company
Contact:  http://www.news-observer.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/304
Author: Ed King

GREEN IN COLOMBIA

The Feb. 25 wire service article about the abduction of Colombian 
presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt left out vital information that 
would help readers put this heinous event in broader political context. 
Ingrid Betancourt is the Green Party candidate in Colombia, and she is 
fighting for some of the same issues that Greens here in North Carolina and 
across the nation are fighting for.

Greens in the United States have joined Betancourt and the Colombian Greens 
in opposing the role of the U.S. government in training the Colombian 
military in police terror and torture tactics at the School of the 
Americas, the destruction of large amounts of Colombia's fertile land in 
the name of the War on Drugs, and other policies that have terrorized and 
imposed poverty on the people and ruined the environment. Is Ingrid 
Betancourt's abduction part of another CIA covert operation meant to win 
international Green support for President Bush's War on Drugs in Colombia?

Those of us N.C. Greens who support the findings of the recent Witness For 
Peace investigatory trip to Colombia, led by Gail Phares of Raleigh, want 
other North Carolinians to know the broader context of this most recent 
terrorist event in Colombia and its relationship to U.S. policy.

Ed King, Pittsboro
- ---
MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager