Pubdate: Sun, 22 May 2005
Source: Houston Chronicle (TX)
Copyright: 2005 Houston Chronicle Publishing Company Division, Hearst Newspaper
Contact:  http://www.chron.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/198
Author: John Otis
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)
Note: Truncated subtitle as found on website

COLOMBIA MIGHT SACRIFICE JUSTICE IN SEARCH OF PEACE

Residents Of San Onofre In Northern Colombia Accuse Paramilitary Forces Of 
Murdering Hundreds And Burying The Bodies On A Farm Outside Their Town. But 
A Propsed Bill Would Ensure That The Paramilitaries, Even If They Confess, 
Would Only Receive Mild Priso

SAN ONOFRE, COLOMBIA - Wielding a trowel and crouched inside a 4-foot-long 
grave, a forensic dentist scraped dirt from the jawbone of an unidentified 
person believed to have been executed by paramilitaries.

Noting that the foot bones lay next to the skull, the investigator said 
that 15 of the 16 bodies uncovered on this cattle ranch in recent weeks had 
been hacked to pieces, a time-saving tactic that allowed the killers to dig 
smaller graves.

"This guy was cut in half," declared the dentist, who, like other 
government experts here, insisted on anonymity for security reasons.

Residents of San Onofre, a farming town of 10,000 people, think that 
hundreds of bodies are buried on El Palmar ranch, which served as a 
regional paramilitary headquarters. Driven out of the area by Colombian 
marines earlier this year, the illegal forces stand accused of widespread 
atrocities against civilians in their battle against Marxist guerrilla groups.

Terms Of A Peace Pact

Now, as the Bogota government negotiates a peace pact with the right-wing 
forces, Colombian lawmakers are debating a bill that would give 
paramilitary commanders guilty of massacres, drug trafficking and other 
crimes just a few years behind bars if they agree to lay down their 
weapons. Heralded as a step toward peace, the legislation is widely 
expected to win congressional approval in coming weeks.

But those crying for justice are outraged.

"They should get life sentences," wailed Luz Bertel, a fish seller in San 
Onofre, whose teenage son was killed by paramilitaries in 2003. "They have 
no heart."

Farmer Hermes Verbel said his brother was run down by a car on the streets 
of San Onofre in January, shortly after giving information about the 
paramilitaries to authorities.

Verbel and others in the village claim that the gunmen sometimes 
dismembered their victims with chain saws and fed them to crocodiles.

"These are very savage people," Verbel said. "They have to be punished."

Under the bill, however, most rank-and-file paramilitaries would not serve 
any jail time if they disarm.

Paramilitary leaders implicated in atrocities -- crimes that would normally 
put them behind bars for up to four decades -- would receive sentences of 
just five to eight years. If they participate in prison study or work 
programs, they could end up serving as little as two years. In addition, 
they would get to keep much of their ill-gotten wealth.

More Carrot Than Stick

Supporters of the bill maintain that offering more carrot than stick is the 
only way to keep the peace talks on track and demobilize Colombia's 15,000 
paramilitary foot soldiers. But critics contend the legislation would allow 
top commanders to continue trafficking drugs, extorting businesses and 
blackmailing politicians.

"The law won't do anything to take apart this gangster network," said 
Antonio Navarro Wolff, a former guerrilla who disarmed in 1990 and is now a 
Colombian senator.

Human Rights Watch has been so critical of the bill that in February it 
urged foreign government and private donors to withhold all support for 
Colombia's peace process unless lawmakers approve a bill that is tougher on 
the paramilitaries and meets world standards. Under international human 
rights laws, victims of atrocities have the right to truth, justice and 
reparations.

The current draft of the bill "provides no incentive for perpetrators . to 
fully disclose their crimes," Louise Arbour, the United Nations' top human 
rights official, said recently in Bogota. "Without the full truth being 
exposed, justice is compromised, and reparations (to victims) are compromised."

Not surprisingly, the paramilitaries, classified as terrorists by 
Washington, view the debate through a different prism.

The vigilante groups, first formed in the 1980s by large landowners and 
drug traffickers, helped push the rebels out of many areas of Colombia at a 
time when the undermanned army and police were foundering.

Paramilitary Claims

Paramilitary commanders claim that most of the civilians killed by their 
troops have actually been members of guerrilla groups that have been 
battling the government for 41 years. Thus, they contend, their right-wing 
fighters should be treated like saviors, not sinners.

In April, paramilitary leaders insisted they would serve no jail time and 
threatened to end peace talks unless lawmakers came up with a bill more to 
their liking.

"This bill offers us no guarantees," said Ernesto Baez, one of the 
organization's top commanders. "We will be the first ones who will be sorry 
if we are forced to return to the mountains."

Many paramilitaries, however, have abandoned their original 
counterinsurgency cause.

The people of San Onofre, for instance, say there were few guerrillas in 
the area when paramilitaries moved in eight years ago. The right-wing 
gunmen, they say, coveted the region near the Caribbean coast as a 
cocaine-smuggling corridor.

Soon, residents say, the paramilitaries began seizing land from farmers and 
bullying political candidates into withdrawing from municipal races to 
ensure victory for their allies. They demanded extortion payments from 
businesses.

"The paramilitaries were the only law in town," said drugstore owner Edgar 
Berrio, who was forced to pay a monthly "protection" fee.

All the while, the town's young men were disappearing.

Fidencia Mendoza, a 56-year-old mother of eight, said her son Raul was 
killed by a paramilitary in a dispute over a woman. Berrio said the gunmen 
dragged his brother from his bed in the middle of the night.

"They took him to El Palmar," he said, shuddering.

Sifting For Clues

Government investigators digging at the El Palmar ranch and other sites 
around San Onofre have turned up remains of 42 people in just the past few 
weeks.

As Colombian marines guarded the dig site at El Palmar one recent morning, 
workers sifted dirt through screens, searching for bullets, rings and other 
clues that could identify the victims and the killers.

Blue-and-white running shoes clung to the foot bones of one victim. Duct 
tape stuck to the eye sockets of another suggested that the man had been 
blindfolded before his skull had been crushed.

"The people say up to 300 people may be buried here," said one of the 
investigators. "They may be right."

But it may prove impossible to assess blame for the El Palmar killings and 
thousands of other paramilitary assassinations across Colombia under the so 
called "peace and justice" bill, critics say. That's because the 
legislation does not require fighters to make across-the-board confessions 
of their crimes.

Human rights advocates say Colombian investigators have spent years 
investigating paramilitary massacres and have managed to pinpoint and 
prosecute only a small number of perpetrators.

Detailed confessions also would help authorities locate the bodies of the 
disappeared, expropriate illegally obtained lands and arrest any 
landowners, military officials and others who financed and supported 
paramilitary groups.

Ivan Cepeda, the son of a leftist Colombian senator killed by 
paramilitaires in 1994, said some legislators have shied away from throwing 
the book at the right-wing fighters.

A handful of lawmakers openly back the paramilitaries and even invited 
three of the group's commanders to formally address Congress last year. 
Some legislators won their seats after receiving the tacit backing of the 
gunmen.

'Political' Crimes

Depending on the final wording of the bill working its way through 
Congress, paramilitary crimes could be classified as "political."

That might shield the group's leaders from extradition to the United States 
on drug charges and open the door for them to run for public office.

"Surely, many paramilitary leaders who helped their communities would be 
elected," the paramilitaries' former top commander, Salvatore Mancuso, 
recently told the Bogota newsmagazine Semana.

Supporters admit the bill is far from perfect. But they point out that the 
legislation is intended to provide the framework for any future peace 
negotiations with the country's two main leftist guerrilla groups. Lengthy 
prison terms and other hard-line measures, they say, would discourage the 
rebels from demobilizing.

"The idea is not to make the most beautiful law," said Sen. Roberto 
Camacho, who supports the bill. "The idea is to achieve peace."

But as he wandered past a string of clandestine graves marked with orange 
flags and yellow police tape, one of the forensic experts at El Palmar 
predicted that without true justice, there will be no peace.

"It's illogical" he said. "Even after committing all of these massacres, 
these people may get only five years in jail."
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MAP posted-by: Elizabeth Wehrman