Socialist Action /April 2002
Solidarity Activists Forced into Hiding
in Colombia
The Irish Latin American Solidarity Campaign announced March 29 that
two representatives sent to Colombia to investigate a complaint of human
rights violations had been forced to go into hiding by collusion between
the Colombian army and right-wing terrorist death squads.
One of those endangered was an Irish citizen, Gearoid O Loinsigh; the
other was a German coworker. The two had flown to Santa Rosa del Sur in
response to an appeal from a nearby farming and mining community.
Upon arrival the two human rights activists were held and questioned
for several hours by the army. When they were released, they were instructed
to stay in a certain hotel in the town. Warned that the hotel was frequented
by the death squadrons, they did not go there. At midnight, the hotel was
raided and thoroughly searched by a squad of right-wing assassins.
The next day a group of Germans, with no connection to the Irish Latin
American Solidarity Campaign, were stopped by the army and persistently
questioned about O Loinsigh and his companion. The two human rights activists
were trapped in the area, fearing contact with the military at the airport,
since it was obviously working with the death squadrons.
A local human rights group with which O Loinsigh works contacted the
Irish government, and it got in contact with the Colombian government. However,
Colombian officials responded only by saying that they had no control over
the death squadrons. They did not offer any protection for the human rights
activists.
Over the past 10 years, hundreds of human rights activists, along with
many trade-union activists and political oppositionists, have been murdered
in Colombia. It has become one of the countries where assassination is the
most common. Murder is obviously one of the main resorts of the corrupt
and discredited rulers that the United States is trying to rescue by massive
military aid.
For further information on this case or to find out how to join a campaign
in defense of the threatened activists, e-mail the Irish Latin American
Solidarity Campaign at lasc@iol.ie.
Socialist Action /April 2002 |