Subject: Weekly News Update on Colombia #619, 12/9/01 WEEKLY NEWS UPDATE ON THE AMERICAS ISSUE #619, DECEMBER 9, 2001 NICARAGUA SOLIDARITY NETWORK OF GREATER NEW YORK 339 LAFAYETTE ST., NEW YORK, NY 10012 (212) 674-9499 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> COLOMBIA: OIL UNION LEADER MURDERED On Nov. 30 paramilitaries from the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) kidnapped oil union leader Aury Sara Marrugo and his bodyguard, Enrique Arellano, in the Caribbean tourist port city of Cartagena de Indias, in Bolivar department. Sara was president of the Bolivar section of the United Union of Workers (USO), which represents workers at the state-run oil company Ecopetrol. On Dec. 1 the USO's 5,000 members went on strike to protest the kidnapping, shutting down the refineries in Cartagena and Barrancabermeja. On Dec. 3, the AUC leadership sent a letter via internet to the government's peace commissioner, Camilo Gomez, acknowledging that they were holding Sara. They claimed to have put him on trial before an "AUC court," and that he had confessed to being the top leader of the Jaime Bateman Cayon Front of the leftist National Liberation Army (ELN) guerrilla movement. The AUC's "tribunal" found Sara guilty of "multiple crimes", but the AUC would be willing to free him so he could be tried and sentenced by the Colombian state, the AUC leaders said in their letter to Gomez. "But we are only prepared to hand him over to you in person in one of our jungle camps, and while you're there you can explain to us what it is exactly that you do, Mr. Commissioner," the AUC leaders warned, claiming Sara told them that Gomez provided helicopters to the ELN which were used in "activities very distant from being humanitarian, something which you will have to clarify sooner rather than later." [El Diario-La Prensa (NY) 12/4/01 from AFP, 12/6/01 from AP] On Dec. 5, the bodies of Sara and Arellano were found in a rural area of Bolivar department; they had been shot to death. USO president Hernando Hernandez immediately announced the union would protest the killing by continuing an open-ended strike. Energy and Mines Minister Luisa Lafaurie said the refineries had been militarized and management had been instructed to take over operation as a contingency plan to maintain fuel supplies. [El Nuevo Herald (Miami) 12/6/01 from Reuters; ED-LP 12/6/01 from AP] "In the past 10 years 187 workers, leaders and activists from our union have been murdered," said Jorge Galindo of the USO's commision on human rights and peace. On Oct. 19 Colombian authorities arrested six USO leaders and charged them with "rebellion" for alleged links to rebel groups [see Update #612]. One was provisionally released; the others remain jailed while their trials proceed. [ED-LP 12/6/01 from AP] Top ELN leader Nicolas Rodriguez accused Vice President Gustavo Bell, who is also Colombia's defense minister, of responsibility for the murder of Sara. Gomez, the peace commissioner, called Rodriguez's accusation "slander," and said only the AUC was responsible for the murder. [ENH 12/8/01 from AP] Meanwhile, between 150 and 200 people were reportedly killed in combat between paramilitaries from the AUC and leftist rebels from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) between Dec. 1 and 5 in the jungles of Choco department, in northwestern Colombia. The fighting has displaced hundreds of local residents. [ENH 12/6/01 from Reuters] ============================================================= Weekly News Update on the Americas * Nicaragua Solidarity Network of NY 339 Lafayette St, New York, NY 10012 * 212-674-9499 fax: 212-674-9139 http://home.earthlink.net/~nicadlw/wnuhome.html * [EMAIL PROTECTED] ============================================================= _________________________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. Box 66 00841 Helsinki Phone +358-40-7177941 Fax +358-9-7591081 http://www.kominf.pp.fi General class struggle news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe mails to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Geopolitical news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] __________________________________________________
