From: Barry Stoller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Report: FARC brought down US helicopter Reuters. 23 January 2002. Colombian FARC Rebels Fired on U.S. Helicopter. BOGOTA -- Marxist guerrillas fired on a U.S. government helicopter involved in an anti-drug mission in Colombia and five Colombian policemen were killed in a subsequent rescue operation, police said on Wednesday. The incident took place last Friday when a State Department UH-1N helicopter, piloted by a civilian contractor, came under machine-gun fire from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and was forced to make an emergency landing, Colombia's anti-drug police chief Gen. Gustavo Socha said. The pilot, a Peruvian citizen who works for DynCorp, a Pentagon contractor hired in the U.S.-funded war against drugs in Colombia, was evacuated unhurt along with the rest of the crew. However, five Colombian police officers sent to rescue the helicopter were killed in a fierce battle with some 300 heavily-armed FARC rebels, Socha said. A Colombian warplane then destroyed the helicopter with bombs to prevent it from falling into rebel hands, he said. A U.S. embassy official said the helicopter had made an emergency landing near a FARC safe haven in southern Colombia. He said no American citizens were on board. The official did not confirm that the aircraft had come under fire and said only that it had had "technical problems." The helicopter was escorting crop dusters spraying herbicide on coca crops, used to produce cocaine. Based in Reston, Virginia, DynCorp has over 300 employees in Colombia, including many Americans and citizens of Peru and Central American countries. The company provides crop duster and helicopter pilots, mechanics and paramedics in President Andres Pastrana's U.S.-funded anti-cocaine "Plan Colombia." "The helicopter was hit during an attack by the FARC. A failure in its hydraulic system forced it to make an emergency landing," Socha told Reuters. The 17,000-member FARC has declared U.S. civilian "mercenaries" in the war on drugs to be military targets. Last February, another State Department helicopter carrying U.S. DynCorp employees was fired upon by FARC rebels during an operation to rescue a Colombian police helicopter. No one was killed. The United States is pouring in more than $1 billion in mainly military aid to help Pastrana wipe out drug production in Colombia, which is gripped by a 38-year old war increasingly funded by the cocaine trade. The aid, which includes the delivery of Black Hawk helicopters and training of anti-narcotics police, is restricted so far to the war on cocaine and heroin production. Some voices on Capitol Hill are pressing for Washington to accede to Colombia's request to be allowed to use the aid for counter-insurgency operations as well. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Barry Stoller http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ProletarianNews _________________________________________________ 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] __________________________________________________
