The guardians of FARC
This evidence is devastating to the Chavez, Correa, FARC plan. While Chavez is listed as FARC's guardian angel, it appears that the Democrats in Washington are Chavez's guardian angels tying the hands of the administration in coming to the assistance of Colombia in its fight against the South American Axis of Evil.Latin American nations and the Bush administration spent the past week loudly arguing over what censure, if any, Colombia should face for a bombing raid that killed one of the top leaders of the FARC terrorist group at a jungle camp in Ecuador. More quietly, they are just beginning to consider a far more serious and potentially explosive question: What to do about the revelation that Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez forged a strategic alliance with the FARC aimed at Colombia's democratic government.
First reports of the documents recovered from laptops at the FARC camp spoke of promises by Chávez to deliver up to $300 million to a group renowned for kidnapping, drug trafficking and massacres of civilians; they also showed that Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa was prepared to remove from his own army officers who objected to the FARC's Ecuadoran bases.
But in their totality, the hundreds of pages of documents so far made public by Colombia paint an even more chilling picture. The raid appears to have preempted a breathtakingly ambitious "strategic plan" agreed on by Chávez and the FARC with the initial goal of gaining international recognition for a movement designated a terrorist organization by both the United States and Europe. Chávez then intended to force Colombian President Álvaro Uribe to negotiate a political settlement with the FARC, and to promote a candidate allied with Chávez and the FARC to take power from Uribe.
All this is laid out in a series of three e-mails sent in February to the FARC's top leaders by Iván Márquez and Rodrigo Granda, envoys who held a series of secret meetings with Chávez. Judging from the memos, Chávez did most of the talking: He outlined a five-stage plan for undermining Uribe's government, beginning with the release of several of the scores of hostages the FARC is holding.
The first e-mail, dated Feb. 8, discusses the money: It says that Chávez, whom they call "angel," "has the first 50 [million] available and has a plan to get us the remaining 200 in the course of the year." Chávez proposed sending the first "packet" of money "through the black market in order to avoid problems." He said more could be arranged by giving the FARC a quota of petroleum to sell abroad or gasoline to retail in Colombia or Venezuela.
Chávez then got to the plans that most interested him. He wanted the FARC to propose collecting all of its hostages in the open, possibly in Venezuela, for a proposed exchange for 500 FARC prisoners in Colombian jails. Chávez said he would travel to the area for a meeting with the FARC's top leader, Manuel Marulanda, and said the presidents of Ecuador, Nicaragua and Bolivia would accompany him. Meanwhile, Chávez said he would set up a new diplomatic group, composed of those countries and the FARC, plus Mexico, Brazil and Argentina, for the purpose of recognizing the FARC as a legitimate "belligerent" in Colombia and forcing Uribe into releasing its prisoners.
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Assuming these documents are authentic -- and it's hard to believe that the cerebral and calculating Uribe would knowingly hand over forgeries to the world media and the Organization of American States -- both the Bush administration and Latin American governments will have fateful decisions to make about Chávez. His reported actions are, first of all, a violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1373, passed in September 2001, which prohibits all states from providing financing or havens to terrorist organizations. More directly, the Colombian evidence would be more than enough to justify a State Department decision to cite Venezuela as a state sponsor of terrorism. Once cited, Venezuela would be subject to a number of automatic sanctions, some of which could complicate its continuing export of oil to the United States. A cutoff would temporarily inconvenience Americans -- and cripple Venezuela, which could have trouble selling its heavy oil in other markets.
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The documents also test the Democrats' commitment to international agreements in the war against terror. They have been critical of the Bush administration for not using these institutions, but they appear willing to ignore them when it comes to the communist terrorist of Colombia.
Responding to Rumors
ReplyDeleteJackson Diehl’s recent column attempts to show an inconsistency between the Bush Administration tough anti-terror stance and its dealings with Venezuela. However, nowhere in this piece does Diehl bother to mention a presumably pertinent fact – namely, by far, Colombia is one of the worst terror organizations in recent memory. According to credible human rights organizations and others Colombia and allied right-wing militias are responsible for, at least, tens of thousands of murders and executions as well as endless cases of grisly torture and torment.
To cite only one piece of evidence, an October 4, 2001 press release by human rights watch concludes that “[u]nits of the Colombian military and police continue to work with and tolerate the illegal paramilitary groups responsible for the country's most serious human rights violations, Human Rights Watch charged in a new report released today” (“Colombia: Paramilitary Groups Closely Tied to Army, Police”). More evidence could easily be cited.
Still let’s assume Diehl is correct and Venezuela is actively aiding the FARC which supposedly puts Venezuela in “violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1373, passed in September 2001, which prohibits all states from providing financing or havens to terrorist organizations” thus “flout[ing] what has been” Bush’s “first principle since Sept. 11, 2001,” namely his attack on state-sponsored terror. A stance merely assumed and never actually shown anywhere in the column.
Since after September 2001, the Bush Administration gave aid to various states – Israel, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, India, Uzbekistan, and others – who are active sponsors and participants of “terrorist organizations” the Resolution one has to conclude is utterly meaningless. Either Diehl is arguing (a) this didn’t happen – we didn’t help these governments or (b) these states are not aiding terror. I leave it to the reader to tap into the vast documentation in the “world media and the Organization of American States” among other sources to dispute Diehl’s dubious assumptions concerning the government’s good faith regarding fighting terror.
A New York Times story found that a year before the coup “the United States channeled hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants to American and Venezuelan groups opposed to President Hugo Chávez, including the labor group whose protests led to the Venezuelan president's brief ouster this month” (“US Bankrolling Is Under Scrutiny for Ties to Chávez Ouster,” April 25, 2002). I presume trying to commit a coup is sufficient to Diehl’s definition of “confronting Chávez,” satisfying those who “have quietly urged Bush to take him on.”
One can certainly criticize Venezuela for many things – keeping to the verified facts. And
if Diehl wants to justify Colombian or US terror that is his right. But to make it seem as if Venezuela is the only guilty party is utterly grotesque and dishonest. Colombia deserves far more condemnation than for its recent bombing.
Sincerely,
Christian Jimenez
Fighting terrorist can be messy work, but that does not mean there is moral equivalence. The dehumanizing aspects of socialism and communism which has been responsible for the greatest genocide in the history of the world make opposition to those who push that ideology important. Those who support narco terrorist deserve to be opposed where ever possible. The world would clearly be a better place if Hugo Chavez was not in power.
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