Colombia’s Uribe soaks up the glory of Betancourt’s release

The recent rescue of Colombian-French national Ingrid Betancourt, and three US military contractors, has been another media coup by Colombian President Álvaro Uribe Vélez against the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

With US Republican and presidential candidate John McCain in the South American country at the time, Uribe’s move was almost perfect. Prior to his visit, McCain called Uribe’s Colombia a “beacon of hope in a region where the Castro brothers, [Venezuelan President] Hugo Chávez, and others are actively seeking to thwart economic progress and democracy”.

Of course the real Colombia under Uribe, which has received over US$5 billion in aid from Washington since 2002, does not even remotely resemble the country McCain attempts to portray.

For a start, Uribe’s own links to the paramilitaries and drug cartels are well known and have been documented by many observers.

On March 25, 2002, Newsweek published an article where Joseph Contreras questioned Uribe on his shady past. The questions were so direct the then presidential candidate became enraged and walked out on the interview.

According to a 1991 report by US Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA) officials in Colombia, Uribe was considered a "close personal friend of Pablo Escobar" who was "dedicated to collaboration with the Medellín [drug] cartel at high government levels". Escobar, until he was gunned down in 1993, was in charge of a vast cocaine empire and fundamental in establishing the country’s right-wing death squads.

Fast forward to mid-2008 and it was Colombia’s Supreme Court which further revealed who runs the country. This time, what was put into question was the legality of Uribe’s government since "the initiative to amend the constitution”, which allowed him to run for re-election in 2006, “was flawed by criminal acts".

This is the latest scandal after Uribe’s own cousin Mario Uribe Escobar - a long time political advisor to the President - was arrested and charged with ties to paramilitary groups. Uribe Escobar is just one of 33 national political representatives currently incarcerated on similar charges while another 52 are also under investigation. To this date, a third of Colombia’s legislature who has some type of ties to Uribe is under investigation or already imprisoned.

On the issue of human rights, according to the Washington Office on Latin America, 28 trade unionists have been murdered in Colombia this year while other sources put the number at about 500 since Uribe took over in 2002. Amnesty International notes (PDF KB) that:

Despite repeated government claims that paramilitaries are no longer active in Colombia, it is clear that they continue to operate, often with the support and acquiescence of the security forces, and to threaten and kill human rights defenders and other activists who they repeatedly label as guerrilla sympathizers or auxiliaries

As a detailed story in the magazine Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting has documented, the US press has largely remained silent (or tried to put the best spin on) issues of corruption and human rights abuses under Uribe’s government in order to support a free trade deal between the US and Colombia.

Recently, even Uribe’s sanctioned military operation, which along with Betancourt freed 14 other hostages, has come under suspicion with allegations made that the government paid $US20 million to the rebels for the release of their captives.

Garry Leech - a scholar in politics at Cape Breton University and editor of the Colombia Journal - notes that the events surrounding the rescue, as described by Colombian authorities who claimed they deceived the FARC into handing over the hostages, appears a “little far-fetched, even given the FARC’s current disarray”.

Leech claims that based on the evidence of various sources, the “alternative scenario” seems “far more plausible” in that:

… the liberation of the hostages resulted from a combination of the FARC agreeing to release them, government intelligence sources learning of the planned liberation, the bribing of the guerrilla commander in charge of guarding the hostages, and a staged rescue operation to make the Uribe administration and the Colombian military appear heroic.

In the last few months the guerrillas have been dealt some serious blows as Washington’s support for Plan Colombia - a counter-insurgency plan presented to the public under the guise of fighting narcotics - has been paying off.

In March, FARC commander and international spokesperson Raúl Reyes was killed after the Colombian military conducted a bombing raid into neighbouring Ecuador. In May, Nelly Ávila Moreno - known as “Karina” and head of the FARC’s 47th front - surrendered following the death of commander Iván Ríos, who is alleged to have been killed by his own chief of security after being bribed by authorities.

Then in the same month, the guerrillas’ long time leader Manuel Marulanda - a.k.a. “Sure Shot” - was confirmed to have died in March of natural causes. With hundreds of rebels regularly defecting, and three of the FARC’s top commanders dead, many observers are claiming the guerrillas are finished.

While this scenario can not be ruled out, as Leech points out, upbeat assessments of the war are often based on journalists uncritically accepting too many Colombian and US government reports.

In the urban centres though, it seems the FARC has little support due to its cruel policy of kidnapping, taxation of the cocaine trade and human rights abuses. Their abduction of Betancourt - a former senator who took on some of Colombia’s most corrupt politicians, including former president Ernesto Samper - was another error in a long line of many.

Now that she is free, Betancourt has not ruled out another run at the presidency in 2010, which could see her face off against a currently popular Uribe. Although Betancourt was quick to thank Uribe for the operation that led to her release, and is currently engaged in an international campaign for the FARC to free all its hostages, she has also stated the Colombian President needs to placate his "radical, extremist language of hate" against the rebels.

Perhaps, like in the past, Betancourt still believes it is best to negotiate with the FARC instead of attempting to destroy them militarily.