By Irina Malenko

Do you remember how suddenly  "the case of the Bogota Three" arose out of
nowhere, after it became increasingly clear that the IRA decommission is not
at all what David Trimble wants, but something he is rather afraid of?
After the British government has shown yet again that it doesn't respect its
own word and still acts like in "good old" colonial days?
After the majority of the Irish people could clearly see who are the real
enemies of peace in Ireland?

The "Irish Times" Editorial in August was claiming that the whole Irish
nation demanded to know what happened in Colombia..
To be honest, I haven't heard anybody (on the streets, in a bus, at work)
asking about Colombia. Except for politicians on TV opposed to Sinn Fein and
desperately wanting to distract Irish people from what they are really
demanding for already 3,5 years: full and speedy implementation of the GFA.

It is becoming more and more obvious that the so-called "case of the Bogota
Three" was created at the most politically suitable moment by those who
oppose peace processes, both in Ireland and in Colombia.

IT IS NOT BY ACCIDENT THAT THE "COLOMBIAN AFFAIR"  - arrest of 3 Irishmen
with Republican political views in Bogota - IS BEING BLOWN UP OUT OF THE
PROPORTIONS BY THE MEDIA AND POLITICIANS.
IT IS ALSO NOT BY ACCIDENT THAT THIS ARREST TOOK PLACE IN THAT PARTICULAR
MOMENT IN TIME IN THE PEACE PROCESSES OF BOTH COUNTRIES.

As the Colombian security services have confessed, they would have never
done it without British intelligence's (MI5 etc.) and the CIA's involvement.

The British government is trying to distract the Irish people and the
world's public opinion from the fact that it renegades on its own
commitments to implement the GFA in full and that it is in breach of the
INTERNATIONAL AGREEMENT (as the GFA is an international agreement!).
Judging by its actions, the British government still believes it can get
away with stopping the clock for political institutions in the North at any
time that suits its securocrats, in order to use the suspension as
blackmailing tool against the Republicans. But, in fact, by doing so, the
British government is demonstrating its disrespect for all the Irish voters
who voted for Agreement, and for the international law.
Some within the British establishment are still attempting to revive the
"political corps": "to save" David Trimble yet again
.
But the main reason for them is to shift the blame for the deepest crisis in
the Irish peace process from their Unionist allies and themselves towards
Republicans.
These people couldn't succeed in finding the "reason" in Ireland itself as
the IRA has shown a truly iron discipline in face of the constant strain of
the Loyalist provocative attacks on the most vulnerable Nationalist
civilians - and so, they looked overseas. And for these people, any man with
Republican political sympathies being in a "hot spot" "would do".

If you looked at the news bulletin on TV (for example, UTV news on 22/08),
the "Colombian affair" as they call it, was a priority topic. But ALL THAT
WAS TOLD TO THE AUDIENCE, WERE BARE SPECULATIONS. For the hard facts on the
very same news bulletin you could come to the conclusion that the only real
threat to the peace in the North comes not from some far Colombia, but from
the Loyalism that continues to use its weapons on a daily basis. And that
the Unionist and the British politicians are not willing to face those
responsible for that. They prefer to speculate on what the IRA might have
been doing or planning - instead of facing what the Loyalists are ALREADY
DOING TODAY AND HAVE BEEN DOING NON-STOP FOR A LONG TIME. Actions - or the
lack of such  - speak louder than words.

The Unionists' reasons making the hype about the Bogota Three are obvious.
The whole world could see that it was Mr. Trimble who ignited the most
recent crisis in the Irish Peace Process by his resignation.
The Unionists had to cover Mr. Trimble's bare behind after this "peacemaker"
who claimed that the only thing preventing GFA from full implementation is
the Republican refusal to disarm, REJECTED the historical IRA offer on
decommission.
.
Now the same David Trimble is claiming that the only thing that prevents him
from going back to government and allowing political institutions to work,
is what happened in Colombia. In such situation any war zone country visited
by any Republicans, "would do".
Whatever happens in the world, even if it will be an earthquake in another
part of the planet, in twisted Unionist logic is always the fault of "Sinn
Fein /IRA" - or, as the anti-Semitic racists in Russia say, "if the water is
not running from a tap, that's because Jews have drunk it all!"

What is much more remarkable and interesting to see, is the reaction of SDLP
and the Irish government. Both have supported the suspension of the
political institutions - (even though publicly said that it was
regrettable), because they are both afraid of Sinn Fein's inevitable
electoral gains.

It is particularly clear when you see how drastically the policy of the
Irish government towards the Republican movement has changed after its
recent electoral success in the 6 counties. The Southern political parties
are clearly panicking at the thought that the same will happen at the next
elections in the 26 counties.

It is also particularly clear when you listen to who within SDLP is
demanding "clarity on Columbia" the loudest.  It was astonishing to see Brid
Rogers on UTV among those talking about "need to come clean on Colombia" as
their main political priority - that is, over the Loyalist attacks on
Nationalist people in the North?
But it is quite understandable to talk about something far, far away- if you
consider her own tremendous electoral humiliation and dramatic loss to Sinn
Fein in the recent elections. It is also a good question why Mrs. Rogers and
likewise politicians were not interested before these elections in what is
actually happening in Colombia - and what exactly are the US military doing
there? Neither was this question raised by the Irish government.

SDLP is also desperately trying to distract the Irish people from a far more
important for them question of the Irish reality today: why did the party
start supporting the flawed British police "reform" that is far short of the
Patten recommendations, AFTER the elections in which it has promised its
voters NOT TO?
In order to do so, again, Colombia or anything else "would do".

The US intelligence and securocrats also have their own reasons to blow
"the Colombian situation" out of proportion.

Gerry Adams is acting as a truly independent politician by planning a visit
to the "Father of all Enemies" for the American imperialism - Fidel Castro.
Those within the US establishment who saw Adams as a "pocket revolutionary",
were extremely unhappy of his independent steps, and decided to prevent it
by all possible means. They desperately needed an excuse for that. Even
though, at the first sight, modern America believes that it does not need
any excuse for any of its actions, including bombing and starving civilians
on a daily basis as they do in Iraq, interfering into civil wars in
different countries and "making peace" by choosing one side over the other,
what leads to the new ethnic cleansings as it is happening in the Balkans,
and arming itself to its teeth, against the wishes of the virtually whole
European continent.
The US see Latin America as its "backyard" - and will not allow peoples of
this continent to take their freedom into their own hands. The whole world
witnessed in 1973 what happened to democratically elected President Allende
in Chile. Little changed since.

The US Bush administration has  (and let's finally face it!)- a different
position on the Irish peace process than the Clinton administration had.
This government is also seeking for an extra excuse to interfere into other
countries' internal affairs all around the world, Columbia and the American
"Plan Columbia" being just one of the examples.
What really worries the US administration, is not that FARC are "involved in
drugs" (FARC only taxes drugs profits while the US-backed through the
Colombian army right wing paramilitaries are actually actively involved into
trafficking and a worker of the US embassy in Bogota was caught recently
sending drugs by diplomatic post), but that they are MARXISTS! Just like in
the 50s with their witch-hunting of McCarthy, being a Marxist is a crime by
itself for the Bush administration: because Marxists are actively opposing
the US' led New World  Order and  their countries being ripped off by the
West.

The National Mobilization on Colombia in the US, the Amnesty International,
the Human Right Watch,  the UH High Agency for Human Rights - all of these
organizations have condemned the American military involvement into this
country's long and bitter civil war. "Current US military aid to Colombia
including military training and private contracting, is a failed policy,"-
writes The National Mobilization on Colombia (NMC). It is planning a major
all-American manifestation against "Plan Colombia" at the end on this month.

The US government is claiming that is fighting against drugs trafficking,
but the numbers are showing that "to achieve 1 % reduction in US cocaine
consumption, US could spend an additional $ 34 mln. On drugs treatment
programs or 23 TIMES MORE,  $ 783 mln. - on efforts to eradicate supply at
the source." (Rydell & Everyngham, Controlling Cocaine). That will make any
reasonable person think that, perhaps, the US have very different  reasons
for being involved in Colombia that they claim to have..

The real reason is, as usually economical - profits of the big corporations
that are so high in a country where  "government policy labels trade union
activists as "terrorists" (NMC). More that 3800 Colombian trade unionists
have been killed since 1986. Of every 5 trade unionists killed in the world
today 3 are Colombians. The numbers speak for themselves.  And the vast
majority - about 80% -  of the killings of trade unionists are committed
either by the Government forces directly or through its indirect agents-
right wing paramilitaries whom they arm and supply with intelligence (sounds
all too familiar for the Irish people here!).  The reasoning  of violence
against trade union activists - "industrial opposition in Colombia to the
exercise of labor rights." Trade union activities are being considered
"subversive" - because they challenge corporate profits!
Primary purpose of the US's policy and "aid" to Colombia is not "War to
Drugs", as they claim, but the protection  of  super-profits and interests
of the big corporations in this area. There is evidence that "several US
companies maintained open relations with murderous death squads as part of
their program to intimidate trade union leaders". Coca-Cola  was brought to
the Federal court "for its role in such violent attacks on labor and other
large corporations are being investigated".

Do you hear Mr. Trimble or Mr. Robinson or Mrs. Rogers demanding from the
American authorities "to come clean" on what exactly are they doing in
Columbia? I don't.

Meanwhile, more than $ 1 billion  of the US taxpayers money are being
propped into  Colombian government which is the 3rd largest recipient of the
US' military aid in the world. According to NMC, "Colombian military has a
horrendous human rights record towards labor. Official Colombian military
has in some cases created paramilitary units to carry out assassinations" -
it is documented by US State Department, by UN High Commission for Human
Rights, by Amnesty International and various other organizations.

Today's Colombia is  a place where 10 people die every day due to political
violence and where 2 million people have been displaced since 1985 - far
more than in Kosovo or in Macedonia that are constantly on our TV screens.

The US media were so outraged about 3 Irish Republicans visiting FARC's zone
that they accused then in all sorts of crimes without any factual evidence.
But what they are forgetting to mention, is  that over 60.000 Latin American
officers, many of them - Colombians, were trained in the US's very own
military School of Americas (currently  Western Hemispheric Institute for
Security and Co-operation, WHISC), and that SOA graduates are "consistently
linked to some of the worst human rights atrocities" (NMC). In Colombia, as
the report of the Human Rights Watch shows,  SOA-trained officers  "are
linked to formation and operation of paramilitary groups, such as "Calima
Front" . The report, called "Ties that bind", shows that this group is
responsible for displacement of over 10.000 people and for at least 200
murders in its first 12 months of existence. Colombia remains until now one
of the main recipients  of the US military training.
"In addition to the SOA, approximately 4000 Colombian military personnel are
trained in combat each year in other locations".

And this very state, involved into all these "activities", dares to say
something about "danger" of the 3 Irishmen with Republican views visiting
Colombia as tourists?

Let's look at the so-called non-military parts of the American "Plan
Colombia": does it bring anything good to the Colombian people?

The biggest part of "Plan Columbia" is forced aerial eradication of coca and
poppy crops. But according to a study conducted by the UN at request of
Colombia's own government, coca crop production has increased since US began
the aerial eradication campaign back in 1995, by 268%!  In year 1999 alone
it has increased by over 60%.

Eradication is a threat to bio-diversity of the Amazon region and to human
health.  The herbicide that is being used for aerial eradication, is Roundup
Ultra that has a lot of untested activities. According to its own
manufacturer,  it is designed to be applied manually and not aerially and it
is dangerous if falls into drinking water sources. There is an increasing
number of reported health problems in the region, respiratory, skin
problems, gastrointestinal problems, particularly with young children.  The
eradication just makes people to move (last year alone there were 300.000
internally displaced persons in Colombia, for various reasons, eradication
being just one of them). According to NMC, "for every acre of cola crops
eradicated in Southern Colombia, 3 acres of Amazon rain forest are cut down
to replace it."

The rest of the world may not be very aware of the fact that just in recent
times 2 new American military  air bases have been established near
Columbia - in the last Dutch colony, on Antillean islands Curacao and Aruba.
The Lower Chamber of the Dutch Parliament approved in May this year  a law
about these FOL bases. The approval of the Higher Chamber was recently
received.

By this law, among other things, American military will not be prosecuted on
these islands' territory for anything they will commit, be it a traffic
accident or a murder. There was already one nearly accident with one of the
planes.

The American administration claims that the bases are needed purely for
intelligence surveillance purposes. Apart from the fact that this so-called
"free world" doesn't even to question the right of the superpower to spy
over the territory of any sovereign country that it picks, at present most
planes on those bases are the F-16 bombers that are far too fast for this
type of work. 

There is growing evidence that Colombia might become US's new Vietnam.

The biggest evidence of the hypocrisy of American "War on Drugs" in Colombia
is the little known to the ordinary people fact  that actual coca production
WOULD HAVE BEEN IMPOSSIBLE IN COLOMBIA WITHOUT USA AND EUROPE: it requires
the use of toxic chemicals that ARE NOT BEING PRODUCED IN COLOMBIA ITSELF,
but are being IMPORTED IN THERE FROM THE VERY SAME USA AND EUROPE. Every
hectare of coca needs approximately 1.3 tones of precursor chemicals - and
all these chemicals end up in the Colombian rivers.

FARC - the Colombian Marxist guerilla movement - was holding  quite a large
territory in the South of the country: the so-called Demilitarized Zone. The
status of this zone was to be reviewed in October, and by August there were
already  many signs indicating  that this would  be the breaking point for
the Colombian peace process as the American government was forcibly pushing
the Colombian authorities back to a full-scale war with FARC.  The war that
has finally started now.

There are, as we see, reasons enough for each interested party - the
Unionists, the British and the American securocrats, the SDLP and the Irish
political parties in the South and, not to forget, the Colombian
authorities - to find a scapegoat for its own  political failures or its own
dirty goals.

AND WHAT ARE THE FACTS? WHERE IS THE PROOF OF ANY OF THE ALLEGATIONS AGAINST THE BOGOTA THREE?

First of all, it  is very strange that the Western countries that speak so
much of importance of the presumption of innocence as the corner stone of
the Western democracy, are  allowing their media to convict these 3 men
without even being put on trial! This is a classical example of defamation.
In any European jury system that would have influenced the future jury to
such a degree that the whole trial would inevitably collapse.
The "free"  media are acting against these men in a shamelessly Stalinist
style. We have been told that we would be shown, for example, "an additional
proof " of the links between IRA and FARC. All what we have been shown in
that news bulletin, was the FARC commander Reyes strongly denying these
men's involvement into any "terrorist training" - and then we were told by
the presenters that we shouldn't believe him and that the Colombian
authorities have found an unnamed man who claims that he saw Martin McCauley
there back in the late 80s doing that. What a great memory this unnamed
source has - and why do we have to believe him and not to believe the FARC
commander?

If you will put the well-paid for it media and the involved politicians'
emotions aside and look at the presented facts, it is obvious that the only
proof of "guilt" of the 3 Irishmen they have, are these 3 men's  political
ideas.
There were no traces of explosives found on their clothes by the Colombian
experts - only the American one "found" it. There is no announced with such
a triumph on the first day's video evidence against them.
There is virtually nothing - except for the false passports, but they
already explained very logically as why did they use them.

Is it their past convictions of some of them (far back in time when the war
was going on in Ireland full-scale) or their voting patterns that they are
being accused of?

An example of what Britain's own citizens are doing abroad in the war zones
of other countries without needed documents, as recent as August 2001.
British citizen Brian Graham was arrested by Russian army in Chechnya,
without proper documents, but with enough evidence on him to accuse him of
connections with Chechen guerilla. He was deported from Moscow.

Are we asking what party is Brian Graham member of or what party was he
voting for? There is a big possibility that he was a Labor voter (too
adventurous for being a Tory!). Is his sympathies to the Chechen rebels a
threat to the  Peace Process, especially since the British embassy in Moscow
was aware of his travel plans? Does any Russian politician or any British
political party demand from any other party Brian Graham might have voted
for, an explanation of what he was doing in Chechnya? Why then does have SF
to explain anything to anybody about travel plans of these people just
because of their assumed political views?

By convicting 3 Irishmen based on their political ideas, Western democracies
are setting an interesting pattern: from now on, will they decide all the
travel destinations for people with political ideas that do not suit their
securocrats?

That is, indeed,  a very interesting concept of freedom of movement which is
remarkably close to that of the late USSR that the West was so fiercely
condemning.

The Colombian authorities have gone now even further, declaring the
Demilitarized Zone virtually a no-go zone for all Irish nationals.
 THE ARREST OF AN IRISH TOURIST KEVIN CRENNAN IN SOUTHERN COLUMBIA - A MAN WHO HAS NOT ONLY NOT COMMITTED ANY CRIME, BUT WHO DOESN'T EVEN HAVE REPUBLICAN POLITICAL VIEWS, HAS been a huge embarrassment for the Colombian
government and its Western sponsors. It  has CONFIRMED THE FACT OF THEIR ANTI-IRISH PARANOIA - AND THAT "THE SEASON OF HUNTING FOR THE IRISHMEN" IN
COLOMBIA HAS BEGAN.

There was from the very beginning  a strong indication that these few months
were desperately needed by the Colombian authorities not in order to prepare
a fair trial, but in order to have enough time to construct the non-existing
evidence against the 3.   It is exactly for these purposes the 2 members of
the RUC, the most discredited police force in Western Europe - police force
that can't even prevent Loyalist bombs being thrown at Nationalist children
going to school, not to mention their own record in fabricating evidence
against innocent people - have traveled to Columbia.

There is no doubt, considering all the anti-Republican hysteria, that, if
there was any clear evidence of the "guilt" of the Bogota Three, it would
have been produced to the media by now.

The question is:
Who is going to guarantee the fairness of the process that these Irish
people will be getting?  Who is going to guarantee that they will survive in
Colombian prison even for these few months?

The Colombian authorities' record of the human rights violations are, to put
it mildly, not very encouraging in this sense.

Do we still remember what happened in  "democratic" Britain to the Irishmen
who needed to be used as a scapegoat for political reasons in the past and
who have paid a very dear price while being innocent: the Guilford Four and
the Birmingham Six?

All the facts are showing that the Bogota Three are just yet another
scapegoat for the enemies of the Irish and Colombian peace processes. These
enemies do not mind that they will most probably have to compensate their
victims for their false accusations in the future: it is only taxpayers'
money anyway. For them, to destroy the Irish peace process on Unionist and
British terms, putting the blame on the Republicans, is such a desirable
goal that they believe any price is well worth to pay.
Even innocent people's lives.

The main question is: will the Irish people allow these 3 Irishmen in
Colombia become a new scapegoats for those in Ireland, Britain and US who do
not want the Peace Processes here and in Colombia to succeed?

"Not for them a judge of jury,
Nor indeed a crime at all,
Being Irish means they're guilty,
So we're guilty one and all!"

Have we learnt something from history lessons?
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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