Colombia Orders Return of Stolen Farmland:U.S. Pact Is Motivation For Move, Critics Say

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Washington Post

Colombia Orders Return of Stolen Farmland
U.S. Pact Is Motivation For Move, Critics Say

By Juan Forero
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, March 23, 2009; Page A08

CARMEN DEL DARIEN, Colombia -- As with so many crimes of war, what happened here in the dense, humid jungles of northwestern Colombia more than a decade ago might easily have been forgotten. Illegal militias forced hundreds of poor black farmers off their land, which politically connected businessmen then seized and turned into lucrative palm oil plantations.

The displaced farmers, well aware that the hundreds of thousands of people uprooted by Colombia's long civil conflict rarely returned home, thought they would never see their land again. But in this case, the government recently ordered nine palm oil companies to return thousands of acres to the farmers, and the attorney general's office is investigating the firms' operators on accusations of homicide, land theft and forced displacement.

The government, however, is motivated as much by self-interest as altruism, say human rights groups, which also charge that state negligence coupled with aid for the palm oil companies helped facilitate the land seizures. President Álvaro Uribe's administration urgently wants a free-trade agreement with the United States, and Democrats on Capitol Hill have made clear that the pact is contingent on human rights advances in Colombia, particularly for blacks and other marginalized groups.

"I think it's directly linked, there's no question about that," Rep. Donald M. Payne (D-N.J.), a member of the Western Hemisphere subcommittee, said of the Colombian government's attention to the land issue in the state of Choco. "I'm not so sure that these efforts by the government would be made had it not been for the external pressure that we've raised."

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/22/AR2009032202029.html

[Demeter]

1. Si, Se Puede!

One by one, the fascist dominoes fall in South and Central America, until they fall in North America, Africa, and lastly, Asia.

[msongs]

2. so what group is oppressing blacks and other marginalized groups did they say? nt

[fascisthunter]

3. Can Ya all Feel that People Power from South America?

now if only distracted Americans would pay more attention to the fact that they have been slaves to a corrupt economic system.

[damntexdem]

4. Believe it when the land has gone back -- and the farmers have been left alone for a few years.

Now, as to the assassinations of union activists ...