Colombia arrests 15 soldiers for peasant killings

[Judi Lynn]

Colombia arrests 15 soldiers for peasant killings
Tue Apr 29, 2008 2:14pm EDT
By Hugh Bronstein

BOGOTA, April 29 (Reuters) - Fifteen Colombian soldiers were arrested on suspicion of killing two farmers in 2005 and passing their bodies off as leftist guerrillas killed in battle, prosecutors said on Tuesday.

The arrests were announced as Colombia tries to convince the U.S. Congress to pass a free trade deal and continue military aid despite accusations of illegal executions and other human rights abuses by state security forces.

Another 14 soldiers are wanted in the case of Frank Martinez and Claudio Olmero, who the attorney general says were falsely identified by the army as insurgents killed in action in the northern province of Cesar.

Security forces are often accused but rarely convicted of abuses connected to a 44-year-old war involving Marxist guerrillas, right-wing paramilitaries and other groups funded by Colombia's multibillion-dollar cocaine trade.

"I do not think these 15 arrests would have been made without pressure from the United States," said Lisa Haugaard, head of the Latin America Working Group, a Washington-based human rights organization.

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