The National Committee to Free Ricardo Palmera is launching a petition campaign targeting U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. The National Committee is demanding the U.S. government immediately release the Colombian revolutionary and stop violating Palmera’s human rights. Angela Denio said, “The U.S. government is acting like a tyrant in Colombia and abusing Ricardo Palmera in a Colorado prison by chaining him from head to toe with the constant threat of electric shock. It is outrageous. Where is Obama on all of this? He promised to stop torture.”
The jailing and repeated postponement of trials of Liliany “Lily” Obando tells the story of a powerful woman. She is dealing firsthand with the extreme repression facing many Colombians who oppose the government. In Colombia there are over 7000 political prisoners. Colombian trade unionist Liliany Obando was arrested in the summer of 2008. Her arrest came during a string of attacks by the Uribe government targeting leaders of Colombia's growing struggles for social change.
Tom Burke, spokesperson for the National Committee to Free Ricardo Palmera, urgently requests, “Help and aid from Americans, Colombians, and the international community to stop a crime.” Professor Palmera is being put on trial in Colombia while held in solitary confinement in the U.S. He is being forced to wear prison clothes, shackled at the hands and feet and then chained together around the waist, with the ever-present threat of electrical shock if he moves too quickly. This ‘trial’ is a violation of Professor Palmera’s dignity and his rights as a prisoner of war. Tom Burke says, “There is nothing fair or just about the trials and imprisonment of this brave Colombian freedom fighter Ricardo Palmera. Ricardo Palmera should be set free.”
In early November I received a copy of a death threat made against student activists at the University of the Atlantic in Barranquilla, Colombia. The threat was sent out in the name of the “United Self-Defense Forces (AUC)-Rearmed”. The AUC is the largest paramilitary organization in Colombia, though it supposedly demobilized due to government efforts. However, a number of organizations, from Arco Iris Corporation to Human Rights Watch, have reported that para-militarism is actually on the increase, often in the form of new or reconstituted organizations.
Professor James J. Brittain's new book, Revolutionary Social Change in Colombia: The Origin and Direction of the FARC-EP (Pluto Press, London: 2010), is a thoroughly researched and documented academic study of the Colombian revolution and of its largest and longest lasting guerrilla organization, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia-People’s Army (FARC-EP). This alone makes it almost unique. Add to this the fact that it is based on five years of extensive research in Colombia’s countryside, both with the FARC and with the rural population, and it becomes clear that we have a one-of-a-kind book. What this study amounts to is a systematic and thorough defense of the FARC, facing the myths and allegations against the FARC squarely and putting them to rest. On this point, the book is invaluable.
The U.S. government is stepping up its surveillance and harassment of U.S. activists in an attempt to intimidate them and dampen their spirits for the change we believe in. International solidarity activist James Jordan was returning from a two week trip to Haiti, on Jan. 7, five days prior to the terrible earthquake disaster. When his flight touched down in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, flight attendants called out for “James Patrick Jordan” and asked him to come to the front of the airplane. Homeland Security came on board the airplane to escort him off.
Speaking with Fight Back! Dec. 15, a leader of the U.S.-based National Committee to Free Ricardo Palmera, Tom Burke, slammed a Nov. 12 lawsuit filed in Florida Middle District Court against the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Burke stated, “This is nothing more than an attempt by a group of U.S. mercenaries to gain publicity and put some more money in their pockets. The lawsuit fits into a larger agenda – to criminalize the main Colombian rebel group, the FARC, an organization that is fighting for a free, just and independent Colombia.”
Daughter talks of father tortured and killed by Colombian Army
Fight Back! spoke with Martina Giraldo at the protest to shut down the School of the Americas in Fort Benning, Georgia. The SOA trains the military officers who run death squads in many Latin American countries. The SOA is a school for torture, death and destruction. Martina lives near Cali, Colombia and is the daughter of Jose Orlando Giraldo – who was murdered by the Colombian Army. Martina Giraldo heads a human rights group called the Asociacion Colectivo Interdisciplinario para la Defensa de Derechos Humanos (ACIDDH).
Bogotá, Colombia – Liliany Obando es poderosa. Ella es una de los miles de prisioneros políticos de Colombia. Ya por un año, le conozco por carta. Por fin, nos conocimos en persona en tres ocasiones, durante una delegación patrocinada por la Campaña de Derechos Laborales (basado en los EEUU) y el Red de Acción Colombiana. Yo representé el Red Internacional en Solidaridad con los Prisioneros Políticos Colombianos.
