BACKGROUND: Bush and some Members of Congress are proposing that we make a bad US policy even worse. So far our aid (at taxpayer expense) has poured toxic chemicals on people, animals, and the delicate ecosystem of the Amazon at an unprecedented rate. Now they want to double the amount of fumigation. So far our aid has trained and equipped the Colombian military, a military with one of the worst human rights records in Latin America and a military with well-documented links to right-wing paramilitary death squads that are responsible for three-quarters of politically-motivated civilian murders. Now, the hawks in Washington want to expand into direct counter-insurgency, leading us into an unending quagmire that will cost too much in terms of human lives (not to mention financially).
WE MUST TELL MEMBERS OF CONGRESS THAT THESE PROPOSALS ARE UNACCEPTABLE TO THEIR CONSTITUENTS!!!
TAKE ACTION:
Contact your Senators and Representative. If you don't know who they
are, visit: www.senate.gov and www.house.gov/writerep
The Congressional switchboard number is (202) 224-3121.
TALKING POINTS
Many members of Congress have good intentions, and want to support an end
to violence in Colombia. But adding more military aid is not the way to
do it. Tell your Senators and Representative that you and members of your
community are against US military involvement in Colombia and are particularly
against this expansion.
1. Sending more military aid to Colombia is not going to help protect civilians. The Colombian military still maintains close ties with paramilitary groups, who are on the US terrorist list and who commit upwards of 70% of civilian killings in Colombia. Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the Washington Office on Latin America released a report in February proving the human rights situation in Colombia is EVEN WORSE than a year ago.
2. Sending military aid to Colombia brings the US into another Vietnam quagmire. Colombia is the size of 53 El Salvadors, and the amount of money necessary to defeat the FARC militarily will be tremendous, and perhaps incalculable. This civil war has been going on for over 40-years and a political solution is the only way out.
3. Real solutions. US support for a negotiated peace process with the FARC and the ELN, and real pressure on the Colombian government to break ties with the paramilitaries, will do more to protect civilians than increased military aid will. Violent actions on the part of the FARC have a tremendous human cost, but supporting a military that collaborates with the paramilitaries has a huge human cost as well.
4. Fumigation has only increased the amount of coca grown in Colombia. More fumigation will only increase it further. Civil society and local governments are asking for the chance to do manual eradication and alternative development. Addicts in the United States are asking for real drug treatment and prevention. Let's look at better ways to spend our tax money.