By Brendan Oliver Bergh
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

BOGOTÁ, Colombia – Peace talks began this week between the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, also known as the FARC Rebels. The FARC are Latin America’s oldest guerrilla army and have been active for nearly 50 years. FARC Leader Rodrigo Londono confirmed that talks had opened up in a video released on the FARC website.

FARC Rebels marching on patrol. (Photo Courtesy of The Telegraph)

This will be the first time that formal peace talks have commenced between the Colombian government and the FARC Rebels since 1999, which ultimately disintegrated after the rebels regrouped and continued to carry out attacks and kidnappings against government and civilian targets.

While FARC proposed a ceasefire during these peace talks, Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos refused the proposition, announcing that until talks have proceeded, combined military and police forces will continue assaults on FARC camps. The bi-lateral cease fire is expected to be reintroduced as FARC has announced it will reprise the issue during talks in October.

The rebels are likely to address issues such as the distribution of government held land to the people. The Colombian government, on the other hand, will likely address the rebel’s link to drug trafficking and the reincorporation of guerrilla members into society, a sensitive topic considering the large amount of Colombian citizens still thought to be held hostage by the rebel army.

Established in 1964 as a Marxist revolutionary movement, FARC has become infamous for funding itself through the drug trade, holding hostages for ransom, and for the murder, rape, extortion and torture of many people. FARC is responsible for the kidnapping and disappearing of numerous military officials, soldiers and Colombian citizens throughout its fifty years, in a war that has claimed tens of thousands of lives. FARC alleges that they are not currently engaging in kidnapping and have not done so since February. Reports from the New Hope Foundation – an NGO that collects the records of from concerning the abductions in Columbia – dispute that claim, suggesting that the FARC still hold an estimated 400-694 Colombian citizens hostage somewhere in the jungle. FARC negotiators, however, have reiterated that they are no longer actively abducting Colombians or holding them hostage for ransom.

These peace talks were announced just three weeks after Colombian FARC rebels blew up an oil pipeline in the Narino department of Columbia. This was just the latest in a series of pipeline attacks; 67 incidents have been reported between January and June 2012, compared to 84 for all of 2011.

 

For further information, please see:

El Pais – And if the FARC say they do not kidnap, what about those missing in Colombia?  – 7 September 2012

La Vanguardia – The FARC pose a bilateral ceasefire in peace talks  – 6 September 2012

The Herald Sun – FARC rebel chief confirms Colombia peace talks  – 4 September 2012

International Business Times – Colombia Holds Informal Talks With FARC Rebels In Hopes Of Ending Half-Century Of Conflict  – 30 August 2012

The BBC – Colombian “Farc rebels ‘ blow up oil pipeline in Narino – 19 August 2012

By Margaret Janelle R. Hutchinson
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

SANTIAGO, Chile – Chile’s top ranked government officials are appalled by the language of a recently exposed internal army document, which implies that homosexuals, poor people, Jehovah’s Witnesses and other groups are not morally fit to serve in the Chilean Army. Rights advocates are calling for the forced retirement of General Cristián Chateau who signed the offending memo.

The exposure of the leaked document, distributed internally on February 22, 2012, comes on the heels of Chile’s first-ever anti-discrimination law, passed in July of this year.

On Friday, Chile Vice President Rodrigo Hinzpeter condemned the document, which surfaced on Thursday, as “very serious and completely unjustified.”

“The document is completely off base from the current reality of our country and should be immediately adjusted to the norms of our anti-discrimination law, which President Sebastian Piñera’s administration enacted a few months ago,” Hinzpeter said.

The document advocated for prioritizing the recruitment of “citizens of more appropriate moral and intellectual capacities,” and excluding “those with physical or mental health problems, the poor, criminals, drug users, homosexuals, conscientious objectors and Jehovah’s Witnesses.”

Many militaries around the world have standards of physical and mental health that must be met in order to serve.  It is the suggestion of categorical exclusion of entire classes of individuals that has Chile up in arms.

Army Commander in Chief Juan Miguel Fuente-Alba condemned any systematic discrimination in the ranks and apologized for the document.

“As Commander in Chief of the army I categorically reject any document, provision, regulation or internal instructions that arbitrarily discriminate against any person or member of an institution,”

“I sincerely apologize to anyone who might have felt affected by such unfortunate language from an internal army document,” Fuente-Alba said.

“It must be guaranteed that there is no discrimination,” Fuente-Alba told the press on Friday. “And I have set the deadline of 10 a.m. Monday for all documents and similar forms to be revised. It must be clear that the Army belongs to all Chileans.”

Defense Minister Andres Allemand added that such ideas are completely opposed to government policy, and said he’s asked for a full military review of the matter to eliminate any such guidance.

The Movement for Homosexual Integration and Liberation (Movilh) said the army’s response has so far been “insufficient.”

“Today we are calling on the defense minister to remove Gen. Chateau from his post,” Rolando Jiménez, president of Movilh, said before the Ministry of Defense on Friday. “It cannot be possible for someone with such a level of classism and homophobia to be in charge of a military unit as important as the army’s first division.”

“And today we have to learn from this violent situation and these lessons are for a proactive policy from every branch of the armed forces and in particular the army and the defense ministry,” Jiménez added.

Movilh has called for the immediate resignation of the commander of the army’s first division, Cristián Chateau who signed the document.

Chateau told La Nación that the document was “already abolished” and “currently not valid anymore due to the recently imposed anti-discrimination law.”

“The meaning of the document was to exclude the obligation of having to join the military service if homosexuals and other mentioned groups did not wish to,” he said.

No reports yet as to whether Chateau will resign or face disciplinary action.

For further information, please see:

Al Jazeera – Uproar over Chile army discrimination – 8 September 2012

Bio Bio Nacional – Instructivo del Ejército recomienda no admitir a homosexuales, pobres y testigos de Jehová – 7 September 2012

Movilh Website – Movilh espera que investigación del Ejército termine con destitución de comandante homófobo – 7 September 2012

Santiago Times – Document suggests homosexual exclusion in Chilean army – 7 September 2012

The Washington Post – Chile criticizes army chief who says gays, poor people, Jehovah’s Witnesses are morally unfit – 7 September 2012

By Margaret Janelle R. Hutchinson
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

 CARACAS, Venezuela – Dozens of members of the Yanomami indigenous group were reportedly massacred back in July, according to a document released on Wednesday by various indigenous rights organizations. Reports of the incident are only now reaching Venezuelan authorities due to the remoteness of the indigenous villages.  The killing may be the latest tragedy in a pattern of vicious encounters between Yanomami and Brazilian gold miners.

Residents of the Hokomawe village said they discovered charred bodies and the torched “shabono” or communal house during a visit to the indigenous community of Irotatheri in early July.  Of the approximately eighty residents of Irotatheri, only three survivors were discovered hiding in the forest.

The survivors reported that they had been out hunting at the time of the attack, which they blamed on miners from nearby Brazil. The hunters said they heard gunshots, explosions and the sound of a helicopter, which miners sometimes use to ferry supplies.

According to the survivors’ account, the miners attacked because some in the community had been “rescuing Yanomami women” from miners.

The Yanomami have often had to contend with Brazilian gold miners, known in Portuguese as garimpeiros, who for years have crossed into Venezuela and torn up the forest, leaving pits of water laced with mercury.

In 1993, activists say, 16 people were killed by Brazilian miners in a Yanomami community in the area of Haximu.  In 2010, Venezuelan authorities said four people in an indigenous community died after drinking water contaminated by miners.

The Yanomami are one of the largest isolated indigenous groups in the Amazon, with a population estimated at roughly 30,000 on both sides of the Venezuela-Brazil border.  They have maintained their language as well as traditions that include face paint and wooden facial ornaments piercing their noses, cheeks and lips.

The isolation of the Yanomami caused the delay in reporting.  The account of villagers from Hokomawe who saw the victims’ remains and talked with the three survivors was later relayed to others in the village of Momoi after days of walking through the forest.  Others then took the news to the larger community of Parima.

The site where the attack is alleged to have happened, in the Venezuelan municipality of Alto Orinoco, near the Brazilian border, is a five-hour helicopter ride, or 15 days on foot, from Puerto Ayacucho, the main Venezuelan city in the Amazon.

Prosecutors were appointed to investigate after leaders of the Yanomami organisation Horonami alerted them to the account, Venezuela’s Public Ministry said in a statement Wednesday.

As of Friday, no headway had been made in the investigation.

Brazil’s Foreign Ministry said on Friday its embassy in Caracas had asked the Venezuelan government to provide it with any information that could help it determine whether the attack had happened and whether Brazilians had been involved.

Brazil’s National Indian Foundation, a government body that oversees indigenous affairs, said it would seek a joint investigation by officials from both countries at the site.

Venezuelan Interior Minister Tareck Al Aissami said in televised comments on Friday that officials had managed to speak with seven of the nine known groups of the Yanomami tribe and thus far had no proof of an attack in any of their settlements.

There has been an outcry from native rights groups across the globe.

Stephen Corry, Director of Survival International said, “This is another appalling tragedy for the Yanomami – heaping crime upon crime. All Amazonian governments must stop the rampant illegal mining, logging and settlement in indigenous territories. It inevitably leads to massacres of Indian men, women and children. The Venezuelan authorities must now bring the killers to swift justice, and send a signal throughout the region that Indians can no longer be killed with impunity. The mining and logging must be stopped.”

The Yanomami have complained of increasing encroachment by the miners.

“The presence of garimpeiros in this area has been documented since at least four years ago, and complaints have been made various times,” said Aime Tillett, an activist with the indigenous rights organization Wataniba in Caracas. “What we’re asking is for the government to take sufficient measures to control the garimpeiros.”

Though the exact death toll is unknown, Linda Manaka, a representative of the Venezuelan Association of Indigenous People in Puerto Ayacucho, said that based on the account she believes dozens died.

“Generally a ‘shabono’ is made up of dozens of people,” she said. “At least there are about four, five dozen people.”

For further information, please see:

The Guardian – Brazil asks Venezuela to investigate village massacre claims – 1 September 2012

Chicago Tribune – Brazil presses Venezuela on alleged Amazon massacre – 31 August 2012

CNN – Venezuela to investigate reports of massacre of Indians by gold miners – 30 August 2012

Fox News – Indigenous Amazon Reports Massacre in Venezuela – 30 August 2012

Survival International – Yanomami Indians ‘massacred’ by goldminers in Venezuela – 29 August 2012

 

By Heba Girgis
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

ASUNCION, Paraguay—We all know what it is like to be stuck in the security line at the airport for an hour anxiously wondering if we will make our flight departure, or wondering if just because we possess certain traits we will be held up at customs. Now take this situation and multiply it by two months of waiting.

This is the situation that 16 lions and tigers face on the border of Paraguay because Argentine officials refused to approve the big cats’ paperwork for re-entry into the country.

The group of cats includes nine Bengal tigers and seven African lions. They all belong to an Argentine circus that travels to the capital of Paraguay every August to perform. The group’s owner, Oswal Wasconi, travelled with them to this year’s performance and ran into trouble when the group attempted to return to Argentina. Apparently a new law was passed in Paraguay banning live animal acts in performing circuses.

After realizing that they had no choice of putting on the live animal show, Wasconi decided to try to ship the lions and tigers back to Argentina. It was at this point in the game that these animals got stuck at the customs border between Argentina and Paraguay. While the animals all have good-health forms and certificates, their entry back into Argentina was blocked by government border officials who demanded more information about the protected species of cats.

Estela Gomez, the director of Paraguay’s wildlife agency, noted that her ministry decided to move the performing cats to the Asuncion Zoo in pairs “so that they can live in some comfort and not in a strange area” until the issue with the border patrol is resolved. The cats’ owner will be providing the zoo with enough food and water to care for the cats while this matter is investigated further.

Gomez said also that, “In the next few days we will continue investigating the true reasons why the Argentine authorities aren’t authorizing their return. I can’t anticipate whether these beasts will remain forever in Paraguay or eventually go to Argentina.”

Paraguay is not the only country to develop this type of ban on live animal acts. Bolivia, Peru, and Ecuador have also passed a similar law and the legislation process is under way in both Colombia and Brazil to develop their own laws of this nature.

As Wasconi awaits the news from Argentine border officials, his animals await the verdict in the Asuncion Zoo in Paraguay’s capital city.

 

For further information, please see:

Global Post – 16 Tigers and Lions Stuck in South American Border Limbo for 2 Months – 25 August 2012

Cortez Journal – Caged Big Cats Stuck on Paraguay Border 2 Months – 24 August 2012

Newsday – Caged Big Cats Stuck on Paraguay Border 2 Months – 24 August 2012

The Washington Post – 16 Tigers and Lions Caged in Two Month Border Limbo; Banned in Paraguay, Barred From Argentina – 24 August 2012