From NSARCHIVE
Washington D.C. October 16, 2005 - There is a "body count syndrome" that tends "to fuel human rights abuses" among Colombian army forces, according to a declassified U.S. military intelligence report published today on the website of the National Security Archive. That mindset had produced what the official characterized as "a cavalier, or at least passive, approach" among military officers when it came to "allowing paramilitaries to serve as proxies for the Colar [Colombian army] in contributing to the guerrilla body count."The document is one of several cited in an article by National Security Archive Colombia analyst Michael Evans and published today in Semana, Colombia's leading news magazine. These records, including the first-hand accounts of senior Colombian army officers, provide important new details about Colombian military involvement in attacks carried out in the last decade by the country’s illegal right-wing militias and offer a unique and intimate perspective on the institutional pressures that encouraged a wide range of cooperation with paramilitary forces--from the tacit acquiescence of senior commanders to the direct participation of field officers and their troops.
Other documents shed light on the infamous series of paramilitary attacks in and around the towns of La Gabarra and Tibú in 1999. In one, Colombian army Colonel Víctor Hugo Matamoros--who remains on active duty--is quoted as telling a U.S. embassy official that his forces would not pursue paramilitary groups: "If you have so many tasks to do with so few resources, and you're faced with two illegal armed groups, one of which (guerrillas) is shooting at you and the other (paramilitaries) is shooting at them, you obviously fight the guerrillas first, then worry about paramilitaries."
Another colonel implicates two former Colombian armed forces commanders as among those who "looked the other way" with respect to collaboration with paramilitary groups. Generals Harold Bedoya and Jorge Enrique Mora "turned their backs to what was happening and felt the Colar [Colombian army] should in no way be blamed for any resulting human rights atrocities committed."
The article is the first in a monthly column to be published in collaboration with Semana.com. The series is the result of a mutual desire to publish and disseminate in Colombia declassified information now emerging from United States files about the major issues in the U.S.-Colombia relationship, including the drug war, security assistance programs, human rights and impunity. An English translation of each article along with the documents cited will be posted on the Archive's website.
Please follow the link below to read the article and documents:
http://www.nsarchive.org
