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Colombian peace talks strained over extradition
12 Apr 2005 19:54:41 GMT
Source: Reuters
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By Hugh Bronstein BOGOTA, Colombia, April 12 (Reuters) - The Colombian government scrambled on Tuesday to avoid a rupture of peace talks with illegal far-right militias after the Senate stepped up the threat that they may be extradited to the United States. A Senate committee late on Monday voted down a provision in the government's "justice and peace" bill which would have defined paramilitarism a political crime, language that could help shield paramilitaries from being sent to the United States to face drug smuggling charges. The government said it would try to restore the provision to the bill. On Sunday, the 20,000-strong United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, or AUC, the main paramilitary group, threatened to end two-year-old talks if the bill passed as written. The Monday vote made the bill even more unacceptable for the AUC. The paramilitaries did not say what they wanted but Congressmen said they are looking for a guarantee against extradition. Both the paramilitaries and their leftist guerrilla foes are involved in the Andean country's huge cocaine trade. "You have to keep in mind that this law will apply not only to the AUC but to any future demobilization of the guerrillas as well," said a government source who asked not to be named. "And if the bill does not offer benefits to these people they will not have any incentive to give up." The failure of the paramilitary peace talks could derail President Alvaro Uribe's attempts to end Colombia's 40-year internal conflict. Security forces privately fear the AUC could launch a terror campaign if negotiations break down. Mauricio Romero, a political analyst at Bogota's Rosario University, said the Senate committee vote "was an initial position taken by the Senate to show they are serious about dismantling paramilitarism and to say they should be subject to extradition." The AUC has its origins in vigilante groups set up by cattle ranchers and cocaine traffickers in the 1980s. It has killed thousands of people in a dirty war against the guerrillas.
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