BOGOTA, Jan 24 (Reuters) - Colombian paramilitary bosses, who gave up their guns under a peace deal with President Alvaro Uribe, on Wednesday opposed a plan that would broadcast their live testimony about atrocities committed under their command.

The testimonies are a key part of the peace accord between U.S.-ally Uribe and right-wing militia commanders who surrendered their weapons and promised full confessions in exchange for reduced prison terms of up to eight years.

The paramilitaries were responding to a prosecutor decision to allow televised sessions. Top paramilitary boss Salvatore Mancuso, who led a brutal dirty war, has been testifying in closed sessions open only to some victims until now.

Rights groups, who say the transmissions would allow victims of paramilitary violence to better scrutinize proceedings, worry the militiamen could use the disagreement over broadcasts to avoid giving complete confessions.

Jailed leaders of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia or AUC, which once battled Marxist rebels still fighting a four-decade conflict, said broadcasts would put their families at risk and undermine due process.

"The public exposure of the truth to a society inflamed, polarized and beaten by war would uncover delicate aspects which would put the families of hundreds at risk," the commanders said in a letter to the defense minister.

The defense ministry said the attorney general's office will decide the matter.

"The question that is raised is whether the paramilitaries want to keep this quiet because they are not planning to tell the whole truth," said Maria McFarland, a Colombia expert at Human Rights Watch.

The testimonies come as Uribe, who has received millions in U.S. aid to fight the rebels and the cocaine trade, fends off a scandal linking some of his congressional allies and other politicians to the illegal militias.

Set up in the 1980s by rich landowners looking for private protection from guerrillas, the paramilitaries soon turned to brutal tactics in their counter-insurgency campaign sometimes in league with police officers and soldiers.

AlertNet news is provided by

Delicio.us  |   Digg  |   NewsVine  |   Reddit                                                                                  Permalink