FARC Me!

[rowan]

Colombians reject a peace deal after 50 years of civil war with FARC rebels - by a fraction of a percent. I know a lot of atrocoties were committed, but that certainly applied to both sides. So at least give peace a chance...

Voters in Colombia's referendum have narrowly rejected a peace accord between the government and the Marxist group, FARC.

The outcome of Sunday's vote endangers a deal expected to end 52 years of war and allow FARC fighters to re-enter society and form a political party.

With more than 99 percent of polling stations reporting, 50.2 percent of ballots opposed the accord while 49.8 percent favoured it - a difference of less than 60,000 votes out of a total of 13 million.

Al Jazeera's Latin America Editor Lucia Newman, reporting from Bogota, called the vote result "very surprising" as every poll before the referendum had given the "yes" camp a lead.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/10/c ... 14696.html

[Adder]

Colombians reject a peace deal after 50 years of civil war with FARC rebels - by a fraction of a percent. I know a lot of atrocoties were committed, but that certainly applied to both sides. So at least give peace a chance...

Voters in Colombia's referendum have narrowly rejected a peace accord between the government and the Marxist group, FARC.

The outcome of Sunday's vote endangers a deal expected to end 52 years of war and allow FARC fighters to re-enter society and form a political party.

With more than 99 percent of polling stations reporting, 50.2 percent of ballots opposed the accord while 49.8 percent favoured it - a difference of less than 60,000 votes out of a total of 13 million.

Al Jazeera's Latin America Editor Lucia Newman, reporting from Bogota, called the vote result "very surprising" as every poll before the referendum had given the "yes" camp a lead.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/10/c ... 14696.html

From what I heard, there was a very small turnout.

[rowan]

Yeh, under 40%. I think the government is already working on having it anulled on that count. Maybe they just made too many concessions though. I mean, giving them a guaranteed 10 seats in the congress, for example, along with 'light' prison setences for those who fess up to their crimes. But that's how peace negotiations are made, at the end of the day. We almost reached that point in Turkey with the PKK, until the Kurdish party became just a little too popular for comfort and the bombing, etc, started again.

[Sandydragon]

This is one of the reasons why peace deals are so difficult to achieve. Often leaders who negotiate need to push the limits with what their own side will tolerate.

I hate the sight of Martin McGuinness and Gerry Adams parading on TV as respectable members of the community (well legit politicians anyway). But if that is the requirement for a lasting peace deal in NI then so be it.

[SerjeantWildgoose]

But MMcG is a respected member of the community - his community. If any peace deal is to endure, then both sides must accept the legitimacy of the other. I would say that McGuinness has come a lot further than you would appear to have managed s-d? Not only was he prepared to lay a wreath in memory of Irish soldiers killed on the Somme and at Messines Ridge, but he was pretty vocal in support of the decision to commemorate the British soldiers killed during the Easter Uprising. I know this is a long way from embracing the likes of you and I, but I get the distinct impression that the republican side is playing the role of appeaser while the unionists remain bitterly unreceptive.

We are preparing for a state visit from the President of Columbia in the next few weeks. Perhaps when he sees how fecked up we continue to be despite 18 years of peace process, he'll realise that getting 20% of the country to vote for peace is a step in the right direction.

[SerjeantWildgoose]

... but I would love to be a fly on the wall when Santos raises the Columbia 3 with the deputy First Minister!

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2002/apr ... d.colombia

[Mellsblue]

a) Kudos on the subject title.
b) The govt need to get the masses reading 'Rwanda. History and Hope'.

[Sandydragon]

But MMcG is a respected member of the community - his community. If any peace deal is to endure, then both sides must accept the legitimacy of the other. I would say that McGuinness has come a lot further than you would appear to have managed s-d? Not only was he prepared to lay a wreath in memory of Irish soldiers killed on the Somme and at Messines Ridge, but he was pretty vocal in support of the decision to commemorate the British soldiers killed during the Easter Uprising. I know this is a long way from embracing the likes of you and I, but I get the distinct impression that the republican side is playing the role of appeaser while the unionists remain bitterly unreceptive.

We are preparing for a state visit from the President of Columbia in the next few weeks. Perhaps when he sees how fecked up we continue to be despite 18 years of peace process, he'll realise that getting 20% of the country to vote for peace is a step in the right direction.

Smart politics by him. Like I said, I accept the necessity and if I were still serving I'd be polite to the bloke f my job required it.

Unionist MPs often make Farage and Corbyn appear sane and normal.

[rowan]

a) Kudos on the subject title.
b) The govt need to get the masses reading 'Rwanda. History and Hope'.

Thanks & yeh. Meanwhile, according to this report, threats from right-wing extremists had kept the likely 'Si' voters away; the campesinos, indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities. & the 'No' vote is seen as a victory for the oligarchs, who had been receiving lethal aid and the latest military technology from the US under the Plan Colombia scheme - led by the Clintons, and touted as one of their major success stories.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/10/03/ ... cts-peace/

[Eugene Wrayburn]

a) Kudos on the subject title.
b) The govt need to get the masses reading 'Rwanda. History and Hope'.

Thanks & yeh. Meanwhile, according to this report, threats from right-wing extremists had kept the likely 'Si' voters away; the campesinos, indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities. & the 'No' vote is seen as a victory for the oligarchs, who had been receiving lethal aid and the latest military technology from the US under the Plan Colombia scheme - led by the Clintons, and touted as one of their major success stories.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/10/03/ ... cts-peace/

Counterpunch says it's all the americans' fault? Well that's a departure for them.

[rowan]

Counterpunch is only a domain which carries articles by a wide variety of writers, including some of the most respected political analysts in the world. I don't think this article is blaming the Americans so much as pointing out the 'No' vote makes a mockery of the Clintons' claims about the success of the Plan Colombia scheme. Meanwhile, the brunt of the writer's scorn appears reserved for the Colombian oligarchs themselves, and also the right-wing thugs who allegedy influenced the outcome of this referendum and kept the voters away. Perhaps I'm wrong, but that's the way I read it.

[WaspInWales]

Counterpunch is only a domain which carries articles by a wide variety of writers, including some of the most respected political analysts in the world. I don't think this article is blaming the Americans so much as pointing out the 'No' vote makes a mockery of the Clintons' claims about the success of the Plan Colombia scheme. Meanwhile, the brunt of the writer's scorn appears reserved for the Colombian oligarchs themselves, and also the right-wing thugs who allegedy influenced the outcome of this referendum and kept the voters away. Perhaps I'm wrong, but that's the way I read it.

Does that mean that Counterpunch publish a wide variety of articles supporting the US and their policies?

[rowan]

No, it's devoted to alternative media and political critique designed to counterbalance the mostly right-wing conformist government propaganda state and mainstream media have been brainwashing us with.

Anyway, as mentioned, the article in question seemed to be primarily an attrack on the Colombian oligarchy, with the slight on the Clintons' misguided Plan Colombia scheme merely tossed in as an afterthought.

So did you disagree with the premise of the story and, if so, why exactly?

About the author: Roger D. Harris is on the State Central Committee of the Peace and Freedom Party, the only ballot-qualified socialist party in California.

[cashead]

Sounds like bias to me.

[rowan]

I'm sure it would. I've seen plenty of links to the BBC, Guardian and other notorious propaganda sheets often enough. But even they carry a lot of good material to go along with their obvious political biases. So, really, it just comes down to the article itself and what you think of it. If there's an actual problem with the content (apart from, perhaps, mention of the Clintons - evidently taboo here), I'd be interested to know what it is. Personally I agreed with the writer's viewpoint. The 'No' vote is a victory for the oligarchs.

[Sandydragon]

Bias in alternative media vs bias in traditional media. This argument seems familiar.

[rowan]

But you still haven't explained in what respect you regard the article as having been biased.

Personally my approach is to read a little of everything going and draw my own conclusions.

[WaspInWales]

I loved the author's style and use of complicated words. It felt like I was really there when I was reading. I closed my eyes and felt the warm embrace of the Bogota air as it caressed my face, giving me the comfort I so dreamed of from my mother....

[rowan]

Interesting report in The Nation from Greg Grandin:

 Polls show that a majority of Colombians favor peace. But Uribe and his allies in the media and congress lied, obfuscated, and scared. They managed to convince a small minority (the 54,000-vote victory margin for “no” is about a quarter of the number of civilians killed or disappeared by the state since the start of the civil war) that the agreement was a giveaway to the FARC and that Santos was “delivering the country to terrorism.” The Times identifies Uribe and the “far right” as the “biggest winner.” The former president “had argued that the agreement was too lenient on the rebels, who he said should be prosecuted as murderers and drug traffickers. ‘Peace is an illusion, the Havana agreement deceptive,’ Mr. Uribe wrote on Twitter on Sunday after casting his ‘no’ vote.” Thus Uribe has forced himself on the bargaining table, with Santos saying, as paraphrased by the Times, that he would be “reaching out to opposition leaders in the Colombian Congress like former President Álvaro Uribe,” with the Times adding that “experts predicted a potentially tortured process in which Mr. Uribe and others would seek harsher punishments for FARC members, especially those who had participated in the drug trade.”

https://www.thenation.com/article/did-h ... agreement/

[rowan]

I read up a little on the history of FARC today. They were founded by farmers and land workers in 1964 during a time of considerable government oppression and inequality. This followed a brutal 10 year civil war sparked by the assassination of liberal politician Jorge Gaitin in 1948. FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) were inspired by the success of the Cuban Revolution and adopted a Marxist-Leninist philosophy. They have remained primarily a rural-based movement and claim to be fighting for the rights of the poor. Their fiercest opponents of course are the wealthy elite, including land-owners. The 52-year struggle has claimed around 220 K lives, about 3/4 of whom were civilians. In recent years America has increased its support for the government, causing rebel numbers to drop from around 20 K in 2002 to between six & seven thousand at the present. Their leader Rodrigo Echeverri goes by the alias Timochenko.

[rowan]

Juan Manuel Santos just won the Nobel Peace Prize:

https://www.rte.ie/news/2016/1007/82216 ... ace-prize/
https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/ ... ement-live

[cashead]

On the one hand, I hope the process is followed through. On the other, I hope FARC is made to pay reparations to their civilian victims (or next of kin) and the various indigenous peoples that they also targeted.

[rowan]

When did FARC target indigenous people? I'm no expert, but so far as I know this has basically been a struggle between the wealthy elite and the impoverished masses, and I'd assume the native minority would generally fall into the latter category. It's the same story right throughout Latin America, of course.

[cashead]

When did FARC target indigenous people?

Plenty of times.

"According to the Indigenous Organization of Antioquia (OIA), one of the most influential regional indigenous groups in Colombia, between September 1986 and August 2001 the FARC was responsible for twenty-seven assassinations; fifteen direct threats; and fourteen cases of occupation, dislocation, detention, or forced work of indigenous community members in that department alone. These numbers are duplicated in other parts of the country with large numbers of indigenous people."

https://books.google.co.nz/books?id=Edh ... &q&f=false

Then there's the Narino massacre in 2009, the details of which are pretty fucked up.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nari%C3%B1o_massacres

https://www.hrw.org/news/2009/02/10/col ... nous-group

I'm no expert,

Clearly. Try googling it.

but so far as I know this has basically been a struggle between the wealthy elite and the impoverished masses, and I'd assume the native minority would generally fall into the latter category. It's the same story right throughout Latin America, of course.

They barge into indigenous territories, act like a bunch of Billy Big Bollocks and do some pretty fucked up shit with no justification and if your so-called "People's Army" goes rushing into a village, starts torturing people while screaming accusations of collaboration, and then comes back a few days later and abducts and kills a load of them because an epic round of torture didn't encourage them to be cooperative, then they're a bunch of cunts that can go fuck themselves, quite frankly. What sort of "People's Army" kills fucking women and kids?

[Eugene Wrayburn]

Most of them?