Yes, I know the rightist paramilitaries in alliance with the U.S. suppiied (to the tine of over $1.3 Billion in last yrs. FY of of the USG) kill 80% of the overall # of civilians in Columbia, but, would the ANC, NLF or the FMLN have considered a church a valid military target? Betcha can't imagine Joe Slovo or Nelson Mandela o'k'ing such an attack.
CIP Colombia Project ... CIP Analyses: The Center for International Policy opposes large increases in military aid and supports a negotiated settlement to the conflict. Read research ... www.ciponline.org/colombia/
Re: Reckless charges against the FARC ... Re: Reckless charges against the FARC by Michael Pugliese 01 June 2001 16:34 UTC, ... FARC has ... http://csf.colorado.edu/pen-l/2001II/msg02705.html LBO-Talk Archive August 2001: Re:Empire and Plan Colombia ... Alfredo Molano has an essay on the FARC and its origins and its relation to ... all Hegelians"; In reply to: Michael Pugliese: "Re:Empire and Plan Colombia"; Reply ... http://nuance.dhs.org/lbo-talk/0108/0229.html LBO-Talk Archive September 2000: Re:Szamuely: Whore on drugs/Co ... More billions down a rathole. But I really doubt the FARC are more than a leftist mirror of official repression. Michael Pugliese. ... http://nuance.dhs.org/lbo-talk/0009/0063.html Michael Pugliese P.S. Counter-point to my rant, PWW Online - Recent Editions - 2002 Editions - Mar 9, 2002 - ... Editorials by PWW Editorial Board, Mar 9, 2002 Saudi plan: A ... US links to Colombian death squads by Fred Hirsch, Mar 9, 2002 Plumbers and Fitters Local ... host10.cpusa.org/article/archive/62 http://host10.cpusa.org/article/archive/62/
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Village had 'no time for prayers' Colombians cringe in civil war's cross fire Karl Penhaul, Chronicle Foreign Service Wednesday, May 8, 2002 ©2002 San Francisco Chronicle
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Bojaya, Colombia -- A shattered effigy of Christ stares skyward and human remains lie scattered around the Bellavista church in this remote jungle village of 800 inhabitants.
Inside, the altar has been blown to smithereens and the wooden pews reduced to firewood. A bag embroidered with the slogan "Beloved Colombia" lies in a pool of blood near a pile of boots and shoes.
At least 117 civilians -- including some 40 children -- were killed and 103 others were wounded in Bojaya last Thursday in the worst single act of violence against civilians in Colombia's 38 years of brutal civil war.
The church, nestled in the jungle fishing community 250 miles northwest of Bogota, was destroyed by a homemade mortar fired by leftist guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) at rival right-wing paramilitary troops of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC).
BOMB FELL DISASTROUSLY SHORT
The 40-pound gas cylinder packed with explosives was launched at the height of battle in an attempt to pound the AUC forces dug in on opposite sides of the chapel. It fell disastrously short.
"There was a huge explosion and I couldn't see anything. There was smoke and dust everywhere and people were just reaching out to find one another," said Juan Eledoro Lopez as he sat on the church steps Monday taking a break from burying the dead. "People found white rags and held them up like flags and tried to run through the cross-fire."
Lopez gave his account to a Chronicle reporter, the first journalist since the bombing to reach this village in an isolated region in Choco province. Lopez said rescue work has been hampered by continuing clashes between the warring factions.
According to Bojaya's priest, the Rev. Antun Ramos, 300 villagers -- mostly descendants of African slaves -- sought shelter in his church from ricocheting bullets fired by both sides. Most homes in the region -- the poorest and one of the most contested in Colombia -- are wooden shacks, and the cement-walled church offered the best protection.
But halfway through the second day of fighting, the rebel bomb smashed through the church roof.
'NO TIME FOR PRAYERS'
"Most people were huddled around the altar and that was where the missile fell," said Ramos, who has since taken refuge in the town of Vigia del Fuerte - - a sister community on the opposite bank of the muddy Atrato River.
"People were blown to pieces. The only thing we (survivors) could do was run to save ourselves. There was no time for prayers," added the priest, who suffered cuts on his foot and forehead.
Entire families died in the blast. Everybody in the village seems to have lost a relative.
Zair Gonzalez, 26, took refuge in the church with her year-old son, mother and three cousins. Gonzalez still cannot explain why she survived with only a few scrapes on her knee while her family perished.
Amid the smoke, rubble and shrieks of the maimed, Gonzalez managed to grab her son, who had been blasted from her arms, and run to a convent about 100 yards away. After making her way to safety, she realized that her son had died,
most likely from internal hemorrhaging from the force of the explosion.
"At first, I couldn't hear or see anything. Some cloth or cushion fell on my head and another body landed on me," she said, still in shock and unable to shed a tear.
"Then I sat up and managed to find my son and I saw my mother with her guts blown out. I don't know the words to describe what I feel."
Gonzalez is now living with friends in a wooden shack perched on stilts in Vigia del Fuerte. She has spent the last several days sitting expressionless or facing other survivors without speaking, hoping to forget.
BURYING THE DEAD
Meanwhile Lopez and other volunteers continue to bury the dead. Enticed by a salary of $30 each offered by the village council, they swig endlessly from bottles of aguardiente, the fiery local alcohol, to ward off the putrid stench of death and to take their minds off their grim task.
"We have been burying the dead for three days. I haven't been able to eat in all that time," said Domingo Valencia. "Nothing like this has ever happened. "
The burial squad places each corpse in a black plastic body bag, then loads the bodies onto a 50-foot canoe for a short trip up the Atrato to a common grave along the river. The village cemetery was flooded by unseasonally heavy rains about 10 days ago and is unsuitable for burial.
At the grave site, flies and vultures hover overhead. Corpses spill out of body bags and limbs of adults entwine with tiny children. There are no coffins,
last rites, mourning relatives or tombstones.
Military authorities say they are assembling a 4,000-man task force to retake control of the area. President Andres Pastrana has called for a United Nations commission to investigate the killings.
By Tuesday, however, security forces had not arrived except for military helicopters that sporadically buzzed overhead. The army says it has been hampered by bad weather, some of the thickest jungle on earth and the threat of a FARC ambush.
GOVERMENT RECEIVED WARNINGS
Interior Minister Armando Estrada has acknowledged that he received warnings that trouble was brewing in Choco, opening the government up for criticism that the attacks could have been prevented.
A 450-strong force of right-wing paramilitary gunmen arrived April 21 in Vigia del Fuerte -- somehow defying army checkpoints along the river, according to local inhabitants.
Then late last week, AUC fighters clashed with FARC guerrillas just outside Bojaya. Within minutes, hand-to-hand combat was raging in the streets, according to witnesses.
Both factions are jealously trying to gain control of the Atrato River -- a major supply route between the Atlantic coast and the jungles of Colombia's Pacific coast for the lucrative business of drugs and arms smuggling.
'INEVITABLE ERROR OF WAR'
On Tuesday, senior FARC commanders were still encamped with hundreds of their troops around Bojaya. One who identified himself as "Chucho" accused the paramilitaries of forcing civilians into the church and using them as human shields. None of the survivors interviewed by The Chronicle, however, supported that assertion.
Chucho called the attack on the church a tragic accident, an "inevitable error of war."
"As a guerrilla organization, we are very sorry for what has happened. But the government should question its own responsibility, for they are the sponsors of paramilitary groups and state terrorism."
International human rights groups frequently accuse the armed forces of backing the AUC -- listed as a terrorist organization by the State Department - - in its campaign against the rebels and their suspected civilian sympathizers.
Chucho sidestepped questions about the legitimacy of using homemade mortars -- which in the past have been notoriously inaccurate and have helped earn the FARC itself a spot on the U.S. list of terrorist groups.
LIVING WITH THE REBELS
The communities of Vigia del Fuerte and Bojaya have lived side by side with the guerrillas for more than two years since a FARC unit overran a local police base, killing 21 people.
Most residents say the relationship was never easy, and in a public communique this week they have asked the FARC to leave.
"You have massacred our loved ones without pity. We now ask you and all other armed actors to leave our community," said the statement, which was read by schoolteacher Roberto Chala in Vigia del Fuerte.
But the fighting is far from over. Hundreds of guerrillas are taking up battle positions around the two villages on both sides of the river, preparing for what they believe will be imminent clashes with government troops.
As a result, hundreds of villagers are fleeing the area, packed onto small dugout canoes.
"If the government thinks the FARC is a defeated force, then it's got another thing coming," said a rebel commander who gave his nom-de-guerre as Ruben.
"And if they think that sending paramilitaries to fight us is the answer, then just ask him," he added, pointing to the corpse of a paramilitary fighter lying face up in a shallow jungle grave.
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