Colombia's Uribe calls senator who alleged he helped death squads a 'slanderer'

[Judi Lynn]

Source: International Herald Tribune/Associated Press

Colombia's Uribe calls senator who alleged he helped death squads a 'slanderer'
The Associated Press
Published: April 18, 2007

BOGOTA, Colombia: President Alvaro Uribe rebutted allegations he aided the rise of far-right death squads when he was a governor in northern Colombia, calling an opposition lawmaker who presented the accusations to congress a "slanderer."

In a two-and-a-half-hour presentation on Tuesday, Sen. Gustavo Petro accused Uribe of letting his family's farms be used by the paramilitaries as killing zones and meeting points. He also demanded that the president's brother, Santiago, be investigated for his alleged role in a death squad known as the 12 Apostles.
(snip)

Petro, who has fashioned himself as Uribe's nemesis in congress, has said he was in the M-19's political wing and never fired a shot.

The scandal over links between the far-right death squads and the establishment continued to widen as three more pro-government congressmen were called Wednesday to testify before the Supreme Court. One, Sen. Ruben Dario Quintero, was the private secretary to Uribe when he was the governor of Antioquia province between 1995 and 1997.



Read more: http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/04/19/america/LA-GEN-Colombia-Paramilitary-Scandal.php

[Judi Lynn]

1. You may find this reference to Uribe's brother, Santiago Uribe, in a Congressional testimony

useful! It was given

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1999
U.S. House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Domestic and International Monetary Policy,
Committee on Banking and Financial Services,
Washington, DC.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:10 a.m., in room 2128, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Spencer Bachus, {chairman of the subcommittee}, presiding:


STATEMENT OF ROBERT MAZUR, PRESIDENT, CHASE & ASSOCIATES

Mr. MAZUR. I am currently the President of Chase & Associates, a company that provides consulting, training, and expert witness services in several fields, including money laundering and international drug trafficking. I started my firm in August of 1998, shortly after I retired from Government service and concluded a 27-year career as a Federal agent. My company presently serves a number of private law firms, Government agencies, and public companies. I continue to frequently interact with the law enforcement community on a number of levels. I conduct advanced training to Federal agents at the national law enforcement academies and I am a consultant to the Office of Independent Counsel, David Barrett, here in Washington, DC. I serve as an anti-money-laundering compliance consultant to a public company that deals frequently with the U.S. Customs Service.

During my law enforcement career, I was a Special Agent with three agencies: The IRS Criminal Investigation Division, the U.S. Customs Service Enforcement Division, and the Drug Enforcement Administration. While working for each of these agencies, I was primarily responsible for conducting long-term investigations of international drug trafficking organizations. I directed dozens of lengthy investigations in various capacities. I functioned as a Project Manager and Case Agent and, in this instance, most importantly as a Long-Term Undercover Agent. I have been qualified in U.S. District Court and the Superior Court in Canada as an expert in international money laundering as well as an expert in international drug trafficking.

During the late 1980's through 1994, I assumed several long-term undercover roles and infiltrated various international drug trafficking organizations including both the Medellin and Cali drug cartels of Colombia. My primary role with these cartels involved the coordination of laundering drug proceeds with various corrupt financial institutions, businessmen, bankers, and financial planners. My undercover roles in these three investigations led to the prosecution of several hundred traffickers and money launderers and the collection of more than $600 million in forfeitures and fines and the development of critical evidence that was used in the conviction of Panamanian General Manuel Noriega.
(snip)

Although I have viewed the drug trafficking and money laundering world as a traditional investigator of historical facts, I was also given a unique opportunity to experience that world from the inside. As a Long-Term Undercover Agent over a collective period of five years, I interacted as a member of the drug and money laundering world on a 24-hour basis. My undercover roles enabled me to interact closely with dozens of significant members of the world's most notorious drug and money laundering groups.

Although it would be impractical for me to mention each of the significant criminals with whom I dealt closely, I would like to mention a few of these individuals so you can better understand why I was in a position to gain a unique picture of the effect that high-level traffickers and money launderers have on Panama and other nations.

With respect to the Medellin Cartel, I dealt closely with one of Pablo Escobar's—the former head of the Medellin Cartel—attorneys and closest advisors, a gentleman by the name of Santiago Uribe, who was responsible for the laundering of a significant portion of Escobar's fortune. Mr. Uribe was a professor at a university in Medellin. In addition, Uribe assisted in the orchestration of the assassination of law enforcement officers in Colombia. He was the author of Colombia's non-extradition treaty which has been rescinded as a result of the courage of the present administration in Colombia.

I also worked very closely with one of Fabio Ochoa's cocaine transportation and distribution specialists, Roberto Alcaino, Fabio Ochoa being one of the members of the Medellin Cartel. While working in an undercover capacity, Alcaino and I became partners in the laundering of drug proceeds for the Medellin Cartel members. Our apparent friendship led to his disclosure to me of an entire clandestine lab operation that produced cocaine that was transshipped through Argentina to the United States and Europe. Information disclosed to me by Alcaino led to his arrest at the site of a 2,500-pound cocaine seizure; and after his arrest, still not realizing that I was an undercover agent, Alcaino put me in charge of his organization to collect drug debts and deal with suppliers.
(snip)

http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/bank/hba61331.000/hba61331_0.HTM

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There you have it: President Alvaro Uribe's brother, Santiago Uribe, and drug lord Fabio Ochoa both mentioned in the same testimony before Alvaro Uribe was elected to Colombia's Presidency.



Fabio Ochoa
http://www.dea.gov/pubs/pressrel/pr082703.html

[Judi Lynn]

2. Other reference to the brother of Colombia's President

Ex-Colombian rebel sparking political uproar

ALLEGATIONS: Unfazed by death threats, Gustavo Petro is pressing for probes into paramilitary activities that have seen eight other lawmakers jailed so far

AP, BOGOTA
Wednesday, Feb 21, 2007, Page 4

~snip~
Petro, 46, is nevertheless turning up the heat on Uribe, claiming that the president's brother, Santiago Uribe, was personally involved in murders and forced disappearances while helping to form paramilitary groups in the 1990s.

The president was governor of Antioquia state at the time, and Petro alleges that he may have helped cover up his brother's crimes. He is calling for a debate on the matter in Congress next month.

"This case which was in the prosecutor's office of Antioquia, which Alvaro Uribe was governing, was shelved," Petro said. "And that's the president's defense today. But nobody is asking, was the case shelved at Uribe's behest?"

Incensed at these allegations -- for which Petro has yet to offer evidence -- the president took to the airwaves to deny the accusations and lash back.

Uribe said Petro and other former members of the M-19 guerrilla movement now in politics have gone from being "terrorists in camouflage to terrorists in business suits."

DEATH THREATS

In Colombia, such language can spur death squads into action, and indeed the very day Uribe insulted the M-19 crowd in radio interviews, Petro's brother was threatened with death if the senator goes ahead with the debate.

"We're going to break you into pieces," the caller said.

Authorities immediately assigned a bodyguard each to Petro's brother and sister, who run a school for underprivileged children of flower workers just north of Bogota, and the president was widely criticized by the media for reckless, unpresidential behavior.

Santiago Uribe, after all, was never declared innocent. The case was simply shelved without explanation by a former chief prosecutor who dropped a number of cases of high-level politico-paramilitary corruption that are now being resurrected, in part, because of Petro's determination to revive them.


More:
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2007/02/21/2003349722



Colombia's President Alvaro Uribe and his friend

[RamblingRose]

3. Thank you for your posts on Colombia. We have good friends here in Atlanta

from Barranquilla and are here on professional work visas. They have 2 children that were born in Colombia and have a 2 year old born in the U.S. They are going through the tedious process of trying to become U.S. citizens. They love Uribe and President Bush and the husband likes to listen to Neal Boortz. I enjoy reading your posts so I can educate myself on Colombia and try to understand their politics.

[Judi Lynn]

7. Hope you can learn a lot more about the country from your friends as time goes by.

It really seems to be a place we should know far more about, since the Colombian military is getting such huge cash infusions every year from the U.S., to the point they are the third largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid, only behind Israel and Egypt.

We need to know far more about the countries we share the Western Hemisphere with, considering we hear almost NOTHING about any of them, and it's been that way from the beginning. It's almost as if they didn't exist as far as the ordinary media is concerned.

That's not nearly good enough.

[gratuitous]

4. Uribe didn't help the death squads

Just a disturbing number of his family members, political associates, and hirelings helped the death squads. The guy sure has bad luck picking the people he hangs out with, doesn't he?

[Judi Lynn]

8. Couldn't get much worse! He's almost entirely surrounded, as it's starting to look.

Whatever it is they're doing in that country, it's a real mess, and absolutely nothing to be proud of.

Colombia is under a great deal of scrutiny right now. They'd be well advised to start cleaning house.

[bemildred]

5. I hope Sen. Petro has plenty of good bodyguards. nt

[Judi Lynn]

6. I think I saw somewhere that he's got NINE now. Yikes. I'm sure he needs every one, too. n/t