'AUC founders were given state seized property'

[Judi Lynn]

'AUC founders were given state seized property'
Thursday, 07 April 2011 06:54
Edward Fox

Founding members of the paramilitary organization the AUC, brothers Vicente and Carlos Castaño, were trustees of Colombia's drug enforcement agency the DNE for over 15 years, El Tiempo reported Wednesday.

Despite having numerous arrest warrants against them, the Castaños appear to have been granted the estate of the DNE seized property of "Las Tangas" in the northern department of Cordoba. This farm later became emblematic of the conflict, being used as a site for AUC massacres.

Carlos Castaño allegedly utilized the Peace Foundation of Cordoba (Funpazcor) to front the ownership of the farm, even selling parts of it to fellow paramilitaries "Don Berna," and "Monoleche."

As late as 2007, the farm was still apparently occupied by the Castaño's half-sister, until it was finally seized by the Prosecutor General's Office. Only last year was the 12,355 acre property divided up and given as compensation to victims of the paramilitaries.

More:
http://colombiareports.com/colombia-news/news/15443-auc-founders-were-given-state-seized-property.html

[Peace Patriot]

1. So, um, where did our $7 BILLION in "war on drugs" military aid go?

"Founding members of the paramilitary organization the AUC, brothers Vicente and Carlos Castaño, were trustees of Colombia's drug enforcement agency the DNE for over 15 years, El Tiempo reported Wednesday.

"Despite having numerous arrest warrants against them, the Castaños appear to have been granted the estate of the DNE seized property of 'Las Tangas' in the northern department of Cordoba. This farm later became emblematic of the conflict, being used as a site for AUC massacres."

---------------------

Our $7 BILLION in "war on drugs" money was feeding the very drug lords and dreadful murderers whom the "war on drugs" was supposed to be curtailing. And, you know, I think my guess that one of the main purposes of it all was correct, that the U.S. "war on drugs" was INTENDED not to stop the drug trade but to consolidate the extremely lucrative, trillion dollar-plus cocaine revenue stream and direct it to the Bush Cartel, the CIA and U.S. banksters.

This kind of heinous lawlessness does not stop at the borders of any estate, nor at the upper ranks of the AUC, nor is it limited to "the underworld." In fact, the "underworld" IS the "over-world"--the government, which doles out "trusteeships" of its "drug enforcement agency" and other powers and lucrative funding sources and impunities from the law, to criminals, because the government is RUN BY criminals. The government of Colombia, funded with $7 BILLION in U.S. aid, was being operated as a criminal enterprise--and, really, that is not far different from how our own government was operated during the Bush Junta, and, it more and more appears, no matter who is supposedly in charge.

Billions and billions of dollars are being doled out to utter thieves--to military and other 'contractors' in Iraq, Afghanistan and other places, to produce NOTHING; to banksters who produce nothing but grief (and riches for the rich); as subsidies and free (taxpayer funded) insurance to the nuclear power industry, to poison us; and, of course, in massive tax breaks to the rich and the corporate. Many of us were appalled to learn that a billion dollars of our money had "gone missing" in Iraq. But that is just a drop in the bucket of what is going on. Our society is being looted and dismantled by even bigger shysters than those in Colombia. Now they're saying they can't pay Social Security pensioners their pensions--pensions these workers PAID FOR all their lives. Where did the money go?

Our criminals may be slightly better disguised than the AUC death squads. But are they any different? They may not shoot the elderly, but they are taking food off the poorest tables, taking heating from the feeblest people and taking medical care from the most vulnerable to illness. Many will die. They may not shoot children but they are taking food out of their mouths and consigning them to "jungle" schools that are little more than prisons, in preparation for a life in and out of prison, with no jobs, a dismal education and no hope. Many will die. They are recruiting our poorest young people to go kill other poor people in their corporate resource wars--young people with poor educations, no jobs and no hope. Many have died. Many will die.

And most of these elderly, whose meager pensions are being looted, and whose health care coverage, which they also paid into, is being looted, are the VERY PEOPLE who built up these corporate entities with their labor, their skill and their loyalty--and the children being undernourished and given no medical care, and whose schools are being looted, and the young soldiers who are being turned into suicides or killers, are THEIR children and grandchildren. The companies are long gone, to the cheapest job markets and slave labor markets they can find aboard (and Obama will be making Colombia one of those). And the multinational corporations they have formed are now looting the tiny incomes of their former workers and are looting and destroying the future.

These transglobal corporate/war-profiteer monsters who rule over us FOSTERED the death squad culture in Colombia. It is a reflection of THEM--the looters and plunderers and killers who rule Washington DC. This is not just a problem in Colombia. It is a problem HERE.