By W. T. Whitney Jr. Dec. 10, 2013
Negotiators of the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) have been at work in Cuba for over a year. Their purpose is to end well over sixty years of war. Peace hopes are up because of agreements reached on agrarian rights and recently on political participation. But prospects for peace depend ultimately on what happens in cities and regions like Barrancabermeja.
The plight of political prisoner and Barrancabermeja native David Ravelo points to difficulties ahead, as does violence directed against Credhos (Regional Corporation for Defense of Human Rights), the Barrancabermeja human rights group Ravelo founded and led. A solidarity delegation joined by the present writer visited Ravelo in Bogota’s Picota prison in late 2012 and also called at CREDHOS headquarters in Barrancabermeja. This report serves as follow-up of that delegation.
By 1987 when Credhos was founded, paramilitaries were on the way to subjecting Barrancabermeja to a reign of terror. David Ravelo and Credhos resisted. According to Peace Brigades International, Credhos provides “promotion, defense, and protection of human rights, democracy, and international humanitarian law.†It pursues “actions and scenarios for understanding, tolerance, living together, and civilized peace.†Over time killers eliminated nine Credhos activists.
Credhos secretary-general, David Ravelo, reported in 2010 that, “There are many murders and forced disappearances in Barrancabermeja and in the Magdalena region. Credhos accompanies victims’ families who are seeking the truth and damages for harm that was done. We demand reparations on their behalf and justice that is their due.â€
Credhos’ formation coincided with growing repression against the newly formed Patriotic Union (UP). That electoral coalition emerged from a government – FARC agreement in 1984 that insurgents would give up arms in return for being able to help build a left political movement. U. P. activist David Ravelo gained a seat on the Barrancabermeja city council. Then in 1993 amidst murders, arbitrary arrests, and disappearances, he went to jail for two years on fabricated charges.
Some 20 years later, violence was still the norm in Barrancabermeja. Credhos reported that during the first two months of 2013, there were “five murders, three forced disappearances, two people wounded, and 20 death threats.†Blame fell on paramilitaries intent upon “maintaining social and political control of the city’s poor districts and thus sustain drug trafficking, a lucrative business through which they finance their criminal action.†Credhos activists were being tracked and spied upon.
David Ravelo was in prison again. Detained on September 14, 2010, he learned in December, 2012 he would remain there for 18 years. Ravelo is one of 9500 Colombian political prisoners, most of them varyingly accused of “rebellion,†terrorism, and ties with the FARC. Thousands are held without trial. Reports abound of prisoners subjected to water shortages, contaminated food and water, terrible sanitation, no family visits, gruesome medical care, and endemic violence.
In April and early May assailants killed 10 individuals in Barrancabermeja. Rafael RodrÃguez, secretary general of the USO oil workers union, narrowly escaped an attack. Abelardo Sánchez is the current Credhos secretary general and target of repeated death threats and attacks. In November, both he and Credhos president Ivan Madero Vergel escaped attackers.
The Santander Superior Court in October, 2013 rejected David Ravelo’s appeal. Responding, Credhos blamed a “lack of guarantees and weakened due process†Indeed, at Ravelo’s trial in early 2012, the prosecution relied upon accusations from two jailed paramilitary chieftains once active in Barrancabermeja. They gained reduced sentences in return for testimony accusing Ravelo of complicity in the 1991 murder of a Barrancebermeja city official. Allegedly they bribed a corroborating witness. The judge refused to hear testimony from 30 defense witnesses.
Ravelo’s appeal had centered on a crime committed by his prosecutor. As a police lieutenant in 1991, William Pacheco helped arrange for the forced disappearance of Guillermo Hurtado. Pacheco spent a year in a military prison. Colombian law bans criminals from serving as prosecutor. Pacheco entered his resignation early in 2013, but remains on the job.
What with judicial persecution of the Credhos founder and ongoing chaos and murder in Barrancabermeja, the Credhos story is a cautionary lesson as to troubles ahead for the project of peace in Colombia with social justice. The Credhos view is that “at the highest levels of the Colombian state they want to weaken social protest.†And, “there are hundreds of cases in which they have opened criminal investigations [of individuals] for daring to defend and promote human rights as a fundamental principle of a society dedicated to human development and defense of vulnerable communities.†As to the Colombian state: “experience has shown us that [its] strategies are structural and systematic.â€
That insight speaks to North Americans who would confront their own government’s war-making. Colombia is the prime U.S. military ally in Latin America and, as such, is the recipient of military aid funds well known to trickle down to the benefit of paramilitaries and other lawless characters.
