Has Chiquita Banana been murdering people?
By Jon Rappoport
April 29, 2014
The phrase "undue corporate influence" is usually applied to buying votes and shaping policy. But how about killing people?
Here is an interview with Daniel Kovalik, an attorney who knows about this subject.
An
adjunct professor of law at the University of Pittsburgh, Kovalik is a
counsel for the United Steelworkers. He has worked on cases involving
human rights abuses in Colombia. The Christian Science Monitor described
him as "one of the most prominent defenders of Colombian workers in the
United States." He has received a Project Censored Award for his
article detailing the murder of trade unionists in Colombia.
Q:
Let's clear away some confusion right at the beginning. We're talking
about the country of Colombia. People in the US have a vague picture of
left-wing guerillas and right-wing paramilitaries fighting each other
for political control and control of the drug trade: Both sides are
crazy killers. Or something like that. So, saying that right-wing
paramilitary death squads are killing civilians in Colombia...it doesn't
really sink in with most Americans. Comments?
A:
Yes, most people remember the death squads in El Salvador during the
1980's, but few Americans know of the existence of the death squads in
Colombia which have existed in various forms since 1962. These death
squads, which continue to haunt Colombia, were the brain child of
General William Yarborough who was tasked to carry out President
Kennedy's National Security Doctrine. This Doctrine, created in
response to the "threat" of Vatican II and Liberation Theology, was
really about destroying popular movements in Latin America, and targeted
union leaders, peasant leaders and progressive Catholic clergy. In
Colombia alone, 80 Catholic priests and 3 Catholic bishops have been
killed since 1984, mostly by right-wing paramilitaries. As the
Catholic Bishops Conference of Colombia has explained, priests continue
to be murdered in that country because of their advocacy on behalf of
the poor. And yet, their deaths, and the death squads responsible for
them, are virtually unknown in this country.
Q:
These right-wing paramilitaries...some of them are paid by US
corporations to kill union organizers and farmers and take over the farm
land for companies like Chiquita Banana? Is that right? And Chiquita is
guilty of being a contractor for murder? If so, how many murders is
Chiquita responsible for?
A:
Chiquita, formerly known as United Fruit Company, is probably the most
notorious company in Latin America. As we mourn the loss of Gabriel
Garcia Marquez, one will recall his recounting of the murder of hundreds
of banana workers in his opus, One Hundred Years of Solitude. This
fictional account was based on the real slaughter of banana workers who
went on strike in the town of Cienaga, Colombia in 1928. They were
killed by the Colombian military acting at the behest of the United
Fruit Company. Fast forward to the present, and Chiquita admitted to
paying Colombian paramilitaries $1.7 million between 1997 and 2004, and
running them 3000 Kalashnikov rifles. According to former Colombian
Attorney General Mario Iguaran, at least 4,000 Colombians were killed by
these paramilitaries that Chiquita sponsored. Iguaran also opined that,
if not for this support, the paramilitaries would not have been able to
spread their tentacles throughout Colombia as they were able to do.
Q: Has any successful legal action been taken against Chiquita?
A:
Chiquita was indicted by the U.S. Justice Department for the foregoing
payment scheme, but they made a sweetheart settlement with the
Department which allowed them to pay a mere $25 million fine with no
jail time for any of the officials involved. And, what's more, they
were allowed to pay this fine over 5 years.
Q: This is an ongoing situation? Chiquita is still paying paramilitaries to kill farmers and union organizers in Colombia?
A:
According to a 2012 report by the Colombian human rights group Justicia
y Paz, Chiquita continues to make payments to the paramilitaries
through a new subsidiary known as Banacol.
Q:
The US government has given, what, several billion dollars to Colombia
to fight against drug traffickers. Yes? Is that the whole story or any
true part of the story? Or has all that money been given for other
purposes?
A:
The U.S. has given the Colombian military over $9 billion since 2000,
ostensibly to fight coca cultivation in and drug trafficking from
Colombia. However, the irony is that the Colombian military and its
paramilitary allies have themselves been directly involved in cocaine
trafficking on a large scale. And so, in reality, the U.S. has been
claiming to fight drug trafficking by sponsoring drug traffickers.
Q:
There is an insane legal precedent that, if you pay people to commit
murder, but you don't know who they then kill, you're off the hook?
Well,
this is an interesting point. The truth is that you can be held
liable for paying groups which go out and murder others if you know that
that is in fact what they will do. In the case of Chiquita, they very
well knew that they were paying money and running weapons to a group,
the AUC paramilitaries, that would go out and murder. And, according
to Mario Iguaran, they counted on the AUC to go out and kill, and in the
process, subdue the banana region of Uraba for Chiquita's benefit.
The reason Chiquita was let off with a slap on the wrist was because (1)
it is a powerful corporation with influence; and (2) it really wasn't
doing anything different than what the U.S. government has been doing
for years. The U.S. helped found the death squads in Colombia and has
continued to funnel billions of dollars to the Colombian military, all
the while knowing that the Colombian military has been working
hand-in-glove with the paramilitaries.
Q: What is Chiquita claiming right now about its role or non-role in murders in Colombia? Are they lying?
A:
Chiquita claims that it has not paid the paramilitaries since 1984.
Again, the report of Justicia y Paz says much differently.
Q: What are the prospects for justice in Colombia?
A:
I think that justice in Colombia will be quite elusive. There are so
many corporations and political actors in that country that are so
intertwined with the paramilitaries that it will be very difficult to
bring all of those actors to justice. Indeed, you really have a problem
of the fox guarding the hen house.
Q:
Name some of the major US corporations operating in Colombia and their
true objectives. Is this all about hiring ridiculously cheap
non-unionized labor and stealing fertile land from peasants, for mining,
agriculture, and oil drilling?
A:
There is a laundry list of U.S. corporations operating in Colombia.
These include Dole and Del Monte --both of which have been implicated in
supporting paramilitaries but which have never been prosecuted;
Occidental Petroleum and British Petroleum which have also supported
repressive forces in Colombia; the list goes on. The whole raison
d'etre of these companies is to exploit the land and resources of
countries like Colombia for their own profit, and largely to the
detriment of the environment and people of Colombia.
--end of interview-
My
comments: You aren't going to hear about these ongoing crimes on the
evening news. Corporate murder-for-hire isn't a popular subject.
Advertisers wouldn't want to buy commercial time on news programs that
trumpeted the names of famous US corporations who pay paramilitaries to
kill people who stand in the way of increased profits.
In
one paragraph, Kovalik makes a perfectly reasonable, persuasive, and
incisive case for the US government's involvement in trafficking. The
government has given billions to the Colombian military, which traffics
drugs. And this operation is part of the US war on drugs.
The author of three explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED, EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, and POWER OUTSIDE THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power.
Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative
reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and
health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other
newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered
lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative
power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free emails
at NoMoreFakeNews.com.
http://bit.ly/1g8vHgs
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Regards,
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