Well, today was a nice and normal day in the office. I woke up early and finished a translation about how the Free Trade Agreement, or TLC by its Spanish acronym, would hurt the working standards and environment of Colombia. Then I finished some notes about the meetings we had been in last week, and then I went to lunch with a friend. On the way back from lunch, I noticed there were students lining my street, tanks in front of the entrance to the National University, which is the largest university in the country and also around the corner from my house, and that people all had their faces covered because they were running away from tear gas. Hmmm...not normal to me, I noted, but after speaking with several people, who looked amazingly unperturbed at what was happening, they assured me that this was nothing; that it was a relatively small, tranquilo protest.
See, the 50-or-so students, all wearing hoods to
cover their faces from the tear gas but also to hide their identities, were mainly throwing rocks, not “papas,” or potatoes, homemade small bombs, and the riot police were using a high-powered hose and tear gas to control the student protesters, not live ammunition. There were no injuries reported on either side.
I then spent a surreal hour standing with the gathered students. Apart from sometimes lobbing more rocks and cement over the fence of the university so that the students
inside the fence would have more ammo, they just looked on, occasionally running if the police came closer and threw tear gas our way, sometimes hooting to let the students know that the police were sneaking around the back of the tank to get nearer to them and throw tear gas grenades (not the technical term) at them. I asked a couple people what was going on, and the first answer I got was that tomorrow is International Women’s Day, and this was a...protest/celebration of that? Didn’t make sense to me either, so the next three people confirmed that this was in anticipation of President Bush’s Sunday visit.
This picture reads "The United States provides the money, Colombia provides the dead - No to Plan Colombia"
Bush will be in Colombia for about 6 hours this Sunday, and there are said to be at least 21,000 Colombian police preparing for his visit, which will entail army checkpoints and closing down some of the roads in Bogotá. There is a large protest planned in central Bogotá by the opposition political party. Colombians are particularly focused on opposing the Free Trade Agreement right now, as it will be voted on by Congress in the four months or so. Among other issues, like NAFTA and CAFTA (the Central American version), the Free Trade Agreement with Colombia would make small farmers unable to compete with US agrobusinesses, make medicine unaffordable to all but the very richest portion of society, and have the effect of futher concentrating wealth in the hands of the few. Here are some excerpts from
our website which give some details of why it is so bad for
Farmers, indigenous people, Afro-Colombians...
*Agriculture is the third most important sector in terms of employment in Colombia, with 22.7% (almost double the figures for employment in the industrial sector, which generates 13.%), and provides 11.4% of GDP. Given that 12 years of NAFTA and the resulting flood of low-cost corn, wheat and beef imports from the U.S. that has been a major contributor to the displacement of 1.7 million small scale Mexican farmers, the potential negative impact on Colombian peasants, indigenous and Afro-Colombians is real. For example, significantly privileged under the agreement is Colombian palm oil -- the very same crop that is promoting violence and displacement among Afro-Colombian communities in the Chocó region. Since opening Colombia’s market to compete with the U.S. will actually lead to more human insecurity, U.S. trade policy in Colombia is inconsistent with the stated goals of the U.S. government’s drug war policy.
Human Rights... The picture below reads: Yankees out of Colombia, and out of the whole world! See, everyone h
ates the Yankees * The U.S.-Colombia FTA lacks meaningful provisions to strengthen human rights protections. With regard to labor rights, the FTA only requires countries to effectively enforce their own labor laws, with no incentive to bring weak laws and enforcement up to the International Labor Organization (ILO) core labor standards. The enforcement and penalty mechanisms in the labor chapter of the U.S.-Colombia FTA are so weak that they provide no credible influence over the multinational corporations or Colombian government. Meanwhile, Colombia continues to be the most violent place in the world for trade unionists. According to the National Labor School (ENS) in Colombia, 70 trade unionists were murdered in 2005. Wages and working conditions in all countries will be hurt if trade pacts continue to encourage corporations to race to the bottom in workers’ rights.
People who think d
ifferently than Bush/Uribe...*
In this picture, to the right of a crossed out Uncle Sam, President Bush is drawn with Colombian President Alvaro Urbe's head on his knee.
The conflict in Colombia is deeply rooted in economic, social, and political inequalities. Wealth and land remain concentrated in the hands of a few and Colombia’s political system neglects the needs of the majority of the population...Political and economic marginalization has already stoked widespread protests and political insecurity. However, dissent has been met with harsh repression. For example, on May 15, 2006 a national summit was called by Afro-Colombians and Indigenous leaders across fourteen provinces in Colombia to protest against the FTA and militarization. Tens of thousands of people who came out were met with severe repression, resulting in many deaths.
A Colombian eating a sandwich, taking in the protest and awaiting some movement by the riot police.
teacher who objects to Uribe, Colombia's president, being put into power by paramilitary forces and the US, not by the pueblo - the people. There were also a 100 or so violent youth throwing rocks amidst the rest of the non-violent protestors. As a result, police dispersed the protest after less than two hours with tear gas, and then later water hoses. Here are some pictures of what I saw:
