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The frame-up of Ricardo Palmera
By
Berta Joubert-Ceci
Washington, D.C.
Published Oct 25, 2006 1:30 AM
Ricardo Palmera, a peace
negotiator from the FARC-EP (Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces-Popular
Army), is currently being tried in the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.,
where he was extradited from his homeland on Dec. 31, 2004, on charges of
kidnapping, terrorism and drug
trafficking.
Ricardo Palmera, a peace
negotiator from the FARC-EP.
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This is an important and
crucial trial. It is the first of this nature, with an insurgent from another
country being tried in criminal court in the United States. Although widely
covered by Colombian and other international media, news of the case has been
notoriously absent from the commercial media in this country, giving the
impression that there is a media
white-out.
The trial on drug trafficking
will be a separate case that will be heard after the conclusion of the current
case of kidnapping and terrorism.
The
charges of kidnapping against Palmera—better known by his Simón
Bolívar-inspired pseudonym “Simón Trinidad”—stem
from a February 2003 incident in which a small plane flown by U.S.
contractors/agents fell over territory controlled by the insurgents in
Caquetá, in the south of Colombia. These contractors were among the many
U.S. military or military-associated personnel sent by the United States to
Colombia to fight against the insurgency under Plan Colombia. The
agents—Thomas Howes, Keith Stansell and Marc Gonsalves—have since
been kept captive by the FARC.
Trinidad
was extradited to the United States place after Colombian President
Álvaro Uribe issued an ultimatum to the FARC. With no possibility of
negotiation, he unilaterally demanded that the insurgents release all captives
by Dec. 30, as the only condition for annulment of the extradition
order.
Trinidad is not charged with
direct involvement in the kidnapping. Rather, the crime for which he is being
tried under the new U.S. antiterrorism legal framework is
“association.” He is charged with “conspiracy” to commit
the crime of hostage taking. The Colombian government accuses Trinidad of trying
to force a prisoner exchange using the three captive U.S. agents.
The fact is, however, that Trinidad had
gone to Ecuador at the request of the FARC to contact James Lemoyne, a United
Nations representative with whom Trinidad had spoken before, about possible
peace negotiations with the Colombian government. This fact has been twisted
into the accusation that Trinidad was pressuring the Colombian government to
exchange the approximately 500 FARC prisoners in Colombian jails in return for
the 60 or so captives of the FARC, including the three U.S.
agents.
The meeting never took place
since the combined action of the Interpol, CIA and the Colombian and Ecuadorian
armed forces captured—or rather, kidnapped—Trinidad in Quito,
Ecuador, on Jan. 2, 2004. He was then extradited to Colombia, where he remained
in maximum security prison until Dec.
31.
There he faced 100 charges of
terrorism, kidnapping, drug trafficking and rebellion that guaranteed 81 months
in prison, according to his lawyer in Colombia, Oscar Silva. In fact Trinidad is
being tried on these charges right now in Colombia even though he is not
present, forbidden to be there by Thomas Horgan, the U.S. federal judge
presiding over his case here.
The charge
of terrorism is based on U.S. President Bill Clinton having designated the
insurgent FARC as a “terrorist” organization in 1997. Therefore,
Trinidad is now charged with aiding and giving material support to a
“terrorist” group.
The trial
The opening date of the trial in
Washington had to be postponed from Oct. 10 to Oct. 16 because the jury had not
been selected on time. The jury of 12 regulars and three alternates is made up
of eight women and seven men selected from a pool of
50.
Who is the judge? Judge Chief Judge
Thomas Hogan was an appointee of President Ronald Reagan. Hogan has ruled on
behalf of the FBI in several occasions. According to the Wikipedia, he
“ordered Judith Miller of the
New York Times
jailed after she refused to disclose her confidential source to a
grand jury”
and in May he “signed the search
warrant authorizing the
FBI to search the
Capitol building offices of
U.S. Congressman William Jefferson, the only
such search in United States history.” He also ruled in July “that
an FBI raid on a Louisiana congressman’s Capitol Hill office was
legal.”
According to the website
www.vetsforjustice.com,
“He joined the ongoing conspiracy to hide the truth in Case 84-0399, a
lawsuit filed by a 100% Service-Connected Disabled Combat Veteran against the
Veterans Administration.”
His long
instructions to the jury in the Trinidad case were very complicated and
difficult to understand. This is a very difficult case as it is, with the jury
having to understand Latin America, Colombia—jurors had to be shown a map
so they could place that country, insurgency, U.S. foreign relations, and so on.
The jury can take notes but must leave the notebook in the court before leaving.
They will not have access to transcripts. The judge was very emphatic when he
told the jury, “You have to rely entirely on the notes you take and what
you hear.”
In order to get into
the courtroom you have to go through two checkpoints with metal detectors. There
had been rumors before the beginning of the trial trying to scare the public
away, saying that the FARC would attempt to kill
witnesses.
Trinidad is being held
incommunicado. He has not even been allowed to choose his own lawyer. He cannot
attend his trial in Colombia nor communicate with his relatives
there.
He appeared very pale the first
day in court. He was however dressed in a dark blue suit, without shackles. The
last time he was in court he had been dressed in prison uniform, shackled and
with no access to interpreters. This time there were three interpreters and
Trinidad movingly thanked them with a big smile at the end of the
hearing.
If convicted he could face the
death penalty. However, because of the extradition agreement between Colombia
and the United States, he could face a maximum penalty of 30 years since the
death penalty doest not exist in
Colombia.
When the defense presented its
arguments, the prosecution objected twice, something that Paul Wolf, a lawyer in
the audience, said it is very uncommon during opening statements. The first
objection came when the defense presented some historical context, explaining
how the FARC had attempted to
participate in national political life through the formation of the Patriotic
Union. This development was very successful in gathering support and
representatives in government, but the Colombian government bloodily betrayed
its promise of protection and security for the UP members, ending in the
assassination of thousands of UP members including presidential candidates.
The prosecution’s second
objection came when the defense started to mention the violence from the state,
the use of the so-called U.S. private contractors and the bombing of civilians
as happened in Santo Domingo in the Arauca region.
A bomb explodes in
Bogota
For several weeks the
Colombian people and the relatives of those held by the insurgents, including
the mother of captive presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, were very
attentive and their hopes rose with the possibility of peace negotiations
between the Colombian government and the FARC. Because of internal and external
pressures, steps were already being taken for the possibility of negotiations
for a humanitarian exchange of prisoners. That possibility, including the
possibility that Simon Trinidad could be part of that exchange, is now
gone.
On Oct. 19, a car bomb exploded in
the middle of the School and University of Nueva Granada in the north part of
Bogota, the most important military installation of its kind in the nation with
a complex of buildings under very tight security. Uribe immediately accused the
FARC; the following day he spoke at the Nueva Granada University and announced
the end of any possibility of negotiations and, more dangerously, that the
Colombian Armed Forces would now attempt the military rescue of the FARC
captives. This has frightened the relatives who know from experience that their
loved ones could die in the crossfire. This “rescue” is an action
that even the mother of Gonsalves, who goes daily to the hearing in Washington,
has rejected.
There are many reports
from Colombia that raise questions about who was responsible for this explosion.
Even the Colombian general prosecutor, Mario Iguarán, stated that there
is no evidence to accuse the
guerrillas.
The explosion has
conveniently handed Uribe an excuse to turn his back on peace negotiations and
instead to harden his fascist-like policies. During his speech, he also proposed
a special tax to fund the anti-guerrilla campaign, and a call for France, Spain
and Switzerland, countries that were mediating between the FARC and the
government, to instead help militarily. He also accused Ecuador and Venezuela of
harboring FARC leaders.
The relatives
and human rights organizations in Colombia called for a protest on Oct. 24,
under the slogan “No al Rescate a Sangre y fuego” (No to the Rescue
with Blood and Fire).
Articles copyright 1995-2012 Workers World.
Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article is permitted in any medium without royalty provided this notice is preserved.
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