EMAIL TO THE GUARDIAN

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/27/colombia-air-strike-kills-farc?INTCMP=SRCH
RE: Colombia Air Strike Kills 36 FARC Rebels

How does the Guardian know that any – never mind all - of the people killed in the airstrikes were rebels?  Why was this AP report run by Guardian without a trace of skepticism included?  

As Daniel Kavalik recently pointed out:
 

“…a November 19, 2009 U.S. Embassy Cable, entitled, ‘2009-2010 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report,’ the U.S. Embassy in Bogota acknowledges, as a mere aside, the horrific truth: 257,089 registered victims of the right-wing paramilitaries.  And, as Human Rights Watch just reported in its 2012 annual report on Colombia, these paramilitaries continue to work hand-in-glove with the U.S.-supported Colombian military.” [1]
 

Here is another key fact Kavlik’s mentioned was that the US government is fully aware:
 

“…the violence in Colombia falls disproportionately on the indigenous population another fact acknowledged by the U.S. Embassy in cables released by Wikileaks.   Moreover, this anti-indigenous violence is escalating.  Indeed, as the U.S. Embassy acknowledges in a February 26, 2010 Embassy Cable entitled, ‘Violence Against Indigenous Shows Upward Trend,’ such violence is pushing 34 indigenous groups to the point of extinction.  This violence, therefore, can only be described as genocidal.”

Yet another incredibly damning revelation:
 

“the Embassy, relying on a study by anthropologist Esther Sanchez – a study itself funded by the U.S. government – notes that the militaries and the paramilitaries target the indigenous because they ‘often perceive indigenous as FARC collaborators because they co-exist on their territories’....the Embassy scoffs at the notion that the Colombian military should leave indigenous territory, characterizing this very request by the Awa indigenous tribe as “impractical.”

And, this is “impractical,” the Embassy forthrightly explains, because that territory must be captured for its vast resource wealth.  To wit, the U.S. Embassy explicitly acknowledges that ‘capital investments in the mining of hydrocarbons sectors’ as well as ‘investments in rubber [and] palm oil’ – that is, the very investments which U.S. military policy and the Free Trade Agreement are designed to promote “
 

To sum this all up for you in a concise way you can use in any future report about Colombia,

the US government has been financing genocide for profit in Colombia for decades. US allies are responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths.
 

Even power friendly groups like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have been documenting this for years. Now we have even more conclusive evidence thanks to Wikileaks. How can the Guardian therefore justify reporting any Colombian government claim about the conflict as if it were fact?

Joe Emersberger

[1] Wikileaks Cables Reveal Killing Hits Record Levels; Slaughter in Colombia
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/02/23/slaughter-in-colombia/