Speech by Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wisconsin, June 21, 2002)

Speech by Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wisconsin, June 21, 2002)
THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS IN COLOMBIA -- (Senate - June 21, 2002)

[Page: S5894]
---
Mr. FEINGOLD. Madam President, I wish to take this opportunity to express my support for the Colombian people following the Presidential election in Colombia on May 26. I was pleased to cosponsor a resolution last week welcoming the successful completion of democratic elections in Colombia. It is a tribute to the Colombian people that despite significant threats and violence, both international and national election observers found the elections to be free and fair.

I am also pleased that the President-elect of Colombia, Alvaro Uribe Velez, has been in Washington this week to discuss U.S. support for counternarcotics operations. The United States has already invested heavily in a unified effort to reduce the flow of drugs from Colombia, while simultaneously promoting human rights and economic development throughout the country. It is essential that we build on that investment during the new administration of President-elect Uribe. Indeed, I am pleased that President-elect Uribe has said that he looks forward to the day when Colombia is not sending a single kilogram of cocaine to the United States. To make that a reality, we must ensure that coca growers in the poor regions of Colombia have access to alternative economic opportunities, and that they take advantage of those opportunities to get out of the coca business for good. We must also promote human rights and the rule of law in Colombia; otherwise, the cycle of violence and narco-trafficking that is draining the livelihood of the country will ultimately lead to total state collapse, and to even more narco-trafficking and perhaps support for terrorism in the ruins of such a failed state.

With the visit to Washington this week of a new President-elect, this is an opportune time to reflect on some of the new directions in our bilateral relationship with Colombia. In particular, this provides an appropriate opportunity to step back and evaluate the effectiveness to date of our various policy objectives in Colombia. We must consider, for example, whether our initiatives have been effective in reducing the levels of violence in the country, in seeking accountability for grave human rights violations, and in cutting off the narco-traffickers who provide both financing and incentives for insurgent forces. We must also ask whether our policy in Colombia provides an effective balance of military assistance and well-managed development support. And we have an obligation to the people of Colombia to consider the human and environmental effects of our ongoing fumigation campaign.

In reflecting on the situation in Colombia today, one thing remains absolutely clear: The status quo in Colombia cannot be justified. The prolonged civil war, which is fueled by lucrative narco-trafficking, has created a volatile society, with untold suffering and a seemingly endless cycle of grave human rights abuses. The narco-traffickers have prospered, the guerrillas, and increasingly the paramilitaries, have offered the narco-traffickers hired protection, and they, too, are prospering from this deadly relationship. It is the people of Colombia, the average farmers and the honest citizens, who must pay the price of the war. That price can be counted in the number of lives lost or displaced in Colombia. But we must also count the lives lost to drugs and violence on our own streets in the United States. Such vast costs are wholly unacceptable.

So, where do we go from here? First and foremost, we must continue to scrutinize the relationship between the

[Page: S5895]
Colombian military and the paramilitary forces in the country. The Colombian military has been taking steps to sever its ties with the paramilitaries, but I am worried that those steps have not translated into meaningful progress on the ground. As the United States considers supporting the counter-insurgency operations of the Colombian military, we must guarantee that Colombia takes seriously its obligation to seek out and prosecute the paramilitaries. And we must remember that by most accounts, the paramilitaries today are more responsible than any other terrorist group for the massive war crimes committed in the country.

We must also ensure that the Colombian government commits its resources to a more robust investment in its own institutions. We must never substitute our own assets or personnel for an appropriate level of investment by Colombia in its own future. This must include domestic support to institutions of justice, and for the protection of civilians, as well as responsible military support to defend the civilian population from rebel and paramilitary attacks.

Finally, we must do more to ensure that communities that have already been so hard-hit by the conflict have access to development opportunities to rebuild their lives. Alternative development must be a cornerstone of any effective counter-narcotics campaign. Without alternative development, displaced communities will have only one rational economic option: to turn to the lucrative but illegal cultivation of the coca that drug lords are so eager to buy and protect. Quite simply, we must give battered rural communities a viable economic alternative to coca or poppy cultivation if we are ever to bring the wars in Colombia to an end. To date, our investment in such development has been insufficient. And perhaps as a result, we have also made little progress in stemming the flow of drugs. Without more of a social investment in alternative development, I fear that the coca fumigation program that is being supported by the United States will merely shift drug cultivation into even more remote and ecologically sensitive areas of the country.

So I rise today to congratulate the people of Colombia on their successful Presidential election in May. That democratic institutions continue to function in the midst of such violence and intimidation is an impressive tribute to the Colombian people. But as the United States moves to support our new colleagues in the incoming government in Colombia, we must continually ask ourselves whether our intervention is achieving our policy goals, and whether it is making a difference to the lives of average Colombians.

Carefully crafted U.S. support for Colombia can make a difference. Indeed, it must make a difference. But we must monitor the effects of that support very closely, because neither the U.S. taxpayer nor the vast communities in Colombia that have already been devastated by the war can afford to see such a significant U.S. investment in Colombia fail. We cannot and must not abandon Colombia. But at the same time, we cannot delude ourselves about the efficacy of our policy thus far. Critics of U.S. policy in Colombia, and in many cases I have been among them, raise valid questions about the commitment of the military to the rule of law and to protecting civilians. They raise important questions about the consequences of fumigation and the economic prospects for farmers who agree not to plant coca. It is our responsibility to weigh these points and to answer these questions, and where necessary, to adjust our policy so that we get it right. For Americans and for Colombians, the stakes are too high to do otherwise.

As of July 17, 2002, this document was also available online at http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/B?r107:@FIELD(FLD003+s)+@FIELD(DDATE+20020621)