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November 13, 2004

Paramilitary talks (2): The "paracaidistas"

Pity poor Pablo Escobar. The flamboyant, brutal drug dealer always wanted a clean slate – to be seen, in journalist Mark Bowden's words, "as a benevolent, law-abiding citizen." But he came and went 15 years too early for that.

Had he been trafficking drugs and killing enemies today, perhaps Escobar could have avoided ending up dead on a Medellín rooftop, surrounded by smiling, photo-snapping policemen. Today, he could have put on camouflage fatigues, christened himself "Comandante" something-or-other, and bought himself a seat at the table in the Santa Fe de Ralito demilitarized zone, where negotiations are proceeding between the Colombian government and the AUC paramilitaries. There, Escobar would have stood a decent chance of winning amnesty, or at least a vastly reduced penalty, for his past crimes. His presence at the table would also have stymied any U.S. attempt to extradite him.

Sounds farfetched? Well, it's happening right now for an entire corps of Colombia's top drug dealers. An odd wave of brand-new comandantes has swept the AUC leadership over the past three or four years: people with precious little experience fighting guerrillas but a long record as capos in Colombian narcotrafficking organizations. Among them are no less than three of the twelve figures on the U.S. government's "wanted" list of members of the North Valle Cartel, Colombia's largest existing drug organization.

Colombians even have a term for these traffickers-turned-paramilitaries: the "paracaidistas" – the parachutists – as in people who've just "dropped in." The paracaidistas' presence at Ralito, and their growing influence over the AUC, might be the largest obstacle the Uribe government's talks face right now.

The difference between these new leaders and more "traditional" AUC comandantes may at first seem semantic, since today's paramilitaries got their start and get much of their support from drug traffickers' money, since they control 40 percent of Colombia's drug trade (according to U.S. Ambassador William Wood), and since much of the AUC leadership is subject to U.S. Justice Department extradition requests. In addition to ordering mass murder, longtime paramilitary leaders like Salvatore Mancuso, Iván Roberto Duque, "Macaco" and Ramón Isaza have helped send prodigious amounts of drugs to the United States.

As awful as they are, though, the paramilitaries' old guard at least can claim to have fought guerrillas and those they regarded as guerrilla sympathizers. The paracaidistas can hardly even claim that. They have few anti-guerrilla credentials, but long resumes in Colombia's drug underworld. It is not even clear whether they view the guerrillas as blood enemies or merely as rival drug mafias. In one celebrated example from February, when Colombian troops participating in the early stages of Plan Patriota captured "Sonia" (Nayibe Rojas Valderrama), the "financial chief" of the FARC's Southern Bloc, they found e-mails on her computer asking the local AUC to lend a helicopter "to transport arms and drugs through the jungle." 

The distinction between old-line paramilitaries, however "narco," and the paracaidistas makes a world of difference for Colombia's peace talks with the AUC. First, it makes international support impossible: a negotiation with longtime, unreformed cartel leaders – regardless of the insignia on their new uniforms – is still a negotiation with cartel leaders, something that no other government is going to touch. Second, the paracaidistas are rapidly supplanting the AUC's old guard – even killing those who (like Carlos Castaño in April, or the Metro Bloc's "Rodrigo 00" in May) opposed the group's advanced narcotization and may have been seen as too likely to turn state's evidence. Under this new management, the paramilitaries are turning into a mafia, or rather a set of rival mafias united only by their common hope to negotiate an amnesty.

Here are some examples of paracaidistas currently in the Ralito zone talking with government representatives.

How remarkable that, in the name of peace and disarmament, some of the world's most prominent narco-criminals not only have a safe haven, but they have regular opportunities to meet with government officials to demand an amnesty deal. If they get even some of the impunity they want, the paracaidistas will have succeeded in a scheme so brazen that even Pablo Escobar couldn't have devised it.

How remarkable as well that the government of Álvaro Uribe – which takes such a hard line against the hapless peasants who grow the narco-kingpins' coca – has reacted so meekly to the growing presence of the kingpins themselves. So far, the Colombian government has sought to extradite only one paracaidista in the Ralito zone, Juan Carlos Sierra Ramírez or "El Tuso," a relatively minor figure who had bought up a small paramilitary bloc in Antioquia department. And they didn't arrest him; "El Tuso" remains at large.

The Colombian government has made no secret of its unhappiness with current low levels of international support for the paramilitary peace talks. For donor governments, though, the talks will remain radioactive – utterly untouchable – as long as the paracaidistas remain at the table. They have to go if this process is to have any credibility at all.

Coming soon: (3) Improvisation and secrecy

Posted by isacson at November 13, 2004 02:01 AM

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Comments

That would be the best outcome, for all of these "paracaidistas" to leave the negotiations...however, considering that some of these and other individuals have so closely integrated into the AUC and other paramilitary structures, especially those that have "landed" more than a couple of years ago, one has to wonder if it is even possible to arrange any sort of significant demobilization without at least the most prominent of them being involved. If, for example, "Don Berna" was kicked out of the table, the talks themselves might be in danger of collapsing. Logically, later arrivals might be easier to handle.

It's easy to condemn all that, but it's harder to handle, I suppose..from what I can gather, perhaps one way out, from the perspective of the Uribe government, would be to simply make the bulk of the judicial benefits not applicable to outright drug dealers, unless they turned themselves and their business partners/routes in, and even if that were the case, the possibility of extradition would remain open. Probably most "new arrivals" would reject that last option, but probably "Don Berna" and others might be willing to face it.

Posted by: jcg at November 13, 2004 01:09 PM

we want see fotografy these terrorist, put on please, jorge 40 and others

Posted by: israel at January 11, 2006 10:01 AM

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