Colombia: Open letter by Liliana Obando/Carta publica de Liliana Obando

September 20, 2008 — At the end of the background information below (and HERE) is a link to an open letter to the national and international community sent by imprisoned Colombian trade union and Human Rights campaigner Liliana Obando.

Background

Colombian trade union and human rights activist Liliana Obando was arrested and detained in a maximum security prison on August 8 by the anti-terrorism unit of the Colombian National Police.

She was charged with “rebellion” against the state, a catch-all charge that is regularly used to imprison those who speak out against the government of President Alvaro Uribe Velez, the largest recipient of US military aid in the region.

At the time of her arrest, Obando, the sole breadwinner in her family of two young sons and her mother, was carrying out a study on assassinations of Agricultural Workers Union Federation (Fensuagro) members by paramilitary death squads and government security forces.

Colombia’s state security forces, in conjunction with paramilitary groups, are notorious for their human rights abuses and murder of social movement activists. To date, more than 2500 trade unionists have been killed, with 40 assassinated this year alone. Meanwhile, more than 70 pro-Uribe legislators are under investigation for having direct links to paramilitary death squads.

Obando toured Australia twice in recent years while working for Fensuagro’s international relations commission, and spoke with many organisations about the Uribe government’s abuses of human rights, and the Colombian people’s struggles for peace and justice.

The international campaign to free Obando and have all charges against her immediately dropped has won wide support in many countries. In Australia, many organisations and individuals — including solidarity groups, academics, religious organisations, NGOs, progressive political parties, and Unions NSW, the Maritime Union of Australia, the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, and National Tertiary Education Union branches — have passed motions and sent letters of protest to the Colombian and Australian governments in recent weeks.

Unions WA voted on September 16 to also organise a delegation of union leaders to meet with Colombia’s ambassador in Australia and to approach all WA members of parliament, at every level of government, to lobby the federal government for Obando’s release.

However, much more pressure must urgently be put on the Colombian government if Obando is to be freed and her safety guaranteed.

All human rights supporters are urged to:

•put motions condemning Obando’s arrest to your union or other community organisations;

•send letters calling for her release to the Colombian president at auribe@presidencia.gov.co, with copies to Colombia’s Australian embassy at embassyofcolombia@bigpond.com, and to your local MP (please send a copy to Peace and Justice For Colombia at pjfcolombia@gmail.com);

•write to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights at oacnudh@hchr.org.co;

•help organise public protest actions; and

•help raise funds for Obando’s legal defence and to assist her children.

For more information, visit http://www.colombiasolidarity.net.

Evo Morales: “If the Bolivian people ask us for socialism, we will deepen towards socialism”

http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/2008/08/evo-morales-if-bolivian-people-ask-us.html

La Paz – President of Bolivia Evo Morales announced yesterday that he would “deepen” the process towards socialism in his country at the request of the population and pointed out that he now understood the slogan “homeland or death” that he said he first heard from his colleague and firm ally in Venezuela, Hugo Chavez.

The president, who celebrated two and a half years in this position and applies a policy of nationalisations of petroleum and service industries, affirmed that the decision to advance towards socialism came about due to a poll, although he did not reveal the origins of the poll.

“I was looking over a poll that came from overseas and the majority of the Bolivians propose socialism, I was left very impressed …. If the Bolivian people ask us for socialism, we will deepen towards socialism” said the president during the inauguration of an indigenous university in the Aymara town of Warisata.

Morales revealed that he now understood the harangue that he first heard from his political ally in Venezuela, who is known for proclaiming in public rallies “homeland or death”, and which has been repeated in Cuba since the 1960s.

“I use to here comrade Chavez say, homeland or death, I didn’t understand it, now I want us all to shout it every day, homeland or death” affirmed the president, who asked the students present to shout at the top of their voices “Homeland or death!”

According to him, experiences of collective property have been registered in Bolivian Andean populations, such as in the case of his home town of Isallavi, in the Oruro region, where he assured that “there is no private property” over cows and llamas.

Morales is one week out from facing a recall referendum

Translated from El Universal

Posted by Bolivia Rising on Sunday, August 03, 2008