[36] in peace2
Columbia (news)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (F. AuYeung)
Sat Jan 22 04:53:21 2000
Message-Id: <200001220953.EAA07495@biohazard-cafe.mit.edu>
To: peace2@MIT.EDU
cc: jbarrera@MIT.EDU, zan@MIT.EDU
Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2000 04:53:09 -0500
From: "F. AuYeung" <auyeung@MIT.EDU>
*sigh* looks like another one is breaking out...
------- Forwarded Message
Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2000 15:30:06 -0500
From: Kim Foster <fosterk@gis.net>
Subject: [Fwd: URGENT COMMUNIQUE! Colombian Military Invades U'wa Land!]
The fax number is 603-668-7358 for Gores headquarters
email: newhampshire@gore2000.org
boston contact: Kim Foster 781-321-8674
cell: 781-308-4530
From: "Patrick Reinsborough" <rags@ran.org>
To: <rags@ran.org>
Subject: URGENT COMMUNIQUE! Colombian Military Invades U'wa Land!
Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2000 12:07:13 -0800
CALL AL GORE'S CAMPAIGNS HQ IN NEW HAMPSHIRE! 603-622-8303
AL GORE HAS HALF A MILLION DOLLARS WORTH OF OCCIDENTAL STOCK. DEMAND THAT
HE USE BOTH HIS PERSONAL AND POLITICAL INFLUENCE TO DEMAND THAT THE
COLOMBIAN MILITARY AND OCCIDENTAL PULL OUT OF U'WA LAND!
(see article below)
FEB 3! ORGANIZE AGAINST FIDELITY INVESTMENTS! FIND THE NEAREST ONE TO YOU :
http://personal400.fidelity.com/gen/centers/invstctr.html.tvsr
CALL YOUR LOCAL REPRESENTATIVES AND TELL THEM TO VOTE AGAINST CLINTON'S
$1.3 BILLION MILITARY AID PACKAGE TO COLOMBIA
FOR MORE INFORMATION CALL RAINFOREST ACTION NETWORK 1-800-989-RAIN
IF YOU ARE IN LOS ANGELES CALL ACTION RESOURCE CENTER - 310-392-7656
Communique from the U'wa People
January 20, 2000
URGENT URGENT URGENT
COMMUNICATION TO THE NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL PUBLIC
OXY INVADES U'WA TERRITORY
THE COLOMBIAN ARMY HAS 5000 AGENTS IN THE SERVICE OF OCCCIDENTAL
On January 19, 2000, more than 5,000 agents of the Colombian Military,
heavily armed, invaded our traditional territory, exactly at Cedeno, where
Oxy's oil drilling site Gibraltar 1 is situated. Faced with opposition
presented by the U'wa people, headed by our representative and indigenous
leader Roberto Cobaria, military forces declared that "the oil will be
extracted even over and above the U'wa people." Also police forces were
dispatched to the zone for the security of Occidental's engineers.
Since the 15th of November 1999, more than 250 U'wa people have occupied
Cedeno, part of our ancestral territory, resisting the exploitation brought
on by Oxy. Now we are being surrounded by the 5000 military agents and
Colombian police who have put at risk our physical integrity.
With this deed, Occidental and the Colombian government are insisting on
ignoring our territorial rights over land we have occupied for thousands of
years. We are the owners of the territory on which they aim to exploit
petroleum, without recognizing the constitutional rights of community lands
for our ethnic group which are inalienable, non-negotiable, and irremovable,
protected by public laws over collective property.
In this way, the Colombian government headed by the Minister of Mining and
Energy with the compliance of INCORA, in a shadowy process is seeking to
declare U'wa territory a special petroleum reserve zone with the false
argument that the national petroleum industry is covered by the law as a
public utility or social interest, with the sole purpose of permitting and
facilitating petroleum exploitation by the multinational corporation
Occidental. We are making an urgent call to the national and international
community, and to all groups who have supported us, to mobilize against this
last attempt to trample upon the U'wa nation, which threatens our existence
and culture. WE U'WA WILL NOT CEDE OUR CULTURAL, HISTORIC AND ANCIENT
RIGHTS. WE PREFER GENOCIDE SPONSORED BY THE COLOMBIAN GOVERNMENT RATHER
THAN HANDING OVER OUR MOTHER EARTH TO OIL COMPANIES.
_____________
Financial Times, 1/19/00
World News / Americas
Gore attacked over Colombia oil project
By Matthew Jones
Environmentalists and human
rights activists are accusing Al
Gore, the US vice-president and
candidate for the Democratic
party presidential nomination, of
hypocrisy over his shareholding
in an oil company prospecting in
Colombian rainforests.
Mr. Gore has targeted the environmental and human
rights vote as part of his election campaign and was last
week rated "the most knowledgeable" presidential
candidate on green issues by the influential League of
Conservation Voters.
But the U'wa Defense Working Group, which represents
the U'wa indigenous tribe from the north east of
Colombia, says Mr. Gore is inextricably linked with
Occidental Petroleum, the US oil group which plans to
start drilling on its ancestral lands in the next few
months in search of an estimated 1.5bn barrels of oil.
According to Mr. Gore's official Public Financial
Disclosure Report for 1998, the latest information
available, the vice-president owned between $250,000
and $500,000 in Occidental stock inherited from his
father, Albert Gore Sr., who died in 1998. Mr. Gore Sr.
became a board member of Occidental Petroleum after
losing his Senate seat in 1970.
According to the Center for Public Integrity, a non-profit
organization that analyses ethics in politics, Ray Irani,
the Occidental chief executive, made a donation of
$100,000 to the Democratic National Committee in the
early 90s following a stay in the Lincoln Room of the
White House.
The campaign group is urging environmentalists not to
vote for Mr Gore and to protest about his links to
Occidental on the campaign trail.
Neither the White House nor Mr. Gore's campaign team
has responded to requests for comment.
Stephen Kretzmann, U'wa campaign co-ordinator for
Amazon Watch, a California-based environmental group,
said: "This will not look good for Al Gore in the midst of
an election campaign. It is clear that he could stop the
drilling with a phone call and if he doesn't do something
about this he will lose the environmental and human
rights vote."
The U'wa, who number 5,000, first hit the headlines in
1996 when they threatened to commit collective suicide
if Occidental's drilling plans were not halted.
The drill site falls 600m outside the legally recognized
U'wa Unified Reserve but the tribe claims it is within
larger, traditional ancestral territory.
The UDWG claims development of the site would be
damaging to the tribe and the environment because of
the likely increase in oil-related violence between
different armed factions in the politically unstable
region.
It says Occidental's existing pipeline has been attacked
more than 600 times in the last 12 years leading to 2.1m
barrels of crude oil spilling into the soil and rivers,
and that U'wa members and humanitarian workers have been
killed or injured in the cross-fire.
Occidental said earlier this month that it planned to
start building roads to the test site at the end of January
and would sink the first test well at the site in May.
Ken Hufmann, Occidental's vice-president of investor
relations, refused to comment on Mr. Gore's stock
holding in the company or any political donations that it
had made.
He would say only: "We're moving ahead with plans to
drill the well but I have no specific dates."
------- End of Forwarded Message
