A heightened US military presence in Colombia?

As is the Palanquero air base: With hangers that can hold more than 100 planes, housing for more than 2,000 people, restaurants, a theater, casino and hospital, it is one of the country’s largest and most well equipped bases.

Colombia is long accustomed to receiving U.S. military assistance, but rumors of a more established presence with a base has sparked concern. “I do not agree with an American base in Colombia,” Rafael Pardo, a former defense minister and current presidential candidate, told GlobalPost. “But I am in agreement with a collaborative arrangement between Colombia and the United States that Colombia defines.”

With details of the negotiations under wraps, the government seems focused on dismissing concerns that the U.S. investment would wrest control from Colombian hands.

“An American base you will not see,” said a Colombian Defense Ministry official. “The Palanquero base — a Colombian base — as it is now, is how it will remain. There will be no change.”

But some human rights advocates object to American investments in Palanquero. Further support for the military will “put civilians at greater risk than before,” said John Lindsay-Poland of the U.S. human rights organization Fellowship of Reconciliation.

Current negotiations for increased military support come at a time when Colombia’s armed forces are under scrutiny, following revelations that more than 1,500 civilians have allegedly been killed by armed forces over the last decade, and have often been framed as guerrillas fallen in combat.

“The human rights record of the Colombian Armed Forces is so terrible,” said Lindsay-Poland, “that we think there’s no justification for giving them any assistance.”

And some critics worry that an increased American military presence in the region could exacerbate the already tense U.S. relationship with neighboring countries Venezuela and Ecuador. Others dismiss such concerns, saying the U.S. presence would only serve to bolster Colombian operations.

"This does not signify a security threat for any neighboring countries; this is not a spy base,” said Aflredo Rangel, a military analyst with the Security and Democracy Foundation in Bogota. Rangel said that Colombians would view increased American assistance for Colombian bases as “absolutely necessary in the struggle to recuperate security.”

According to Colombian newspaper El Tiempo, Defense Ministry sources said Colombia, through the Palanquero negotiations, was trying to gain more military aid from the United States. Colombia has received some $6 billion from the U.S. since 2000, mostly in military aid.

The Colombian air force unit based at Palanquero was barred from receiving U.S. military aid in 2003 following the 1998 bombing of 18 civilians in the northeastern town of Santo Domingo. The U.S. lifted the suspensions last year when Colombian courts held the pilots responsible for the bombing, an e-mail from a State Department official explained.

Read more on Colombia:

Drug traffickers move underwater

Did a US company hire a Colombian paramilitary group?

Colombia's folksy president

Slideshow: Bastardilla's Bogota

Global Blogs:

• Latest

More Dispatches:

• Latest

Sponsored Links

Prom Dresses
Brokers Online Health Insurance
Casino News
drug addiction treatment
P90X
Credit Card