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I was in Colombia two weeks ago. I am Spanish so I could talk with the people. Not everybody supports the "peace process" like any Western media displays. In C

by pipio21 10y ago

I was in Colombia two weeks ago. I am Spanish so I could talk with the people. Not everybody supports the "peace process" like any Western media displays. In Colombia lots of terrible things have happened. There is people that had made a fortune simply murdering and stealing entire families, and of course drugs. Peace process means legalization of all this crimes, and laundering all the money and power gotten mainly by extortion. There are thousands of victim's families that are angry because it means no justice for them, the people that killed their family members will not go to jail and the properties that were stolen will not go back to the families. Uribe put the guerrilla on his knees by force, making it to want to make a deal in the same way the Germans or Japanese wanted a honorable peace deal when everything was lost. Now Santos gets all the Glory basically capitulating against the Guerrilla. The deal is a very bad deal, for example it makes Guerrilla a "democratic" party, but if the people do not vote them, it does not matter because representation is warranted by law, basically giving them the territories that they already controlled by force.

notgood 10y ago
I live in Colombia. No, they weren't in "his knees", that's a lie perpetuated by Uribe himself. Being elected doesn't give them any power over any territories, they will be just part of the Congress, so they will have power to vote there, but not over "specific" territories. By the way today an scandal is up in Colombia where one of Uribes friends declared all the tactics to emotionally manipulate the people to vote against the treaty with lies and overly exaggerated claims (https://www.google.com.co/amp/amp.noticias.caracoltv.com/acuerdo-final/hubo-tergiversaciones-en-campana-del-no-juan-carlos-velez-desata-escandalo?client=ms-android-motorola https://www.google.com.co/amp/amp.noticias.caracoltv.com/acu...)
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- davidpelaez 10y ago
  Thank your for a reasonable comment! There is indeed a lot of ignorance from the outside. There's a logic to many points and theories but definitely people should be more informed even here in HN.
ceronman 10y ago
You are not well informed. In Colombia the majority of the victims of the conflict support the peace process. You can easily see it in the map of how the people voted and you’ll notice that those territories where the war was actually fought got the big majority of the votes supporting the peace treaty. The process didn't legalize the crimes nor allow the guerrilla to keep their drug dealing money. That's just FUD. The kind of FUD that made uninformed people vote no. Uribe fought the guerrilla fiercely, but he did it by getting alliances with paramilitary groups that were even worse than the guerrilla. The peace treaty is not perfect, and yes, there were some concessions made to the guerrilla. Like the possibility to have 10 out of 270 positions in the congress even if they didn’t get the votes, but only for two periods. It’s not easy to negotiate after 50 years of crude war, but all the lives saved with it are completely worth it.
- tarancato 10y ago
  >You can easily see it in the map of how the people voted and you’ll notice that those territories where the war was actually fought got the big majority of the votes supporting the peace treaty. Or maybe because people in those territories support the guerrillas?
  - ceronman 10y ago
    No, I'm taking about territories that were attacked by the guerrilla. Like Toribio Cauca, that got more than 600 guerrilla attacks since the 80s. 81% of them voted yes to peace treaty.
    - Graphon1 10y ago
      I'm uninformed, but is it possible the vote was basically a choice between "war" and "not war"? Maybe people voted for anything but more of the same?
      - davidpelaez 10y ago
        The people who vote against claim they are not in favor of the war but in favor of another agreement. There's very few people in everyday life that want "the same". However, through many lies popular believe is that we can close the conflict making things even, like there's a better amazing deal we are missing altogether and need to stop and rethink it all. There's no full justice we can achieve as a country as there will never be anyone who can repair all the WWII deaths, destruction and suffering. That didn't mean that Europe couldn't recover and that Jews, as the most clearly affected group by size, where not able to cope and forgive in many cases. That's the point that voter against don't see and think they can easily get through another agreement.
yabatopia 10y ago
You can't end a war without leaving the past behind. And that means you have to make concessions. You make the comparison with Germany at the end of WWII. Not every Nazi or was punished, on the contrary, the majority escaped what uou call justice. Yes, it's unfair and hard to accept, but that's what makes every peace process so damn hard.
- ekianjo 10y ago
  Nazi not punished ? Most of them died in the war. Oh and none of the allies war criminals were punished. You forgot to mention that.
  - tirant 10y ago
    We evan had a nazi soldier become a Pope. But you're right, none of the allies war criminals was punished.
    - tdb7893 10y ago
      He was conscripted into the Hitler Youth, which I think was required by law at the time.
    - ptaipale 10y ago
      Do you say that Joseph Ratzinger was actually a Nazi, or just that he was a German soldier in Second World War? There's quite some difference. The German army was just German army, not specifically a "Nazi army" even though the country was lead by Nazis and even though modern click-baiting headlines equate the two. As far as I know, Ratzinger had nothing to do with National Socialism beyond what was compulsory and unavoidable under pain of death in Nazi Germany (i.e. being drafted).
      - trentmb 10y ago
        > The German army was just German army, not specifically a "Nazi army" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_Wehrmacht https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_Wehrmacht
wslh 10y ago
Can you make some parallels with the Amnesty Law in Spain after Franco died? [1] I think that amnesty was much worse than the Colombian peace process. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Terror_(Spain) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Terror_(Spain)
subpixel 10y ago
Also relevant is the fact that Uribe and his family have longstanding ties to the criminal groups that control the drug trade (as well as extortion, illegal gold mining, and human trafficking.) From Escobar to the AUC to the BACRIM who have filled in the vacuum most recently. Some enlightening/depressing background for context: http://www.insightcrime.org/investigations/bacrim-and-their-position-in-colombia-underworld http://www.insightcrime.org/investigations/bacrim-and-their-... Lost in most of the US/European coverage is the huge threat the peace process represents to the Colombian political elite: when guns are put down, eventually their long history of collaboration with criminals will come to light. (E.g. in August Uribe's niece and her mother were extradited...) Sadly, the corruption runs very, very deep and it goes straight to the top. I fully supported the Yes vote (I'm not Colombian) but I also recognize that the government vs. FARC battle is only one front in a much larger war under which the Colombian people continue to suffer.
Shorel 10y ago
What you wrote is a belief shared only by people in Medellin and other areas with strong support for Uribe, and it is far from the truth. For a start, there were parts about restitution, and that means some people bought lands very cheap because the wars made their rightful owners displace to Bogotá or somewhere else. These lands are in the hands of capitalists and they are a big group supporting the NO. A big part of the campaign was disinformation, proponents of the NO where saying we would become just like Venezuela. They proponents of the NO did a big campaign about how a big part of the agreements were about LGBT rights and abortion (that was not true), and the backwards conservative people believed that. And, to further disagree with your 'it makes the Guerrilla a "democratic" party', we had another peace process 25 years ago, with the M-19 Guerrillas. And in fact some of them have been some of the best politicians of the last two decades, like Antonio Navarro, who won the distinction of being the best Colombian mayor, when he was mayor of Pasto. The people supporting the NO are: clueless people, religious fundamentalists, yuppies who never leave the city and the owners of lands that could lose some terrain in the restitution process.

by pipio21 10y ago

notgood 10y ago

I live in Colombia. No, they weren't in "his knees", that's a lie perpetuated by Uribe himself. Being elected doesn't give them any power over any territories, they will be just part of the Congress, so they will have power to vote there, but not over "specific" territories. By the way today an scandal is up in Colombia where one of Uribes friends declared all the tactics to emotionally manipulate the people to vote against the treaty with lies and overly exaggerated claims (https://www.google.com.co/amp/amp.noticias.caracoltv.com/acuerdo-final/hubo-tergiversaciones-en-campana-del-no-juan-carlos-velez-desata-escandalo?client=ms-android-motorola https://www.google.com.co/amp/amp.noticias.caracoltv.com/acu...)

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
davidpelaez 10y ago
Thank your for a reasonable comment! There is indeed a lot of ignorance from the outside. There's a logic to many points and theories but definitely people should be more informed even here in HN.

ceronman 10y ago

You are not well informed. In Colombia the majority of the victims of the conflict support the peace process. You can easily see it in the map of how the people voted and you’ll notice that those territories where the war was actually fought got the big majority of the votes supporting the peace treaty. The process didn't legalize the crimes nor allow the guerrilla to keep their drug dealing money. That's just FUD. The kind of FUD that made uninformed people vote no. Uribe fought the guerrilla fiercely, but he did it by getting alliances with paramilitary groups that were even worse than the guerrilla. The peace treaty is not perfect, and yes, there were some concessions made to the guerrilla. Like the possibility to have 10 out of 270 positions in the congress even if they didn’t get the votes, but only for two periods. It’s not easy to negotiate after 50 years of crude war, but all the lives saved with it are completely worth it.

tarancato 10y ago
>You can easily see it in the map of how the people voted and you’ll notice that those territories where the war was actually fought got the big majority of the votes supporting the peace treaty. Or maybe because people in those territories support the guerrillas?
- ceronman 10y ago
  No, I'm taking about territories that were attacked by the guerrilla. Like Toribio Cauca, that got more than 600 guerrilla attacks since the 80s. 81% of them voted yes to peace treaty.
  - Graphon1 10y ago
    I'm uninformed, but is it possible the vote was basically a choice between "war" and "not war"? Maybe people voted for anything but more of the same?
    - davidpelaez 10y ago
      The people who vote against claim they are not in favor of the war but in favor of another agreement. There's very few people in everyday life that want "the same". However, through many lies popular believe is that we can close the conflict making things even, like there's a better amazing deal we are missing altogether and need to stop and rethink it all. There's no full justice we can achieve as a country as there will never be anyone who can repair all the WWII deaths, destruction and suffering. That didn't mean that Europe couldn't recover and that Jews, as the most clearly affected group by size, where not able to cope and forgive in many cases. That's the point that voter against don't see and think they can easily get through another agreement.

yabatopia 10y ago

You can't end a war without leaving the past behind. And that means you have to make concessions. You make the comparison with Germany at the end of WWII. Not every Nazi or was punished, on the contrary, the majority escaped what uou call justice. Yes, it's unfair and hard to accept, but that's what makes every peace process so damn hard.

ekianjo 10y ago
Nazi not punished ? Most of them died in the war. Oh and none of the allies war criminals were punished. You forgot to mention that.
- tirant 10y ago
  We evan had a nazi soldier become a Pope. But you're right, none of the allies war criminals was punished.
  - tdb7893 10y ago
    He was conscripted into the Hitler Youth, which I think was required by law at the time.
  - ptaipale 10y ago
    Do you say that Joseph Ratzinger was actually a Nazi, or just that he was a German soldier in Second World War? There's quite some difference. The German army was just German army, not specifically a "Nazi army" even though the country was lead by Nazis and even though modern click-baiting headlines equate the two. As far as I know, Ratzinger had nothing to do with National Socialism beyond what was compulsory and unavoidable under pain of death in Nazi Germany (i.e. being drafted).
    - trentmb 10y ago
      > The German army was just German army, not specifically a "Nazi army" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_Wehrmacht https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_Wehrmacht

wslh 10y ago

Can you make some parallels with the Amnesty Law in Spain after Franco died? [1] I think that amnesty was much worse than the Colombian peace process. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Terror_(Spain) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Terror_(Spain)

subpixel 10y ago

Also relevant is the fact that Uribe and his family have longstanding ties to the criminal groups that control the drug trade (as well as extortion, illegal gold mining, and human trafficking.) From Escobar to the AUC to the BACRIM who have filled in the vacuum most recently. Some enlightening/depressing background for context: http://www.insightcrime.org/investigations/bacrim-and-their-position-in-colombia-underworld http://www.insightcrime.org/investigations/bacrim-and-their-... Lost in most of the US/European coverage is the huge threat the peace process represents to the Colombian political elite: when guns are put down, eventually their long history of collaboration with criminals will come to light. (E.g. in August Uribe's niece and her mother were extradited...) Sadly, the corruption runs very, very deep and it goes straight to the top. I fully supported the Yes vote (I'm not Colombian) but I also recognize that the government vs. FARC battle is only one front in a much larger war under which the Colombian people continue to suffer.

Shorel 10y ago

What you wrote is a belief shared only by people in Medellin and other areas with strong support for Uribe, and it is far from the truth. For a start, there were parts about restitution, and that means some people bought lands very cheap because the wars made their rightful owners displace to Bogotá or somewhere else. These lands are in the hands of capitalists and they are a big group supporting the NO. A big part of the campaign was disinformation, proponents of the NO where saying we would become just like Venezuela. They proponents of the NO did a big campaign about how a big part of the agreements were about LGBT rights and abortion (that was not true), and the backwards conservative people believed that. And, to further disagree with your 'it makes the Guerrilla a "democratic" party', we had another peace process 25 years ago, with the M-19 Guerrillas. And in fact some of them have been some of the best politicians of the last two decades, like Antonio Navarro, who won the distinction of being the best Colombian mayor, when he was mayor of Pasto. The people supporting the NO are: clueless people, religious fundamentalists, yuppies who never leave the city and the owners of lands that could lose some terrain in the restitution process.