Colombia: The Genocidal Democracy
Giraldo, a Colombian Jesuit priest who heads the Comison Intercongrecacional de Justicia y Paz, provides an overview of human rights abuses and the drug trade that is not readily available from other sources. Giraldo opens with numbers: his organization's estimate that, between 1988 and 1995, more than 60,000 Colombians were assassinated, disappeared, were "socially cleansed," died in combat, or ceased to exist--more total casualties than in the worst years of Argentina's or Bolivia's or Chile's long military dictatorships. Giraldo's narrative explains how and why his nation's leadership kills its own people, points out the influence of the U.S., and clarifies how paramilitary groups serve to insulate political and military leaders from apparent responsibility for terror and massacres across the country. Although the drug trade often seems to North Americans to justify tough measures, the drug traffickers are likely to be part of the paramilitary forces brutally suppressing the nation's peasants. Essential information on an important subject.Mary Carroll--This text refers to theHardcoveredition.