COLOMBIA

Mother wants U.S. military to allow justice for girl's rape

The alleged rape of a girl at the hands of a U.S. officer on a Colombian military base has rekindled the anger and frustration of her mother, who also was raped 12 years ago and faces major hurdles in her quest for justice.

LOS ANGELES TIMES

Tensions linger between Colombia and Ecuador

Ecuador today will begin imposing stiff tariffs on hundreds of Colombian imports, the latest round in a festering dispute between the neighbors.
LOS ANGELES TIMES

The FARC isn't finished

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the oldest and strongest terrorist group in North or South America, turns 45 this week -- that's 45 years of kidnappings, murders, bombings and drug trafficking.
THE WASHINGTON POST

Ecuadoran town a hub for drug-running rebels, Colombia says

Authorities in neighboring Colombia contend that the Ecuadorean border town of Puerto Nuevo is the thriving nerve center for an elite Colombian rebel unit that helps keep a 44-year-old insurgency alive by trafficking cocaine through Ecuador's ports.
THE WASHINGTON POST

Scandals surround Colombia's Alvaro Uribe

For weeks after the news broke, Colombians knew only that the secret police had spied on Supreme Court judges, opposition politicians, activists and journalists. Suspicions swirled that the orders for the wiretapping, as well as general surveillance, had come from the presidential palace.
THE WASHINGTON POST

Colombia orders return of stolen farmland

What happened in northwestern Colombia more than a decade ago might easily have been forgotten. Illegal militias forced poor black farmers off their land, which politically connected businessmen then seized
KCJA

Colombian blogs use acid humor to reflect polarization

Whether they criticize President Uribe or his opponents, bloggers from Bogot� and other cities employ irreverent humor�borrowing from the British and Argentine traditions�to illustrate Colombia's political tensions. �Behind the liberty that their pseudonyms give them, (the bloggers) loosen the reins of their political passions," the weekly magazine Semana says.
LOS ANGELES TIMES

A key to Colombia peace: Reintegrating ex-fighters

Programs that help former FARC rebels and paramilitary troops reenter society is seen as crucial to the nation's long-term peace. The U.S. is on board, checkbook in hand.
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR

Colombian drugs behind Guinea-Bissau murders?

The murder of the president and the Army chief on Monday raises questions about the nature of the instability in the African nation.
EFE

Mexican student visited other FARC camps (Spanish)

El ex director de Inteligencia del Ej�rcito ecuatoriano Mario Pazmi�o confirm� hoy a Efe que informes y fotograf�as que se�alaban la presencia de la estudiante mexicana Luc�a Morett en varios campamentos de las FARC el a�o pasado est�n documentados en la Direcci�n de Inteligencia Militar.
LOS ANGELES TIMES

West Africa gets help fighting Latam drug traffickers

Aware that law enforcement agencies of poor West African nations are no match for drug cartels using the region as a major transit hub, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and the European Commission have launched a program to offer training in operations and intelligence gathering, as well as the chance to network with agents from other countries.
LOS ANGELES TIMES

Colombia is asked to probe slayings of Indians in Narino state

Human rights groups Tuesday called on the Colombian government to investigate the disappearance and slayings of members of an indigenous community in southwestern Colombia.
LOS ANGELES TIMES

The FARC's cynical stunt

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, which has funded its war against the government with drug trafficking and kidnappings for ransom, has released four hostages: three police officers and a soldier. Two more are to be released in coming days, according to a senior rebel leader, as a gesture of goodwill. But the time for gestures is long past. If the FARC's aim is political credibility, it needs to demonstrate a complete rejection of lawless behavior and release the hundreds of other captives it still holds in the jungle.
LOS ANGELES TIMES

Shine is off FARC rebel army

Colombian military officials say the 20% increase in FARC desertions last year from the 2007 level is compelling evidence of their increasing battlefield dominance over the FARC, which the military has been fighting for more than 40 years.
LOS ANGELES TIMES

Q & A with Colombian Defense Minister

Colombian Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos will meet with Barack Obama soon after inauguration to try to persuade him to continue Plan Colombia, the $556-million-a-year U.S. aid plan. He discusses the case he will make.
ST. PETERSBURG TIMES

Turmoil, violence constant in Colombian cocaine hub

Renowned as Colombia's most violent city, Buenaventura is on the front line of Colombia's drug war, a choke point for lucrative cocaine smuggling routes up the Pacific Coast.
WALL STREET JOURNAL

Colombia rebels wield power inside Venezuela

This sweltering market town on Venezuela's southwestern frontier has its own mayor, council and police force. It also has a parallel government of sorts - a group of Communist guerrillas from the neighboring country of Colombia.
LOS ANGELES TIMES

Ground crews a bigger part of Colombia's cocaine battle

Aerial spraying is still the preferred method of coca eradication in Colombia, but the use of manual laborers is expanding. Many take the dangerous job because of good wages; some have more personal reasons.
ST. PETERSBURG TIMES

Colombia inches toward justice in paramilitary killings

For months the sometimes headless bodies, cut up by chain-saws, washed up on the banks of the muddy Cauca River.
HOUSTON CHRONICLE

Body-count scandal mars Colombian victories

Inquiry finds the Colombian army killed slum dwellers, then said bodies were those of guerrillas