Month of January, 2007

Colombian revolutionary Ricardo Palmera is facing a second trial, March 26. Ricardo Palmera, known in Colombia as Simon Trinidad, is a political prisoner of the George Bush and the U.S. government. Palmera’s first trial resulted in a hung jury and Judge Hogan was forced to declare a mistrial. U.S. prosecutor Kohl and Judge Hogan will need to bend the legal rules more if they are going to win this time.

The Colombian Supreme Court is to rule whether to subpoena legislators involved in a political liaison with the paramilitary AUC (Self-Defense Units of Colombia in July 2001.

Colombian Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos stated on Saturday that an army colonel, whose name was not revealed, was dismissed from his post after his links with paramilitary groups were uncovered.

Greetings for the new year! We at LAWG are excited about the prospects of what the new Congress could mean for U.S. policy in Colombia. We have included a brief analysis of the political scene and the changes we can expect to see this year. Working together, we know that we can create change, and the first step is to target the new representatives and senators. We need your help to educate new members of Congress about Colombia, and make sure that they're sensitive to the many human rights, labor and drug policy concerns that we have! Below we ask you to meet with your representatives and senators if they are new to Congress.

BOGOTA, Colombia: A leading paramilitary warlord has started to name military men who helped him carry out savage massacres in Colombia's civil war — but so far the soldiers implicated are dead or imprisoned.

The announcement of a new counterinsurgency strategy by the Colombian government, dubbed "Plan Victoria," and the deterioration of diplomatic relations with Ecuador point to a new phase in the internal armed conflict afflicting Colombia for over four decades.