I am wondering, with all due respect, if Mr. Stephen Harper is going blind and deaf. May be it is time for him to get a checkup because he’s not listening to his fellow Canadians at all and is missing the entire picture of Colombian reality as well.

By Eva Golinger - Thursday, Nov 5, 2009

An official document from the Department of the US Air Force reveals that the military base in Palanquero, Colombia will provide the Pentagon with “…an opportunity for conducting full spectrum operations throughout South America…” This information contradicts the explanations offered by Colombian President Alvaro Uribe and the US State Department regarding the military agreement signed between the two nations this past October 30th.

By Micheal OTuathail - October 08, 2009

...[T]he ignorance...in the House of [Commons] is driven by an ideological fervour for the advancement of neoliberalism in Colombia, Canada and around the globe. Massacre, corruption, drug-trafficking and the silencing of opponents is what is being supported by the Canadian government (and the Liberal Party that props it up) as long as it ignores the realities lived by people in Canada and Colombia alike.

In her new book Blood & Capital: The Paramilitarization of Colombia, Jasmin Hristov seeks to expose the rational motivations behind state violence for capitalism’s economic elites in the US and Colombia. In meticulous detail, Hristov shows how the super-rich benefit from state repression and how the violators of human rights have essentially become immune from any consequences for their actions. If death squads are truly to be abolished in Colombia, we must look honestly at how and why they exist today.

By NIKOLAS KOZLOFF - August 14-16, 2009

A worrying consideration for the Colombian elite is that [Venezuelan President Hugo] Chávez may have an ideological impact not only upon ordinary Colombians, but also those Colombians living in Venezuela. For years, Colombian immigrants have fled the war in their country, fleeing across the border and seeking greater economic opportunity. Unfortunately for the Colombian elite, many émigrés have returned to Colombia and helped to organize Bolivarian movements at home.

By JOHN LINDSAY-POLAND - July 31-August 2, 2009

With an increasingly unpopular drug war and presidents (both Uribe and Obama) enamored with special operations, the establishment in Colombia of five U.S. military facilities for at least a decade, whose missions include counterinsurgency and transcend Colombian borders, would be the worst thing to happen to U.S. policy in the Andes since Plan Colombia began a decade ago.

By Manuel Rozental - Znet

...[T]he Uribe government is highly criminal and corrupt. Canadians should demand that Uribe's government do the opposite of what it has done since coming to power. Most importantly, Canadians should listen to the victims in Colombia who are clearly not calling for ratification of this deal. On the contrary, they have taken great risks...to oppose it.

By Frank Seier and Joanne Robertson - June 15, 2009

The following email exchange took place between...Canadians Joanne Robertson and Frank Seier and Conservative parliamentarian Ed Fast. Most remarkable about it is the sarcasm and contempt shown by a politician towards constituents. During the parliamentary debates, Conservatives showed surprise when they heard that Liberal, NDP, and Bloc (Quebecois) politicians were receiving letters from all over the country against the Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement. Campaigners generally didn't write the Conservatives. The Conservative parliamentarian's attitude towards those who wrote him shows why.

By Gustavo Capdevila - June 14, 2009

Colombia has long been the world leader in murders of trade unionists - a dubious distinction that it seems in no danger of losing, according to a new report by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC)...[I]n Colombia, 49 were murdered last year, 10 more than in 2007, "despite assurances by the administration of Colombian President Álvaro Uribe that the situation was improving," says ITUC.

By Justin Podur - Znet

Regimes that violate people's rights don't stop at any borders. Indeed, for the [Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement] to pass, it is probably necessary that those of us who are against it in Canada receive smears, false accusations, and perhaps legal persecutions the way people in Colombia do.

Mariam Ibrahim and Siavash Saffari - ViveLeCanada

If you’ve ever travelled anywhere outside of Canada, chances are somewhere along the way you met some fellow Canadians with the country’s flag sewn on their backpacks. It’s almost as if the flag is meant to say to the rest of the world, “Don’t worry, I can be trusted. My country doesn’t have military bases all over the world. My country isn’t waging war indiscriminately. We’re just peacekeepers”...According to Yves Engler, author of the recently-published The Black Book of Canadian Foreign Policy, a vast majority of Canadians believe that Canada is a force of good in the world. However, there appears to be a significant disconnect between what Canadians see as distinctly Canadian values and the Canadian government’s actual record in conducting its foreign policy.
Canada Colombia Free Trade Agreement