12 - 18 April 2001
Issue No.529
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Al-Ahram Weekly On-line 12 - 18 April 2001 Issue No.529 |
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Current issue | Previous issue | Site map | ||
No such thing as a free gift
Colombia's sponsorship of a pro-Palestinian resolution at the UN enrages the US, writes Jasper Thornton
The stony troubles of the Palestinians may seem far-removed from the lush landscapes of Latin America. But recently, the travails of the Middle East have leaked into Colombia's own already outsized barrel of difficulties. The resultant brew threatens to poison relations between Colombia and its biggest foreign aid donor, the United States. Late last month Colombia sponsored a United Nations resolution to send UN monitors to the occupied territories. The US was most upset.
At the end of March, the non-aligned movement (NAM) members of the United Nations Security Council, which include Colombia, tabled a resolution to install UN monitors in the Israeli-occupied territories. The monitors' mandate would be to "protect Palestinian citizens in the occupied territories." Israel has repeatedly voiced iron opposition to any such plan. Russia and China supported the seven NAM nations. This prompted James Cunningham, the US ambassador to the UN, to use the first US veto for four years.
Things did not end there. After garroting the NAM initiative, the US turned its disapproving glare toward those nations who had the temerity to sponsor such an "unbalanced," "unworkable" and "unwise" resolution, in the words of Ambassador Cunningham. That glare fell on a squirming Colombia. State Department Spokesman Richard Boucher grimly told a Congress subcommittee that the US, at the "highest" levels, is "disappointed" with the Latin American state.
Last year the US gave Colombia $1.3 billion in aid. Colombia is now unexpectedly learning the costs of that help. Boucher's condemnation followed questions from a Florida Democrat who declared that those countries that receive substantial US aid should be made accountable by the United States for their actions. Agreeing, Boucher darkly threatened that Colombia's "vote in the UN will have consequences." He added that the US will "review that action (the vote), in the context of our relations with Colombia, both bilateral and multilateral." It is not yet plain what form that review will take. These announcements sent the Colombian press into paroxysms of dismay. Claudia Morales, press secretary at the Colombian embassy in Washington, told Al-Ahram Weekly, that the Colombian press deluged her after Boucher's remarks. This is hardly a surprise, so dependent is Colombia on US goodwill. But Colombian officials have responded stoutly. A source in the Colombian mission to the UN assured The Weekly that, despite the censure of the US, Colombia's position on the "question of Palestine," would "remain the same, as it has for many decades." The same source expressed belief that the US would not cut its aid to Colombia.
US assistance aims to bring "stability" to the fractious country. Across Colombia, militias and the government struggle over a gargantuan drug trade. The unrest has been bloody and long. In 10 years, insurgents and government forces have slain over 35,000 civilians. The fourth highest number of internal refugees in the world wander forlorn through Colombia's hills and plantations. With US encouragement, President Andres Pastrana has promised to fight the huge domestic traffic in drugs and try to make peace with left-wing guerrillas. Plan Colombia, Pastrana's bid to achieve these aims, is costed at $7.5 billion. The plan is largely paid for by the US. The Clinton administration spent a billion dollars on the plan. Colombia depends on a further 400 million arriving next year. Human rights organisations such as Amnesty International have faulted Plan Colombia for ignoring the current government's complicity in the drug trade and for merely massing the armour at the disposal of combatants, rather than addressing human suffering. US State Department statements confirm that Plan Colombia will provide over 60 US helicopter gunships to the South American state.
Efforts to yoke US aid more closely to US foreign policy have quickened of late. The new US administration appears to want to monitor more scrupulously the uses to which aid is put. USAID, the agency that dispenses non-military US aid, firmly declares in its latest mission statement that the aim of US aid is to "contribute to US national interests." And Boucher's comments come after Zionist groups in the US vocally urged the government to prune aid to Egypt. The biggest recipient of US aid is Israel, followed by Egypt and Colombia.
The traditional actors in the Middle East conflict are well-known. But lately, diplomatic spills from the struggle have sloshed into areas once utterly marginal to Middle East affairs. Colombia has discovered that the new administration in the US is no longer shy of marshalling influence from around the globe to help meet distant foreign policy goals. Such zeal will make it hard for any country to continue to act freely in international forums. Governments like Colombia's, which benefit much from US generosity, may find the conditions attached to that munificence far more miserly in times to come. In future, when the US shifts its elephantine bulk through the undergrowth of foreign relations, smaller creatures attached by the nooses of aid may find it impossible not to scurry haplessly after.
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