COLOMBIAN BREW Aid money being sent to Colombia will arrive with fewer strings attached now that president Clinton has signed a waiver allowing the $1.3 billion to bypass human rights conditions potentially blocking its release. Billed as "both pro-peace and anti-drug," is made up of about $1 billion in military and police assistance, with the rest being reserved for civilian uses. Added by Congress because of concerns over the Colombian military's poor record, the human rights prerequisites could only be swept aside for "national security" reasons, as President Clinton has now done. Only one of seven conditions imposed by congress had been met - that Colombian President Pastrana inform the military that soldiers accused of human rights abuses would be tried in civilian courts. Without the waiver, the U.S. Secretary of State would have had to certify the Colombian government's investigation and prosecution of military and paramilitary abuses, as well as its progress toward cutting ties between the military and paramilitary forces (illegitimate "death squads"). Drug trade revenues indirectly finance not only the largest leftist rebel groups, but also various right-wing paramilitary organizations. Yet it appears that the training and equipment Colombia will receive, including sixty U.S. helicopters, will be used to eliminate drug crops contained mostly in rebel territory. Links between the Colombian military and murderous paramilitaries, well documented by such groups as Human Rights Watch, seem to be overlooked in the rush to fight drugs. In the spring, paramilitary leader Carlos Castano admitted that some 70 percent of his funding was drug-related. He later claimed on television that the Drug Enforcement Agency had offered him aid in return for his promise to fight drug traffickers.
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