Gaviria responds angrily to WikiLeaks revelations

[Judi Lynn]

Gaviria responds angrily to WikiLeaks revelations
Thursday, 09 December 2010 09:00 Adriaan Alsema

http://colombiareports.com.nyud.net:8090/pics/government/jose_obdulio.jpg

Jose Obdulio Gavira, personal advisor to former President Alvaro Uribe, on Thursday responded furiously to leaked diplomatic cables which allege that Colombia's police chief suspected him of ordering the illegal wiretapping of government opponents.

"What evidence did you have, Naranjo? I noticed this hostile environment, but naively I thought of enemies, not betrayal," Gaviria Tweeted shortly after Colombian media revealed the content of the cables.

The controversial former presidential advisor said he feels persecuted by the FARC, the media, the police, and the secret service DAS, whom he allegedly instructed to perform the illegal wiretap .

~snip~
The leaked cables reveal that Naranjo told then-U.S. ambassador to Bogota William Brownfield that he personally suspected the former presidential advisor, a cousin of slain drug lord Pablo Escobar, of being involved in the illegal wiretapping of Supreme Court judges, journalists, human rights organizations and politicians.

http://colombiareports.com/colombia-news/news/13333-gaviria-furious-about-police-commanders-wiretap-accusations.html

http://frogstorm.com.nyud.net:8090/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Pablo-Escobar.png

The Death of Pablo Escobar
Fernando Botero.

[Judi Lynn]

1. Who would have expected Uribe, known to the US gov't in 1991 as an Escobar ally

to appoint his COUSIN as his advisor? Well?

~~~~~August 2, 2004
U.S. INTELLIGENCE LISTED COLOMBIAN PRESIDENT URIBE AMONG
"IMPORTANT COLOMBIAN NARCO-TRAFFICKERS" IN 1991

Then-Senator "Dedicated to Collaboration with the Medellín Cartel at High Government Levels"

Confidential DIA Report Had Uribe Alongside Pablo Escobar, Narco-Assassins

Uribe "Worked for the Medellín Cartel" and was a "Close Personal Friend of Pablo Escobar"
http://www.gwu.edu.nyud.net:8090/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB131/diaexcerpt.jpg

Washington, D.C., 1 August 2004 - Then-Senator and now President Álvaro Uribe Vélez of Colombia was a "close personal friend of Pablo Escobar" who was "dedicated to collaboration with the Medellín cartel at high government levels," according to a 1991 intelligence report from U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) officials in Colombia. The document was posted today on the website of the National Security Archive, a non-governmental research group based at George Washington University.

Uribe's inclusion on the list raises new questions about allegations that surfaced during Colombia's 2002 presidential campaign. Candidate Uribe bristled and abruptly terminated an interview in March 2002 when asked by Newsweek reporter Joseph Contreras about his alleged ties to Escobar and his associations with others involved in the drug trade. Uribe accused Contreras of trying to smear his reputation, saying that, "as a politician, I have been honorable and accountable."

The newly-declassified report, dated 23 September 1991, is a numbered list of "the more important Colombian narco-traffickers contracted by the Colombian narcotic cartels for security, transportation, distribution, collection and enforcement of narcotics operations." The document was released by DIA in May 2004 in response to a Freedom of Information Act request submitted by the Archive in August 2000.

The source of the report was removed by DIA censors, but the detailed, investigative nature of the report -- the list corresponds with a numbered set of photographs that were apparently provided with the original -- suggests it was probably obtained from Colombian or U.S. counternarcotics personnel. The document notes that some of the information in the report was verified "via interfaces with other agencies."

More:
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB131/index.htm

[naaman fletcher]

2. This wikileaks cable is accurate

since it reflects poorly on the U.S. and/or a U.S. ally. The ones that report the sad state of venezuelan health care or how Chavez is destroying the VZ oil industry are, by definition, false since they reflect poorly on chavez.

[Peace Patriot]

3. I don't think this cable is necessarily truthful. Could well be the treacherous Uribe

trying to throw blame, through the police chief, on his cousin. He is not a nice man, Uribe, and ran one of the filthiest regimes ever in Colombia. The spying scandal also holds the most peril for him, i.e. his (and the CIA's?) arrangement to have all the main spying witnesses against him given weird, overnight asylum in Panama, recently.

The fact that Gavira is still in Colombia (if he is) might mean that he isn't guilty of ordering the spying (on judges, prosecutors, political opponents, human rights groups, trade unionists and others). They whisked those who could nab Uribe on the spying charge out of the country, to Panama. Or it might mean that he was able to keep arms length from this and other scandals so that the prosecutors have nothing on him, with which to pressure him on Uribe. That's why he's still there (if he is). (Over 70 of Uribe's closest political cohorts, including family members, are under investigation or in jail for ties to death squads, drug trafficking, bribery and other crimes). He may be a "made man" like Uribe--and will never talk as long as he has CIA protection. (And, believe me, the CIA has some kind of Bush Junta trail they are covering over in Colombia. Could be the U.S. was involved in the spying, among other things.) Or it could be that the police chief, Naranjo, was trying to misdirect Brownfield, or that Brownfield was trying to misdirect someone, or was angling to get Naranjo spied upon. (He points to someone who suspects someone close to "made man" Uribe, and that gets directed, by his superiors, over to Langley?)

Colombia is a very, very "tangled web," to use Shakespeare's phrase. And these cables are NOT easy to parse, especially with someone like Brownfield (a real Bush Junta operator) penning them. Could be Gaviria's been set up.

I just noticed this, at the end of the article: "Gaviria and two other Uribe aides are under criminal investigation for their alleged role in the (spying) scandal."

I'm not sure if these "two other aides" are among the total of 7 who fled to Panama. Nor do I know where Gaviria is. I don't think he was mentioned as one of the absconded but I don't know that I ever read all of their names.

Anyway, NO, I am not believing ANYTHING in the cables--especially considering who writes them (diplomats for the U.S. government and its multinational corporate/war profiteer masters), whether it fits into my political opinions or not. I urge caution on the cables and trying to understand context and penetrate hidden agendas.

I would never take the Colombian police chief's word for ANYTHING (nor Brownfield's, that he said it). I can make my own assessment of Gaviria. He was a close aide of one of the most corrupt men ever to run Colombia. And he is, most certainly, in that respect, a candidate for having passed Uribe's orders along for the spying program. I can't know whether he did or not. And I am more interested in whether the U.S. was providing "high tech" equipment and "training" for the spying program--because that would indicate which direction various rats are running in, and why. If this is true, it might eventually explain why Gaviria says he is being "persecuted" by all (if that isn't just whining). Perhaps they are all dumping on him because he is the one who DOESN'T know where the equipment/expertise came from and thus can't give it away. I would think (if it is true) that Brownfield certainly knew. So was Brownfield soliciting comments from the police chief to set Gaviria up as the patsy for others?

Gawd. I guess all I'm saying here is that this cable SHOULDN'T BE taken at face value. Nor should any of them. Know the players. Understand the context. Try to read between the lines. Try to understand where the cable writer thinks the cable will end up--on whose desk, directed toward what purpose, in furtherance of what overall policy (or against it), or at the Washington Post, or what? All of that can help you understand what you are reading. And it's not as if diplomats don't lie, fudge, color and distort--even internally. Henry Cabot Lodge did it to JFK from Vietnam. Any of them can be running their own agendas, or answering to other agencies or powers than the one they are writing cables to.