DTN News: Colombia To Buy 9 Sikorsky Helicopters

DTN News: Colombia To Buy 9 Sikorsky Helicopters Source: DTN News / Reuters (NSI News Source Info) WASHINGTON - April 15, 2010: The Colombian government plans to expand its military aircraft fleet with the purchase of nine Black Hawk helicopters from Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. in Stratford, Reuters reports. Officials said Colombia aimed to hand over an acceptance letter to Sikorsky in the coming months confirming its intentions. The helicopters would be paid for through a new wealth tax recently approved by the Colombian Congress, they said. Four of the helicopters would go to the Colombian police, four to the Army and the remaining helicopter would go to the Air Force, they said. The helicopters would be added to Colombia's existing fleet of Black Hawks, which have proven valuable in the country's long-running battles against drugs and FARC rebels.

DTN News: US Military Have No Evidence Of Venezuela, FARC And ETA Links

DTN News: US Military Have No Evidence Of Venezuela, FARC And ETA Links Source: World-countries.net (NSI News Source Info) MIAMI - March 14, 2010: General Douglas Fraser, Commander of US Southern Command, Miami. However, he admitted that the US Southern Command is “watching very closely”. He did not provide further details of the military monitoring operation in Venezuela, the Venezuelan state-run news agency Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias (ABN) reported. “We have not seen any connections specifically that I can verify that there have been a direct government-to-terrorist connection” Fraser said. This was the description he used to refer to the groups which international media have insistently tried to link with the government of President for Hugo Chávez Frías, ABN said. However Arturo Valenzuela, US Assistant State Secretary for Latinamerican affairs said on Wednesday before the House or Representatives that “there are some indications that there has been some kind of assistance” from Caracas to FARC. Fraser admitted there are “old evidences” of assistance, but “I couldn’t say if that continues to be the case or not”. A judge of the Spanish National Court commenced an investigation to establish alleged Venezuela’s participation in the relation between the Colombian guerrillas FARC and the Basque separatist ETA. In Madrid Spanish Deputy Prime Minister María Teresa Fernández de la Vega said on Friday that Spain has the support of Venezuela in the fight against the armed Basque group ETA, as it occurs with other countries like France or Portugal. Fernández de la Vega made these remarks during a press conference held after a meeting of the Council of Ministers. The top Spanish official was asked about the detention in Portugal on Thursday of alleged ETA member Andoni Zengotitabengoa while attempting to board a flight to Venezuela using a fake Mexican passport, according to reports from Lisbon. “We are cooperating and acting in cooperation with all countries, with Portugal, as it has been shown, but also with Venezuela,” the Spanish Deputy Prime Minister said. Zengotitabengoa had been on the run since a police raid last month revealed hundreds of kilograms of explosives at the house he shared with another ETA member near the Portuguese city of Obidos. His accomplice has not been apprehended. The arrest is the latest in a comprehensive effort by Spain, France and Portugal to work together to capture ETA members, who are thought to be seeking new hideouts in Portugal and Northern France after coming under increased police pressure in Spain and southern France. ETA is considered a terrorist organization by the European Union and United States and is blamed for over 800 deaths during its 41-year armed struggle for independence for the Basque region of northern Spain and southwest France. *This article is being posted from Toronto, Canada By DTN News ~ Defense-Technology News, contact: dtnnews@ymail.com. For this article click on above and this link World-countries.net Disclaimer statement Whilst every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of the information supplied herein, DTN News ~ Defense-Technology News cannot be held responsible for any errors or omissions. Unless otherwise indicated, opinions expressed herein are those of the author of the page and do not necessarily represent the corporate views of DTN News ~ Defense-Technology News. Read More Articles On World-countries.net: ETHIOPIA: Real-life drama Commentary: The President of Haiti and the concept of leadership China calls on US not to make the Yuan de facto dollar peg “a political issue” ZIMBABWE: Typhoid kills five people WEST AFRICA: Fewer meningitis cases but more deadly DRC: US, UN accuse forces of "crimes against humanity" Cuban dissident hunger striker remains in hospital Lehman Brothers had been using “accounting gimmicks” for years WEST AFRICA: Fewer meningitis cases but more deadly US military have no evidence of Venezuela, FARC and ETA links US military have no evidence of Venezuela, FARC and ETA links Barbados going after Canada's golf enthusiasts Unconscionable airfares prompt Guyana government to consider re-entering airline business BiH demands UK apology for mistreating Ganic “God is Bolivarian” and will bring rain to Venezuela’s power stations, says Chavez

DTN News: At Least 16 FARC Rebels Killed In Colombia Bombing

DTN News: At Least 16 FARC Rebels Killed In Colombia Bombing *Source: DTN News / AP

(NSI News Source Info) BOGOTA, Colombia - July 26, 2009: The Colombian military says at least 16 suspected guerrillas and one soldier have been killed in clashes. Colombian army troops passes by one of the seven lorries burnt by guerrillas members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in Alto Zaragoza, department of Valle del Cauca, Colombia. Defense Minister Gen. Freddy Padilla says troops faced off with rebels belonging to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, in the southern department of Meta. Padilla says soldiers seized camping equipment, munitions and other items following Friday and Saturday's clashes. He added that the suspected rebels answered to No. 2 FARC commander Jorge Briceno, or "Mono Jojoy."

DTN News: FARC Kill Six Soldiers In East Colombia

DTN News: FARC Kill Six Soldiers In East Colombia

*Sources: DTN News / Int'l Media

(NSI News Source Info) BOGOTA, Colombia - July 1, 2009: Six soldiers were killed in combat with FARC guerrillas in the eastern Colombian department of Arauca, official sources said Wednesday. Two soldiers were injured. Colombian military and police personnel, who were former hostages, pose for photographs after arriving at Lindosa in Sanjose del Guaviare province for the commemoration of the first anniversary of the Jaque military operation June 30, 2009. Former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt and three U.S. citizens were also rescued by the military during the operation. According to newspaper El Espectador, the members of the army's 5th mobile brigade were ambushed by guerrillas near the town of Tame, some seventy kilometers from the Venezuelan border. Arauca governor Luis Eduardo Ataya Arias expressed his regret over the death of the soldiers. "I want to show my solidarity to the families of these soldiers who died defending the tranquility and peace in the Arauca department," he told the newspaper. The FARC has attacked several army units over the past few months after the rebel group's 45th anniversary.

DTN News: U.S. SouthCom Head Warns Of Iranian Influence In Region

DTN News: U.S. SouthCom Head Warns Of Iranian Influence In Region

*Sources: DTN News / Defense Media

(NSI News Source Info) MIAMI - June 26, 2009: Iran's growing influence in Latin America is a "potential risk" to the region, the newly-appointed head of the U.S. Southern Command has warned. U.S. Air Force Gen. Douglas Fraser, who took charge of U.S. military operations in 31 countries across Latin America and the Caribbean on June 25, expressed "real concern" about the Islamic Republic's links with "extremist organizations" in the region. "The real concern is not a nation-to-nation interaction, it is the connection that Iran has with extremist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah, and the potential risk that that could bring to this region," Fraser told journalists ahead of taking up the post. Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has forged close ties with several leftist Latin American leaders in recent years, most notably Venezuela's Hugo Chavez and Cuban leader Raul Castro. Commenting on Iran's ties to extremist groups in the region, Fraser said: "It is a concern, and it is an issue we will continue to monitor for any increasing activity." He cited Lebanon-based Hezbollah, which has links to Iran and is accused of being behind a suicide bombing that killed 200 U.S. marines in Beirut in 1983 and the 1996 bombing of the Khobar towers in Saudi Arabia, which killed more than 20 people. The group has denied playing a role in those attacks and the bombing of Israeli and Jewish targets in Buenos Aires. Fraser, who was deputy commander at U.S. Pacific Command, said the illicit trade in arms drugs and people was worrying, and indicated it would be the focus of his work. "The major concern is the illicit trafficking and the impact that that is having in the security and the stability, especially through the northern part of South America through Central America and the Caribbean, and through Mexico and the United States." He added the U.S. needed to ensure links between narcoterrorism and illicit trafficking do not become more pronounced. Fraser played down talk of a conventional threat in the hemisphere, but said Venezuela's military stance was concerning. "I'm concern with the military buildup in Venezuela because I don't understand the threat that they see," he said. "I don't see a conventional military threat in the region. So I don't see why they see a need to build their military to the point that they are pursuing." Fraser, who lived in Colombia for three years as a teenager, said Southern Command would continue to help that country combat leftist guerillas like the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia - the FARC - and narcoterrorist groups. "The FARC is not defeated and we need to continued that effort. That's been a focus for a very specific reason," he said. "But Southern Command has been engaged with all the militaries within the region, with the exception of Cuba," he continued. "My intent is not to focus on one nation or the other because it is together that we build that capacity." Fraser is the first Air Force officer to take the helm of the Southern Command. He replaces U.S. Navy Adm. James Stavridis, who has been tapped to become NATO Supreme Allied Commander in Europe.

DTN News: Colombian Rebels Seek Farc Truce

DTN News: Colombian Rebels Seek Farc Truce (NSI News Source Info) May 30, 2009: The leader of Colombia's second-largest rebel group has appealed to the country's largest, the Farc, to end fighting between them. "We must order a stop to fratricidal war between our two forces," wrote the National Liberation Army (ELN) chief Nicolas "Gambino" Rodriguez. He sent the message to Alfonso Cano, the new head of Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc). The ELN has about 1,500 fighters but its organisation is under pressure.Soldiers carry the bodies of fellow soldiers at a military base in Pasto May 10, 2009. Seven members of Colombia's army died and four were wounded in the province of Samaniego, near the Ecuadorean border, when they were attacked by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), said military authorities. The BBC's Jeremy McDermott in Colombia says many ELN units now ignore orders from their leader. Others have made alliances with drugs trafficking gangs to ensure their survival economically and in the face of attacks by the Farc, our correspondent adds. Both rebel groups have been forced onto the back foot by the US-supported offensives of President Alvaro Uribe, he adds. Both the Farc and the ELN have been fighting the Colombian government since the 1960s and are believed to hold hundreds of hostages. Meanwhile, Gen Freddy Padilla - the current head of the armed forces - has been appointed the new Defence Minister. He will retain his military post. Gen Padilla replaces Juan Manuel Santos who recently resigned to prepare for a possible run for president next year. With FARC in retreat and ELN negotiating a peace deal, the military is turning more of its attention to the militias formed by drug gangs. This month, the army and navy spent weeks taking apart a militia belonging to the Norte del Valle drug cartel, near the Panama border. The operation led to the surrender of 112 militiamen, and over a hundred killed, deserting or getting away. The war against the leftist rebels (FARC and ELN) is often more expensive after the rebels are driven out of an area. The FARC administered rural areas primarily to support the production of cocaine. Farmers were encouraged, or forced (via threats, kidnapping and murder) to grow coca. The rebels controlled the local economy. When the government moves back in, they have to bring administrators and cash to rebuild the economy and build infrastructure (which the leftist rebels largely ignored for decades). Farmers need a lot of help to switch to new (legal) crops. As the leftists and drug gangs lost control of most of their territory in the last five years, they have had to force more farmers, in areas they still operate in, to grow more coca. Living in a rebel controlled area is a lot worse than in a government controlled one. ELN is the smaller of the leftist rebel groups that began fighting in the 1960s. Now with less than 2,000 armed members, the ELN is falling apart because of growing violence with FARC, and ELN commanders ignoring its revolutionary activities, in favor of business with the drug gangs. ELN leaders have called for a truce with FARC, but the FARC leadership is too distracted by their own problems to be bothered.

In this photo released by the Colombian National Police, Miguel Angel Beltran, alias "Jaime Cienfuegos," center, an alleged member of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, FARC, is escorted by police officers upon his arrival to Bogota, Thursday, May 23, 2009. Beltran was arrested in Mexico and extradited to Colombia by the Mexican government. The constant military and police pressure on the leftist rebel groups, and the loss of so much territory, has forced most of the FARC leadership to move outside the country. Most FARC political and military leaders now live in Venezuela, Ecuador and Cuba. These three nations are run by leftist governments that support FARC, despite FARC being tagged as a terrorist organization by the international community. Leftists, both governments and political parties, in Europe and the Americas tend to overlook the drug activities and terrorism of leftist rebels, and provide moral and tangible support to show "solidarity". This support is helping keep FARC in business by providing sanctuary, and positive spin in the media (or negative spin on the Colombian government and security forces). This support often backfires. Ecuador and Venezuela has found that allowing FARC to set up camps on their side of the border leads to more crime against the locals, and an increase in drug activity and corruption. Thus Venezuela recently arrested a former local police commander and extradited him to Colombia for drug trafficking. The foreign supporters of FARC are frustrated trying to get the leftist rebels to give up the drug business. Panama and Brazil are not cooperative with FARC, but the leftist rebels and drug runners try to move in anyway. Tiny Panama gets more attention, since it's a way station to the major cocaine markets in North America, and has weak security forces. Brazil, the largest nation in South America, has made its border unfriendly for FARC and the drug gangs. As a result, the violent activity goes elsewhere (Venezuela, Ecuador and Panama.)

Hugo Chavez Says Venezuela Ready For War With Colombia

Hugo Chavez Says Venezuela Ready For War With Colombia (NSI News Source Info) Caracas - March 10, 2009: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has said the armed forces are ready for a war with Colombia should the country provoke it. "In case of a provocation on the part of Colombia's armed forces or infringements on Venezuela's sovereignty, I will give an order to strike with Su aircraft and tanks. I will not let anyone disrespect Venezuela and its sovereignty," Chavez said Sunday on his weekly TV show, "Hello, President." Chavez said this in response to Colombian Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos's recent statements, which said that Colombia's military will keep killing rebels from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) on the territory of other states. Bilateral relations sharply aggravated after Colombia's military bombarded a camp of Colombian rebels in Ecuador in March 2008, killing FARC leader Raul Reyes as well as another 16 rebels. In response, Chavez ordered to dispatch several thousand soldiers and tanks toward the border with Colombia. Chavez characterized Colombia's actions as violating Ecuador's sovereignty, and called Colombian President Alvaro Uribe "a criminal." This week, Colombia's National Radio said citing a high-ranking intelligence source that nine people from the FARC General Staff hide in Venezuela and another two in Ecuador. The top management of the staff includes 31 people. FARC is a Marxist-Leninist guerrilla group established in 1960s. It is considered a terrorist organization by the Colombian government, the U.S. and the EU. The rebels' revenues are believed to be partly obtained from drug trafficking and kidnapping.

Colombia's Militants FARC Public-Opinion Dipping

Colombia's Militants FARC Public-Opinion Dipping

(NSI News Source Info) January 9, 2009: FARC has admitted what everyone already knew, that one of their roadside bomb attacks last month, killed two medical workers. As with any use of roadside bombs, the victims are often innocent civilians. FARC confessed and apologized to try and regain some of the local support it lost in the south when the medical personnel were killed by what was, as far as everyone in the area was concerned, a FARC bomb.

In the past, FARC would sometimes try to blame such errors on the government, but there has never been any proof to back up this conspiracy angle, so most Colombians simply don't believe it. The government is now offering a new series of cash rewards (of from $2,500 to $2.5 million) for the capture of FARC officials (from some very junior officials, to the most senior guys.) The government also offers transportation to a foreign country, for those who flip on a senior FARC official and have to worry about retribution from FARC death squads. The government is also offering large rewards for FARC members who will surrender, and bring kidnapping hostages with them. FARC is negotiating the terms of how it can release six more high-profile kidnapping victims. FARC wants to gain some good will, and this still seems a good way to do it. FARC and the government have agreed on letting the Red Cross provide witnesses to insure that the government does not set a trap for the rebels.

FARC has good reason to be nervous. More of its members are deserting to the government, and accepting amnesty deals. Worse, more FARC members are becoming double agents for the government. This is dangerous for the agents, but very lucrative. Some of the agents, however, are also interested in revenge against FARC and some of its leaders.

The spies inside FARC are leading to more FARC camps being found, and the rebels losing more valuable weapons and equipment, not to mention drug shipments they are supposed to be guarding. FARC and ELN are being ground down, but it's a slow process that may take another decade before both organizations are effectively gone. January 8, 2009: In a Madrid, Spain hospital, an assassin shot dead a Colombian drug lord (Leonidas Vargas). Drug gang feuds do not usually spill over into foreign countries, so this new incident worries officials in Colombia and Europe. January 1, 2009: In the north, someone tossed a grenade into a New Years celebration in an Indian community, killing five and wounding 65. It's unclear if this was FARC (which is often at war with Indian tribes in rural areas), or some tribal feud. Police have offered a $9,000 reward for information on who made the attack. December 25, 2008: ELN rebels ambushed and killed a former ELN commander (along with four civilians who also happened to be in the car.) The leftist rebels (ELN and the larger FARC) often send death squads after those who have surrendered to the government and accepted amnesty deals.