COLOMBIA: Video Raises Numerous Questions About Rescue Mission

COLOMBIA: Video Raises Numerous Questions About Rescue Mission

By Constanza Vieira
Inter Press Service
August 6, 2008

Bogota - "It is a serious matter that members of the armed forces
clandestinely leaked news without coordination with their superiors," says a
presidential communiqué issued in Colombia after a local TV station
broadcast a video on the operation in which Ingrid Betancourt and 14 other
hostages held by the FARC guerrillas were rescued last month.

The Defence Ministry had earlier released three and a half minutes of
heavily edited images on the successful Jul. 2 intelligence operation in
which only one drop of blood was shed: the one that spattered former senator
Betancourt, the highest-profile hostage, when Alexander Farfán, a guerrilla
whose nom de guerre is "Enrique Gafas", was hit near her in the helicopter
that rescued the 15 hostages.

In his statement, Colombian President Álvaro Uribe thus indirectly confirmed
Tuesday that the video was not provided to the RCN TV station by the Defence
Ministry, a doubt that had circulated among the media since the video was
aired, at 8:00 PM local time Monday in Bogotá.

Although RCN news director Clara Elvira Ospina did not clarify whether the
station paid the 60,000 dollars that were being asked for the 58-minute
recording, the press had information that a member of the military was
offering the video for 30,000 dollars, while a middleman was asking for a
similar amount.

According to the government, "Operation Check" (as in chess) consisted of
tricking the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) rebels guarding
the hostages into believing that they were handing the prisoners over to an
international humanitarian mission that would take them by helicopter to the
camp of FARC chief "Alfonso Cano".

THE U.S. ROLE

The video clearly shows that at least one U.S. military cargo plane was
involved in the rescue operation.

The broadcast by RCN, a station close to the government, also shows that the
military helmets used by the intelligence team that carried out the rescue
mission, which had been painted red and white, were carrying microphones,
reportedly connected to the Defence Ministry and the U.S. cargo plane.

Thus, the Colombian military forces and the U.S. army Southern Command
directly received coded messages from the officers taking part in the
operation: "Fuel Ok" meant that everything was going as planned, and
"Takeoff Ok" meant that the helicopter was taking off with the 15 hostages.

Gerardo Aguilar, alias "César", the head of the FARC unit that was holding
the hostages, who was captured in the operation, said the first thing he saw
when the helicopter rose above the jungle were two planes flying high
overhead in a wide circle.

The Colombian government has not yet acknowledged the U.S. Southern Command'
s active participation in planning and implementing the mission, although
Colombian generals who said they commanded Operation Check admitted that
there was a "button" installed by the United States in the helicopters.

The "button" was to be pushed if the guerrilla unit guarding the hostages
did not fall for the ruse, which would have activated an unprecedented
all-out military attack by the Colombian air force.

According to a so far unconfirmed version obtained by IPS, the Southern
Command headed the operation from the very start, a year earlier.

Besides French-Colombian politician Betancourt, the group of hostages
included three U.S. military contractors and 11 members of the Colombian
military and police. The FARC had seized the hostages with the aim of
swapping them for hundreds of imprisoned guerrillas.

THE RED CROSS

The video also clearly shows that the use of the International Committee of
the Red Cross (ICRC) emblem by the mission was not merely the result of a
hasty last-minute decision by one of the soldiers taking part in the
operation, as Uribe had stated.

The president had to publicly apologise to the ICRC when CNN reporter Karl
Penhaul reported on Jul. 16 that a "confidential military source" had tried
to sell him a video and three photos that clearly showed the Red Cross
emblem used in Operation Check. The source said the photos were taken before
the mission began.

"CNN declined to buy the material at the price being asked; it was therefore
unable to verify the authenticity of the images," Penhaul's article stated.

After the CNN report came out in mid-July, Uribe said he had ordered an
internal investigation on the use of the Red Cross symbol by one of the
members of the military intelligence team that carried out the rescue
mission. According to Uribe, the officer "said that when the helicopter was
about to land, he saw so many guerrillas that he got terribly nervous, and
fearing for his life, he pulled a piece of cloth with the Red Cross emblem
out of his pocket and put it over his vest." The president added that the
officer would not face sanctions and that he himself assumed complete
responsibility.

But the video shows the officers on the morning of Jul. 2 at a farm in
southern Colombia, disguised as members of a supposed humanitarian mission.
As they pose for the camera before the helicopters took off for the jungle
pickup of the hostages at 11:59, one of them can be seen wearing a bib with
the Red Cross symbol.

The statement released Tuesday by Uribe added that "It is serious that in
the initial investigation of the operation, the whole truth did not emerge."

The Defence Ministry announced a new inquiry among those taking part in the
mission, because the video was supposedly in the hands of the Ministry.

Defence Minister Juan Manuel Santos announced that the decision to decorate
the members of the mission with the Cruz de Boyacá, Colombia's highest
honour, had been reversed.

The ICRC released a statement Wednesday expressing "serious concern over
what appears to have been a deliberate misuse of the Red Cross emblem" in
the Jul. 2 rescue operation.

"If authenticated, these images would clearly establish an improper use of
the Red Cross emblem, which we deplore," said the ICRC's deputy director of
operations, Dominik Stillhart.

The ICRC explains that the use of the red cross, red crescent and red
crystal symbols is governed by the Geneva Conventions and their protocols,
and the symbols may not be used by organisations or persons not entitled to
do so under international humanitarian law.

"Complete and total respect for the red cross emblem is essential if the
ICRC is to be able to bring assistance and protection to the people worst
affected by armed conflicts and other situations of violence," says the
statement.

Through Defence Minister Santos, the government once again apologised to the
ICRC on Tuesday.

But his cousin, Vice President Francisco Santos, denied that the use of the
symbol constituted a war crime, because "no one was killed or injured" in
the rescue operation, which also resulted in the arrest of two guerrillas.

The defence minister said the controversy "should not tarnish the results of
the operation.which we are all still celebrating."

"We have seen the images," ICRC spokesman in Colombia Carlos Ríos told IPS.
"The information initially obtained (from the president's office) was
apparently not so accurate.

"The emblem was misused, with the wrong intentions. That is not a good
thing, because humanitarian efforts could be affected," he added.

Although he clarified that the ICRC has not had any problems in its 12
offices in Colombia since the rescue mission, he underlined that the misuse
of the emblem is "a violation of international humanitarian law, whether or
not it generates security problems."

TELEVISION LOGOS

The video also confirms the use of the logos of the Venezuela-based regional
Spanish-language TV network Telesur and the Ecuadorean TV station Ecuavisa
by members of the team posing as a camera crew.

The two helicopters, which had been painted white, did not carry the Red
Cross symbol. Instead, they bore a fictitious logo invented for the
operation, with the words "International Humanitarian Mission".

The helicopters also carried prominently in several places the "no weapons"
symbol -- an automatic rifle in a red circle with a bar through the
middle -- used by all international humanitarian missions.

Towards the end of the tape, the members of the rescue team can be seen
burning the emblems used in the mission, while one of them can be heard to
quip "burning the evidence."

Two women formed part of the team, and not just one "disguised as a nurse,"
as army chief Mario Montoya had reported.

The insurgent known as "César" said one of the women was wearing a FARC
uniform.

He also said the Red Cross symbol and the apparent presence of reporters
helped convince him and his fellow guerrillas, according to his lawyer
Rodolfo Ríos.

"We have told the whole truth. Operation Check was planned and implemented
by the Colombian army, using members of the army, and emerged from army
intelligence," General Montoya stated on Jul. 3. (END/2008)

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