From: Colombian Labor Monitor <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Thu, 5 Jul 2001 08:14:20 -0500 (CDT)
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: IPS: Prisons another Battlefield in Civil War
================================================
''The government shows no interest in the crisis
affecting the justice system, and less in the
crisis of the prisons, where the response to the
inmates' demands is further repression.''
_____________ ================================================
INTER PRESS SERVICE
Wednesday, 4 July 2001
Prisons another Battlefield in Civil War
----------------------------------------
By Yadira Ferrer
BOGOTA -- At least 12 people died and 16 were injured in uprisings and
violent clashes in three Colombian prisons involving leftist guerrillas,
right-wing paramilitaries and ordinary prisoners, incidents that were
brought under control Tuesday by the authorities.
''The paramilitaries entered the cells of the political inmates
(guerrillas) to attack them,'' Agust?n Jimenez, president of the
non-governmental Defence Committee for the Human Rights of Political
Prisoners, told IPS.
According to Jimenez, the rebels had previously denounced threats made by
the paramilitaries who are fighting the leftists for control of the
prison, just as the groups are doing on the other side of the bars, in
disputes over broad stretches of Colombian territory.
The National Penitentiary Institute reported that at the Modelo Prison in
Bogota, 10 people died and 15 were injured in clashes over the last two
days that are still being investigated.
The confrontations there were reportedly triggered Monday afternoon when
guerrillas and paramilitaries faced off.
The situation at the detention centre was finally brought under control
Tuesday when police stormed Modelo after an exchange of gunfire and
explosions of homemade bombs thrown by the prisoners.
A woman who identified herself as Diana, a relative of an inmate, told the
local radio station Caracol that the violence began when the guerrillas
attempted to occupy the halls of the prison in order to launch an escape
attempt, a plan opposed by the paramilitaries in the jail.
She said that her relative had telephoned her from within the prison
Monday night, asking her to seek intervention by government authorities.
According to Colombia's security forces, the insurgent Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia (FARC) plan to take over several prisons in order to
free their members if an additional agreement is not reached with
government negotiators on a prisoner exchange.
A thousand police and army troops surrounded the Modelo Prison for more
than 15 hours before they were able to take control of the site Tuesday.
In the western city of Cali, in a separate incident Monday, two inmates
were stabbed to death and one injured at Villahermosa prison, which
suffers serious overcrowding.
Officials there blamed the fight on quarrels between common criminals.
The inmate population at Villahermosa surpasses 2,300, though the facility
is built to hold just 900.
Meanwhile, at a prison in Calarca, in central Colombia, eight inmates
declared themselves to be engaged in ''civil disobedience'' to press the
government to keep its promises to improve living standards there.
The opposition Liberal Party attributed the crisis Tuesday to the lack of
a clear government policy for prison management.
Horacio Serpa, head of the party, said it is incredible that ''vendettas
and assassinations continue to be reported in the prisons, and that
inmates escape and are the ones in control.''
Last week, 90 prisoners, more than half of them leftist rebels, escaped
from La Picota prison in Bogota during an action led by the FARC.
On other occasions, the inmates have taken visitors hostage, demanding
improvements in prison conditions in exchange for the release of the
hostages.
The scant attention the government pays to the prisoners' demands means
that ''each week a protest erupts in some penitentiary,'' commented Juan
Alvarez, head of a social programme run by the National University that
involves La Picota inmates.
Overcrowding, lack of security and of basic services, including medical
attention, as well as the intermixing of condemned criminals with inmates
who are awaiting trial, are the main problems affecting the 186 prisons in
Colombia.
''Overcrowding at these detention centres is 200 percent, there are not
enough guards, and there is no weapon-detecting equipment,'' reported the
Human Rights Inspector after visiting Modelo and La Picota, the country's
largest prisons.
According to the official report, ''the inmates have to pay 'rent' to
sleep in the cells or in the hallways and for access to the toilets or
showers, or even for privacy during conjugal visits.''
In these prisons, weapons are abundant, including explosives, said the
Inspector, and drug trafficking and consumption and prostitution occur
within a framework of widespread corruption.
The Inmate Solidarity Network, made up of non-governmental organisations
and relatives of the prisoners, has said that ''the government shows no
interest in the crisis affecting the justice system, and less in the
crisis of the prisons, where the response to the inmates' demands is
further repression.''
According to the Network, ''the lack of a true process of re-
socialisation in the prison system leads the inmates to feel resentment
toward society and toward the state, and the prison ends up being a school
for criminals.''
Copyright 2001 IPS
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