FARC Trial to begin in DC

16 October 2006
Colombian rebel's trial to begin in D.C.
By HOPE YEN, Associated Press Writer

The politically charged trial of a top Latin American rebel leader is set to begin in a 3-year-old kidnapping case that has the lives of three Americans hanging in the balance.

Opening statements were scheduled for Monday in the U.S. District Court trial of 56-year-old Ricardo Palmera, who is considered the most senior member captured from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), on charges he provided material support to a [so-called] terrorist group.

Palmera, better known by his nom de guerre Simon Trinidad, was extradited in late 2004 after his capture in Ecuador. He is accused of conspiring to kidnap three Americans in connection with the February 2003 downing of a small U.S. airplane over a FARC stronghold in southern Colombia.

FARC is demanding that the U.S.-backed Colombian government release all of the group's imprisoned comrades, including Palmera, in exchange for the release of 62 hostages.

The hostages include three Americans on the plane - Thomas Howes, Keith Stansell and Marc Gonsalves - who authorities say were defense contractors involved in an intelligence-collecting mission.

Palmera is also charged in the killings of two others on the plane, U.S. pilot Thomas Janis and Sgt. Luis Alcides Cruz, a Colombian soldier, who were found near the crash site apparently shot to death.

The trial is the latest evidence of a stiffening U.S. stance against FARC, which the U.S. government considers a terrorist organization. Since 2000, the U.S. has given more than $4 billion to Colombia [purportedly] to fight the insurgency and the world's largest cocaine industry.

Family members of the hostages say they welcome Palmera's trial, although they acknowledge it could backfire. The three hostages are believed to be alive but haven't been publicly seen since a July 2003 video released by the rebels.

"I worry they may retaliate against the Americans," said Jo Rosano, mother of Marc Gonsalves.

Although Colombian President Alvaro Uribe has indicated an openness to a prisoner swap, he has suggested the release of Palmera and another leading rebel, Nayibe Rojas, is out of his hands because they had been extradited to the U.S. for trial.

A former banker from a wealthy family, the Harvard-educated Palmera says he took up arms to fight social injustice. FARC, along with a smaller leftist rebel group, has battled to topple the Colombian government for 42 years in a conflict that claims more than 3,000 lives every year.

He told The Associated Press in 1999 that he had chosen to "be alongside the progressive people fighting the 10 percent of landowners who are monopolizing 90 percent of Colombia's land." [Good for him!]

The group [purportedly] funds itself through drug trafficking, extortion and kidnapping.