Word: andean
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...Colombian incursion, which sparked an Andean diplomatic crisis, appears to have given Correa the leverage he was looking for to make sure Ecuador's National Assembly doesn't renew that lease. "I'm convinced that the United States provided information and cutting-edge technologies without which the [March 1] attack wouldn't have been possible," Correa said on a visit to France this week. In addition to breaking off diplomatic relations with Colombia since the March raid, Correa has also alleged that U.S. spies have burrowed into his military and security forces. Last month he purged his top military brass...
Either way, it appears all but certain now that the Manta base will be one of the most high-profile casualties of the Andean fracas. U.S. officials argue the Manta FOL has played a key role improving drug interdiction as the southern tip of a triangle that includes U.S. FOLs in El Salvador and the Caribbean island of Curacao. They estimate those three FOLs intercepted, in street-value terms, $4.2 billion worth of cocaine and other drugs in 2007. But many anti-drug experts in the U.S. nonetheless argue the bases are expendible in the larger interdiction picture...
...Navy now plans to revive the Fourth Fleet (which had been scrapped a half century ago), led by a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, to cruise the hemisphere's waters in part to search for drugs. The U.S. is also considering a replacement FOL in Colombia - which is, as the Andean crisis has so uncomfortably demonstrated to Washington, one of the few places left in the Americas where the Yanqui military is welcome...
Amidst those muddled Andean politics, some suggest a better hope for the Americans may be sitting inside U.S. jails. In 2004 and 2005, Colombia extradited to the U.S. two FARC leaders, Ricardo Palmera, a.k.a. Simon Trinidad, and Omaira Rojas, a.k.a. Sonia. Sonia was convicted last year on drug charges and given 17 years in prison; Trinidad, convicted for conspiracy in the Americans' capture, was sentenced to 60 years in January. The FARC has made the pair's release a condition for the U.S. hostages' freedom. The U.S. has designated the FARC a terrorist group and can't negotiate with...
That incursion spurred an Andean diplomatic crisis: an angry Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa severed relations with Colombia, and the Organization of American States called the attack a violation of sovereignty. But conservative Colombian President Alvaro Uribe accused Ecuador and its left-wing government of harboring the FARC, which has fought the Colombian government in a bloody civil war for 44 years. Uribe claims that data on Reyes' laptop computer reveals ties between the FARC and Ecuadorian Security Minister Gustavo Larrea. Correa vehemently denies it, insisting his military has removed FARC camps inside Ecuador and that Colombia - whose own military...