Once again I find myself asking for prayers of strength, determination and fierce love in the face of desperate acts.

"Our church has been robbed," Viviana, the pastor and close friend of mine, struggled to tell me on the phone. "They took everything and I don't know what we're going to do".

The church I attend is a small, but tight-knit community of approximately 50. The pastors and family live in the house where we congregate, so clearly, they also were burglarized. We did not have much in the way of instruments, nor the did family have much in the way of anything, but what was there was cherished, and it has been taken.

The burglary does not seem to have been politically motivated, and everyone is safe, so thank God for that.

However, the instruments in the church were stolen, computers, televisions, and credit cards, which have already been maxed and have indebted the person who owned them.

Perhaps scariest - or perhaps most miraculous - is that the children of the pastors were just walking in the door of the house while the robbers were still there, and the elder heard something and was wise enough to decide to leave and go to an aunt's house until her parents returned home. Commonly in Bogotá robbery is armed and people are often hurt. It is also likely that the perpetrators live in the same neighbourhood as our church, and that they are connected with illegal groups who run the delinquent crime in the area.

We ask now that you pray for us.

Pray for strength to not allow fear to grip us and guide our actions or thoughts.
Pray for determination to stand firm in our ministries of social justice and peace building despite the difficulties that confront us.
Pray for fierce love, to enter our hearts to forgive and understand that these acts are done out of a desperation born from seemingly impossible reality.

This Sunday my church will gather and celebrate the love feast, as we are celebrating the month of love and friendship in Colombia. I hope you will join us in spirit and laughter as we find ourselves celebrating without instruments, but with music that will not be silenced.

In peace and blind hope,

Rebecca

Just released--the second edition of “A Prophetic Call,” a report on violations of human rights and international humanitarian law against Protestant and Evangelical Churches.
COLOMBIAN CHURCHES DOCUMENT THEIR SUFFERING AND THEIR HOPE

Bogotá, September 17, 2007. Wednesday, March 12th Justapaz—the Christian Center for Justice, Peace and Nonviolent Direct Action, and the Peace Commission of the Evangelical Council of Colombia (CEDECOL), released the second edition of “A Prophetic Call: Colombian Churches Document Their Suffering and Their Hope,” which synthesizes the sociopolitical violence suffered by evangelical and Protestant churches in the context of the ongoing armed conflict in Colombia.

This second report documents violations of human rights and international humanitarian law committed against evangelicals and Protestants in Colombia. It also highlights several significant social and peacebuilding initiatives undertaken by these communities as contributions towards a non-military solution to the armed conflict.

The information compiled in the report is based on field-work carried out by coordinators of the Documentation and Advocacy Program and regional team members. These program volunteers were trained to gather essential data on each case in their community, the biblical basis for documentation and advocacy, and accompaniment of traumatized victims. They interviewed war victims, pastors and church members to register violations of human rights and international humanitarian law. This primary source information was centralized in Justapaz where program staff reviewed and corroborated the reports with secondary sources and, lastly, registered the accounts in a specialized database.

During the report period of 2006, 16 homicides of people related to churches around the country were registered. One hundred and forty-seven people received threats, 103 men, women and children were forcibly displaced from their homes, and a significant number of people were victims of torture, threats, and attacks on civilian goods. The various parties to the conflict—guerrilla, paramilitary and State armed forces—are responsible for these human rights violations committed against members of more than 21 different churches and denominations.

This report offers testimonies and highlights the right of churches to participate in government processes to promote peace, as provided for in the Colombian Constitution. To address the underlying factors that both cause and allow this unacceptable violence to continue, the churches call for targeted changes in Colombian, U.S., Canadian and European policy. The report also spells out internal initiatives needed to restore Colombia’s social fabric and hope for cooperative development.

The production of this report was possible thanks to the support of international church agencies that support this ministry: Mennonite Central Committee, Christian Solidarity, Diakonia—Swedish Ecumenical Action, Kairos Canada and Church World Service.

MEDIA CONTACTS: Janna Hunter-Bowman, Justapaz Documentation and Advocacy Program Coordinator: janna@justapaz.org cell phone: 57 (300) 364.9102. Paul Stucky, Justapaz Program Coordinator: pablo@justapaz.org, 57 (300) 557-2894. Jenny Neme, Justapaz Director (Spanish only): jennyneme@justapaz.org phone: 57 (300)557-3102. Ricardo Esquivia, CEDECOL´s Peace Commission National Coordinator (Spanish only): resquivia@gmail.com phone: 57 (313) 555-4404.

In his first term representing the District of Illinois, Democratic Rep. Phil Hare speaks out on Trade, and his own ruminations being a member of the House Trade Working Group. This is taken from the site Politico.

Free trade must be fair trade
By: Rep. Phil Hare
September 19, 2007 03:51 PM EST

In baseball, if the pitcher on one team must throw off of a mound 90 feet from home plate while his opponent is allowed to stand 30 feet closer, that is an uneven playing field.

And if the umpire refuses to enforce any of the rules of the game, you have an all-around flawed process.
The same fundamental principle goes for our trade policies — with much more serious consequences for the failure to require fairness.

As such, Congress cannot support unfair trade agreements destined to outsource more American jobs to countries that systematically violate human rights.

And we cannot defer to an administration unwilling to hold any of the key players accountable for their actions.

I certainly support free trade. But trade must also be fair. Unfortunately, the pending trade agreements with Peru, Panama, Korea and Colombia follow the same flawed NAFTA model that resulted in the hemorrhaging of good paying jobs in America and a race to the bottom in Mexico.

I have seen the effects of unfair trade policies in my home state. The manufacturing sector, historically a key component of a once-thriving Midwest economy, has seen 3 million jobs lost to NAFTA. And our trade deficit has gone from $100 billion to over $700 billion since its passage.

The four pending free trade agreements will only make this problem worse.

NAFTA’s dreadful record of job loss makes it clear that American workers will suffer if these carbon-copy agreements are enacted.

But our trade policies have become a global problem, as illustrated by worker protests in Peru, Panama, Korea and Colombia against their pending agreements, in addition to objections by countries with which we already trade, such as Mexico.

While the agreement reached between congressional Democrats and the White House regarding labor and environmental standards sounds good on paper, there is little evidence that the Bush administration will change course and enforce these rights for the first time.

In addition, I remain concerned that improved labor and environmental standards will be made a part of side deals, which have historically been ignored.

The Peru and Panama deals look ominously similar to the Jordan free trade agreement, which also was hailed for including improved labor and environmental standards.

But a year after the free trade agreement was enacted, the White House trade representative sent Jordan a letter informing them that the U.S. would not enforce those standards.

Jordan is now home to extensive slave labor and human trafficking, and the Bush administration has sat on its hands in response.

We cannot let history repeat itself. I am particularly troubled by the pending agreements with Colombia and Korea. As the Houston Chronicle reported this summer, “Colombia is the most dangerous place for labor unions — over the past 15 years, some 2,000 union members have been assassinated in Colombia, more than the rest of the world’s nations combined.”

The Korean agreement gives automakers unfettered access to the U.S. market without requiring Seoul to dismantle barriers that have kept the Korean market virtually closed to U.S. products. Last year, Korea exported 700,000 cars to the United States while U.S. carmakers sold only 4,000 cars in Korea.

The president has fast-tracked these agreements, which means Congress cannot submit amendments to create enforceable labor and environmental standards. Therefore, we have no alternative but to vote up or down on entire agreements.

I am pleased that President Bush’s fast-track authority expired at the end of June. At this critical moment in history, Congress must reassert its constitutionally mandated authority over crafting our trade policies.

I campaigned on the issue of trade. And I was elected because I pledged to come to Washington and protect American jobs. Democrats won majorities in the House and the Senate in large part because of the failed trade policies pursued by President Bush and his allies in Congress.

Average working Americans, still reeling from the economic devastation caused by NAFTA, CAFTA, and other unfair trade deals, expect this Democratic Congress to change course now.

As one of eight freshmen in the House Trade Working Group, I am committed to fighting for a new direction on trade that protects American jobs while promoting labor and environmental standards. Fortunately, these two goals reinforce each other.

If we enforce labor rights and environmental protection abroad, international wages and environmental standards will improve, giving American corporations less reason to send their jobs overseas.

The American people are demanding that we reject the flawed NAFTA model that is devastating workers in all participating countries. We can rebuild our once-thriving manufacturing economy. And we can stop the outsourcing of U.S. jobs once and for all.

I urge my colleagues on both sides of the Capitol, Republican and Democrat, to find the courage to do so.

I love the alarming silence of Bogotá at 1:30am. Alarming because over 8 million people live in this metropolitan kingdom. Kingdom because the monarchy of the elite exists here in such transparent and unashamed contrast to the sprawling serfdom of the millions of displaced and homeless. Serfdom because they all work to make the existence of BMW dealerships possible in a country where over 50% of the population lives in conditions of poverty. Colombia has the second highest incidence of economic inequality, after Brasil, in Latin America. And these Lords and Ladies have just signed a free trade agreement with the highest eschalons of the greater global monarchy, signing over not only their natural resources and livlihoods of the poorest of the serfdom, but also guaranteeing their own demise. Will we not learn from history? Argentina, Bolivia, Mexico, Venezuela...this system doesn't work for the lower eschalons of the monarchy, not even the high eschalon in this particular national monarchy.

A note from John Perkins:

Today, men and women are going to Thailand, the Phillipines, Botswana, Bolivia, and every other country where they hope to find people desperate for work. They go to these places with the express purpose of exploiting these wreched people - people whose children are malnourished, even starving, people who live in shanty-towns, and have lost all hope of a better life, people who have ceased to even dream of another day. These men and women leave their plush offices in Manhatten or San Francisco or Chicago, streak across continents and oceans in plush jet-liners, check into first-class hotels , and dine at the finest restaurants the country has to offer. Then they go searching for desperate people.

Today, we still have slave-traders. They no longer find it necessary to march into the forests of Africa looking for prime specimens who will bring top dollar on the auction blocks of Charleston, Cartagena and Havana. They simply recruit desperate people and build a factory to produce jackets, blue-jeans, tennis shoes, automobile parts, computer components and thousands of other items they can sell in the markets of their choosing. Or they may elect to not even own the factory themselves; instead they hire a local businessman to do their dirty work for them.

These men and women think of themselves as upright. They return to their homes with photographs of quaint sites and ancient ruins to show their children. They attend seminars where they pat each other on the back and exchange tidbits of advice about dealing with the eccentricities of customs in far-off lands. Their bosses hire lawyers who assure them that what they are doing is perfectly legal. They have a cadre of psychotherapists and other human resource experts at their disposal to convince them that they are helping those desperate people.

The old-fashioned slave-trader told himself that he was dealing with a species that was not entirely human, and that he was offering them the opportunity to become Christianized. He also understood that the slave was fundamental to the survival of his own society, that they were the foundation of his economy. The modern slave trader assures himself (or herself) that the desperate people are better off earning one dollar a day than no dollars at all, and that they are recieving the opportunity to become integrated into the larger world economy. She also understands that these desperate people are fundamental to the survival of her company, that they are the foundation for her own lifestyle. She never stops to think about the larger implications of what she, her lifestyle, and the economic system behind them are doing to the world - or how they may ultimately impact her children's future.

- From: Confessions of an Economic Hit-Man

Oh How Can we Keep Silent? Canada’s Free trade Negotiations with Colombia

Colombia is home to the largest population of internally displaced persons in the world. It is the only country in the Americas currently in a state of internal armed conflict, which claims some 3,000 lives every year. Colombia’s government is currently mired in a complex political scandal which is bringing the current adminsitration of Alvaro Uribe’s relationships with paramilitary militias to the public fore. According to Amnesty International, these groups are responsible for the vast majority of the gross human rights violations ocurring in a war which has ravaged the country for the past 60 years. Colombia’s military has one of the worst human rights records in the hemisphere and Colombia maintains its place as the world’s leader in trade union official assasinations.

Church leaders and communities continue to be targetted by all armed actors involved in the war. In 2006, 68 cases of human rights violations, representing 223 victims and 289 aggressive acts, were registered by a project dedicated to documenting violations of human rights abuses suffered by Protestant Churches in the country. Just 2 months ago, a Mennonite Central Committee partner was attacked in a politically motivated assault, intended to instill fear and hesistancy in the hearts of those working to bring about Christ-centred social change in the country and a just peace for all.

Yet, the Canadian government has deemed Colombia and President Alvaro Uribe’s current administration – himself having been implicated in ties with illegal armed mercenary groups and drug cartels(Juan Forrero, Washington Post, “Colombia President Denies Ties to Paramilitary Groups”, April 20, 2007)– a prime destination for increased Canadian investment, having initiated free trade negotiations just a few weeks ago. This is the country where Canada’s newly proposed “Third Way” diplomacy will have its debut, proposing to demonstrate a new balance between the US-inspired free market capitalism and hard-line socialist policies of the Latin American Left. Canada’s brave entrance into the murky waters of human rights concerns amid the continued criticsm of the Uribe administration’s lack of ability to curb allegations of ties with paramilitaries, is even less responsible than the US House of Representatives. In turning a blind-eye to humanitarian concerns and a clearly-marked path of favouring Canadian business before Canadian ethical concerns, Harper’s new Foreign Policy agenda for the region is less concerned with human life than that of the United States House of Representatives. While the democratic US Congress has rejected ratifying a bilateral free trade agreement with Colombia until clear improvement in the government’s human rights record can be proven and ties with paramilitary groups are entirely severed, Harper has called the expectation of negotiations to be contingent on social and political justice “ridiculous”.(The Economist, “Saying no to Free Trade, July 18)

As Canada attempts to establish a new place for itself in the international scene, a laudable and necessary move, Canadians should be called to hold our government accountable for misguided initiatives that not only harm our international reputation but in fact demotes human security to secondary importance after corporate interests.

Who Benefits?
Canadian investment in the Americas is 3 times its investment in Asia. In the last 3 years, Canadian investment grew by 79% in the region, compared to an average of 15% in the rest of the world. In Colombia, Canadian investment is around USD$2 billion, mostly in the oil, gas, mining, and service sectors. It is the concentration of Canadian investment in the extractive industry in the country that generates a large part of the concern around the trade talks. Canadian mining companies are increasing in the country by an average of 1.4 companies every month and it is in the areas of the country where extractive industry companies are operating that some 75% of human rights violations take place. As a source within the foreign affairs department shared with The Star, (Allan Wooods, July 12, 2007) in negotiations with Colombia, “Canada will insist on non-binding references to corporate social responsibility,” further adding, “It’s just basically to raise the visibility of it (corporate social responsibility).” Currently, various foreign extractive companies are under investigation for employing paramilitary death squads in the protection of foreign business infrastructure, including the assasination of union leaders and death threats and forceful displacement of local communities to allow companies to freely explore resource deposits. Implementing references which are non-binding is certainly a questionable way to prevent serious violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, especially from a government which lauds itself as a World leader in respect for human rights and human security. It is clear that Harper is so desperately interested in raising Canada’s international profile, filling the gap left by the more US congress, not only jeopardizing US-Canadian relations, but also compromising respect for Canada in the international scene.

And corporate Canada will benefit. The concessions the Colombian government is handing out to foreign companies assure significant profit for the foreign firms, some guaranteeing up to 80% of royalties won in operations. The argument of more free trade deals bringing more development and even helping Colombia “renounce violence” as Harper brazenly suggested (Richard Foot, CanWest News Service, July 16) is truly troubling.

Aside from the increased threat of Canadian companies being complicit in human rights violations, the reality that highly subsidized Canadian goods – particularly agricultural – will begin to flood the Colombian market will make it nearly impossible for local Colombian peasant farmers to compete. Free trade itself is not necessarily the problem. The problem is that Canada enters the negotiations in an already semi-protectionist stance, unwilling to negotiate domestic subsidies, yet expecting Colombia to “free” up their trade barriers.

Unfortunately, more details on the deal cannot be divulged, since the negotiations are happening behind closed doors with little participation from civil society in either country.

What can we do?

The benefits and priveleges of being Canadian allow us to choose. We can choose our political leaders, we can choose where we buy our groceries, we can choose what church we will attend, and we can choose whether or not we witness prophetically to neighbours and policy makers.

As Christians we have less choice. We are called to live justly and peaceably, not only in our own communities, but with the family of God in the World. Jesus calls us to lead lives of truth; being honest with ourselves and our leaders about what free trade deals might really mean for a country in the midst of a war that our Prime Minister is choosing to ignore. We cannot ignore it. We cannot keep silent.

Pray
For Colombian churches as they continue to witness as SALT and Light in the darkness of violence and injustice.
For ourselves as we seek to be SALT and Light in our communities and in our country.
For negotiators as they continue to determine the terms of agreement for the FTA.

Learn
Visit the MCC Colombia Website (www.mcc.org/colombia) to learn more about the country and the exciting and sad things happening there.

Act
Write a letter to your Member of Parliament expressing your concern for Colombia and Canada’s new initiative of Free Trade in the country. Clarify that a free trade deal should NOT happen if not contingent upon a clear improvement in the government’s human rights record, a complete severing of government ties to Paramilitary groups, and a verification that the demobilization process is serving to bring peace to the country and not more violence. In addition, Canada and Colombia must assure that the agreement will be justly negotiated, keeping in mind the needs of the marginalized and needy in both countries.