Did Human Rights Watch Sabotage Colombia’s Peace Agreement?

On Sunday, Colombian voters rejected the peace agreement that the government, led by President Juan Manuel Santos, worked out with the FARC guerrillas by the slenderest margin possible: 50.21 percent to 49.78, a difference of 53,894 votes. The turnout was 37 percent, out of 34 million eligible voters.

It’s a heartbreaking disaster for the long, intricate peace process, which sought to put an end to Colombia’s more than five-decade-long civil war. That war has claimed hundreds and hundreds of thousands of lives and has displaced millions upon millions of people. The peace deal, which was worked out during years of negotiations, mostly in Havana, was more aspirational than binding, offering hope that one of the world’s longest-running conflicts would come to an end. Now, that deal is in “tatters.” But keep in mind that “no” won with a sliver of a voting majority (less than 1 percent) of a minority (of eligible voters), with turnout low due to, in many precincts, extreme tropical rain, mostly in coastal departments where “yes” won handily.

The CIA and NSA Helped Colombia Target and Kill FARC Leaders

A secret “black budget” government project used CIA and NSA resources to help Colombian officials target and assassinate top leaders of the long-running Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), The Washington Post reports.

The assistance, which included pinpointing targets, helped the Colombian government kill at least two dozen rebel leaders, the Post said, citing interviews with some 30 former and current U.S. and Colombian officials. From the Post:

    The secret assistance, which also includes substantial eavesdropping help from the National Security Agency, is funded through a multibillion-dollar black budget. It is not a part of the public $9 billion package of mostly U.S. military aid called Plan Colombia, which began in 2000.