=================================
It apparently was the first time
the United States has revoked the
visa of a Colombian military
official in connection with human
rights abuses.
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ASSOCIATED PRESS

Friday, 15 May 1998

U.S. Pulls Colombian General's Visa
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By Frank Bajak

BOGOTA -- The United States has revoked the visa of a senior 
Colombian general who human rights groups say has a lengthy 
record of backing paramilitary forces involved in death squad 
activity, the officer said Friday.

Gen. Ivan Ramirez was commander from 1995-97 of the army's First 
Division, which operates in a northern region where landowner-
backed paramilitary forces are known for killing scores of alleged 
guerrilla sympathizers, sometimes with the army's close cooperation. 

Ramirez, currently the army's inspector-general, denied 
responsibility Friday for any human rights abuses and said the State 
Department action taken against him would demoralize Colombia's 
soldiers. 

"The only thing I've done is to combat violence and terrorists for 36 
years," Ramirez told RCN radio, saying his conscience was clear. "I 
don't have any investigations pending against me." 

Ramirez also was the army's intelligence chief between 1992-95 and 
oversaw the 20th Intelligence Brigade, which the United States has 
accused of sponsoring death squads.

U.S. Embassy officials would not publicly confirm the revocation of 
Ramirez's visa.

The action comes as U.S. policymakers weigh whether to provide 
advanced weaponry, training or other counterinsurgency assistance 
to Colombia's beleaguered military, which recently suffered a string 
of major defeats by leftist rebels.

It apparently was the first time the United States has revoked the 
visa of a Colombian military official in connection with human rights 
abuses. The State Department stripped President Ernesto Samper and 
more than a dozen other Colombian politicians of their U.S. visas in 
1996 for allegedly accepting money and favors from drug cartels. 

Two weeks from May 31 presidential elections, Colombia is in the 
midst of a mounting dirty war of political assassinations. Three 
prominent left- leaning human rights activists have been killed since 
late February and a former hard-line defense minister, Fernando 
Landazabal, was assassinated Tuesday in what many believe was 
rebel retaliation. 

A State Department report says 7.5 percent of all politically 
motivated extrajudicial killings during the first nine months of 1997 
were committed by government forces, with the army responsible 
for many. Paramilitary groups committed more than two-thirds of 
the political murders, human rights groups say.

Copyright 1998 The Associated Press