Interview

CARLOS Lozano has been the editor of the Colombian newspaper VOZ for almost a decade. VOZ is the paper of the Colombian Communist Party and is the only print media in the country that opposes the regime of right-wing President Alvaro Uribe.

Last year, the government publicly accused Lozano of being linked to the left-wing FARC guerilla group - claims which, as Lozano put it, "are like signing a death sentence on me." Sure enough, the accusations were swiftly followed by several death threats.

On a recent visit to Colombia, I spoke to Lozano about Colombia's 50-year-old conflict and what it's like working as a journalist while living in the shadow of death.

How do death threats affect the day-to-day work of you and the VOZ staff?

There have been many death threats against me and other members of VOZ. There have also been three bombs planted outside our office in recent years. This year has been especially difficult. We have had lots of threats, through telephone calls and through receiving invitations to our own funerals.

These threats not only come from right-wing paramilitary groups but also sometimes direct from the state security forces. Notwithstanding, we won't let them put an end to our work. We will continue to produce the paper.

For the last two years, we have worked tirelessly to improve the paper. Although we still do not reach the whole of the country because there are areas controlled by the paramilitaries where we are unable to distribute, we are the only print media that analyses the situation in Colombia from a progressive perspective.

We are threatened because we try to cover popular struggles. VOZ is the voice of the trade union movement, we promote unity among the Colombian people, we are the voice of the Communist Party, the left and civil society groups in Colombia.

We cover the human rights situation, the exploitation by multinational corporations and also question US and other foreign intervention in the Colombian conflict. This obviously all sits very uncomfortably with the ruling establishment here.

Since Uribe came to power, he has implemented numerous repressive polices, which VOZ has criticised. But Uribe's government does not accept any opposition. It is part of an attempt to wipe out democracy in Colombia.

At the moment, freedom of speech and freedom of the press do not exist here. The only media that is respected by the government is that which promotes the government's agenda.

Uribe's government has been conducting a PR campaign throughout Europe, including Britain, claiming that Colombia's political situation is changing for the better. What do you think about the situation in Colombia?

The conflict in Colombia is political, social and armed and has been affecting the country for 50 years. It started because there was a lack of democracy and immense exploitation, but, above all, because the ruling class got used to ruling through the use of violence.

The lack of respect toward political opposition to the ruling elites is best exemplified by what happened to the Union Patriotica (UP) political party. It was formed as part of the 1984 process with the left-wing guerillas and was composed of trade unionists, indigenous groups, peasant organisations and other marginalised sectors of society.

The party was exterminated. It had two presidential candidates, virtually all of its elected congressmen and over 4,000 of its activists assassinated.

What happened to the UP remains one of the worst cases of political genocide that has ever happened in the world. There have been horrible racial genocides, but not many political genocides on that scale. In Colombia, you were killed simply for being a member of a certain political party.

(Lozano's predecessor as VOZ editor was Manuel Cepeda, who was elected to the Senate for the UP. He was assassinated by military intelligence agents in Bogota in 1994).

Things haven't changed at all. Uribe keeps saying that the killings are something of the past, but, since he has been in power, over 100 Communist Party activists have been assassinated, not to mention the hundreds of trade unionists, campesinos, indigenous or Afro-Colombian people who have also been murdered.

This is all to do with the aim of exterminating any progressive forces. What we are saying is that there is a social and political armed conflict, something that the government denies.

It reduces the problem to a simplistic perspective of a few terrorists fighting the rest of the nation. We believe that the government must first acknowledge that there is a conflict and the only way to resolve it is through a negotiated peaceful political solution.

We do not think that peace can be reached through Uribe's military policies. He has put in place a huge military operation and has implemented several offensives, which have been a total failure.

Even the US, which finances the plans, has recognised the inefficiency of them.

Is there any sign of the guerillas being willing to negotiate with the government?

The guerillas have shown their willingness to sit down and talk, yet Uribe has repeatedly knocked back their proposals. For example, the FARC has been seeking an exchange of its prisoners of war for those guerillas currently held in government jails. For this negotiation to start, the guerillas have asked the government to demilitarise two small towns to guarantee their security when they sit down to talk. But the government will not allow this, because it says that it would be a concession to the guerillas.

The guerillas won't give up the armed struggled unless there are critical guarantees in place.

They don't want a peace that is imposed on them by force but one based on democracy and social justice. In that sense, the political position of the guerillas is similar to that of the trade union movement and civil society.

What is the position of VOZ regarding the insurgency?

Our position regarding the armed insurgency is very clear. The armed struggle in Colombia is a reaction to a situation. It is a struggle that responds to a lack of democracy, social inequalities and the repression of workers, particularly in rural areas - the peasants. Those are the causes of the conflict in Colombia and we share that analysis. That is why we recognise that it is a fully fledged armed conflict, not a simple good-versus-evil "war on terrorism."

Can you explain a little about the peace process that the government has started with the paramilitary death squads?

This government has started a so-called "peace process" with the paramilitary groups in order to be able to show that they are doing something about paramilitarism. However, paramilitary groups are, in fact, getting stronger and stronger - and the "peace process" is helping them to do this by giving them legitimacy.

Even members of the elite, such as former Liberal Party presidential candidate Horacio Serpa, have highlighted the rising paramilitarisation. Paramilitary groups continue to carry out massacres, remain heavily involved in drug trafficking and continue to push their political influence in all regions of the country.

The government is basically trying to clean up the image of paramilitarism. The problem is that the Colombian state has a long-standing debt with the paramilitaries, because it organised and financed them.

The problem has to be resolved through a negotiated peaceful agreement, but the first step should be the acceptance and recognition of the state's involvement in their creation. There must also be truth, justice and reparation for the victims of crimes carried out by paramilitaries.

Why is the government so keen to negotiate with paramilitary groups and not with the guerillas?

The government understands that the paramilitaries have always been a repressive tool of the state. Uribe thinks of himself as some sort of messiah destined to defeat the insurgency and that is why he is working so closely with the paramilitaries. More than one paramilitary leader has said that, after he has demobilised as part of the "peace process," he will run for Congress with the full support of Uribe's government and the paramilitary political machine.

When Uribe was governor of the department of Antioquia, he initiated a relationship with paramilitary groups. He created the Convivir groups of armed civilians, set up to fight the guerillas, but which soon began targeting the civilian population and the political opposition.

As president, Uribe is using the same tactics. Paramilitaries have been given so much power that it will be very difficult to take it away.

A real democracy needs to be established. We are not even talking about socialism, but about setting up the conditions to be politically active without the fear of being killed.

We want a real democracy so that then we can fight for socialism, without the danger of being assassinated or sent to jail.

Interview by Pablo Conde

• Justice for Colombia and the National Union of Journalists have a project to provide financial support to VOZ. Please send cheques payable to Justice for Colombia to: JFC, c/o ASLEF, 9 Arkwright Road, London NW3 6AB. Please mark cheques "VOZ Appeal" on the reverse.

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