Det danske Fredsakademi
Kronologi over fredssagen og international politik 8. April 2013 / Time Line April 8, 2013
Version 3.004/08/2013
Chiquita Sues to Block Release of Files on Colombia Terrorist
Payments
Banana Giant Fears National Security Archive "Media
Campaign"
Company Says SEC Should Withhold Info on Illegal Transactions
Washington, DC, April 8, 2013 -- Chiquita Brands International last
week filed a "reverse" Freedom of Information lawsuit to block the
release of records to the National Security Archive on the
company's illegal payments to Colombian terrorist groups, according
to the complaint filed in U.S. District Court. At issue are
thousands of documents the company turned over to the Securities
and Exchange Commission (SEC) from 1998-2004 as part of an
investigation of the company's illegal transactions with leftist
insurgents and right-wing paramilitaries from the United
Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC).
Two years ago, the Archive published "The Chiquita Papers," a
declassified collection of more than 5,000 pages of internal
Chiquita documents turned over to the Department of Justice and the
Federal Bureau of Investigation as part of a criminal investigation
of more than $1.7 million in payments to the AUC over six years,
and for nearly three years after the group was formally designated
as a terrorist organization. That case resulted in a 2007
sentencing agreement in which Chiquita admitted to more than ten
years of payments to a variety of Colombian guerrilla and
paramilitary groups.
The Chiquita Papers included evidence that Chiquita and its
Colombian subsidiary had received tangible benefits from those
transactions, undermining one of the key aspects of the company's
defense: that it had never received "any actual security services
or actual security equipment in exchange for the payments."
Chiquita's "reverse" FOIA complaint now claims that the news
headlines based on the documents were part of "a media campaign to
publicize biased mischaracterizations of the documents."
"We strongly reject Chiquita's assertion that we mischaracterized
information found in their own corporate records," said Michael
Evans, director of the Archive's Colombia Documentation Project.
"Chiquita admitted to more than a decade of regular payments to
death squads and narcotraffickers," he added. "Now, Chiquita wants
to cover up the documents that would let us judge for ourselves
whether those payments were extortion or security for banana
operations, or both."
Among the evidence that Chiquita did, in fact, benefit from its
"sensitive payments" is a 1994 legal memo indicating that Colombian
insurgents provided security at some of Chiquita's plantations in
Colombia. The memo says that the general manager of Chiquita
operations in Turbo told company attorneys that "Guerrilla Groups"
were "used to supply security personnel at the various farms." A
subsequent draft of the same memo includes annotations asking, "Why
is this relevant?" and, "Why is this being written?"
Another document published by the Archive in April 2011 shows that
Chiquita also paid right-wing paramilitary forces for security
services--including intelligence on guerrilla operations--after the
AUC wrested control of the region from insurgents in the mid-1990s.
The March 2000 memo, written by Chiquita Senior Counsel Robert
Thomas and based on a conversation with managers from Chiquita's
wholly-owned subsidiary, Banadex, indicates that paramilitaries
formed a front company to disguise "the real purpose of providing
security." The unidentified Banadex official said Chiquita "should
continue making the payments," because the company "can't get the
same level of support from the military."
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