[RSS][Colombia] Chiquita liable for financing death squads in Colombia: US court

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Chiquita must compensate victims of paramilitary organization AUC, which received financial support of the banana corporation in Colombia, a US court ruled. The sentence is a major victory for nine victims whose family members were assassinated by the paramilitaries. Chiquita will have to pay these victims $38 million, according to Noticias Uno director Ignacio Gomez, who revealed the banana company’s ties to AUC death squads in 1997 already. The total cost of Chiquita’s terrorism financing will likely be much higher as the court had already accepted demands by 106 victims. The paramilitary group that received $1.7 million from the banana company left as many as 4,900 victims in Colombia’s Caribbean region. According to human rights law firm Earth Rights International, which represented the victims, “this historic ruling marks the first time that an American jury has held a major U.S. corporation liable for complicity in serious human rights abuses in another country.” This verdict sends a powerful message to corporations everywhere: profiting from human rights abuses will not go unpunished. These families, victimized by armed groups and corporations, asserted their power and prevailed. Earth Rights International lawyer Marco Simons The victims began appealing for justice in the US after a 2007 sentencing agreement between Chiquita and the Justice Department in which the banana company agreed to pay a $25 million fine for its support for the AUC, which was declared a foreign terrorist organization by the US Government in 2001. Chiquita’s financial support for the AUC and its role in arms trafficking was key for the expansion of the paramilitaries, who killed tens of thousands and forcibly displaced millions of people in Colombia during the armed conflict. In 2018, Chiquita settled similar claims brought by victims of guerrilla group FARC, which received payments from the banana company before the creation of the AUC. Chiquita’s predecessor, United Fruits Company, has been held responsible for its role in the massacre of hundreds of workers to quell a strike in 1928. The post Chiquita liable for financing death squads in Colombia: US court appeared first on Colombia News | Colombia Reports.

Source: https://colombiareports.com/chiquita-li ... -us-court/