COLOMBIA, ALWAYS IN A LAND WAR
Cartucho is not easy to enter. Much more difficult to get out. We are in the toughest neighborhood in Bogota Colombia in what the police call the day of the great illusion. The last attempt to rid that city of the eastern part of the desperate people who have busy, broken, burned and humiliated. Hours of battle, stones batons. Then yet another surrender of security forces. Two steps from hell is Calle 26, the capital's main artery that bisects the city, as a permanent observatory on Colombia changing.
Lt. Saul Lopez: " Here the violence is rooted, difficult to eradicate. It 's definitely a social problem before the public order. But the country is slowly raising his head, trying together to solve the economic problems that are real drama of Colombia. Certainly it is a war and we want to win, but we can not police themselves do it. "
"El Cartucho" is only one side of Colombia. The face of war: ancient painful, endless. To understand if and when the war ends, here is the story of a journey inside the planet Colombia, a country of glaring contradictions. Insaguinato happy and very rich and very poor, with people very civil and ruthless criminals. A country that is at the crossroads and along with the worldwide symbol of the drug, but where no one takes drugs.
Our journey begins naturally from Bogota, the capital, a megalopolis (six million inhabitants) with skyscrapers and shacks, almost a summary of this two-faced Colombia. The war. Many wars. Before the policy, fought with the obstinacy of a feud. Then the guerrillas and the drug traffickers in particular. Thirty thousand deaths a year. How many deaths. Too many. Poor Colombia, for fifty years in the trenches. A beautiful land where the "violence" is mythical, wild, natural. There are plenty of those among these people, like all South American popular imagination, but a summary of them all and dramatic with the "plomo" or the "plata", ie with lead or with money. As if to say that there is no way out or becomes corrupted or is killed, however the law is that of violence. It 's a day of hard work, even today to the police. Clean ones, which remained after the clean-up. In two years they were hunted almost four, though. All the pay of drug traffickers. It's hot, even if we are over three thousand meters. It is hard to breathe. Even a flight by helicopter. You have to hit from above. The team antinarcos special today is a top field in Santander de Quilichao amapola. This, too, destroyed. It goes on. We must continue to strike, without stopping. The transaction was now cocaine laboratories. There 'dust ready but luckily this never comes to increasing the market for the white death. The thirteen thousand cocaine in the world. A scourge. We
Guacamaya. They arrested all those who work. It is not surprising that much. If you were waiting for him. Like now expect the traffic boss pull them out of prison as soon as possible. The game is this, always. With lead or with money. If you think a game. Those who fight the drug traffickers must be prepared, and hard, as they did. These are new images: a secret training camp of the special teams. The Colombian superpoliziotti 2500, highly trained, well paid. The operation is very expensive: one billion dollars a year, an enormous sum for a country in serious economic crisis. But the government also knows that this is the battle to win.
is anti-narcotics police chief Col. Leonardo Gallego. Figure popular in these parts. The number one enemy of the traffickers, a role that the master loves to show it. A touch of megalomania does not clear, however, excellent results. Col. Leonardo Gallego - anti-narcotics commander, "Of course I'm the enemy of the narcos. Since I manage the team, I arrested a thousand and four hundred. I have reduced the Seventy percent of the crops. And it is only the beginning. We are preparing for the final blow and they know it. One thing is certain. We all organizzaizone disjointed. The large cartels no longer exist, for years. Before the killing of superboss historian, Pablo Escobar, then the capture even those who had replaced the brothers Orrequella. So we destroyed the first then also Cali Medellin. Now there is a series of 'tags', at least a hundred, but definitely aggressive all independent and therefore not strong. We must give place to the Government of Colombia's great will to defeat this scourge that has bloodied and humiliated our country. It 's a heavy commitment, but it is also not clear that Colombia can fight this great battle alone. Here, it is true, but the leaves are produced without the chemical precursors that could never be cocaine. And those are from Europe, the United States, the industrialized countries. Perhaps the fault is all ours .
Orrequella Brothers, the last boss, are confined to the "Performer." Ironic paradox to call one of the worst prisons in the world. It is not easy to explain. To give a sense we say that When an inmate is for the "Modelo" he says, completely without irony: "I'm going to hell." We go we hell. A prison born three thousand prisoners, it is home to almost double. We are still in the prison yard when they arrive other prisoners. As they arrive, they tell us, dozens, every day. There should be no place for some time, but no one refuses. The situation is increasingly hellish. There are also many Italians. Twenty-eight. Some are in a patio, the department of safety. There they go again today because we were-we-say in the direction of two attempts to escape. And do not tell us but what we whisper the detainees: that there were two murders, the usual daily average. A tragic practice, along with robbery and abuse of those in charge, an Italian tells us that prefer not to show up in jail because you know everything and if they know who has spoken ... He tells us that even in the face of safety, all have guns in their pockets and mobile phones, pay millions for parties within the cell and in fact commanded them. So much so that every three months at the "Modelo" change the manager. We insist to go with the camera. Impossible: they do not want. That is, they do not want the boss. But with the direction we come to an agreement: they will give us the pictures. And so here is the documented story of yet another escape attempt. Two nearly completed tunnel leading outside. If you really commanded them, then why can not the evasion? we ask. Because maybe you're better off in here that we meet. Imagine out. But it's just a joke. The day after the escape fails. Run away an entire band, fifteen, under the command of a small boss, Elver Cubillos. An escape finds three dead. Massimiliano
Fodarella is one of twenty-eight Italians imprisoned in Bogota. Former policeman, called by All Max, he is not afraid to speak because we explain the others, he is a man of respect in here. Arrested with four others with twenty kilograms of cocaine, was sentenced to eight years in prison. Talk to declare his innocence. He is not a drug trafficker, swears, though perhaps now will become so. And it is the most disturbing aspect of his story. The next day we visited another prison in Bogota, the female. The Italian held three. One is called Angel and is likely many years in prison. E 'was arrested with Max and prefers silence. The other two want to talk, even if you ask us not to flaunt their faces because at home, in Italy, both have children and are likely to lose them. These then are the stories of Miriam and Linda. Miriam is
Verona, thirty years of a wretched life and unfortunate. Will have to spend another five years in prison. E 'was made with three pounds of cocaine at the airport in Bogota in mid-July, the day before her birthday. He does not deny being a "mule", a drug couriers. She has a son in Italy and another in Colombia.
Linda looks and above the age of a child. Although it is already mom. She too was taken from drugs (almost a pound) airport. He'd wear but has denied any responsibility and is still awaiting trial. Originally from Somalia, has dark skin but she was born and raised in Rome. "You realize that they are a little tan" still manages to joke. When Linda says hello to us, crying because we just did see pictures of her baby, there is a hint of anger: "Call me 55597 , now I'm just a number, like all in here." For all these numbers
sad and desperate, now in the "Buen Pastor" have invented a party. We sing, we dance, strictly between detainees. To our surprise, the answer charge of the rehabilitation program, which is also the daughter of the minister of justice. Patricia Guellard - rehabilitation held: " know it is not easy to give a moment of serenity with these girls so alone and so feel, but we try, we feel that at least for an afternoon to create the illusion of normalcy. Why do not yet know what The real surprise of the festival . We get little to find out. With just the screaming of women prisoners. They organized a show that is unconventional in Colombia outside of these walls dramatic. One male strip. We all are. In the front row is Natalia, wretched life, the last - even in twenty-four arrests of life in New York full of cocaine, a drug couriers known and feared, but above all beautiful, so that for all is now "miss prison."
And here again the thousand faces Colombia, the land of contradictions. A jail where some people partying, and where, as the patio 2, the most hellish of all, girls remain closed as small animals. And 'maybe true but unfortunately the party is certainly true, and sad, this other life, without ever seeing the sun, nor smiling. The drug couriers. In Colombia out tons and tons of drugs, especially cocaine, every day. On ships and small aircraft. Only a small part goes with the "mules", courier: a ton about six hundred. Yet they are always only to be arrested, although the mechanisms are constantly changing, to circumvent the controls. But it is very easy around here to find other "mules", explains the official defense of numerous narcopostini, avv.Plinio Chaparro.
- How does the passage?
" You have to think that poor people here in Colombia are many. And the drug dealers know where to go and who to enlist courier. It 's a negotiation: they offer money to bring drugs and many are unhappy that accept .
- How much is a kilo of cocaine for a courier?
"A kilo of cocaine worth five thousand U.S. dollars .
- There are more and more 'foreigners among the couriers.
" Yes, many. Italians, Spaniards, many Europeans .
- And why foreigners?
" Why Colombians are less controlled. It 's easier .
One of the most difficult battle is against the guerrillas. What is new is that there is a pact between the guerrillas and drug traffickers. Indeed, new facts are two. The news is also that Colombia, as the central clearing of the drug, has now transformed into a manufacturing country, replacing destroyed Peru and Bolivia from the hard hitting, constant of the United Nations. The market then moved further north, in Mexico. But the offensive of the civil society continues. Pino Arlacchi, director of the UN anti-drug program, came to Colombia to groped agreement. He was to meet the leader of the FARC, the elusive Marulanda (here he is in a very rare image), when the killing of three U.S. citizens on the border with Venezuela, has blocked everything. Because the guerrillas themselves have admitted responsibility for the massacre. You can not deal with those who kill. But surely we must go forward.
Who are the rebels? They are responsible, in large part, of the blood in Colombia. Impressive figures. Each year, thirty thousand murders and 2,500 kidnappings for extortion purposes. Affected mainly foreigners, are able to pay. Average time of a seizure, six or seven months. The redemption usually around three hundred million dollars. Currently the hostages in the hands the guerrillas are nineteen. Three Italians. We collect the story of Count Danilo. Almost fifty years, the Trentino, the restaurant entrepreneur, was kidnapped Count one summer night two years ago in a cottage in the department of Caldas and issued for a hundred million pounds in seven months in captivity. Exactly 219 days past the Andes with the ninth against the FARC. The guerrillas are about thirty thousand. The military in the mid FARC (Colombian armed forces) divided into seventy divisions. Count Danilo in those months on the mountain has lost thirty pounds. Experience dramatic and heavy which helps to understand who the guerrillas, bandits, campesinos. "All children . I also taught to read and write ." Danilo Matters is not escaped, as did others. It is not even a lady ran courage that we encounter in Bogotá. The objectives of the narcos are police officers, judges and journalists often complain that the collusion. The largest newspaper in the capital, "El Espectador" has long been under fire: six editors were killed and also the director Guillermo Cano, the first to attack Escobar. We meet his widow. Anamaria Cano: " My life today is very upset. How do you think of risking his life for an article or a title. I'm not brave, but something must be done." Anamaria Cano is actually very strong because he has the courage of modesty. Almost in tears, in secret, confesses a desire. To meet for once the criminals. To ask why. The reason for all this violence and hate. To ask how do they sleep. Especially if one day cease to ask ".
To understand why some of these, visit Medellin, the city of Pablo Escobar, an illiterate thief who managed to bike, until he was killed, desperate to make small trades in a universal dishonesty. Medellin, small capital sitting on the equator to nearly two meters high, you see that has grown too fast. In half a century of thirty thousand to two million people. The north is south and south to North: naughty words in this land development was born in South and there are the rich. Indeed, because super-rich who make money on coke makes it a lot. Here in "El Poblado", the residential area, it is said that there is a brick that does not exude a white powder. And woe to those who speak ill of "doctor Pablo" on which legends flourish as if he were a hero and some people swear that in reality is still vivo.Certamente his ghost still lingers on Aranquez district in the north of Medellin , the undisputed kingdom of sicarios. All young, up to sixteen years. They kill for twenty dollars and after each murder go to church to put a candle. There are guys that have more than one hundred twenty murders on his conscience. They say that Pablo Escobar was sold from those of Cali, the third city \u200b\u200bof Colombia, tropical climate and atmosphere, dominated by brothers Gilberto and Miguel Orrequella. This was their stronghold in the "Ciudad Jardin, the garden city. They too have paid for: a turncoat has betrayed them in exchange for leniency in court in Miami. But perhaps still rule, from prison in Bogota. One evening in Cali know Francisco, a former great jazz musician. Since the bazuco devastated the brain plays with the kids on the street. The bazuco is a deadly drug because it is very poor, desperate for: the remains of cocaine, marijuana remains, even cement dust. We are the "barrjo of invasion", literally the busy neighborhood, a slum where a census is impossible but where it is assumed they live five hundred thousand people. Living is a way of speaking. Even if no waiver to the "Buglia", the din at the party. Just pass a bridge and you find yourself in hell, and yet the people here pretending to live a normal life. Among the five barracks find discos and even two "amablados, two brothels. But a church with a courageous missionary, Father Mario. Here it is, therefore, Colombia. The land of emeralds and orchids could be rich and happy, and instead continues to cry.
Our journey ends near the Magdalena, a river as large as the Danube, full of stories and legends that Simon Bolivar chose for their last journey. And among the many stories that are told in these parts there are many who speak of hope. There does not seem fair to account. And our trip seems really only concluded between these young and beautiful faces that light up the future of Colombia. As if to say that this country does not resign. And he wants to live.
Pino Scaccia ( 2000)
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