Colombian Military’s Rescue Operation May Be Harmful to Aid Workers

July 11, 2008

Colombian Military’s Rescue Operation May Be Harmful to Aid Workers

Although the Colombian military successfully rescued 15 hostages last week from Marxist rebels by posing as humanitarian-aid workers, the impersonation could pose future harm to actual humanitarian-aid workers, reports the online daily-news site MinnPost.com.

Michael Barnett, a professor who teaches classes on humanitarianism at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, said the impersonation would make life more difficult for aid workers, as combatants in Colombia may now suspect them of actually being members of the military or friendly with the government.

“I don’t want to be melodramatic,” Barnett said. “It doesn’t necessarily mean that aid workers are going to get shot. But it does mean that you’re going to have a lot more difficult time getting access to populations at risk. It does mean you’ve got to go through a lot more hoops. It means that you probably have to go through more searches and more background checks.”

Comments

As a former aid worker, I agree that the Colombian rescue is a worrying turn of events. But it is only one in a long series of events that put relief and aid workers in greater danger and further erodes the concept of neutrality.

For years the people of Darfur have been bombed by un-marked planes painted U.N. white. And the SPLA used shell relief agencies to facilitate the transportation of matierials into south Sudan.

Even before the Cold War, intelegence agencies world wide used relief agencies as fronts for their operations and intelegence gathering. But so have insurgent groups. And to their shame some of the people in the agencies knowingly assisted these operations.

Aid has always been both the carrot and the stick.

Of greater concern however has been the practice in Iraq and Afghanistan where the military units have directly been involved in implementing humanitarian projects, completely obliterating the distinction between humanitarian aid and military strategy.

And to our detriment, some aid groups have undermined our own neutrality through the practice of hiring armed foreign contractors to provide security for our workers.

We all need to take a step back and examine our values and our principles.

— Roger Jul 11, 02:50 PM #

Commenting is closed for this article.

Previous: Santa Group Gets in Trouble Over Charity Appeals
Next: Federal Prosecutors Oppose Action of Civil-Liberties Group in Muslim-Charity Trial