Banana company executives charged with financing paramilitary groups in Colombia

ogotá, Mar 12 (EFE) – Producers and representatives of 14 banana exporting companies were charged on Tuesday with financing a front of the now defunct paramilitary group United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), the Attorney General’s Office announced Tuesday.

The defendants allegedly made illegal contributions to the AUC between 1996 and 2004 in exchange for security and permits for their commercial activities in the Urabá region in northwestern Colombia. The companies paid three cents on the dollar for each box of bananas that left the country, the Attorney General’s Office explained in a statement. These contributions amounted to over 33.2 billion pesos (around 8.5 million dollars); and were made through a “convivir,

” the name given to the security cooperatives that ended up financing the AUC, a far-right militia that purportedly fought left-wing guerrilla groups but was involved in drug-trafficking and land-grabbing activities. According to the indictment, the businessmen were charged with “aggravated criminal conspiracy in the modality of promoting and financing organized armed groups outside the law,” the statement added.

It is not the first time that banana companies have been accused of involvement with paramilitarism in Colombia. Local exporters and international importers have been previously accused and involved in legal proceedings for financing these groups. In May 2023, former paramilitary leader Salvatore Mancuso accused the banana trading company Banadex of having links with paramilitaries.

The multinational Chiquita Brands also admitted in 2007 that it had paid nearly 2 million dollars to Colombian paramilitaries, as it said at the time, “under pressure” to protect its employees, for which it reached a legal settlement in the United States that resulted in a $25 million fine. EFE rga/mcd/ics