ISDS Case Map
Colombia
Both sides in the debate over the controversial trade deal with Colombia believe the pact has a better chance of passing next year if Barack Obama is elected president. The irony is that Obama has been an opponent of the deal, while Republican presidential candidate John McCain is a staunch supporter of the accord.
In perfect coordination, worthy of the political affinity between Alvaro Uribe and Alan García, the two presidents sent identical letters on 9 September 2008 to the President of the European Commission, in which, unilaterally and without consulting their partners in the Andean Community of Nations (CAN), they terminated the Association Agreement negotiations between the CAN and the EU. What they seek is quite serious: to force bilateral negotiations with the European Union, excluding both Bolivia and Ecuador.
While the eyes of the world focus on the internal crisis in Bolivia and the unfolding tensions in the Andean region, the pro-Bush government of Colombia is engaged in one of its most intensive lobbying efforts in recent memory, a full court press that will culminate with the visit next week of President Alvaro Uribe to Washington.
The Bush administration, Republican lawmakers and business groups pressed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Wednesday to allow votes on free trade pacts with Colombia, Panama and South Korea by the end of the year.
While Colombian representatives lobby the Democratic and Republican conventions in support of the Bush administration's Colombia Free Trade Act, the US labor movement continues its opposition to the pact, signed in November 2006 but put on hold by Congress last April.
The US free trade agreement and the state and paramilitary violence in Colombia are part of the same project
We visited Colombia from July 18-25 on behalf of one million Canadian public sector workers. Our mission was to see for ourselves whether our opposition to the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement was justified. What we saw and learned confirmed that we are right to oppose this deal and to speak out against it on behalf of Colombian workers and their families.
With the Canada-Colombia deal done, but the text still kept secret, some say that the provisions on labour and the environment at least establish a record of commitment, while others say that without enforceable complaint mechanisms the side agreements amount to little more than lip service.
Paul Moist, the President of Canada's largest union, expressed concern about a free trade deal between Canada and Colombia during a recent meeting with Fabio Valencio, Colombia's Minister of the Interior.
When Canada concluded free trade talks with Colombia in June, the announcement came in the form of a release on a Saturday. But burying news of the deal on a weekend hasn't stopped a storm of protest. In Ottawa, the opposition blasted the government for reaching an FTA (whose ratification will likely take months) without waiting for an assessment report from the Commons trade committee, whose members recently travelled to Colombia - a country that has been plagued by drug trafficking, paramilitary death squads and other forms of strife.
