Luis Farjado

Alejandro Carranza's family has accused the U.S. government of having killed Mr. Carranza. They specifically say that the Secretary of Defense had given the order. This has of course created a lot of media interest in Colombia and across Latin America at a moment where a lot of people are paying attention to what is happening in the Caribbean with the U.S. military build-up. What can you tell us about the fisherman who was killed, Alejandro Carranza and his family?

There's been a lot of controversy in Colombian media about Mr. Carranza. He was a 42-year-old fisherman living near Santa Marta, which is a port city of the Colombian Caribbean, relatively near to the border with Venezuela.

Ja vanhempi sanoo, että hänellä ei ollut mitään liiketoimintaa. Ja myös Colombian presidentti Gustavo Petro, joka on ollut hyvin antagonistinen viime vuosina USA-yhdistelmällä ja erityisesti Donald Trumpilla. Mr. Petro, Colombian presidentti, on sanonut,

or initially said that Carranza was an innocent fisherman who had been killed. However, unconfirmed reports in Colombian media have suggested that there had been a criminal investigation into Mr. Carranza a few years ago. He was alleged to have been suspected of being involved in a weapons trafficking deal.

Ja myöhemmin presidentti Petro, muutama viikko myöhemmin ensimmäisen puheenvuoron jälkeen, hän sanoi, että nyt hän ajatteli, tai hallitus ajatteli, että Mr. Carranza oli vahvistunut mukaan jonkin osan rauhoittumisesta, koska hän oli pahin pysyväinen ja halusi auttaa hänen perheensä. Joten on paljon kontroversioita. Se, mitä on totta, on se, että colombian hallitus on tehty erittäin suuri juttu tästä. He ovat käyttäneet jopa valtion mediaa.

to highlight what they say was an injustice committed, and the lawyer, the US lawyer who is actually presenting the case to the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights, is the same lawyer who is helping President Petro, Colombian President Petro, defend himself of allegations of ties to illegal groups, which led to economic sanctions being imposed on him by the US Treasury.

How much legal weight does this case, does this petition carry? It has more political weight than actual legal force. This is not something that would be binding if eventually this commission's findings were against the US government.

Colombian media have commented that it would be part of a political strategy to highlight the case of Mr. Carranza, and that eventually, and this is hypothetical, the family could also try to bring his case to U.S. courts. But the actual Inter-American Commission of Human Rights, which is a multilateral organization, it does not have power to impose binding rulings. So whatever decision they make, it would not have very strong legal, rather political effects.