Sinn F\u00e9in\u2019s Spokesperson on Foreign Affairs, Trade, and Diaspora, Se\u00e1n Crowe TD, today met with the Justice for Colombia group to discuss on going issues in the country and the on-going peace talks.<\/p>\n
Deputy Crowe said:<\/p>\n
\u201cToday I met a delegation which represented the Justice for Colombia (JFC) groups of Ireland and of Britain.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe discussed the on-going peace talks, as well as continued human rights abuses and the killing of trade union activists in the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis summer seen strikes by rural farmers and solidarity protests for them across the country, and which lead to 16 protesters and activists being murdered.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe union activists were protesting over agricultural imports, which have been allowed into Colombia under free trade agreements with the US, the EU, Canada and other nations, which are undercutting their livelihoods.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Colombian government continue to try to smear the protesters and union activists with lies about apparent paramilitary connections, which massively endangers them and their families. Colombia remains the world\u2019s most dangerous country to be a trade unionist.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe protests also led to the arrest and imprisonment of high profile Colombian trade unionist, Huber Ballesteros. His arrest is a clear attempt by Colombian authorities to punish him for his trade union activities.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe should be released immediately, and increased protection and support for trade union leaders and activists should be implemented without delay in Colombia.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Irish government\u00a0needs to stand up for workers\u2019 rights and human rights\u00a0in Colombia, and to stand against the EU\u2019s free trade agreement with Colombia, which will ultimately undermine all these rights for the interests of big business.\u201d<\/p>\n
ENDS<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sinn F\u00e9in\u2019s Spokesperson on Foreign Affairs, Trade, and Diaspora, Se\u00e1n Crowe TD, today met with the Justice for Colombia group to discuss on going issues in the country and the on-going peace talks. Deputy Crowe said: \u201cToday I met a delegation which represented the Justice for Colombia (JFC) groups of Ireland and of Britain. \u201cWe […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[84,19,85],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-colombia","category-eu","category-trade"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1212"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1214,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1212\/revisions\/1214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}