LatinNews Daily - 30 October 2008

Development: On 29 October President Alvaro Uribe's government fired three generals and 22 soldiers following an investigation into alleged extrajudicial killings of civilians by troops.
 
Significance: This is the biggest single purge in the Colombian military's recent history and sends a clear message to the armed forces that human rights abuses will not be tolerated by the government.   The purge sets an important precedent because it holds to account not just troops directly implicated in illegal killings, but also military top brass on the grounds that they failed to prevent or investigate adequately murders that took place under their command. It is also the government's most explicit recognition to date of a practice long-condemned by human rights groups: the use by members of the armed forces of so-called “false positives" - civilians murdered by troops and passed off as members of guerrilla groups - to inflate operational success rates by upping body counts.