Counter-guerrilla assistance to the Colombian security forces

Oliver Houston made this Freedom of Information request to Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The request was partially successful.

From: Oliver Houston

10 February 2009

Dear Sir or Madam,

Under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act, please could you
inform me in what year the British Government ceased providing
counter-guerrilla assistance to the Colombian security forces?

It may be useful for you to see the 23/11/99 parliamentary
statement made by former Minister John Speller in which he confirms
that such assistance was being provided at that time.

Yours faithfully,

Oliver Houston

Link to this

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

12 February 2009

Dear Oliver

Thank you for your Freedom of Information request. It has been passed to
the relevant section within the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to deal
with. They will be in touch with you should your request need
clarification.

We received your request on 10 February 2009 and will aim to respond
within 20 working days.

Yours sincerely

Information Rights
Foreign & Commonwealth Office
email: [FCO request email]
... visit our blogs at [1]http://blogs.fco.gov.uk

show quoted sections

Link to this

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

11 March 2009

Attachment FOI response 0114 09 Houston Colombia.doc
66K Download View as HTML

Dear Mr Houston

Please find attached a response to your FOI request.

Tony Kay

Head of Andean Section

DO for Colombia and Venezuela

South America Team

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

Tel: 020 7008 2608

Fax: 020 7008 2476

show quoted sections

Link to this

Oliver Houston left an annotation (11 March 2009)

Usual fob-off (it'll take too long to find out and cost too much), plus an irrelevant Answer to a PQ. See below.

Am definitely going to write again, as it's absurd that a Minister on one date says there IS counter-GUERRILLA assistance, then on a later date says there is now only counter-NARCOTICS assistance and NO counter-GUERRILLA assistance. At some date the advice to Ministers must have changed to reflect a new policy or the ending of a funding programme(s).

Once they admit they have it and that they can find it no problems, I imagine they'll claim some nonsense such as it would be deterimental to International Relations to reveal the date...

Dear Mr Houston

YOUR FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST 0114-09

Thank you for your email of 12 February, received in the FCO on 13 February, in which you requested:

“Under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act, please could you inform me in what year the British Government ceased providing counter-guerrilla assistance to the Colombian security forces?

It may be useful for you to see the 23/11/99 parliamentary statement made by former Minister John Speller in which he confirms that such assistance was being provided at that time.”

I can confirm that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) holds information regarding UK Government assistance to Colombia.

Section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act makes provisions for public authorities to refuse requests for information where the cost of dealing with them would exceed the appropriate limit. The limit has been specified in the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004. For central government the appropriate limit is set at £600. This represents the estimated cost of one or more persons spending 3 ½ days working days in determining whether the Department holds the information, and locating, retrieving and extracting it. Your request as presently formulated is widely-framed and I estimate that it will take more than 3 ½ working days to locate, retrieve and extract this information. In these circumstances we are not obliged under the Act to comply with your request. You may therefore wish to refine your request to narrow its scope to bring it within the appropriate limit. Should you wish to narrow the scope of your request we will assess the new request and whether it falls with the stipulated limit of £600 to administer.

In considering a new request, you might wish to refer to an answer Gillian Merron, FCO Minister for Latin America, gave to a Parliamentary Question on this issue on 4 March:

Jeremy Corbyn: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what mechanisms are in place to ensure that counter-narcotics assistance provided by the Government to the Colombian security forces is not used for counter-insurgency purposes. [260004]

Gillian Merron: We scrupulously monitor all UK engagement with the government of Colombia on counter-narcotics. Our work continues to meet the highest standards of probity and effectiveness. We do not provide any counter-insurgency assistance.

We fully endorse the efforts of the Government of Colombia to tackle the influence of illegal, criminal and terrorist groups in a manner consistent with international humanitarian law.

If you are unhappy with the service you have received in relation to your request and wish to make a complaint, or request a review of our decision you should write to me at the above address. You have 40 working days to do so from the date of our response.

Yours sincerely,

Tony Kay

Link to this

From: Oliver Houston

24 March 2009

Dear Sir or Madam,

I made a FOI request on February 10th 2009 which can be seen at:
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/co...

The request asked in which year the British Government ceased
providing counter-guerrilla assistance to the Colombia security
forces. I gave as a reference a 1999 statement by then Minister
John Speller in which he confirmed that such assistance was being
provided at that time. I am also aware of more recent statements by
Ministers that such assistance is no longer being provided.

Hence my request was a simple one – which year did the change
occur?

Your March 11th response to my request said that you were refusing
to provide the information as it would cost over £600 to do so. I
fail to understand how providing me simply with a year, and one
after 1999 at that, could possibly cost so much.

As a result I am requesting an internal review of your decision.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours sincerely,

Oliver Houston

Link to this

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

26 March 2009

Dear Mr Houston,

Thank you for your request for an internal review of your Freedom of
Information request. It has been passed to the relevant department within
the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to deal with. They will be in touch
with you with an outcome.

Yours sincerely

Henry Leitch
Information Rights Team

show quoted sections

Link to this

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

27 April 2009

Dear Mr Houston,

You requested an internal review of the decision, conveyed to you in your
email of 24 March 2009, not to disclose 'the year in which the British
Government ceased providing counter-guerrilla assistance to the Colombian
security forces' under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 ("the Act").

I have conducted a full examination of all the material, both released and
exempted, of relevance to your request. I have concluded the following.

Search for information

I have reviewed the extent of the files that are relevant to your request
and I am content that a reasonable search was carried out to identify the
amount of time that would be required to search for the information you
have requested.

Use of exemptions

The use of Section 12 of the Act, providing exemption on the basis of cost
was properly applied in this case.

Your specific queries

You ask why the provision of a date would push this request over the cost
limit. The nature of your request was such that each paper within the
files held on Colombia would have been required to be reviewed to search
for any mention of counter -guerrilla assistance. The volume of files
over this period is such that this cannot be carried out within the cost
limitations. For the years 1999-2004 there are approximately 2180 folios
that would need to be assessed and from 2005-2009 approximately 80
folios. Allowing an average five minutes per paper (they are of varying
lengths) this would take some 180 hours to check for relevant material,
which would clearly take us over the cost limit.

I note as well that the Minister for Armed Forces, the Rt Hon Bob
Ainsworth MP, answered a written parliamentary question in the House on 19
March 2009 on this very question. His response was that "The UK has not
provided specific counter-insurgency assistance to the Colombian Armed
Forces". You may wish to direct further questions on this statement
towards the MOD.

If you are not content with the outcome of this Internal Review you have
the right to apply directly to the Information Commissioner for a
decision. The Information Commissioner can be contacted at:

Information Commissioner's Office

Wycliffe House

Water Lane

Wilmslow

Cheshire SK9 5AF

Yours sincerely,

Andrew Millar

Andrew Millar
Head - North America
Foreign & Commonwealth Office
WH2.321
+44(0)207 008 2660

***********************************************************************************
Visit [1]http://www.fco.gov.uk for British foreign policy news and travel
advice and [2]http://blogs.fco.gov.uk to read our blogs.

Please note that all messages sent and received by members of the Foreign
& Commonwealth Office and its missions overseas may be automatically
logged, monitored and/or recorded in accordance with the
Telecommunications (Lawful Business Practice) (Interception of
Communications) Regulations 2000. We keep and use information in line with
the Data Protection Act 1998. We may release this personal information to
other UK government departments and public authorities.

***********************************************************************************

References

Visible links
1. http://www.fco.gov.uk/
2. http://blogs.fco.gov.uk/

Link to this

Things to do with this request

Anyone:
Foreign and Commonwealth Office only: