Colombia’s ambassador to US implicated in land theft scandal

Source: Colombia Reports

Colombia’s ambassador to US implicated in land theft scandal
posted by Adriaan Alsema
Jun 17, 2013



Colombia’s ambassador to the United States is implicated in the fraudulent legalizing of stolen lands for major Colombian companies, a Colombian senator said Sunday. According to opposition Senator Jorge Robledo, ambassador Carlos Urrutia’s former company, law firm Brigard & Urrutia, helped major companies like cement monopolist Argos and business mogul German Efromovich to illegally obtain stolen land.

Robledo claimed that the cases involving Urrutia’s former company demonstrate how Colombia’s top companies and businessmen were involved in the usurping of land through displacement, theft and avoiding legislation that put limits to the amount of land that may be privately owned.

According to the opposition senator, the ambassador’s former company fraudulently helped formalize large companies’ ownership of some 100,000 acres of land in central Colombia, transactions that are currently being investigated by the Superintendent for Notaries and Registries.

Robledo said the Superintendent had been conservative when estimating the Colombian state lost 1.7 million acres of land to corruption and called on authorities to investigate to find how much more had illegally been appropriated by established companies.

Read more: http://colombiareports.com/colombias-ambassador-to-washington-implicated-in-land-theft-scandal/