[R-G] PERU-IRAQ: A Year in Hell for 1,000 Dollars a Month

[Anthony Fenton]

PERU-IRAQ:  A Year in Hell for 1,000 Dollars a Month
By Ángel Páez

Credit:Norman Solano.

Solano, third from left, on patrol in Basra.

LIMA, Nov 6 (IPS) - Former Peruvian noncommissioned army officer
Norman Alfonso Solano is happy because he has once again been
recruited to work as a private security guard in one of the most
dangerous places in the world: Iraq.

Although he saw fellow security guards killed by the Iraqi resistance
when he was working in the southern Iraqi city of Basra, Solano
clenched his teeth and told himself, "I need the money." This time he
is heading to Baghdad.

The robust 46-year-old 1.80-metre tall Solano forms part of a new
contingent of former members of the Peruvian armed forces and police
who will guard U.S. installations in Iraq for a year in exchange for a
hefty paycheck, by Peruvian standards: 1,000 dollars a month.

"I earn 200 dollars a month here, and that's when I manage to find
work," said Solano, a veteran of the 1980-2000 counterinsurgency war
against the Maoist Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) guerrillas.

"I have four kids. I'm an expert in weapons and am trained for war.
That's why I have to go where there is war," he told IPS.

The U.S. private military company Triple Canopy, which has drawn
criticism for taking advantage of the high unemployment and low wages
in Peru to recruit workers, has been hiring former members of Peru's
security forces to work in Iraq for the past several years. It also
hires workers from Chile, Colombia and El Salvador.

The firm was founded in 2003 by former members of the U.S. army's
elite Delta Force. Thanks to contacts in the George W. Bush
administration, it quickly won lucrative contracts with the State
Department.

Like other private security firms, Triple Canopy provides bodyguard
and site security services to U.S. infrastructure and personnel in
Iraq, which has been occupied by the United States since March 2003.

In Peru, the availability of poor, well-trained potential applicants
with combat experience is so broad that Triple Canopy has opened an
office in Lima: TCLA Internacional, run by U.S. citizens Jay Franklin
Bryant, Armand Leon Gadoury and Herbert Terrence Williams.

Hiring here was previously carried out by another firm, Defion
Internacional. But Triple Canopy decided to do the recruiting in its
own name, TCLA general manager Hugo Cobos told IPS.

"We no longer have any links with Defion. This is a completely new
company," said Cobos. But he declined to provide further details of
TCLA's activities.

"It is company policy to only give out information in response to an
official request. You send us a letter with the doubts that you would
like us to clear up, we will send it on to corporate headquarters in
the United States, and they will respond. It'll take a week for you to
receive a response, at the most," he said.

But although IPS followed these instructions, no response was ever received.

Authorities in Peru estimate that at least 1,600 Peruvians have been
hired by U.S. companies to work in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2005.
However, that figure is only approximate, because the firms are under
no obligation to report on their activities.

"In the Ministry of Foreign Relations, we have no list of names of
Peruvians who have left the country to work in security in Iraq or any
other conflict zone," Enrique Bustamante, head of the Secretariat of
Peruvian Communities Abroad, told IPS.

"In order for us to keep records, the companies that hire them or the
hired security guards themselves would have to voluntarily provide us
with information. There is no statute or law requiring them to do so,"
he said.

Solano worked in Basra from Dec. 5, 2005 to Jan. 18, 2006. "This was
the agreement: they paid me 100 dollars directly and sent the
remaining 900 dollars to my family," he explained.

"There were many really tense days, very dangerous. I witnessed mortar
attacks by the Iraqi resistance and saw fellow employees from other
countries shot dead and Peruvian colleagues seriously injured," he
said.

"But the money I saved up has run out," he went on. "So I applied, and
they told me to get my documents ready because they're putting
together another contingent to be sent over."

"Yeah, I'm going to work for Triple Canopy again, like the first time.
I can't complain; things went really well for me."

Norman's brother is midfielder Norberto Solano, who has made a name
for himself in English football and forms part of Peru's national
team.

"My brother's a millionaire, and he likes football. I'm not a
millionaire, I'm a soldier, I like war and I need money," he said.

The Triple Canopy recruiters did not hesitate to hire him as soon as
he applied: he served in the army from 1978 to 1986, and has ample
combat experience. He took part in the brief 1995 border skirmish with
Ecuador, and in counterinsurgency operations against Sendero Luminoso
in the 1980s.

"I left the army because I had a family to support and the pay was
bad. I worked in different security companies for years. I was a
supervisor and instructor, but when the war against terrorism ended,
there wasn't much work available, and I found myself unemployed until
I heard from some friends that they were recruiting people for Iraq,"
he said.

"My family begged me not to take the risk. The news coming from over
there was really alarming. But it was a chance I couldn't pass up. It
was worth risking my neck."

Several Peruvian security guards who have come back with injuries have
protested over the lack of medical insurance and compensation.
According to a copy of a contract to which IPS had access, the
employee agrees that any claim to reparations must be filed at the
Fairfax district court in the U.S. state of Virginia, where Triple
Canopy is based.

The question is, how many Peruvians could make the trip to the United
States, or afford a U.S. lawyer?

"What we are suggesting is that the recruits register with us
voluntarily, for us to have an idea of how many have gone abroad and
how we can contact them, and for us to keep a list of their relatives
here, instead of waiting for a tragedy to happen before we take
action," said Bustamante.

The government is unaware of how many Peruvians have been shipped
overseas to take part in foreign wars, and it is even less aware of
how many have been injured or have received compensation, insurance or
medical care, because the contracts contain a confidentiality clause.

In January, members of a mission from the United Nations working group
on the use of mercenaries, headed by chairperson-rapporteur Amada
Benavides de Pérez, told IPS that they had received reports that the
Peruvian recruits were going beyond the work of mere security guards
and received training in firing weapons and at times had used their
guns.

Bustamante was careful not to refer to the Peruvian recruits as
"mercenaries", "because they are hired as security guards. It is a bit
bold to use that term to describe people who are going over to guard
institutions. Do we call people who work here in security
'mercenaries' just because they carry weapons and use armoured
vehicles?"

Nor would it be possible to keep these firms from recruiting here, or
to prevent Peruvians from working in war zones. "We as a state cannot
make that decision. Individuals are free to take the jobs they choose
and assume their own risks, and the state cannot adopt measures that
go against their free will," he said.

"During my stay in Basra, we were the targets of around 450 attacks
with explosives," said Solano. "We carried M4 and AKM assault rifles
and M240 machine guns. We generally only fired warning shots. There
was a lot of tension, especially when the enemy was firing mortars. We
had a nasty sensation of being trapped or shut in. Fear was just
something you lived with all the time."

One of the worst cases of injuries was that of Richard Misarayme, 24.
"We prayed for him because it looked like he was going to die. But he
made it through," Solano recalled.

What did he do with the 12,000 dollars he earned in Basra? Asked IPS.

"I built a house for my family and paid for my children's schooling,"
he said. "It was a veritable fortune, and it's not every day that a
chance comes along to earn that kind of money. It would have taken me
years to save up here. That's why I'm going back to Iraq. I make my
living off of war, and as long as there's war, I'll keep doing so."
(END/2007)