Terrorist Bananas

This post suggested by my daughter Ali, who wrote the first part for the amazing Mr. Marchese’s junior year Government class at Wilson High School. It’s the topic of her “Current Event” for the week, taken from The Oregonian‘s front page yesterday. I’d link that for you, but a search on their site turns up only an older article, now packed into paid archives. Probably much the same as the AP release, anyway.

Ali’s condensation of the article:

Banana company Chiquita Brands International admitted in federal court Monday that for years it has paid Colombian terrorists to protect its most profitable banana-growing operation. Chiquita pleaded guilty to one count of doing business with a terrorist organization. The plea is part of a deal with prosecutors that calls for a $25 million fine and does not identify the several Chiquita executives who approved the illegal protection payments. Prosecutors say the Cincinnati-based company agreed to pay about $1.7 million from 1997 to 2004 to the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, also known as the AUC for its Spanish initials (Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia). Chiquita said it was forced to make the payments and was acting only to ensure the safety of its workers, but prosecutors noted that from 2001 to 2004, when Chiquita made $825,000 in illegal payments, the Colombian banana operation earned $49.4 million and was the company’s most profitable unit. “Funding a terrorist can never be treated as a cost of doing business,