The Landmark Ruling Against Chiquita Exposes the Failure of Voluntary "Corporate Social Responsibility"

Chiquita’s financing of a Colombian paramilitary group while claiming a reputation as a “responsible corporate citizen” shows the need for robust civil society institutions.

MANPREET KAUR KALRA AND ANNA CANNING
JUNE 20, 2024

Last week, Chiquita Brands International — one of the world’s largest banana distributors — was found liable in a Florida court for financing a Colombian paramilitary group. The ruling marks a landmark moment for corporate accountability: It is the first time a U.S. corporation has been held liable for human rights violations abroad in connection to their business operations. As momentous as this victory is in its own right, it also illustrates the ineffectiveness of voluntary corporate social responsibility initiatives — and the need for strong civil society institutions to protect human rights.

Chiquita Brands International has vast banana plantations throughout Colombia. After a 17-year legal battle, a federal jury in Florida delivered a groundbreaking verdict on June 10 holding Chiquita accountable for financing the violent paramilitary group Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (AUC). The AUC was declared a Foreign Terrorist Organization by the U.S. Department of State in 2001. Chiquita has previously pleaded guilty to paying the AUC ​“for security services.” The recent verdict holds Chiquita accountable for what they paid for: The court found in favor of plaintiffs who have long alleged the AUC murdered, tortured, and terrorized workers between 1997 and 2004 in an effort to intimidate them to prevent organizing, and assassinated union leaders who posed threats to the corporation’s bottom-line as the company bought land and expanded its influence in Colombia.

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The case against Chiquita

Evidence presented in the case revealed Chiquita’s complicity in the AUC’s operations, including use of Chiquita’s ports for weapon imports and banana boats for cocaine exports. Despite the AUC’s designation as a terrorist organization, Chiquita continued to utilize the AUC as a tool to secure corporate expansion and profits from 1997 until 2004. Chiquita disguised payments to the AUC by classifying them as business costs. When payments to the AUC were brought to the attention of Chiquita’s Board of Directors six years after the initial payment, the board decided to disclose the payments to the U.S. Department of Justice while claiming they were made under duress. However, Chiquita continued to disburse payments through its Colombian subsidiary, Banadex. The AUC, responsible for thousands of civilian deaths, used these funds for violence, including the murder of trade union representatives. Chiquita eventually pled guilty to a felony charge of making payments to a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization in 2007 after a U.S. Department of Justice proceeding, paying a $25 million fine for that crime. In the process, there was no mention of the business interest that this served for Chiquita — suppressing the voices of human rights defenders — nor was there mention of those killed and their families.

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Chiquita’s ​“storied” past: United Fruit and mass murder

These abuses were not the first time that Chiquita has been complicit in massive human rights violations. Throughout the company’s history, including the years it operated as the United Fruit Company (UFC), Chiquita has showcased a long history of extraction, worker repression, suppression of labor movements and corporate dominance in Latin America. In 1928, UFC orchestrated the massacre of over 1,000 striking workers in Colombia who were being paid only $1/​month. Perhaps most famously, the United States overthrew the democratically-elected government of Guatemala in 1954 to protect UFC’s grasp on the nation’s economy, installing a pro-business military dictatorship instead, which set the stage for the Guatemalan Civil war and the genocide of hundreds of thousands of Indigenous Maya.

More:
https://inthesetimes.com/article/chiquita-auc-colombia-death-squad-verdict

(My bolding)