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In jungle camps, Colombia rebels take peace lessons
MAGDALENA MEDIO VALLEY (Colombia), Feb 27 — In their secret jungle camps, Colombia’s Marxist rebels used to learn how to fight.
They still carry the rifles and machetes they have used for half a century in their war against the Colombian government. But now troops of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) are sitting down for classes on how life will be once they lay down their weapons.
Thousands of miles away at talks hosted by Cuba, their commanders are negotiating a peace accord they hope to sign with Bogota in March. Meanwhile, here in the jungle, FARC soldier Tomas, 37, is acting as an instructor, explaining to his fellow recruits what is at stake. AFP was granted exceptional access by FARC commanders to this mountain camp in northwestern Colombia.
After his 14 years spent marching and fighting in this jungle, Tomas must now convince his comrades to work to achieve the FARC’s aims by political means. “Some of them are looking forward to it. They are pleased about it, optimistic,” he said. “But others are keeping quiet about it. They are a bit reserved. “How do we sever ourselves from the weapon we have carried for so many years?”
Makeshift classrooms
Classes like these are going on in various camps around the country that are home to the FARC’s 7,000 members. At this camp in the Magdalena Medio region, a mustachioed commander in a green beret orders ranks of troops to sit down side by side. They have built the makeshift classroom themselves, cutting down trees to make tables. Among the fighters are young women and boys scarcely out of puberty, with rifles by their sides and pistols on their hips.
With the sun beating down on him, Tomas sits by his laptop computer and explains the issues covered by the peace talks. “The problem, companions, is about the land. Access to the land must be democratized,” he said. Some of the young recruits yawn and shake their heads as they struggle to follow the presentation. Older troops listen more closely and take notes, occasionally raising their voices to say “excuse me, comrade” and ask a question.
Among the elder members is Cornelio, who has spent 33 of his 55 years fighting in the FARC. He fears anarchy could break in the regions it controls, if its fighters disarm. “They talk to us about laying down our weapons. They talk to us about turning into a political party,” he said after the class. “So the question we ask ourselves is: what will happen when we put the weapons away and delinquency breaks out?”
No more killing
The FARC started in the mid-1960s as a peasant uprising against perceived state oppression and took over areas where state control was absent. They are classed as a terrorist organisation by powers including the United States and the European Union. The conflict has ground on for decades as a territorial dispute between various armed groups.
Now, as negotiators close in on a March 23 deadline to sign an accord, Latin America’s last armed conflict could soon be over. But lingering disagreements over disarmament and other points in the negotiations still risk delaying the accord.
The conflict has killed 260,000 people and displaced 6.6 million, according to the United Nations. Even with the prospect of peace, some FARC members are afraid. Franky, 27, has been a FARC soldier since he was 17. “We hope they don’t let us down,” he said. “That we don’t lay down our weapons and then find they carry on killing us just for the sake of it.”
Then, there is the risk from within, said Tomas. For some of the younger recruits, politics is far less exciting than having rifles in their hands. “We have to guarantee that, when we lay down our arms, those kids get down to the work of political activism,” he said. And “that is a real challenge.”
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When Colombia Bombed Ecuador: The Killing of Raul Reyes
The FARC’s second in command was killed in Ecuador eight years ago by the Colombian army, with the help of U.S. intelligence.
On March 1, 2008, the Colombian military carried out an attack on a FARC guerrilla camp in northern Ecuador, killing one of the group’s top commanders, Raul Reyes.
The attack, an aerial bombardment, has long been considered controversial because it was illegally carried out in Ecuadorean airspace, with the help of the U.S. government.
Then-President Alvaro Uribe at first denied this fact, saying the attack was carried out from Colombia in order to “not violate the sovereignty” of its neighbor. Evidence later revealed, however, that the Colombian air force had deliberately crossed into Ecuadorean territory to target the rebel camp, and specifically the rebel leader.
According to testimony from both U.S. and Colombian officials, the Colombian Air force also carried out the attack with tacit U.S. approval, and dropped U.S.-made “smart bombs,” according to The Washington Post.
This close partnership between the U.S. and Colombian forces was part of a larger CIA covert action program to help Bogota take out rebel leaders. This included providing real-time intelligence to track the guerrillas and a US$30,000 GPS guidance kit to guide smart bombs to their target, reported the Post.
Reyes, in addition to being one the FARC’s top two leaders, was an advocate for peace. He was one of the principle negotiators of the previous peace talks (1998-2002) under former President Andres Pastrana, trying to bring five decades of fighting to an end.
He also led a mission of FARC guerrillas on a special trip through Europe, along with government officials, to raise awareness and funds for a post-conflict Colombia.
However, when Uribe took office in 2002 the peace talks crumbled, the new president determined to crush the guerrillas rather than negotiate. That same year, the military took over an area of 42,000 kilometers and a US$2.7 million bounty was put on Reyes’ head.
The guerrilla leader took refuge in the jungle region of Putumayo, and crossed the border into Ecuador where he and his crew were eventually found and targeted.
The 2008 bombardment also killed over a dozen other people in Reyes’ camp, most of whom were other guerrilla combatants.
Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa condemned the attack and confirmed that Colombian war planes had entered into Ecuador’s territory, followed by ground troops who came by helicopter to collect Reyes’ body and bring it back to Colombia before the FARC could give him an honorable burial.
Today, Reyes is a divisive figure. For supporters, the rebel leader is a symbol of resistance against the oppression of the Colombian state. For the army, Reyes’ killing was considered one of their most important victories against the left-wing guerrillas.
In 2012, after Uribe left office, the FARC and the Colombian government renewed peace negotiations under the administration of President Juan Manuel Santos, who was the Secretary of Defense at the time Reyes was killed. The two sides are closer than ever to reaching a final peace deal and expected to sign an agreement by their self-imposed deadline of March 23.
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Political prisoner of the FARC Jhon Jairo Moreno Hernandez died because the Colombian government headed by the Ministry of Justice not only refused his release but also failed to comply with the commitment to make health brigades to know the health status and authorize treatment of political prisoners sick.
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Prompt Rectification is Required
Not for the moment affect hope for peace. Invigorating necessary prudence and confidence, it is what suits the supreme good of peace.
By Ruben Zamora, a guerrilla of the FARC-EP
Among the actions that the government should rectify promptly, is the mass capture of peasants by military units in the departments of Meta and Huila, just to give two examples. In La Uribe, Meta, in early December, the army captured thirteen peasants without any evidence. The front men, of which they are accused, is a crude hoax to expel residents of a territory historically occupied, which rightfully belongs to them, but still they are lands of the nation, as required by law.
Reasonably, what should the state do with those families, it is formalizarles the property as established in the agreement Comprehensive Rural Reform for a new Colombian countryside.
the same operation performed against farmers in the municipality of La Macarena, Meta, supposedly to recover allegedly illegally appropriated by the FARC EP lands of the nation is replicated in La Uribe. And if so, would the dialogue table space to address that issue, as others have occurred in reason and in the context of internal armed conflict. A serious partner in a process as delicate as this, in which the fate of the country is defined addresses issues related to the armed conflict with extreme caution and, even more, to avoid causing new victims. Who will answer for the remaining homeless caught up legally? They have not thought that respond affected by families, especially children? And they tell them what their rights?
So the alleged illegal appropriation of land by the FARC EP has no logical handle. These farmers are being re-victimized by the state after decades of neglect. Depriving them of freedom is an illegitimate and unconstitutional, is inconsistent with the need to move towards reconciliation and peace and institutional obligations under Title I, more precisely Articles 2 and 5, and enshrining Title II, chapter I and II of the constitutional Charter, which refers to fundamental rights.
We have always jealously care of this territory up to life itself, so it means for the nation and for the communities living there. We have made efforts to ensure that the agricultural frontier is not extended, taking care of the Natural Parks of Chiribiquete, Tinigua, La Macarena, Los Picachos, and Sumapaz. Not that we claim this land as a heritage of the insurgency, but as ecosystems which must be preserved for the benefit of humanity.
And we should have prioritized this area for Comprehensive Rural Reform, by the conditions of extreme poverty in their communities live, by abandonment to have been submitted by the State and by the intensity and the effects of the social and armed conflict. But it is happening quite the contrary, has been prioritized for oil holdings, the prosecution of innocent and provocations by the security forces. Since we declared the unilateral ceasefire intensified military operations, the entry of food, medicine and other supplies, especially against guerrilla units that we are preparing for the challenges of reconciliation and peace is controlled.
It is annoying that these arbitrary practices of the F.F. M.M. occur under the ministry of Luis Carlos Villegas. It can not be denied that his appointment to high office caused great expectation and hope for peace. He had been part of the government delegation at the talks in Havana, where he worked alongside delegates our long hours, trying to build agreement on the point of comprehensive agricultural development. He was one of those who in many difficult moments helped to find ways of settlement.
Today we must say that these dynamics of the state through the Attorney General and the armed forces are an offense to human dignity and goodwill of peace. No help create confidence in the possibility of a return to civilian life, who is absent from hatred of the counterparty and certainly bloodstains inside our guerrilla force.
Colombian military forces are obliged to provide us with trust and certainty that will not be repeated as painful as those the country has experienced episodes. This corresponds to dismantle the doctrines, legislation and counterinsurgency structures and implement a sovereign and humanist military doctrine, encouraged by dynamics of reconciliation.
Hopefully the general report to the Minister Villegas our clandestine stations and overall our rebel troops, in response to the fences and locks to the entry of food by the military brigades, sent them both sent messages calling on them to respect the unilateral ceasefire and reconciliation. And make no mistake, there is no question of military weakness but of belief in the need to achieve a stable and lasting peace.
Not for the moment affect hope for peace. Invigorating necessary prudence and confidence, it is what suits the supreme good of peace.
Colombia mountains
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GUERRILLA A PRISONER TO PRESIDENT SANTOS
Good thing in this correspondence we could give free rein to our desire for peace with social justice and Continue feeding dreams finally see finished this fratricidal war among the children of our beloved Colombia. The reality for our fighters in prison is frustrating, as you talk peace, torture, hatred and political revenge systematically by those increases from the institutions believe they have patent to continue to act with impunity as they have for decades agents and INPEC officials.
Sorry Mr. President, that our complaints are not taken into account to order to suspend the systematic campaign of torture, hatred and revenge that are applying ourselves by order of the military doctrine that violate us from regional and local addresses with senior military commanders army and police. They seem not to have been heard by you. We insist on the violent confrontation carried out by officials of INPEC, as does the GRI, the CORES, and a dashboard with paramilitary soul. They humiliate us with counter-insurgency viciousness and offer money to third parties Garrotera, stab or simply to make them life impossible for our prisoners.
We quote what happened on December 25 in jail in Arauca, where the way to celebrate you christmas our prisoners, was humiliating to our children and family, votándoles food and trampling the time of admission, later to departure, undertake violently against prisoners patio N. 2, leaving hitherto known balance between 25 and 30 companions tortured and wounded by GRI staff, plus 10 comrades moved and uprooted from their familias.También wounded in Arauca prison the sergeant Morelo INPEC and dragoon Camargo who profess visceral hatred of political prisoners and the insurgency.
Once again we request order the suspension and investigation of torturers agents and dashboards GRI INPEC committed human rights violations Mr. President.
Even in the worst conditions of captivity, our struggle for respect for human rights of the prison population grows stronger. Despite the agreement and progress in the peace talks, within the same institutions they are the forces of a sector of paramilitarism which has also embedded in the INPEC, through senior military and police officers. They act as assistant directors and directors of the centers, especially in maximum restrictions to apply ourselves its counter-insurgency military doctrine, as developed by the own General Brigadier Jorge Luis Ramirez Aragon, current General Director of INPEC. Yesterday, as he in his speech, delivered the message of Christmas, their numbers selectively, they brought from their cells, one by one the guerrillas where they had already been gassed, to be tortured with electric shocks through beaten paths with which they were awoken who as a result of discharges, fell asphyxiated by private or pepper spray in completely defenseless.
Weary of such ignominy and not having a serious response by the Minister of Justice, we are ready to face them to keep watching trampled the dignity of our guerrilla and guerrilla prisoners.
I know what it means for our security to make public this letter, we know historically what they have done and are able to do the executioners raging guerrilla prisoners.
For the dignity of prisoners and prison guerrillas National Movement,
MURILLO TULIO AVILA
POLITICAL POW FARC-EP
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The puzzle of paramilitarism in Colombia
Paramilitarism is a state policy that has since its inception a mission that has not changed.
By Maria Aurelian Buendia
Guerrilla of the FARC-EP
The first condition to enter some light on this puzzle, is fair play. That means act honestly, with loyalty, respect towards the opponent or against the enemy or against the victims, why not. Expect these qualities appear in the State or government, it Sounds impossible!
For lack of these qualities and many personal and social others, such as democracy, justice, equality, is that the state in Colombia resorted to literally assemble the jigsaw puzzle, broken-arms, broken-leg-breaking wills , scabs, break-protests, break-opposition … and now the government (this and all previous) check the story that does not know or no as to disassemble the puzzle and break-of-all who armed with both ” success”. Worse, they have little courage to say that the paramilitary phenomenon no longer exists and never was a state policy. I have a very brief account here that proves otherwise:
In February 1962 Colombia visited the General Yarborough, director of research at the Special Warfare School at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, USA In elSuplemento Secret elaborated later, reads: “a team should be established now in that country, to select civilian and military personnel for clandestine training in operations of repression, they should be required in after This should be done in order to develop. a military civic structure fished in the event that the internal security system of Colombia deteriorate further. This structure will be used to press the changes we know, they are going to need to put into action functions counter-agents and against -propaganda and, insofar as necessary, to promote sabotage and / or terrorist activities against known paramilitary supporters of communism. the United States should support this. ”
On April 9, 1969, elReglamento was adopted Combat Counterinsurgency, prepared by the Army Command, which reads: “Organize in military form to the civilian population to be protected against the action of the guerrillas and support implementation combat operations … According to the objective sought, the civilian population can be organized in two ways: a) As defense Committee b) As civil defense … “the Board self-defense is a military-type organization that is made with staff civil selected from the combat zone, which is trained and equipped to undertake operations against guerrilla groups threatening the area or to operate in coordination with troops combat actions … the board of self-defense can be organized in areas where there have been presented problems of violence, to prevent the formation of armed groups, or where they have destroyed insurgent movements to give capacity to the same civilian population to reject them if resubmission … the organization of self-defense committees should be done with individuals chosen and in areas where there is the absolute certainty that no major problems with training and weapons delivery … a network of self-defense committees, controlled by the military command is presented, represents a powerful tool for the defense of nation against external or internal attacks. Your organization must, therefore, be under the military unit at all times … ”
In 1979 the Army published the book “General Instructions for Counter-Guerrilla Operations”. He says: “Organization of self-defense groups at village level and sidewalks so that residents of the area contribute actively in the fight.”
On July 20, 1980, five members of the Intelligence and Counterintelligence Battalion “Charry Solano” Army officer, denounced the constitution of the paramilitary terrorist group called “Triple A” by their bosses. The military claim that they are all “officials serving military intelligence for several years … to precisely the army which we serve for many years with determination and sacrifice, doing illegal things, making crimes by higher orders, ranging since the kidnapping, torture, terrorism, even murder to supposedly defend the state, and nowadays pursued by those superiors who ordered do such things. ”
“War of counterinsurgency, also called counter-revolutionary or anti-subversive, is one that holds the government supported by a large portion of the population: in 1987, in elReglamento Combat Counterinsurgency, War Counterinsurgency well defined a civil country, using actions of a political, economic, psychological, sociological, military type paramilitary against insurgent forces to prevent or eliminate the revolutionary process and ensure that no show again … ”
On 1 November 1989 he was captured Army Lieutenant Luis Antonio Meneses Báez, who presented confessions of the national structure of para militarism. Meneses Baez says that the commanders of the XIV Brigade and Battalion Bárbula linked him to the Autodefensas de Puerto Boyaca in 1981, being an Army officer and states that “The peasant self-defense groups … are a government policy to fight against subversion.” He says that later the Second Brigade, based in Barranquilla, entrusted the creation of other “self-defense” in southern Bolivar and the B-2 Brigade was a bridge between the “self-defense” and military hierarchies. He claims that in 1987, “military intelligence headed by Charry Solano Battalion, brought together the movements of peasant self-defense under its control and to do a meeting with regional leaders on the premises of Charry, where a National Board Self-Defense emerged was organized, composed of approximately 8 regional leaders whose role was to promote and coordinate system Autodefensas with the Army intelligence operations … “Baez says:” Until the beginning of 1989 contacts were made with the Staff of the Army and currently used intermediaries … ”
On January 4, 1994 the newspaper La Prensa, Bogota, published verbatim confessions made by Carlos David López Segura Maquillón and Saul Palace, members of the Network Intelligence 07 Navy. Networks, and in particular the 07 functioned as criminal structures to murder, massacre, disappear, attack and threaten members of popular organizations, opposition political parties and human rights defenders, journalists, etc.
On December 4, 1995 in the prison of Palmira, the paramilitary leader Alonso de Jesus Baquero Agudelo activity refers Israeli mercenaries in training paramilitaries in the Middle Magdalena in 1987-88. His promoter was General Farouk Yanine Diaz, who wanted a more offensive paramilitary force. The course, taught by four Israelis, lasted two months and was present at the closing ceremony, next to the drug lords, a delegate of the Ministry of Defence Colonel and was apparently the Secretary of the Ministry.
In another inquest the same paramilitary Baquero said, “at that time there was eagerness to get the guerrillas out of the entire Middle Magdalena and the military arranged for us to us to do what they could not do was kill people and commit massacres. it is that if the Prosecution recalls in years 86, 87, 88 and 89 showed a lot of people dead and another missing in Puerto Boyaca, in Puerto Nare, La Sierra, Puerto Berrio, Cimitarra, Puerto Parra, San Rafael de Chucurí and in Barrancabermeja, and family or give any reason why the paramilitaries were responsible for that but commanded and supported by the army. ”
Narra Baquero what they did in “Palo de Mango” Puerto Zambito, Scimitar: “Beyond talk of” picalesco “is tearing the person by joints, remove their hands, head, feet, he removed the intestines and cast the body aside, this is done in order to not appear floating down the river, and at that site, where ever people were killed because it is at that site the river hits the front and the water is diverted to Antioquia it is like a whirlpool, then the site is provided so that no trace because the current is strong. ”
On February 13, 1998 a paramilitary of Brown or ACCU, had that had been trained in the fincaLas Thongs, with 15 instructors among whom there was “a gringo”. The training had the “courage test” that went like this: “dismember a person off his head, take an arm, put people brought from outside, every 15 days had like 7 or 8 people and threw in the field . they took to train a person and carried there and they said to one who has to take the arm or crack it alive, to me they sent me one to take his arm and opened it, it was in 1994 “.
On 29 November 2000 the paramilitary organization “La Terraza” publishes a letter to President Pastrana, in her claim that the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia -AUC- maintain ties with Army Commander General Jorge Enrique Mora Rangel, and the General Harold Bedoya Pizarro. (This count continued …)
There are all pieces of the puzzle: para militarism is a state policy that has since its inception a mission that has not changed: the elimination of all thought or ideological position, establish terror to anyone protesting that capital gains are guaranteed.
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With dirty war and para-militarism we shall never achieve peace
RELEASE
We inform the community of Guamocó and around in the general area of Puerto Claver in the Bagre our organization is strongly confronting criminal structures and paramilitary gangs that have shown no mercy against the humble people of these regions.
As far this year the farmers have been murdered 20 years Jair Suarez and Francisco Moreno 84, joining a 5 farmers more missing finalized and December. In the village of El Coral they kidnapped and threatened its inhabitants for more than 20 hours. Have been harassed residents of the villages of La Llana, holy people, moqui, Pisingo, Spring, Santa Rosa, Caño Ñeque, La Arenosa, Ralito and Customs who have been displaced to Puerto Claver and El Bagre.
Nowhere the voice of the Church denouncing these facts, nor the mass media or the Red Cross or human rights defenders is heard. Little has made the security forces to prevent these abuses become public knowledge paramilitary deployment that make from their camps in Cuturu.
The extorsivo paramilitarism tissue extends over the population under the infamous principle that “everyone should contribute something.” There are houses down with armed structures that tax compromising the economies of small and medium businesses, grocers, drugstores, pumps and gas stations, hardware stores and spare parts, miners, traders of food, peasant growers of coca leaf and all type of activity that the local paramilitary groups consider source of income to support their criminal structures, including threats to human rights defenders, land claimants and popular leaders.
The government and its spokesmen in the Dialogue should understand that may not be the transformation of an armed organization open to debate in public places, ideas and visions of the country’s political movement without weapons, if the state paramilitary can not unmount disguised as a criminal gang.
With all known historical examples of treachery and killings Colombia political opposition can not tolerate victimization by the state. Paramilitarism has been the most effective mechanism they have used in their counterinsurgency struggle. It’s time to clarify and initiate the complete dismantling of the paramilitary phenomenon.
And an organized communities rise up, speak out and demand the withdrawal of their territories who both damage and terror have caused them; only then will it be possible to sow the seeds of peace and justice we deserve.
Mobilize and around the final end of the conflict and the extermination of the causes that originated it. War or peace are issues that concern us all Colombians and we are obliged to speak out. With dirty war and paramilitarism we never achieve peace.
Company Gerardo Guevara
Magdalena Medio Bloc FARC – EP
Northeast Mountains Antioqueño
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