Colombia Army Launches Major Attack on Rebels

by Yadira Ferrer

The airstrikes began after President Andres Pastrana announced Feb. 20 that he was breaking off the negotiations with the 17,000-strong FARC, the largest rebel group involved in Colombia's four-decades-old civil war. He gave the insurgents 12 hours to pull out of the enclave.

The first phase of the operation to recover the Switzerland-sized guerrilla safe haven in southern Colombia involved reconnaissance flights in the wee hours of the morning, overflights with attack helicopters that opened fire on targets like clandestine air strips, and the deployment of 6,000 of the 11,000 army troops to be mobilized for the offensive, which will take place by land, air and river.

In a nationally televised address, Pastrana called off the peace talks, which began in late 1998. The president said the FARC, who he labelled "terrorists," had "abused his good faith."

The collapse of the peace process occurred after alleged FARC rebels hijacked a plane carrying 30 passengers Feb. 20, forced it to land on a rural road, and kidnapped Senator Jorge Gechem, the president of the Senate Peace Commission, leaving the rest of the passengers and the crew stranded but safe.

The kidnappers also blew up a bridge, killing four civilians.

The president, who met for several hours with the military brass before announcing the end of the peace talks, showed army intelligence photos of more than 40 clandestine airstrips built by the guerrillas, plantations of drug crops, and cocaine processing labs in the insurgent enclave.

Colombia was hoping that the FARC would live up to the commitment it assumed on Jan. 22 to reach an agreement aimed at reducing the intensity of the armed conflict and protecting the civilian population, said Pastrana.

He complained, however, that the rebels instead stepped up their attacks and staged 117 "terrorist acts," including four car-bombs that killed 20 civilians, and the dynamiting of "33 electricity pylons, two oil pipelines and three bridges."

In a press release issued Feb. 21, the FARC held the Pastrana administration and the "intolerance of the oligarchy" that holds power in Colombia's two-party system responsible for the collapse of the peace talks.

According to the insurgents, "the government arbitrarily squashed the possibility" of making progress in the peace talks "when the meaty issues on the common agenda had already begun to be discussed."

The FARC and the government agreed on a common agenda for the peace talks in early 1999. But of the 12 points on the agenda, only "economic issues" had begun to be debated, and no concrete results had yet been reached.

Analyst Luis Valencia at the public National University told IPS that among the factors that led to the breakdown of the peace process were the pressure from military officers opposed from the start to the creation of the demilitarized zone, the latest attacks by the FARC, which exhausted the patience of the public, and the international scenario.

The FARC's escalation of attacks on electricity pylons and other targets essential to the civilian population was aimed at "demonstrating the guerrillas' strength" after the talks narrowly escaped a final rupture last month, said Valencia.

However, the incidents merely heightened public opposition to the rebels, he added.

In addition, the international campaign against terrorism headed by the United States since the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington "have changed the view" held by some sectors abroad, who saw the FARC as an organization fighting for social justice, said the analyst.

Furthermore, the post-Sept. 11 international climate strengthened the image of the armed forces and those opposed to peace talks, who accuse the guerrillas of "narco-terrorism."

"Tolerance for peace talks with an organization that Washington classifies as 'terrorist' was wearing thin," said Valencia.

The FARC, as well as the smaller National Liberation Army (ELN) and the paramilitary United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) are included on the U.S. State Department's list of 30 "terrorist" groups considered a threat to global security.

Sabas Pretelt, the president of the National Business Council, which represents the 30 main productive sectors of the Colombian economy, backed Pastrana's decision and called on the FARC "not to take reprisals against the civilian population."

Pretelt projected an increase in rebel activity, but said there should be no panic regarding the state of the economy of this South American country of 42 million, because "Colombians are used to working in the midst of the war."

In a communique, the AUC said the peace process broke down due to "the unreasonableness and barbarity" of the guerrillas. The outlawed paramilitary umbrella group predicted "a wave of terrorist actions" by the FARC "that will be intense the first month" and will later die down.

The breakdown of the talks began to be felt in the five municipalities or counties making up the rebel-controlled zone "amid a tense calm," said Mayor Javier Ortega of San Vicente del Cagu‡n, the town where the negotiations have been held for the past three years.

The arrival of the armed forces came as no surprise to the roughly 80,000 people living in the demilitarized area, he added, because the latest spate of guerrilla attacks made the failure of the talks a likely outcome.