COLOMBIA'S CENTER CANNOT HOLD

While networks air up-to-the-minute updates on the crisis in the Middle
East, a country right in America's backyard is falling apart with scant
notice from the media.

Colombia's most powerful and brutal narco-terrorist group, known as the
FARC, announced Tuesday it was dropping out of cease-fire talks with the
Colombian government. And it is no wonder. Although President Bill Clinton
approved a $1.3 billion aid plan earlier this year to help Colombia respond
to the growing narco-terrorist and paramilitary threat, only a very small
portion of that money has reached Colombia.

In addition, the Colombian military is demonstrating a distressing
ineptitude in countering the escalating problem. Lawmakers who are
traditionally hawkish on Colombia are expressing grave doubts that a large
aid package could offset the military's increasingly glaring incompetence.

Recently, forces of the Colombian army attacked each other in Sierra Nevada
de Santa Marta, which is near Bogota, while members of one battalion were
trying to lend support to another battalion. Since coordinating troops is
one of the military's many weak points, the battalions started firing at
each other. A total of four troops were killed and three were severely
wounded before the mistake was realized. Astonishingly, the army high
command has shrugged off the error, saying only it could have been much worse.

Even more worrisome is the FARC's siege of the Putamayo, a department in
southern Colombia with a population of about 350,000. Although a total of
about 24,000 troops, including the army's counter-narcotics brigade, are
located in and around Putumayo, they have not been able to protect the
citizens there, noted Rep. Dan Burton, chairman of the Government Reform
and Oversight Committee, in a statement. The FARC has effectively built a
blockade around the region for almost two months, restricting the passage
of desperately needed food, medicine and fuel. The Colombian national
police has been the only government organization to consistently fly
supplies into the area.

All these gaffes prove that the U.S. aid package should have allocated more
resources to the Colombian police, which were appropriated only about $99.5
million of the $1.3 billion package. The police's counter-narcotics team
has proved to be highly effective in combating the drug scourge in Colombia
and hasn't had a single credible human rights violation leveled against it.
The military, on the other hand, has been unable to meet the human rights
criteria outlined in the U.S. aid plan. Mr. Clinton signed a waiver of
these criteria in order to free the small amount of aid that has been sent
to Colombia.

Interestingly, human rights groups and a number of Republican lawmakers
have reached common ground on the aid package. In a hearing before the Drug
Policy, Criminal Justice, and Human Resources Subcommittee of the
Government Reform Committee in late October, Andrew Miller, acting advocacy
director for Latin America and the Caribbean for Amnesty International,
said that his organization would support the aid package if the funds were
destined for the police rather than the military. Mr. Burton has
articulated a similar position. "Absent a significant shift in the
distribution of Plan Colombia aid to the [Colombian police], I am doubtful
Plan Colombia will do anything more than waste Colombian Army and Police
lives, as well as U.S. taxpayer's money . . . Unfortunately, the
administration has blindly forged ahead to provide a lion's share of the
assistance to the Colombian army," said Mr. Burton's statement.

The delay in restoring peace to Colombia is costing many thousands of
lives. The U.S. government should heed the concerns of human rights
organizations and lawmakers and restructure U.S. aid immediately.