ENEMIES OF THE STATE, WITHOUT AND WITHIN

Colombia's Conflicts:

Colombia's Terrorists May Lack Global Reach, But That Makes Them No Easier
To Defeat--As A Lurid Murder And A Damning Human-Rights Report Make Clear

BOGOTA -- For the past three years, President Andres Pastrana's government
has tried to put an end to Colombia's murderous civil conflicts with a
two-track strategy. On the one hand, Mr Pastrana has opened peace talks with
the FARC guerrillas. To do so, he has withdrawn the security forces from a
large swathe of mountainous jungle in the south, creating a "demilitarised"
zone. On the other hand, the government has sought international support to
strengthen the armed forces, making efforts to improve their behaviour. On
both counts, Mr Pastrana was this week dealt setbacks.

On September 29th, the body of Consuelo Araujo, formerly Mr Pastrana's
culture minister, was found in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada de Santa
Marta, six days after she had been kidnapped by the FARC's Caribbean front.
Her captors appear to have shot her several times at close range, as they
fled from army troops. The wife of a senior government law officer, Mrs
Araujo was the founder of the country's most important folklore festival.
She was a well-known personality, as well as being a close friend of many
people prominent in politics and the arts. Colombians have been outraged by
her murder. Thousands turned out for her funeral.

On the same day, the FARC used mines and troops to stop Horacio Serpa, the
Liberal who the polls say is the frontrunner to become president next year,
from leading a march of some 4,000 supporters into the supposedly
demilitarised zone (known to Colombians as the despeje). That made a mockery
of the government's claim that civil and political rights still applied in
the FARC controlled zone.

Most Colombians have lost patience with peace talks that have produced no
significant agreements, while the FARC, with around 18,000 fighters,
continues its military campaign across the country. Even so, Mr Pastrana had
been expected to announce this week the renewal of the despeje until the end
of his mandate. A small committee set up by the president and Manuel
Marulanda, the FARC's leader, last week proposed a six-month ceasefire
during which the two sides would discuss reforms to be put to a constituent
assembly, and the guerrillas would be paid to stop kidnapping. But now Mr
Pastrana faces pressure to scrap the enclave, and also therefore the talks,
unless the FARC agrees to an unconditional ceasefire.

The United States, which last year granted $1.3 billion in mainly military
aid to Colombia, has hitherto given unenthusiastic backing to the talks.
After the September 11th attacks, some Colombians expect a tougher line. The
FARC, together with the smaller ELN guerrilla group, is on the United
States' official list of "foreign terrorist organisations". But so, too,
since last month, are the right-wing paramilitaries of the United
Self-Defence Forces of Colombia (AUC). They are responsible for more
civilian deaths than the guerrillas, many of them in massacres aimed at
clearing alleged guerrilla sympathisers from rural areas. On October 2nd,
paramilitary gunmen murdered a Liberal congressman.

In a report this week, Human Rights Watch, a New York-based group, details
the close links that continue to exist between the armed forces and the AUC.
Such accusations are not new; neither is the official rejoinder that they
are the actions of rogue individuals. But the report gives damning support
to the claims of critics that the paramilitaries operate as an unofficial
extra division of Colombia's army, and will thus embarrass the government.

Human Rights Watch investigated allegations against three army brigades (out
of 17 in total), each based in areas where the AUC is on the offensive, as
well as several police detachments. It found evidence that these units
"promote, work with, support, profit from and tolerate paramilitary groups,
treating them as a force allied to and compatible with their own".

One of the units is the 24th Brigade, based in Putumayo department, where
separate American-trained battalions are supporting a coca-eradication
campaign. According to evidence cited in the report, the soldiers and
paramilitaries operated jointly. The brigade's officers gave transport and
the use of barracks dormitories to the local AUC, and shared intelligence
with it as well as with American-trained troops. An accountant who worked
for the AUC told Human Rights Watch that the group had an annual budget of
$8m in Putumayo, most derived from taxing the cocaine business. She said the
AUC made payments of up to $3,000 a month to police and army officers (as
senior as colonels) in return for their collaboration.

Under Mr Pastrana, the army's top commanders have taken some steps against
the AUC, arresting some of its members. Some officers accused of links with
the paramilitaries have been sacked and, in one case, sentenced to
imprisonment. But such efforts have been ineffective in breaking the links,
says the report. Neither have they halted the AUC's rapid growth.

One of Mr Pastrana's achievements has been to involve outsiders in trying to
settle Colombia's conflicts. But despite his courageous efforts, the peace
process now inspires almost as little confidence abroad as it does at home.
And none of the Colombian groups has been mentioned by American officials as
being among the terrorist organisations "with global reach" that have become
the prime target of the United States since September 11th. Unless the
government takes more resolute steps to curb the paramilitaries as well as
the guerrillas, the United States' Congress may yet decide that American
money is better spent elsewhere.