HELP COLOMBIA

Out of national self-interest, as well as humanitarian concerns, America
should step up its aid to the Colombian government to suppress
narco-guerrillas (mostly the leftist FARC, but there are right- wingers,
too). The disorder in Colombia has powerful ripple effects here -- in
illegal immigration, drugs and potential terrorism.

In particular, we ought to continue to help President Andres Pastrana's
government recapture a FARC-controlled "safe haven" he granted them for a
while in southern Colombia that has been used as base for an accelerating
number of violent acts against civilians nationwide, with massacres,
kidnappings and hijackings, financed by stepped-up drug trafficking.

It bears noting that FARC has links with terrorists abroad. Indeed, U.S.
intelligence officials believe that the FARC's new campaign of urban
terrorism involves techniques learned from three Irish Republican Army
agents arrested in Bogota last fall.

The FARC has used peace talks as a delaying and distracting tactic while it
builds up its forces. There is no indication that FARC leaders actually
want peace in Colombia if peace means a democratic government. Indeed, the
last month saw almost 200 armed attacks after President Pastrana offered
the FARC a cease-fire. The attacks have included hijacking a plane carrying
the president of the Colombian Senate's peace commission!

In short, the FARC must be eliminated.

At the same time, as the Colombian military seeks to pacify the FARC
sanctuary, Bogota must act to ensure that right-wing paramilitaries don't
use that as an opportunity to attack the civilians in the former haven, or
otherwise wreak more mayhem. Such right-wing groups have probably killed
far more people over the years than the FARC.

Meanwhile, Americans should remember that much of the financing of
Colombia's seemingly endless war comes from the insatiable thirst for drugs
here.