DEAL RESCUES COLOMBIA PEACE TALKS

Bogota, Colombia - Averting a new cycle of fighting, Colombian
guerrilla fighters and the country's president struck an eleventh-hour
deal Monday to revive talks to end a 38-year-old war.

Colombians had been bracing for the total collapse of shaky peace
negotiations started by the guerrillas and President Andres Pastrana
three years ago.

The president had set a Monday night deadline for the guerrillas to
agree on terms to talk again --- or vacate a large region in southern
Colombia that Pastrana ceded to the rebels as a safe haven when talks
were launched.

Army troops were poised to move into the region had the deadline been
missed.

The rebels, known as the FARC --- Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia --- are Latin America's oldest Marxist insurgency. Several
months ago, the rebels complained that the Colombian army was flying
over the safe zone and setting up roadblocks.

On Monday, after marathon sessions with a United Nations envoy, the
FARC accepted government guarantees that it would respect their safe
haven. In return, the rebel group agreed to abide by earlier vows to
refrain from kidnappings and violence against civilians.

European and Latin American diplomats helped hammer out the agreement
just hours before the deadline.

After the agreement was announced, radio stations celebrated, playing
salsa music and Colombia's national anthem.

Diplomats from Canada, Cuba, Spain, France, Italy, Mexico, Norway,
Sweden, Switzerland and Venezuela applauded the deal they helped
forge. The group of diplomats, which did not include U.S.
representatives, "firmly supports a negotiated political solution to
the Colombian conflict and is urging that at this difficult point all
that's necessary be done to deepen this effort," according to a
statement by French Ambassador Daniel Parfait.

Pastrana was to go on television later Monday night to brief
Colombians about the deal.

Earlier in the day, he sounded tough and ready to order the military
into the safe haven. "One day they'll understand you never enter the
hearts of the people with force," Pastrana said.

In recent years, the FARC has built a formidable army of 17,000 to
18,000 fighters. It has raised funds from terrorist kidnappings,
"taxed" or extorted funds from businesses and, it is widely suspected,
protected farmers that raise coca leaves and engaged in cocaine
trafficking.

In May, Colombians will elect a new president. The candidate of
Pastrana's Conservative Party --- Juan Camilo Restrepo --- praised
Monday's deal.

"After these terrible ups and downs that have been going on, not only
is [the process] still alive, it's been given psychological conditions
to advance with more clarity," Restrepo said.

The rebels had said they would willingly vacate cities in the haven
and flee to the hills. But many Colombians were bracing for war
between the rebels and soldiers, who had massed by the thousands on
the edge of the safe haven.

The rebel-controlled enclave south of Bogota is about the size of
Switzerland. The area has been wracked by violence despite the peace
talks, with paramilitary groups and guerrillas both killing innocent
civilians.

The FARC as well as human rights organizations have criticized
Colombia's military, accusing it of allowing paramilitary groups to
run amuck.

U.S. relations with Colombia are sensitive and focus on the fight
against drug trafficking.

In 2000, the United States authorized nearly $1 billion in military
aid to Colombia to combat cocaine production and trafficking. The aid
is not supposed to be used to battle the insurgency, but some
observers said such a pledge would be hard to keep if full-scale war
were to erupt.

With roots stretching back four decades, the FARC has survived leftist
rebel groups in other countries, such as El Salvador and Nicaragua,
that flourished among impoverished peasants.

In Bogota, Colombia's capital, some polls showed Colombians had little
faith in the peace negotiations and mostly blamed the FARC for
recalcitrance. In a survey conducted by Colombia's largest radio
chain, Caracol, 70 percent of 775 people polled said neither side
should bother with a last-ditch effort to save the talks.

But inside and near the area the rebels control, residents were
frightened that they would be targeted as rebel sympathizers. Human
rights groups were concerned that anti-rebel paramilitary groups that
protect landowners would unleash a bloodbath against civilians if the
rebels left the zone.

"Don't walk away from the table," said Carlos Silva, a resident of the
rebel zone who was holding a white flag as he was interviewed by
Colombian television.