DRUGS FUND MARXIST MINI-STATE

WOMEN guerrillas, armed and dressed in battle fatigues, guarded a roadblock
on the potholed gravel road leading to the cattle town of San Vicente del
Caguan.

They marked the gateway into a Marxist mini-state, which Colombia's largest
left-wing rebel group is carving from the peasant-populated,
cocaine-producing southern jungle regions.

"From here on, you are under the jurisdiction of the Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia (Farc) and subject to guerrilla regulations and taxes,"
a stern-faced "Comrade" Maria said as she leafed through the documents of a
crowded bus of farmers taking their produce to San Vicente.

"The Farc are the government here," a 16-year-old guerrilla, wearing a
T-shirt imprinted with the face of Che Guevara, reiterated. She demanded
that the bus driver pay the equivalent of pounds 13 in road tax and that
all the passengers buy a raffle ticket for an obligatory lottery organised
by the Farc. "This money will be used to build a Colombia equal for all,"
she declared, brandishing her AK47 machinegun.

We had entered the demilitarised zone, about the size of Switzerland, that
covers part of the southern states of Caqueta, Meta and Guaviare, which the
Government of President Pastrana handed over to the Farc guerrillas six
months ago in a conciliatory measure to lure them to peace talks.

The demilitarised region, joined with neighbouring jungle areas that have
been under guerrilla control for years, has placed what is the heartland of
cocaine production - it provides 80 per cent of the world's market - almost
entirely under the control of the Farc.

With the peace process now mired in a seemingly endless impasse, the
guerrillas have taken advantage and are making the zone into the base from
where to build their vision of a revolutionary utopia. In recent months,
they have regrouped, rearmed their cadres and widened their offensive
against army camps from inside the zone.

San Vicente del Caguan has turned into the capital of a showpiece
mini-state, where the Farc intends to run a Marxist regime on the back of
taxes on Colombia's most lucrative export - cocaine.

Military estimates say that the Farc has earned more than pounds 550
million in taxes imposed on drug-traffickers for protecting the coca leaf
cultivation zone. It also charges a fee for shooting down anti-narcotics
helicopters that try to raid the jungle laboratories that manufacture the
drug.

Fifty miles outside San Vicente, down a dusty road that cuts through
deforested cattle fields, a contingent of rebels guards an illegal runway,
where Cessna aircraft take off with cocaine cargoes. For each take-off, the
Farc makes pounds 1,200.

"We had to forgo one revolutionary ideal to achieve our ultimate idea of a
Marxist-run state," Commandant "Diego Velodrome" said. "Cocaine is a cancer
imposed on Colombia by the United States and we absolutely prohibit its use
in our regions, but since it is our country's major export, we cannot forgo
its lucrative income."

Thousands of peasants survive on the cultivation of coca used to make the
drug and the Farc cannot take this away from them, he said.

San Vicente is run on a strict regime and guerrillas patrol the town around
the clock to impose their rules. The central square in the town is filled
with signs outlining the Farc laws.

The effect is welcomed by many of San Vicente's 20,000 people. "This used
to be a den of vice and killings; since the rebels came, we live in peace
and order," Evert, a taxi driver, said.