COLOMBIANS WANT NEGOTIATIONS

Andres Pastrana's election Sunday as president of Colombia is one more
pointer in the direction of peace negotiations as the only solution to the
country's 40-year-old civil war. The U.S. should heed the signs and get
with the momentum for talks with the two guerrilla fronts and freeze
additional aid to Colombia's military.

The message from Colombia's voters was clear: They voted for a candidate
whose representative had met with a leader of the guerrillas shortly before
the election and who promised, if elected, to seek direct talks with the
insurgents within a week.

Pastrana's victory also signals a desire to break with the government of
President Ernesto Samper, crippled by allegations of links with the Cali
drug cartel. In fact, Pastrana's opponent in the Sunday election, the
Liberal Party's Horacio Serpa, was a close ally of Samper.

Adding to the clamor for negotiations, the Catholic Church has called a
national assembly for peace on the weekend before Pastrana's inauguration
Aug. 7.

No one expects a quick end to a conflict that resembles scorpions fighting
endlessly in a jar: Two guerrilla fronts, the official military, plus
paramilitary units fighting for whomever hires them, whether
narcotraffickers, landowners or even the military.

The United States' recent role in this bloody morass, however, has been to
pump money and equipment into the Colombian military--supposedly to fight
the narcotraffickers--despite growing evidence it is used to combat the
guerrillas. Total U.S. anti-drug aid to the army and police increased from
$28.8 million in 1995 to nearly $100 million last year. Voices in Congress
and the Pentagon argue for even more aid.

This is a foolish spiral in U.S. policy. Reinforcing and egging on a
military that has been accused of myriad human-rights abuses--and with no
prospects whatever of winning the war against the guerrillas or the
narcotraffickers--makes no sense.

Washington should instead use aid as a lever to pressure the military and
the government to come together with the guerrillas and do what the people
of Colombia most obviously want them all to do--negotiate for peace.

Checked-by: (Joel W. Johnson)