On February 1, 2017, two months after the signing of the definitive peace agreement, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) filled the Colombian people with hope with the beginning of the demobilization, which would entail putting an end to a conflict that had already lasted more than half a century. But this new reality, far from taking hold, is currently going backwards due to the accelerated growth of dissidents and their recurrent attacks.
To achieve the pact and start with the demobilization, the negotiations took at least four years. It was during the government of Juan Manuel Santos (2010-2018) when the now ex-FARC, led by Rodrigo Londoño, alias Timochenko, signed it on September 26, 2016 in Havana, with Cuba and Norway as guarantors.
How was the demobilization?
The ceasefire entered into force on August 29, almost a month before the signing of the peace agreement, but in 2017 the doors were opened to the political participation of the members of the FARC and the demobilization and delivery of weapons began, pick up CNN.
demobilization consisted of going to rural areas (villages) from the departments of Cesar, Norte de Santander, Antioquia, La Guajira, Chocó, Córdoba (north), Tolima, Meta (center), Nariño, Putumayo, Caquetá (south), Arauca, Guaviare and Guainía (east) to hand over their weapons and begin the transition to legal life.
It was determined that all the weapons that the FARC would deliver, under the verification of the United Nations, would be destined for construction of three monuments in New York, Cuba and Colombia. Disarmament was developed in two stages, called “arms control and laying down of arms”.
Once each member handed in his weapon, he had access to training in productive tasks, leveling in basic primary, secondary or technical education, according to his own interests, identification days and other preparation activities for reintegration into the civilian life.
Until 2020, 13,394 members of the FARC had demobilized, 10,293 men and 3,101 women, according to data from the United Nations Verification Mission in Colombia.
However, Not all FARC combatants agreed to the pact. Even since 2017, guerrilla fronts did not accept demobilization and became dissidents; These factions do not receive any of the benefits of the peace agreement and continue to be considered actors outside the law. EFE.
Along with the demobilization, in the same year 2017 The Common Alternative Revolutionary Force (FARC) political party was born, which in 2021 changed its name to be the Comunes party.
With its political organization, the former guerrilla managed, on July 20, 2018, that eight peace signatories occupied seats for the first time in the Colombian Congress, despite the fact that they generated a tense atmosphere and at the beginning they were received with shouts from other legislators. , who accused them of being murderers.
The peace agreement established that the party has access to a bench of ten seats for two legislative periods (2018 and 2022): five in the Senate and five in the House of Representatives. Comunes will have a presence in Congress in this year’s elections despite the fact that the polls have not forgiven him for half a century of war. In 2018 they achieved just 85,000 votes, refers The country.
Dissident attacks
At the same time that the demobilization process was being carried out, the dissidents continued to attack and the Colombian armed conflict, whose end they proclaimed five years ago, persists and intensifies in different parts of the country.
In 2017, dissidents kidnapped a UN official in Colombia, and In 2019, veteran FARC guerrillas alias Iván Márquez, Jesús Santrich, El Paisa and Romaña appeared in a video announcing that they were going to dissidence and that they would take up arms again.
Attacks by illegal armed groups have multiplied in almost the entire country, but the situation is particularly delicate in the departments of Cauca (southwest) and Arauca (east), and in the Catatumbo regions, bordering Venezuela; Bajo Cauca Antioquia (northwest) and South Pacific.
According to a report from last August by the Peace & Reconciliation (Peers) Foundation, the Post-FARC Armed Groups have grown rapidly in the places where the former guerrillas operated and, although it is not known how many thousands of men they have under arms, they already operate in 138 municipalities in the country, articulated in two large organizations.
One is the one directed by alias Gentil Duarte, consolidated in the southwest; and the other is the so-called Second Marquetalia, led by alias Iván Márquez.
In addition, there is a third category, made up of smaller groups, which Pares calls “dispersed” and which act mainly in the southern region of the Pacific coast.
The Government holds these dissidences responsible for a large part of the crimes of social leaders and demobilized FARC members, the most recent of which occurred this Sunday in Saravena (Arauca), where Juvenal Ballén Gómez, the 300th victim among the former guerrillas and the first this year, according to the Institute of Studies for Development and Peace (Indepaz).
Origin of the FARC
The origin of the extinct guerrilla goes back to the military dictatorship of Gustavo Rojas Pinilla (1953-1957). After the return of liberals and conservatives, the two most important guerrilla groups in Colombia were created in 1964: the FARC and the National Liberation Army (ELN). Its founder and leader was Pedro Antonio Marín, alias Manuel Marulanda or Tirofijowho died on March 26, 2008, of a heart attack.
The area where the FARC was born was Tolima, a rural region that saw a lot of violence and the rise of self-defense communities. In the following decades they did not stop growing; they had their peak in 2008, and it is believed that they had up to 35,000 members.
Among his most remembered acts is the kidnapping of former presidential candidate Íngrid Betancourt, who was in captivity between 2002 and 2008; In addition to a series of crimes and attacks against different sectors and inhabitants of the country, it includes Time.
The FARC came at the time to entrench themselves in large territories, also resorted in different periods to drug trafficking to finance themselves and came to be designated as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union. (I)
Source: Eluniverso
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