wfn.org | NCC Group Visits War-Weary Colombia

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National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA
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NCC GROUP VISITS WAR-WEARY COLOMBIA, TALKS ABOUT PEACE

127NCC12/21/99
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

by John Filiatreau*

 BOGOTA, Colombia - Five peacemakers from the National 
Council of Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. (NCC) 
encountered very few optimists during a recent "listen-and-
learn" visit to war-torn Colombia. Even those who claimed to 
see a glimmer of hope for peace in the country said they saw 
it only dimly and in the far distance. 

 What the U.S. visitors did encounter in nearly everyone 
they met in Colombia was a near-universal dream of peace, an 
indistinct but warming vision of a more rewarding life that 
might ensue, if someone, someday, actually managed to stop 
the killing.

 By the end of their four-day excursion, the NCC 
visitors had come to feel that Colombia's national dream of 
peace - and its citizens' weariness of war - might be common 
ground enough to bring some of the warring parties to the 
table for talks. 

 The purpose of the tour was to learn whether the NCC 
can play a constructive role in facilitating communication 
among the parties in the nation's 35-year-long civil war, 
thereby advancing the cause of peace. The answer, in general 
if not in the details, was yes.

 An estimated 35,000 people have been killed in the 
conflict in just the past 10 years.

 In the NCC group's meetings with spokespeople for all 
sides in Colombia's long civil war, the principal topic of 
conversation was the prospect of peace after two generations 
of murder and mayhem. The interviews were uniformly 
disheartening.

 The top U.S. diplomat in Bogota said the making of 
peace "will be a long, long, long, long process." A foreign 
diplomat remarked that the combatants "are not in a hurry to 
make peace." A political activist in the capital commented, 
"Peace is not just around the corner."

 A Swedish diplomat, asked whether he could see any 
positive aspects of the situation in Colombia, came up with 
one: "The incredible resilience of the Colombian people, who 
somehow, in the midst of violence and terror, hang on to the 
dream of peace. They don't give up."

 In October 1997, 10 million Colombians - about a 
quarter of the population - went to the polls in a non-
binding election to express their desire for a peaceful end 
to the civil conflict. In October 1999, 12 million took to 
the streets to protest the continuing violence and to demand 
that the government and the guerrillas agree to a cease-
fire. Colombian President Andres Pastrana is said to have 
won last year's election because he managed to identify his 
candidacy with the people's dream of peace.

 The NCC team, led by Dr. Oscar McCloud, Pastor of Fifth 
Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York City, and coordinated 
by the Rev. Oscar Bolioli, director of the NCC's office for 
Latin America and the Caribbean, met with the U.S. 
ambassador in Bogota, Curtis Kamman; Msgr. Alberto Giraldo 
Jaramillo, president of the Roman Catholic Episcopal 
Conference of Colombia; Gen. Fernando Tapias, the commander 
of Colombia's armed forces; Dr. Jose F. Castro, the 
country's chief public defender and human-rights 
"ombudsman"; Bogota-based diplomats from Spain and Sweden, 
two countries with long experience in Colombia; the chiefs 
of United Nations missions in Colombia on human rights and 
on internal refugees; officials of the Revolutionary Armed 
Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the Army of National 
Liberation (ELN), the two largest guerrilla groups opposing 
the national government; and a group of more than 20 leaders 
in Colombia's civil society, including labor officials, 
educators and directors of non-government organizations 
(NGOs).

 Dr. Joan Brown Campbell, the NCC's general secretary, 
had been scheduled to lead the delegation, but became ill 
and was unable to travel to Bogota for the Nov. 29-Dec. 2 
tour. The participants, in addition to McCloud and Bolioli, 
were the Rev. Dr. Rafael Malpica-Padilla, program director 
for Latin America and the Caribbean of the Evangelical 
Lutheran Church in America; the Rev. Arturo M. Fernandez, a 
member of the General Board of Global Ministries of the 
United Methodist Church; and Samuel Lobato, a regional 
representative for Latin America of the NCC's Church World 
Service and Witness program. 

 Bolioli said the trip was an effort to capitalize on 
the "credibility" the NCC has achieved in Latin America 
without seeming to trump the efforts of local and regional 
religious organizations.

   "It was not and is not our intention to become directly 
involved in Colombian affairs," Bolioli said as the tour 
drew to a close. "We came here to try to open new channels 
of communication, to help Colombians work together better 
for peace. And I think we accomplished what we set out to 
do."

 The first conclusion drawn by the NCC group was that 
the more one learns about Colombia, the more confused one is 
apt to become.

 "We knew before we came that the situation here was 
very complicated," McCloud said after the second day of 
meetings, "and every conversation we've had so far has only 
reinforced that impression."

 "Sometimes even myself, I don't understand what's going 
on," Gen. Tapias admitted.

 The government, which says it wants peace and was 
elected on a peace platform, is fighting a hard-line Marxist 
guerrilla army, which says it too wants peace - but also 
demands "justice" (meaning, among other things, political 
and land-ownership reforms) for Colombia's campisanos, or 
peasants.

 The countless private armies known as "paramilitaries" 
or "self-defense forces" represent the country's wealthy 
landowners and blue-bloods, who profess to want peace, 
bitterly oppose land-reform and share-the-wealth proposals, 
and may or may not be allied with officers of the Colombian 
military. The Colombian military and these right-wing allies 
of theirs are said to be responsible for about three-
quarters of the "human-rights abuses" reported in Colombia.

 All these combatants have one thing in common - a 
steady and generous source of cash: The country's drug 
cartels, which make hundreds of millions of dollars a year 
selling cocaine, mostly to consumers in the United States, 
and want to continue doing business in relative peace, and 
therefore are happy to pay "taxes" and "protection money" to 
the forces that control various parts of Colombia through 
which the traffickers have to move "product."

 Gen. Barry McCaffrey, the head of the White House 
Office of National Drug Control Policy, says the "narco-
guerrillas" in Colombia - meaning FARC, ELN and the right-
wing paramilitary forces - together collect about $600 
million a year in tribute from the drug trade. (Although you 
wouldn't expect McCaffrey to say so, there is every reason 
to believe that the Colombian military exacts a similar 
toll.) McCaffrey has told reporters that differentiating 
between U.S. anti-drug and anti-guerrilla efforts in 
Colombia is "counterproductive."

 According to a study by the U.S. Embassy staff in 
Bogota, about half the guerrillas' income is from drug 
payoffs - but they make almost as much from kidnappings for 
ransom. (About 2,000 people have been kidnapped in Colombia 
this year.)

 Tapias, taking his cue from McCaffrey, said last month 
of FARC: "Not only do they levy a security tax, they are now 
selling coca paste to drug traffickers."

 When violence breaks out among the various standing 
armies in Colombia, the people most likely to be killed, 
injured and tortured are unarmed, peace-deprived peasants 
who have refused to join one of the armies, been accused of 
befriending "the enemy," or gotten caught in cross-fires. 
Until they are killed, many make a subsistence living by 
growing coca for sale to the drug cartels. They say that's 
the only way they can feed their families in the midst of 
Colombia's deepest recession in 70 years, with unemployment 
and inflation both above 20 percent.

 Tapias told his NCC visitors that 792 Colombians had 
been killed by guerrillas and 605 by paramilitaries in the 
first nine months of this year. Spokesmen for the public 
defender's office blamed "80 percent of the killings" on the 
paramilitaries, which they said also are largely responsible 
for the one million "displaced" Colombians who are refugees 
in their own country. They said government troops were often 
involved in the private armies' atrocities in the past, but 
are implicated less often today; they credit Tapias for 
getting rid of officers with close ties to the 
paramilitaries, which were outlawed in 1989.

The United States, which says it also wants peace in 
Colombia, has spent billions of tax dollars, and proposes to 
spend billions more, to help the Colombian government 
eradicate coca crops with toxic herbicides and wage high-
tech war on the drug barons - and secondarily on the 
guerrillas, now the supposed No. 1 threat to the Americas 
(having supplanted Cuba).

 U.S. and Colombian authorities say the way to make 
peace is to put the drug sellers out of business, thereby 
depriving the guerrillas of essential financial support. 
(They claim, citing poll results, that the rebels have scant 
popular support.) Tapias says he could put the guerrillas 
out of business in three years or less with the right kind 
of U.S. support against the drug traffickers.

 "If we cannot eradicate the narco-traffickers, no peace 
process can succeed," Tapias said. "The amount of money 
these people (the guerrillas) receive is beyond imagination, 
more than the security forces' budget. Cutting off that 
source of income is the only way to motivate the guerrillas 
to seek peace."

 He noted that the drug merchants, "a source of jobs in 
a country without enough jobs," don't care about public 
opinion, because they can survive without public support: 
"Thanks to the narco-traffickers, they are totally 
independent," he said.

 The guerrillas say the only way to make peace is to 
redistribute the nation's wealth and return much of the land 
to the peasants.

 The one thing that seems clear about the conflict is 
that neither side is likely to achieve a military victory 
anytime soon. Meanwhile, each side presents itself as the 
vanguard of peace.

 In a meeting in the jungle south of Bogota, a FARC 
officer told the NCC group: "FARC has been searching for 
peace from our birth. But peace is not possible unless it 
comes along with social justice. Peace is not possible until 
we solve the problems that gave rise to the conflict."

 The NCC delegation had talks with Commandante Raul 
Reyes, one of seven members of FARC's ruling secretariat; 
"Olga," a veteran guerrilla officer who also is the daughter 
of the guerrillas' military commander, Manuel Marulanda 
Velez, also known as "Tirofijo" ("sure shot"); and a rebel 
officer named "Fernando."

 Reyes, asked about the killings of three U.S. 
indigenous-rights activists in northeastern Colombia last 
March, said FARC takes responsibility for what he called "a 
very big mistake, a barbaric act." He offered a public 
apology and said an internal investigation of the case is 
nearly finished. All that remains, he said, is for FARC to 
decide how the three soldiers responsible will be punished.

 Asked about the threat of U.S. military intervention in 
Colombia, "Fernando" replied: "For more than a century, the 
United States has already been intervening in our country. 
Remember - Panama was part of Colombia."

 The rebels said they "are not interested in persecuting 
any church or religious group," and contended that they have 
acted against religious people "only in cases of 
collaborators (with the enemy), cases in which our people 
have been killed because someone has opposed us under cover 
of the church. ... where someone has used (religious) 
institutions to destroy what we are building."  The rebels 
said they hoped to create communication channels with 
NCC/CWS to deal with difficult cases and avoid mistakes.

 "Fernando" asked the NCC group to go home and refute 
"the big disinformation about the peace process and who we 
are - tell people in the States that they are not the 
enemy."

 In June, a Colombian newspaper, citing U.S. State 
Department sources, reported on a purported U.S. plan to 
block the spread of Colombian guerrilla activity to 
neighboring countries by (1) supplying aircraft and 
intelligence to border forces in Brazil, Ecuador, Panama, 
Peru and Venezuela, to help them keep the Colombian rebel 
forces under control; and (2) pinning a "narco-guerrilla" 
label on FARC and ELN, implying that they are involved in 
narcotics processing and peddling.

 The State Department has said consistently that the 
United States will not be drawn into Colombia's battle 
against the guerrillas, but will continue to be involved in 
the war on drugs. Many Latin Americans suspect that U.S. 
officials are tarring the guerillas with the drug-dealer 
brush to justify a deepening of its commitment to counter-
insurgency operations.

 In August, in testimony before a Congressional 
committee, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Chief 
Donnie Marshall said his agency doesn't regard the Colombian 
guerrillas as drug traffickers. He conceded that FARC and 
ELN are "associated with" drug sellers, "providing 
protection or extorting money from them;" but said the DEA 
has never "come close to the conclusion" that they can 
reasonably be called "drug-trafficking organizations."

 Pastrana has called the charge that the guerrillas are 
drug traffickers "ridiculous."

 Part of the delegation traveled to see the Commander 
"Pablo," who is number three in the command of the ELN and 
responsible for international relations.

 By January, 2000, Pastana will give "neutrality" 
protection to an area under ELN control so the ELN can hold 
its National Convention for Peace.  ELN leaders said they 
believe in a participatory process involving all sectors to 
achieve peace.

 ELN leaders also expressed interest in continuing 
conversation and cooperating on the issue of religious 
freedom in zones under their control.  They would like U.S. 
agencies to support programs to eradicate small farmers 
planting marijuana and to create alternative crops and 
markets.  They have requested that NCC/CWS act as an 
"observer" in the area under their control and that NCC/CWS 
staff be observers in peace talks with the government.

 Also in June, during a meeting of the Organization of 
American States (OAS), U.S. representatives proposed the 
creation of a multinational force - "a group of friendly 
countries" with political and economic ties - to safeguard 
the security of the Western Hemisphere by intervening in 
internal conflicts that threaten democracy in Latin America. 

 Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru and 
Venezuela all vehemently rejected the proposal. Then U.S. 
representative Victor Marrero told reporters: "We never 
hoped that the proposal would be approved at this session; 
we just wanted to put the matter on the table for 
discussion. But this topic is not dead."

 Gen. Tapias and Colombian Minister of Defense Luis 
Ramirez traveled to Washington in July and asked for $500 
million in counter-narcotics and counter-insurgency aid. The 
next day, McCaffrey proposed a $1 billion U.S. contribution 
to "emergency drug supplemental assistance" for fighting the 
anti-drug war in South America, including $570 million for 
Colombia.

 In September, Pastrana visited New York and Washington 
to promote "Plan Colombia," a multi-billion proposal to curb 
narco-trafficking, end the civil conflict and revive the 
economy. The plan includes police and military aid. Pastrana 
said he would seek substantial contributions from "donor 
countries," principally the United States. 

 Colombia is now the third-largest recipient of U.S. 
military aid.

 Earlier this month, Colombia showed off its new Rapid 
Deployment Force (RDF), the first fruit of its plan to 
upgrade its military. It also has created a new anti-
narcotics battalion and a brigade to patrol the nation's 
rivers. The RDF includes troops from three mobile counter-
insurgency brigades, a Special Forces group trained by the 
United States, and an artillery unit. It is supported by 
aircraft, including 15 U.S.-made Blackhawk helicopters.

 The war continues. When someone is reported killed or 
"disappeared," which happens nearly every day, a number of 
"the usual suspects" are almost equally plausible: the army, 
the guerrillas, the paramilitaries, the "narco-traffickers," 
U.S. agents or advisors, political terrorists, common 
bandits - all groups that say they want peace in Colombia.

-end-

John Filiatreau, reporter with the Presbyterian News Service 
in Louisville, Ky., accompanied the NCC delegation on 
assignment by the NCC.
 -0-