Colombian Forces Retaking Rebel Haven

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, February 22, 2002

Colombian Forces Retaking Rebel Haven

Colombian government forces, bombarding strategic targets, began retaking a rebel enclave Thursday, after President Andre Pastrana broke off peace talks with leftist guerrillas.

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Colombian government forces, bombarding strategic targets, began retaking a rebel enclave Thursday, after President Andres Pastrana broke off peace talks with leftist guerrillas.

The bombing of airstrips and rebel camps within the enclave, twice the size of New Jersey, began just hours after Pastrana announced Wednesday night that a peace process aimed at ending the 38-year-old civil war was formally over.

The zone was granted to the 17,000-strong Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, in 1998 as a stage for peace talks. The large-scale attack against it involves the U.S.-backed army, air force and marines initially focused on 85 strategic points, according to the armed forces central command. The government had 13,000 troops ready.

The rupture of more than three years of peace talks followed a hijacking of a commercial airplane Wednesday. Four rebels forced the pilot to land on a highway and kidnapped a senator who was on the flight.

In his address to the nation announcing the end of negotiations, Pastrana said Colombians should expect more violence. "We must be prepared because it is possible that they will increase their terrorist acts," he said. The conflict has claimed 3,500 lives each year.

Many in Bogota, who had grown frustrated with the lack of progress in negotiations and the ever-increasing violence, rejoiced, honking their horns in approval. The three main candidates running in the presidential election in May said they supported the president's move. Critics of negotiations had said the FARC ran the enclave as a private fiefdom: a holding pen for kidnap victims, a drug trafficking center and as a launch pad for rebel attacks on rural towns.

The United States has been providing training, equipment and intelligence support for Colombia's war against drug trafficking, but recently it indicated a shift in policy to provide funding for counterterrorism. The State Department includes the FARC on its list of terrorist groups.

Last month, Pastrana had threatened to break off talks, but the rebels agreed to an April 7 deadline for a cease-fire. Then, the FARC stepped up attacks. The hijacking Wednesday was "the last straw," Pastrana said.

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