FARC rejected by many of its members

Houston Chronicle:

Once a guerrilla, always a guerrilla.

At least that's the credo of Colombia's largest rebel group, which insists that its foot soldiers remain loyal to the cause even from behind bars.

But in a startling development, more than 700 imprisoned rebels have renounced the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, and are calling on the guerrilla army to make peace.

"We are telling the FARC that they no longer have a claim on us," Raul Agudelo, a high-ranking rebel commander, said in a prison courtyard surrounded by gray concrete walls — his home for most of the last five years.

"We don't want to ever again pick up a rifle and point it at a fellow Colombian."

Like Agudelo, many of the imprisoned guerrillas are experts in military strategy, explosives and kidnappings.

The FARC has been trying for years to fold these veterans back into its ranks by urging the Bogota government to trade them for rebel-held hostages.

But the dissidents have no interest in going back to the jungle to rejoin their old units, even if it would mean getting out of prison.

Instead, they have publicly called for their former brothers-in-arms to surrender.

And in exchange for reduced prison terms, many say they are willing to cooperate with the Colombian military, revealing intelligence on clandestine graves, arms caches and the locations of rebel hostages.

"These are people with 10, 15, or 20 years in the FARC who had a lot of responsibility," Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos said in an interview. "Because of that, the information that they can give us is much more valuable."

Santos and others contend that the collaboration of FARC dissidents could further weaken the rebel group, which once fielded 17,000 fighters but now deploys about 8,000.

In the past year alone, about 2,500 guerrillas have turned in their weapons, Santos said.

...

There is much more.

FARC's reach inside the prison is losing its grip. As these guys turn on their former comrades they can also disclose information about where to find them and how they operate. I suspect that some of the success this year resulted from information they provided. One of those who turned had both a father and grandfather in FARC. He was definitely a red diaper baby who make a decision that FARC had alienated the people and had no chance.

President Uribe deserves much of the credit for turning things around in Colombia and so does President Bush who supported those efforts with funding and training as well as trade.

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