Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia

The Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia – Ejército del Pueblo ("Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People's Army", or FARC-EP), classified internationally as a terrorist group, is Colombia's oldest, largest, most capable and equipped militant guerrilla group, established in 1964-1966 as the military wing of the Colombian Communist Party. FARC has been estimated to have roughly 12,000 to 18,000 members and maintains presence in approximately 35 to 40% of Colombia's territory, mostly in the jungles of the southeast and the plains at the base of the Andes mountains.

Activities

See also : Military History of the FARC-EP

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FARC has financed itself through kidnapping ransoms, extortion, and protection of the drug trade. Many of their fronts have also overrun small communities in order to distribute propaganda and, more importantly, to pillage local banks. Businesses operating in rural areas, including agricultural, oil, and mining interests, were required to pay "vaccines" (monthly payments) which ?protected? them from subsequent attacks and kidnappings. An additional, albeit less lucrative, source of revenue was highway blockades where guerrillas stopped motorists and buses in order to confiscate jewelry and money, which were especially prevalent during the presidencies of Ernesto Samper Pizano (1994-1998) and that of Andrés Pastrana (1998-2002).

Related Topics:
Ernesto Samper Pizano - Andrés Pastrana

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Over time, fewer recruits joined the organization for ideological reasons, but rather as a means to escape poverty and unemployment. ?FARC's narcotics-related income for 1995 reportedly totaled $647 million.? Although the FARC rarely provides a regular cash pay to the majority of its members, per capita income for Colombian guerrilla fighters has at times been calculated to reach at least 40 times the national average.

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By 1998, some studies showed that FARC's ranks could have swelled to approximately some 15,000 guerrilla fighters, up from an estimated 7,500 in 1992, and effectively were in a position to control and freely operate through large rural areas of the country (the high-end estimates being about 40%-50%, according to some analysts). One observer controversially noted that, on average, they would appear to be ?better armed, equipped, and trained than the Colombian armed forces.? Other observers would dispute the current applicability of this assessment in the face of increased U.S. aid and training to the Colombia state and its military.

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The FARC-EP has employed vehicle bombings, gas cylinder bombs, killings, landmines, kidnapping, extortion, hijacking, as well as guerrilla and conventional military action against Colombian political, military, and economic targets, to attack those it considers a threat to its movement. It has not been uncommon for civilians to die or suffer forced displacement, directly or indirectly, due to many of these actions. The FARC-EP's April 16 and April 18 2005 gas cylinder attacks on the town of Toribió, Cauca led to the displacement of more than two thousand indigenous inhabitants and the destruction of two dozen civilian houses. A February 2005 report from the United Nation's High Commissioner for Human Rights mentioned that, during 2004, "FARC-EP continued to commit grave breaches such as murders of protected persons, torture and hostage-taking, which affected many civilians, including women, returnees, boys and girls, and ethnic groups."http://www.hchr.org.co/documentoseinformes/informes/altocomisionado/informes.php3?cod=8&cat=11

Related Topics:
Vehicle bomb - Landmines - Kidnapping - Extortion - Guerrilla - April 16 - April 18 - 2005 - Toribió - Cauca - February - United Nation - High Commissioner for Human Rights - 2004

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The FARC's tactic of employing improvised missiles made from gas canisters (or cylinders) as explosives, a weapon it often uses when launching attacks at towns and sites in them that they consider as military objectives (such as police stations), has a high degree of inaccuracy. Resulting targetting difficulties have caused these weapons to often level civilian houses and/or harm civilians, such as was respectively the case in Toribío on April 24 2005, and the earlier 2002 attack on a church in Bojayá which killed 119 civilians.

Related Topics:
Toribío - April 24 - 2005 - 2002 - Bojayá

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Human Rights Watch considers that "the FARC-EP's continued use of gas cylinder bombs shows this armed group?s flagrant disregard for lives of civilians...gas cylinder bombs are impossible to aim with accuracy and, as a result, frequently strike civilian objects and cause avoidable civilian casualties."http://hrw.org/english/docs/2005/04/15/colomb10496.htm

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In March 1999, the FARC-EP killed three U.S. citizens, who were Native American rights activists, in Venezuelan territory after kidnapping them in Colombia. After initial denials and claims that these individuals would be CIA agents, the FARC-EP subsequently admitted that this action was a mistake, and claimed that it would internally punish those responsible. International NGOs and observers have argued that the FARC would have yet to apply any serious punishment to those involved in the incident.

Related Topics:
March 1999 - Native American - Venezuela - CIA

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The FARC-EP is responsible for most of the ransom kidnappings in Colombia. The group's kidnapping targets are usually those that it considers wealthy landowners and businessmen, as well as foreign tourists and entrepreneurs, and prominent international and domestic officials. Colombian and international NGOs have documented that in recent years the FARC has also resorted to kidnapping people from lower income sectors (that is, from the Colombian middle class downward), in particular when they are thought to be collaborators or relatives of the FARC's enemies. It is argued that many of these kidnappings have taken place with little to no regard for the target's age, gender or health conditions.

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The FARC is believed to have ties to narcotics traffickers, principally through the provision of armed protection, including a form of "taxation" over drugs crops and their profits. During the mid- to late-1990s, several drugwar analysts have stated that the FARC would have become increasingly involved in the drug trade, controlling farming, production and exportation of cocaine in those areas of the country under their influence. This claim is also supported by U.S. and Colombian authorities.

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Brazilian druglord Fernandinho Beira-Mar was captured in Colombia on April 20, 2001 while in the company of FARC-EP guerrillas. Colombian and Brazilian authorities have claimed that this constitutes proof of further cooperation between the FARC-EP and the druglord based on the exchange of weapons for cocaine, though Fernandinho himself and the FARC-EP have denied this. FARC itself has claimed that in their areas of influence the growth of coca plants (while this has been an enduring tradition, in one form or another, in the Colombian countryside by some of the indigenous communities for centuries, it had never reached its contemporary levels of plantation) by farmers would be taxed on the same basis as any other crop, even though there would be higher cash profits stemming from coca production and exportation.

Related Topics:
Fernandinho Beira-Mar - April 20 - 2001

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During the first quarter of 2005, joint intelligence and police operations by law enforcement authorities from Honduras and Colombia resulted in the seizure of a number of AK-47 and M-16 assault rifles, M-60 machineguns, rocket launchers and ammunition cartridges that were stated to be part of illegal weapons shipments from criminal gangs and black market dealers in Central America to the FARC in exchange for drugs, allegedly for two thousand kilos of cocaine. Ethalson Mejia Hoy, a Colombian who was illegally released from Honduran custody in July 2004 24 hours after his arrest, was named as one of the key figures in such an arms-for-drugs traffic. It was reported that "Police intelligence were monitoring communications between two 14th Front guerrillas when they heard 'the package' being discussed. In actuality the package consisted of sufficient weapons to arm a minimum of 180 combatants." Arms dealers in the region were also accused of providing similar weapons to rightwing paramilitaries in Colombia. http://aol.countrywatch.com/aol_wire.asp?vCOUNTRY=75&UID=1488302http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N15364065.htmhttp://www.elheraldo.hn/series.php?nid=93&idse=19&fecha=2005-04-14http://www-ni.laprensa.com.ni/archivo/2005/abril/17/nacionales/nacionales-20050417-12.html

Related Topics:
2005 - Honduras - Colombia - AK-47 - M-16 - M-60 - Black market - Central America - Ethalson Mejia Hoy - 2004

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