Word: farces
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...jungle as part of a U.S. aid project called Plan Colombia. Begun in 2000, the plan has cost more than $5 billion, making Colombia the fourth largest recipient of U.S. aid, after Iraq, Israel and Egypt. The plan is designed to combat both cocaine production and groups like the FARC that profit from the trade. Although Colombia has failed to stem cocaine production, the cash has at the very least helped rebuild Colombia's military, which in turn has knocked the FARC back on its heels. The rebels have seen their ranks of almost 20,000 fighters halved...
...that climate, there has been guarded hope that the FARC wants to discuss the release of the Americans and its more than 700 Colombian military, police and civilian hostages. U.S. Representative Jim McGovern of Massachusetts, who is involved with the campaign to free the Americans, says, "The FARC seems engaged on this issue for the first time ever." Since the start of the year, the group has handed six hostages - including a Colombian congresswoman and a former vice-presidential candidate - over to Chavez. But Colombia now accuses Chavez of supporting the FARC financially. (He denies...
Amidst those muddled Andean politics, some suggest a better hope for the Americans may be sitting inside U.S. jails. In 2004 and 2005, Colombia extradited to the U.S. two FARC leaders, Ricardo Palmera, a.k.a. Simon Trinidad, and Omaira Rojas, a.k.a. Sonia. Sonia was convicted last year on drug charges and given 17 years in prison; Trinidad, convicted for conspiracy in the Americans' capture, was sentenced to 60 years in January. The FARC has made the pair's release a condition for the U.S. hostages' freedom. The U.S. has designated the FARC a terrorist group and can't negotiate with...
...sources stress they have as yet heard nothing concrete from the FARC. Meanwhile, the American hostages follow a dismal routine, say Pinchao and other recently released hostages. They are forced into days-long marches to new camps when the FARC fears the military is close. Their rice-and-bean meals are varied only when they're near a river or an area where wild pigs roam, and they often fight illnesses like hepatitis with only poorly trained nurses to treat them. (The FARC refuses visits by Red Cross medical teams.) Pinchao, 37, says Stansell taught him how to swim during...
...Americans' captivity is part of the broader haggling between the Colombian government and the FARC over how to revive peace talks in a four-decade-old civil war that has left some 40,000 dead and millions more displaced. Racked by social inequities, Colombia has endured internecine violence for much of the past 100 years. "The FARC are like fish born in a tank that remains their entire world," says Colombia's Foreign Minister Fernando Araujo, who was a hostage for six years before escaping in 2006. "They're convinced they have the right to violently terrorize others...