Colombian peace
President-elect Trump should maintain ties with our South America partners.
Colombia’s Congress approved a landmark treaty with the leftist FARC rebels last week that has the South American nation on the precipice of peace, or at least partially so, for the first time in half a century.
The 310-page agreement, hammered out in four years of negotiations in Cuba and almost scuttled by a surprise rejection in an October plebiscite, lays out a well-defined path to the conflict’s end that is the result of difficult compromises by both sides and it deserves support.
The FARC, which began as a communist agrarian reform movement in 1964, has agreed to disarm in exchange for a broad amnesty, inclusion in the country’s political life and the government’s commitment to address the long-standing social and economic problems afflicting rural Colombia.
President Juan Manuel Santos, who initiated the peace process in 2012 and won a Nobel Peace Prize for it in October, has had to overcome opposition that considers the terms too lenient and rebel participation in government unacceptable.
More than 220,000 people, most of them noncombatants, died in the war and another 7 million were displaced by the violence, so opposition is personal for many in the nation of 49 million. The rebels also won few friends when they turned to cocaine production, kidnapping and extortion to fund their long fight.
That animosity was reflected in the narrow loss of the plebiscite, which many considered unrepresentative because only about a third of the country’s voters cast a ballot. Santos, betting that most Colombians wanted peace more than retribution, launched a quick renegotiation of the pact that made cosmetic changes but left the major provisions intact.
Then, since a plebiscite was never officially required, he sent the deal straight to Congress where his ruling National Unity coalition approved it.
Santos is now in a race against time because he has only 18 months left in office and wants the peace process far enough along to be considered irreversible by term’s end.
The first order of business is for Congress to pass an amnesty for most of the fighters, after which the FARC is to begin a six-month-long process of laying down its arms. We would urge both Congress and the rebels to move as quickly as possible, not only to end the war but also to proceed with the rural development program that is key to avoiding future problems.
Inequality and poverty in the countryside were the seeds of the FARC 52 years ago, and they still exist today, as do the accompanying problems.
Another, smaller leftist rebel group, the ELN, began about the same time as the FARC and though the government is pursuing peace talks, no cease-fire has been agreed to.
Also, Colombia has seen an increase in cocaine production and the criminal groups behind it in recent years.
The U.S. provided billions of dollars in aid that helped weaken the FARC and bring about negotiations, and President Barack Obama has pledged another $450 million for the peace accord’s implementation.
While President-elect Donald Trump has said he will unwind many Obama projects, we would urge him to continue this successful partnership.
In the meantime, we applaud Santos’ efforts and urge him to vigorously continue the pursuit of peace on all fronts.
His Nobel Peace Prize was well deserved, because he has shown the world that with sufficient political will and a spirit of compromise, even the most entrenched conflicts can be ended peacefully.