Colombia's security forces on Monday struggled to contain a surge in left-wing guerrilla violence that has now killed more than 100 people in five days and threatens to derail the country's troubled peace process.
As thousands of soldiers deployed to quell violence near the northeastern border with Venezuela — where more than 80 have been killed and 11,000 displaced by days of fighting — the defence ministry reported a similar outbreak of fighting in a remote Amazon region.
A ministry official told AFP that 20 people had been killed in fighting between rival left-wing guerrillas in the jungle-clad department of Guaviare.
The Amazon clashes involved rival FARC splinter groups — leftwing guerrillas who, unlike the rump Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, have not signed peace accords.
The military had already moved to deploy 5,000 troops to try to contain some of the worst violence Colombia has seen in years.
Leftwing National Liberation Army (ELN) militants launched an assault near the border last Thursday, attacking ex-members of the now-defunct FARC guerrilla force who kept fighting after it disarmed in 2017.
Terrified residents carrying backpacks and belongings on overladen motorcycles, boats, or crammed onto the backs of open trucks, fled the region over the weekend.
Hundreds found refuge in the town of Tibu, where several shelters were set up, while others crossed the border to Venezuela — for some a return to a country from where they had fled economic and political upheaval.
"As a Colombian, it is painful for me to leave my country," Geovanny Valero, a 45-year-old farmer who fled to Venezuela, told AFP, saying he hopes the situation will be "sorted out" so he can return.
The Ombudsman's Office cited reports of ELN rebels going from "house to house," killing people suspected of ties to the FARC dissidents.
Deepening Crisis
The clashes are a fresh challenge for Colombia's leftist president Gustavo Petro who has staked his political fortunes on a policy of "total peace."
In the face of some public opposition, Petro launched negotiations with the various hardline armed groups that still control parts of Colombia after being elected in 2022.
Critics allege that his conciliatory approach has emboldened groups who are often funded by the proceeds of cocaine and other trafficking, and allowed them space to grow in power and influence.
A 2016 peace deal with FARC was hailed as a turning point in the six-decade-long conflict between Colombian security forces, guerrillas, right-wing paramilitaries and drug gangs, which has left nearly half a million people dead.
But dissident factions continue to control territory in several parts of Colombia, the world's biggest cocaine producer.
— Times/AFP
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