Colombia Farc: The former rebels who need bodyguards to stay safe

  • 2020-11-03 18:05:05
After fighting with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc) for more than two decades, Luz Marina Giraldo started a career in local politics and ran for a seat on the town council in Mesetas, a rural district in Colombia's eastern plains. But her campaign ended abruptly last year when hooded men burst into her home and killed her partner, Alexander Parra, also a former Farc guerrilla fighter, shooting him five times in the back. Ms Giraldo fled with her children to a nearby city and has not returned to Mesetas. She is one of hundreds of former guerrilla fighters dressed in white T-shirts who marched into Colombia's capital, Bogotá, on Sunday to seek a meeting with President Iván Duque. The protesters, who have been holding demonstrations in front of the presidential palace, say the government is not keeping up with commitments made in a 2016 peace deal that led to the disarmament of 13,000 fighters and transformed Latin America's oldest guerrilla group into a political party. The new party retained the initials Farc but they now stand for Common Alternative Revolutionary Force.  

Related