Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC)
Historical background:
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia was co-founded by Manuel Marulanda and Jacobe Arenas and has been operating in Colombia since 1964 as the largest communist insurgent group and organization with current membership of 8,000 men and women. (Economist)
FARC basically fulfills its financial needs through its insurgent activities such as murdering, bombing, extortion, kidnapping, hijacking and drug trafficking, cultivation and distribution. The primary objective of this insurgent group is to have control over the Colombian territory in order to decrease the influence of the U.S in the region as well as to bring major land reforms so as to help poor communities with the distribution of equal wealth as the rest of population based on the communism of Marxist ideology.
This group was formed as a result of an “intense class turmoil” in the country where there was a conflict in the rural areas on wealth and land distribution. FARC was designed to stand against the two powerful political forces; the Conservatives and the Liberals who joined each other to take power over Colombian government and they were interested in supporting the landowners to invest and use peasant lands.
“After the death of FRAC’s 1st leader Maneul Marulanda due to a heart attack in March, 26 2008 Alfonso Cano, took lead until he was killed in a military attack on November 2011”. “The FARC have yet to name a new leader”. The group continues to fight against the government although they confess that “We may not be the best alternative, but we are better than the government!” (ISVG.org). The group have been successful in making links to Cuban drug cartels, Brazilian organized crime ...
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...houghts and ideologies. They believe in extensive use of force to bring change their societies. They have the political aims seeing their society and the government as illegitimate due to several reasons and differences are with their reasons and having political vs religious ideologies. FARC was influenced by different radical political ideologies but the other three groups we fighting religious identities in to reform the reliogous teachings in their communities.
Bibliography:
http://terrorism.about.com/od/groupsleader1/p/FARC.htm
http://www.tni.org/briefing/revolutionary-armed-forces-colombia-farc-and-illicit-drug-trade
http://www.cfr.org/colombia/farc-eln-colombias-left-wing-guerrillas/p9272
http://www.start.umd.edu/tops/terrorist_organization_profile.asp?id=96
(Economist
(ISVG.org).
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-1140095
ICG.ORG
The Civil War in El Salvador lasted from 1980 to 1992, and the El SAlvadoran government was doing their best to minimize the threat of their opposition. Their main opposition, The Frente Farabundo Marti Para La Liberacion Nacional; otherwise known as the FMLN, was a guerrilla group that was organized to fight the corruption in the country. 175). One of the main goals of the organization was to create a new society that is not degrading its citizens and promotes equality. Throughout El Salvador’s history, one organization to the next would run the country through repressive actions and social injustice. One of the main reasons that the FMLN fought the acting government were due to these social restraints on the lower- class citizens in El Salvador.
For the 71 years that the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) was in power, Mexico saw great political, social and economic upheaval. This can be seen in the evolution of the PRI party, whose reign over Mexican society came at the expense of true democracy. “A party designed for power, the PRI's mechanisms for success involved a combination of repressive measures. The party professed no specific ideology, enabling it to adapt to changing social, economic and political forces over time. It attached itself virtually all aspects of civil society, and in this way, it become the political extension and tool of the government.” In 2000, however, the PRI’s loss of its monopoly on political power and institutional corruption gave rise to inter-cartel violence that was created in the political void left after the PAN won the national presidential election. These conditions gave rise to the Zetas: a new type of cartel that changed the operational structure of previous drug cartels. The Zetas operate in a new militant structure associated with a higher brand of violence, which has led it to branch out beyond a traditional drug smuggling enterprise common under the PRI government. Simply put, the electoral defeat of the PRI in 2000 was supposed to usher in a more democratic era in Mexican politics. Instead, the PRI party’s defeat created a state of chaos that gave rise to inter-cartel violence and the birth of the Zetas cartel.
In 1930 a man named Rafael Leónidas Trujillo was elected, he was known for his dictatorship. During his Campaign he had it arranged with a secret police force called SIM “Servicio de Inteligencia Militar” (Military Intelligence Service) so that his opponent would get killed. In 1950, Trujillo tried to find reasons to put the three sisters “in their place”. Trujillo felt threatened by the sisters, not only did they oppose him secretly but publicly as well.
Kampwirth, Karen. Women and Guerrilla Movements in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Chipas and Cuba. The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2002. University Park, PA.
There was piece in the streets, no more bombs, less violence, kidnapping, etc… I want people outside of Colombia to know about what truly Colombia is about. We always take into the fact that when people associate Colombia they associate it with the negative actions of Pablo Escobar and how he smuggled Cocaine into the United States. When people associate Colombia, they do it with Pablo Escobar, when the actual reality is that Pablo Escobar was at war with
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202). In contrast, the presence of the Colombian government has not had a remarkable impact on social policies because it is less intrusive. Hence, limited resources compel practitioners to work in a precarious
.... The death of Gaitán and the Bogotazo on April 9, 1948, would later be used by historians to mark a new era of violence in Colombia called La Violencia. In the years following the Bogotazo, from 1948-1958, another 200,000 Colombians would die. More than 1000 people would die every month during the peak of the La Violencia. Many of the reasons and injustices that divided Gran Colombia in 1831 continue to cause violence in Colombia today. Daily one can read in Colombia’s newspapers report of incidents of violence in many different regions of the Colombia. Fighting between guerilla and government soldiers still take people’s lives and rob them of their hopes for a better future. Our United States State Departments still sends out travelers warnings of more potential violence in Colombia. No significant breakthroughs toward lasting peace seem likely in the near future.
Narcoterrorism has a long past in the history of Colombia, focusing mainly on the market development of one drug: cocaine. Colombia, with its arid tropical climate and lush land, is an ideal place for the sowing and reaping of the coca plant whose extracts are synthesized into the powder cocaine drug. As Colombian cocaine production skyrocketed in the 1970’s and 1980’s thanks to booming demand for the product in Americas, drug kingpins in Colombia began to wield immense power in the country. ...
Political violence is action taken to achieve political goals that may include armed revolution, civil strife, terrorism, war or other such activities that could result in injury, loss of property or loss of life. Political violence often occurs as a result of groups or individuals believing that the current political systems or anti-democratic leadership, often being dictatorial in nature, will not respond to their political ambitions or demands, nor accept their political objectives or recognize their grievances. Formally organized groups, Non-Government Organizations (NGOs), businesses and collectives of individual citizens are non-state actors, that being that they are not locally, nationally or internationally recognized legitimate civilian or military authorities. The Cotonou Agreement of 2000 defines non-state actors as being those parties belonging to the private sector, economic and social partners and civil society in all its forms according to national characteristics. Historical observation shows that nation states with political institutions that are not capable of, or that are resistant to recognizing and addressing societies issues and grievances are more likely to see political violence manifest as a result of disparity amongst the population. This essay will examine why non-state political violence occurs including root and trigger causes by looking at the motivations that inspire groups and individuals to resort to non-conforming behaviors that manifest as occurrences of non-state political violence. Using terrorism and Islamic militancy on the one side, and human rights and basic freedoms on the other as examples, it will look at these two primary kinds of political violence that are most prevalent in the world ...
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