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August
2001
Page
1 of 3
 It
is the most violent town in Colombia, or the world for
that matter. Everything might look calm in the city
center of Barrancabermeja, but on the outskirts of town,
a dirty war is raging between paramilitaries and guerrillas
of the leftist ELN, Ejército de la Liberación
Nacional (National Liberation Army). The victims, as
usual in the Colombian war, are mostly civilians. In
2000, 700 people died a violent death in this city with
a population of 250,000. And, from the looks of it,
2001 will not be much different.
Another murder
On Friday evening, March 23, two cars stopped at the
house of union organizer Rafael Attencia. Eight armed
men forced their way into his house and took Attencia
away at gunpoint. Attencia and his eight assailants
vanished into the night. The next day, his bullet-ridden
body was found in a ditch near a deserted railroad track.
Attencia was the 176th victim this year. Most likely,
by the end of 2001, there will be hundreds more.
Since 1998, a brutal war has been raging over the control
of Barrancabermeja. Located along the important Magdalena
River, which offers a water route to the Caribbean Sea,
this industrial city refines 80 percent of the nation’s
oil and stands at the heart of the fertile cattle ranching
lands and rich coca producing areas of northern Colombia.
Barrancabermeja was traditionally a stronghold of the
ELN. Politics turn a different turn in the region in
May 1998, when paramilitary troops began their offensive
by killing 25 suspected guerrilla sympathizers in a
village nearby and announcing their intention to "sweep
the city of subversives."
Paramilitary forces have slowly taken control of one
neighborhood after another. ELN members are laying low
or have retreated to the countryside. Paramilitary violence
has focused lately on human rights groups, popular organizations,
and labor unions. Since the government revealed plans
to grant the ELN a neutral and demilitarized zone west
of Barrancabermeja, the violence has only increased.
Big landowners and cattle ranchers—the staunchest
supporters of the paramilitaries—have strongly
opposed any plans for creating a neutral zone.
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