Colombia's FARC female fighter
Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation - Fri, 9 May 2014 14:00 PM
Author: Anastasia Moloney More
news from our correspondents.
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Colombia’s largest guerrilla group,
the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), is one of the world’s
longest-running guerrilla insurgencies and turns 50 on May 27.
This photo essay is part of a
series of first-person accounts and articles looking at the FARC’s half-century
war against the Colombian state and views on the ongoing peace process between
the rebels and government in Cuba.
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Women and girls have played an
important role in the FARC since the insurgency was founded in 1964. There are
about 7,000 rebel fighters, and women and girls are thought to make up about 30
percent of FARC ranks, the government estimates.
Photo: REUTERS/Eliana Aponte
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Standing guard is a common duty
carried out by rank-and-file fighters. Female rebels are often used to gather
intelligence, report on the movements of government troops and serve as
informants in urban areas. They also prepare and serve meals, dig trenches and
latrines, and lug firewood in jungle camps.
Photo: REUTERS
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In rebel ranks, women and girls
are expected to carry out the same duties as their male counterparts. They
fight alongside men in combat against government troops, are taught to fire
pistols and AK-47 assault rifles, and are trained to assemble and plant
homemade landmines.
They also serve as nurses,
perform first aid and are taught to handle radio communications for commanders
hiding in jungle lairs across Colombia
to speak to each other in secret code and plan military operations.
Female rebels are also used to
recruit child soldiers, rights groups say.
Photo: REUTERS/Jose Gomez
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Inspired by Marxist ideology and
leading figures in the Cuban Revolution like legendary guerrilla leader Ernesto
Che Guevara (in the poster above), the FARC started out as an agrarian movement
to defend poor and landless peasants.
The group later turned to cocaine
trafficking, kidnapping and extortion to fill its war coffers. It is considered
a terrorist organisation by the United
States and the European Union.
Photo: REUTERS
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Like male fighters, women and
girls endure weeks-long marches hoisting heavy loads through mountainous
terrain.
Photo: REUTERS
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One of the FARC’s most renowned
female commanders was Nelly Avila Moreno (left in above photo), known as
Karina. During the 1990s, she was in charge of hundreds of rebel fighters in Colombia’s northwestern province of Antioquia.
Karina was a priority target for
government security forces for years and carried a $1 million bounty on her
head.
Half-starved and wounded, Karina
and her lover handed themselves in to Colombian security forces in May 2008,
after more than 20 years with the FARC.
The government accused her of
overseeing a string of murders, kidnappings and guerrilla attacks against civilians.
She lost sight in one eye during combat.
Photo: REUTERS/El
Colombiano-Henry Agudelo/Handout
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The vast majority of rebel
fighters are Colombian, but Dutchwoman Tanja Nijmeijer (right), seen dancing in
a FARC jungle camp in this government photo, is an exception to the rule.
In the 1990s, Nijmeijer left her
middle-class home in the Netherlands
and went to Colombia
to teach English. She ended up joining the FARC as a fighter in 2002, rising
through the ranks to become an assistant to a senior commander. Photographs of
Nijmeijer were found on a computer belonging to Mono Jojoy, a top FARC
commander who was killed in a bomb raid by state security forces.
Photo: REUTERS/Handout
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Today Nijmeijer (center) is one
of several women on the FARC team of negotiators at peace talks in Havana,
Cuba, where rebel commanders and the Colombian government hope to reach a deal
to end 50 years of war.
The peace process started in
October 2012, and both sides have so far reached two partial agreements on
rural reform and the FARC’s participation in politics as part of a five-point
agenda.
Photo: REUTERS/Enrique De La Osa
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