Ex-rebel fighters struggle to find jobs, rebuild lives

chika ebuzor

February 19, 2016 7:57 AM

Around 18,000 former child fighters, and adult rebels, have quit the FARC ranks since 2003 and joined the government's reintegration programme.

Columbia's FARC rebels

Deep in the Colombian jungle, child fighter Yeimi Diaz feared for her life as members of Latin America's oldest guerrilla group held a meeting to decide whether to order a firing squad to shoot her.

In the 14 years she fought for the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) rebels, Diaz faced two such councils.

"A war council is almost always a death sentence," she said, recalling the way the FARC punished fighters who broke its rules. "I got lucky. A guerrilla commander who knew my mother stepped in at the last minute and voted to save my life," she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

After years of skirmishes with government troops, long mountain treks and rationed food, Diaz escaped and turned herself in to the army in 2009, after finding a leaflet dropped by army helicopters urging rebels to surrender.

A further 8,000 FARC fighters may hand in their weapons over the coming months if peace talks in Cuba with the government result in agreement to end their 51-year war, which has killed 220,000 people and displaced 6.5 million.

As the March 23 deadline for a peace accord looms, negotiators are discussing how best to reintegrate ex-fighters, while Colombians consider how far they will accept former combatants back into society.

chika ebuzor