Is Colombia Finally Heading Toward a Peace Agreement?

The following series conveys the vastness of the Colombian conflict’s infinite sadness. A fifty year old war that polluted with violence and displacement, regardless of economic class, political affiliation or physical realm all Colombians alike. From the mountains that form a vertebrae in the territory to the abundant forests that ring the periphery of the country, no corner was left untouched by the internecine bloodshed that’s left nearly 250,000 dead, 5.7 million more displaced and a third of a country covered in improvised explosive devices.

These images take place in some of the conflict’s most emblematic theaters. In the riverlands of El Choco, one of the war’s last (and cruelest) battlefields, the slums of displaced people living near Bogota, over the mined mountains of Antioquia as the army performs counter-insurgency operations and in the midst of the FARC’s camps deep in a unmarked forest with no name.

Now, after a stutter step, a final peace agreement between the main belligerents, the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), has been reached. Pending its assured implementation, the agreement will bring the hostilities to an end as well as guerilla fighting force from out the jungles of Colombia into the process of being demobilized. This is not Colombia’s first attempt at such a process. Previous insurgencies have laid down their arms, though many were subsequently slaughtered by right-wing affiliated death squads. Colombia’s challenge, both for the government as well as Latin America’s oldest irregular army is to hold the line as the countless young men and women who answered the call to revolution attempt to live a life without their rifle at the ready.

For further understanding, read Mathilde Allain’s article, Is Colombia Finally Heading Toward a Peace Agreement?

During the negotiations—and the cease re in effect—the insurgency spent their time once dedicated to running military drills towards mentally preparing themselves for their transition into civilian life. Yoli, the pregnant guerilla at left, holds a contradictory view of the future: hopeful but cautious. © Tomas Ayuso.

A farmer—and former soldier—holds the penal code and the constitution he carries with him when he goes out into the field. He does so in case any group looks to infringe upon his rights as a farmer. He leads a group of farmers in northern Tolima state who are campaigning against a mega-mining project in Cajamarca slated to start one the peace treaty comes into effect. © Tomas Ayuso.

“My boy was killed because of his color,” says Ramulio Perlaza, the grief stricken father of Daniel (whose picture he wears on a t-shirt he wears every day). Daniel, 17, was gunned down a year ago in an act condemned as part of a “social cleansing” campaign targeting young black males in Cazuca, a crime-ridden suburb of Bogota. The days leading up to his shooting, terror spread through the barrio when menacing yers warning Afro-Colombian youths to stay home were slipped under doors and shared through social media. © Tomas Ayuso.

A private being ferried from one forward operating base to another as resources are being allocated during the re-accommodation period with the FARC and recalibration against the ELN.

Right-wing paramilitary groups, once thought vanished after a peace accord in 2007, have returned to Belen de Bajira. They ex their muscle ahead of the incoming peace deal with the FARC to make it clear for demobilizing guerrillas who runs the town. The graf ti—which is misspelled—reads Gaitanista Self-Defense Forces. © Tomas Ayuso.

A soldier ending his deployment and returning to Medellin after months on counter-insurgency duties looks out over one of the region’s IED-ridden areas.

Estefany joined aged 10 after the conflict swept through her village and left her orphaned. At 15 a galil round tore through her shoulder during combat. With noticeable tears in her eyes, Estefany tells how she tattooed herself a twin heart in memory of comrades who were lost in that encounter.

The army’s 7th division covers all of Antioquia with its varied terrain of swampland, mountains, plains and rivers. The enemy had been up until recently the FARC, but in the ceasefire, the small but eager ELN guerrillas advanced their campaign into the realms being abandoned by the FARC.

A fishing village on the banks of the Atrato River was taken under control by a reanimated paramilitary as a position against the FARC. It serves as a warning for the guerrillas once they begin demobilizing. The river was weaponized once the war came to the region; it was used for troop transport, gunship patrols and body disposal, contaminating riverside communities with violence.

Houses built precariously on packed dirt are built with security doors and barred windows. Violence has increased in the generation of adolescents born after their parents’ displacement. Cazucan youth, either displaced or born and bred, are not dying in the conflict zones their families fled, but in the gang wars of southern Bogota.

Farc guerrillas of the 62nd front raise a barn for one of their collaborator in the Savannah of the Yari in the former DMZ in Caqueta state.

Tomas Ayuso is Honduran photographer, born in Tegucigalpa. He is also a writer and documentary producer. Tomas also received a Masters Degree in Conflict and Development from the New School in 2012.

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