This early December 2002 in Bogota has seen the diffusing of 1500 kilos of explosives in the south of the city, and the capture of many decomissioned Police arms supposedly in current use by Esther the FARC (left wing guerilla) or the AUC (right wing paramilitary). 

Every mainstream news report here and indeed the people on the street, blame every bombing and attempted attack on the FARC.  

Me, I am not so sure that the AUC or its ilk is somehow associated.

This week the indigenous Wiwa people found some of their own murdered and blamed it on the AUC.

The central office of Amnesty International in London this week denounced the activities of the paramilitary or autodefence groups. They denounced the President for not using enough force to diminish paramilitary activity, in contrast to the excessive USA sponsored force against the guerilla.

President Uribe (former paramilitary) narrowly survived his 12^th assassination attempt yesterday in Medellin.

I imagine that the brutal tactics used over the past month by the military and police forces against the pueblo of Medellin in their attempts to flush out guerillas, has not been received well by the local people.  There are no small stirrings of discontent in that large city but full-blown protests and the entry of UN sponsored peace negotiators.

Meanwhile in neighbouring Venezuela, the country is severely divided and is at fever pitch following a week of a national strikes by right-wing alliances opposed to Hugo Chavez as President. Yesterday there were reports of large movements of FARC in Venezuelan territory, purportedly being trained by the section of Chavez army which is still loyal to him.

Meanwhile in Bogota, two universities are closed following protests wherein two students were killed by the police interventions.

The international Red Cross launched an appeal this week in Geneva for Colombia wherein this year there are 150,000 people who have been forced to flee their homes by an upsurge in fighting between government forces, left-wing rebels and right-wing paramilitary groups.

What is more worrying is that this week the IMF Chief met with President Uribe, and expressed his delight with the progress of Colombia towards economic stability.  We all know what that means, the loss of social services at the expense of business growth.

And the icing on the cake, was the recent visit of Secretary of State of the USA, Colon Powell, to Bogota to meet with Uribe.  Funny that it was only days before the final vote in the UN Security Council to bomb Iraq back to prehistory.  The ten temporary members of the Security Council included Colombia. The foreign secretaries and presidents of the nine other states were visited last week by high-ranking USA diplomats.  But Colon Powell himself came here. The deciding vote had to come from Colombia, and come it did.

The lights of Bogota city are turned on for Christmas, and what a sight.  Avenues of raining stars, parks full of brightly coloured trees, songs on every corner.  The Colombians are a cheerfully resilient people.